The Intent of our RSE Curriculum at Holy Family

At Holy Family we believe that Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) is an integral part of a child’s education so they can ‘Live life to the full’. We endeavour to ensure RSE is faith sensitive, inclusive and inspiring. Children explore how we are created and loved by God, created to love others and created to live in community. Through RSE our children understand the importance of family life, stable and loving relationships. They understand how to show respect, love and care for others as well as themselves. Our RSE curriculum helps to foster pupil well- being, confidence, self-esteem and develop resilience, values that we know are fundamental to pupils being happy, successful and productive members of society.

In this session, children learnt the difference between good secrets that are safe to keep, and bad secrets that are unsafe to keep. They helped Super Susie to decide whether some secrets she is asked to keep are good or bad, and what to do about it. 

Children learnt that their behaviour can not only upset other people, but it can hurt God too. They were given an opportunity to reflect on their own experiences and to give and receive forgiveness.

Building on the session ‘Feeling Inside Out’ in Module 1 where children learnt that their feelings and actions are different things, this session investigated how their behaviour can affect other people. Children will interacted with a film to help them to identify appropriate and inappropriate behaviours and the effects that they can have.

Using the knowledge they gained from Zoe and Joey over the previous sessions, the children acted as the mantle of the expert and helped Super Susie navigate through strong feelings for the first time. 

Year 1 listened to the Live Picture News Assembly for Children's Mental Health Week. They listened to grownups and children sharing examples of supporting their own mental health.

Year 3 enjoyed taking part in mental health week in school, by joining the picture news life where we discussed mental strategies, and things that made us happy.

Pupil Voice:

“ I like to be in the outdoors to help me stay calm, appreciative and happy”

“ I like to spend time with others and share good times with my family to enjoy life”

” I enjoy swimming to relax and take time for my self”

Year 2 enjoyed participating in the Picture news assembly for mental health week. They discussed factors which could affect our mental health and the importance of recognising it. 

In RSE we have been talking about friendships and what makes a good friend. The nursery children made each other friendship bands and together we made a friendship flower.

The year 1 and 2 children loved having the Riot Act in to deliver a road safety play. They listened and learnt all about how to be safe near roads and sang the ‘Stop, Look and Listen’ song.

In RSE the children have been identifying people who are special to them and what makes them special. They have been learning about the importance of family and making their own family trees.

Year 1 had a visit from the school nurse. They discussed the importance of safe touch and what to do if they felt worried.

Year 6 knew the importance of creating Respect pledges during Anti-Bullying Week

Year 4 worked in small teams to create different slides to contribute towards out ant-bullying powerpoint. The children discussed what it means to show and receive respect and what action they should take if they are being bullied. 

The children were excited to welcome Thomas Gibbs, a teacher from Dentaid, the dental charity.  The charity works to improve oral health and delivers the BrightBites oral health education programme. The children learnt about the names and functions of teeth, healthy eating, good tooth brushing techniques and the importance of regularly seeing a dentist. They even were given a toothbrush and tooth paste to take home.

Year 1 learnt all about celebrating our God-given bodies and the things they enable us to do! We sang head, shoulder, knees and toes and labelled our friends.

In RSE the nursery children have learnt that we are created and loved by God. They have learnt about their uniqueness and celebrated their differences. They have also learnt about their amazing bodies and how to look after them.

After watching the Bible story of Jesus calming the storm and learning how Jesus is always there through life's storms, the children in Year 5 responded by writing prayers asking for help for themselves or for others and started to fill our 'prayer cross' in class.

'God cares for us and wants us to put our faith in Him.'

In this session, children learnt about the different communities that they are part of, both local and global. They will think about what it means to belong to a community and the rights and responsibilities that come with it. They played the 'Find Someone' game and watched Suzie's videos.

The children have been getting better at understanding how to live in the wider world in our community. The children have explored approached of the charities’CAFOD and Emmaus’, and have discussed their understanding using a comprehension approach. The children have explored how they can put love into action in the communities we live in. They recognise how we can care for others and how we can be cared for through a sorting activity completed in pairs.

