Easter in the context of the new agreed syllabus
1. The new agreed syllabus is much more
specific than its 1995 predecessor about what RE is to be taught during Key
Stages 1 and 2. For each year in these key stages, the RE programme must
include:
·
four RE units;
·
a
school-designed unit on the theme ‘Celebration, Festival and Community’.
2. Each year, the school-designed unit must
include specific work on both Easter and Christmas (including, but not limited
to, classroom activity).
3. In order
to assist schools in creating broad and balanced RE programmes that address
both continuity and progression, a focus (phrased as a question) is suggested
for each year group’s exploration of Easter:
Year 1 How do
we know that Easter is coming?
Year 2 What
special story is told at Easter?
Year
4 How
do Christians remember the events of Holy Week?
Year
5 Why
is Easter important for Christians?
Year
6 What
are the sources of the story about what happened on the first Easter Sunday?
Easter in the context of Christian history
1. Easter has always been the central
Christian festival. It was the belief that Jesus had risen from the dead that
gave rise to the Christian Church. This belief inspired the early Christians
and, as they looked back on Jesus’ life, they wrote about it in the light of
this event.
2.
The first Christians were Jews
who kept the Sabbath. However, Sunday became the most significant day of the
week for them because it was on this day (Easter Sunday) that the resurrection
of Jesus took place. Indeed, the events of the last week of Jesus’ life became
very significant for them and so they were recalled and passed on. The special
days of ‘Holy Week’ are:
· Palm
Sunday (when Jesus entered Jerusalem riding on a donkey, what Christians have
called his ‘triumphal entry’);
· Maundy
Thursday (when Jesus shared his last supper with his closest followers);
· Good
Friday (when Jesus was crucified by the Roman authorities);
· Holy Saturday;
and
· Easter
Sunday (when the tomb in which Jesus’ body had been placed was found to be
empty and when some of Jesus’ followers ‘met’ him again).
3. It was deeply significant to the Early
Christians that Jesus’ death (on ‘Good Friday’) and resurrection (on ‘Easter
Sunday’) took place at the time of the Jewish Pesach (Passover) festival
that celebrated freedom and focused on the idea of sacrifice. For Christians
down the ages, it has also been significant that Easter is a Spring
festival when rebirth and springing back to life are so evident in nature.
4. Exactly what happened on the first
Easter Sunday has been the subject of great thought and reflection down the
centuries. Not all Christians would take an absolutely literal view of the
accounts left by the first Christians (who lived in a pre-scientific world in
which notions of ‘scientific accuracy’ were absent). But all Christians would
probably agree that something extraordinary did happen: how else would a
small group of followers of Jesus of Nazareth, who fled when he was tried,
flogged and executed (by crucifixion), some weeks later be announcing with
great fervour the ‘good news’ (the meaning of the word ‘gospel’) that Jesus had
risen from the dead and was available to all?
5. In the European Middle Ages, when
religion was heavily mixed with superstition, relics (objects associated
with the life of Jesus or other biblical events) were held to hold great
spiritual and magical power. Relics included such things as nails that were
used to crucify Jesus and pieces of the ‘true cross’. (For an understanding of
the power which such objects were believed to have, see Melvyn Bragg’s Novel
about life in post-Roman Britain, Credo – Sceptre, ISBN 0 340 66706 0 –
where a piece of the true cross figures prominently.) Many legends grew up
around the ‘True Cross’.
6. The shape and style of Christian crosses
are varied and can tell us much about how particular Christian groups look at
the Easter event eg
· Roman
Catholic Christians usually use a crucifix (ie a cross with the figure
of the dying Jesus upon it) which helps them to focus on Jesus’ death as a
sacrifice;
· Protestant Christian groups usually use an empty cross
that helps them to focus on the resurrection of Jesus.
7. The centrality of Easter to the Christian story is reflected in many of the features of church buildings and the practices that take place there eg
· the cruciform ground plan of the traditional church building;
· around
the inside walls of a Roman Catholic church building will be found the
‘stations of the cross’, a series of 14 tablets or paintings depicting the
story of Jesus’ last hours;
· for
most Christian groups, the key act of worship is based on the Last Supper and
is called a variety of names – ‘Mass’ (Roman Catholic), Holy Communion
(Methodist), Eucharist (Church of England) etc.
