At Villa Real School we aim to create a happy, purposeful and supportive environment where children are enabled to become safe, successful learners, develop their full potential and achieve the highest educational standards they can. Our vision statement reflects a passionate commitment to learning and recognition of the uniqueness of individual learners. It is driven by our desire to offer the best possible education for our pupils and students in partnership with parents, therapists and the local community.
Personal, Social, Health and Citizenship Education (PSHCE) and Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) equips children with a sequence of components, disciplinary knowledge and substantive strategies required to live healthy, safe, productive, capable, responsible and balanced lives. It encourages them to be enterprising and supports them in making effective transitions, positive relationship, learning and career choices, and in achieving economic wellbeing. A critical component of PSHCE / RSHE education is providing opportunities for children to reflect on and clarify their own values and attitudes, and explore the complex and sometimes conflicting range of values and attitudes they encounter now and in the future. Villa Real School is supporting pupils / students to become increasingly independent and critical thinkers through their commitment to the Thinking Schools’ initiative.
The overarching aim for PSHCE education is to provide pupils/students with:
Accurate and relevant sequence of component knowledge
Opportunities to turn that knowledge into personal understanding
Opportunities to explore, clarify and if necessary challenge, their own and others’ values, attitudes, beliefs, rights and responsibilities
The substantive strategies they need in order to live healthy, safe, fulfilling, responsible and balanced lives
Literacy is developed throughout the curriculum, and supported within PSHCE / RSHE by expanding vocabulary particularly for emotional literacy both spoken (expressive and receptive communication) and in written forms.
Number and mathematical language is used throughout PSHCE / RSHE, for example, this can be seen in pupils/ students rating their feelings, their attainment, the number of people in their family, being able to put a telephone number into a phone etc.
EYFS children have a bespoke curriculum set out in their individualised MTPs that plan objectives in each of the learning strands that builds upon their unique starting points, and follows the sequential developmental pathways set out in Development Matters (the non-statutory curriculum guidance for EYFS). In our Early Years classes at Villa Real School, we deliver the curriculum through a themed /topic approach so that learning is cross curricular and covers all areas of the EYFS Curriculum.
The statutory EYFS Framework (Sept 2021) Educational Programmes for PSED is as follows:
Children’s personal, social and emotional development (PSED) is crucial for children to lead healthy and happy lives, and is fundamental to their cognitive development.
Underpinning their personal development are the important attachments that shape their social world. Strong, warm and supportive relationships with adults enable children to learn how to understand their own feelings and those of others.
Children should be supported to manage emotions, develop a positive sense of self, set themselves simple goals, have confidence in their own abilities, to persist and wait for what they want and direct attention.
Through adult modelling and guidance, they will learn how to look after their bodies, including healthy eating, and manage personal needs independently. Through supported interaction with other children they learn how to make good friendships, co-operate and resolve conflicts peaceably. These attributes will provide a secure platform from which children can achieve at school and in later life.’
Villa Real School has highlighted the following elements from the EYFS Framework Educational Programmes, as non-negotiable content and provision for each individual’s bespoke curriculum plan, within each topic covered.
The non -negotiable content for PSED is:
Focus on developing attachments to key adults
Focus on developing supportive relationships
Focus on understanding of feelings and emotions
Develop an increased sense of self (including looking after their body, developing independence, develop friendships, develop confidence, healthy eating, understand and express dis/likes)
Key Stage 1-4
Sequential learning is provided in a cyclical manner with areas of leaning revisited, memorise and master within six areas. Each of the six sections is subdivided into topic areas, and there is overlap between the topic areas and sections, for example, mental health and online safety are explicitly covered in some topic areas but are also integrated throughout all six sections where appropriate:
1. Self-Awareness (Me, who I am, my likes, dislikes, strengths and interests)
2. Self-care, Support and Safety (Looking after myself and keeping safe; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education.)
3. Managing Feelings (Understanding feelings, and that how I feel and how others feel affects choices and behaviour; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education)
4. Changing and Growing (How I and others are changing; new opportunities and responsibilities; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education)
5. Healthy Lifestyles (Being and keeping healthy, physically and mentally)
6. The World I Live In (Living confidently in the wider world)
Key Stage 4-5
Students follow PSHE / RSHE qualifications that are relevant to their developmental attainment levels, through a rolling programme offered throughout the year.
Content from the Kidsafe programme is offered as supplementary content for our most able pupils / students from upper KS2–5.
PSHCE / RSHE education is taught as a planned, developmental programme of learning through which children acquire the disciplinary facts and vocabulary through sequential components to enable them to apply this substantive, small steps of learning they need to manage their lives now and in the future. Pupils/students work at their own pace, at a level suitable to each pupil. Methods of delivery include kinaesthetic with visual and auditory prompts, to support learning and progression in a safe and controlled environment.
As part of a whole-school approach, PSHCE/ RSHE education develops the qualities and attributes pupils need to thrive as individuals, family members and members of society. Further, it can help reduce or remove many of the barriers to learning experienced by pupils, significantly improving their capacity to learn and achieve. Teachers provide learning opportunities matched to the needs of children. PSHCE / RSHE education also makes a significant contribution to pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, their behaviour and safety, and to their emotional wellbeing.
PSHCE / RSHE education contributes to personal development by helping pupils to build their confidence, resilience and self-esteem, and to identify and manage risk, make informed choices and understand what influences their decisions. It enables them to recognise, accept and shape their identities, to understand and accommodate difference and change, to manage emotions and to communicate constructively in a variety of settings. Developing an understanding of themselves, empathy and the ability to work with others will help pupils to form and maintain good relationships, develop the essential skills for future employability and better enjoy and manage their lives.
Villa Real School’s ambitious PSHCE / RSHE curriculum is mapped against the EYFS Framework, Development Matters and National Curriculum. It is reviewed and updated according to annual cohorts and national agendas.
Assessment in PSHCE / RSHE education should be active and participatory, helping children to recognise the progress they are making in developing and taking part. In PSHCE / RSHE the various forms of assessment are built in as an integral part of learning. Pupils / students are being taught to learn to reflect on their experiences, ask questions, make judgements about their strengths and needs, and begin to plan how to make progress and set personal targets. Teachers ensure regular opportunities to reflect on and identify what students have learnt, what needs to be learnt next and what they need to do to continue their learning. Teachers assess children’s work in PSHCE / RSHE education by making informal judgements as they observe during lessons and at other times during the school day. Some aspects of learning in PSHCE / RSHE lend themselves more easily to formal assessment than others. Baseline assessment, in order to understand pupils’ prior learning, is essential to ensure new learning is relevant and progress can be assessed. Assessment should encompass teacher, peer and self-assessment. Progress in PSHCE / RSHE education should be recorded and reported to parents as part of the child’s annual school report. Villa Real School use REAL targets to plan, review and assess progress.
Learning in the EYFS is recorded and assessed through daily observations captured alongside their bespoke MTPs in their EYFS learning journal file, on Earwig and when in Reception, workbooks. Progress in the EYFS is tracked on BSquared using the explicit EYFS section, which then feeds into the following Engagement Steps and Progression Steps accordingly, as they move into Year 1 onwards.
Judgements will be made on the extent to which pupils are:
Developing confidence and responsibility and making the most of their abilities
Learning to play an active role as citizens
Developing a healthy, safer lifestyle
Developing good relationships and respecting the differences between people