RSHE

Relationship Sex and Health Education (RSHE)

Why is it important to our students’ futures? For our students, RSHE is crucial as it supports them in acquiring the knowledge they need to handle many of the important opportunities, difficulties, and responsibilities they will encounter in life. For many autistic students this needs to be explicitly taught. We teach students about healthy relations, maintaining their physical and mental well-being, taking ownership of their own actions and behaviours, exercising initiative, and developing empathy, self-worth, and resilience. All of these abilities will help students grow more independent, overcome learning obstacles, boost their ambitions, and improve their prospects of success in future life.

What does RSHE look like in Lighthouse School? The RSHE spiral curriculum is essential to ensuring that our students’ knowledge and learning are frequently revisited across an age-appropriate timeline and to expand and deepen their developmentally appropriate understanding of a topic. It also supports the various levels of independence that students have at Lighthouse. The three key stages are covered in RSHE through a spiral curriculum that incorporates the following six important topics:

1. Self-Awareness – To be able to self-advocate who they are, their likes, dislikes, strengths and interests.
2. Self-care, Support and Safety – To be able to look after themselves and keep safe; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education.
3. Managing Feelings – To be able to identify feelings, and that how they feel and how others feel affects choices and behaviour; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education.
4. Changing and Growing – To be able to recognise how themselves and others are changing; new opportunities and responsibilities; aspects of Relationships and Sex Education.
5. Healthy Lifestyles – To be able to recognise and demonstrate how to keep healthy, physically and mentally.
6. The World I Live In – To be able to live confidently in the wider world.

RSHE is embedded throughout the school curriculum via a range of cross-curricular links. We work closely with Science, Computing, SaLT, and other subjects or enrichment activities that come under the Personal Development curriculum at Lighthouse School; The KS5 curriculum incorporates elements of the Preparation for Adulthood framework and “connects” prior learning to scenarios relevant to this age group, e.g. the workplace.

RSHE Curriculum: