Tag: teacher

Turning on the head of a pin: Why developing agency in beginning teachers matters

Photo by Ekrulila on Pexels.com If the pandemic period has convinced me of anything it is that developing professionals with agency is vital for society.  The ability to imagine an alternative to what is already known and practised, and to find a way of enacting that imagining, has been part of our daily experience over … Continue reading Turning on the head of a pin: Why developing agency in beginning teachers matters →

I don’t like Mondays: Advice for beginning teachers on making a positive return to post-lockdown teaching

Photo by Max Fischer on Pexels.com As we stand on the precipice of returning to full classroom teaching after the most recent lockdown I’ve begun wondering how our beginning and early career teachers might be feeling.  It seems I’m not alone in this thought.  Indeed, shortly after having conversation with one of my own PGCE … Continue reading I don’t like Mondays: Advice for beginning teachers on making a positive return to post-lockdown teaching →

Writing job references for beginning teachers: Recommending Rahul, the Pandemic Edit

It is a tricky job writing a reference for a beginning teacher who may then be compared with more experienced colleagues, but where to begin in the middle of a Pandemic when their initial teacher education year has been so disrupted and unusual?  I first wrote a blog about writing references for trainee teachers in … Continue reading Writing job references for beginning teachers: Recommending Rahul, the Pandemic Edit →

An Ode to our History ITE Mentors: A journey into training to be a teacher virtually, Part 3

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com The pandemic has demonstrated the strength and versatility of cooperation and collaboration in our ITE partnership.  This has been shown through the support and flexibility of our school partners joining with us to train beginning teachers, and through the ways in which the University PGCE has worked to develop … Continue reading An Ode to our History ITE Mentors: A journey into training to be a teacher virtually, Part 3 →

Bamboozled by remote learning apps? Making sense of different online learning tools

This week on the University of Nottingham ITE programmes our beginning teachers have been looking at how we can teach effective lessons in a remote learning context. As part of this work they were tasked with exploring a range of different online learning tools which could be used in their teaching. Erin Brady, one of … Continue reading Bamboozled by remote learning apps? Making sense of different online learning tools →

Embracing the space: A journey into training to be a teacher virtually

Photo by Ingo Joseph on Pexels.com Before I begin this blog it is important to establish that I am utterly convinced of the importance of partnership in Initial Teacher Education.  Training teachers ‘outside’ the classroom environment in a purely theoretical realm is just not possible; theoretical knowledge cannot be easily interpreted by teachers into effective … Continue reading Embracing the space: A journey into training to be a teacher virtually →

Moving beyond delivery: The thorny issue of competency

Photo by Ivan Bertolazzi on Pexels.com It is at around this point in the ITT year when many training teachers begin to get into their stride.  They are no longer complete novices; they have built a familiarity with their placement setting and its rules and procedures, they are understanding how to fit into the departmental … Continue reading Moving beyond delivery: The thorny issue of competency →

The Power of Partnership in Initial Teacher Education

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com One of our history ITE mentors likes to talk about the way she and I often perform a ‘pincer movement’ on the beginning teachers we share.  This sounds much more aggressive than the reality!  Our ‘pincer movement’ most often involves both of us praising the student for the same achievement … Continue reading The Power of Partnership in Initial Teacher Education →