RPL in the News: Religious education through new eyes
On July 30, 2018, Caroline Matas wrote about the experience of John Camardella, RPL Education Fellow and a Prospect High School social studies teacher in Illinois who has completely redesigned his curriculum to approach teaching world religions in a new way, such as through exploring fashion, space, and travel.
"Prospect High School social studies teacher John Camardella is wading into the intellectual unknown, all for the benefit of his students.
The Illinois native and veteran educator recently threw out the playbook and completely redesigned the curriculum of the world religions elective he has taught to high school seniors for the past 15 years.
The impetus? A “life-changing” method of teaching religious studies he learned from Harvard Divinity School’s Religious Literacy Project (RLP). Camardella, whose own parents are an ex-nun and ex-monk, is betting his career on the new teaching method.
Most high school religious courses teach a traditions-based model, with a unit on each of the major faiths’ “DERMS”: doctrines, ethics, rituals, myths, and symbols. Camardella had been using this method for years when the National Council for the Social Studies tapped him to help workshop a set of guidelines for teaching religion in public schools.
Through the workshop, Camardella found himself face-to-face with a religious literacy scholar whose influence would ultimately leave him bleary-eyed as he scrambled to rewrite his entire curriculum this winter.
Diane L. Moore, senior scholar and the founding director of the RLP at Harvard Divinity School, has pioneered the field of religious literacy. Rejecting “traditions-based” methods of teaching religion, she proposes that religion should be studied through the lens of cultural studies with the following maxims in mind: 1) religions are internally diverse, 2) religions evolve and change, and 3) religions are culturally embedded.
Meeting Moore and getting the opportunity to continue working with the RLP, Camardella said, “absolutely changed everything I believe about education.”
Read the full article on The Harvard Gazette.