• Provide a framework in which sensitive discussions can take place.
• Prepare pupils for puberty, and give them an understanding of sexual development 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.
• Support families and students in any challenges that may arise relating to RSE.
• Support staff through their induction training and their continued development.
• Support students to form safe relationships and to safeguard students.

RSE is lifelong learning about physical, sexual, moral and emotional development. It is about teaching sex, sexuality and sexual health in a way that gives students the confidence to make sound decisions when facing risks and other challenges. It includes teaching about friendship, the importance of caring, stable and mutually supportive relationships with another person, and how to control and understand feelings that come with being in a relationship.

RSE will outline that there are different types of committed, stable relationships, the characteristics and legal status of other types of long-term relationships, the importance of marriage as a relationship choice and why it must be freely entered into, how relationships might contribute to human happiness and their importance for raising children, as well as highlighting the roles and responsibilities of parents with respect to raising children, characteristics of successful parenting and how to judge when relationships have become unsafe as well as how to seek help or advice and report concerns about others.

At Wren Spinney we use The SoSafe! Program to deliver our RSE

The SoSAFE! Program is a visual teaching tool which enables learners to develop their abilities at managing and communicating about their relationships. The program covers all degrees of interaction; from a student’s expectations of strangers, to the intricacies of an intimate relationship.

Intent

• To recognise and accept differences between people.
• To understand personal space.
• To distinguish between “private” and “public”.
• To categorise people and associate social rules for each category.
• To understand different types of relationships.
• To use behaviour appropriate to relationships.
• To keep safe within a relationship.
• Know where to seek help or advice.

Implementation

The Wren Spinney RSE curriculum is built upon 4 levels, based around cognitive abilities which we take from our assessment, called the W-Levels.

Level 1: RSE for very special Learners (PMLD): Sensology

Level 2: RSE for ASD-SLD (W1-W5): Sensology and 1^st-5^th concepts from adapted from SoSAFE!- Stage One (see below)

The delivery of these concepts has been modified to suit the ASD cohort as follows:

• OK helpers are defined as all the people from the student’s class. This is to enable the student to ask for help in class when the key worker is absent.
• OK helpers are labelled twice a day during circle times. The students use their PBS book to point to the picture of each OK helper, after adult modelling.
• Community workers are all the other adults working in school (eg nurses and therapists).  They are labelled during circle time, if they visit the class during that day. The students use their PBS book to point to the picture of the community worker, after adult modelling.
• OK/Not OK concepts are reinforced during sensory or personal care activities. The students use their book, or poster (located in the toilet), to answer if it is OK for the adult to proceed with a specific action.

Level 3 RSE for W6-W8 :SoSAFE! Curriculum + RSE Equals Semi-Formal

Level 4: RSE for W9- onwards SoSAFE! Curriculum At level 3 and 4, the students’ learning will be enhanced by discreet sessions focused on Emotional Regulation and Decision-Making. This is because, in order for our students to stay safe from abuse, form healthy relationships and lead a happy and fulfilling life to the best of their abilities, they need to be able to regulate their own emotions and make the best possible choices.

As a school, we understand that first, very young children can understand events that happen only “here and now”, and that they cannot perceive the past or the future.

After the age of 3, children learn to extend themselves over time and separate between 'self' and the world.

At a much later stage, they will be able to identify their own goals and learn how to control these goals and derive them from their needs. Students will also establish purposes and then form models of reality together with others and begin to form a social self.

All pupils will have a People and Relationship Book. This makes use of several concepts, including the TALK TOUCH TRIANGLE shown below. 

Impact

• The students will make good progress towards their PLGs.  
• The students will show love of learning and curiosity.  
• The students will display contextually appropriate behaviours.
• Improving emotional regulation by expanding their concepts (repetitive labelling the stimuli in a predictable environment).
• The students will be more confident, well-rounded, tolerant and more independent by the time they leave Wren Spinney.