Physical education plays a vital role in helping Harnham Junior’s school fulfil its mission statement ‘Aspire to succeed’, by encouraging every child to reach their personal best through perseverance, teamwork, and self-belief. In PE, pupils learn the importance of setting goals, overcoming challenges, and celebrating progress—skills that extend beyond the sports field into all areas of life and learning.

PE also underpins the school value of FAITH. Through team games and shared experiences, children learn to forgive mistakes and move on for the good of the group. Acts of encouragement, inclusion, and kindness during activities allow them to show active love in practical ways. PE also inspires children by helping them see what they can achieve through effort and perseverance, building confidence and motivation. The challenges of physical tasks teach tenacity, as students learn to keep trying despite setbacks or difficulties. Finally, working together in teams, dances, or group exercises fosters harmony, showing children the importance of cooperation, respect, and unity. In this way, PE nurtures both the body and the character, shaping children into well-rounded, compassionate individuals.

It is our intent at Harnham Junior School to teach children life skills that will positively impact on their future. We aim to deliver high-quality teaching and learning opportunities that inspire all children to succeed in physical activities. We want to teach children how to communicate, build resilience through co-operation and collaborating with others, as part of a team, understanding fairness and equity of play to embed life-long values.
Our curriculum for physical education aims to ensure that all pupils:
• continue to apply and develop a broader range of skills, learning how to use them in different ways and to link them to make actions and sequences of movement. They should enjoy communicating, collaborating and competing with each other. They should develop an understanding of how to improve in different physical activities and sports and learn how to evaluate and recognise their own success.
• take part in regular physical activity.
• have the opportunity to succeed in physical education.
• at Harnham Junior School are competent swimmers who understand water safety.
• are inspired to lead healthy, active lives and build resilience. We aim to give children different pathways into different sports and pathways to live a healthy and happy life.
• have the opportunity to excel within PE and offers children opportunities to compete at different levels of competition.
• have the opportunity to take part in a range of different physical activities within PE lessons and extra-curricular clubs.
Competition intent
Harnham Junior School enjoys participating in a wide range of Inter-School competitions and events, these are usually at a local or county level. The intent for our competitors are numerous and cover a range of personal and social goals:
•   the opportunity to experience being part of a team and recognise and understand their contributions to that team
•   to improve and challenge themselves, particularly if participating in a new sport
•   to demonstrate and build on resilience
•    to have the opportunity of competition and in doing so, meet new people/friends
•    to enjoy themselves - no matter what the result
Pupils at Harnham Junior School participate in weekly high quality PE and sporting activities. Our PE long term plan incorporates a variety of sports to ensure all children develop the confidence, tolerance and the appreciation of their own and others’ strengths and weaknesses. All children receive a minimum of two hours PE a week. Throughout the year, and their time at Harnham Junior School, children have the opportunity to learn and develop specific skills around the different units of the PE curriculum.
We provide opportunities for all children to engage in extra-curricular activities during and after school, in addition to competitive sporting events, inter- and intra-school. This is an inclusive approach which endeavours to encourage not only physical development but also well-being.
It is really important that we promote competitive support in schools. It is very important that we recognise that has to be underpinned by good quality physical education and by getting people into patterns of exercise.’ Lord Sebastian Coe
Throughout the year, we take part in many competitions involving a range of sports, these include: football, tri golf, netball, orienteering, hockey, tag rugby, cricket, Salisbury mini-marathon and athletics. These competitions give children the chance to participate in competitive sport and represent our school as part of a team.
Inter-house competitions take place throughout the year, enabling every child in the school to compete and contribute to a team. These competitions cover skills learnt in PE lessons and develop fitness for all.
To ensure we meet swimming standards and to teach a very important life-saving skill, every child in Year 3 takes part in swimming lessons, with catch-up sessions provided for non-swimmers in Year 4.
Children experience outdoor adventurous activities while participating in a residential trip in Year 6. These provide opportunities for children to really challenge themselves, drawing on their tenacity, and in turn help children to develop resilience and perseverance.
As a school, we promote a healthy lifestyle through physical education lessons and specific health and well-being sessions. This enables all children to understand the benefits and importance of living a healthy lifestyle.
The Harnham Junior School PE curriculum aims to improve the wellbeing and fitness of all children at the school, not only through the sporting skills taught, but through the underpinning values and disciplines PE promotes. Within our lessons, children are taught about self-discipline and that to be successful you need to take ownership and responsibility for your own health and fitness. We want all children at Harnham Junior School to become physically active pupils. Our impact is therefore to motivate children to utilise these underpinning skills in an independent and effective way in order to live happy and healthy lives.
Children will:
• have the ability to acquire new knowledge and skills in order to develop an in-depth understanding of PE.
• be willing to practise skills in a wide range of different activities and situations, alone, in small groups and in teams and apply these skills in chosen activities to achieve exceptionally high levels of performance.
• develop high levels of fitness.
• lead a healthy lifestyle, achieved by eating sensibly and exercising regularly.
• stay physically active for sustained periods of time and understand the importance of this.
• have the opportunities to become young leaders by organising, officiating and motivating other children to do well.
• demonstrate a keen interest in PE and a willingness to participate eagerly in every lesson.
• be able to swim at least 25 metres by the end of Year 6 and have a knowledge of how to remain safe in and around water.
The impact of our PE provision is assessed through termly pupil voice, termly assessments, lesson observations and performance within local competitions.