Mohammad Zakaria
Locating and Implementing Values in Religious Education: The Place of Ethics & Morality in GCSE Religious Education Resources.
This article addresses Religious education in Britain and the significant changes which It has undergone, which have mirrored the changing religious landscape and nature of British society. Although the change has not been simultaneous it has been significant and meaningful, to the extent that all the major world faiths are represented in the teaching content within University based Religious Education Teacher Training qualification, the five main Examination boards and a broad range of resources for the study and teaching of Religious Education at the GCSE and GCE levels are now readily available. What is of further interest for contemporary British society is that increasing numbers of children of secondary school age (entered for GCSE Religious Education qualifications) per research data (Bullivant, 2015) are growing up in a society whose population increasingly describes themselves as non-religious or lacking a faith in a supreme deity. A figure of 48.6% identifies as having ‘No Religion’ referred to in the research as ‘Nones’, equating to 24.3 million people (Bullivant, 2015). With the increase of secularism within British society and a negation of deity in the public and private the spheres the role religion (established church) once played in defining and regulating values. Has been replaced by an ever increasing, socially relevant and confident secularism, which has successfully entered all aspects of contemporary post sacred faith British society. This article’s central focus is on locating the source of ‘values’, in Religious Education and the shape and form of the ethics and morality which emerge from it within a variety of Religious Education resources.