8. As with many other Christian festivals,
elements of non-Christian festivals were incorporated into Easter. Indeed, the
name ‘Easter’ itself comes from the name of an Anglo-Saxon goddess Eostre.
9. As with Christmas, there are many traditional practices that have grown up around Easter (and which were often ‘borrowed’ from pre-Christian festivals and folklore). Many of these traditions involve the egg that is an ancient symbol of rebirth (ie an egg looks dead until, contrary to appearance, the chick bursts forth from it). Thus, practices involve such things as:
· decorating
eggs;
· exchanging
eggs;
· rolling
eggs;
· cracking
eggs against others;
· hiding
and finding eggs;
· eating
chocolate eggs.
1. Jesus is not only a significant figure
for Christians. For example:
·
Hindus might regard him as an inspired
religious figure and even have a picture of statue of him in their family shrine
(as Mahatma Gandhi did in his);
·
those with no or ambivalent
religious beliefs might still regard him as a person of great wisdom and a good
example.
2. Muslims regard Jesus (Isa –
pronounced ees-ah – in Arabic) as one of the line of prophets who preached
God’s message until the line ended with the Prophet Muhammad (570-632 CE) , the
‘seal of the prophets’. Muslims therefore honour Jesus though the Qur’an
teaches that he neither died on the cross nor rose from the dead.
Easter in the
context of contemporary culture
1. Given the huge (commercial) place of
Christmas in our own culture, it is easy to forget that Easter remains the most
important festival of the Christian year.
2. Within schools, there has been a tendency to stress Christmas as a festival because:
·
it ‘goes with the grain’ of what
is happening in society;
·
it is comfortable to look at
‘homely’ things like the birth of babies;
·
it is easy to skirt around
Christian beliefs.
3. By contrast, schools have often given less stress to Easter because:
· it
deals with harsher realities such as execution, death and bodies;
· the
belief in ‘resurrection from the dead’
does not easily fit with views of the world which our culture propagates;
· its
‘inner’ significance is difficult to grasp for those whose lives and thoughts
are not shaped by belonging to a worshipping Christian community.
4. In a multi-ethnic community like
Redbridge, boundaries between different groups, religions and traditions will
be fluid. A Sikh family, for example, might very well buy chocolate eggs at
Easter time.
The nature of the support material that
follows
1. For each of Years 1 to 6, the agreed
syllabus suggests an angle of approach through a lead question. This lead
question is followed below by some general ideas (shown in italics) and then four key questions.
2. Information about four types of resource
material has also been supplied:
·
planned activities found in the
Scholastic Curriculum Bank RE books;
·
useful websites;
·
Easter books.
Year 1 How do we know that Easter is coming?
Customs associated with Lent and Easter … Pancake Day (Shrove Tuesday), Ash Wednesday … eggs … hot cross buns … signs of new life …
·
What signs tell us that Easter is
coming?
·
What do our senses tell us about
Easter coming?
·
What feelings do we have about
Easter and springtime?
·
How would some Christians prepare
for Easter?
Year 2 What special story is told at Easter?
See eg The Easter Story by Brian Wildsmith or Easter by Gail Gibbons
·
What is the storyline of the
Easter story?
·
What do we think about when we
hear the story?
·
How do different books (picture
books, text books etc) show the Easter story?
·
How can we tell the Easter story
to others?
Year 3 How is Easter represented in art and music?
Easter cards … decorated eggs … famous Easter paintings … the Last Supper … Stations of the Cross … the crucifix and different kinds of cross … Handel’s Messiah …
· What special symbols are used at Easter and why?
· What do Easter cards tell us about the festival?
· How is the crucifixion of Jesus shown in art?
· How does Christian music communicate the feelings of Easter?
Year 4 How do Christians remember the events of
Holy Week?
Palm
Sunday … Maundy Thursday … Good Friday … Easter Saturday … Easter Sunday
·
What are the key events
associated with Holy Week?
·
How are these events shown in
images and words?
