PSHE / Life Matters

At St Catherine's our own Life Matters courses address topics and issues from the PSHE curriculum. Life Matters at St Catherine's seeks to equip our students with balanced and accurate information with which they can make good choices for life, and forge happy and healthy relationships, both now and in the future.

We are very proud of our existing program, and the legislation that came into effect in Summer 2021 for PSHE gave us exciting opportunities to review our Life Matters curriculum further. The new government mandatory requirements for the teaching of Relationships and Sex Education covered much familiar content, and also contained updated guidance on the teaching of Mental Health. A significant difference was the new requirement to assess student progress, and we leveraged some of our favourite digital tools (Kahoot, Quizizz, Mentimeter, Google Forms, Kialo etc.) to achieve this in an engaging way in class time, without adding to student workload. With the introduction of OneNote students have all resources in one place, including links to websites relevant to each topic. The students are given the opportunity to reflect on questions and different scenarios and they are able to write down their thoughts in to OneNote during the Life Matters lessons. Tutors then have an overview and are able to reflect on this during tutor time.

Every year parents receive a letter detailing information on the RSE section of the course.

Click here to view our Relationships & Sex Education policy.

Curriculum

Philosophy and Aims

Throughout their Life Matters lessons at St Catherine's all girls should develop the following:

Strong Inter and Intrapersonal Skills eg. Communication, Empathy, Self-Awareness
An Informed Worldview – eg. What are Human Rights, What is Radicalisation
Applied Thinking Skills – eg. Problem Solving, Risk Assessment

In their weekly dedicated lesson students in U3-U5 follow a program including sessions of active learning, group work, teacher-led inputs, and talks from visiting speakers (see enrichment section for details). Students gain skills and experiences which contribute both to their broad general education and also to the aims of St Catherine's and Life Matters.

Themes

Taking the 9 themes from the PSHE association we have a spiral curriculum, where these themes are revisited each year. This allows for reflection and consolidation, for the induction of new girls, and for the delivery of age-appropriate content.

Identity (their personal qualities, attitudes, skills, attributes and achievements and what influences these)
Relationships (including different types and in different settings)
A healthy (including physically, emotionally and socially) balanced lifestyle (including within relationships, work-life, exercise and rest, spending and saving and diet)
Risk (identification, assessment and how to manage risk rather than simply the avoidance of risk for self and others) and safety (including behaviour and strategies to employ in different settings)
Diversity and Equality (in all its forms)
Rights (including the notion of universal human rights), responsibilities (including fairness and justice) and consent (in different contexts)
Change (as something to be managed) and resilience (the skills, strategies and ‘inner resources’ we can draw on when faced with challenging change or circumstance)
Power (how it is used and encountered in a variety of contexts including persuasion, bullying, negotiation and ‘win-win’ outcomes)
Career (including enterprise, employability and economic understanding)

6th Form

Within the SCOPE curriculum, specific lectures are delivered on various age-specific life matters content; for example:

Festivals - having fun whilst keeping safe
Resilience
The Science and Practice of Happiness
Safe-drive, Stay alive
Drugs education
Equipping students with the skills and knowledge to help them in the future

Staff Team

Life Matters is primarily taught by Senior Pastoral staff with the confidence and experience to manage issues arising. School Housemistresses, Boarding Housemistresses and experienced Pastoral staff receive specialist training, and meet weekly to ensure lessons reflect and address any pastoral concerns, or current issues in the school community.

Support for Parents

If you would like to know more or have any particular queries contact:

Isabel Cook - Head of Life Matters
Kirsty Meredith - Senior Housemistress
or.. any of the other members of your daughter's pastoral team.

Regular Communications

Parents and guardians should expect a termly Clarion detailing the topics that are coming up for particular year groups and suggesting any particularly relevant resources for that age group.

Useful websites

General:

www.thinkuknow.co.uk/parents
www.youngminds.org.uk
www.sexwise.fpa.org.uk (used in 5th Form teaching)

Substance abuse:

Family Planning and Sexual Health :

www.fpa.org.uk

For current parents, we offer a full list of helpful websites related to the Life Matters Curriculum.

Resources

Financial Awareness

Financial awareness is a neglected aspect of education in Britain, despite its being one of the main headings of the last government’s Every Child Matters agenda: Achieving economic wellbeing.

Decisions relating to financial products such as credit cards, mortgages, pensions and student loans are significant because the outcomes of these decisions can affect not just our bank balance, but also our relationships with others and general wellbeing.

At St Catherine’s we take financial awareness seriously. The following topics, amongst many others, are taught to our girls in lecture sessions that run throughout their time at the School:

Saving and investment: what are the pros and cons of holding cash savings, compared to alternatives, such as shares and bonds? Is it always wise to delegate our financial affairs to so-called experts? How are IFAs paid? And why does this matter?

Debt: what are the pros and cons of fixed rate versus tracker mortgage? What are the advantages of repaying mortgages early? What are the dangers of equity release schemes?

The lectures begin with very basic points on saving, how to earn some extra pocket money and budgeting in Upper 3, and culminate in U6 with some hard facts on student loans!

Health at School

St Catherine's takes a holistic view of the girls' wellbeing and therefore, at the beginning of their time at senior school they take part in a panel lecture and discussion. Key members of the health and pastoral teams speak to students about staying happy and healthy at school:

Rev'd Dr McNair Scott, School Chaplain
Sister Green RGN - Senior Nursing Sister
Dr Taylor, School Psychologist

The panel works together to encourage girls to:

Enjoy their school / work life balance
Fully immerse themselves in school life
Know how to access help and support
Take care of themselves as well as others

In this session students are encouraged to ask probing questions which help them understand themselves and aspects of their wellbeing as to inform them of the range of support available.

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