The Daily Act of Collective Worship and Religious Education

Daily Worship

Wadham is a Church of England Voluntary Controlled School and, as such, it sets out to communicate and uphold Christian teaching and values.

Although the School is too large for all students to be accommodated easily in our Assembly Hall, Acts of Collective Worship are held daily for different groupings of students, particularly by Year Groups in addition to the daily meetings of the Tutor Groups with their Tutors and House meetings. Two "half-School "Acts of Collective Worship are held weekly.

The aims and ethos of the School reflect the fact that the Spiritual and Moral dimension of education should not be artificially separated from the curriculum or from the daily life of the School. As a Community School the building up and strengthening of relationships and a sense of community goes much wider than that of the statutory School day.

The formality and orderliness of our daily meetings helps to confirm the corporate life of the School and its common values. The range of "worship" or "worthship" extends from the "daily-quotations" and discussions between tutors and students through times of quiet reflection to the more formal acts of worship where inspiration can be found from the readings, talks, music and prayers.

The Spiritual Dimension

For both staff and students it is often the case that spiritual awareness arises out of the experiences of the teaching and learning situation. Most subjects offer the opportunity to question the purpose of our world and our place in it. Quite often the words of a poem, the number patterns in mathematics or the wonder of a scientific experiment serve to heighten spiritual awareness and the fact that the whole School shares in our Life Education Programme heightens our awareness of the moral issues which face the world.

We always welcome contributions from our friends in the community to share in presenting a balance of viewpoint and to give the students the opportunity to explore these issues for themselves.

Religious Education (called Religion and Philosophy at Wadham)

As far as Religion and Philosophy is concerned we follow the Somerset Agreed syllabus for Religious Education (available in School) which "reflects the fact that the religious traditions in Great Britain are in the main Christian whilst taking account of the teaching and practices of the other principal religions represented in Great Britain" (1988 Education Act). The law requires R.E. to be taught in all years including years 10 and 11 and in the Sixth Form. School has met these requirements, including meeting the Attainment Targets for the various key stages.In Religion and Philosophy our aim is to assist students in their personal search for the meaning and purpose of life through the exploration of human experiences which raise fundamental questions about beliefs and values. We aim to provide knowledge and understanding of Christianity and other major religious traditions represented in Britain today and the way in which they approach or try to explain the fundamental issues of life.

Right of Non-Participation

Parents continue to have the right to withdraw their son/daughter from the Act of Collective Worship and from Religion and Philosophy lessons and they should contact the Headteacher in the first instance.

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