A multi-disciplinary, inclusive, inquiry-based approach to learning empowers teachers and students to explore complex questions collaboratively.
TWCF's Big Questions in Classrooms (BQiC) priority takes a multi-disciplinary, inquiry-led approach to learning and teaching. It equips teachers and students to collaboratively explore questions about humankind's search for meaning and purpose that stretch across subjects.
Watch the video to find out how a dialogic style of teaching is transforming students' and teachers' experiences — and empowering them both with a sense of curiosity and the confidence to examine life's biggest questions.
Young people are curious about life, and crave to learn about the world around them and their place in it. "Many questions in life are 'Big Questions' that stretch across subjects," says science education specialist, Professor Berry Billingsley of the Epistemic Insight Initiative, yet schools often struggle to create space for this kind of exploration. This challenge is evident in science education, where, as Michael Reiss, former President, Association for Science Education (ASE) notes "most students, rather sadly, by the time they've gone through their secondary Science Education have lost a lot of that initial curiosity which younger students have."
Religious Education (RE) faces similar issues. Traditional teaching methods often presenting idealized and monolithic portrayals of faiths, says RE adviser, Gillian Georgiou of the Religious and Worldviews Project. "Religious education in this country, for many years, has not really been supporting our children and young people to understand the rich and complex and somewhat messy lived reality of religious and non-religious worldviews," she explains.
"If we're to equip young people to be active citizens and to have an informed approach to the world we have to equip them to ask the big questions," says Sarah Lane Cawte, Chair, Religious Education Council of England and Wales.
At its core, BQiC encourages inquiry-led learning, where questions like "What makes us human?" become central. By focusing on open-ended questions about about existence and knowledge, the teaching models supported by BQiC prompt students to consider beliefs, emotions, and humanity's fundamental traits. Different academic perspectives, such as philosophy, theology, and psychology, are combined to approach the inquiries holistically.
Marianne Cutler, Director for Policy & Curriculum Innovation, ASE highlights how dialogic teaching enhances this approach. She explains, "Dialogic teaching enables children to have a view as long as it’s reasoned...It focuses much less on the right and wrong, and enables children to look at questions which actually are more interesting — the why sorts of questions." This method encourages students to engage in meaningful dialogue with one another and the teachers, allowing them to express, challenge, and refine their ideas collaboratively.
The approach also challenges teachers to reflect on their own professional practices and acknowledge how their worldviews influence their teaching.
Stephen Pett, National Religious Education Advisor, RE Today, observes that the BQiC-related resources distributed to more than 3,500 teachers has had a profound dual impact. Teachers gained new insights into their approaches to education and began recognizing how their own perspectives shape the materials they present. Simultaneously, students became more engaged by exploring how their worldviews influence their understanding of subjects, leading to deeper and more personal connections with the material.
This focus on the nuances of religious and non-religious worldviews is ensuring that students feel included and valued in discussions about beliefs and values. "One of the big impacts that happened very quickly was that we had children and young people coming to the teachers and saying 'oh, I see me! I've never seen me before in the classroom!' and that's making them feel valued, and as a result they are more interested they are asking more questions," shares Georgiou.
Cawte sums it up this way: "If students feel that their views are valuable, and that they have something to bring to the classroom, that's a fundamental stepping stone in building engaged young people who will be able to carry on and use that...to flourish in whatever they go on to do."
Templeton World Charity Foundation’s “Stories of Impact” videos by journalist and senior media executive Richard Sergay feature human stories and critical perspectives on breakthroughs about the universe’s big questions. The inspiring narratives and observations in these award-winning videos portray the individual and societal impacts of the projects that bring to life TWCF-supported research.
