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Religious Studies
Religious Studies is a compulsory subject at all levels.
As taught in the Senior School, it follows a spiral pattern with the students revisiting key issues each year with increasing complexity. Students are taught by specialist teachers and encouraged to commence their life-long search for understanding, meaning and spirituality. They participate fully in class activities and respect other students' ideas and beliefs. Class discussions aim to help students think critically and to encourage enquiry into the religious and moral issues, which underpin society.
Year 7
The first year in Senior School lays down firm foundations for future years of study. We understand that students come from varied backgrounds and schools, and therefore their knowledge will be assessed and their needs catered for.
Why do we study religion?
In Term 1, students will endeavour to find an answer to this question through ‘The Island' unit. Here they are transported to an imaginary desert island, and through a range of sensory stimuli, determine how we, as humans, need to have a structure of the spiritual, combined with ritual and tradition in our lives.
How Christianity began
Term 2 develops studies of the Christian faith by looking at the origins of the religion, key figures in the Old Testament, the Anglican denomination and our use of symbols to aid understanding and teaching.
Equality in Sikhism
Term 3 explores key beliefs within Sikhism, focusing on equality and the importance of the Langar within the Gurdwara.
Was Jesus an historical Figure?
In the final term, students examine the historical evidence around Jesus’ existence and then explore Jesus as the founder of the Christian faith.
Year 8
Students cover four units in Year 8. We also begin to explore comparative religion in more depth. As Islam is the second largest religion in the world, and often misrepresented in the media, a study of the basic beliefs and practices are taught with a focus not only on learning about religion but also learning from religion.
What does it mean to be an Anglican in Australia?
In the first term, students explore Anglican Christian worship with a particular focus on belief, faith and the idea of God. We also provide a historical context of how the Church has developed over two centuries.
Worship and Prayer
During the second term, students partake in a thorough examination of the meaning and purpose of The Lord's Prayer. Students also spend some time analysing how and why people of all religious traditions use prayer.
Do our actions affect us when we die?
This Term 3 unit examines the concepts of reincarnation within Hinduism. We also compare other faith’s views of life after death.
The Islamic Vision
In Term 4, students explore Islam through key religious beliefs and practices. Students also learn about the link between Islam, Christianity and Judaism.
Year 9
Students continue their search for answers to life's big questions and develop their knowledge of the world's great religions through four challenging and searching programmes of study.
Religion, Justice and Equality
The study of ethics is continued with a special focus on global issues - respect, need or greed, development charities such as Anglicare and The Anglican Board of Mission, and equality in the roles of women, ethnicity and culture.
Christian Community and Tradition
In Term 2, students will consider the meaning and importance of the Bible and the Church for different groups of Christians.
Worship and Celebration
In Term 3 students explore, think, and learn about how people become members of the Christian Church, and how they worship and celebrate festivals.
What is it like to be Jewish?
The final unit in Year 9 asks students to study Judaism's foundation, culture, beliefs and practices in preparation for studies on the Holocaust in Year 10. They will explore the historical background of the important concept of covenant; look at kashrut and Shabbat and examine the importance of rites of passage such as Brit Milah and Bar Mitzvah.
Year 10
This year of study aims to stimulate students' interest in further big questions in life, as well as providing opportunities for spiritual development.
Why do we suffer?
In the first term, we examine concepts central to religion. All the major religions offer insights into the struggle between good and evil in human experience and suggest answers regarding the origin, nature and end of evil.
Can happiness be achieved?
This unit explores some of the key philosophies of Buddhism, paying particular attention to the noble eight fold path and the four noble truths.
Jewish Responses to the Holocaust
In the third term, students examine the causes and effects of the Holocaust on the Jewish religion. An empathetic exercise, ‘Diary of a Jewish Teenager in the Warsaw Ghetto', concludes the unit.
Living a Christian Life
For our final unit in Year 10, students explore the idea of Christian vocation and how the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount act as a guide for living. They will also re-examine some of the earlier units focusing on how Christians respond to evil and suffering.
Year 11 and 12
The programme consolidates the understandings and teachings of Christianity gained from previous years. The course aims to encourage students to think about themselves, the society in which they live and the meaning of life.
The course is divided into six main sections:
- Believing in God – religious upbringing and experience, design, causation and belief in God, the search for meaning and purpose, evil and suffering.
- Matters of life and death – life after death, abortion, euthanasia, genetic engineering
- Marriage and the Family – the purpose of marriage, divorce and family life.
- Religion and the Media – the variety and range of specifically religious programmes, religious themes in film and television dramas and how religion is dealt with in the media.
- Community Cohesion – how Christians respond to prejudice, discrimination and social harmony
- Capital Punishment – explores personal and religious responses to capital punishment
