PSHE & Wellbeing

At Gunthorpe Primary School, we believe that PSHE has the power to enhance the health and wellbeing of all children, their families and the whole school community. It has a positive influence on the ethos, learning and relationships throughout the school. It is central to our values and to achieving our school’s aims.

Our PSHE curriculum - following the Cambridgeshire PSHE Service scheme - helps children to develop the knowledge, understanding, skills and attitudes they need to live confident, healthy, independent lives, now and in the future, as individuals, citizens and workers. It is embedded within wider learning to ensure that children learn to develop resilience and healthy relationship skills, which they will practise and see enacted in the school environment.

Our Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) curriculum is adapted and applied with clear thought for the needs of our pupils and takes into account the concerns of their families, again using the Cambridgeshire PSHE Service scheme.

Please see our RSE Policy for full details of the content taught in our school.

We’re happy to answer any questions you have about our curriculum, and we invite you to come in to look at our resources. We believe all parents should be well-informed about what their children are learning.

There’s a lot of misconceptions surrounding this subject and we want to reassure you that relationships education is not the same as sex education.

The focus of relationships education is to teach your child about what healthy and unhealthy relationships look like so they can be safe at school, at home and online. We will also teach them about how their friends’ families might be different from their own families. Their friends might have different religions, speak different languages at home, or have two parents of the same gender.

The aim of our relationships education is to reinforce the values you’re likely to be teaching your child anyway:

Being kind to others
Respecting others’ differences
Living in peace with each other

The Department for Education requires that we teach relationships and health education to all pupils, so you won’t be able to withdraw your child from this part of our curriculum.

Our sex education programme is tailored to our pupils’ age, and physical and emotional maturity. As children get older, they may be confused by changes in their bodies – this confusion can be made worse by misinformation online and from other children. We offer fact-based education to reassure your child that what they’re experiencing is normal, and we explain the science behind these changes.

We encourage you to keep your child in this programme and to have conversations at home about this topic. However, you can withdraw your child if you wish. Should you decide to withdraw, you can contact your child’s class teacher or respond to the letter that will be shared via Class Dojo prior to teaching.

The Department for Education has published some resources for parents that explain what they expect pupils to learn in school and why.

If you have any concerns, we are always happy to discuss them with you. Please contact the school office to make an appointment with your child’s class teacher or our PHSE Leader - Miss Hawkins