St Ann's CofE Primary School

Intent

The school’s PSHE curriculum is systematic in its approach. It has recently been embedded across school running from Nursery all the way through to Year 6.  

The school has decided to use the Heart Smart curriculum to enable this to happen smoothly. Each year group will follow the same topic but each topic is dealt with at an age-appropriate level. The topics discussed are: Meet Boris, Don't Forget to Let Love In, Too Much Selfie Isn’t Healthy, Don’t Hold On To What Is Wrong, Fake Is a Mistake and No Way Through Isn’t True. These topics look at issues such as loving yourself and others, what love is, relationships, friendships, being honest and overcoming challenges. These topics also link with the school’s Christian values of Perseverance, Hope, Respect, Honesty & Trust, Forgiveness & Reconcilliation and Peace. 

Many children in our school benefit from knowing how to behave with others and how thinking of others is vital in order to live a happy and fulfilled life.  Each lesson encourages discussion and opportunity for children to explore their own thoughts and those of others. Then children will be encouraged to think how this will work out in their lives.  |It is hoped that each year the children move into, the things they have learned will be built upon and their ability to apply these concepts into their everyday lives will enable them to become more well-rounded children and be able to adapt to life in modern Britain when they are older.

The Heart Smart programme also fulfils all the requirements of the governments’ new relationship education programme. Children will think about healthy relationships, puberty and problems arising from social media. In a rapidly changing world, children will need to be prepared to adapt and to make informed choices.  

Parents are engaged by having been informed of recent changes to the policy and have been encouraged to look over the curriculum and ask questions where necessary. 

Implementation 

PSHE is taught every week across the school. The school uses the Heart Smart program. This has a consistent approach across school so the children understand the language and each element is developed year on year. The program has 5 core principles: Don’t forget to let love in. (realising they are loved and what love is) Too much selfie isn’t healthy (Thinking of others) Don’t hold on to what’s wrong. (Forgiveness and reconciliation) Fake is a mistake. (Being truthful) No way through isn’t true (Developing perseverance) These principles are explored in more detail and topical subjects are discussed to enable the children to live in modern Britain. The principles also complement our school Christian values too.