Today I taught a KS3 lesson to year 8 on personal safety named Calling 999 - Helping in an Emergency, this has never been a topic I have thought very much about but it was something the pupils were extremely engaged with. 

We talked about:

How to make a 999 call and how to set up the ability to text 999 in an emergency (something I had recently learnt from my own CPD first aid course). 

How it can be useful to set up what3words in order to give a precise location. I got the pupils to have a go finding out the three words for their home and school and even got a bit of online safety recap in here as I reminded them that a strong password is made up of three random words and suggested they could choose a place important to them and use the three words as their strong password, they were also amazed at how precise the location was, showing the building we were in and we spoke about how Snapchat location could also do this and why this could possibly leave us unsafe.

I was actually surprised how many of them reported having had to call 999 previously, it was a sobering reminder that our pupils often carry much more real-world experience into our classrooms than we give them credit for.  I think this is however, often the key to successful PSHE lessons, pupils feel the content is most useful and engaging when they can see the relevance and benefit to their lives both now and in the future. The nature of this lesson also allowed me to adapt it to where there interests lay, so for example we discussed how to deal with bleeding and delivering CPR in more detail than I had planned, in fact I had a large group of them stay behind at the end of the lesson wanting to ask more questions. 

If you are looking for a lesson on personal safety, you can find ours here. 

This PSHE lesson meets the DFE's 2026 RSHE Guidance under the Keeping Safe heading - 

How to increase their personal safety in public spaces, including when socialising with
friends, family, the wider community or strangers. Pupils should learn ways of seeking
help when needed and how to report harmful behaviour. Pupils should understand that
there are strategies they can use to increase their safety, and that this does not mean
they will be blamed if they are victims of harmful behaviour. 

Have you ever had a lesson completely hijacked by your students' own curiosity? What are the life-saving tools you think every teenager should be taught? Let me know in the comments below!