THERE has been a rise in the number of primary school pupils who admit to “sexting” - with eight per cent of Year 6 children admitting to sending or receiving explicit messages.

A survey of thousands of school pupils in Calderdale asked them questions about their gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, health, emotional health and wellbeing, and harms they might be subjected to ranging from their home life to drug use.

The survey is a detailed snapshot of how they see their lives at this moment in time.

Reviewed recently by the council’s Children and Young People’s Scrutiny Board, Calderdale’s electronic Health Needs Assessment (eHNA) has been running for ten years.

One question asked was whether young people had been involved in “sexting.”

This year, 7 per cent of primary pupils questioned (Years 5 and 6) reported that they had been involved in sending or receiving inappropriate messages. The report says: “This is a significant increase on last year when five per cent reported being involved in sexting.”

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The increase is greatest in Year 6 - where eight per cent admitted sexting - up from five per cent last year.

When asked why they had sexted, 19 per cent said they had been threatened to.

Overall, 14 per cent of secondary students reported that they had been involved in sexting, rising to 24% per cent for Year 10s.

Councillors were told the annual survey is widely considered to be “best practice” in its format and execution and staff compiling it are often asked to advise colleagues in other areas on both their approach and survey findings.

The 2019 report, completed by them electronically and co-ordinated by school staff, saw 4,123 secondary school students from 100 per cent of Calderdale’s schools taking part, 2,273 from Year 7 and 1,850 from Year 10.

Over 4,150 primary school pupils took part, 2,067 were in Year 5 and 2,086 were in Year 6.

Councillors learned the report provides “a rich and valuable insight” into the lives of children and young people in Calderdale, allowing all to better support them and keep them happy, healthy and safe going forward.

The results are shared with professionals in the council’s public health, and children and young people’s directorates and with partner agencies including Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group and health services. Schools participating also receive an in-depth report detailing findings for their own school and comparing them to district averages, and all schools taking part are offered support in developing health and wellbeing action plans tailored to meet the needs of their students where appropriate and to access a range of associated resources and services.

The survey drills down into how their see their lives and alongside statistics like those involving drugs also reveals much about what can be seen as their everyday lives.

For example, half of them feel they are a healthy weight, though a similar figure had said they had tried to lose weight and girls were more likely than boys to think they were overweight.

Fewer than one in five eat the recommended “five a day” fruit and veg – in line with the national picture.

Fewer students walked to school than last year’s cohort.