PSHE education Planning Framework for Pupils with SEND (2026)

The Planning Framework has six sections:

1. Self-awareness
(Me, who I am, my likes, dislikes, strengths and interests)

2. Self-care, support and safety
(Looking after myself and keeping safe, including online)

3. Managing feelings
(Understanding feelings, emotion regulation skills, and how feelings can affect choices and behaviour)

4. Changing and growing
(How I and others are changing; new opportunities and responsibilities; managing puberty and reproductive health)

5. Healthy lifestyles
(Being and keeping healthy, physical activity, food choices and hygiene routines)

6. The world I live in
(Managing money and aspirations for work; living confidently in the wider world)

Grids for each section identify learning opportunities in progressive stages, starting with the first stage, ‘Encountering’, through to the final stage, ‘Enhancement’.

Each stage builds on the one before, while allowing pupils to access the content at a stage that is most appropriate to their learning needs.

This progression assumes that the pupil can meet the previous stages’ outcomes, and in some cases introduces new or additional learning in successive columns.

Depending on the level of special educational need, pupils may be able to work only within the learning outcomes of one stage, (e.g. Encountering or Exploring). However, some pupils may be able to work progressively across the seven stages with regular opportunities for revisiting and consolidation of previous outcomes, as they mature through school. In this way, the framework could be adapted for groups of pupils or used to create a bespoke learning programme for individuals.

There are references at the end of each learning opportunity to show which statutory RSHE content it addresses. Where there is no reference, this learning should be considered non-statutory (although in many cases, still essential learning).

The Planning Framework is intended as a guide to the possible content of a spiral PSHE education programme (including statutory RSHE) for pupils with SEND. You are free to use it flexibly, adapting it to the unique needs and abilities of your pupils, as their development will not necessarily correspond to their chronological age or their key stage, in many aspects of their learning in PSHE education. For example, you might need to draw on learning outcomes from key stages 1 and 2 for some pupils in key stage 3 or 4.

We have provided a suggested primary and secondary long-term plan to help you organise this content across age groups and in each half term. We offer these long-term overviews as a possible starting point rather than to be followed rigidly. If they are useful to you, please feel free to adapt and implement as best suits the needs of your pupils.

The Framework may also be used to help audit your school’s current PSHE provision by mapping your curriculum or schemes of work against the Framework content and then adding to or updating your schemes of work as necessary.

The Planning Framework may be further modified and adapted to pupils’ needs by:

• Breaking down the learning outcomes into smaller steps so that they form the basis of a lesson or series of lessons.

• Revisiting, reinforcing, consolidating and generalising previous learning, as well as introducing new concepts, knowledge and skills.

• Focusing on one aspect or a limited number of aspects within each stage.

• Revisiting content through cross-curricular learning and/or through other activities in school.

• Offering both explicit and implicit learning opportunities and experiences which reflect pupils’ increasing independence (where applicable).

• Incorporating the seven stages into school assessment, so that pupils’ progress can be monitored within lessons and over a period of time.

• Including different sensory experiences at the encountering, exploring, foundation and core levels tailored to individual pupils.

• Providing opportunities both in and out of school to promote physical, social and emotional understanding and put learning into practice.

In mainstream settings, the framework can be used to support pupils with SEND by:

• Using the planning framework to tailor learning that best matches the PSHE topic being taught to the rest of the class.

• Using the learning outcomes to support targets and identified areas of need in a pupil’s Education, Health and Care plan (EHCP) or to set Individual Education Plan (IEP) targets.

You’ll be pleased to see that we’ve retained the six themes from the 2020 edition, along with many of the existing learning opportunities that we know are working well and already meeting learning requirements across the framework.  

But we’ve also made some key changes and updates to save you time and allow you to see clearly ‘where’ and ‘how’ you can meet pupils’ needs and new statutory requirements.

For instance, the new long-term plans (for KS1-2 and KS3-4) help you organise content flexibly across age groups for each half term. These follow a thematic approach, with each suggested age group learning the same theme at the same time. 

Read our blog post for a full breakdown of what’s changed, and download our accompanying document showing where changes have been made to the existing Framework. 

The number of pupils with SEN support has increased by 33.0% since 2016.

This presents challenges for special schools to meet increasing need. And now, there is a national shift towards greater inclusion of SEN students within mainstream settings. So making tweaks around the edges to existing PSHE lessons might no longer be enough to make the learning accessible for these pupils. 

The latest edition of our Planning Framework for pupils with SEND will help you ensure adaptable, accessible learning for pupils with a range of special educational needs and disabilities, and to enable them to thrive no matter what their starting point.

Crucially, the Planning Framework can be used in conjunction with your current approach to help you tailor the learning for those pupils who really need it.