Engaging in Professional Practice in Primary and Early Year Settings (X6607)

15 credits, Level 5

Autumn and spring teaching

This module will encourage you to engage more fully in the classroom with 8 weeks of professional practice.

During the module, you will continue to develop the skills, knowledge and understanding required to successfully engage in teaching, learning and children’s wellbeing with a Primary or Early Years setting. You will experience a phased introduction to teaching, including a timetable of a minimum of 15 hours (8 hours classroom teaching and 7 hours other professional duties including observing and co-teaching).

You will move from supporting the learning, development, and wellbeing of individuals to taking responsibility for preparing and delivering learning experiences for larger groups of children. You will also be guided to focus on gaining wider experiences in education beyond the immediate classroom/setting to look at how the school or setting manages transition and operates in the wider community. You will again be challenged to develop skills in personal resilience, professionalism, communication, and reflection.

You will further participate in the statutory Intensive Training and Practice (ITAP) weeks that focus on specific, foundational, or pivotal areas of the ITE curriculum relevant to the primary/early years phase. The ITAP includes a minimum of 25 hours of planned and supported hours per week and a minimum of 4 hours per week of expert support per trainee. You will study the impact of statutory frameworks within which schools, early years settings, teachers and fellow professionals operate including the Teachers’ Standards or Early Years Teachers’ Standards.

Contact hours and workload

This module is approximately 150 hours of work. This breaks down into about 24 hours of contact time and about 126 hours of independent study. The University may make minor variations to the contact hours for operational reasons, including timetabling requirements.

We regularly review our modules to incorporate student feedback, staff expertise, as well as the latest research and teaching methodology. We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2024/25. However, there may be changes to these modules in response to feedback, staff availability, student demand or updates to our curriculum.

We’ll make sure to let you know of any material changes to modules at the earliest opportunity.