In year 3, the children have been getting better at learning about the wider church and its mission to reflect the Holy Trinity through love for others. The children have developed their learning through meaningful discussion about the ‘common good’.

Through the story of The Good Samaritan, children learnt who their neighbour is – everyone! They reflected on what this means for them and their communities.

At the heart of this session is a story about Lucy and her family. Through the story, children were introduced to the concept of the Holy Trinity and thought about what the Holy Trinity means for them. 

The children in year 5 were excited to learn all about 'Giving Assistance' by helping others in need. They were taught basic first aid knowledge including the recovery position and the DR ABC primary survey and were able to role play to practice their newly learnt skills. 

Holy Family had a visit from the school nurse who spoke to the children about the negative effects on a person's body after consuming lots of energy drinks. 

In year 3 the children have been using role play and drama techniques to act out scenarios given by Dr Datfa at the ‘courages child awards’ for bravery in first aid and 999 calls. The children worked in groups to act out house fire, drowning, burns and seizure scenarios. We then reflected of the bravery of the children and people involved in these scenarios, and thanked God for watching over us and rising us up in times of need.

Children learnt all about keeping safe and unsafe outdoors and indoors and what they would do if they were poorly.

Children have learnt about what is and isn’t an emergency and that in an emergency, they (or an adult) should call 999 and ask for ambulance, police and/or fire brigade.

In this session, children learnt the difference between good secrets that are safe to keep, and bad secrets that are unsafe to keep. They helped Super Susie to decide whether some secrets she is asked to keep are good or bad, and what to do about it. 

Children were introduced to medicines and learnt how to be safe around them. Children drew on their own experiences of feeling poorly and taking medicines. Children were taught that our bodies are a gift from God in which we should take care of.

In this module, the children have been exploring and identifying complex relationships in their lives. The children have discussed what it means to be a good friend and learnt some strategies to use when it can be difficult in relationships. Here the children are doing a sorting activity of scenarios and relationships into categories (Friends, Family and Others).

Year 6 thoroughly enjoyed their visit to Crucial Crew! They learnt life lessons involving water safety, fire safety, a courtroom reenactment, arson, child criminal exploitation, bus safety, knife and hate crime and road safety!

In RSE year 3 have acted out a forgiveness illustration to resemble how “we can forgive other how God forgives us”

During this half term in RSE, Year 6 learnt about body image (the importance of body image and how it can have an effect on people), peculiar feelings (knowing which behaviours are wrong and that we must take responsibility for our actions and that people can react differently based on their circumstances), emotional changes (identifying what angers or upsets them and thinking of coping strategies to use in their life), seeing stuff online (how the internet can influence people and what to do for next steps), making babies (understanding the science behind how babies are made) and menstruation.

Year 6 learnt about their own gifts and talents, boys' bodies and their changes, girls' bodies and their changes and about spots and the importance of a good nights sleep!

Year 6 took part in an event by Picture News; this focused on understanding our British Values!

In module 1, Created and loved by God, Reception children have learnt all about their bodies and being healthy, emotional well-being and life cycles.

During Anti-Bullying week, Year 4 wrote their own creative poems about friendship. The children then performed their poetry to others Please take a listen to the children's amazing poems!

Children in FS2 have explored what makes an anti-bullying superhero. We discussed what it looks like when someone is in a unkind way and how we can help those affected.

We read the story, 'Be the Kind Kid' and and learnt about a kind hearted girl called Ellie who set up a kindness club after finding out one of her friends were being bullied.

Picture News- Protected Characteristics and British Values

Year 5 took part in a wonderful session learning all about protected characteristics and British values and why the are important in everyday life. We learnt that everyone is equal and deserves to be respected. Well done year 5!

Session 2: Respecting Our Bodies 

In this session, Y3 explored the importance of respecting their bodies as a gift from God in very practical ways, such as clothing, food and physical exercise. Returning to the character of AJ (on screen) and Sophie and Aidan (played by pupils), children explored problems and solutions through role-play and discussion. Children will have reflected on their bodies as a gift from God that He wants us to look after and respect. 

