At St Mary's Primary School we firmly believe that
‘You're never too young to make a difference’
and so in line with this, we have developed
‘Personal Development’ (PD) to encompass:
- Relationships Education curriculum
- PSHE through Jigsaw
- additional wider safety
- economic understanding
- strong E-safety curriculum to support children's understanding of technology and media.
- Developing citizens of the future through our vision and values actively contributing to our community.
- A focus on developing children's character to facilitate them to be successful
- A strong understanding of British Values in their daily lives
- facilitating aspirations for children's future careers
By enabling our children and young people to develop their own skills, knowledge and understanding of how to be who they are, understand the world they are growing up in and how to keep themselves safe in all areas of their world, we believe that we are giving each and every one of them the best chance for their lives ahead. Our curriculum has been designed with our children in mind and may vary in content to reflect the ever-changing world we live in.
Be sure to read our blog post showing how our Year 6 children achieved the St Mary's Top Ten Things To Do this year by clicking on our Personal Development Blog (below)
Mental Health and Wellbeing
At St. Mary's C of E School, we are committed to supporting the positive mental health and wellbeing of our whole community; children, staff, parents and carers.
Our ethos is supportive, caring and respectful. We understand how important positive mental health and wellbeing is to our lives. We recognise that children’s mental health is a vital factor in their overall wellbeing and how it can affect their learning and achievements. Our School encourages children to be open and we support all children to have their voice heard.
Mental Health Definition:
“Mental health is a state of well-being in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community.”
World Health Organisation, 2018
What supporting Positive Mental Health means to us:
- The child stays at the centre of every conversation.
- We prioritise those who need our help most, but we promote positive mental health with everyone.
- We embedded social, emotional and mental health awareness across the curriculum.
- Children and young people are taught skills to build resilience and manage everyday stressors.
- Staff wellbeing, resilience and mental health is a key focus.
- We have a trained Pastoral Team who lead on evidence-based practice for our interventions.
How we ensure best practice:
- Time for training and appropriate interventions (TIS, Forest School and Forest School Adventurers)
- Staff are well trained so that they feel equipped to fulfil their role and staff encouraged and supported to identify training needs and access training both internally and externally.
- Staff trained and adept at using MyConcern to report concerns
- Timely referrals for mental health support (CLEAR, CAMHS, Dreadnaughts, music therapy, Play therapy) made by SENCO
- Careful monitoring of the impact of interventions and curriculum
- Regular supervision in place with a choice of senior staff and for DDSL’s
- Occupational health services available for staff (including counselling where needed)
- Parents well informed about provision available in school and where to seek further advice if needed
- Children taught about where they can get help and advice.
- Strong PHSE and RSE curriculum (Jigsaw) to support children to make healthy lifestyle choices
- Staff read and understand section one of Keeping Young people Safe in Education.
- Staff know our behaviour, SEMH, attendance and safeguarding policies and protocols.
- The wider school community has an active voice about SEMH.
- We speak to each other with courtesy, respect and empathy.
We are starting on our journey to a whole school approach but have already made significant inroads to supporting all stakeholders;
- School Mental Health Lead – Kim Rundle
- Pastoral lead – Sophie Vowles (SENCO)
- TIS Practitioner – Leigh Pritchard
- Forest School Teacher- Joanne Mitchell
- All staff have benefitted from whole school TIS training and Emotion Coaching.
Children
- In school, the school council feed information back to their peers and highlight any issues and concerns raised by their classmates.
- Visuals to support children in expressing their emotions and explaining 'What's wrong?'
- Restorative approach to conflict resolution (Jigsaw Talk it! Solve it!)
- Embedded Mental Health and Wellbeing within the PSHE curriculum
- Celebrating Mental Health Week annually
- Collective Worships have a planned focus of Mental Health and Well Being each half term.
- Developed a forest school curriculum that offers children the chance to be in nature and learn outside.