DfE publishes new guidance for teaching relationships

The Department for Education (DfE) has published its statutory guidance for relationships, health, and sex and relationships education (RSE).

The new guidance will better protect children and young people from misogyny, deepfake porn, and unhealthy attitudes to consent, power and control, with a new focus on helping boys identify positive role models and challenging myths about women and relationships that are spread online. This is in response to misogynistic online culture and the ‘manosphere’.

Consequently, secondary schools will now include lessons on intel culture, including how a piece of content online can impact a person’s understanding of sexual ethics and behaviour, as well as increasing awareness of AI, deepfakes and how pornography links to misogyny.

This follows new data that revealed that over a third of (37 per cent) of pupils aged 11-19 had heard comments that made them concerned about the safety of girls, and over half (54 per cent) said they had witnessed comments they would describe as misogynistic.

The guidance will help children building positive relationships between friends and family in school, followed by new dedicated content in secondary school that help boys identify positive role models, and all children to expect consent and kindness in more intimate relationships.

For secondary schools, added content includes: sexual ethics beyond yes, staying safe in public spaces, financial exploitation, and positive conceptions of masculinity and femininity. By enforcing age-appropriate teaching, children will not be taught things they are too young for.

Spiking, methanol poisoning, and women’s health issues like endometriosis have all been added to the curriculum too.

Schools will able to apply for an RHSE training grant, starting in early 2026, to empower schools to tackle the huge challenges they face when educating about relationships, with research finding that the average age for exposure to pornography is 13. Additionally, Oak National Academy, the publicly-funded providers of curriculum and teaching resources for schools, has released a set of online safety lessons reflecting this part of the guidance that will warn teenagers of the dangers of intel ideology and other forms of misogyny they encounter on the internet.

Education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, said: “Before I was elected to Parliament, I managed a refuge for women and children fleeing domestic violence, so I have seen first-hand the devastating impact when we don’t foster healthy attitudes from the youngest age.

“I want our children to be equipped to defy the malign forces that exist online. Schools and parents alike have a vital role to play, helping children identify positive role models and resist the manipulation too often used online to groom impressionable young minds.

“Whether its helping deliver on our Plan for Change mission to halve violence against women and girls or growing a more just and equal society, there can be no no more basic mission for government then making sure our children grow up to become decent, respectful adults, prepared for the modern world.”