risk SOW

PSHE Association 2013 - This is an extract from the Scheme of Work Planning Toolkit. For the full toolkit, book a place on our Planning your Schools PSHE

Education Programme training course. Our full range of other resources and support are available to members of the PSHE Association.

Risk & Road Safety - understanding risk within the context of road safety Year 8

Adapted from Health for Life 11-14, session K16

Aim of this series of

sessions

To understand risk within the context of personal safety, especially road safety.

Session objectives

To learn:

about road safety;

how to manage risk when on the road;

Learning outcomes

The learners will be able to:

explain why young people are particularly at risk on the road;

recognise different types of behaviour that could increase their chances of having an accident on the road;

analyse the wider effects of road accidents on those other than the victim;

explain strategies to manage the risk when on the road;

Resources required Copies of the four sheets entitled Liam, Alice, Sara and Ryan enough for one of each per small group (see below).

Flip chart paper and marker pens.

To the teacher This session places a strong emphasis on road safety. People are rightly worried about issues such as HIV, drug misuse and alcohol misuse, but young

people are very vulnerable to injury and death from road accidents. There may be neurological reasons for adolescents being particularly at risk. Many

teenagers are simply distracted by other things and fail to notice the threat. Some take risks that a younger or older person might not take. This session

looks at a number of incidents and could be used to trigger a wider discussion. It isnt necessarily the skills of crossing a road we need to emphasise; it is

remembering to focus attention on managing the risks.

Year 8 Risk & Road Safety - understanding risk within the context of road safety



This session introduces two important concepts: up time and down time. Up time is when we are present in the real world; we are noticing what is going

on around us. Down time is when we are inside our heads, thinking about something. Many accidents happen when we are in down time; people say you

werent paying attention.

This session looks at four different issues: being distracted; being in down time; going with the group; and playing chicken. It also raises the issue of how

many other peoples lives are damaged by a single accident with apparently only one victim.

[You may wish to change the characters names before printing the materials if members of the class have the same name.]

Session outline

Focusing activity:

Introduce the session: Did you know that three quarters of all accidental deaths of young people happen on the roads? Many are made by drivers

making a mistake but many happen because people dont take enough care when near roads. The purpose of this session is to think about some of

the risks.

Read (or ask a volunteer to read) the conversations to the class:

Josh, Kirsty, Sara and Joe were walking home together.

Did you hear about Liam? Joe asked

What?

He got run over.

What happened?

He was out with his mates when he saw Megan over the other side of the road. Seems he just walked out without thinking.

Thats horrible, will he be okay? It reminds me of Alice, someone my brother knew. She got hit by a car and got pretty smashed up. She was listening to

music through headphones and just didnt seem to be concentrating. She walked straight out in front of a car. Kirsty said

Sara was really quiet then she said, I got a real scare once. I was out with some friends and we were crossing the main road. The cars just kept going by

really fast and we couldnt be bothered to walk to the pedestrian crossing. Anyway there was a gap in the traffic but I thought it was too small to chance.

All my mates ran across and I hesitated, but they had all gone so I did too. I nearly got killed. A cars mirror caught my bag and pulled it off my shoulder. If

the strap hadnt broken it would have pulled me into the wheels.

My mother hit someone once in her car. Joe said. His name was Ryan. Turned out he was part of a group playing chicken, you know, see how close you

can get without being run over. Anyway he ran out straight in front of my mum. He wasnt badly hurt but mum couldnt drive for nearly a year she was so

upset.




Explain that many of us worry about all sorts of risks: plane crashes, getting mugged, getting the latest disease. Actually its often things we are

really familiar with and that we dont worry about at all that cause us problems.

Ask the group what other things young people do that might cause them to have road accidents. Look for:

o messing about with your friends and getting distracted;

o crossing roads in risky places;

o taking chances

o playing football in the street;

o having drunk alcohol or used drugs and not being able to judge speed or distance;

o wearing dark clothes at night, especially if there is no pavement;

Development Activity 1:

Divide the class into small groups and ask them to think about the four incidents in the scenario above. Ask them to discuss what the incidents

have in common and how they are different.

