Introduction

From 2020, ‘Relationship, Health and Sex Education’ became compulsory in all primary schools in England and our policy sets out our approach at The Gateway Primary Academy to the teaching of this topic. Our policy is based on the statutory guidance given in the Relationships, Sex and Education Guidance, DFE (2019)

At The Gateway, we recognise that our pupils are growing up in an increasingly complex world and are living their lives both on and offline. We recognise that while this presents many exciting and positive opportunities, it also presents challenges and risks. Through our teaching, we recognise that our pupils must know how to be safe and healthy, and how to manage their academic, personal and social lives in a positive way.

We recognise that our relationship teaching presents a huge opportunity to help our pupils develop. The knowledge and attributes gained will support their own and others’ wellbeing and attainment, and will help our pupils to become successful and happy with the skills to deal with challenges in the future. Our teaching will provide our pupils will the information of how and when to ask for help and where to access support.

Our school vision and values

All of the content within our Relationship, Health and Sex policy supports our school vision, which is for all of our pupils to achieve their full potentially physically, socially and academically whilst preparing them for a successful future in a multicultural society by celebrating diversity and embracing our British values. 

The teaching of relationships at the Gateway is supported by our work on our school values, which are:

• Teamwork
• Honesty
• Respect
• Politeness
• Kindness

Our values are central to our weekly assemblies and are celebrated in our weekly Golden Time assembly with children displaying them being given our Gateway Stars. The core values of relationship, health and sex teaching also links with our Golden Time system by encouraging children to take responsibility for their own behaviour and changing it.

Aims

The aims of relationships, health and sex curriculum at our school are to:

• Provide a framework in which sensitive discussions can take place
• Prepare pupils for puberty, and the importance of health and hygiene
• Help pupils develop feelings of self-respect, confidence and empathy
• Create a positive culture around issues of sexuality and relationships
• Teach pupils the correct vocabulary to describe themselves and their bodies
• Keep our pupils safe and healthy
• Give our pupils the information they need to make good decisions about their own health and wellbeing and know how to seek support and guidance

Relationships education focuses on teaching the fundamental building blocks and characteristics of positive relationships including:

• Families and people who care for me
• Caring friendships
• Respectful relationships
• Online relationships
• Being safe
• How to be healthy

Health education focuses on:

• Mental wellbeing
• Internet safety and harms
• Physical health and fitness
• Healthy eating
• Drugs, alcohol and tobacco
• Health and prevention
• Basic first aid
• Changing adolescent body

Our relationship education is taught through:

• The use of our Jigsaw Scheme of Work (see Appendix 1)
• Our Computing curriculum (see Appendix 2 for year by year objectives)
• Our Science curriculum (see Appendix 3 for year by year objectives)
• Our PE curriculum (see Appendix 4?)
• Our School Values
• Aspects of our Religious Education scheme of work (Discovery RE)
• Class Circle Times
• Our use of BLP (building learning power)
• Our Golden Time system
• Collective Worship
• Theme Days/Weeks
• Use of outside visitors such as: FRED workshops
• Class visits

At The Gateway, we use the Jigsaw Scheme of Work to support our teaching of relationship education as it matches the requirements set out in the RSE statutory guidance (2019). Jigsaw is split into 6 puzzle pieces which are developed and built on year by year progressively (see below).

Jigsaw was chosen to deliver our relationship curriculum as it breaks down the core knowledge linked to relationships into manageable sized units and is carefully sequenced, which ensures its’ content is age appropriate. Our teachers develop the content in Jigsaw to match the needs of their pupils and add in well-chosen opportunities and contexts for our pupils to embed new knowledge so it can be used confidently in real life situations.

Piece 1 - Being me in my world

This puzzle piece focuses on children developing an understanding of their own feelings, their community in school, working with others and developing a class charter to allow everyone to be treated with respect in class.

Piece 2 - Celebrating differences

This unit focuses on developing positive attributes, such as: friendships and how kindness, integrity, generosity and honesty are key parts of respecting differences.

Piece 3 - Dreams and goals

Central to this unit is encouraging children to set themselves goals (both academic and personal) and then support them in identifying the steps they need to take to be successful. The children focus on developing their perseverance and resilience which they then use across the curriculum.   

Piece 4 - Healthy Me

Healthy Me builds on our work in Science and PE developing an understanding of the importance of exercise, sleep, healthy diet and keeping safe. It also covers stranger danger and what to do if you feel unsafe both online and offline.

Piece 5 – Relationships

Throughout this unit, we focus on healthy friendships, family relationships and other relationships which children many come across. This is to enable our pupils to recognise the features of relationships which will lead to happiness and security. This will also help them to recognise any less positive relationships (both online and in real life) when they encounter them and how to seek help. We also look at how friendships can promote good mental wellbeing.

Piece 6 - Changing Me

Changing Me covers preparing for changes, for example transition to the next year group or changes in our body or lives for example: puberty.