Ethics, Philosophy & Religion and French Year 7

[lollybongbong]

We will be moving from abroad back to the UK (Leicestershire) next summer and my son will be entering a UK State school for the first time (he'll be entering year 8).

I've spent quite a bit of time looking through the UK curriculums for Geography, History, Science and Maths and we've been working through some books with him in preparation. I've looked at schools in the area and the school in the catchment area, which we hope he will go to does lessons in Ethics, philosophy and Religion. I don't want to spend too much time preparing him for this but can anybody recommend some good resources. We live in the Middle East and he currently learns about Islam and Christianity, the two main religions here.

The secondary is quite small and only offers French as a MFL. Where we are now, he does German and Arabic, although he studied a little French at primary school. I want to reintroduce French over the next few months, however, my French is very bad so I can't teach it as such. I know that many schools utilise the use of technology in schools with the use of ipads etc. Can anybody recommend some good apps or books we could use?

If he knows about Christianity & Islam he'll be well setup for RE.

The ethics stuff is likely to be things like Abortion, Euthanasia, Divorce. DD is doing RE for GCSE and has to be able to say things like:
"Catholics are against abortion because they think life begins at conception. Muslims are also generally against abortion but will permit it under certain circumstances before 120 days when ensoulment occurs. I believe in a woman's right to choose up to 12 weeks."

re resources, try searching for Hodder GCSE RE guides (or CGP ones but the Hodder ones tend to be more expansive.)

Can't help on French.

For start of Year 8, I wouldn't worry too much about catching up on the Philosophy. the main thing is to understand how to give and evaluate different points of view.

so, if the topic is life after death, you need to be able to say "Christians think x, Muslims think y, other people think z. I think abc because ..."

This will have been new to most of the students in Year 7, and Philosophy typically doesn't have too many timetabled lessons, so other than maybe getting into discussion at home about "philosophical" subjects, I wouldn't worry too much about it.

What many RE teachers forget is the word 'some.' Some Christians believe that and some Muslims believe that With that mindset of the breadth of the major monotheistic religions and remembering that if you have three rabbis in a room you have four opinions he will go far.

To find the rationale behind teaching RE and what the learning outcomes are type the word SACRE into google with your local authority name you will get some idea of what has been and is going to be taught. An example is here schools.essex.gov.uk/other/Essex_SACRE/Documents/RE%20AGREED%20SYLLABUS%202015%20exploRE.pdf

Ah yes Mostly DD does write 'some' or 'most'. I'm not doing the GCSE myself so don't need the get the wording spot on!

Re French, if he is already learning German and Arabic then unless he has specific difficulties, he will find learning a 3rd language easier. (I have 3 DC who all speak 3 languages for various reasons and have found each language progressively easier to learn despite some of them being harder.)

Duolingo or Brainscape are good apps. I'm not sure how great the grammar instruction is on Duolingo but worth a look. You could buy him a Bescherelle grammaire book - there are many and for different ages/levels - used by all children in French speaking countries but I wouldn't worry too much.

Honestly i wouldn't worry too much, from what you've said the only area he is likely to be slightly behind in is French. On entering secondary the differences in language ability is absolutely huge, some will have done a fair amount in primary, others will have done none at all. It may be asking whether they stream/set for French by ability. You don't want him to end up in the bottom group with kids who just hate it/hate languages full stop and probably will drop it before GCSE.

Maybe worth finding out which textbook they use for French in yr7 and go through it? It shouldn't be too hard, they will have started from complete scratch.

Linguascope is a website we use at school to teach French in Key stage 2 (7-11 year olds)

As already stated, at Y8 the ethics and philosophy of religion taught in Religious Education lessons is very straightforward and does not require prior preparation. The ethics will likely all be applied ethics (different approaches to abortion, euthanasia, crime and punishment, the environment...) They will learn a little bit about about why different religious groups hold the views they do and they might learn about the idea that some people think things are right or wrong in themselves, while other people think the consequences of the action are what counts. In Philosophy of Religion they will be introduced to some of the basic arguments for the existence of God and encouraged to think about the strengths and weaknesses of each argument. It is unlikely that they will be introduced to much complex philosophical or theological vocabulary in any of these topics at this age. Think of the lessons as a form of early introduction to rhetoric. They are beginning to develop the skills to understand different arguments on the same topic, evaluate them and reach their own well reasoned conclusion.

My daughter moved into a French speaking class for Y8. Over the summer I studied an hour a day with her and she is doing well now. If you know any French at all, you should be fine teaching her.

We used the Expo 1 book and accompanying workbook plus CGP workbooks. Quizlet is good for learning the vocab and spelling. You can find tons of flashcards for Expo 1 on there.