What's included in the What is Parliament? Whole School Assembly PowerPoint resource and why is it useful?

What is Parliament? Whole School Assembly PowerPoint is a slideshow that introduces children to democracy and how decisions are made in the UK. The content includes 10 slides with teacher notes, covering why your voice matters, what a democracy is, the three parts of Parliament, key people in Parliament, what Parliament does, how people can have their say, why Parliament matters, a final reflection and follow-up activities. It links to PSHE and citizenship learning and supports teaching the British value of democracy.

Democracy and Parliament

How people in a democracy share their views and choose who represents them, and how the House of Commons, the House of Lords and the monarch each play a part, with questions such as "Why might it be important to hear different ideas before making a decision?"

Who Does What?

The roles of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the Speaker, and how Parliament makes and changes laws, debates important issues, checks and challenges the Government and approves Government spending.

Your Voice in Democracy

Voting, contacting your MP, petitions and campaigns, and why democracy works best when people listen and respect different views, asking "How can we respect others' views?"

How do our whole school assemblies work?

Our whole school assemblies are PowerPoint slideshows that follow a similar structure: an introduction, questions to get children thinking, the key points of the topic and reflection time. They're paced to suit a primary school assembly and work best on a whiteboard, projected out to the hall. You can use them:

• as a whole school assembly, from EYFS up to KS2
• as a class assembly
• as a teaching PowerPoint when you want to cover an event or topic in your own classroom

The majority of our assemblies include teacher notes and guidance to support delivery, and because they're pacey, you can adapt them to however long your assembly lasts.

Adapting the Assembly for Your School

Every assembly is editable, so you can add, remove or change slides to suit the needs of your school. We cover religious events, seasonal topics, values such as kindness, friendship and tolerance, science, history, PSHE, music, significant people and sporting events, so you can choose the assemblies that fit your school year.

Supporting Learning at Home

Families can carry the conversation on at home by asking children about their assembly: what they heard, how it made them feel and what they think about it.

You can explore more of our whole school assembly resources here.