Planning in Religious Education

1. Planning in Religious Education Some considerations What do we aspire to through our planning? What are we reaching for?

2. Who are the students I teach? Class context: What do I need to take into account when planning for my particular group of students? Consider cultural and religious backgrounds, learning needs of students…

3. How will I teach? BCE model of pedagogy: Principles and practices of learning and teaching that leads to success for all learners.

4. Identify the Content Descriptions • What Religious Knowledge and Deep Understandings will the unit cover? (What will students know?) • What will students be able to do as a result of their new knowledge? (Skills)

5. Line of Sight • Read the Year Level Description and the Achievement Standard and identify the learning that matches the Content Descriptions grouped together for this unit. This enables the overarching ideas to be identified, which are the deeper concepts that need to be taught through the unit.

6. Learning Intentions • A learning intention describes what students should know, understand or be able to do by the end of a lesson or series of lessons. Learning intentions identify new learning and focus on transferable skills.

7. This is what students will learn throughout the unit Be specific and name what you expect to cover • Through this unit of work students will: • Investigate some of the challenges (poverty, isolation, access to Eucharist…) and the impact they had on Catholics in colonial Australia • Engage students in the story of Mary MacKillop • Explore Mary MacKillop’s letters and identification of how her challenges in life shaped her faith and core beliefs • Research how Mary MacKillop shaped and strengthened the community of believers in her time • Investigate ways that Mary MacKillop’s story influences, strengthens and shapes the lives and faith of believers today The design of learning intentions starts with the answers to these questions. What do I want students to know?What do I want students to understand? What do I want students to be able to do?

8. Teaching and learning opportunities are designed to provide students with opportunities to meet the learning intentions. Success criteria are directly related to the learning intention. Feedback is based on the learning intention and the success criteria. Learning intentions are informed by the curriculum. Teacher questioning always keeps the learning intention in focus. Learning Intentions Students self assess in light of the learning intentions and the success criteria. The assessment task / activity matches the learning criteria. Peer feedback reflects the learning intentions and the success criteria. From: https://kweb.bne.catholic.edu.au/LandT/LearningTeaching/Pedagogy/Pages/Learning-Intentions.aspx Diagram adapted fromhttp://www.assessmentforlearning.edu.au

9. Success Criteria • Success criteria describe what successful learning looks like at the end; how the learner will know when they have reached/achieved the learning intention successfully.

11. If success criteria are to be any use to students, they need to •be written in language that students are likely to understand •be limited in number so students are not overwhelmed by the scope of the task •focus on the learning and not on aspects of behaviour (e.g. paying attention, contributing, meeting deadlines etc.) •be supported, where necessary, by exemplars or work samples which make their meaning clear •created, ideally, with input from students so that they have greater understanding and ownership.

12. Are discussed and agreed with students prior to beginning the learning activity. Are directly related to the learning intention. Are used as the basis for feedback. Are specific to an activity. Describe what successful learning looks like. Success Criteria Should be written in language that students are likely to understand. Can be a series of dot points or in the form of a rubric. Are used as the basis for peer feedback and self-assessment. From: https://kweb.bne.catholic.edu.au/LandT/LearningTeaching/Pedagogy/Pages/Success-Criteria.aspx

13. As a teacher you are responsible for identifying the learning intentions and the success criteria. However, the success criteria can be written in more student friendly language after student input.

14. Assessment Assessing student learning is an integral part of the school classroom. It improves learning and informs teaching: it is the process through which teachers identify, gather and interpret information about student achievement and learning in order to improve, enhance and plan for further learning.

15. Assessment should: •include the collection of assessment data used to monitor a student’s progress against the curriculum •assist teachers to evaluate the success of their teaching approaches •provide evidence to inform students, parents and the system about student progress and achievement.

16. It is important to keep data to assist in making professional judgements about whether each student has achieved the success criteria, or whether they are ‘above standard’ for each unit of work. ‘Above standard’ would be indicated by students demonstrating one or more of the following: • Greater depth of knowledge • Greater depth of understanding • Greater sophistication of skills

17. Assessment plays a key role in determining: Where the learner is right now Where the learner is going How to get there Therefore, diagnostic, formative and summative assessment are all essential elements for planning in religious education.

18. Student self assessment is now regarded as vital to success at school.  For strategies for assessment as learning and self assessment see these resources.

19. Teachers will use a range of different assessment strategies to ascertain what each student has learnt (actual achievement) and will make judgments about the extent and quality of each student’s achievement in relation to the Religious Education Curriculum achievement standards.

