PSE is important!

Show Cardiff Youth Council your support by signing our campaign for a better curriculum to prepare young people for life.

Sign the campaign and tweet your support by tweeting #Tools4Life!

Tools 4 Life - An Online Media Resource for PSE

How to use Tools 4 Life
Tools 4 Life is an online resource for teachers to be used in the context of PSE.

It has been developed by Cardiff Youth Council taking as its baseline the information gathered from surveys run with young people in Cardiff.
1. Choose your topic
2. Scroll through descriptions of content
3. Click on icon
4. Please contact us to leave comments and suggest new content.
Cardiff Youth Council (CYC)
Who are CYC?

Cardiff Youth Council (CYC) is a network of young people aged 11-25 that advocates for positive change and works to make Cardiff a better place to live, work and play.

What does CYC do?

Each year we run a survey of thousands of young people living in Cardiff to find out what are their top issues. We then develop actions and campaigns around the top issues.

For 2 years in a row ‘A curriculum that prepares you for life’ came in the top 3 issues here in Cardiff. As a result CYC ran an online survey to find out more about this important subject.

Online Survey Keys Facts:
- 1035 respondents 48% male 52% female.
- 50% from year 7-9, 30% year 12/13 and 7% left school.
- Nearly half of the young people stated that they were not satisfied with their PSE lessons.
- Half of the young people felt that PSE did not prepare them for life.
What did the young people say when asked about their experience of PSE in Cardiff?

Although some of the work we are taught in PSE has relevance, it seems to lack substance in some areas.

I would like to learn skills that will help me in life like how taxes work or different career options, politics, volunteering and housing.

I would wish that a guest speaker came in and delivered a lesson on the subject.

Poorly taught, very badly neglected as a subject. Get some teachers that actually specialise in the subject NOT COVER TEACHERS!

It is also not given enough importance as teachers are often pulled from other areas to teach it and this gives.

It needs more lessons on how to independently manage on your own life.

At the moment, it just feels like a time killing subject.

We should learn more about our human rights, how to parent properly, how to recognise a mental disorder.

Most of us are not in a position to vote, not because we are too immature but because we don't know enough about politics.

People need to know mental health is important and it deserves to have time spent on educating us about it, not just shoving it to one side because the school wants better GCSE results in Maths and English.
Creating Tool 4 Life from survey findings
How did we use the survey findings to develop Tools 4 Life?

We asked ‘What topics should young people be taught in PSE to help them prepare for life?’
- Sex Education
- Money Skills
- First Aid
- Careers
- Employment and Taxes
- Mental Health
- Relationships
- Parenting
- Human and Children's Rights
- Housing
- Bullying
- Smoking
- Independent Living
- Healthy Eating
- Documents (Passport/license)
CYC then used the survey data to map out what topics were currently being taught in Cardiff.

A number of the highlighted topics such as Bullying, Smoking, Healthy Eating were being taught widely.

This then gave us a list of topics that young people required more PSE lessons on but were not being taught.

We have developed the Tools 4 Life resource around these topics to help teachers and youth workers meet the needs of young people.

The subjects are:
- Employment and Taxes
- Independent Living
- Documents (Passport/license)
- Housing
- Parenting
- Money Skills
- First Aid
- Travelling
- Mental Health
- Cooking
- Local and National Democracy
- Human and Children's Rights
- Sex Education
- Careers

What People Say about Personal and Social Education (PSE)

Professor Graham Donaldson - Successful Futures Report

Children and young people in particular would like to see a greater focus on general social competences - life skills and personal confidence and personal and social education.

The curriculum should ensure that all our children and young people will be healthy, confident individuals who have the skills and knowledge to manage everyday life as independently as they can.
Estyn

When evaluating pupils’ social and life skills, inspectors should consider how well all pupils are prepared for life and work outside school.

1.2.4: social and life skills
Welsh Government

Our Personal and Social Education (PSE) framework for 7 to 19-year-olds in Wales provides schools and teachers with guidance on how to teach PSE.

Teachers are required to have an understanding of the diverse learning needs their learners may have and do all they can to provide the best possible education for them to reach their potential, whatever their personal circumstances.

Educators should provide:

‘A meaningful, relevant and motivating curriculum and meet the specific needs of their learners and further their all-round development’
Young People

PSE helps children and young people understand what happens in the future.

PSE is very educational and can improve our understanding.

Kids need to be taught at the right age and right time not to do stupid mistakes.

PSE prepares us for when we are adults and looking after ourselves.

PSE helps a lot with our future education and what to do with your health and relationships.