Lesson video

Hello and welcome to today's lesson on Christianity, in which we're going to be recapping the information that we've learned in the first four, five lessons of this unit, if you've been going through the unit with me.

Recaps are really important because it gives the opportunity to go over what you've already looked at.

And we know that we do not remember everything, without spending some time to recap it.

So for example, if I were to ask you what you had for lunch everyday last week, you've probably spent quite a long time thinking about it.

Even if you had the same thing every day, you'd probably still have to think about it, because our memory is not perfect.

Our memory will forget things.

If we're not going over them regularly, even things that have happened to us like meals.

So, we're going to go through some core concepts that we've looked at so far.

You're going to need a pen or pencil, some paper and a different coloured pen, which is going to be really helpful for you in making corrections and additions to your work.

Firstly, we're going to start with some quick fire questions.

So, this is just to warm up your brain, and help you to remember what we've looked at so far.

So firstly, what is the Holy Spirit traditionally represented as in Christian art? A dove.

Which of the explanations below is the best description of God in traditional Christianity? I'm going to give you a moment to read through all of them.

There we go, the right answer here, is there is one God in three persons.

So a couple of the other options there are, misunderstandings of the Trinity, or maybe historically there've been some arguments about what the Trinity really means, but what we're going for here is the mainstream, traditional Christian understanding of the Trinity, which is the idea that there is one God in three persons.

What was miraculous about Jesus' birth in the Gospel story? So we've got two answers here that Mary was a Virgin, and then it was predicted by a prophet.

So well done, if you spotted both of those.

What is the name of the events in which the angel Gabriel told Mary that she would become pregnant? The Annunciation.

So remember the word annunciation, is a bit like the word, announced.

So something is announced, it's announced to Mary, that she is going to have a baby.

Where was Jesus born according to the Gospels? In Bethlehem.

Who did a host of angels announced the good news, this is the good news of Jesus' birth, to? The shepherds, and remember that the shepherds were, sort of the lowliest in society.

They were really looked down upon by other people.

So it would be very surprising to them to be chosen by God, to be some of the first people, to hear the news about Jesus' birth.

Which word means 'to take on flesh' and shows the Christian belief, that Jesus is God in human form? Incarnation.

True or false, Christians traditionally believe, that The Son came into existence in "The Nativity Story." Your moment to think carefully about this one.

So the answer, is false.

So remember Christians believe that Jesus, is a member of the Trinity, but he is fully God, and one of the qualities of God, is to be eternal.

Christians believe that his birth in "The Nativity Story," is when he was incarnated, became human or became flesh, but not when he started to exist.

They believe that The Son is eternal along with The Father and The Holy Spirit.

Okay, so we're going to start working through some exam style questions.

Now lots of these are going to fit quite well with AQA, but it's also going to fit well with other examples as well.

And the main focus here is that, we're just getting down our key knowledge.

It's really good to write full sentences in your answers, just so that when you're looking back at your work, you know what you were on about.

'Cause if you write short answers, then you'll forget when you look back.

So first question, this one is going to be very, very easy.

Name two members of the Trinity.

Pause the video to write down your answers.

And have a different coloured pen ready for corrections.

So, two members of the Trinity, you could have The Father, you could have The Son or Jesus, and you could have The Holy Spirit.

What you can't have, is God, and the reason why you can't have that, is because Christians believe that, the Trinity is God.

That all members of the Trinity are God.

There's not one, which is called God.

This has got, it starts getting complicated, so I talk about it.

So, sometimes the students will write God and Jesus, as members of the Trinity.

But remember Christians traditionally believe that, Jesus is fully God, he's just as much God as The Father is.

So you need to specify, The Father, rather than just saying God.

So that's why you can't, just write God in this answer.

So, in the next question, you're going to need two short sentences.

Again, if this was an AQA question, it would be worth two marks, and I'm sure it's relevant for other examples as well, just in terms of your general knowledge.

So, give to things that happen in "The Nativity Story." Pause the video to write your answers.

So, two things that happen to "The Nativity Story," my example answers, Mary and Joseph travelled to Bethlehem for a census, Jesus is born and placed in a manger.

