Summer Work - July 2025

Welcome to A Level Religious Studies!

Year 11 / Year 12 Summer work - Mr. Cawsey

To prepare for Mr. Cawsey's classes in September, you will need to complete the following:

Podcasts

Listen to the following podcasts about Religious Experience:

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3

Please make notes from each of the podcasts - we will be referring to these in our first few lessons in September! 

Year 11 / Year 12 Summer work - Mr. Jeffries

Philosophical Puzzles

Two philosophical puzzles to keep you fresh over the holiday.

Research the Ship of Theseus puzzle. Come up with your own response… is it the same ship? Now consider how this links to identity. Look at the work of Thomas Reid, in particular the ‘brave officer’ example.

Research the Brain in a Vat argument – what do you think?

Reading

• Introduction to a priori and a posteriori reasoning - https://iep.utm.edu/apriori/
• Introduction to Plato - https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato/ - Read sections 1 and 2
• Background on Aristotle – Section 2.C https://iep.utm.edu/aristotle/#SH2c
• Peter Singer; Famine, Affluence and Morality
• Watch this TedEd video on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave

Year 13 Summer Work

Work from Mr. Cawsey

Halakhah

We will be studying the following topics in September:

1. Kashrut
2. Business Ethics

Please read the following:

Kashrut:

• Orthodox Approach
• Reform Approach

Business Ethics:

Please make notes - we will be studying these topics in September

Work from Mr. Jeffries

Mini-Game

Two philosophical puzzles to keep you fresh over the holiday.

Research the Ship of Theseus puzzle. Come up with your own response… is it the same ship? Now consider how this links to identity. Look at the work of Thomas Reid, in particular the ‘brave officer’ example.

Research the Brain in a Vat argument – what do you think?

Reading

• Read https://iep.utm.edu/dualism-and-mind/ on the Soul and the Mind
• Read https://iep.utm.edu/rel-lang/ on Religious Language
• Van Inwagen, P. ‘Necessary Being: the Ontological Argument’ in Stump, E and Murray, M. J. (ed) (1999) Philosophy of Religion: The Big Questions, Blackwell
• Swinburne, R. (1997) ‘God-talk is not evidently nonsense’ in Davies, B. (2000)
• Read David Chalmers, Hard Problem of Consciousness
• Recap on Meta-ethics – Mackie – Inventing Right and Wrong. Chapter 1.3.

Extended – if you are targeting an A* I encourage you to read these

*All are available online.