Too much religion at school ?

[Twowords]

How much does your child's school reference religion in teaching about something else? We don't identify as Christian or any religion and our child just started at our local village C of E school last week. We realised that there would be teaching about different religions, however the second day of school they have learnt Christian songs and the first term 'homework' has a big section to read out about Jesus, using it to explain respect, which in our opinion could have been done using loads of other examples in a secular way. Am I being unreasonable to expect that they shouldn't be pushing this as the first homework example? Is this common with your experiences of C of E schools?

Yanbu. Religion shouldn't be in education.

Most people's "choice" of school is actually very limited so saying "just choose a different one" doesn't work.

Just tell your daughter it's not true. School aren't being shy about telling her things - absolutely no reason for you to pussyfoot around it. If they're telling her things that don't align with your values, all the more need for you to communicate those values to her.

I mean, get her to do the reading and so on, but tell her it's stories that people make up. Which it is.

I don’t think you can really send your child to a faith school and then say they’re learning too much around that religion.

My children went to a CofE school and we are another religion. We talked about it lots at home and I think it was good for my children. A lot of it was just good morals.

Your children being happy, having nice friends and a supportive environment is what matters.

Agree with this one hundred percent. Why send them to a faith school??
My children attend a C of E school as we wanted them to go to a faith school.
I cannot believe you are complaining about religion when you are sending them to a faith school.
YABVU

In your opinion it isn’t true. That’s it - YOUR opinion.

🙄🙄🙄

Religion and gender are both indotrcines. Neither have a place in a modern school.

To be fair to OP our local village school was CofE and so were all the surrounding ones.
I'm not sure where dc would go if they didn't want to go to a CofE school.

No it doesn't.

They're not uniquely Christian principles, believe it or not non religious schools teach those exact same principles of love and kindness just because it's the right way to behave, not so that you won't be a sinner and go to hell.

Maybe the clergy shouldn't have abused so many children and vulnerable people and then more people would have kept religion as a part of their lives and their childrens lives😃

@Twowords I'm also a rural atheist (albeit a lapse confirmed Catholic) whose dc went to a CoE primary school due to limited choice. They are Y7 and Y10 now, so it's a things of the past, but here's my experience:

-The Autumn term tends to be the most religious, with Harvest Festival and Christmas, and general getting-to-know-you niceness.

• In DS's class, there was only 1 family were regular church goers, and parishioners of the church the school is attached to, 1practicing Catholic family, and 1 Muslim family.
• My DC learnt about Christianity, but left it at school. I want them to know about it - I can't hide it, and it does underlie a lot of our customs. Christianity was very compartmentalised to school. I took opportunities to explain the links/history of pagan festivals and Christian festivals eg midwinter solstice/Chistmas; Oestra/Easter.
• Attending a CoE primary school didn't make us a family of God-botherers!
• My DC havn't not wanted to ever go to church our if school, and never since they left primary school.
• I agree, "Christian values" are general "being nice and thoughtful to other people" values.
• The school/church/village has a tremendous sense of community. The vicar came to vicaring later in life and is very aware of an increasing secular society/dwindling congregations, and is very involved with what the church can do to support the villagers, whertger ir not they are parishioners - aligned with "Christian values" but not pushing the Christianity - eg: food bank in the church; supporting Ukrainian refugees; running a holiday club; weekly coffee mornings for older/lonely/newcomer folk.
• Just wait til you hear some of the dreadful, misogynistic, secular songs that get rolled out for Mother's Day (which is astonishingly un-religioused) - save your complaints for them!

So many ignorant posters sneering about 'what did you expect'. Grow up and try to understand that in lots of areas in the UK there are only CofE schools. The nearest non-faith school might be 20 miles away and the chance of getting a place there will be non-existent.

Also the level of religious indoctrination (as opposed to the learning about religion) is completely dependent on the HT. The sneerers might be interested to know that if their local non-faith school has a change of HT they might find the children saying a prayer when they arrive, saying grace before food and having two religious assemblies a day. I know, I've worked in one!
Looks like you might have to roll with it op but instil your own values as a non-believer at home.

As someone upthread mentioned, even completely 'secular' primary schools in the UK have (by law) to include a 'daily act of worship' by the children.

IMO that's religious indoctrination in a country that is in no way 'Christian' anymore. It absolutely boils my piss.

I’m an atheist but I wouldn’t have a problem with this. They’re using it to teach respect for others. They aren’t teaching that dinosaurs don’t exist, or that evolution is a load of rubbish.

Most CofE schools are not technically faith schools, they are inclusive schools. They will not have a religion requirement in their admissions policy. But they will have to follow SIAMS framework

I'm a Christian, but I hate the way that so many families have no choice but to send their children to a faith school. It should be an opt-in choice, not the only option, and I think that CofE schools which are the only realistic option for local families should be sensitive about this, and not pressure children or their families into to participating in a religion they aren't part of when they are uncomfortable with that. There are ways of educating people about faith and demonstrating faith and sharing cultural elements of that faith and offering the option to join in without making people actually participate in it.

