Intent
PSHE education is a planned programme of learning through which children and young people acquire the knowledge, understanding and skills they need to manage and enjoy their lives – now and in the future. At Elmwood Infant School, it is our intent that all children will be ‘lifelong learners’ with the confidence and ability to develop their skills and understanding when having new experiences, meeting new challenges and finding themselves in unfamiliar situations. In doing so they learn to recognise their own worth, work well with others and become increasingly responsible for their own learning.
Throughout lessons children are encouraged to think about which ‘Super Skills’ they might be using in order to be the best they can be, such as collaboration, communication and being reflective. We offer a nurturing learning environment in which each child is encouraged to develop their full potential and where their achievements and successes are celebrated and rewarded. As a school, we celebrate children as the unique individuals they are and aim to encourage mutual respect, responsibility and foster self-esteem in a happy and caring atmosphere.
Elmwood Infant School is a rights respecting school and we give children the opportunities to learn about their rights and responsibilities. Children are encouraged to use their knowledge about rights during PSHE lesson discussions and within the wider curriculum. Using the Jigsaw programme, children acquire knowledge, understanding and the skills they need to manage their lives now and in their futures. Ultimately, developing the qualities and attributes children need to thrive as individuals, family members and as members of society and the global community.
Impact Statement
At Elmwood, we aim to prepare our pupils to become confident, rights respecting individuals with a deep understanding of how to best care for themselves and others, now and throughout their futures.
Through Jigsaw, our chosen programme of study, we cover a range of topics within a safe and nurturing learning environment. The children are encouraged and supported in expressing themselves, sharing their experiences and listening respectfully to their peers, who may have different thoughts and beliefs.
Alongside our programme of work, we embed a positive learning attitude through our ten ‘Super Skills’ at Elmwood. These skills are a key learning tool but they are also skills that we aim to further develop for success in the future, such as communication, inquisitiveness, reflectiveness and collaboration.
In our Early Years provision, we strive to develop the children’s social language to best ensure that they can be as independent as possible in making friends, expressing their needs and resolving conflict through effective communication and thinking of how others may be feeling.
In Key Stage 1, during our Celebrating Differences topic, we aim to achieve, within each of our children, an appreciation for their self-worth and individuality, by celebrating what makes us unique as well as exploring what links us to our immediate family and to any family members around the world. We teach the children about their bodies, how to be healthy and what has changed in them since they were born. Across Key Stage 1, the children also learning about their emotional well-being within the boundaries of healthy relationships and goal setting. At Elmwood we support every child to meet their full potential and to ultimately believe that they can achieve whatever they set out to do, now and in the future.
We also pride ourselves at Elmwood on our wider curriculum, with kindness and our rights respecting ethos being at its heart. We are supporters of the Show Racism the Red Card competition, in which we take part every year, but most importantly, we embed anti-racism in our learning throughout the year. We take part in regular road safety exercises to ensure that we are being environmentally responsible as a community as well as keeping ourselves safe on the streets.
Overall, at Elmwood we support the children in becoming happy, healthy individuals with a sense of pride in themselves. Children are encouraged to take responsibility for their learning and strive to reach their potential.
Implementation
Elmwood Infant School aims to provide a supportive, safe environment in which to promote all aspects of PSHE. Class teachers are responsible for the delivery of PSHE within their timetable. Good classroom practice involves a wide range of teaching and learning strategies, which take into account different learning styles. Teachers employ a range of teaching styles to meet the needs of visual, auditory and kinaesthetic learners and styles include active learning, enquiry and discussion.
PSHE is taught through a combination of: –
- Discreet curriculum time: e.g. Circle time
- Through other subject’s and curriculum areas: e.g. Rights Respecting School ethos, Science, PE, etc.
- Through focus weeks, activities and events; e.g. Assemblies, Friendship Week, Show Racism the Red Card, Anti-bullying Week, Refugee Week, etc.
The Scheme of Work and Resources
In KS1 we use the Jigsaw Scheme of Work, which offers a nurturing learning environment in which each child is encouraged to develop their full potential and where their achievements and successes are celebrated and rewarded. Each class has access to the Jigsaw resource folder with the scheme of work included. The scheme indicates topics to be covered in each year group within KS1. The time scale is only a guideline and year groups will decide the best sequence to cover each topic area.
Jigsaw themed materials are used as a basis for teaching PSHE and encompass the following areas: –
Being Me in the World
Celebrating Difference
Dreams and Goals
Healthy Me
Relationships
Changing Me
PSHE Early Years Foundation Stage
In the Early Years Foundation Stage, PSHE is encouraged through the ‘Personal, Social and Emotional Development’ curriculum. PSHE is about making connections and is strongly linked to play. PSHE is taught through activities that are part of topics, as well as on an individual basis to develop personal skills such as dressing, feeding and toileting. Positive experiences are built through daily opportunities to share and enjoy a range of different activities. Children will learn to form positive relationships in a setting that supports mutual respect and understanding and that celebrates and acknowledges differences. We give children the confidence to make the most of opportunities, to communicate effectively and to explore the world around them. They learn to work as part of a group or class taking turns and sharing, and show their own feelings in appropriate ways.
PSHE around our school
Year 1 have been enjoying learning in their PSHE lessons.
