We all know that teaching is not a profession for the fainthearted, and for trainee teachers, the myth of the seemingly never-ending workload starts to become a reality; between the academic essays on ‘best practice’ and ‘pedagogy’, and role-playing behaviour management techniques, what keeps you going throughout your PGCE course is knowing that you will be able to make a difference in the lives of young people: that you will have the potential to provoke a true and life-long love of learning.
However, given the immense pressure and countless time-consuming tasks trainee teachers face, it’s perhaps no surprise that sourcing the perfect means for instilling this passion in pupils often takes a backseat to delivering essential content for them to pass their exams. However, these two things aren’t mutually exclusive; it’s no secret that interactivity has become an increasingly important part of the learning experience. The days of passive learning are gone, and educators now have access to an abundance of resources to illustrate and enhance their teaching. Students who have grown up in this digital world now expect an element of interactivity and visual stimulation in their lessons, and through broadcast media, all learners can be inspired.
It is a well-established fact that broadcast content is an invaluable teaching tool, allowing pupils to visualise and contextualise their learning, filling in any gaps in their subject knowledge, and bringing abstract concepts tangibly to life – bringing history into the present and the expanding galaxy into the classroom. That said, for trainee teachers, this ‘abundance’ of resources at their fingertips is almost overwhelming, making it difficult to locate relevant and meaningful material. Therefore, it’s important that ERA makes it easy for library and resource professionals to help PGCE students get there.
We have developed (and will continue to develop) a number of time-saving resources to help those starting out on their teaching journey. Our Subject Playlists, for example, contain a number of TV and radio clips tailored to a number of subjects. These have been hand-picked based on the GCSE curriculum, and timestamped at key points so that teachers don’t need to watch the entire programme or clip to know that they are getting the content that they need. These will shortly be accompanied by curriculum links, suggested activities, and printable tasks that pupils can complete alongside watching or listening to the broadcast content. This will ensure that even the most reluctant learners are engaged, as it removes their option to ‘opt out’ of the lesson. These resources have been designed in such a way that they can complement existing lessons and schemes of work, or inspire lessons in themselves – lessons built around broadcast content that directly contributes to pupil progress and attainment. ERA strives to help teachers utilise broadcast media to its maximum potential in the classroom, without increasing their already demanding workload.
At ERA, we want to be able to support students and teachers, but we also want to make it easier for librarians and information professionals to guide students to the resources available under the licence. If you have any suggestions, we’d welcome them.
And hey, if you can have Brian Cox at hand in your physics class and Stephen Fry encouraging your ancient history students, why not make the most of them?
You can find out more about the ERA Subject Playlists here, or about ERA in general here.
This blog was originally published in the Winter 2019 CITE Magazine.
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