Areas of Weakness (Wales)

Unsatisfactory standards in RE are identified by Estyn as when pupils:

• have a superficial knowledge of a narrow range of religious traditions and no conceptual framework within which to understand the facts they learn;
• are unaware of the contemporary significance and context of religious belief and practice;
• show little awareness of the significance, for believers today, of authoritative texts and traditions or of key contemporary and historical teachers and leaders;
• fail to understand how beliefs influence and regulate people's way of life and shape their own identity and that of the communities to which they belong;
• interpret expressions of religious belief in narrow, uncritical and inappropriately literal terms;
• remain oblivious to the fact that their experience of the natural world and their relationships with other people present questions, issues and dilemmas that religious belief and practice seek to address;
• find it difficult to explore religion and human experience for themselves or to express their own responses to the issues and questions that are raised.