Our vision for PSHE, including RSHE, is to support our pupils to become safe, healthy, confident and responsible members of society, to form respectful relationships with other people and to have knowledge, understanding and respect for people’s opinions, beliefs, cultures and ways of living, both those in their local community and in the wider world.

This aligns with our school vision which is to inspire children, their families and our staff to SHINE, LEARN, BELIEVE and BELONG so our children achieve their very best, leaving us as confident, happy, resilient learners: With knowledge anything is possible. Through our PSHE and RSHE curriculum, we recognise that our pupils need to be able to think, talk and reflect about themselves, including how to stay safe, healthy and happy, to form positive relationships and to explore their connection with the wider world. 

We want our children to be able to be emotionally literate and to recognise and identify the different emotions that they feel, what causes them and how to cope with and manage them during times of stress.  We want them to know how to stay safe and healthy and to make good choices with regard to their health and well-being and to have good self-esteem and a recognition of the importance of good mental health.

Our PSHE and RSHE curriculum will empower our pupils so that they will be able to form appropriate relationships and friendships by recognising what makes a good friend or family relationship, being able to empathise and to recognise unhealthy relationships and negative peer pressure and to have strategies for seeking help where necessary.  

We want our pupils to function confidently as part of the wider world and to learn about how to make a positive contribution. We want them to be resilient and aspirational and to be motivated to set achievable goals for themselves. We see diversity as something to be celebrated.  We want our pupils to be curious about differences in terms of individuals, family relationships, cultures and communities and to be able to discuss them and learn about them with sensitivity, knowledge and respect. We recognise that our pupils need opportunities to explore the world beyond their local area.

Through our PSHE and RSHE curriculum, we want our pupils to develop their skills to: 

Learn – know and understand how to stay healthy and safe, form appropriate relationships and connect with the wider world in a positive and confident manner

Believe – recognise similarities and differences and that diversity is a positive thing.  Also to recognise that they need to be respectful to others, to respect people’s lifestyles, appearance, identity and culture and to recognise and use the language of respect

Belong – recognise where they belong in their families, their communities and in the world, and to know their rights and responsibilities

Shine - celebrate themselves as individuals whilst also celebrating and respecting the uniqueness of others.

To achieve our intent, we use the PSHE Association guidance and resources to ensure full coverage of everything we believe our children need to know. This is grouped into the areas of Health and Wellbeing, Relationships and Living in the Wider World. This is supported by the excellent teaching resources provided by Educator Solutions to teach high quality RSHE across all year groups with six key areas: My feelings; My Body; My Relationships; My Beliefs; My Rights and Responsibilities; and Asking for help.

These are carefully planned and incorporated into wider planning to ensure our children can make links and apply the skills they are learning. There are also discrete teaching opportunities to ensure the content is given the importance it needs, especially when of a sensitive nature.  We may vary our curriculum in response to emerging issues and to reflect the rapidly changing world in which our pupils are living and learning.

Teaching RSHE and PSHE:

When teaching any lesson that deals with potentially sensitive subjects, teachers will begin by creating a safe and secure learning environment.  This will help children to feel confident to share their ideas, values and attitudes without fear of negative feedback from their peers.  A safe learning environment with clear boundaries also helps teachers to manage discussion on sensitive issues with greater confidence.

To do this we:

• establish a working agreement based on our school values 
• depersonalise discussions by using distancing techniques- stories, role- play, scenarios of real situations but with fictional characters and storylines
• have an 'ask it basket' in class so children can ask questions anonymously
• small group discussions

Consulting with Staff, Parents/ Carers and Pupils

A full consultation with parents, staff and governors took place following the publication of the new guidance for RSHE in 2020 and in 2021.  As part of our on going curriculum planning and development, we regularly seek the views of staff, parents/ carers and pupils.  These views are used to support our curriculum planning and implementation.

RSHE Parent Consultation 2021/2022

Thank you to all parents/ carers who responded to our consultation.  We had 39 questionnaires returned in total.

The overall response to our questionnaire was very positive.

Here is a summary of the responses:

You can find our RSHE policy in the policies section of our website - please click the link below:

PSHE and RSHE in our community.

As part of our Harvest celebration in October, EYFS and KS1 collected food for Swaffham Food Bank. We hope to make this an annual collection to support our local community.

In November we raised £118 as a school for BBC Children In Need by wearing non-uniform clothes that were yellow or spotty. We also celebrated Anti-Bullying week by wearing odd socks to remind us that it is good to be different.

Also in November, Year 1 enjoyed a visit from Norfolk Fire Service who drove a fire engine onto our playground. We learned lots about how to stay safe and what to do in the event of a fire.