PSHE

Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) Education

Personal, Social, Health and Economic Education (PSHE) enables children to become healthy, independent and responsible members of society. Pupils are actively encouraged to play a positive role in contributing to the life of the school and the wider community. In doing so we help to develop pupils’ sense of worth and we teach them how society is organised and governed. We teach them about their rights and responsibilities and enable them to learn to appreciate what it means to be a positive member of a culturally diverse society.

St Matthew’s is committed to providing a caring, friendly and safe environment for all pupils so they can learn and develop in a relaxed and secure environment. 

The spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of all pupils is extremely important and pupils are supported on a daily basis through the school’s ethos, during assemblies and across many areas of the curriculum.

At St Matthew’s, we follow the PSHE Association Programme of Study (PoS) which aims to develop skills and attributes such as resilience, self-esteem, risk-management, teamworking and critical thinking in the context of three core themes: Health and Wellbeing, Relationships and Living in the Wider World.

The National Curriculum states that ‘all schools should make provision for personal, social, health and economic education (PSHE), drawing on good practice'. PSHE education contributes to schools' statutory duties outlined in the Education Act 2002 and the Academies Act 2010 to provide a balanced and broadly-based curriculum and is essential to Ofsted judgements in relation to personal development, behaviour, welfare and safeguarding.

Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) Education

Curriculum Statement 

Until September 2019, Personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education is a non-statutory curriculum subject.

However, all schools are still expected to provide PSHE and Sex and Relationship Education.

The government has tabled amendments to the Children and Social Work Bill which, if passed, would:

• Make PSHE education a requirement for all primary and secondary schools, both maintained schools and academies
• Replace the term ‘sex and relationships education’ with ‘relationships and sex education’ (RSE) and make this compulsory in both maintained and academy secondary schools

Currently, only maintained secondary schools have to offer sex and relationships education, and PSHE is only mandatory at independent schools. Academies do not have to teach either.

The DfE also plans to:

• Introduce ‘relationships education’ as a new subject in primary schools
• Publish an internet safety green paper 
• Set out statutory RSE guidance on:
  • Age-appropriate RSE
  • Consent
  • Mental well-being
  • Resilience
  • Keeping safe online (including online pornography and sexting)

The RSE guidance will replace current guidance, which was issued in 2000 and which the DfE says is “increasingly outdated”.

The regulations and statutory guidance will be open to public consultation, and the DfE hopes they will be ready for teaching from September 2019.

The DfE also makes clear that:

• Schools will have flexibility over how they deliver PSHE and RSE, taking into account religious and community needs
• Parents will still be able to withdraw their child from these subjects
• Schools will have to publish a policy statement on how they teach these subjects and information about what will be taught

The DfE says:

Relationships education, RSE and PSHE are designed to ensure pupils are taught the knowledge and life skills they will need to stay safe and develop healthy and supportive relationships, particularly dealing with the challenges of growing up in an online world.