At Culgaith School we have designed a rich and diverse Religious Education curriculum which will ensure our children have a deep understanding of the Christian faith whilst they will learn about the religions of the world in a respectful and engaging way.

As a church school, we believe that Religious Education and its teachings on diversity, empathy and kindness are an integral part of our ethos not just a stand-alone lesson each week. We support our children to grow up to develop a strong moral code using Jesus’s teachings about having love for yourself and love for your neighbour.

As a church school, Christian principles and Jesus’s teachings are at the heart of our ethos and our approach to our teaching nurturing a love of learning in our children. We believe that we too, as adults, will develop and deepen our knowledge and own understanding through conversation with our students. Children in our school approach RE sessions differently to others, we have a clear understanding that we must be respectful and have open minds to the beliefs of others, believing that these learning opportunities will help us grow and develop into well rounded adults in a modern society. Children feel confident to ask questions with curiosity.

We believe that through the teaching of Religious Education in our school we can pass on the teachings of the Christian faith, aiding the children to become supportive, empathetic, helpful and understanding adults. We regard the teaching of other religions highly important in today’s modern society, teaching that our differences are what make us special and we must show each other care and love.

We create a safe and thought provoking environment in RE sessions discussing how it is vital that we are respectful of others within our classroom and the wider world. We encourage our children to be brave to question the teachings and practices we are not familiar with to develop our own thoughts and beliefs. Sessions are designed to challenge children to reflect and think deeply.

The intent of our 3 year rolling programme is to ensure our children have a solid understanding of the Christian faith whilst dedicating time to other religions of the world including, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and touching on Sikhism. Our curriculum has been designed so that in each unit of work teachers discuss similarities and differences between religions including their practices and beliefs solidifying the importance of respect.

We use the assessment points from the Cumbria Agreed Syllabus to create end of key stage assessment grids for each individual child across our school. We feel this produces a well-rounded assessment covering; Know About and Understand, Express and Communicate and Employ and Gain skills giving a good picture of how their learning is progressing.

We teach our children through a varied curriculum including readings from Holy books, use of iPad apps to research, book work, artefacts, practical drama and role play to ensure we create sessions which inspire and captivate the children’s attention. We feel that a repetitive, spiral of learning approach building on previous learning supports the children to develop not only their knowledge and understanding of religion but how those of who believe feel about their faith.

We have developed a 3 year rolling programme of units that give the children a breadth and depth of knowledge and understanding of Christianity and other major world faiths divided into our 3 class structure. Children in the early years join in with KS1 lessons ensuring Religious Education teaching is inclusive of all children in our school. This approach ensures children right from the very foundation of our school start their RE learning with respect and curiosity.

Furthering our goal for Religious Education at Culgaith to be an ethos not just a stand-alone lesson we include RE in cross curricular lessons e.g. discussing faiths of Tudor kings in History lessons or diary writing from Jesus’ perspective in English sessions.

A glimpse of Religious Education at Culgaith C of E School

Vision and Values Workshops - Wonderfully Made 

Throughout the year joined our friends at Langwathby Primary School in a joint project to share our Christian values. When we at Culgaith hosted, we created stations focusing on Respect, Friendship and Courage. Langwathby kindly shared their focus on Compassion, Service and Hope. The workshops have been a wonderful way to share our schools values whilst building stronger links and friendships, we look forward to continuing this in the future. 
 

We also held a school vision day where parents, governors and those from local churches gathered to join in a carousel of workshops surrounding our vision ‘Wonderfully Made.’ During this day we celebrated all children at Culgaith C of E School creating a tapestry celebrating us all as unique, this now proudly hangs in our school hall. 

Archbishop of York Young Leaders Award 

RUN FOR THE REC - What an incredible day!

The children's vision for their Archbishop of York Young Leaders Award came to life and shone bright. They set their sights on a continuous run 9am-3pm, taking turns through the day with a little help from Class 1, parents and our friends at Alston even popped down for a few laps too. 
 

The children gathered sponsors as a way of raising money to develop their local recreational ground and school, with the final total over £400. 
 

#BeTheChangeYouWantToSee Go team Culgaith ⭐️

Child Led Collective Worship

We are super proud of this months collective worship leaders - Sept 2024

This morning they delivered an assembly to the whole school based on Global Goal 6 - Clean water and sanitation. 

The children placed two jugs of water on the table, invoking a discussion surrounding the difference in water quality available across the world, asking "Is this fair?"

They then played a video from the charity Water Aid, linking our school council, looking forward, how can we make change? They suggested all classrooms follow the lead of Class 2, who instead of tipping out water from their bottles down the sink, use to water class plants. 

Next, they invited the school to join them in singing a song, before reading a passage from the story of creation from the Bible. Finally asking for a prayer to be offered and added to our school prayer book. 

Year 6 leavers concert at Carlisle Cathederal