RSE and LGBTQ+ toolkit – primary

This toolkit comprises three essential documents for school leaders to audit your school’s RSE curriculum approach, map coverage and also includes a LGBTQ+ audit tool to ensure your school is inclusive. OFSTED will discuss your school’s approach to delivering the RSE curriculum and to what extend you are supporting LGBTQ+ students as part of the Personal Development strand of the Education Inspection Framework.

Relationships and sex education audit tool

As a primary school, it is necessary to provide education on relationships. The DfE outlines a set of expectations regarding the knowledge that pupils should acquire by the end of the primary phase.

While sex education is not mandatory in primary schools, it is strongly recommended, and there are guidelines on what should be covered if it is included in the curriculum.

To assess your current progress and identify any areas that need improvement, you can use this audit. Each expectation can be assigned a ‘red, amber, green’ (RAG) rating. A red rating indicates that the expectation is currently not taught at all, amber signifies that it is covered but not effectively or that there are outstanding issues, and green indicates that it is covered effectively with no further work needed.

Curriculum coverage map

To identify where statutory Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) content is delivered in each year group and term across primary school you need to identify where takes place. By creating a coverage map you can systematically identify where statutory RSE content is delivered in each year group and term across the school. This approach helps ensure there are no gaps in coverage, the school meets statutory requirement and to assess the balance of content provided.

LGBTQ+ Curriculum review tool

To foster a more inclusive understanding and foster positive attitudes toward gender and LGBTQ+ inclusivity among your students, it is crucial to implement changes throughout your entire curriculum. Simply addressing topics related to gender and sexuality in a limited number of PSHE or RSE (Personal, Social, Health, and Economic Education; Relationships and Sex Education) lessons is unlikely to yield significant results.

Whole school gender and LGBTQ+ audit tool

This audit primarily addresses concerns related to gender and LGBTQ+ issues. The reason for addressing both of these protected characteristics simultaneously is because discussions concerning harmful gender stereotypes frequently intersect with conversations about sexuality or gender identity, and vice versa.