Human Values Foundation

The National Curriculum (UK)

As part of the inspection framework, all schools, which are subject to the regulations of the National Curriculum, are expected to have an active policy in place for the following:

• Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural (SMSC) education
• Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE)
• Citizenship / Democracy
• Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL)
  

It is not easy for a school to design a ‘whole school approach’ and plan to implement a practical syllabus that meets the requirements of the National Curriculum and which, at the same time, can be adopted and adapted to suit the school’s culture and ethos.

The Government’s Every Child Matters initiative is a commitment to introduce measures to achieve a healthy population of young people, by helping them to develop healthy behaviour and to raise their self-esteem and achievement levels.

The five areas are:

• being healthy
• staying safe
• enjoying and achieving
• making a positive contribution
• economic well-being.

The Human Values Foundation’s programmes called “Education in Human Values” (EHV) for 5 to 12 year olds and Social and Emotional Education (SEE) for 12 to 14+ year olds, offer a way in which to meet National Curriculum expectations, because they have been designed and written to make the range of topics easily and readily available for teachers to deliver.

The materials were written by teachers for teachers and are universal resources. Their teaching techniques are easy to apply. The lesson plans are detailed and are supported with music on CDs, song sheets, stories, ideas for group activities and themes for school assemblies. Each lesson illustrates a value and, in an organised and coherent way, leads on to a series of related values, that make delivery of objectives easy to implement. As the teaching techniques are all largely familiar to teachers, there is nothing new to learn.