Texts and teachers: the practice guide

We recommend reading this document together with the ‘Texts and Teachers Findings Report’, Opening the Door
to Hermeneutical RE (available online at www.canterbury.ac.uk/nicer/ hermeneutics), as well as the linked Bible Society resources. The sections contain different kinds of information which together form a development programme for teachers who want to know more about developing a hermeneutically shaped curriculum. It could also be used by resource developers seeking to develop new materials framed by hermeneutics and could also be of use for those involved in developing examinations and questions that permit students to explore their hermeneutical knowledge
and competence.

Where to start sets out the broader educational case for a more hermeneutical approach in the subject. It sets out a pedagogical way of thinking about this approach and how to think about the material and the learner.
Introducing hermeneutics is a concise accessible introduction to the hermeneutical aspects in the curriculum, disciplinarity,the question of meaning, and the broader educational and academic aims of hermeneutical RE. It also introduces some key ideas from Christian sacred text scholarship and a series of key questions. This sets the scene for the kind of classroom experience students will be drawn into, through questions.

1 Bowie, R. and Coles, R. (2018) ‘We reap what we ‘sew’: perpetuating Biblical illiteracy in new English Religious Studies exams and the proof text binary question’, British Journal of Religious Education, 40:3, 277-287.
2 Thiselton, A. C. (1992) New Horizons in Hermeneutics, Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA: Zondervan, 1992.
3 Pett, S. and Cooling, T. (2018) ‘Understanding Christianity: exploring a hermeneutical pedagogy for teaching Christianity’, British Journal of Religious Education, 40:3, 257-267.
4 Eco, U. (1979) The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts, Bloomington, USA: Midlands Book, 7-11.
5 Taji-Farouki, S. (Ed.) (2015) The Qur’an and its readers worldwide, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1.
6 Saeed, A. (2005) Approaches to the Qur’an in contemporary Indonesia, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3.
7 Taji-Farouki (2015), 2.
8 Burge, S. R. (2015) The Meaning of the Word, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1.
10 Carswell, M. F. (2018) ‘Teaching Scripture: moving towards a hermeneutical model for religious education in Australian Catholic Schools’, Journal of Religious Education, 66, 213-223.
11 Pontifical Biblical Commission (1964) Instruction on the Historical Truth of the Gospels https:// www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=1352, Retrieved Nov 1, 2019.