Learning for Life (L4L)

Learning for Life (L4L) is Bartholomew School’s Personal Social Health and Economic (PSHE) education. Students have weekly lessons which provide opportunities for them to discuss many issues that may affect them, as well as the general world around them. L4L aims to empower students with the knowledge and life skills to manage risk and to make well-informed decisions, for both now and in the future. It is literally 'learning for life'.

Students follow a spiral curriculum, revisiting key topics at an age-appropriate level. L4L lessons are usually taught by form tutors from across the School. The nature of PSHE allows for a range of activities to be used in lessons, such as: discussions, quizzes, group work, presentations, documentaries, and independent work. L4L complements content that is covered in other subject areas, such as science, religion and philosophy and physical education, along with food and nutrition, and often explores the content from a different angle.

HOW WILL LEARNING FOR LIFE BE RESOURCED?

In line with the statutory Department for Education content for Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) our PSHE curriculum has been mapped out below. 

L4L teachers utilise many resources developed or quality-assured by the PSHE Association when planning their lessons. To help our students develop confidence, knowledge and vital life skills, our teachers use a wide variety of delivery techniques to ensure that lessons are engaging and pitched appropriately for our students. We also seek advice from the School Health Nurse team, Thames Valley Police, and other professionals when necessary to help plan the most useful and relevant provision for our young people.

WHAT WILL MY CHILD BE LEARNING ABOUT IN LEARNING FOR LIFE?

The spiral curriculum is based on the following common themes, which are revisited with our students in an age-appropriate manner:

  • Community involvement
  • Healthy relationships – including sex education
  • Personal safety - including online safety, tobacco, drugs and alcohol
  • Emotional, physical and sexual health
  • Careers
  • Personal finance
  • Citizenship
  • Human rights and discrimination
  • The Law
  • Emergency first aid 

If you have any questions about our curriculum please contact us via the main office or use our Enquiry Form.

Further resources:

Key Stage 3 Extension Reading Journey

The information below is an overview of our current PSHE curriculum.

MAIN TOPICS COVERED

YEAR 7

Students are taught L4L lessons in their form groups. During Year 7 students will explore the following topics in an age-appropriate manner:

  • Managing the transition into secondary school - considering how to thrive in a secondary school and goal setting
  • Healthy Relationships - exploring how to form and maintain positive relationship with peers and family members
  • Body Confidence - including the influence of advertising and the media
  • Careers - exploring the local job market and the different jobs available
  • Puberty - physical and emotional changes, menstrual wellbeing, healthy and unhealthy relationships, and consent
  • Being Safe - cyber safety, including cyber bullying and avoiding fraud
  • Being Safe - the dangers of tobacco, caffeine and alcohol
  • Being safe in the warmer weather - sun safety and water safety
  • Female Genital Mutilation - using carefully planned resources in collaboration with the School Health Nurse team when possible
  • Being Healthy - the importance of physical fitness, a balanced diet, sleep and oral hygiene
  • Finance - including what influences our spending, budgeting, jobs, payslips and inflation, and being a critical consumer
  • Being Heathy - emotional health, including bereavement
  • Citizenship - young people and the law

YEAR 8

Students follow a carousel system of five lessons on each topic in their form groups:

  • Careers – including what is a career, work-life balance and the workplace
  • Finance - including bank accounts, savings, bank cards and managing debt
  • Family Life and Looking After Our Planet - including family relationships and different roles in the family. There is also a citizenship element exploring ways in which we can look after the planet
  • Citizenship - Children's Rights, including considering values, being a positive bystander, individual’s rights and challenging gender stereotypes
  • Staying Safe - the warning signs of feeling unsafe, road safety, protecting your identity and money online
  • Relationships - considering relationship values and expectations, sexual orientation and gender identity, consent, and an introduction to contraception
  • Emotional Health and Staying Safe - domestic abuse and violence, sharing images online, and emotional health

Students will also explore what influences our health choices and how to support healthy behaviours

YEAR 9

In Year 9, students will begin the course with two lessons about friendships, differences and influences

Students will then follow a carousel system of five lessons on each topic in their learning groups:

  • Careers - job applications, CV writing, what makes a good colleague, and challenging gender stereotypes in the workplace
  • Relationships - respectful relationship behaviours, freedom and capacity to consent, sexual health, contraception including how to correctly use a condom, and how to manage the end of relationships
  • Finance - mobile phones, understanding crypto, avoiding fraud and identity theft, money mules, online gaming and in-app purchases, and how to seek safety online
  • Staying Safe - exploring attitudes towards drugs and alcohol and the law, considering the effects of alcohol, cannabis, and vaping
  • Belonging and Community- exploring identity and community, bias and stereotypes, discrimination and protected characteristics, diversity and values
  • Looking After Ourselves and Others - avoiding involvement in serious and organised crime (including county lines and knife crime). Students will also focus on emotional health using carefully resources lessons from the PSHE Association, including unhealthy coping strategies (eating disorders), healthy coping strategies, and coping with grief, change and loss
  • First Aid - basic life support and dealing with emergencies involving asthma attacks, bleeding, choking, and head injuries

In Year 9, students will also watch a documentary about the Holocaust to complement their Citizenship and History learning

YEAR 10

Students follow a carousel system of five lessons on each topic in their L4L groups:

  • Careers - post-16 options, applying for jobs, the local labour market, cover letters and CVs, and interview skills
  • Relationships - the role of intimacy and pleasure, the impact of pornography, pressure, persuasion and coercion, managing conflict and breakup, and addressing relationship abuse
  • Staying Safe - what makes a good role model and avoiding serious crime, assessing and managing risks associated with drugs and alcohol, how to seek help and support for substance abuse, and a lesson discussing the risks of sharing images online
  • Emotional Health - new challenges facing Year 10 students, how to reframe negative thinking, recognising mental ill-health, coping with change, loss and grief, and promoting emotional well-being.
  • Finance - having a career in the city, apprenticeships, entrepreneurship, understanding gig work and your rights, pay issues and how to speak up at work
  • Citizenship and Democracy - how the British political system works, how laws are upheld and made in the UK, the policies of current political parties

Keeping myself and my finances safe- gambling and how to manage the risk, what influences people to gamble, and how to support people who struggle to manage gambling. Students will also consider the influence of gangs on some young people

YEAR 11

L4L lessons are delivered by the Year 11 team, building on the knowledge and skills developed lower down the school. Content will be adapted to suit the needs of the individual year group, but includes:

  • Recapping good study skills and time management
  • Healthy Relationships, including management of conflict, reconciliation and ending relationships.
  • Being Healthy – physical health (including self-examination), sexual health, pregnancy choices and outcomes, and emotional health
  • The rights and protections provided within legally recognised marriages and civil partnerships, and the legal status of other long-term relationships
  • The roles and responsibilities of parents with respect to raising of children, including the characteristics of successful parenting
  • Emergency First Aid
  • Being Safe - cyber safety
  • How to access the NHS and other services
  • Careers - post-16 options and recapping key skills, such as applying for jobs
  • Managing finances- calculating your take home pay, budgeting, savings, investments and insurance.
  • Donation – including exploring stem cells, blood and organs
  • Citizenship- including valuing diversity and challenging radicalism and extremism

Body image- exploring why some people may choose to have tattoos, piercings, cosmetic procedures, and/or to use sunbeds. Looking at the risks involved and the law

 

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