Spiritual, Moral, Social & Cultural (SMSC)
SMSC is the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our children. This is not a separate subject that is taught explicitly, but an aspect of learning that is present throughout daily life in school. Some lessons lend themselves more easily to direct SMSC development such as PSHE and RE. We also aim to develop SMSC through assemblies, theme days and events and through the behavioural expectations and attitudes in school.
Spiritual Development:
Children explore beliefs and experiences and respect faiths, feelings and values.
They enjoy learning about themselves, others and the surrounding world.
They use imagination and creativity and reflect.
Moral Development:
Children develop the knowledge, skills and understanding, qualities and attitudes they need in order to make responsible moral decisions and act on them.
Social Development:
Children develop the knowledge, skills, understanding, qualities and attitudes they need to make an active contribution to the democratic process in their communities.
Cultural Development:
Children develop the knowledge, skills, understanding, qualities and attitudes they need to understand, appreciate and contribute to culture.
Throughout the school, individuality is encouraged. Children are encouraged to make their own decisions about aspects of school life based on their own personal interests, strengths and values, through the democratically elected School Council.
Older children support younger ones in the ‘playground buddy’ initiative, providing them with a positive role model and opportunity to make the correct choices in their playing.
Our Curriculum is inspiring - children very quickly develop a love of learning and are eager for more. They have a strong sense of right and wrong which underpins positive behaviour. The children are proud to be part of the school and enthusiastically join in with all the opportunities that are offered, such as:
- trips/visitors to consolidate their themed learning.
- a wide variety of extracurricular activities, such as gardening, sport and cooking clubs.
- teacher-led extra reading and writing groups.
Through our SMSC provision we:
- enable our children to develop their self-knowledge, self-esteem and self-confidence.
- enable our children to distinguish right from wrong and to respect the civil and criminal law of England.
- encourage our children to accept responsibility for their behaviour, show initiative and to understand how they can contribute positively to the lives of those living and working in the locality of the school and to society more widely.
- enable our children to acquire a broad general knowledge of and respect for public institutions and services in England.
- further tolerance and harmony between different cultural traditions by enabling our children to acquire an appreciation of and respect their own and other cultures.
- encourage respect for other people.
- encourage respect for democracy and support for participation in the democratic processes.
All of the above points helps to underpin our ethos to developing SMSC in school.
Links with the Wider Community:
- visitors are welcomed into our school.
- links with local Churches are fostered.
- visits are undertaken to places of worship of other faiths to support the understanding of their own and different cultures.
- the school supports the work of charitable events such as Children in Need, Red Nose Day, NSPCC and providing donations for the ongoing Ukrainian crisis.
- the development of a strong home-school relationship is regarded as very important, enabling parents and teachers to work in an effective partnership to support the children.
- children will be taught to appreciate and take responsibility for their local environment through both curricular and extracurricular activities such as Gardening Club and the Blackfields Creative 'Vertical Garden' Art project to enhance their immediate and local environment.