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Religious Education

Intent

In line with the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, Religious Education at St Patrick's is the “core of the core curriculum,” allocating a minimum of 10% of taught timetable time. RE is not merely one academic subject among many; it underpins the entire Catholic life, ethos, and educational vision of our school.

Our primary intent is to nurture religiously literate, morally grounded, and spiritually engaged pupils who can reflect critically, think ethically, and understand the demands of religious commitment in the modern world.

To achieve this, we follow the Religious Education Directory (RED), To Know You More Clearly, delivered using the Magister Resources scheme of work. This combination ensures total alignment with Church teaching, academic rigour, and age-appropriate pedagogical depth.

Curriculum Architecture: The Religious Education Directory (RED)

Religious Education Directory, 'To know you more clearly'

The RED structures the RE curriculum around the overarching narrative of Salvation History. Learning is revisited sequentially across Key Stages to ensure cumulative progression in knowledge and understanding.

The 6 Curriculum Branches

The academic year is organised into six half-termly branches that mirror the liturgical calendar and theological narrative:

1. Creation & Covenant: Exploring God’s origin for creation, human dignity, and the historical covenants with humanity. 

‘The heavens are telling the glory of God’ (Ps 19:1). In this branch, pupils will encounter the God who creates and calls a people. They will explore revelation of the Christian belief that all that is comes from God, the Creation accounts in Genesis, and scientific explanations of the process of Creation. They will explore the call of God and his covenantal relationship with his people first through Abraham and Moses, then through the narrative of the Old Testament.

2. Prophecy & Promise: Examining Old Testament expectations, God's promises, and the Season of Advent.

‘In many and various ways, God spoke to our ancestors by the prophets’ (Heb 1:1). The prophets speak of God reaching to his people, calling them back into a relationship with him. In this branch, pupils will explore the Christian understanding of the teaching of the prophets as they point to the fulfilment of God’s promise in a messiah, Jesus Christ. They will explore the expectant waiting for the Messiah through the Advent season and how this speaks to Christians today as they wait for Christ. Pupils will encounter the story of the nativity of Jesus and the mystery of the incarnation.

3. Galilee to Jerusalem: Studying the life, ministry, parables, and miracles of Jesus Christ.

‘God’s only Son, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known’ (Jn 1:18). In this branch, pupils will experience the ministry of Jesus, the Word of God. They will learn about the life of Jesus and his revelation of the Kingdom of God through parables, encounters, miracles, and teachings. They will learn about the call of the disciples and the nature of being a follower of Jesus.

4. Desert to Garden: Focusing on Lent, Holy Week, the Passion, and the Resurrection of Jesus.

‘Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day’ (1 Cor 15:3). In this branch, pupils will study the season of Lent and its culmination in the events of Holy Week. They will learn about the Paschal Triduum at the heart of the Catholic Church’s Liturgy and life. The title of this branch points both to the liturgical journey from the desert of Lent to the garden of Resurrection, but also to the Paschal journey from darkness to light, barrenness to fruitfulness, death to life.

5. To the Ends of the Earth: Investigating the Holy Spirit, Pentecost, the Early Church, and the Sacraments.

‘Go, therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’ (Mt 28:19). In this branch, pupils will 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. They will also learn about the Catholic Church today as the apostolic Church and how its liturgy and structures flow from the early Church.

6. Dialogue & Encounter: Engaging in respectful dialogue with other Christian denominations, world religions (e.g., Judaism, Islam), and secular worldviews.

‘For “In him we live and move and have our being”’ (Acts 17:28). In this branch, pupils will learn how Christians work together with people of different religious convictions and all people of goodwill towards the common good, respecting the dignity of all humanity. They will also encounter other pathways of belief drawing on the teaching of the Church about intercultural dialogue.

Knowledge Lenses & Ways of Knowing

To ensure comprehensive coverage, learning within each branch is studied through specific Knowledge Lenses (hear, believe, celebrate, live) and developed through three systematic Ways of Knowing (skills - understand, discern, respond):

  • Understand: Recalling, assimilating, and analysing theological content, scripture texts, and church teachings.

  • Discern: Evaluating, questioning, and reflecting critically on theological concepts and ethical dilemmas.

  • Respond: Expressing personal reflections, making moral choices, applying Catholic Social Teaching (CST), and integrating faith into daily action.

This is what the RED summarises these three elements as:

Knowledge lenses set out the object of study for pupils; they indicate what should be known by the end of each age-phase. They are referred to as lenses, since they are the things we are looking at and they divide the content of the programme of study into four systematic subsections for the study of Catholicism and two additional lenses for the study of religions and worldviews, which together comprise the six knowledge lenses of hear, believe, celebrate, and live (the study of the Catholic religion), dialogue, and encounter (the study of other religions and worldviews).

Implementation

While the RED establishes what must be taught, Magister Resources provides the structured, high-quality framework for how it is effectively delivered in the primary classroom.

Theological Fidelity & Ecclesial Approval

  • Imprimatur & CES Endorsement: Magister’s Firm Foundations curriculum holds an Imprimatur and Catholic Education Service (CES) approval, guaranteeing complete theological fidelity to Catholic doctrine and Church tradition.

  • Doctrinal Accuracy: Teachers can deliver complex theological concepts (e.g., Trinitarian theology, Sacramental theology) with total confidence in the material's orthodoxy.

Impact

Through the implementation of the RED, our school anticipates the following outcomes:

  1. Religiously Literate Pupils: Children demonstrate clear progression in theological vocabulary, scriptural knowledge, and understanding of Catholic doctrine across all key stages.

  2. Faith Lived in Action: Pupils articulate how their learning informs personal virtue, moral decision-making, and active engagement with Catholic Social Teaching (CST) and global issues. 

 

Right for Parents to Withdraw their Children from RE & Collective Worship

In England and Wales, parents have the right to withdraw their children from RE lessons and acts of Collective Worship in schools. As parents, you are not obliged to give a reason for requesting the withdrawal.

However, before exercising any right of withdrawal, we would recommend you discuss your concerns with the class teacher or Headteacher.

Should a pupil be withdrawn from those learning activities/lessons, they will be directed to supplementary topic lessons instead.

Requests for withdrawals are made in writing via the school office.