Personal Development is all about the foundations & skills needed to develop the personal, interpersonal, practical and social skills that are needed to help create successful wellbeing for now and the future. Learning is centered around three core topics; health & wellbeing; relationships; and living in the wider world. Personal Development enables students to apply and develop communication, research, analysis, debate, personal reflection and critical evaluation skills. Students develop substantive knowledge through research based factual information regarding issues, including their rights and responsibilities so that they gain functional understanding of the world around them.
PD covers a wide range of topics and issues. All lessons are rooted in compulsory curriculum expectations set out by the Department for Education/National Curriculum; these include, Citizenship; Careers; Personal, Social, Health (PSHE); Wellbeing & Safety; Relationships & Sex (RSE); Global Issues & Values; Financial & Economic Education. The PD department is led by a PD, CZ, PSHE, RSE specialist and lessons are delivered and facilitated by a team of skilled, qualified, teachers. Lessons focus on core issues that directly impact on students’ lives and futures and they are designed to be solution focussed providing students with the skills and knowledge necessary for the development of resilience and independence as well as the confidence and knowledge to be able to access appropriate information and additional support as and when needed. Our PD schemes of work are designed in a spiral so that as students’ progress through their school years, the PD lessons covered reflect age appropriate content; starting in Y7 for example covering friendships & bullying building through to Y11 covering intimate relationships & domestic abuse.
There is not a formal examination or qualification at GCSE level that satisfactorily combines the knowledge developed through the breadth of our KS3 & KS4 PD curriculum. The model of assessment we use is ipsative assessment which compares where a student is at the end of a lesson or series of lessons against where they were before the lesson(s). This means that the benchmark against which progress is measured is the student’s own starting point, not the performance of others or the requirements of an exam syllabus. In addition, a variety of formative assessments are built into each unit of work including; questioning, discussion, low stakes knowledge quizzes, card sorts (eg diamond 9), scales or continuums and extended writing. Clear and direct feedback is offered to all students via the use of individual Verbal Feedback and Whole Class Feedback that is relevant covering common mistakes and/or correcting misconceptions. This feedback is also reflected and shared through our report system so that parents and carers have a clear understanding of areas for praise and areas for more progress.