Address: Pound Hill, Alresford, Hants, SO24 9BS

Country: United Kingdom

 School website

Project: Life Studies – learning about life

Working language during the project:

• English
   

Themes of the Council of Europe project “FREE to SPEAK, SAFE to LEARN - Democratic Schools for All” covered:

• Making children’s and students’ voices heard
• Addressing controversial issues
• Dealing with propaganda, misinformation and fake news
• Improving well-being at school
   

Competences from the Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture (CDC) addressed and where / how they were integrated:

• Knowledge and critical understanding of language and communication
  During the 2019-20 academic year, we implemented a fortnightly lesson for Year 8 pupils on media literacy, to improve their understanding of language used within various forms of media. This has included an examination of bias within news articles, analysing the lyrics of songs about social issues and developing an understanding of different information neighbourhoods.
   

Target group age range:

• 11 - 15
   

Level of education:

• Lower secondary education
• Upper secondary education

Short description of the project:

PSHE is a subject in schools in England in which many areas of personal, social, health and economic education are covered; Citizenship is a subject on the National Curriculum which covers aspects of human rights, the law, democracy and politics. We have previously taught these subjects in a subject named Personal Development Learning (PDL).

Many curricular aspects of PSHE became statutory as of September 2020, which necessitated a new approach to be taken within our school. For the 2019-20 academic year, Perins School introduced enrichment lessons for Years 7 and 8, allowing new areas of study, including media literacy and enterprise, to be added to our curriculum. These subjects allow for elements of the new statutory PSHE curriculum to be taught, but also enable staff to engage pupils in additional areas of interest that we believe will assist them later in life. In media literacy lessons, for example, pupils have explored not only how the media operates, but how to verify the information that they are consuming. Enterprise lessons help pupils put their theoretical mathematics skills into practice, by engaging in real-world scenarios such as money management and product design.

In addition, PDL was renamed ‘Life Studies’, to better reflect the content of the subject. Every school year now has Life Studies lessons on the timetable. In Years 9, 10 and 11, these lessons are taught by specialist teachers, to facilitate discussion of topics such as relationships and sex education (RSE), breast and testicular self-examination, racism, and pornography.

Pupils are encouraged to share their views during lessons, with the knowledge that there is rarely only one ‘correct’ view. This helps pupils to understand better the reasons behind someone else’s opinion, as well as contributes to developing their own ability to justify their points of view.

As the required implementation date approaches, we are continuing to develop and fine-tune the curriculum in a way that will best serve our pupils.

Year 8 pupils additionally participate in a specialised Careers topic, which aims to support their ability to recognise the skills sought by employers, to complete application forms accurately and to apply for jobs. This culminates in a session where parents from a range of industry areas come into school to run an interview with each pupil. The interviewers then offer feedback to each pupil on performance aspects they need to improve for the future.

Furthermore, we also offer GCSE Citizenship Studies (a national certified qualification) to pupils who wish to learn more about how society works. This course covers human rights, law and the legal system in England and Wales, citizen action, elections and voting, the British Constitution, the economy and international relations. As part of the course, pupils are required to participate in a citizen action project to raise awareness or effect change on an issue of their choice. This subject has been very popular since we began teaching it and attracts large numbers of pupils.
 

Aims/objectives

• To help our pupils to be the best versions of themselves; to help them to become fully-functional members of society with the knowledge and skills to succeed in all aspects of their lives beyond formal education
• To offer more than just the ‘standard’ expected curriculum
   

Expected results/outcomes

• Pupils who are more self-aware and conscious of the rights and feelings of others, leading to improved behaviour in and outside of school
• Further development of the ‘soft skills’ desired by employers
• Exposure to aspects of the real world often not covered by school curricula
• Greater understanding of how to analyse information, how to recognise mis-, dis- and malinformation, and what to do in these circumstances
• Improved mental health, resilience and mindsets
• Long-term benefits in managing risk and decision making
   

Changes

• Additional curriculum time for all year levels
• Introduction of enrichment subjects in Years 7 and 8, which overlap with other curricular areas and allow for exploration of topics not usually covered in the standard National Curriculum
• Additional specialist member of staff to assist in delivering Life Studies lessons
• Complete overhaul of previous schemes of curricula work and development for new enrichment lessons, to respond more clearly to pupils’ needs and to give them the opportunity to develop
   

Challenges you faced

Limitations on curricular time; financial restrictions in employing another specialist teacher
 

Time-frame of the project:

Ongoing, and aiming to build and improve in the future
 

Council of Europe materials on citizenship and human rights education used while preparing or implementing your practice:

• Managing controversy
• Freedom(s) - Learning activities for secondary schools on the case law of the European Court of Human Rights
• Multimedia Material (ex. video “Beat Bullying”, series of cartoons “Democracy and Human Rights at School”, video “Corporal punishment at school: how two parents decided to change things”)