PSHE

Welcome to PSHE at Mossbourne Community Academy.

Welcome to PSHCE (Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship and Economic education) at Mossbourne Community Academy.

In order to deliver our PSHCE curriculum in an exciting and dynamic way, we currently take the whole school off timetable four times a year.

During these days, pupils undertake a planned programme of PSHE and Citizenship activities. In addition to form tutors delivering the planned PSHCE curriculum designed by the head of PSHCE, we also invite specialist teams into the academy in order to involve our students in a variety of workshops, seminars, and theatre projects.

Each year group focuses on a different theme each day. PSHCE education helps children and young people to identify, celebrate, and manage the many personal, economic and social challenges they face, while they are at school, and in the future.  Through PSHCE education children and young people should acquire and extend the knowledge and skills they need as they, and their communities, grow and change, so that they can be safe, healthy and economically secure. 

Our last PSHCE day of the 2010/2011 academic year (29th March 2011) was a great success.

Present at the event were officers from the Metropolitan Police’s Dogs Unit, CO19 (Tactical Firearms Unit), Trident and  Hackney’s Integrated Gangs Intervention Project (IEIP), along with colleagues from partnership organisations such as Hackney Council’s Drug and Alcohol Action Team (DAAT), Olympic Security Directorate and Synergie Theatre Company. They all shared their knowledge and experiences with the students here at Mossbourne.

A number of workshop sessions took place throughout the day, explaining to the students, aged 14 to 15, different aspects of policing. The children were also offered advice from DAAT and from the joint Integrated Gangs Intervention Project., run jointly by the police, council and probation service.

The Synergie Theatre Company based their workshop on the impact and emotional effects on different individuals, following a murder. The workshop covered different aspects of crime, violence and social responsibility. The students demonstrated how the murder of a child can affect the lives of so many people in a community; this was described as the ‘ripple effect’. Students were also asked to demonstrate how families would feel if their son or daughter were convicted of a murder. 

Throughout the day, students attended further workshops which included a CO19 presentation by PC Vicky Farrington from Operation Make Peace. She spoketo students about the danger of being in gangs, using weapons and getting involved in crime. Since 2008, 64 young people have been killed by the use of a knife or a gun in London. The students were given a clear understanding of the consequences they face carrying a knife or gun. The danger of life in gangs and the bleak prospect of long term imprisonment were also highlighted, with a demonstration of possible prison sentences.

Possession of a knife = 4 years imprisonment
Possession of a firearm = 5 years imprisonment
Possession of a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence = 10 years imprisonment
Possession of an imitation firearm in a public place = 12 months imprisonment
Possession of an imitation firearm with intent to cause fear of violence - 5 years imprisonment
Possession of a taser = 10 years imprisonment

PC Andy Hills, Mossbourne Community Academy Schools Officer in Hackney, said: ‘My role at the Academy is challenging but also very rewarding. Today has given the students a great insight into what the Metropolitan Police does and has also made them aware of other organisations that work in partnership with us. What happens outside school often gets brought into school, so I hope today’s event will help the pupils make the right choices and stay away from crime.’

We hope that our PSHE days will encourage students to think carefully about the choices they make, and the impact they have on all the communities they come into contact with. We also aim to learn new things in an interesting, interactive, and imaginative way.