@PIoE News and Views
October 2016
Bringing the Civil War to life in Somerset
As a Lecturer in Education teaching Humanities I spend my time encouraging student teachers to move away from writing lesson plans with a strong focus on research and recording to lessons that are dynamic, engaging children in historical activities to develop a passion for history. The student teachers’ own experience of primary education has been structured by the QCA lesson exemplars that were followed closely by many schools when the National Curriculum was first introduced. I decided to choose an aspect of history that they were unlikely to have been taught in their primary schools, to demonstrate how this can be taught through activities requiring fewer literacy skills which can become a barrier to children developing their historical skills, knowledge and understanding. I chose the Civil War as the topic and situated it in the South West as part of local studies. I taught this as a module for two years and then decided it was time to take some of the activities into school to see how they worked in practice with a class of children.
Two students and myself were kindly offered the opportunity to work with key stage 2 in a two class village school for two days. This involved 19 children in years 3-6 at the beginning of the academic year. This presented challenges in differentiation as the children’s abilities covered such a wide span. This made the necessity of an active approach even more necessary to allow all children to make good progress.
The children were divided into Royalists and Parliamentarians and were dressed appropriately so that they began to identify with one side, we were later able to explore the biases that they were developing towards their own party. The children did need to learn some information about the Royalists and Parliamentarians and Oliver Cromwell at the beginning of the topic. To do this they looked at paintings, some written information and quotations from Cromwell and his contemporaries, to identify the principles and values of each side, as well as Cromwell’s motivation. We moved on to a scenario game, where the Parliamentarians were under siege in Taunton with the Royalists in the countryside outside. The children developed interesting strategies to enable their party to be successful in taking ownership of the town, despite the difficulties that were presented to them at each step of the scenario.
The story of the Civil War in the South West was acted out using a big map on the playground and children as the individual characters from the war moving around with lots of booing and cheering from each side. Ralph Hopton was put on trial but managed to convince the jury that he was innocent.
Several battles ensued with lots of planning of strategies and tactics and we ended with a cream tea to reconcile both sides to live with each other under the new Commonwealth protectorate.
Viv Southall
Plymouth Institute of Education’s geographical connections
Plymouth Institute of Education was well represented at the annual conference of the Geographical Association, held at the University of Manchester from 7th to 9th April. The conference was attended by over 700 delegates from around the world and offered lectures, workshops focused on pedagogy and curriculum change and research papers. Lecturer in Education and PIoE EdD student Kay Chapman gave a research paper based on her thesis entitled ‘Reflections on using a postcolonial theoretical framework to analyse geography education in international schools in Sri Lanka: using ‘third space’ to understand similarity and difference’.
Plymouth Institute of Education alumni represented the newly formed Cornwall GA branch at the conference. Amy Sparrow (Secondary PGCE Geography), Head of Geography at Pool Academy, Cornwall and Dan Venton (Secondary Geography, School Direct), Head of Geography at Penryn College, Cornwall are pictured with Kay Chapman and GA President, Steve Rawlinson. Amy and Dan established the Cornwall GA branch with PIoE’s Kay Chapman in order to connect teachers and develop geography as a subject in Primary and Secondary schools. Steve Rawlinson applauded the commitment and enthusiasm shown by Amy and Dan and the way in which their connection with PIoE is supporting their both professional development and geography education in Cornwall.
Promoting Sustainability in Science Education Programmes: Becoming Aware of Gender Stereotyping and Improving Practice
As a lecturer in science education, the concept of environmental sustainability is heavily embedded within my teaching. This article aims to highlight the links between gender and sustainability. The sustainable development agenda 2030 states that one of its targets is to ‘achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls’ (United Nations, 2015). The reality is that women are still under-represented in science, technology, engineering and mathematical (STEM) fields (Penner, 2015). This article explores the issue of this under-representation of women, and also specifically focuses on changing practice within a primary science teacher training programme. The article not only explores gender equality for women, but also for men, highlighting the stereotypical barriers trainee male primary school teachers encounter. The issues of ‘unconscious bias’ and ‘stereotype threat’ are also discussed and changes in practice recommended. The article highlights the fact that teachers and higher education professionals are in the fortunate position where they can facilitate change; after all, education is the key to a more sustainable future for all (Nevin, 2008).
BA ECS students making a difference!
Following a very successful BA Early Childhood Studies field trip to The Gambia in January 2016, two of our students decided that they would like to make a contribution to improving the quality of care and education for young children there.
Beth Taylor decided to undertake a sponsored run in the Plymouth Half-Marathon in April, and Leah Trevelyan a sponsored sky-dive in September, to raise funds for The Gambian Schools Trust. The Trust is a small educational charity supported entirely by donations, fundraising activities and unpaid volunteers to build, equip and maintain nursery school, provide school libraries, ship and distribute school materials, furniture and resources from UK, and improve access to clean water from wells.
Together, the students raised an amazing sum of almost £1300 to benefit the work of the charity and both are hoping to return to the Gambia with colleagues to spend a week volunteering on a local project early next year.
PhenoloGIT
PhenoloGIT is an Erasmus Plus-funded 3 year project (2015-18), working with partners and schools across the 7-14 age range in the UK, Spain, Denmark and Lithuania.
The partnership uses interactive technology to enhance children's understanding of the natural world.
