PSHE


What does PSHE stand for? PSHE stands for Personal, Social, Health and Economic and it is extremely important that all children have a PSHE education. It is currently a non-statutory subject however all schools should teach PSHE which will be outlined in the new curriculum. (Department of Education, 2013) PSHE is a school subject which children develop the knowledge, skills and attributes they need to keep themselves safe and healthy, and also to prepare them for work and life in the real world. PSHE lessons can be proven to have had academic and non-academic outcomes for pupils when it is well delivered. (PSHE Association, 2018)

PSHE is thought of and delivered to the children differently in each school. Some schools make it part of a Religious Education lesson or some integrate it into other lessons as a cross-curricular approach. While others deliver discrete PSHE lessons or use circle time. (Goddard, 2013) Goddard (2013) states that teaching and learning methods to teach PSHE work better when following social constructivist principles. (Vygotsky, 1978) This supports the constructivist theory that the individual ‘learner is an active agent in their own learning, rather than a passive receiver of what is taught’. (Piaget, 1951) In the classroom if teachers take this approach towards learning then pupils will adopt ideas by connecting them with real life experiences.

A study by Formby (2011) has mentioned that one member of staff in a school commented that ‘PSHE is the thing most likely to drop off at the end of the day because of pressure of so many other parts of the curriculum and activities.’ This comment portrays to us that schools have so much to teach to the children that meets the curriculum that there just is not enough time to do it all. However, why should the children miss out on an important part of their learning because there is not enough time? Can we not integrate PSHE lessons into another lesson and make it cross-curricular, so that the children will still learn about it? The study also states that teachers struggle with the general teaching of PSHE, because they feel they have not got the confidence to teach it. Secondary schools commonly use external providers to deliver PSHE lessons although in primary schools this is less common. Teachers mentioned that when they had external providers in and they valued them for their ‘technical expertise’ plus it was memorable and had an impact on the pupils.

Formby (2011) mentions that when pupils were interviewed they were generally interested in the topics that were associated with PSHE education. Also, if the lessons are made fun and engaging then they are going to enjoy learning about all the different issues related to it. If we look at the study by Formby (2011) we can see that it had ‘923 completed primary questionnaires’ by this, we can come to an idea of whether we can take his findings as being reliable or not. From the fact that there were 923 completed questionnaires you could say that it is reliable however when you look further the interviews and discussion groups were only conducted with ‘102 pupils’. So that makes us question that only those 102 children feel that they were interested in PSHE topics but how do we know what the rest of the children in the UK thought?

As stated before PSHE is not a statutory subject. Although, a high majority of schools have chosen to teach it because it has a massive impact on their responsibilities to improve children and young people’s personal and economic well-being. (Ofsted, 2013) There are various aspects of PSHE where only some are taught to the younger children. However, Ofsted (2013) inspected the teaching of PSHE in primary and secondary schools as mentioned previously some teachers found it hard to teach PSHE lessons because they felt that they did not have the knowledge. From the inspection they found that 58% of primary schools teaching was at least good. The best teaching came from teachers who had a good subject knowledge.

Willis et al (2012) study on PSHE education in primary and secondary schools gives an idea on the different topics and which are taught in primary and secondary schools. It states that overall the majority of schools felt that their PSHE lessons were effective. Some areas of PSHE were more effective in primary schools than others. For example, personal finance section of it is going to be less effective for the primary school pupils as they are younger than the secondary school pupils who will want to know more about how they can control their finances when they are older. On the other hand, the emotional health and well-being section was far more effective for the primary school children rather than the secondary school children. This may be because the secondary school children are older and may feel that they do not need to learn or listen to things about their well-being. 



Here is figure 1 from the study which shows the various aspects of PSHE and how effective or not effective they were in both primary and secondary schools. (Willis et al, 2012)













Reference list

Department of Education. (2013). Personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/personal-social-health-and-economic-education-pshe/personal-social-health-and-economic-pshe-education (Last Accessed 29/10/2018)

Formby, E. (2011). ‘Its better to learn about your health and things that are going to happen to you than learning things that you just do at school: findings from a mapping study of PSHE education in primary schools in England.’ Pastoral Care in Education, 29(3), pp. 161-173. Doi: 10.1080/02643944.2011.599857

Goddard, G., Smith, V., & Boycott, C. (2013). ‘PSHE practice in schools today.’ PSHE in the primary school: Principles and practice. Routledge.

Ofsted. (2013). Not yet good enough: personal, social, health and economic education in schools. Available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/attachments_data/file/413177/Not_yet_good_enough_personal_social_health_and_economic_education_in_schools.doc (Last Accessed 07/11/18)

Piaget, J. (1951). The Psychology of Intelligence. London: Routledge and Keegan Paul

PSHE Association. (2018). Curriculum guidance. Available at: https://www.pshe-association.org.uk/curriculum-and-resources/curriculum (Last Accessed 07/11/18)

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. London: Harvard University Press.

Willis, B., Clague,L., & Coldwell, M. (2012). ‘Effective PSHE Education: Values, Purposes and Future Directions.’ Pastoral Care in Education, 21(2), pp. 99-111. Doi: 10.1080/02643944.2012.747556

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