Religious Education in Schools

irishconvert

Hi guys & gals,

It's a long time since I've been in school so I was wondering what religious education is like nowadays. Do they teach about the religions of the world or is it still focused on Catholicism?

When I was in school they taught us in detail about Catholism, that it was the right religion and every other religion was wrong. They didn't teach us anything about any of the other world religions (Islam, Hindu, Sikh, etc) so I left school being fairly ignorant. I didn't even know the difference between a Muslim and a Hindu!

So what is it like now, interested to hear your experience.

Thanks.

allanb49

When i was in 5th class all we did was watch movies and the simpsons. Seemed just like a 40 min break for the students and teachers

In primary school, it was all very catholic
In secondary I didn't have any religious education, which was fine by me

AnonoBoy

irishconvert wrote: »

So what is it like now, interested to hear your experience.

When I go into National Schools now it seems like all I hear is the same old thing.

"Excuse me Sir but what are you doing here? Can you leave please?"

RoadKillTs

I think it was replaced with social studies or something like that.

Biggins

When I was at school in secondary, "Religious Class" was actually a free class that that the teachers allowed us to do our homework or study of other subjects.
As long as we behaved, we could treat that period as basically a free period.

irishdub14

My religion book has all the main religions in it, but the class itself is a joke, its a complete doss class, we have no respect for the teacher and most of us refuse to do any work because our school doesn't do the religion LC Exam, so we don't really learn anything fortunately!

lily09

Ok can only talk about my experience in primary school
The Alive-O program is what is used. In the Junior classes this is mainly based on using story to teach "the commandments" it has a particular emphasis on I am special, to encourage self awareness and growth.
The children are introduced to different bible stories and stories of saints in different years ie it might be St Patrick one year and St Brigid the next.
In the more Senior Classes there is all this and an emphasis on development education, ie the lives of those in developing countries and what can be done to help.
This is my experience in the classes I have taught and am open to correction.
Totally agree that children should be taught aspects of other religions, deity, traditions etc If nothing else they really do find it interesting and would hopefully promote tolerance in later life. Ironically it was in teacher training college I learnt about other religions only for it not to have a place in the primary school.
Hope that helps

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

irishconvert wrote: »

Hi guys & gals,

It's a long time since I've been in school so I was wondering what religious education is like nowadays. Do they teach about the religions of the world or is it still focused on Catholicism?

When I was in school they taught us in detail about Catholism, that it was the right religion and every other religion was wrong. They didn't teach us anything about any of the other world religions (Islam, Hindu, Sikh, etc) so I left school being fairly ignorant. I didn't even know the difference between a Muslim and a Hindu!

So what is it like now, interested to hear your experience.

Thanks.

Q -What's a Hindu?
A - Lays eggs!

ancapailldorcha

Non-Catholic in a Catholic area, no religion for me!! They did arrange for our minister to come in Friday mornings but it clashed with Woodwork so I wasn't arsed going by myself.

Cookie_Monster

i read the junior cert exam for Religious education not so long ago. Its balanced across all the religions but most of the questions try to relate philosophy and morals and religion into the one question.

"God does not exist, all religions are immoral and wrong" would have been my answer to every question, and I would have failed it.

irishconvert

lily09 wrote: »

Ok can only talk about my experience in primary school
The Alive-O program is what is used. In the Junior classes this is mainly based on using story to teach "the commandments" it has a particular emphasis on I am special, to encourage self awareness and growth.
The children are introduced to different bible stories and stories of saints in different years ie it might be St Patrick one year and St Brigid the next.
In the more Senior Classes there is all this and an emphasis on development education, ie the lives of those in developing countries and what can be done to help.
This is my experience in the classes I have taught and am open to correction.
Totally agree that children should be taught aspects of other religions, deity, traditions etc If nothing else they really do find it interesting and would hopefully promote tolerance in later life. Ironically it was in teacher training college I learnt about other religions only for it not to have a place in the primary school.
Hope that helps

Very interesting, thanks for that Lily. Is it a Catholic school you teach in?

