PSHE

Our Mission and Aims

At Penn Wood, we teach Relationships Education through our values, as well as through our PSHCE (Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship Education) lessons. We use 1Decision, the national curriculum and the Relationships and Health Education government guidance to ensure that we support our children up to be successful adults, providing them with a rich coverage of both PSHCE and Relationships Education. We strive for all children to leave Penn Wood as confident citizens who can advocate for themselves and others with great oracy and an understanding of the world around them.

Relationships Education

At Penn Wood Primary and Nursery School, we endeavor to improve the lives of children.  We celebrate our rich diversity and take steps to prevent and tackle all kinds of bullying, including bullying online.  Our latest bullying policy is on our website.  We also produce an online safety policy in line with the latest DfE guidance (2019).

Our curriculum is designed to enable the children to understand the benefits that exist in a society where diversity and difference are acknowledged, valued and celebrated.  We teach that there are different opinions and ideas, reinforcing that it is acceptable to hear and talk about different ideas and still have respect for one another if we disagree.   Our curriculum is designed to promote equality and support inclusivity. We use picture books and film to support this. We believe our policy is sensitive to the range of religious and cultural views present in our community, whilst ensuring pupils have access to the learning necessary to prepare them for adult life.

It is important that children leave primary school prepared to live in a Modern Britain: full of difference and diversity, whether that difference is linked to ethnicity, gender, ability, sexual orientation, gender identity, age or religion. The purpose of Relationships Education is to equip pupils with the knowledge, skills and positive attitudes to grow up as members of society, empowered to make decisions about their own lives, understanding and respectful of beliefs and lifestyles different to their own and recognising what constitutes respectful and positive relationships with others.

The aims of relationships and health education at our school are to:

• Teach the fundamental building blocks and characteristics of positive relationships, with particular reference to friendships, family relationships, and relationships with other peers and adults.
• Help pupils develop feelings of self-respect, confidence and empathy.
• Provide a safe framework in which sensitive discussions can take place.
• Prepare pupils for puberty, and give them an understanding of the importance of health and hygiene.
• How to recognise if they need help and how to seek help and advice from others if needed.

Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship Education (PSHCE)

‘PSHCE education is a planned, developmental programme of learning through which children and young people acquire the knowledge, understanding and skills they need to manage their lives now and in the future.’

PSHCE Association 2017

Personal Development

At Penn Wood School, we encourage pupils to participate in a wide range of activities and experiences across and beyond the curriculum, contributing fully to the life of the school and the local community. In doing so, pupils learn to recognise their own worth, work well with others and become increasingly responsible for their own actions. Children reflect on their own experiences and understand how they are developing personally and socially, tackling spiritual, moral, social and cultural issues.

We encourage pupils to build confidence, resilience and self-esteem, and to identify and manage risks, make informed choices and understand what influences their decisions.  Pupils learn about the main political and social institutions which affect their lives and discover their responsibilities, rights and duties as individuals and members of communities.