Case studies

RE Week

Introduction

At REinspired we usually see a school throughout the year for their lessons. However when our programme with one school got off to a faltering start it provided the impetus to try something different - an RE Week.

The Problem

Hillside Primary School had heard about REinspired from other schools and had experienced a few sessions. But our relationship hadn't really got going when the team leader moved on. We found we would have been stretched supporting another school throughout the year.

The school was uncertain about the benefits of taking the next step of committing to lessons across the school.

REinspired was already working with 9 primary schools at the time and the challenge of finding somebody to look after another school throughout the year would have been difficult.

The Solution

After talking it through with the school's RE coordinator we agreed go into the school for a week in September and deliver shortened versions of two of our core sessions to each year group in the school hall.

Benefits

The school got to see the breadth, depth, quality and value of what REinspired could offer in the space of just one week with no on-going commitment to work with REinspired.

Taking REinspired into the school made it much easier for the school to commit to the idea because there was much less disruption to the classes, no extra help needed to walk children, and less paperwork!

REinspired didn't have to form a permanent team to look after the school because volunteers on our other teams were willing to commit to a couple of extra sessions during one week at a quiet time of year.

RE Week is looked on as one of the highlights of the school year.

Opportunities

With two lessons delivered to the same year group in the same week the lessons are fresh in the pupils' minds so it's frequently possible draw from the first lesson and build on it in the second one.

Even though RE Week is our main interaction with the school, frequent ad-hoc visits by clergy to the school and by year 1 pupils to the local parish church have resulted.

Conclusion

We've run an RE Week at Hillside Primary School annually ever since, and the school, having seen the benefits of working with REinspired, were happy to make the effort to walk all the children to a local church over the course of a week when the school hall was unavailable one year.

Be flexible in your approach to working with schools. It doesn't have to be the same in every school every year. RE Week worked for us because we were committed to a partnership with the school and were willing to work together to find a solution that worked for us both.