The PSHE & Careers curriculum provides students with essential knowledge and skills in key areas that impact the health and well-being of young people, both in the local community and a wider global context. The aim is to engage students to explore their own thinking and personal feelings, as well as those of others, in forming personal identity and a moral landscape on important life challenges, choices, and societal issues. This is to develop their capability to be agentic learners able to make thoughtful decisions relating to health and well-being.
The Careers curriculum provides students with current information on a wide range of career directions and viable options, exploring with them their own feelings and dispositions. The approach focuses on helping students to identify and understand their potential talents and interests but is mindful that students’ perspectives can change as they move through their school journey. The aim is to provide an ongoing conversation, with current resources on potential career and further education options, offering them an evidence-based platform for their decision making in this important area of life choices
PSHE & Careers education is inclusive and seeks to help students make positive choices to become healthy, independent, and responsible members of society. It also aims to help them to understand a range of of Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural issues in the context of Jersey, UK, and further afield, to enable them to develop their own perspective on both self-worth and in being a responsible global citizen.
Implementation
Haute Vallée follows the PSHE and Careers Jersey Curriculum in terms of the essential content within a whole-school program. Years 7 & 8 (KS3) and Year 9 (first year of KS4) have a timetabled hour of PSHE content each week. Years 10 & 11 (last two years of KS4) receive their PSHE input during a mixture of form-times, drop-down days, and specific events / visiting speakers.
The instructional approach for subject areas covered within both PSHE and Careers education primarily focuses on understanding concepts / principles and the formation of student viewpoints and opinions. It is often that only when these are revisited as the students’ progress through the school years that the required depth of knowledge and understanding occurs enabling them to better prepare for life beyond Haute Vallée.
The Jersey Curriculum content is delivered to all students within Years 7-9, and then the reviewing, consolidation, and development of principles and ideas takes place in Year 10 & 11. SME’s address the more complex / specific areas (e.g., Brook charity, which deliver the Sexual Health content to both upper and lower school) as the subject specific knowledge and sensitivity required to deliver certain subject areas needs to be fully evidence-based to ensure accuracy and engagement for students.
The Scheme of Learning developed for our students also includes opportunities to link the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child (displays in the school) with Key Campaigns (e.g., Anti-bullying Week, SID (Safer Internet Day) to the school’s core values, all within the curriculum.
Across a range of subject areas, PSHE teachers employ learning activities that facilitate the ethos of PSHE, especially supporting the development of students’ communication skills (e.g., empathic listening and speaking with clarity and conciseness). The learning experiences also provide opportunities for students to talk about feelings and / or personal situations, where they can develop better understanding of themselves, of other people, and to build resilience and well-being.
Topics delivered within PSHE / Careers include:
Transition & Change (KS2-3 & KS3-4)
Well-being- Inner Strength & confidence
Keeping my body strong
Jersey- and other countries, cultural differences
The Media & its Power
Children’s Rights & Society
The Police & the Law
Drugs & Drug Taking
Sexual Health & your Choices
LGBTQ+ rights / issues / tolerance
Staying Safe- at home, out & about, & online
The World of Work
Aims and ambitions – making career choices
Boosting your Employment Chances
Money- Budgeting, Saving & Risk
Financial Choices & their consequences
Careers education features in the input within the content delivered to every year group- ranging from introducing a variety of careers and working styles / types in Year 7- to Work Experience and Post 16 applications for the next steps in the higher years. Students have access to specialist career advice, current resources on employment opportunities, support in preparing their applications for further education or employment, and how best to conduct themselves in interview contexts.
Impact
The impact of the curriculum is ascertained through a range of quantitative and qualitative data. These include:
Key concept tests on topic areas (short answer items, MCQ’s)
Student feedback on topic relevance and instructional approaches (e.g., ‘Student Voice’ is employed periodically through surveys- usually a year group at a time to gain feedback and to facilitate the tailoring of PSHE content and impact).
To confirm quality control across the department, there are learning walks which take place as per the school policy / calendar, as well as two-way feedback between HOD and department staff. The HOD responds to regular whole school / GOJ / UK wide initiatives, as well as parent feedback, and implements specific student input across the school as and when required.
