RE and Collective worship
Welcome to St Stephen's R.E. and Collective Worship Page
Subject Leader: Mrs J Johnson
Religious Education
At St Stephen's, the teaching and learning of R.E. is underpinned by our Christian vision and values. We believe that quality R.E. ensures that pupils flourish through deepening their understanding of other faiths, promoting respect, tolerance and empathy towards others. We celebrate diversity and seek to draw the similarities between faiths whilst allowing pupils to develop spiritually and morally.
Through our teaching we want our pupils:-
●1. To know, understand and describe the beliefs of the 5 major world religions but in particular Christianity and Islam.
●2. To understand and empathise with others viewpoints and draw similarities between religious and non-religious viewpoints.
●3. To understand that a person’s relationship with God or not, is personal to them and explore the different ways people maintain that relationship.
●4. To develop spiritually to ask and answer life’s big challenging questions in order to explore morality and discuss these matters in a respectful way.
●5. To explore themes and values, discussing what is right and wrong and why and to be able to express yours and others beliefs in an articulate way and be able to agree and disagree with others respectfully.
Although RE is taught as a discrete subject weekly, being a Church of England school, we embrace and celebrate God's word and values in everything we do. At St Stephen's, we wholeheartedly believe that our chosen values should be lived and breathed in order to become the caring citizens that God wants us to be. Whilst we follow 'Questful RE' the Blackburn Diocesan agreed syllabus, the content has been tailored to meet the needs of our pupils.
We are proud of the way in which the Christian teachings and Muslim faith can work in harmony, with everyone showing tolerance, acceptance and respect for our school family. Our pupils are proud to come to St. Stephens where they can learn about the Christian faith, nurture their own faith and develop their spirituality within a rich and caring community.
RE curriculum overview and Progression Document
Collective Worship
Our CW plays a vital role in children developing their understanding of the Christian faith and is inviting, engaging and inclusive for all. It is embedded at the start of each day to give pupils the opportunity to reflect, develop spiritually and start each day with God's word in their hearts. Our strong Christian ethos and character is developed through a range of daily acts of worship including song, prayer, Godly Play and reflection. This guides pupils on their own spiritual journey and allows them to aim high with God in their hearts.
Each half term we focus on a particular Christian value, underpinned by a bible reference and stories which allow us to explore this theme deeply, whilst also drawing on other faiths, courageous advocates and worship through song.
Our Worship Wardens play an important role in supporting the leaders of daily Worship. They apply for this position and are responsible for some of the planning, delivering and evaluating of worship with the RE leader throughout the year.
Their roles and responsibilities as well as the planning include:
Setting up and preparing the hall and reflection spaces for Worship
Participating in leading through drama, prayer, welcome/sending and readings
Leading their own Worship reflecting upon and evaluating the value of the half term
Asking children and staff to evaluate our Worship
Monitoring the Reflection Areas in classrooms, giving staff feedback
Asking the Big Questions and collating responses.
Being and leading upon our Courageous Advocacy projects throughout school.
Supporting the RE leader with the Reflection table displays and Worship display board
Attending the Diocesan Conference for RE and/or Worship
Collective Worship Values
Courageous Advocacy
At St Stephen's we are always looking for ways to help others and support those in need. We aim to tackle social injustices which are close to our hearts through educating ourselves on local, national and global issues and subsequently generating ideas to help, support and tackle these issues. For example, we have held 'Come and Keep Warm Sessions' and created leaflets to signpost parents to foodbanks or financial support services whilst learning about the cost of living crisis. During recycling week, we created posters for our local community, held litter picks and educated pupils on how to recycle effectively. After our local area was left in a terrible state after a Bonfire Night event, our pupils wrote to the local council to complain and ask for the site to be tidied. These are just a few examples of our Faith in Action.
Visits and Visitors.
As part of our RE and Collective Worship offer, we seek to include as many visits and visitors as possible into this area of the curriculum. During 'Inter-faith week' we invited in a member of the Christian, Muslim and Hindu faiths to discuss their beliefs and similarities between the religions. Pupils also had the opportunity to ask questions and deepen their understanding of these faiths. We have visited the church, mosque, Hindu temple, Cathedral and cenotaph to develop our knowledge and understanding of faiths and spirituality.
Archdeacon Visit
Visits and Visitors
Pupil led Worship
All of our pupils have the opportunity to plan, prepare and deliver worship to pupils, staff and parents. They often have the opportunity to do this in the Church. We work closely with the members of our Church to provide opportunities to strengthen the Christian distinctiveness of our school. Pupils lead worship on key Christian festivals e.g. Christmas, Easter, Harvest, Christingle and Advent. They also lead on assemblies on key events such as Mother's Day, World Book Day, Holi and Eid. This gives pupils ownership of the worships, how the messages are delivered and allows them to reflect spiritually on their understanding of the event.
Parents do have the right to withdraw their child from all or part of RE and/or collective worship. However, we would encourage you to come into school for a discussion before thinking of doing so.