PSD at the Dixie incorporates PSHE (Personal, Social, Health and Economic education) and RSE (Relationships & Sex education), citizenship, careers and co-curricular activities. 

PSD is a unique subject within school with links to many other subjects. It gives every student equal opportunity to develop the skills, knowledge, beliefs and values they need to thrive now and in the future.

This includes equipping students to deal with issues they face every day such as online safety, friendship and relationship issues, emotional wellbeing and change, giving them a solid foundation for whatever challenges and opportunities lie ahead.

Weekly PSD lessons enable students to voice their opinions and ideas in a non-judgemental and safe environment where our school values of respect, care and courage are actively encouraged.    PSD is taught by class teachers at the Junior School and specialist teachers through the Senior school.  This enables students to build trust and good relationships with staff and is an extra layer of safeguarding and care for our students.

Three Main Themes

We follow a spiral curriculum based on the 3 main themes from the statutory guidance:

  • Living in the wider world
  • Relationships
  • Health and Wellbeing

Planning, Resources and Schemes of Work

We have a long term PSD plan which runs from Pippins to Year 11.  This is under constant review and is subject to change depending on a variety of factors including student needs, current issues and the age and developmental stage of the students.  The PSD teaching staff work closely with the Safeguarding team to ensure that we support students, meet their needs and teach PSD in an developmentally appropriate way. 

Our medium term planning, schemes of work and the varied teaching and learning strategies serve to emphasise the friendly and nurturing atmosphere of the school.

The schemes of work are comprehensive, but adaptable, in order to be up-to–date and reflect current issues and also to include topics, which are important to individual students, whether they be of a personal, social or economic nature.  

We access resources from a range of sources including charities and specialist organisations who work with young people, for example CEOP, NSPCC, Brook, PSHE association, Thinkuknow.

Our PSD policy, developed in consultation with parents, is available to view with all other school policies here and we welcome feedback on this.