ABSTRACT
As long ago as 1967 (see Plowden, 1967) the recommendation was made that conceptual development in Religious Education was the likely way in which the subject would move forward, leaving behind the days of confessionalism and the ‘give them the facts of religion’ approach to the subject. However, over thirty years later there is little evidence that this vision has ever been satisfactorily approached, never mind achieved. There are several reasons for this, not least of all the research work of Goldman (1964, 1965) who, as mentioned earlier (p. 13, 34) argued that children below the age of about twelve years were unable to think ‘religiously’.