!Do keep an eye on our website!
www.phenologit.org @phenologitorg #phenologit
We are delighted to announce that this autumn term sees the start of our piloting with teachers. The interactive application has been developed by the team and implemented by our partners at the Galician Supercomputuing Centre (CESGA) with exciting new functionality, please feedback your thoughts using a walk-through video available here:
All project partners (see www.phenologit.org for details) have undertaken a curriculum mapping exercise showing how the activities can fulfil curriculum targets. If you would like to see this for the UK, by subject area at each of Key Stages 2 and 3, please contact us (see below).
Participating schools are listed below:
Devonport High School for Girls (Plymouth);
http://www.devonportgirls.plymouth.sch.uk/
East-the-Water Primary School (Bideford); http://www.east-the-water.devon.sch.uk/
South Dartmoor Community College (Ashburton);
http://www.southdartmoor.devon.sch.uk/
St John’s Primary School (Totnes)
http://totnes-st-johns-primary.devon.sch.uk/
and Wellington Prep School (Somerset)
http://www.wellington-school.org.uk/Prep-School/Welcome/Introduction.aspx
Please send your comments and queries to:
janet.georgeson@plymouth.ac.uk , tel 01752 585348 OR joanna.watt@plymouth.ac.ukMagical Belief and Undergraduate Students: An International Research Collaboration
Roger ‘The Thing’ Cutting has had a paper on 'magical belief’ accepted for the forthcoming PedRIO ‘What is Teaching Excellence?’ Conference taking place on the 22nd of November.
Speaking from his crypt, Roger said:
“I was delighted, but somewhat surprised that the paper was selected for a conference on excellence in teaching, as NNS scores, my PDR and now peer review all reinforce that I know nothing about it.
The project grew out of a light-hearted conversation about a BBC News story on how 30% of students claimed to have lucky underwear. Then, quicker than you could say ‘abracadabra’ it turned into an externally funded international research project. Sorry got to go, the sun’s coming up.”
Between the nonsense the paper actually provides a critical voice in relation to the efficacy of HE pedagogy in the development of the deeper critical dispositions in students as described by Kreber (2014).
All are welcome, but due to health and safety concerns, werewolves are asked to check the lunar calendar before committing to attendance. Furthermore, due to this year's budgetary constraints we only have a limited number of cauldrons.
ECER conference
As you can see from this happy photograph, PIoE staff showed a strong presence at the European Conference for Educational Research (ECER) in Dublin last month. The research presentations we gave ranged through Early Years, Sustainability, Educational Leadership, Outdoor Learning, Special Needs, Educational Policy, Teacher Education and ICT, showing the broad spread of international work we do. We were delighted to touch base with our Marie Curie Scholars, Verity and Chris, who seem to be having very interesting and productive times in Hungary and California respectively. ECER is a very good conference, offering excellent opportunities for network-building. Next Year it is in University College, Copenhagen from 22-25 August, see http://www.eera-ecer.de/ecer-2017-copenhagen/. Get writing those papers, send in an abstract and get your R1 bid in early!
From the left (standing): Stephen Sterling, Jan Georgeson, Cath Gristy, Megan Crawford, Verity Campbell-Barr, Sue Waite, Linda la Velle and ( in front) Christoforos Mamas.
Joanna Haynes new book publications for September 2016
Chapter 18 Philosophy for Children: An Imaginative Democratic Practice in Helen Lees and Nell Noddings (Eds) The Palgrave International Handbook of Alternative Education. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
I think this rich collection of ideas on alternatives in education will be of interest to many colleagues in PIoE.
Chapter 15 Being and Becoming a Philosophical Teacher in Babs Anderson (Ed) Philosophy for Children: Theories and praxis in teacher education. London and New York: Routledge.
I think this collection will be of particular interest to colleagues in teacher education and CPD.
NEW BOOK
Palgrave Macmillan have just published a new book edited by Denise Summers and Roger Cutting. Entitled Education for Sustainable Development in Further Education: Embedding Sustainability into Teaching, Learning and the Curriculum. Denise and Roger also provide a number of chapters along with other PIoE staff: Russell Shobrook, Sue Webster and Simon Webster.
The book explores a number of aspects and projects that relate to the sustainability agenda in the Further Education (FE) sector. Often to referred to as the "Forgotten Sector” this has never been so apposite in relation to education for sustainability (EfS). Many colleges are in fact at the forefront of the implementation of many innovative and successful projects and FE staff are taking the agenda into a very wide range of vocational courses.
The book also provides an opportunity to consider key debates, useful links and suggested reading to encourage further investigation and development of practice. Its utility is in its aims to empower teachers to critically analyse EfS through their own subject specialisms, engage in the debate and learn with their students.
Achievements
Macmillan coffee morning
The coffee morning continued after it had officially finished when I discovered two more Judith cakes - one for eating immediately which was utterly amazing and earned her the title of 'Best Baker' all over again. We need to try it out again very soon, I think! The other was the raffle chocolate cake which I hawked around to everyone I could find. The winner was Heather Knight and, as she'd only just submitted her thesis, it was only appropriate that she should get it and be able to add it into her celebrations. How fortuitous that was!
Lastly, the amount that we made is substantially up on last year. It looks as though it's going to be £155 which is fantastic. If you'd like to make a late contribution, not having been able to be there - or not having funds on you at the time - then that would be great. Just drop anything you'd like to give into my willing palm or that of Kath Vineer.