Year 6: The Qur'an

Introduction

Here children will learn more about why the Qur’an is important to Muslims and find out more about the names of God. A variety of internet resources are used.

What will the children learn?

What prior experience do the children need?

Children would benefit from having studied sacred texts in other religions and from having an understanding of some important Muslim beliefs.

Equipment

The Lesson

Play a recording of a recitation from the Qur’an. Recitations can be found on CD-Rom or CD. Alternatively online examples are available at:

Prepare the children to listen with respect to the sounds they are going to hear. Tell them that the words are sacred to the person who is chanting them because it is a way of worshipping God.

Ask the children to listen out for the ‘Bismillah’ that starts every recitation. It is in Arabic and means ‘In the name of Allah, the compassionate, the merciful’. Play other recitations and identify this phrase.

Discuss the meanings of compassion and merciful. You can look these up in a dictionary or use an online dictionary such as http://dictionary.cambridge.org/ to look the words up. Which of the possible meanings of the word do we think are the most likely to be what Muslim’s believe? Because every recitation starts by calling God merciful and compassionate, what does this tell us about the Muslim view of God?

Tell the children that Muslims are said to have ninety-nine names for God. Display these names. They are available online at:

Discuss some of the names. Cut and paste a name that the children don’t understand fully into the online dictionary and discuss the meanings.

In pairs or small groups ask the children to find out exactly what some of the names of God mean. The children could be tasked with preparing their work for presentation in the plenary or to make a poster or some other form of presentation. The children can cut and paste some of the harder names into the online dictionary and work out what they mean. They could decorate their work by cutting and pasting some of the Arabic writing into their work or by copying the writing using conventional means or by copying the calligraphy in a graphics program and importing the pictures.

Why are we using ICT?

References

QCA Schemes of Work ICT Unit 6D Using the internet to search large databases and to interpret information
http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/schemes2/it/?view=get

QCA Schemes of Work RE Unit 6D What is the Qur’an and why is it important to Muslims http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/schemes2/religion/?view=get

5-14 National Guidelines for the Curriculum in Scotland: *Religious Education 5-14 Roman Catholic Schools, Other World Religions – Scared Writings, Stories and Key Figures, Level D – D2.1 and D2.2
ICT, Searching and researching; Creating and presenting, Level D
http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/5to14/guidelines/index.asp
* RC guidelines were selected because they contain more detail than the guidelines for non-denominational schools.

Where do we go next?

The children could think about the qualities that they think God might have. They could learn more about how the Qur’an guides the lives of Muslims.

Differentiating the activity

Some children will need more help with reading the meanings of the words.

Some children could follow the links on the recitation pages or carry out their own searches on the internet to find out more.

Reflecting on their work

Discuss some of the names of God that they have found out about.

Can any of the names be grouped together? What do these names tell us about how Muslims view God?