What is SMSC?
SMSC stands for spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. All schools in England must show how well their pupils develop in SMSC.
Spiritual: Explore beliefs and experience; respect faiths, feelings and values; enjoy learning about oneself, others and the surrounding world; use imagination and creativity; reflect.
Moral: Recognise right and wrong; respect the law; understand consequences; investigate moral and ethical issues; offer reasoned views and have an appreciation of British Values.
Social: Investigate and moral issues; appreciate diverse viewpoints; participate, volunteer and cooperate; resolve conflict; engage with the fundamental values of British democracy.
Cultural: Appreciate cultural influences; appreciate the role of Britain’s parliamentary system; participate in culture opportunities; understand, accept, respect and celebrate diversity.
Click here to visit our Pastoral Care and Wellbeing page
Click here to visit our British Values page
SMSC in our curriculum…
SMSC is evident in all of our curriculum areas; from developing confidence and expertise in language in English, encouraging pupils to reflect on the wonder of the natural world in Science, studying people and Physical Geography and self-reflection, awareness and challenge in PE.
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Commando Joe’s
Each class from Years 1-6 complete a weekly Commando Joe activity. This is a physical activity designed to get children moving, thinking and working as a team. More details about Commando Joe can be found here.
School Elections and Subject Ambassadors
In the academic year 2020/21 children ran for school council and were voted in by their peers in a democratic vote. We used ballot boxes and ballot sheets to imitate a real ballot children would vote in when they are old enough.
Our school council this year is being replaced by Subject Ambassadors – more info can be found here.
Clubs and Extracurricular Activities
As a school we offer lots of after school clubs to give children rich experiences that they may not be exposed to outside of school. We work hard to ensure all children are offered the chance to attend an after school club, and our clubs involve Kickboxing, Gymnastics, Drawing. We are also very lucky to have some fantastic volunteers and coaches who help keep our clubs going!
More information on school clubs can be found here.
School Trips and Essential Learning Experiences
As part of our Dimensions curriculum, school trips or ‘Essential Learning Experiences’ are just that! Essential! Our children are offered trips to various places around the North East that will enhance their learning or give them context to their knowledge they have gained in school.
We also offer trips as rewards for various things such as 100% attendance and reaching diamond level on the individual ClassDojo reward chart.
We are also very lucky to have plenty of visitors come into school to speak to the children and enrich their learning experiences.
Choir
Through our Dimensions curriculum, we aim to embed cultural capital fundamentally for all children. Children in the school choir have represented our school at local events and carol concerts over the years.
Competitions
We offer our children a chance to participate and represent our school in a number of sporting related competitions. For example, here are some Year 3 children who won second place at the Multi-Skills event at Boldon CA in 2020.
R.E. Curriculum and learning about other cultures and religions
In R.E. lessons children begin to build an understanding and an awareness of other cultures and religions. In KS1 and 2 children learn about Sikhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam.
The Giving Project
Children supported the local community during lockdowns in 2020 and 2021 by creating gift baskets, cards, singing songs among other things.
See the Giving Project page for more information by clicking here.
Assemblies and whole school worship
As a school we worship together in whole-school assemblies daily. We also have a celebration assembly every Friday where children are rewarded for their good work or good behaviour over the course of the week.
Read more about our celebration assemblies here.
Diversity Week
In 2021 children in all year groups celebrated Diversity Week. We all came to school in bright colours to represent the rainbow flag and each class completed a different activity celebrating difference.
Read more about how we recognised Diversity Week 2021 across the school by clicking here.
Mental Health texts
Each term, as a school, we have a week where we look at one text in English across the whole of KS1 and 2. In September 2021 our text was Augustus and his Smile. Children in KS1 created story maps, and acted out elements of the story, and children in KS2 retold the story, wrote poems and developed an understanding of the deeper meaning behind the text.
