Social Spiritual Moral and Cultural (SMSC) and British Values
At Winnington Park, we strive to create a learning environment which promotes respect, diversity and self-awareness and equips all of our pupils with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values they will need to succeed in their future lives. We recognise that the personal development of our pupils- spiritually, morally, socially and culturally, plays a significant role in their ability to learn and to grow into well rounded members of society. SMSC is a fundamental part of our curriculum and underpins all that we do.
Through SMSC we aim to provide an education that provides our pupils with opportunities to explore and develop:
- Their own values and beliefs
- Spiritual awareness
- High standards of personal behaviour
- A positive and caring attitude towards other people
- An understanding and respect for their and others social and cultural traditions,
- An appreciation of the diversity and richness of cultures and the world around them.
We promote the British Values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of those of different faiths and beliefs. We do this through making sure that all pupils within our school have a voice that is listened to, assemblies, using teaching resources from a wide variety of sources to help pupils understand a range of faiths, visiting different places of worship, demonstrate how democracy works through school council elections.
British Values
Democracy
Our school values pupil voice and we ask the pupils about their learning, their concerns and for their ideas about how we can make things better for them. We do this by using pupil questionnaires, through our School Council and through our Children’s Parliament sessions. .At the beginning of the Autumn term children vote for their class representatives through a democratic election process. Two school councillors are elected for each class.
The Rule of Law
The school has a Positive Behaviour Policy. The children understand the school rules and what happens if these rules are broken. At the start of each year classes discuss our school rules. During PSHE lessons and assemblies children learn about the importance of having rules and how these relate to laws. PSHE promotes moral, spiritual, social and cultural awareness among our pupils. Our children have a well-developed sense of justice. They understand and are able to discuss why there need to be consequences for those who break the rules or laws. By being immersed in the ethos of our school, children learn about their responsibility to be law abiding citizens.
Individual Liberty
Alongside rules and laws, we promote freedom of choice and the right to respectfully express views and beliefs. Through the provision of a safe, supportive environment and empowering education, we provide boundaries for our children to make choices safely.
We ensure every child’s voice is heard through opportunities to discuss and ask questions during our whole school Children’s Parliament sessions. School councilors represent the views of children in their classes at school council meetings.
Our Behaviour Policy is built on the principle that children are responsible for their own actions and choices and that these have consequences.
During PSHE, E-Safety lessons and Assemblies pupils are taught how to keep themselves safe whilst they exercise their rights and personal freedoms. There are two E-Safety officers.
Safeguarding is embedded in every aspect of life at our school.
Mutual Respect and Tolerance
Our ethos at Winnington Park is based on mutual respect and good manners. Adults actively model respect with one another, and with the children, in how we speak and treat one another. Through our creative curriculum, we promote an awareness of different faiths and we encourage our pupils to recognise and understand these faiths. Our pupils naturally show tolerance for others and have a curiosity to find out and understand cultures and faiths that are different from their own. All staff model a tolerant and accepting attitude. We use assemblies, as well as “Friendship” and “Respect” weeks, to challenge prejudice and celebrate diversity.
At Winnington Park School, we will actively challenge pupils, parents or staff who express opinions contrary to fundamental British Values, including extremist views.
Equality of opportunity at Winnington Park Primary School means that all children, taking account of gender, age, ability, disability, ethnic origin, faith, culture, social circumstances and sexual orientation have full access to all the curricular, pastoral and social opportunities offered by our computing curriculum.
