Statutory requirement to deliver Relationships and Health Education – Parent Consultation

Welcome to this temporary part of our website which is designed to allow us to share information with you about these important changes to the school curriculum.

You may know that from September 2020, the Government has decided that all primary age children will be taught Relationships and Health Education (RHE), although they have given schools some flexibility on when they fully implement the new curriculum until summer term 2021 due to the disruptions caused by the Coronavirus pandemic.

These subjects, which we will teach via our Personal, Social, Health & Economic (PSHE) education curriculum, are designed to equip your child with knowledge to make informed decisions about their wellbeing, health and relationships as well as preparing them for a happy and successful adult life.  For many years now, we have covered the vast majority of the topics and themes which the Government is now asking all schools to deliver.  This has been done through our PSHE education programme which is an important part of our approach to developing the whole child at St. Patrick’s.

As part of our preparation to deliver these new requirements, we have been working hard to make sure that the resources and materials we use to do this are right for both our children and our school community.  As required by the Government, we are now consulting with parents and carers on our approach to this, specifically around our Relationships Education curriculum and policy.  Given the current circumstances around social distancing and other restrictions, we felt that the best way to do this was via our school website and by sharing some of the key documents for you to take a look at.

The idea of this consultation exercise is to give you a chance to see how we have interpreted the statutory guidance and let us know what you think.  Please take a look at our draft RSE Policy which will give you all the information you need about our approach to Relationships & Sex Education (RSE) at St. Patrick’s.  Within the appendix of this policy, you will find an overview of our PSHE curriculum which will give you more information about the themes and topics covered across the school years.  The other documents within this site are designed to give you further information and guidance about our wider approach to PSHE education at St. Patrick’s.

We have also produced a short presentation to help give you further information, including a clear understanding of the work we have done and what we are required to deliver.  We would advise that you look over the PowerPoint Presentation first as it explains all you need to know about the consultation process and the new requirements.

Please read and refer to the following documents to see exactly what your child will be taught and information concerning a parent’s right to withdraw their child from any lessons where this right applies.

The consultation process is now closed and we would like to thank all of the parents/carers for your feedback. We thoroughly looked at all of your feedback and have dealt with any specific questions or queries with individual parents.

We have created a document with answers to general/similar questions and keep all of this documentation on the website until Friday 27th November.

After this all important documentation will be added to the PSHE section under the curriculum tab.

Please click here for the list of Frequently Asked Questions.