Now, call me silly, but I’m not sure that the acronym RASH is the best for Relationship and Sexual Health Education… which is the now-preferred name for Sex Ed.
The rationale behind that is to remove the emphasis from the sex bit – the thing that sends parents into panic mode (and almost understandably so) – and onto the real nature of the curriculum which is the pastoral side of teaching which you can never be taught and only get better at with experience. It’s quite rare to receive training on PSHCE, usually the ‘bigger’ subjects tend to get the focus, so today was a welcome change.
The new curriculum announced recently makes little or no reference to sexual education and the previously statutory part of it, hidden inside the Science curriculum, is also mysteriously absent. So, what are we to make of this? There is a need to fulfil the pastoral side and part of that includes educating children about the changes in their lives as we grow up – and it’s hard to ignore puberty! As well as this schools are legally required to have some form of policy regarding sexual education – even if to say that the decision has been made not to teach it.
Anyway, it was an interesting day with plenty to think about in relation to the teaching of Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship and Economic Education (PSHCE Ed).
The evening has been spent on Heroes. It is now pretty much done in that the basic bones are there and just need mapping onto the appropriate brass instrument. That may be a tricky job, although I do have plenty of ideas already.
