For the classroom

He stood quite still, almost overwhelmed by the moment, listening to his heartbeat pounding in his head as well as his chest. He was very aware of the silence that seemed to be closing in on him and the anticipation...

the story of life as it fades away Of others there is no memory; they have perished as though they had never existed; they have become as though they had never been born … Ecclesiasticus 44:9 In an issue focusing on...

One must be an inventor to read well. Ralph Waldo EmersonThe American Scholar, 1837 Let me start by making quite clear that I do not classify the Gospel of Mark as fiction, but I do recommend the attempt to read it as if...

Emma Harwood is an RE teacher and a Christian mother. She faced an agonising dilemma when she was pregnant in 2015. Generously, here she shares her experience to open up moral and spiritual questions about the...

My Year 11s were greeted with REtoday’s ‘Muslims in Britain today: a reality check’ on their first day back after the holidays. It looked like a win-win; they show off their knowledge, I gain a sense of any...

three examples to address preconceptions and assumptions With increasing Islamophobia in the British and worldwide press, teachers might be inclined to readjust the balance and tell the story of ‘good Muslims’ or...

We teach many creation stories, especially to younger children in the primary phase. However, older children can benefit from returning to well-loved creation stories and taking a sociological or psychological view,...

Sergio Cariello has drawn for Marvel and for DC Comics. Now he has created The Action Storybook Bible: key stories from Christian scripture in comic-book style for children aged 4–8. It is drawn for those inside the...

1. Shared stories, different meaning? When telling stories from a shared tradition, make sure you get it right. For example, Adam and Hawa (Eve) feature in the Qur’an, but Hawa does not tempt Adam to eat the fruit;...

At St Joseph’s Catholic Primary, Shrewsbury, English, art and outdoor learning are combined with RE to offer children and parents different experiences of prayer. In the words of teacher Helen Thorpe, the school...

The exhibition has been organised by the Believe in Hull church partnership as part of its contribution toward Hull City of Culture celebrations 2017, with funding support from the Methodist Church.

Every day we are ‘storied’. We all live by stories – indeed, our lives are stories – but for them to mean something we have to be inside them; otherwise they are merely words. When we achieve that synergy, we...

I started teaching the new GCSE RS course last year, completing Christianity and two themes in Year 10, and am part way through Islam in Year 11. On the one hand I have really enjoyed the in-depth study of these...

Robert Kirkwood has resourced RE over many years with exciting textbooks through his collaboration with the cartoonist Edward McLachlan. We asked him how he sees the subject at the moment.

Fr Peter Walters has lived in Columbia since 1994, where he works directly caring for and empowering Columbia’s los desechables; its ‘disposable’ street children. His charity, Let the Children Live, offers...

Gill Tewkesbury teaches in Devon. She wanted to help her pupils think more deeply about religion and the end of life, so she went to the graveyard with her class. Secondary teachers reading this face the challenge:...

Amanda Donelan is headteacher of the Holy Spirit Catholic and Church of England Primary School in Leasowe on the Wirral. She describes a new spiritual beginning for her school.

Ulrike Hunt wanted her pupils to start thinking more deeply about respect for all. Here’s what she did.

This idea is one of many ways to move RE in an enquiring direction. If we think of pupils as researchers, then the enquiring purposes of RE come into focus. So we asked several schools (thanks to them all) to set...

Shiva Nataraja, Lord of the Dance, is one of the most well-known of all Hindu images. It is enigmatic on first encounter, but its complexity makes it an exciting resource for exploring Hindu beliefs about the cycle of...