God and Jesus.... A conversation.

[Grauntie Mag]

Joe aged 6 said to me ' I think I believe in Jesus but not in God!' It seems they have had people from other religions to talk to them in class. I waffled my way round it and waited for DD1 to come. She is not happy. She says people from other religions come in and try to enforce their beliefs and the children are too young to understand the differences and so become confused. If this is so, it is wrong. Of course, she should go in to school and address the matter, but she has no spare time as she runs her own business. I'm not sure whether to stick my beak in. Would you?

[Oma]

I think she should sit and have a chat with him and explain in words she knows he will understand about it .If she can't go into school maybe sending a email outlining her concerns to the school governors Grauntie

[Daisy]

GM - Good advice from Oma. I think there are certain things primary children can be opted out of - and while I think it is good for children to learn about the main world religions, their similarities and their differences, I think 6 is far too young.

[Plantaholic]

Oh dear! What next are these young souls going to be subjected to in schools

[Sum1Ls]

Sadly, it sounds as if possibly the school has been negligent in its duty to teach religious education properly. Inviting outside speakers whose ideas and content of the 'lesson' is not known by the school, is a recipe for confusion.

Religious education is badly taught in most schools and although parents have the right to remove their child from collective acts of worship, in practice this rarely happens as assemblies tend to be moments of quiet reflection at their end.

As parents I think our duties are to share our own beliefs with our children, in the main, by example. If Mummy is worried, and it sounds as if Joe is thoroughly confused, her best course of action is to write to the headteacher and ask for clarification. RE should be teaching about a range of beliefs and practice, with Christianity predominant, but not about doctrines or pushing any one view.

In most schools you will find if RE is taught at all it will be through the the medium of stories from the Gospels or other sacred books with moral lessons drawn from them, as for example, the Good Samaritan or the escape from slavery. Sometimes their may be visits to places of worship in the locality.

It's likely that the school will only discuss this with the parents, but she could ask if you could meet with the head to obtain clarification about what is happening in lessons.

[Elisi]

I do completely agree with Sum1Ls. Whilst these "visitors" to the classroom explaining their Faith or non Faith are concerned are they not as guilty of indoctrination of the children with their beliefs as that which they accuse Christians ?

Last year my GD1's school was accused by that ridiculously PC correct Ofsted by not being multi cultural enough. A tiny village in the midst of the Wolds. !!!!!

Children should indeed be lead by their immediate family in matters of Faith and not subjected to complex and emotionally confusing outside influences until they are old enough to cope and seek answers for themselves.

[Shemadee]

One of my great nephews suddenly came out with "there is only one God and his name is Allah". This was some years back and we didn't really think too much about it. They live inBirmingham. GS1 never really mentions religion but GS2 quite often talks about God or religious matters. I would guess one of his teachers involves this with the lessons. SIL is a non-believer though he did tell boys a family friend had gone to heaven when they asked where he was now. Complex issues for adults and even more so for young children.

[Oma]

In Joshua school they have RE this is one lesson he really doesn't like, not because we are non believers ,we all encourage the grandchildren as we did our children to get the facts and make there own minds up about it. DD even said if he would like to go to church she will willingly take him but he just has no interest , When they have school trips to say for interest a synagogue all the parents had a letter to sign giving permission, DD gives Josh the choice if he wants to go or not . Only once has he objected to anything and that was when they were learning about the Quran and the teacher insisted they say a certain phrase all the time I think it was something like Allah be with you , Josh just wouldn't say it he thought it was disrespectful as he didn't believe in it , but DD explained it was only like us saying Amen , He wasn't happy so DD had to go into school and have a word with this teacher who actually understood where he was coming from and was glad he understood and was mature enough to decide himself . He is not sure what he believes but we keep telling him he has years of growing up yet and time will tell , no matter what he decides it's ok with us ☺

[Gemini]

I seem to think when my children were at school they learned about Christianity, which is the main and traditional religion of our country, first. RE in later years covered other faiths. I agree totally with this, as we are a multi cultural society these days. I do think they should be old enough to understand their own faith, if they follow it, before learning others. Otherwise it's like having French lessons before you have mastered English!
When I worked in a primary school, the children learned about Diwali and Hannukah. They understood that these were festivals which other religions celebrate, as we celebrate Christmas. Some of the things I have read on this thread seem to have confused children, rather than giving them an insight into various religions.