What is SMSC?
SMSC stands for spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. All schools in England must show how well their pupils develop in SMSC. As part of work in this area, it meets Article 2 for the Rights of the Child where they apply to every child without discrimination.
Spiritual: Explore beliefs and experience; respect faiths, feelings and values; enjoy learning about oneself, others and the surrounding world; use imagination and creativity; reflect.
Moral: Recognise right and wrong; respect the law; understand consequences; investigate moral and ethical issues; offer reasoned views and have an appreciation of British Values.
Social: Investigate moral issues; appreciate diverse viewpoints; participate, volunteer and cooperate; resolve conflict; engage with the fundamental values of British democracy.
Cultural: Appreciate cultural influences; appreciate the role of Britain’s parliamentary system; participate in cultural opportunities; understand, accept, respect and celebrate diversity.
How have we embedded SMSC at Green Gates?
Spiritual: Children have the opportunity to reach out and connect with the local community through the celebration festivals, fundraising days and regional celebrations. The school uses our school ambassadors to hear our pupil voice in order to decide which charities we will support on fundraising days. Recently charities such as ‘Macmillan Cancer’, ‘Sara’, ‘The food bank’ ‘Children in Need’ and ‘Comic Relief’ have been supported by the school. The achievements of our pupils at Green Gates are recognised through celebration assemblies, where rewards and merits of the pupils are acknowledged from both in and out of school.
Moral: The children have a clearly defined sense of right and wrong presented to them through the school vision, behaviour chart and school rules. The school has a clear behaviour policy which outlines the expectations of pupils within the school.
In addition to this, they are guided towards and consideration of wider moral issues through the study of topic work and classroom circle time and discussion. The teaching of P.S.H.E within the school curriculum acknowledges different personal identities, positive relationships, cultural diversity and promotes healthy lifestyles. Anti- Bulling week in November highlights our zero-tolerance policy towards bullying. Year five and six pupils are also trained to be anti-bullying ambassadors and playground buddies in order to help smaller children in the playground and sort out disputes alongside the lunchtime assistants and classroom teachers.
Social: We provide many opportunities for children to enhance their social skills. As well as promoting a culture of pupil voice and teaching our children that we all have different views, we take part in many activities that involve democracy such as voting for our School Ambassadors and deciding on important issues within school.
Cultural: The provision we make to support the cultural development of our children is extensive. The children’s understanding of their own culture is explored through local area topic work, local art, and literature.
Through our study of other faiths, cultural focus days and from ‘Multicultural week,’ we aim to ensure that our children are fully aware and appreciate Britain as a multi-cultural society. The pupils at Green Gates Primary school also learn French as a modern foreign language. Through their language learning, the children have the opportunity to increase their own intercultural understanding of different nations.
We have close links with our local church. The children also have the opportunity to visit other religious establishments within Redcar and Cleveland, such as the Hindu Temple. We invite various speakers from a wide variety of other faiths to attend assemblies and lessons.
Our Religious Education overview:
