The Welsh Government has been holding online ‘Policy Insight Events’ to keep stakeholders up to date with professional learning developments for the Curriculum for Wales.
Staff at the St Giles’ Centre are pleased to be part of the Policy Insight Event for Religion, Values and Ethics (RVE). You can register for the Event now and circulate the details to anyone who may be interested to learn more about the national professional learning opportunities for RVE.
The following details have been published on Hwb:
26 April: 2 to 3 pm (Tuesday) Policy Insight: Religion, Values and Ethics (RVE) Professional Learning Resources for the Curriculum for Wales The statutory Religion, values and ethics guidance was published on Hwb in January 2022. The Welsh Government has been working in partnership with the Wales Association of SACREs (WASACRE) to create a suite of national online Professional Learning resources to support practitioners and settings in their design and delivery of Religion, values and ethics within the Curriculum for Wales. A team of specialist practitioners drawn from schools across Wales are creating these resources. This event will provide an opportunity to learn more about the development of these resources and to view what is being made available online.
The St Giles’ Centre has recently published the special science and religion issue of the A-level journal, Challenging Religious Issues in Welsh. (The English version was published in autumn 2019.)
This special issue was originally made possible through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, USA.
Free access to both the English and Welsh versions is available here on our 16+ page.
The special issue articles include:
Technology and Human Nature by Adam M. Willows The article reviews some theological discussion about developing technology. It discusses how new technologies raise questions about our understanding of human nature, and how different theological responses might approach these questions.
Evolution and the Argument from (or to) Design by Jeff Astley The article summarises the effect of Darwin’s proposed mechanism for evolution on the design argument for God’s existence.
Stewardship of Creation by Andrew Village The Jewish-Christian tradition has been partly blamed for creating an attitude towards the environment that sees it as something to be dominated by humans and exploited for their benefit. It also stresses the idea that humans are ‘stewards’ of creation, given the task to look after the planet for God. But what does it mean to steward creation? This article describes two examples of the way in which human activity has shaped different habitats and had complex effects on the birds that live there.
Thinking about Being Human in a Universe of Aliens by David Wilkinson One of the most compelling scientific issues of our generation is the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). The question whether we are alone in the universe has long fascinated the media and the public and has received fresh momentum in the discovery of exoplanets, a small minority of which have Earth like characteristics. The discovery of life elsewhere in the universe, especially if it is intelligent, poses major questions for the Christian faith in areas such as creation, incarnation, redemption and the nature of what it means to be human.
Is Creation Complete? A Critique of Continuing Creation by Timothy Wall The article explores the idea that creation is incomplete, through the concept of continuing creation. This arises from the dynamic world as described by science and in the Bible, but it is argued that it is ultimately flawed both scientifically and theologically. It is inherently problematic to say that creation is incomplete because it allows for no discontinuity between creation and new creation. The article suggests that a view of creation rooted in Christ may allow us to say that creation is both complete and dynamic.
Challenging Religious Issues is a free, open access on-line journal designed to support teachers and students engaged in A-level Religious Studies, bringing recent and relevant scholarship and research from the University into the A-level classroom.
The Welsh language version of Challenging Religious Issues is funded and managed by the St Giles’ Centre, Wrexham.
St Giles’ Centre staff are part of a European research team exploring core questions about what really matters in RE in light of Covid-19 experiences. This qualitative research project focuses on experiences and perspectives of RE specialists, and it is hoped that research results will play a role in informing future directions in RE in schools across Europe.
Phase 1 of the project was launched on 9 February 2022 with an online survey distributed to the Board members of the European Forum for Teachers of Religious Education (EFTRE), which includes 26 European countries.
Phase 2 of the project involves focus group interviews with RE practitioners from a smaller sample of five European countries: Wales, Germany, the Republic of Ireland, Austria and Hungary. Phase 2 will begin later in 2022.
The members of the research team, who are drawn from the boards of the European Forum for Teachers of Religious Education (EFTRE) and the Intereuropean Commission on Church and School (ICCS), are:
Dr Sandra Cullen (Dublin City University, Ireland)
Mag. Dr Sonja Danner (Private University College (KPH) Wien/Krems, Austria)
Dr Eszter Kodácsy-Simon (Lutheran Theological University in Budapest, Hungary).
The St Giles’ Centre welcomes the opportunity for Welsh voices to be included in this exciting project, and for Wrexham practitioners to be a particular focus during phase 2 of the project.
St Giles’ Centre staff are very pleased to be part of the Wales Association of SACREs’ project team overseeing the development of national online professional learning resources for Religion, values and ethics (RVE) in the Curriculum for Wales. Expert practitioners selected from schools across Wales have been given the task of shaping and writing the resources that will be most useful to schools and settings as they prepare for curriculum roll out.
This national professional learning project is made possible through a partnership between the Wales Association of SACREs (WASACRE) and the Welsh Government, which has released government funding for the creation of a range of professional learning resources for RVE. When completed, the bilingual resources will sit on Hwb.
Staff at the St Giles’ Centre have played a key role supporting Welsh Government in the development of the statutory Religion, values and ethics (RVE) guidance, and are delighted to share their expertise and experience in this exciting project.
It is hoped that the resources will be available on Hwb in April 2022. We will keep schools and settings in Wrexham updated!
The St Giles’ Centre has created a free video on RVE in the Curriculum for Wales, which can be viewed on its website.
The 45-minute video is an adaptation of a professional learning session offered by the Centre to all schools in Wrexham on 12 January 2022. Over 90 practitioners from Wrexham attended this online event, and the video is designed to support those who were unable to be present on the day (as well as being a helpful resource to re-visit for those who attended).
Schools in other local authorities may also find the professional learning video helpful.
You can access the video on our Courses page. (Note: Select the HD option to watch the video in ‘high definition’.) There is also a pdf version of the presentation available.
On Thursday 13 January, Wrexham Agreed Syllabus Conference (ASC) convened its first meeting to plan for a new locally agreed syllabus for Religion, values and ethics.
Coming just days after the publication of the new statutory Religion, values and ethics guidance on Hwb (10 January), members had the opportunity to discuss the guidance in depth and to set up a working group to take the work of the ASC forward.
The ASC working group has already held its first meeting and another is planned for early February. It is hoped that the new agreed syllabus for Wrexham schools and settings will be completed this spring term, in time for the summer.
If you have any questions about the ASC or agreed syllabus, you can contact Libby Jones, who is RE/RVE advisor for Wrexham local authority.
The statutory Religion, Values and Ethics Guidance (RVE) was published on Hwb yesterday (10 January 2022). The RVE guidance has been fully integrated into the Curriculum for Wales, and sits within the ‘Designing your Curriculum’ section of the Humanities Area of Learning. Relevant information on RVE and the legislation can be found within the ‘Summary of legislation’ section of the Curriculum for Wales.
Follow the links below to read this essential guidance for all those responsible for designing a curriculum in Wales.
The St Giles’ Centre is offering schools in Wrexham a foundational professional learning session on Religion, Values and Ethics (RVE) in the Curriculum for Wales.
The session is free and will take place on Microsoft Teams on Wednesday, 12 January 2022 at 4pm. It will last around an hour, which will include time for a Q&A session at the end.
If your school is within Wrexham local authority and you are interested in joining this professional learning session, contact us with the name and email address of the member(s) of staff who will be attending by Friday, 17th December. They will then be contacted in January with the invite and resources needed for the session.
In the December issue of the ICCS* and IV newsletter (published today), you can read about the latest European developments relevant to religious education, and Church and School.
Some of the short news articles include:
A report on the Klingenthal conference about using storytelling to communicate why religion in education matters;
An initiative to develop common Christian RE in Lower-Saxony, Germany (Catholic-Protestant co-operation);
A European research project on Covid-19 and RE;
A project to assess educational programmes against intolerance and discrimination.
* The Intereuropean Commission on Church and School (ICCS) is a network, created in 1958, which aims to provide a framework for cooperation in monitoring and developing church and school issues in Europe. It brings together representatives and experts from research, practice and policy working on religion and education.
Important information relating to “The parental right to request withdrawal from RVE in the Curriculum for Wales” has been published this week on the Wales Association of SACREs (WASACRE) website.
