Jumping in at the deep end

Day 1

We were encouraged to get out of our comfort zones as much as possible during the course. I tried to take that seriously from the start, speaking to and getting to know a wide variety of people.

We were primarily introduced to the ethos of Marjon itself, alongside some surprisingly useful reflections on academic searching and why we should make proper use of the University’s own systems. Even after many years working as a researcher at a university, I think I may finally have been convinced to hang up the ol’ Google Schol in favour of something a little more professional.

Becoming a professional teacher and all, it only seems right.

Day 2

I sat down on Day 2 rather tired. It has been a long time since I have woken up at 6:30am two days in a row.

I got to campus, read some of a teaching book I had heard discussed on a podcast, and then went to class. I sat down next to another student and immediately encountered my first social hurdle: I spent the first five minutes slightly afraid to speak.

Eventually, I braved the possibility of an icy cold shoulder with:

“Hey, are you doing primary?”

Turns out everyone in that room was...

We had a bingo icebreaker and I managed to speak to lots of people in the class. I was trying to follow the advice about getting out of my comfort zone, and it was genuinely fun and exciting.

The slight downside of trying to speak to everyone was that, by lunchtime, I hadn’t really found a little group where I thought, yeah, I can sit with these people. I got myself a jacket potato and then a friend from church waved me over, so I spent some time chatting with several of the Secondary Education PGCE students.

Godspeed to those working with 11–16-year-olds. I salute you.

Anyway, back to class.

We had several really interesting sessions.

Instructions, reflection and a bit of the dark arts

One of the most memorable sessions centred on instruction, reflection, aims and objectives.

Rather than simply telling us what good instruction looked like, the lecturer treated us as a class and made us experience it. We reflected on how instructions were given, what happened when they were not clear enough, how a teacher might respond, and how activities could be made accessible to a variety of learners.

It was a properly mind-stimulating session. At points it felt a little like Professor Snape teaching us the dark arts through loops, clues and mind tricks.

Great fun.

And somehow we came out of it with a single piece of paper containing a surprising amount of useful information.

The whole session modelled what good teaching could look like. Thinking about it afterwards, several of the sessions did this: the way we were being taught was itself part of what we were learning.

A letter to future me

Another session asked us to write a letter to our future selves based on why we are teaching, what kind of teacher we would like to become and what we are currently nervous or excited about.

I really like the idea of eventually reading this again and seeing what has changed.

Right now I feel extremely enthusiastic. I suspect there will be points later in the year when I am considerably more tired, stressed or unsure of myself, so it might be useful to have something that captures why I wanted to do this in the first place.

Subject, curriculum and pedagogical knowledge

We then spent some time thinking about subject, curriculum and pedagogical knowledge.

Subject knowledge refers to knowing the content itself — for example, understanding how to multiply or simplify fractions.

Curriculum knowledge is more about understanding the learning journey pupils go on and how different areas of knowledge connect over time. For example, how early phonics and reading development eventually support pupils to engage with, interpret and write about increasingly complex texts.

Finally, pedagogical knowledge concerns the strategies we use to actually teach these things.

I found this distinction really useful.

Something taught to a five- or six-year-old might appear fairly straightforward from an adult subject-knowledge perspective, but teaching it effectively requires considerable thought.

I liked this.

This kind of stuff really excites me, and I am keen to get stuck in and learn as much as possible.

Meeting our virtual class

Our final session involved meeting a virtual class.

This was particularly interesting because it encouraged us to think laterally about individual pupils and, importantly, to recognise how much we still did not know about them.

We looked at a range of fictional pupils, initially as a group and then in pairs, before sharing our ideas back.

For each pupil we considered: what might we notice? What would we want to monitor? What else would we want to know? Who could we speak to? And what assumptions might we already be making?

A few things particularly stuck with me.

One was remembering that a difficulty in one subject does not necessarily mean a pupil will struggle in the same way elsewhere.

Another was thinking about what might sit underneath behaviour.

If a child frequently uses humour, for example, and appears socially confident but regularly experiences misunderstandings with friends, what might actually be happening? The important thing is not to immediately decide that we know the answer, but to remain curious and gather a fuller picture.

That might mean speaking to other teachers, teaching assistants, families and, of course, the pupil themselves.

We also considered practical ways teaching could be adapted.

If a pupil finds extended writing difficult, for example, could seating help? Would modelling or scaffolding help? Could we create opportunities for them to take more risks or feel more comfortable making mistakes?

I really liked spending time almost meditating on how we might understand pupils, investigate what we notice and check our own assumptions.

Overall

My first couple of days have left me really enthusiastic.

I have genuinely enjoyed meeting new people, deliberately pushing myself outside my comfort zone and beginning to properly engage with teaching, learning and the curriculum.

Perhaps most excitingly, I feel like I am beginning to learn about something in which I genuinely want to develop expertise.

That had become increasingly difficult for me in research. I had reached a point where I struggled to picture a professional destination that particularly motivated me. I didn’t really aspire to become a senior researcher in health or science, or eventually a Professor of Geography.

Teaching feels rather different.

The idea that I could become a really good classroom teacher, and perhaps much further down the line contribute through leadership, specialism or teacher education, genuinely excites me.

Obviously, I have approximately everything to learn before any of that.

But that is also rather exciting.