Head of Department: Miss D Bunkell

Curriculum Intent

The RS, Philosophy and Ethics curriculum is designed and centred around our students. We recognise the importance of inclusive, rigorous and relevant content, which can help students develop and acquire a better understanding of the role that different religions and cultures play in today’s pluralistic world. We create a safe space in our classrooms in which students can develop their own ideas about religious, philosophical and ethical questions while learning to be tolerant of other people’s views. The curriculum supplies students with an initial understanding of the multicultural society in which we live and the key skills with which to discover more about the world and their individual place within this, in order to encourage them to become global citizens.

Adopting a mixture of thematic and religious approaches to our schemes of work allows students to apply, compare and contrast some of the world’s major beliefs, religious and secular, to some of the ‘Big Issues’ we are faced on a day-to-day basis. Some of our non-secular topics include Animal Rights
and Medical Ethics. There are also opportunities for students to study current issues through both a secular and non-secular lens, such as our topics on Drugs and Alcohol and Crime and Punishment. Throughout all the key stages, Religious Studies provides students with the opportunity to debate and discuss thereby improving their ability to articulate verbally as well as enabling them to develop their extended writing skills.

As students’ progress into Key Stage 4 and Key Stage 5, they are given the opportunity to explore these bigger questions on a deeper level through the study of Philosophy and Ethics, sharpening critical thinking alongside developing a student’s ability to think and theorise through issues themselves. At Key Stage 4, students undertake an in-depth study of Christianity and Buddhism building on the work from Key Stage 3. Students will be able to apply Christian, Buddhist, non-religious and their own views to a range of ethical and philosophical questions such as, Existence of God, Evil & Suffering, Capital Punishment and Poverty to name a few. Our Key Stage 5 curriculum continues to build on learning from Key Stage 3 and 4 and students examine in detail Philosophers from the UK and across the world. We aim to give students exposure to a variety of key philosophical and ethical concepts such as Religious Experience, Natural Law, Language, Meta-Ethics and a detailed study of Christianity.