There are lots of other options that you could have here.

Literally anything from "The Nativity Story" you could have.

So you could have the Magi, the wise men following a star, to the place where Jesus is.

You could have, the angels appearing to the shepherds as they watch their flocks, by night.

You could have that, the angel Gabriel told Mary that she was going to have a baby.

There's lots and lots of options here.

So it's a really nice open question.

So, next we're going to just slightly longer question, and it's going to be an explain question.

So the question we're going for here is, explain it to Christian beliefs about original sin.

So explain questions need to be in full sentences.

You should make a point and then explain it, in a little bit more depth.

In this case, you need to include detail about what Christians believe, about original sin.

So how do they believe it came into the world, for example, and what effects does it have on humans? For example.

You can think carefully back to the lesson, on the creation and The Fall, and think about what you can remember.

Definitions are also really useful in questions like this.

And I always advise students, to use the wording of the question in your answer.

So if you are being asked about original sin, you should use the words, original sin in your answer.

And that just makes it really clear, to the examiner that you've not gotten original sin mixed up with something else and that, you know what you're talking about.

Because they don't know what's in your head, they only know what you've written down.

So you're going to pause the video and write to your answers to this question.

You need two paragraphs, two short paragraphs.

So you could have just two sentences in each paragraph.

That's the sort of thing.

That's the sort of length you should be writing.

Before we do go onto the main question, I'm going to give you a moment, to just mind map or list everything that you can think of in terms of original sin.

Just to help you write this answer.

Okay, so this is my mind map for original sin.

You can add to your own mind map or your own bullet pointed list, to add anything you're missing.

So firstly, you've got our definition, which is right here.

So their definition of original sin, is the sin that was inherited by Adam and Eve, that Christians believe all humans are born with.

You could have in there, that it causes a tendency for humans to do sin, you could have the belief that it is washed away at baptism, the belief that it separates God and humans, or that it originates in "The Story of The Fall." So now you've got lots of ideas down, or you need to do is choose two of them.

Write down the points, and then give a bit, of explanation, a little bit more extra detail about that point.

So pause the video on the pause slide and write down your answer.

So like I said before, two short paragraphs, you can have two sentences in each paragraph.

Okay, so here I've got my example.

And as you saw in my mind map before, there were quite, few options.

So, if you haven't got the same as what I've written, it doesn't necessarily mean you're wrong.

I'm going to read it out to you and then I'm going to talk about the, colour coding I've got here.

So one belief about original sin, is that this is the sin, which all humans are born with.

Which is inherited, from Adam and Eve when they sinned against God, in "The story of The Fall." Another belief about original sin, is that it separates humans and God.

However, Christians traditionally believe that it can be washed away with baptism.

So you can see here, I've got my points in purple and my explanation in green.

Because sometimes students struggle, to know the difference between a point and an explanation.

If you look at my first paragraph, my point, one belief about original sin is that it's the sin all humans are born with.

That's a point, isn't it? But imagine someone's gone to, what you on about? I don't know why you're saying that or what you mean or where that's come from.

So you just need to explain a little bit more of the story, which is, telling them about Adam and Eve and "The Story of the fall." So that's what you need to do, and an explanation.

I'm going to give you a moment now to pause, so that you can write down any additions that you need to your own answer.

Make sure you've got a clear point and a clear explanation for each belief.

Okay, hopefully you paused just then whilst as I waiting.

Otherwise you're going to be pausing me halfway through a sentence, and that's going to be very awkward.

Okay.

Next type of questions, that you often have to write about for your GCSE, is explaining something with evidence.

So evidence could be a quotation or it could be a story that you've learned, in Christianity, from the Bible in Islam, from the Koran or from the life of Muhammad, for example.

As we are on the Christianity unit at the moment, please only talk about Christianity in your answers because that's what it's asking you.

So this question is, explain to Christian beliefs about Jesus' life.

So again, this needs to be in full sentences.

You should make a point, then explain it.

And again, in this case, this question is really open.

You just need to think about what evidence you could use.

