PSHE and Open Evening Classroom Ideas

As we enter the time of year when secondary schools are opening their doors to welcome in year 6 parents in order to show off all of the amazing things we do, we often come to think about what activities we can have on display to highlight all the important topics we cover.

Youcantknoweverything Education thought we'd do a bit of the thinking for you and come up with some brilliant activity ideas for PSHE classrooms on open evenings.

PSHE Activity Ideas

• Drunk / drug goggles - Follow a bendy tape line, draw a circle or drive a remote control car.
• CPR dummies - Pupils follow instructions to see if they can perform chest compressions.
• Bandage Activity - Get pupils to bandage a student volunteer.
• Sugar Ordering - Pictures or real drink or food containers, can the pupils put them in the correct order of how much sugar they contain?
• Identify the disinformation or myth vs fact - Can pupils recognise the information which isn't true?
• Gratitude tree - Pupils add something they are grateful for onto a post it note and add it to the tree.
• Budgeting Task - pupils have a set amount of money and need to decide how to use it. 

PSHE items to have on display on open evening

• Your PSHE roadmap
• Your intent, what are the aims of PSHE in your school?
• Year 7 PSHE work samples
• Information booklets from local national support agencies
• Display items e.g. smoking and tar jar that get pupils talking.

What not to do in a PSHE open evening classroom

• Get pupils to discuss topics which could cause trauma.
• Display work or materials which may not be age appropriate, for example you might not share a year 11's book.
• Have too much written information for parents to read, instead use bite-sized, high-impact visuals.
• Use activities which do not fully engage the pupils and parents for example simple colouring or word search tasks which do not lead to discussion surrounding PSHE topics.
• Leave staff or pupils to answer challenging conversations about withdrawal or sensitive RSHE topics, have a clear response to encourage adults to arrange a later discussion with the head of department or have a clear print out which can be given if it is asked for.