Relationship Sex and Health Education

Brackenfield SEND School has achieved Gold BERT award status.

Brackenfield SEND School is pleased to announce that in December 2023 we were awarded the Gold BERT award, the highest level award possible and a recognition of the efforts of everyone in this area.

The BERT award is about supporting everyone in the school community to build effective relationships.

Please remember if you are worried about anything or need any advice or support with puberty changes or behaviours such as masturbation please email earlyhelp@brackenfield.derbyshire.sch.uk. Early help are able to provide support such as social stories, packs and sign post you to further advice if needed.

Please click below to read a leaflet prepared by Derbyshire County Council and Derbyshire Community Health Services

RSE For your child with Send

Relationship Sex and Health Education (RSHE) equips our pupils with the knowledge and skills they need to keep themselves safe, healthy and develop healthy relationships in later life.

Our policy has been informed by pupil, family and staff voice and this has shaped the RSHE curriculum in school. Our RSHE governor oversees the implementation of RSHE at Brackenfield SEND school. They work with Sarah Preece, the RSHE lead in school to ensure that our RSHE provision is of a high quality, meets the needs of all pupils and not only fulfils statutory requirements but continues to adapt and collaborate with pupils and their families to ensure everyone feels informed and involved in their RSHE education.

Sarah Preece

What does Relationships Sex and Health Education look like at Brackenfield?

At the start of each academic year, parents and carers receive a letter with a clear outline of curriculum content, the right to withdraw from sex education if intending to teach that year and invites parents in to discuss the lessons and view resources before it is delivered to the pupils.

Curriculum content is supported by interactive resources such as cloth dolls with anatomy to use with sensory stories, toiletries, period products, bras, a life size vulva model which can show menstruation and urination, male anatomy learning aids with moveable foreskin and urination/ ejaculating feature. We also have a range of resources to support the teaching of drugs, alcohol, SRE and virtual online safety. These resources are available for you to view.

The government guidance states it is mandatory to teach relationships and health education including the science behind conception (part of the science national curriculum) to all pupils in an appropriate way. Parents can withdraw their children from all or part of sex education that does not form part of the statutory National Curriculum. However, 3 terms before the child’s 16th birthday they can opt into sex education.

Relationships and sex education is taught at an appropriate time to pupils. During KS4, class teams work with local health teams to provide practical safe sex advice and guidance. This includes the demonstration of contraception and visual images of STIs. If pupils are not able to learn how to keep themselves safe this must form part of the discussion when setting personal learning intentions, Annual Reviews and other face to face meetings. At transition into KS4 there must be a plan recorded throughout the Annual Review process about how to equip pupils with the necessary skills and knowledge to keep themselves safe.

How to support and communicate with my child?

For all children, always use the correct names for private parts and try to support your child to recognise public and private spaces. This can be modelled by ensuring clothes and underwear are worn in most parts of the house and reinforcing where you can be naked (own bedroom, home bathroom).

When supporting with personal care try to show them what is happening to their bodies e.g: bowel/ bladder movement and use a running commentary of what you are doing using the correct names. If you child uses PECS, symbols for private parts could be used to support communication. Try singing body part songs (head shoulders, knees and toes) and Pantasaurus song NSPCC. When going through puberty, it can be a tricky time to deal with changes such as pubic hair, menstruation, breasts, erections and feelings. It is a good idea to talk about these changes before they happen if appropriate to your child using social/ sensory stories with dolls and symbols.

If your child is beginning to menstruate, you may want to use a period pad to show this change even if they are using incontinence pads too. This can help pupils to develop an awareness and recognise/ anticipate changes. It might be useful to track symptoms to support your child with pain and emotions. If your child is beginning to touch themselves or have erections, you can support your child by telling them private, no touching, only in bedroom and allowing time to explore their bodies in their own bedroom. We can provide further support at school with masturbation if needed.

For semi-formal children, use all of the above advice and encourage further independence in personal hygiene and toileting. Social stories and prompt cards can be created about most things including feelings, emotions, relationships, puberty, washing body, changing period products, public and private places, appropriate and inappropriate touch to support children to develop an understanding of the world around them and develop their independence. There is also a puberty packs which can be requested from the class team or Early help range and a range of videos that are available to use.

Problematic and Harmful Sexual Behaviours

Harmful sexual behaviours (HSB) are developmentally inappropriate sexual behaviour displayed by children and young people which is harmful or abusive.

Peer-on-peer sexual abuse is a form of HSB where sexual abuse takes place between children of a similar age or stage of development.

Child-on-child sexual abuse is a form of HSB that takes place between children of any age or stage of development.

Problematic sexual behaviour (PSB) is developmentally inappropriate or socially unexpected, sexualised behaviour which doesn’t have an overt element of victimisation or abuse.

For more information please click here for NSPCC advice.

Procedures for dealing with harmful and problematic sexual behaviours

Every incident of inappropriate touching of genitals will be reported and recorded through Iris and logged as ‘sexual activity’ and parents informed where appropriate. If there is a suspected safeguarding element staff are to follow the usual safeguarding procedures – please see the safeguarding policy for more information.

Functional Behavioural Assessments are used as the initial starting point to determine the cause of the ‘sexual activity.’ These are carried out by our inhouse Occupational Therapist’s or trained members of school staff and from this a plan will be put into place to support the pupil. A harmful sexual behaviour risk assessment will also be completed and shared with parents to mitigate risk and protect and support anyone involved. This includes all pupils, from 3 years upwards, as any touching of genitals is considered inappropriate away from a private place.

Brackenfield also employ the use of the Brook Sexual Behaviours Traffic Light Tool to support identifying, understanding and responding to sexual behaviours from our pupils.

Puberty and Menstrual Education

Puberty, health and relationships are taught to all pupils at an appropriate level to help them to understand their own bodies and skills to keep themselves safe. This is taught as an embedded approach each week as part of our good health and friends, relationships and community sessions.

Menstrual education can be very scary for young girls, particularly when developmentally their learning is delayed. Therefore we have an extensive range of resources to prepare girls for this change in their body. This is delivered alongside communication with home, to ensure anything learned and discussed in school can be followed up. There are practical resources, including a life size vulva model which menstruates. Knickers and period products to apply as well as social stories to demonstrate how you might feel when on your period.

To ensure sessions are meaningful and in context, we use a range of realistic learning aids, make and female anatomical models, stories (social stories and Kings princesses ducks and penguins series), role play and sensory stories using dolls.

Advice and Guidance for parents:

It is important our families can access the right support and advice when it comes to relationships, puberty and sex education. Please see below a list of useful websites:

The Internet Watch Foundation have put together some parental advice about making sure your home doesn’t have an open door to child sexual abusers. Please Click Here to access.

If you have any concerns please email earlyhelp@brackenfield.derbyshire.sch.uk and a member of the family support team will be in touch.

Useful Links:

Learn and Thrive – including relationship and sex education

https://www.lifeconnections.ie/post/5-dos-and-donts-of-conversations-with-your-children-resources

https://www.bigtalkeducation.co.uk/parents/

https://www.childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/cco_talking_to_your_child_about_online_sexual_harassment_a-guide_for_parents_dec_2021.pdf

https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/support-for-parents/pants-underwear-rule/

https://amaze.org/having-the-talks/

https://amaze.org/age-guide/

https://amaze.org/jr/

https://amaze.org/video/amazejr-where-do-babies-come-from/#parents

https://amaze.org/video/amazejr-how-are-babies-made/