LEARN MORE ABOUT
Personal development
At Kickstart
Personal development lies at the cornerstone of our curriculum and ethos
At Kickstart Academy the Personal Development Curriculum is firmly rooted in our Core values of Belong, Respect, Inspire, Succeed and Enjoy. Our Learning 4 Life lessons are centred around building life skills enabling our students to live a happy, healthy and successful life.
“Through my education, I didn’t just develop skills, I didn’t just develop the ability to learn, but I developed confidence.” Michelle Obama.
The key aim is to support students to become confident, healthy, considerate, responsible young adults through a variety of ways of learning and guidance.
We deliver an inspirational curriculum that meets the needs of our students and directly supports their pastoral education. We strive to give students a sense of empowerment and the knowledge skills and understanding to become aware, active and responsible citizens, both at local, national and global level. We aim to build the confidence in our students to make well informed decisions on how to stay safe and be involved in their communities and be the best possible version of themselves. It ensures that each of our students will know more, remember more and understand more about how to play a positive and successful role within our society, both as a child and as an adult within the future.
The curriculum aspect of Personal Development draws upon strands of PSHE, RSE, Citizenship, British Values, SMSC (Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural Education), Careers, Enterprise, and Employability.
By nature of the subject matter, certain elements may resonate with specific students more than others, based on their background and life experience. However, the content is designed to be taught to all students on the basis that it aims to build understanding and appreciation of others in order to further strengthen relationships and preparedness for adult life.
Content relating to sex and relationships will be taught in such a way as to be equally applicable to LGBTQ+ young people as to CIS opposite sex relationships. Students will also have access to a broad and in-depth curriculum on other matters including financial and careers education.
PSHE contributes to the whole school SMSC (spiritual, moral, social and cultural education) which helps students develop a breadth knowledge of the world around them. The breadth of our curriculum ensures future preparation for our students to help them become well rounded individuals that are prepared for life after Kickstart Academy.
Through delivering this curriculum, teachers would be further embracing and enhancing inclusivity within their student cohorts. The curriculum breaks down lengthy guidance into deliverable, manageable chunks. It aims to challenge students to deeply reflect, and to embrace a wide range of subject (and topic) specific vocabulary, to equip them with the tools needed to navigate their lives as teenagers and adults, and to understand experiences that might affect friends, relations, partners and colleagues both now and in the future, thus hopefully making them more empathetic individuals.
Our aim is to provide students with a challenging curriculum that develops knowledge of their surroundings; whether it be locally, nationally and globally and give them confidence to tackle many of the moral, social and cultural issues that are part of growing up within different contexts. We hope our curriculum guides our students into making good life decisions and helps them decide their future pathway and career.
Through scenario-based teaching, coupled with clear, honest approaches, this curriculum will come to life for students as they will understand the relevance and applicability of the content to their own lives.
A core purpose of our PSHE programme is to tackle barriers to learning, raise aspirations, and improve the life chances of all students, including the most vulnerable and disadvantaged. PSHE helps a school to create a good and safe ethos, where students feel safe and supported by peers and staff, and this ultimately boosts attainment and helps build resilience and wellbeing, therefore PSHE is vital for our young people.
This area of the curriculum is delivered during our tutor time, lesson time and is also embedded via cross curricular lessons.
Outside of the curriculum we offer students educational day trips, careers fairs, work experience, visits from guest speakers, student council opportunities, extra curricular clubs, assemblies, cultural festivals and many more experiences that enrich the students’ understanding of equality, diversity and tolerance.
At Kickstart Academy we raise awareness of many important national events. For example, Mental Health Day, Remembrance Day and Black History Month.
All our students are encouraged to take part in the wide range of activities and experiences across and beyond the curriculum, contributing fully to the life of the academy and the wider community. In doing so, students learn to recognise their own worth, develop a sense of their own identity and the ability to take their place in the community as well as respect and work with others. Students are encouraged to reflect on their experiences and to recognise how they are developing personally and socially, addressing the spiritual, social, moral and cultural issues that form an intrinsic part of growing into a young adult.
