Why we teach it
Children will learn about relationships, their bodies and their emotions whether or not adults teach them. The question is only whether they learn it from people who love them and know them, or from a phone.
Relationships education, relationships and sex education, and health education are compulsory in all schools. Our programme meets the Department for Education's statutory guidance of July 2025, which came into force on 1 September 2026 — the same date Growing in Christ launched.
But we would teach this anyway. A child who does not understand what a good friendship looks like, or why their body is changing, or what to do when they are frightened, is a child left unprotected.
Our approach
Growing in Christ is taught from the biblical account of what people are: made in God's image, made for relationship, made with bodies that are good, and living in a world where relationships go wrong and can be put right.
That framing is not a way of avoiding the difficult parts. Pupils are taught what the law says, what they are entitled to, and what is happening in the wider culture, accurately and without caricature. We want pupils who can give a fair account of a view they do not hold. Teaching them a straw man would fail them twice: once as learners, and once as Christians.
Content is always age appropriate. A six-year-old is taught about kindness, families and safe adults. Nothing is brought forward because it is in the news.
Where our convictions differ from prevailing views — on marriage, for example — pupils learn the school's position clearly, learn the legal facts accurately, and learn to engage other views with gentleness and respect. Families whose lives look different from ours are treated with respect and kindness. Both of those are required of us, and both are right.
The seven strands
The programme runs on seven strands, each revisited at every stage with increasing depth rather than covered once and left behind.
| Strand | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Identity and belonging | Who a person is, and whose they are. Made in God's image, and what that means for how we see ourselves and everybody else. |
| Character and wisdom | How to live well: honesty, perseverance, forgiveness, and the skill of making good decisions under pressure. |
| Relationships, family and sexuality | Families, friendship, marriage and commitment, consent and boundaries, and — in the secondary years — sex and sexual health. |
| Wellbeing | Emotions, mental health, sleep, food, exercise and substances. Prayer and honest lament taught alongside evidence-based strategies. |
| Safety and digital life | Being safe in the world and online: personal safety, exploitation, online harms, misinformation, and knowing how to ask for help. |
| Stewardship, money and work | Money, possessions, contentment, financial harms, and work as vocation rather than only income. |
| Community, citizenship and justice | Living alongside people who differ from us, the law, prejudice, and the responsibility to speak up. |
What is taught when
The programme runs across seven phases, from Reception to Year 11, on a rolling cycle that suits our mixed-age classes.
| Phase | Year groups | |
|---|---|---|
| EYFS | Reception | Planned against the EYFS framework through provision, story and routine |
| Phase 1 | Years 1 and 2 | Families, friendship, big feelings, being safe |
| Phase 2 | Years 3 and 4 | Belonging, forgiveness, kindness online, health habits |
| Phase 3 | Years 5 and 6 | Puberty, boundaries and consent, prejudice and standing up, first aid |
| Phase 4 | Years 7 and 8 | Identity, healthy and unhealthy relationships, digital life, money |
| Phase 5 | Year 9 | Coercion and control, exploitation, substances, financial harm |
| Phase 6 | Years 10 and 11 | Marriage, singleness and commitment; sex, health and wisdom; money for adult life; first aid for life |
Puberty is taught in Phase 3, to the older cohort separately, and parents are told in advance.
If you would like to see the actual teaching materials for any unit, ask and we will show them to you. We have nothing we would want to hide from a parent.
The right to withdraw
Parents have the right to request that their child is withdrawn from sex education. That right does not extend to relationships education, to health education, or to the science curriculum.
What counts as sex education here
At Emmanuel, the sex education from which a parent may withdraw their child is the Phase 6 unit Sex, health and wisdom — the teaching on intimate sexual relationships, contraception and sexual health.
Everything else is not withdrawable, including:
- Relationships education throughout the primary years
- Relationships education in the secondary years, other than the content named above
- Health education, including puberty
- Reproduction as taught within the science curriculum
We do not teach sex education in the primary phases beyond the statutory curriculum.
How to request a withdrawal
- Write to the Head Teacher.
- We will meet you to talk it through and make sure you know exactly what would be missed.
- The request will be granted, other than in exceptional circumstances, up until three terms before your child turns sixteen.
- After that point, a pupil who wishes to receive sex education is entitled to do so, and we would tell you that this had happened.
- A withdrawn pupil is given purposeful work elsewhere in the school.
We would always rather talk first. In most cases a conversation about what is actually taught settles the concern.
Who teaches it
Growing in Christ is taught by class teachers who already know the pupils, not by visiting speakers. A child is far more likely to disclose something to an adult they trust, and that adult is far better placed to notice when a lesson has landed badly.
Every unit carries a safeguarding note and a prompt to the Designated Safeguarding Lead. If something a pupil says raises a concern, it goes to the DSL the same day.
Some topics need particular care — suicide prevention and self-harm awareness among them — and staff receive specialist-informed training before teaching them.
Pupils with additional needs
Content is adapted so that pupils with special educational needs receive the same protection and understanding as everyone else.
Pupils with additional needs can be more vulnerable to exploitation, not less. Withdrawing them from this teaching would leave them at greater risk, not less.
Working with parents
Our RSE policy is reviewed in consultation with parents. A consultation is taking place during the autumn term of 2026, ahead of the trustees adopting the revised policy.
You do not have to wait for a review to raise something. If you are uneasy about anything in the programme, tell us and we will talk about it. Curriculum content is available to view on request, and we hold an information session each year.