Ask the groups to feedback their ideas. Look for:

o Liam was focusing on the wrong thing;

o Alices attention was inside her own head;

o Sara went with the crowd;

o Ryan was playing a game.

Give each group a copy of each of the four sheets entitled Liam, Alice, Sara and Ryan. Ask them to discuss the questions on each sheet and

note down their ideas in the thought bubbles.

Invite feedback on the questions about Liam afterwards draw out the point that our brains are only able to focus on a small number of things at

one time. When we are crossing the road we need to focus all our attention on that.

Invite feedback about Alice afterwards talk about up time and down time. Up time is when you are noticing what is happening around you.

Down time is when you are inside your head thinking about something else (sometimes we call it being miles away). When we are in down time,

we are not concentrating on the world around us. Many accidents happen when we are in down time. Music is good for helping us relax but it can

also make us go into down time.

On the question of the risks of listening to music through headphones in the street, apart from putting you into down time, the learners should

suggest that it makes it much harder to hear traffic or people calling out to you. Another point that needs to be stressed is that talking or




texting/messaging on a mobile phone or using mobile internet, or even talking to someone theyre walking with, would carry equal risks.

Invite feedback on Saras situation and explore these additional questions: How easy is it to be the odd one out? How easy would it be to walk to

the crossing when everyone else is crossing the road at a place you feel unsure about?

Invite feedback on the questions about Ryan (and Joes mum) then extend the discussion by asking: What could have happened if Joes mum

needed to drive for her work? Is the person who is injured in an accident the only one who is hurt?

Development Activity 2: [If time is short this activity could be replaced with a whole-class discussion covering the same questions]

Give each group a sheet of flip chart paper and marker pens.

Ask each group to draw a spider gram of the people who could be affected in any way by an accident. For example, effects include loss of

confidence in driving or loss of work for the driver, upset parents, family and friends of the casualty, emotional trauma to witnesses of the accident

etc.

Ask the groups to circulate around the room and look at each others spider grams have they come up with the same ideas? Did any groups think

of things they hadnt thought of? Do they disagree with anything another group has put?

Concluding Activity: Reflection

Ask the learners to notice for the rest of the day when they are in up time and when they are in down time. They can also look around them at

other people and think about whether they are in up or down time.

Ask the learners to imagine themselves approaching a road, see it in their minds eye and think about being in up time.

If they were now asked to give one message about road safety to other people of their age, what would it be?

Assessment opportunities:

Questioning and feedback are central to Assessment for Learning. Through questions we find out what learners know, understand, believe and can

do. We can also correct misconceptions and can adjust our teaching accordingly. This session offers many good opportunities for this.

The session also offers a starting point for a research project on road safety or work to contribute to a school website.

This lesson plan is adapted from Health for Life 11-14 by Nick Boddington and Noreen Wetton [published by Nelson Thornes]




Year 8 Risk & Road Safety Liam

He was out with his mates when he saw Megan over the other side of the road.

Seems he just walked out without thinking.

Why do you think Liam did what he did?

Was he really stupid to walk into the road like that?

Could that ever happen to us?

What might make us do that?




Year 8 Risk & Road Safety Alice

She got hit by a car and got pretty smashed up. She was listening to music through headphones and just didnt seem to

be concentrating. She walked straight out in front of a car.

Why do you think Alice walked in front of the car?

What are the risks associated with listening to music

through headphones in the street?

Other than listening to music, what else might someone be

doing that could lead them to behave as Alice did?




Year 8 Risk & Road Safety Sara

All my mates ran across and I hesitated, but they had all gone so I did too. I nearly got killed.

Why didnt they all just wait for a bigger gap

or walk to the crossing?

If Sara was unsure about the place they were trying

to cross, why didnt she walk to the crossing anyway?

What does it feel like when youre in a group and everyone else

does something youre not sure about?




Year 8 Risk & Road Safety Ryan

Turned out he was part of a group playing chicken, you know, see how close you can get without being run over.

Anyway he ran out straight in front of my mum.

Why might people do this sort of thing?

Is this an accident? How is this different from the

other situations?

How do we feel about Ryan and his friends?

Joes mum knows it wasnt her fault, so

why did it affect her so badly?

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