·
How do Christians today remember
and relive these events?
·
How can we show the events of
Holy Week?
Year 5 Why is Easter important to Christians?
Speaking to Christians about their beliefs … exploring
responses to the crucifix and empty cross … designing a picture/mural/model to
symbolize new life …
·
What does Jesus’ death and
resurrection mean to Christians?
·
How do artists show the themes of
Jesus’ death and resurrection?
·
How do Christians around the
world remember Easter?
·
What images can we create to
symbolize the theme of resurrection or new life?
Year
6 What are the sources of the story about what
happened on the first Easter Sunday?
How each of the Gospels tells the Easter story … other
stories which have developed from the source stories eg The Three Trees
… legend of how the donkey got the cross on its back ... legend of the ‘True
Cross’ …
·
What do people know about the
Easter story and where do their ideas come from?
·
How do the different Gospels tell
the Easter story?
·
What other stories explore Easter
themes?
·
What stories can we create together which use the themes and symbols of
Easter?
(Book
1 – Early Years + Key Stage 1; Book 2 – Key Stage 2)
Why
is Easter special for Christians?
Book 1, pp80-82
How
do Christians remember the events of Holy Week?
Book 2, pp66-68 (includes photocopiable
sheet, p138)
What
happened on the first Easter Sunday morning?
Book 2, pp70-72 (includes photocopiable
sheet, p141)
Why
are there different types of cross?
Book 2, pp100-101 (includes
photocopiable sheet, p154)
Useful Websites
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/1465/candle.html
Basic information about Paschal candles
http://www.gieson.com/john316/
Powerful
animation of the Crucifixion that links parts of the story with Christian
belief (such as ‘love’, ‘truth’ and ‘sacrifice’)
http://www.execpc.com/~tmuth/easter/holiday.htm
Facts
about Easter around the world (eg Romanian Easter customs)
http://www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/wilderness/58/cross.html
One
of many versions of how the donkey got the cross shape on its back
www.geocities.com/treasuresinheaven/threetrees.html
A
Christian retelling of the Three Trees story
http://gallery.euroweb.hu/art/j/juanes/1lastsup.jpg
Here
is a less well-known image of the Last Supper by Spanish painter Juan de Juanes
(b1523)
http://gallery.euroweb.hu/art/h/huguet/last_sup.jpg
Another
Last Supper image by Jaume Huguet (1415)
|
Title |
Author |
Publisher |
ISBN |
Comments |
|
Celebrations: Easter |
Anita Ganeri |
Heinemann Library |
0431137919 |
A lively book exploring the celebration with craft
ideas |
|
Festivals through the Year: Spring |
Anita Ganeri |
Heinemann |
0431054568 |
Exploring the wide range of Spring festivals |
|
Big Book of Easter |
Helen Hall |
Prim-Ed Publishing |
1864001488 |
|
|
Easter |
Mike Hirst |
Hodder Wayland |
0750228083 |
Looking at events that led up to Easter +
traditions |
|
The Easter Story |
Brian Wildsmith |
Oxford University Press |
0 19 272286 7 |
Powerful retelling with vivid illustrations |
|
Easter |
Lois Rock, Maureen Galvani |
Lion |
0745947417 |
Storybook |
|
Easter |
Fiona French |
Frances Lincoln |
0711218587 |
Stained glass tableaux |
|
The First Easter |
Penny Frank |
Lion |
0745941230 |
Simple retelling of story |
|
Easter |
Mike Hirst |
Hodder Wayland |
0750228326 |
Bright overview of Easter customs and traditions |
|
Celebrations:
Easter Big Book |
Anita Ganeri |
Heinemann |
0431138060 |
Big book – out in April 2002 |
|
Jesus
through Art: A Resource for Teaching RE and Art |
Margaret
Cooling |
RMEP |
185175119X |
A large
format book with colour plates |
|
Easter |
Gail Gibbons |
Picture
Knight |
0340564326 |
A simple
retelling of the Easter story with information about Easter customs. Bright, attractive pictures |
|
The True
Cross |
Brian
Wildsmith |
OUP |
0192721704 |
The legend
of the true cross in words and pictures |
