At St Joseph's we recognise that the pastoral care of our children is one of our most important roles. We educate the children through PSHE lessons - personal, social, health education and RSE lessons - Relationships and Sex Education but we are constantly supporting them to develop socially and emotionally.
To prepare our children for the modern world, we support our children to develop a deep sense of self worth, self respect, self awareness as well as self discipline. We support the children to develop these skills alongside our Gospel Values and Virtues which we also model to show positive behaviour and learning attitudes.
We realise that at different times, different children may need a little bit more support to help them socially or emotionally. This is why we have trained staff who run different pastoral groups. We also have support for children who may find lunchtimes challenging.
We offer many groups throughout the school to offer further opportunities for the children to take on different leadership skills and learn different skills. These include our GIFT Team (Pupil Chaplaincy), School Council, Mental Health Ambassadors and an Eco-team.
At St Joseph's, we recognise the importance of teaching the children about mental wellbeing. It is at the heart of what we do as we teach the children that they are all as special as God's children. We celebrate their talents and differences and support them to feel confident in their bodies and to understand how they can look after themselves. We want our children to be equipped to both face and overcome challenges and develop the character that we know is fundamental to being successful, happy and productive members of society. We want our children to know that they can achieve goals and ambitions, that they have the skills and aptitudes to stick to learning or tasks and that they have the resilience to recover from setbacks that may occur in life. Through our curriculum, we have specific sessions dedicated to recognising our mental health and how to support it. Our Mental Health Ambassadors regularly meet and also promote this within school, delivering assemblies to the children as role models.
RSE
We follow a Relationship Education programme for Catholic primary schools, titled Life to the Full.
The Life to the Full programme is based on ‘A Model Catholic Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) Curriculum’ by the Catholic Education Service which was highlighted as a work of good practice by the Department of Education. Therefore, we have confidence that the programme will be fit for purpose in supporting the growth and development of your child.
Life to the Full is much more than a series of lessons. It is an entire platform of creative resources that will engage, inform and inspire our children and, indeed, you as parents. This includes interactive video content, story-based activities, employing a wide range of teaching tools, original worship music and an accompanying programme of classroom prayers.
Life to the Full covers the Statutory requirements for RSE but we supplement it with the Scheme KAPOW to cover other areas of PSHE. Please see our Unit Overview below.
Please see the Letter attached below for more information.