In Y3-RSE this term, children have been learning about the Gospel story of Jesus healing Jairus daughter. Y3 have been learning about the sacraments of Baptism, and Reconciliation.

Religious Understanding

The children at Holy Family have thoroughly enjoyed learning about the Gospels during their first unit of the year- Religious Understanding.

They now know:

We are created individually by God as part of His creation plan.

God wants us to talk to Him often through the day and treat Him as our best friend.

God made us with the desire to be loved and to love and to make a difference: each of us has a specific purpose.

God cares for us and wants us to put our faith in Him.

To celebrate their understanding and knowledge, each class created a display to showcase their learning throughout the topic. Take a look at the wonderful work below.

In RSE, Nursery children learnt all about God's Creation. They used a range of materials to represent each day, perfected fine motor skills, used full sentences to explain the different creations and used colours for purpose.

In RSE, FS2 children have been introduced to the story of creation, where God created the earth, sea, stars, planets animals and humans. The five-story sessions encouraged children to creatively explore this topic and help them to deeply know that they are created by God out of love and for love. The children really enjoyed using their creative talents to create all things on our amazing earth that God created.

Children in Year four have explored the story of Jesus healing Jairus' daughter and how He gives us life. The children have enjoyed writing a diary entry from Jairus' viewpoint, retelling the story and writing prayers of thanks for the lives we lead. 

The children in year 5 having been looking at the topic- Calming the Storm.

We have been learning how to have faith in ourselves and God and how we can use that faith to help us through challenging times in our lives. We looked at the Gospel of Jesus calming the storm and how the fishermen didn't have faith in him and explored what lessons could be learnt from this.

" Faith is trusting and believing in God and Jesus and relying on them even though you can't see them."

"Faith can help you by giving you strength and courage when you're doing something new or experiencing new things."

"Faith in God can help when things change or there are storms in our lives."

Year 5 pupil responses.

Anti-bullying Week

The children at Holy Family have been celebrating anti-bullying week, focusing on this years theme- Reach Out!

Each class has produced pieces of work, from letters to the school council to posters to place around school that encourage the children to speak up and stop bullying.

Take a look at wonderful work below!

We made posters and plaqards to inform everyone who they should reach out to if they saw, heard or felt bullying.

Year 5 discussed the theme, Reach Out and created posters to place around school to encourage children to reach out and tell others about bullying.

Year 4 have learnt about the Trinity and how God is Love shown by the Trinity - a 'communion of persons supporting each other in their self-giving relationship'. The children created a Trinity triangle to show that God is made of three separate persons that come together as a whole - the Father, the Son (Jesus) and the Holy Spirit. The Trinity triangles showed that God is love - each person in the Trinity is loved and each person in the Trinity loves each other. 

Year 4 had a fantastic trip to Hatfield Water Park. The children started the day with raft building - the children worked so hard in teams and tried really hard to build rafts that would get them across the lake. Out of the 4 groups, 1 group succeeded... the rest of the children got very wet! The children then had a go at kayaks, which they really enjoyed. After lunch, the children took on the challenge of the climbing wall. Miss Bulmer was very proud of the children as they showed resilience and even when they were scared had a go at the climbing wall. The children then took part in archery, some of the children had a very good aim and even got a gold! The children had a wonderful trip. 

Children in Reception have learnt that God is love and that being made in His image means being called to be loved and to love others. Children have engaged with their learning and joined in discussions. They have also taken part in a treasure hunt to develop their understanding of virtues to live by.

Year 6 really enjoyed their visit to Crucial Crew. It taught the children about our wonderful services that help, care and love other people. The service professionals went through a variety of role play scenarios enabling our children to learn all about being a respectful member of society. 

In Year 2, we have continued to explore relationships. We have discussed who we can talk to about things that make us happy and things that make us sad. 

In Year 2, we discussed who is around us in our lives and who is important to us. The children drew their 'Super Hero Squad' to show some of the close relationships they have.