Wellbeing

The Wellbeing Curriculum

At St. Paul’s, our children’s wellbeing is an extremely high priority. We believe that positive wellbeing is something that children need to actively learn about alongside their academic studies. 

Children with positive wellbeing will enjoy school more and be better equipped to succeed at school. We describe wellbeing as everything that keeps us ‘happy and healthy’ and we have built a curriculum based around six different areas of wellbeing that we want our children to learn about. These are:

Physical and Sensory Wellbeing:

My physical wellbeing includes everything to do with having a healthy and happy body. The sensory aspect means having a healthy understanding of all of our senses and how these impact me.

Social Wellbeing

My social wellbeing includes everything to do with having healthy and happy relationships and positive interactions with the people around me.

Mental and Emotional Wellbeing

My mental and emotional wellbeing includes everything to do with keeping my brain happy and healthy.

Environmental Wellbeing

My environmental wellbeing includes everything to do with ensuring the environment/ space I am in is happy and healthy. This includes my classroom, the wider school, my home, my community, my country and the world.

Economic Wellbeing

My economic wellbeing includes everything to do with having a healthy and happy relationship with money and understanding how this affects my life.

Spiritual Wellbeing

My spiritual wellbeing includes everything to do with religion and what I believe in. This includes learning about and respecting all religions and developing my own beliefs.

These aspects of learning are covered throughout the school day, sometimes in Personal Social Health Education lessons, the wider curriculum, assemblies or through stories. Teachers monitor how well students are progressing with their understanding of wellbeing.

The Wellbeing Tree

The six different areas of wellbeing are illustrated on our wellbeing tree, drawn by Mrs. Baggs.

Each classroom has a wellbeing tree in it, so that teachers and children can refer to it throughout the school day and become familiar with the language. When children become more familiar with the language surrounding wellbeing, this can help to break the stigma associated with words such as ‘mental wellbeing’.

Wellbeing Interventions

Some children may need further support with their wellbeing, therefore we also provide some wellbeing interventions to support these children. 

Emotional Literacy Support Assistant

Like many schools in Surrey we are part of the ELSA network, this means that we have an Emotional Literacy Support Assistant at our school who can meet with our children individually or in small groups to support their emotional learning. The ELSA at our school has been trained and is regularly supervised by the Educational Psychologists in Surrey.

You can find out more about our ELSA here.

Pastoral Care

We aim to develop a sense of responsibility in all our children and one of the ways in which this can be achieved is by giving the children at the top of the school the opportunity to take on specific responsibilities.  Some of our Year 6 children run excellent lunchtime clubs for other children. They are wonderful role models for the younger children. We also operate a 'house' system with all children  joining one of four houses, Abbey, Bourne, Mole or Wey. Children are awarded points for their house for special effort, both inside and outside the classroom.

BFGs

At St Paul's we have BFG's who are chosen for their nurturing and caring qualities. Their role is to look after younger children who may have difficulties in the playground. They spend time with the children and encourage them to play, teaching them games and generally offering a friendly face. This support is there for as long as the individual child needs but we usually find it is only needed for a short period of time as children quickly become more confident to play with their peers without daily support.

Home School Link Worker

The Home School Link Worker acts as a liaison between school and families to provide support and advice to minimise the impact of specific / ongoing events either at home or at school:

• Friendship issues
• Attendance problems
• Bereavement
• Marriage break-up

The Home School Link Worker is available to provide a friendly and confidential support to any of our families and children.  

Wellbeing at home

We are committed to working closely with parents and carers to support all aspects of their child's development including their wellbeing. 

If anyone has a concern about a child's wellbeing they can speak to our Wellbeing Lead Teacher, who is able to offer support, signpost to other agencies who may be able to offer further support and work together with families to ensure that all our children thrive academically and emotionally.