So what stories can you remember from Jesus' life that we've looked at or what stories might, you know, anyway, from your general knowledge.

Can you think of any quotations? And one of the lessons, we're going to do in this unit is going to be deliberate practise sitting and learning some quotations, but we've not done that yet.

So for now, we've not done that yet.

So for now, see if you can focus on stories in your answer.

If you can remember a quotation, that's going to be really, really good.

Okay, so I've got some ideas here to help you and you can see how open this question is.

I've gotten "The Nativity Story," we've already led to that quite a bit, so hopefully it's fresh in your mind.

I've got a quotation here.

"If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, "let him slap your left cheek too." This quote is very memorable, and so you might not have sat down to learn it, but you might recognise it.

So it's really useful.

We've got "The story of Zacchaeus," which hopefully you remember, because I made you learn the spelling of Zacchaeus.

We've got, Jesus' teaching, so one of which is that quotation, but we looked at quite a few others as well.

The miracle of the feeding of the 5,000, or you could talk about the kingdom of God.

So that was in some of my explanations, that I said that, Christians believe that through his life, through his teachings and his actions, Jesus brought about the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven on earth.

You're going to pause and you're going to add these points, to your list or to your mind map, pause now.

And now I've got all of that down, you're going to give a go at writing your answer.

So this time we're going to need a point, you're going to need some evidence, and then you're going to need an explanation.

Here's my model answer.

And you might've gone for a different piece of evidence, to me and that is fine.

One Christian belief about Jesus' life, is that his actions works to bring about the kingdom of God.

For example, in "The Story of Zacchaeus," Jesus' love for Zacchaeus, caused Zacchaeus, to change his ways and stop cheating people.

This brought about God's kingdom, because it helped to fix human relationships.

Now I've not told the whole "Story of Zacchaeus" in this answer.

And if I was to go into lots and lots of detail, it would probably be more than necessary.

But I have said something specific, haven't I? I've said Zacchaeus' name for one thing, I've said that he changed his ways and that he stopped cheating people, and I said that was all because of Jesus' love.

So I've got some key details from the story, without writing out the whole story.

You could say, Zacchaeus was the tax collector who changed his ways, in response to Jesus' love.

That'd be another way to explain it.

So again, pause the video and see if you can add to your own answer.

Make sure you've got three parts to each of your paragraphs that you've got your point, you've got your piece of evidence, and that you've got your explanation as well.

If you want to colour code it like I have, if that's helpful, that's also a really good idea.

So, if you unpause, you must've unpaused, if you're watching me.

We've got another example paragraph for you.

So one Christian belief about Jesus, is that his teachings have authority because he is the son of God.

For example, in the Bible, Jesus says, "If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, "let him slap your left cheek too." So here you got the example of a quotation being used in your paragraph.

The next part is to explain, and actually when we use quotations, I think that's when students most often leave off, the explanation.

You need to explain what the quotation means, even if you think it's obvious.

So Christians would say, that even if this is difficult to follow, they should as Jesus' teaching show how to live a good life.

So if you just left it there at the quotation, you're not giving a full explanation of the Christian belief.

But by saying that, all Christians might say this is really hard to follow, but that they should, then you're explaining it in a bit detail.

So again, pause the video, add any necessary additions or corrections to your work.

Okay.

Next part.

So this is going to be an evaluate question, and these are often the most challenging, and they're often the longest questions to answer in an examination.

These questions need you to explain reasons, for and against the statements.

So the statement I've got here is, 'The crucifixion is the most important belief in Christianity' Discuss.

So it's not a question, in the same way, as the questions we've already had, which will ask you what or why or how to explain a particular thing.

It's giving you a statement that some people might believe, and you need to decide from what you know about Christianity, whether you think that's a strong statement that you can agree with, or whether you might say, actually, I disagree with this statement and this is why.

So, you need to use specific knowledge, from what you've learnt.

Don't be vague.

So, don't just say, oh, some Christians might say that, you know, God loves them, et cetera.

Christians do believe God loves them, but to make sure we're not being vague, we need to use things like examples from the Bible.

