Children: Drownings

Swimming and water safety is a vital life skill and that is why pupils are taught how to swim and be safe in and around water at primary school.

Swimming and water safety are compulsory elements of the Physical Education (PE) National Curriculum at Key Stages 1 and 2. For example, it includes teaching on how to perform safe self-rescue in different water-based situations.

The department is focusing on a number of measures to support teaching in this area, as part of its ongoing review of the Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) curriculum. The public consultation on the revised draft RSHE statutory guidance closed on 11 July 2024. The revised guidance includes a new section called ‘Personal safety’, which outlines that pupils should know how to identify risk and manage personal safety in increasingly independent situations including around roads, railways and water.

It is vitally important that teachers have clear guidance, which is why the department will be looking carefully at the consultation responses, re-engaging with stakeholders and considering the relevant evidence before setting out next steps to take the RSHE guidance forward.

The department is also working closely with swimming and water safety stakeholders such as the Royal Life Saving Society UK and Swim England to support schools in raising attainment in primary school swimming and water safety. Support and advice from Swim England includes resources for schools and parents, which can be found at the following links: https://www.swimming.org/schools/ and https://www.swimming.org/learntoswim/learn-to-swim-information-for-parents/.

Department officials have also worked alongside the National Water Safety Forum to develop free resources for schools to provide vital water safety knowledge that can go a long way to reduce drowning deaths. These resources can be found on the Royal Life Saving Society website at: https://www.rlss.org.uk/Pages/Category/water-safety-education.