Teaching and Learning
The University places emphasis on enabling students to develop the independent learning capabilities that will equip you for lifelong learning and future employment, as well as academic achievement. A mixture of independent study, teaching and academic support through the personal academic tutoring system enables you to reflect on progress. You will build up a profile of skills, achievements and experiences that will enable you to flourish and be successful.
Teaching
You are taught through a combination of interactive seminars, workshops and lectures. The seminars will enable you to link educational theory to practice through reflection and evaluation. You will have seminars in all National Curriculum subjects to enable you to experience the full range of educational provision in primary schools. Practical subjects will be taught in specialist spaces such as DT rooms, gymnasiums and dance studios.
You will have the opportunity to plan and deliver lessons in your seminar rooms and then take them into placement to teach in the classroom. Following placement your seminars will give you opportunities to discuss your teaching - what went well and what changes you would make in the future - linked to the Teachers' Standards. Workshops delivered by Head Teachers and teachers in school will complement your seminars to ensure you are constantly up to date with current practice in the classroom. In addition, meetings, called Staging Posts, with personal academic tutors are scheduled on at least 4 occasions in each year of your course.
You will also undertake placements in each year of study matched to your pathway choice (3-7 or 5-11 year olds). You will receive training on how to succeed in placement through successfully meeting the Teachers' Standards over the three years of study. You will receive outstanding support whilst in school from trained mentors and class teachers, as well as a tutor from University who will observe you teach and give instant feedback to ensure you continue to improve through reflective practice.
Contact time
In a typical week you will have around 18-24 contact hours of teaching. The precise contact hours will depend on the optional modules selected and in the final year, you will normally have slightly less contact time in order to do more independent study.
Typically class contact time will be structured around:
- 4 hours of large group lectures
- 18 hours of seminars / workshops in groups of around 28 students
Independent self-study
In addition to the contact time, you are expected to undertake around 36 hours of personal self-study per week. Typically, this will involve pre and post reading for each of your seminars or large group lectures, completion of subject audits, working on group activities or presentations, undertaking research in the library and online, preparing for coursework assignments and /or placement.
A range of excellent learning facilities, including the Hive and library resources, the virtual learning environment, and extensive electronic learning resources, supports independent learning.
Teaching staff
You will be taught by a teaching team whose expertise and knowledge are closely matched to the content of the modules on the course. The team includes senior academics, professional practitioners with school experience and senior leaders from school.
Teaching in based on research and consultancy, and 33% per cent of course lecturers have a higher education teaching qualification or are Fellows or Senior Fellows of the Higher Education Academy. You can learn more about the staff by visiting our staff profiles.
Assessment
Each module has one or more formal or 'summative' assessments, which are graded and count towards the overall module grade. Assessment tasks are designed to assess the appropriate level of professional and academic knowledge, understanding and skills required and which encourage increasing levels of independence as well as the development of critical analysis, reflection and evaluation.
Assessment methods include a range of coursework assessments such as essays, presentations, production of lesson plans and resources, subject profiles and a final year research dissertation.
The formal summative assessment pattern for each year of the course is:
Year 1
5 written assignments
4 subject profiles
3 individual or group presentations
1 reflective portfolio (RP) for school experience
Year 2
8 written assignments
3 individual or group presentations
1 reflective portfolio (RP) for school experience
Year 3
4 written assignments (including research dissertation)
1 research poster
1 research proposal
1 individual presentation
1 reflective portfolio (RP) for school experience
In addition, mentors undertake continuous assessment of your progress whilst you are on school experience (SE). In discussion with the University School Experience tutor, a final written report on progress is produced, indicating the level of suitability and aptitude for primary teaching. Assessment of your performance is graded against the Professional Standards for QTS and increase in demand with each placement. Grades are based on two features of SE:
- continuous assessment of performance in relation to learning outcomes against the Professional Standards for QTS;
- the SE file, including a record of work with children and responses to tasks set for the placement.
Feedback
You will receive feedback on formal assessments undertaken by coursework. Feedback supports learning and you are encouraged to discuss it with personal academic tutors and module tutors as appropriate.
We aim to provide you with feedback on formal course work assessments within 20 working days of hand-in.