So you could say that God's love was demonstrated on the cross when Jesus died, or you could say, you know, Jesus said, "Love your neighbour as yourself." Or you could have the quotation, "For God, so loved the world "that he sent his only son, et cetera." I hope you get the idea.

You also need a conclusion, which will be saying what you think is the most convincing side of the argument is and why.

So sometimes your teachers might say, that you show your opinion.

And I sometimes have students say, well, I'm not a Christian, so, I don't have an opinion on this.

You don't have to be a Christian to have an opinion on these statements, or you need to know some Christian teachings.

That's all you're being asked to do.

Saying, well from your knowledge of Christianity, do you think this is a strong statement? Or would you say that actually lots of Christians wouldn't agree with that.

In your conclusion, you don't have to say, in my opinion, you can just say in conclusion, this is stronger than this.

And that's absolutely fine.

No one's going to hold you to that opinion, by the way.

No, one's going to catch up with you in 10 years time, and say, oh, on your GCSE paper, you said that you thought, the crucifixion is the most important belief in Christianity.

No one's going to do that.

All you're doing is weighing up, the pros and cons based on what you know about Christianity.

And if you can remember more evidence for one side than the other, then go for it.

Okay, that's going to be absolutely fine.

It's always best to use Christian teachings, only in these units.

So if you're, writing an examination on a Christianity unit, then most examples would say, you should only be talking about Christianity because in that unit, they're not asking you about, Islamic beliefs on this topic, that would be saved for the Islamic unit.

In themes units, you're often invited to talk about, several different religious and non-religious worldviews.

So that's something to keep in mind, what are you being tested on in each unit? A question like this, is just testing you on your knowledge of Christianity.

So what I'm going to get you to do, is spend a bit of time thinking about what Christian beliefs, about the crucifixion are, and then we're going to build up to writing an answer to this question.

Okay, so you've spent some time adding some of my, for or against reasons, to your list, so hopefully you've got quite a lot that you can talk about.

Now key things to make sure you're including there, is evidence.

So again, stories from the Bible or quotations to support what you're saying.

What you can find to be really useful in a question like that is, you know, stories about the crucifixion, from those biblical narratives that we've looked at.

Evaluation is another thing.

Now I think sometimes students struggle to understand, what's really meant by evaluation.

What it means is weighing up how strong or weak a point is.

So for example, if I was going to say that, I don't know, Caprice chocolate is the best chocolate.

Then, someone might evaluate my statement, by saying, well, you know, Miss Kendrick's statement could be agreed with because of this reason.

But actually it's weak, because other chocolates are better, okay.

So, you're making those statements about something being, strong or something being weak, and the reasons why.

So for example, in Christianity, if you think a particular viewpoint, doesn't fit well with other beliefs in Christianity, you might say, well, actually this is a really weak viewpoint.

Finally, you need to have a clear judgement in your conclusion.

Now you can conclude, that both sides of the argument, are really important and that you can't have one thing without the other, but you need to make sure it's clear that is, a judgement.

Don't just summarise and say, well, in conclusion, some people will agree with this, because blah, blah, blah, and other people would disagree because of x, y, z.

That's not a judgement , that's just a summary of what you've said.

In your conclusion, you need to say, well, this side is stronger because, or this side is weaker because, in conclusion you say, I agree or disagree with the statement.

So we're gearing up to answering this question.

So one thing you need to keep in mind, is often these questions are asking for several paragraphs.

So you need to be writing quite a lot in this answer.

On the next slide, you've got some sentence starters, but I've only put the sentence starters once.

To write a full answer, you're going to need to use those, a couple of times.

I tend to advise my students to write four paragraphs, sometimes even more, if they're aiming really high.

And, one of those paragraphs would be your conclusion.

So you're aiming to write quite a lot here, and I really encourage you to give it a good go.

Because these questions, usually worth most marks, in assessments.

So they're really worth absolutely nailing at this point.

So, you're going to pause the video.

You're going to give this task your best shot, and then I'll have an example for you at the end.

Thank you so much for all of your work in today's lesson.

Now complete the quiz at the end, and I'll see you next time for our next lesson.