Religious Education

Religious Education Policy

Religious Education Curriculum Statement

Intent

At Alston Lane Catholic Primary School, Religious Education is the ‘core of the core’ curriculum and our primary intent in teaching is to learn and grow as children of God. We want our children to develop knowledge, understanding, reflection skills, analysis and faith through their learning and religious experiences. In our Catholic community, we intend for our children to gain a wide range of experiences to build their sense of belonging alongside their individual faith. We wish to support them to become religiously literate, knowledgeable of sacred scripture and aware of Catholic Social Teaching, acting upon this with integrity and humility.

We aim to enable the children to be active participants in RE through our curriculum as well as our whole school worships, Masses and celebrations. These all allow our children to feel they are an important part of our school community.

Implementation

As directed by the Bishop’s Conference, our Religious Education scheme is called 'To know you more clearly’. This curriculum is gradually being rolled out across the primary and secondary sector but we have chosen to begin this now, well in advance of the 2026 statutory deadline for implementation. This new scheme seeks to present the teaching of religious education in a sequential and progressive form, rooted in the liturgical year. The framework has four structural elements:

• Knowledge lenses which indicate what should be known by the end of each age phase. These are split into hear, believe, live and celebrate.
• The ‘ways of knowing’ are the skills which develop as the children progress through their curriculum journey. These are split into understand, discern and respond.  
• Expected outcomes are set for each age phase and indicate what pupils are expected to know, remember and be able to do.
• Curriculum branches are the way the programme of study presents its model curriculum. There are six half term branches which are the same in each year group:

Autumn 1- Creation and Covenant - Encounter the God who creates and calls all people with a focus on the accounts of Creation.

Autumn 2- Prophecy and Promise - Explore the expectant waiting for the Messiah through the Advent season.

Spring 1- Galilee to Jerusalem - Experience the ministry of Jesus and the Word of God. They will learn through parables, encounters, miracles and teachings.

Spring 2- Desert to Garden - Study the season of Lent and its culmination in the events of Holy Week.

Summer 1- To the ends of the Earth - Study the events that flowed from the Resurrection and Ascension in the coming of the Holy Spirit and the work of the apostles and early Church.

Summer 2- Dialogue and Encounter - Learn how Christians work together with people of different religious backgrounds, building an understand that all people work towards a common good and should respect all humanity.

Impact

We assess children's learning and attainment through the expected end of age-phase outcomes, on a termly basis. These are reported to parents through the termly report card and at the end of the year in the detailed pupil report. Internal moderation of their work, as well as moderation alongside other Diocesan schools, serves as a benchmark to support teacher assessment throughout the year.