Terry

We had no choice in secondary school.
There was a handful of CoI students who would have a class with the local Vicar (or whatever his title was). The rest of us were forced to listen to the teachings of Camilla the Nun.

There was a visiting priest there one day. He went around the class shaking hands with everyone. I was wearing fingerless gloves, as was the style at the time, and didn't remove them when I shook his hand.
Got a week in detention for that one.

Bunch of out of date idiots, all those Catholic religion teachers. They shouldn't be allowed to preach their intolerance to vulnerable children.

MitchKoobski

I went to De La Salle and in the junior cert it was mainly about different religions of the world, with a small few classes about issues around the world.
Leaving Cert was mostly a free class, but when we were made work it mainly turned into a social class or something. We just watched videos on abortion, road deaths and drugs.

Forgot to add, for the one class where we were actually taught by a christian brother, he just had us watch Dances With Wolves because it was his favourite film.

Sanjuro

We had a religious teacher in 4th year who was fresh-faced, straight out of Maynooth. Must have been about 25 or 26 years of age. Mr. Peppard was his name. So second day, somebody wrote 'PEPPER DUCKY' on the blackboard before he came in. He saw it, literally had a ciniption fit and demanded we wrote out Genesis in our copy books for the following morning. We all started laughing. He lasted a week, I think. That's pretty much all I can remember from Religion class.

Sanjuro

Sanjuro wrote: »

We had a religious teacher in 4th year who was fresh-faced, straight out of Maynooth. Must have been about 25 or 26 years of age. Mr. Peppard was his name. So second day, somebody wrote 'PEPPER DUCKY' on the blackboard before he came in. He saw it, literally had a ciniption fit and demanded we wrote out Genesis in our copy books for the following morning. We all started laughing. He lasted a week, I think. That's pretty much all I can remember from Religion class.

lol, sitting here giggling at my desk now...
pepper ducky, that's brilliant

derfderf

After the jc our religion class was more of a social studies / self awareness class. The drug talks were very informative. The teacher warned us all about the dangers of cannabis that she learned about by speaking to people who'd destroyed the lining of their nose by sniffing it.
They knew as much about educating people on the dangers of drugs as the catholic church knows about educating people about being a good person.

lily09

irishconvert wrote: »

Very interesting, thanks for that Lily. Is it a Catholic school you teach in?

Your welcome, yes I teach in a small catholic school. The Church of Ireland use quite a similar program.
I would not be religous in the slightest but I must say that the program can be very nice as it has a lot of emphasis on the self development of the child, lots of stories some songs and little activities.
In the older classes I have done work on teaching about other religions through the History and Geography aspects of the curriculum and there has never been a problem with this.
Religion is supposed to be taught for half an hour a day (and at 12 o clock from an old rule!) but I must confess it can be compacted slightly in favour of Maths and English:rolleyes:

starlit

Strictly catholic when I was attending primary school. Mostly catholic religion in secondary school but did learn a little bit about other religions but not very much. Religion in secondary school wasn't like primary school where they shoved catholic teachings down our throats. :mad:
didn't have religion as an exam subject for JC and LC in my time at least!

prinz

Can't remember much of primary school, mostly listening to stories/ drawing pictures and the likes. More morality based than strictly religious.

Secondary school did all the major world religions and atheism. Mixed class religion or lack of wise. No issues. Really interesting class. More like history and social studies mixed with philosophy tbh. Never had books, or work to do. Religion class was more a debate/discussion structure, name some members of x religion, what we knew, what we wanted to know, compare and contrast beliefs etc.

This was in a school run by a Catholic order too. Catholicism got no more mention that any other.

Nevyn

irishconvert wrote: »

Very interesting, thanks for that Lily. Is it a Catholic school you teach in?

Alive -O is the program in all the Catholic ethos Primary schools which is approximately 90% of all primary school and yes in those school it is still taught that Catholicism is the only one true religion with daily prayers ect.

http://www.veritas.ie/Education/Primary_School/Pupils_Books/Aliveo_8_Pupils_Text/1853907049/details3.aspx

http://www.catholicireland.net/pages/index.php?nd=363&art=1209

Absolution

its based on world religions.

spurious

If, as according to this thread, there is very little religious education going on, you'd wonder what reason the churches will come up with to justify their hanging on to control of the vast majority of schools in this country.

