Experiential RE supdocs.indd - SfE

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Experiential RE Teaching RE with the Theatre of Learning Sue Phillips Here you will see me teach a group of 22 mixed ability Year 11 pupils in a double lesson on a Thursday afternoon at the end of November. Bognor Regis Community College, where I have developed this method of teaching over the past ten years, is a school of 1500 pupils on a split site. 40% of its pupils have special educational needs. It is currently a school facing challenging circumstances having recently come out of special measures. The active experiential methods we use meant that the RE department was graded one for ‘behaviour’ and ‘attitude to RE’ during the inspection that placed the school in special measures. These methods have seen our results rise from 15%-32% A*-C to 60%-75% A*-C. The class you will watch are learning about Religious Experience for the Edexcel paper, Christianity and Philosophical Perspectives. At the time of filming, they are due to take their mock exam in two weeks time. They have already completed the topic on Religious Experience. Today they will reinforce their learning with a re-enactment of Orthodox worship, which they have not done before. They have prepared for this lesson over the previous three lessons, learning about the features of the church and this style of worship, with the set representing the church in the classroom for them to see. The re-enactment that you will see them take part in to sum up their learning is their first handson experience of Orthodox worship. This lesson, taken from Teaching Christianity with the Theatre of Learning, normally takes place in a candlelit classroom which is otherwise completely darkened to represent the death of Jesus on Good Friday. The highlight of the lesson comes when the doors of the iconostasis open and the “priest” brings the single lighted candle to the waiting “congregation” whose candles are all lit from his, gradually filling the classroom with light to represent the resurrection of Jesus on Easter day. It was not possible to film in the dark, so an important element of this powerful lesson is unfortunately missing. This DVD shows two lessons; the first is an experiential lesson which sums up a period of learning about Religious Experience. The aim of this is to reinforce not only the memory and understanding of what happens in order to prepare for the examination but also, and very importantly, to enable the pupils to evaluate religious experience. In this case, the religious experience is that of worship, and it is evaluated through this religion neutral exercise. How much more ably will they be able to discuss the effect of worship on a believer after a lesson like this? The second lesson is designed to prepare the pupils to write an essay on Religious Experience. In this lesson they revise previous knowledge and are introduced to the concept of verification. A series of fun and engaging practical activities prepare them to write a Caterpillar essay. My thanks go to my colleague Julie Woodward for developing this idea. This essay will enable pupils to organise information into a well structured argument using response levels to raise achievement. It will provide a useful revision aid and a structure for planning on the day of the exam. It uses active and spoken literacy concluding with a traffic lights discussion. This is more fully described in my article in RE Today, January 2007. Traffic lights discussion and Caterpillar essays are explained in more detail in Teaching Tolerance, published by Tribal in 2007. 2 Experiential RE: Supporting documents
If you are new to the Theatre of Learning you will find the following introduction to the five techniques and how they work useful before watching the film. If you are already familiar with the concept, you can skip to the two lesson recipes at the end. What is the Theatre of Learning? Theatre of Learning is a process not a place It is a process that I have developed over many years to make RE make sense. It is about using circle work and experiential learning techniques in a multi sensory setting with music, artefacts and displays to motivate, engage, and improve behaviour and written work. Most important of all, these techniques can change the way young people see themselves and others. Ten years after I began to develop the techniques and share them with other teachers, there has been an unforeseen benefit, the effect of these methods on the teachers themselves. For many, it has rekindled their passion for the subject, tapping into their own spirituality and creativity. It is enabling them to find RE teaching more satisfying and rewarding as they discover their pupils from all kinds of backgrounds engaging in the lessons and in many cases being moved by them. Not only has it enabled the pupils to understand and empathise with traditions and ways of life very different from their own, but teachers, also, have engaged with the traditions differently, as relating to the spirituality of the traditions has deepened their appreciation of them, both intellectually and emotionally. “After teaching the lesson on the Atman (the Hindu idea of god) the way you showed us, I felt I understood it properly myself for the first time.” Jenny, Head of RE in a Manchester school “You have completely changed the course of our careers – two weeks into our teaching practice Emma and I were on the point of giving up; the children just didn’t want to know. After we left your session on Saturday we hit the charity shops buying music and fabric, candles and plants. It changed everything; my head of department couldn’t believe the effect it had on the children.” Jill Blanchard a trainee at Manchester Metropolitan University in 2001 Five years on, following a Theatre of Learning course on RE and Global Citizenship in March 2006, Jill’s trainee, Andrew, writes: “I felt revitalised and energised; it reminded me that I too am a creative and energetic person who wants to enhance the learning of the pupils using other methods than textbook and worksheet. I had been feeling negative about the notion of teaching for the exam, but the ideas have helped awaken and enliven my passion for the subject again. It certainly gave me killer confidence to try new ways of working.” Following a day with the Roman Catholic Schools Partnership in Birmingham at the beginning of March, Theresa Edge from Cardinal Wiseman Catholic School tried the methods and wrote to say: “I tried The Island [one of the the Theatre of Learning techniques] and watched my children learning RE for the first time. I had so much fun that I will definitely do more.” A month later she wrote again: “I wanted to do something different for our Year 5 taster days and Year 6 induction day. I thought I would have a go at your fabulous experiential teaching about Christian Experiential RE: Supporting documents 3
Page 1: Experiential RE Sue Phillips
Page 5 and 6: idea what I was gong to do instead!
Page 7 and 8: the pupils, if they wished, to writ
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Page 11 and 12: write down or throw away regrets or
Page 13 and 14: Lesson Recipes Lesson One: Re-enact
Page 15 and 16: Re-enactment: • Blow out the cand
Page 17 and 18: 4. As the first circle, the topic,
Page 19 and 20: Further RE resources available from

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