@Twowords I tend to agree with you. We had a wonderful community infants school and the daily act of worship was light touch about being kind, sharing what you have etc. Roll on to CofE junior. More religious in character but light touch. My DC have left this school years ago and both went to schools with religious affiliation for secondary. Neither is religious so Dc choose what they want and usually follow parental ethos.

Going back to the CofE junior school. New head - religious zeal! Prayers before lessons. Religious sayings all over the building. In your face religion with vicar taking much more interest. I would avoid it now. Luckily I would be able to do this but many cannot. This is not even an Aided school which select on CofE affiliation and church attendance. It’s a bog standard junior school.

So I’m with you. Just engage with the minimum. I would hate bible notices everywhere and prayers all the time as happens here now. My neighbour is a CofE head. Her school web site is littered with bible references. It’s clearly in every aspect of school life. No escaping it. Her village residents would have to travel miles to another school. In these days, that’s hardly a green policy!! Some of this is very much down to the individual heads. CofE education can be very “recruiting” though via diocesan policies.

This is scary. If a person needs religion to tell them to essentially be a good person, a good member of society, then they have much bigger personal problems to deal with.

Love and kindness can and are being taught without needing to reference god and Jesus.

Actually, there are hardly any real secular schools out there, unless you it’s a private school. In most areas there is absolutely no choice other than the local CodE school. Sounds like the OP had no
alternative choice.

I think you are being unreasonable, OP.

I was brought up C of E but am now an agnostic. However, I'll be eternally grateful for the background knowledge of the Christian religion I gained - it's hugely helpful in all kinds of areas (music, art history, history - which is very much a story of religious conflict, let's be honest! - literature etc). So your children are getting a big leg-up when it comes to studying these subjects later on. We didn't go to church and our children went to a non-church school, but I got my old children's bible out (great, dramatic Hollywood epic-style pictures) and went through the basics (Jesus's life and some of the main stories - Creation, Exodus etc) because I knew the value of this cultural background. They also learned about other religions at school. I also didn't push my agnosticism - but just answered their questions honestly.

I think militant atheists can be as ruddy dogmatic and evengelical as fundamentalist religous people!

I taught at a C of E School (they knew my beliefs) and of course, I quietly supported the Christian ethos of the school. It was very gentle, broad-minded and inclusive and I think this is true of C of E Schools nowadays. Just enjoy the Nativity plays, Easter services etc etc - the children enjoy these things and it's part of the culture of this country - to understand the background to the various festivals, even though the religious element is not longer significant to most people.

It's up to you, but I wouldn't be too openly antagonistic to the religious side of things - let them come to their own conclusions 'organically'.

Hi OP, there are a lot of posts on here having a go at you for sending your child to a religious school, but I’m just wondering if you actually had a choice in the matter? I’m aware many parents don’t get a choice as to which school they are allocated.

I’m with you. I’m an atheist (from a Jewish background) and I would absolutely be intolerant of any kind of religious teaching outside of actual RE class. God is a fictional character and therefore to me, it’s not appropriate that my kids pray to him. We also don’t need religious values to be good people.

A lot of the time people do not have the choice as to which school their kids go to.

If you live in a rural location and the only primary is C of E, what, exactly, are you supposed to do?

Religion being taught as fact in school should have stopped decades ago, and here we are with the church still doing it's best to brainwash kids into believing this utter nonsense.

A C of E school has to do all the religious stuff because it's within the remit of the school.

My kids go to a C of E school as there was no nearby alternative. They do the religious stuff, and at home I just explain that I'm not religious, but as Christianity was a huge part of the UK in the past, then it's important to learn about it and that it's still important to many people.

If they want to believe in God, that's their choice. They can make up their own mind when they have the facts.

I'd expect that from a CoE school, it's why I didn't send mine to one (we are atheists so we wouldn't have been a good fit for the school and viseversa) as we had other options that weren't religious

We have a bit more than I'd like here (they go to the church a few times a year and have the vicar come in for assembly sometimes, but don't do the same for any other religions (though we're not in a particularly multicultural area)), but it's probably about the same as what we had when I was in primary, we weren't a CoE but sang hymns in assembly regularly

I knew the first few responses would tell you that you shouldn’t have sent them to a religious school when you clearly said in your OP that you were rural so likely no choice 🙄.

It sucks OP - especially as we are not a Christian country anymore. No schools should be faith schools, religion is for the home and it’s far better that children of all faiths learn together but it is what it is.

We just reinforced the point that this is what “some people believed” and so it redressed the brainwashing from school.

This would upset me too.
It’s terrible there’s no normal state schools (I.e. not religious) accessible to you. I wonder if there’s a case for arguing the council to provide transport to and back from the nearest non-religious school? Ethically there should be.
Or potentially home education might be an option if this is very important to you. (It is to me! No way would I send to my children to a Christian/ Catholic school).

People saying you shouldn't have chosen a C of E school where we live there are 2 C of E primary schools and one RC . You would have to go to the get town for a non religious school and the your childs friends would not ge local.

I went to C of E and am now (have always been) atheist. i think your parents' values rub off more than the ones in school. i was the only kid who really loved the stories about jesus! (probably cos i hadn't heard them before...). so don't worry. i only sent my DC to secular school because i just remember feeling it was such a waste of time singing songs that i didn't like/didn't believe in, that i could have spend that time playing!