Charlotte Newman shares five approaches to challenge learners in secondary school religious education (RE).

I want to start off by sharing my context with you as I believe this is important in what I have found works well in my school. I am a Head of Religious Education in a secondary school in Cambridgeshire. We are the largest school in the county and as a result we are truly comprehensive with a wide range of student abilities and backgrounds. At KS3, our classes are mixed ability and therefore, it can sometimes be difficult to stretch and challenge the most able when there may be other students in the group that need more support. At KS4, we set by ability with English, taking into account students’ target grades and KS3 data. 

1.  Teach to the top (and beyond!)

At KS3, we always aim to teach to the top and scaffold for those students who require more support. This ensures that every student in the class is challenged. Regular opportunities are built into the lessons to extend students’ thinking. This does not simply mean additional tasks, as this is something our students often get frustrated with – that ‘challenge’ equals ‘do more’. Instead, we will ask them to research something from the key stage above. For example, when teaching about the Four Noble Truths in Buddhism I might ask more able students to research the idea of dependent arising to better understand the Buddhist philosophy. At KS4, when teaching about Jesus’ resurrection to sets 1 and 2, I will bring in the views of Rudolf Bultmann and N.T. Wright on the idea of a metaphorical versus historical resurrection from KS5. 

To ensure all teachers across the department are doing this effectively, we have spent CPD time mapping our KS3 against our GCSE specification to highlight the links we can make. We have done the same between our GCSE and A Level specifications. This has been particularly useful for those teachers who do not teach KS5, to increase their subject knowledge in order to stretch high ability students.

2. Encourage deep analytical thinking

In our school, we have employed PiXL ‘Thinking Harder’ strategies. These ensure students are showing their understanding of our topic by having to analyse the knowledge they have learnt. For example: which of a set of factors (Paul’s missionary journeys, martyrs, the Nicene Creed, Constantine) contributed most to the development of the early Church? They may order these and have to justify their choices. 

We can also do this through questioning during philosophical debates to get students articulating their thoughts in a sophisticated argument. Examples include: “Why might that be the case?”; “Why is that significant?”; “What evidence do you have to support that view?”; “Can you add to what X just said?”

Additionally, it is important to ensure that students have the opportunity to engage with primary religious texts such as the Qur’an, as well as those from different scholars, such as Descartes’ Meditations. This enables them to develop their hermeneutical skills to really understand the text and its context, compare interpretations/perspectives of it and critically analyse it.

3. Allow opportunities for multidisciplinary connections

Religious education is a multidisciplinary subject. The Ofsted RE Review (2021) promotes “ways of knowing”, that students should understand how they know, through the disciplines of Theology, Philosophy and Social Sciences. You could arguably add others too: Psychology, History, Anthropology, etc. 

When developing an enquiry question for a scheme of work, you may have in mind a particular discipline you wish the students to approach it from, for example exploring “What does it mean to be chosen by God?” using a theological method/tools to study the question from the perspective of Judaism. However, in order to stretch the most able students it would be fantastic if you gave them opportunities to think about this from a different ‘lens’. How might a Christian/Muslim approach this question? What would a philosophical/social scientist approach to this question look like?

4. Facilitate independent research projects

I currently run the NATRE Cambridgeshire RE Network Hub and so I regularly have the opportunity to meet up with other teachers/schools in my region. I was recently involved in a curriculum audit with other secondary teachers and I loved a scheme of work employed by one of my colleagues. Prior to starting the GCSE course, students are given the chance to choose a topic of interest to them within RE to conduct independent research and eventually present their findings. They are given a framework and some suggested ideas/resources to guide them as well as different ways in which they could present their research. This is a fantastic idea to stretch the most able as there is so much scope with this student-led project. 

In my colleague’s school, all students have access to a handheld device, therefore IT is easily accessible to support this work. Teachers can easily share documents and links to students this way too. Unfortunately, this is not the case in my context and so wouldn’t be feasible, but I am in the process of thinking about how we could do something similar that works for us.

5. Promote independent learning outside of the classroom

In RE, we have the privilege of being able to teach about many real-world issues and ethical debates that students find fascinating. As a result, they often want to explore these further in their own time. Therefore, in my school we have compiled ‘Independent Study’ materials for each unit of both the GCSE and A Level courses.

At GCSE, we have compiled booklets where we suggest something to read, something to watch something to listen to, and something to research. These have enabled us to introduce A Level thinkers into the course and engage students with high-level thinking through The RE Podcast or Panspycast, for example. This is key as it piques students’ curiosity and promotes a real love of the subject.

At A Level, we provide students with university lectures (the University of Chester is great for this for RE) and debates between scholars on YouTube (e.g. Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath on the relationship between religion and science). We then expect to see evidence of this further reading/research in their exam answers and their contributions to lessons.

About the author: Charlotte Newman is a Trust Lead for Religious Studies for Archway Learning Trust. She is on the Steering Group for the National Association for Teachers of RE (NATRE) and the Oak Academy Expert Group for RE. She is also a member of Cambridgeshire SACRE and has until recently led an RE local group. She has delivered much CPD on RE nationally.