Mike 1972

religious education = contradiction in terms ?

spurious wrote: »

If, as according to this thread, there is very little religious education going on, you'd wonder what reason the churches will come up with to justify their hanging on to control of the vast majority of schools in this country.

It never ceases to amaze me how people will identify (sometimes quite strongly) with a particular religion without having a clue about many of the basic tenets of said religion.

ScumLord

Our secondary school was a catholic school we used to have a few nuns teaching us (90s). My English/religion teacher was a nun but actually a really nice person, she was always fair and honest with the students and everyone liked her. She didn't dress like a nun though. She's left a lasting impression of what religion can inspire in a person if they focus on the forgiveness and understanding part of Christianity.

We had a lot of mass that we all had to take part in but I don't remember religion class being overtly Catholic but definitely Christian. They did try to have a class but it was a doss class really.

kylith

In second year the protestant girl in the class had to tell us all about being a protestant. Then we went on a trip to the local Methodist church where the vicar, or whatever, bitched about how the Catholics had given them the church 200 years ago knowing full well that it was crappily built, leaking and rotten.

That was about it for compartative religion.

SV

My only memory from Religious education in school was being the only one in the class to deny the existance of a God and the teacher then attempting to give me detention for it.

In those classes after I just did homework and the teacher would constantly come up and give me scriptures from the bible with bits highlighted to tell me how I could be saved and if I kept doing what I was doing I'd spend all eternity in hell....

ahhh RE, how I miss you.

Mike 1972

kylith wrote: »

In second year the protestant girl in the class had to tell us all about being a protestant. .

Was her name "Token" :pac:

Chuchoter

Up through primary school, it was all catholic but mostly singing songs and reading silly stories. Secondary school we do it as an exam subject up until JC (waffle olympics) and then we have it for senior cycle but I don't know what its for. We covered Judaism. It was and is the biggest waste of a subject going (one class a week till sixth year but it was like 4 a week until 3rd! I could have been doing Irish or Maths!)

Celly Smunt

i'm happy to have gone to a prod school

kylith

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Was her name "Token" :pac:

Now you mention it, I believe it was.

George Orwell 1982

pmcmahon wrote: »

i'm happy to have gone to a prod school

God save the Queen.

Celly Smunt

George Orwell 1982 wrote: »

God save the Queen.

so you're a loyalist by being a prod?

storm2811

In primary school Catholosism wasn't really forced on us,not by the relligous books anyway but two teachers were nuns,who are gone now.
A lot of time is wasted during communion and conformation though,basically just 3 months of writing about religion,making posters and singing hymns.

In secondary school,the junior cert religion syllabus anyway,is mainly based on,morality,religious groups(SVP etc.),pilgrimages,religious figures,prayer/meditation and Islam.
Stuff like that,not based on one religion itself,depends on the teacher you have,if they're a die hard catholic or nun of course they'd still teach you the main syllabus but rabble on about Catholosism.
Unfortunately for me,my principal is an ex-nun,so there's religious statues/pictures all over the place and a few months ago we had two born again christians come in and talk to us.

There was also this priest who came in talking about this place he runs where they take junkies out of Dublin and put them on this farm where they have to grow their own crops and kill their own animals,it was weird.
He asked us all to pray and I didn't,he then said people who don't join in and pray are probably going to be drug users and are depressed.
I walked out of school that day,I usually think priests are alright but this guy was just a bollox.

kylith

storm2811 wrote: »

...principal is an ex-nun,so there's religious statues/pictures all over the place and a few months ago we had two born again christians come in and talk to us.

I used to work with a born again; pain in the arras, she was, but fun to take the piss out of.

Her: You shouldn't have sex before marriage, it's sinful. You should save yourself for marriage.
Me: So, are you a virgin then?
Her: Um... no....
Me: Shut the frak up so.