RSE and Health Education
At Marsden Infant and Nursery School, we understand the importance of educating pupils about sex, relationships and their health, for them to make responsible and well-informed decisions in their lives.
The teaching of RSE and health education can help to prepare pupils for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of adult life. It allows us to promote the spiritual, moral, social, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at school and in the wider society.
We are clear that parents and carers are the prime educators for children on many of these matters and the school’s role is to provide our pupils with high-quality and age-appropriate teaching to support their personal development and pastoral needs.
The RSE and Health education policy outlines how the school’s RSE and health education curriculum will be organised and delivered as well as what will be taught to the various year groups. You can access a copy of this policy via the link below.
The Department for Education has produced guidance for schools on the teaching of Relationships Education, known as Relationship, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) following nationwide consultation in 2019. These changes came into effect in the summer term 2021 when all schools were required to make sure they were teaching the new statutory content. The guidance has since been updated in 2025. Links to our RSHE curriculum are below.
Defining Relationship and Sex Education
The DFE guidance defines RSE as “lifelong learning about physical, moral and emotional development. It is about the understanding of the importance of marriage and family life, stable and loving relationships, respect, love and care. It is also about the teaching of sex, sexuality and sexual health”. Our pupils are very much at the start of the learning they will have throughout their time in education. The teaching and learning for Relationship and Sex education is planned at the age appropriate level for our children, for their age, their understanding and developmental needs.
Working with parents
- We believe in effective communication between home and school. If parents have concerns regarding RSE and health education, they may submit these via email, or contact the school office to arrange a meeting with the headteacher.
Right to withdraw
- Parents have the right to request that their child is withdrawn from some or all of sex education delivered as part of statutory RSE.
- Parents do not have a right to withdraw their child from the relationships or health elements of the programmes.
- The school will respect the parents’ request to withdraw their child.
- Requests to withdraw a child from sex education will be made in writing to the headteacher. Children cannot withdrawn from learning which is within the Science National Curriculum for Key Stage 1.