20. Reporting • Reporting to parents will provide information about a student’s actual achievement against the achievement standards. The use of Religious Education Curriculum achievement standards as a common reference point for reporting to parents will contribute to consistency in reporting in RE across all BCE and Archdiocesan schools.

21. There is flexibility in terms of what information may be displayed on the report (how helpful will it be to parents?). • The report informs parents about what their child has learnt in religious education (not their behaviour or their perceived level of faith).

22. Fertile Questions What are the assumptions that students come with that you wish to challenge? Construct a question that challenges one of these assumptions, ensure it is open-ended and make it connected to the learner by including a personal pronoun such as ‘I’, ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘me’, and it will probably meet the 6 criteria for a fertile question.

23. An example from a year 1 class: Assumption of the majority of students: Prayer is about talking to God (it doesn’t have anything to do with listening) Fertile question: Why would God want to talk to me? The result: Through engaging in gentle dialogue, meditation and other prayer activities, by the end of the unit students were saying: “If God wants to talk to me, then God must really love me”. These students had moved to a whole new point in their faith journeys.

24. The key to developing a good fertile question is determining where students’ thinking needs to be challenged. If the majority of students think that Mary MacKillop is not really that relevant for us today because she lived a long time ago, then a possible fertile question could be: Why is Mary MacKillop still important for us today?

25. To access more resources about fertile questions go to: the Brisbane Catholic Education RE Curriculum site

26. Connections to other learning areas • Look for connections with other learning areas, the general capabilities and cross curriculum priorities. • NOTE: We do not want to integrate one into the other. Rather, we want to make legitimate connections, ensuring that students will still be able to learn what they are entitled to learn in all areas.

27. Begin with the approved curriculum Example: History – Year 5 So how do I connect with other learning areas? What do I need to teach and what are students entitled to learn?

28. When you have identified what students are entitled to learn through each learning area then you can make decisions about how to connect the learning areas (teaching what is relevant at the same time).

29. Connections to the Religious Life of the School Sometimes the RE Curriculum needs to make explicit links to one or more elements of the Religious Life of the School.

30. Pedagogy Principles High expectations - for successful learning for every learner Equity and excellence – in every classroom through evidence based practice Continuity of learning – through access to learning entitlement for every learner

31. The Religion Curriculum P-12 promotes inquiry learning, a learner centred pedagogical approach to learning and teaching, that aligns closely with the directions taken in the Australian Curriculum.

32. Inquiry Learning • Some questions to consider: • How can we document our planning in RE so that inquiry learning does not look like a linear process? • As a teacher, where am I on the continuum for how I implement inquiry learning? (Structured, guided, open, student initiated.)

33. Some resources for Inquiry Learning Go to Resource Link to find a https://kweb.bne.catholic.edu.au/ResourceLink/resources/RLproductions/inquiringminds/Pages/InquiringMinds.aspx Resources from Kath Murdoch Articles, information and websites What is inquiry? What does an inquiry classroom look like? Overview of inquiry

34. Digital Learning • Religious Education in the Archdiocese of Brisbane seeks to engage students in the critical, creative, and responsible use of digital tools which is an important component of digital citizenship. This enables them to express their learning in rich and relevant ways.

35. In planning, the question to ask is: Where could teaching and learning be enhanced through the use of digital tools? Some resources: Web 2 tools Cool tools for schools Digital tools to support inquiry learning Apps and websites to support inquiry learning Web 2 tools and edtech

36. Dialogical teaching and learning • Religious Education needs to be more than a series of activities. Deep learning occurs through conversations – reciprocal dialogue between teacher and students. Consideration needs to be given to the questions and opportunities for dialogue that are an intrinsic part of teaching and learning opportunities.

37. Dialogue with students about their own learning increases participation in their learning. Quality conversations assist students to move from knowing content to achieving a depth of understanding. Consider how key comments and phrases used by students through quality conversations could be recorded (e.g. web 2 tools) to assist in making professional judgements about whether each student has achieved the success criteria, or whether they are ‘above standard’.

38. Scripture • Core Scripture texts taught throughout the year need to cover the following three elements: • A study of the world of the text • A study of the world behind the text • An exploration of the world in front of the text • See BCE RE Curriculum

39. Teacher evaluation and student feedback • Spending even 5 minutes recording your evaluation of the unit in key areas can be enormously helpful for informing future planning and professional dialogue. Target key areas (where things went really well or where further support would be most beneficial) • As the target audience for our planning, how can appropriate feedback from studentsbe obtained?