Categories:
All teachers, TAs and adults working with C&YP

INTENT: A Proven Path to Prevention in Your Classroom

The attached INTENT flyer (pdf, 201kb) gives brief information on INTENT, a way to book training sessions, and how to contact us for more information.

18 secondary schools have already signed up in 2024–25 and are delivering the prevention programme for smoking and vaping.

For further information, visit the Evidence to Impact website.

If you are interested in finding out more, please contact: Charlotte.iddon@oxfordshire.gov.uk

INTENT – What is it?

  • INTENT is an evidence-based smoking prevention programme based on over 20 years of research by academics from the University of Leeds.
  • INTENT targets adolescents who have never smoked prior to delivery.
  • INTENT reduces smoking initiation by getting adolescents to engage with anti-smoking messages, and then creating Personal Plans or Implementation Intentions about how to stay smoke-free.
  • Implementation Intentions are specific “if…then” plans which focus on how, where, and when to perform a behaviour.
  • Implementation Intentions involve people thinking through in advance specific situations they will encounter. By forming a concrete plan about a specific situation, this situation is processed and becomes activated in our brain. This means that we have a better, faster memory of the right thing to do when we are in that situation for real.
  • The INTENT effectiveness study showed that the students that received INTENT were 25.6% less likely to ever smoke, and 14% less likely to smoke regularly than those that did not participate in the programme.
  • INTENT will equip young people with useful and practical tools to respond to potentially challenging situations.

INTENT – What actually happens in schools?

  • The INTENT model uses a ‘Train the Trainer’ approach. Training for teachers takes 60 minutes and will be delivered by local authority staff online.
  • Alternatively, teachers can also participate in self-led training, which is the official training that includes notes explaining the training slides.
  • Staff will then be expected to deliver 2 x 45–60 minute sessions, at least 3 months apart, in Years 7, 8, 9, and 10, covering a range of smoking-related topics and resilience strategies.
  • High-quality lesson plans, which build incrementally using the interactive whiteboard, are provided, along with an electronic Curriculum Guide.
  • Whilst INTENT does not have to be delivered exclusively during PSHE/RSE time, it covers much of the content suggested by the PSHE Association Education Programme of Study (Key Stages 1–5), the only national programme of study for the subject that is regularly signposted to by the Department for Education for schools to use.
  • Help and support is available for teachers via the INTENT website and Local Authority staff.
  • The INTENT programme now includes two vaping sessions which can be delivered alongside the smoking prevention resources to students in Year 7 and 8, and can be repeated in Years 9 and 10.