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Staff and Students Reflect on Research with IMPact
Two tutors and two 2nd year students from the BA Primary Education course at Bishop Grosseteste University have had an article published in IMPact the University of Lincoln’s journal for Higher Education research. Dr Ashley Compton and Emma Rogers, both lecturers in Primary at BGU, co-authored the paper alongside students Christopher Johnstone and Dan Waite. The paper reflects on their learning about research through researching with children as part of the ‘Beginning to Research’ module of the Primary Education course. During this module the students learn about designing and undertaking research, including the ethics involved, and then have two days when children come on to campus to take part in the research projects. Staff at the University of Lincoln read about the research days on the BGU website and contacted Ashley and Emma asking for a write up of the experience for their journal. Following the publication Dr Compton discussed the unusual opportunities for reflection it offered: “The process of writing an article about practice makes you reflect quite deeply on what you're trying to achieve with that practice and what theory underpins it - things we don't always articulate when focusing on our research” “Both Emma and I felt it was important to incorporate staff and student perspectives and were delighted that Christopher and Dan were able to work with us, both have been excited about being published authors now” The paper has now been published and is available to read in the first anniversary edition of IMPact. If you’d like more information on how to begin your adventure in the world of education, visit our website or contact our Enquiries Team today to find out more about our range of PGCE and Primary Education courses. -
Academics complete international project exploring personalised learning
Academics from the School of Teacher Development at Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) have completed work on an Erasmus+ project this month, attending the final meeting in The Netherlands to showcase their output. The Erasmus+ project, on Personalised Learning in Primary and Secondary education phases, included research teams from The Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Finland and the BGU UK team. The academics involved from the School of Teacher Development were; Dr. Emma Clarke, Kevin McLaughlin, Shaun Thompson, Dr. Jonathan Wainwright and Aimee Quickfall. The BGU team joined the project in January this year, taking over from a school partner in Lincoln, and quickly became part of a strong research group across Europe during visits to The Netherlands and Sweden in the spring. Their output is the 'teacher profile' - a tool for teachers across Europe to assess their own level of personalised learning practice, with advice and targets if they wish to increase their level of skill in this area as Dr Clarke explained: “The toolkit is deliberately non-judgemental, for teachers to use individually or with peers. It avoids suggesting that some teaching approaches are better than others - but will support practitioners who wish to develop key personalised learning skills.” As part of the final project meeting, the Erasmus+ team presented to teachers and leaders in The Netherlands. Returning from the meeting Aimee commented: “It has been a pleasure to be involved in this European project, with researchers who have different backgrounds, settings and perspectives, but who share a passion for improving education and professional development for teachers. We have built relationships with our partner teams and hope we can continue to develop our links and projects.” The completed project will 'go live' in the autumn of 2019. If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher! If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps. -
BGU Exhibition Joins Lincoln City Football Club to Celebrate Women’s Team Launch
Bishop Grosseteste University’s (BGU) ongoing exhibition into the history of Women’s football in Lincolnshire travelled to Sincil Bank this week to join in the celebrations as Lincoln City Football Club officially relaunched their Lincoln Women team. The team, who will play in the FA Women's National League Division One Midlands, were formally launched last night having previously been known as Nettleham Ladies and at the event they were supported by BGU’s vibrant exhibition celebrating the history of the women’s game in Lincoln so far. Chloe Brock-Taylor, Lincoln City Women Captain and PGCE student at BGU, shared her excitement about being part of the ongoing journey of women’s football in Lincoln: “I’ve been involved with Lincoln City since I was a kid so it’s amazing to be back here today to relaunch and lead the women’s team. It’s great that BGU have been able to support the relaunch with this exhibition and I’m really pleased that it’s here today. It’s fantastic to see the history of women’s football in the city being celebrated and I’m excited for me and my team mates to become a part of that story” Terry Hibbard, Media Manager at Lincoln City Football Club, explained why the Club felt it was important to have the exhibition at the event: “There is a rich history of women’s football in both Lincoln and the wider county which the exhibition from BGU captures superbly. On a day like today we felt it was vital that that history and those traditions be championed to give people an understanding of everything the women’s team has accomplished so far and what it’s capable of achieving.”Dr Andrew Jackson, Head of Research at BGU, expressed his delight at seeing the continuing impact of his team’s exhibition on the Lincoln community: “When we were in the early stages of putting the exhibition and play together we hoped they might help towards the reestablishment of the Lincoln Women’s team so it’s great to be here now seeing that become a reality. We’re excited to see the new Women’s team succeed and hopefully we’ll be able to add this new chapter into our exhibition in the future” The exhibition is currently on display and open to the public at the Lincoln Central Library. The Research Team at BGU are dedicated to preserving and championing the history of Lincolnshire and its residents. You can keep up to date with all their activities via our website or, if you would like to get involved yourself, you can contact our Enquiries Team to find out how to start your new adventure. -
BGU wellbeing research reaches a wider audience at national conference
Academics from the School of Teacher Development at Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU), Dr. Emma Clarke and Aimee Quickfall, presented their on-going wellbeing research at a British Education Research Association (BERA) special interest group, last month. The BERA Mental Health, Wellbeing and Education special interest group support researchers in education who are looking at the mental health and wellbeing of students, teachers and children. Their July event included presentations from The Education Support Network, Professor Andrew Ravenscroft from the University of East London and Dr. Elizabeth Nye from the University of Oxford. Following the event Aimee explained how the diverse nature of the attendees made the BERA group the perfect place to present their research: “The attendees were hugely supportive and interested in our research methods and findings. We have made links with other universities and organisations who have the same passion to improve conditions for teachers and trainee teachers that we have, and we look forward to working with them in the future.” The research project at the centre of Aimee and Emma’s presentation, which has so far included projects in Finland, Denmark and at two universities in the UK, has been carried out by Shaun Thompson, Sue Lambert, Hannah Wells, Dr. Claire Thomson, Dr. Emma Clarke, Aimee Quickfall, a team of student researchers on the BGU PGCE Primary programme and Professor Jonathan Glazzard at Leeds Beckett University, as well as faculty members in The University of Eastern Finland and UCC in Copenhagen. For Dr. Clarke the opportunity to work with student researchers on the project was a particular highlight: “The interviews and other methods were enjoyable for researchers and participants. We particularly enjoyed working as a team with student researchers, who helped to design the research and to keep it strongly focused on the student experience of the PGCE.” Strands of the project have used photo-elicitation to capture the daily experiences of being a teacher trainee, as well as drawing timelines of the whole programme in terms of well-being and semi-structured interviews to talk through the photographs and timelines. The team have also used a simple 'see-saw' model for trainees to consider their resources and challenges and whether they can balance these. The team are now building in sessions for trainees on the PGCE Primary to think and talk about their well-being based on their pilot study findings, as well as rolling out the well-being research for a second year with Leeds Beckett University and international collaborators. If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher! If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps. -
BGU lecturer joins academic and literary legends in exploring a balanced curriculum for children
Aimee Quickfall, Head of Programmes for Primary and Early Years in the School of Teacher Development at Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU), has contributed a chapter to a new book on the primary curriculum.'A Broad and Balanced Curriculum in Primary Schools: Educating the whole child' identifies the pressures of standardised testing and the focus on English and maths as impacting factors on teaching time, and asks how teachers can ensure that the curriculum truly is broad and balanced. Contributors provide an exploration of the current challenges in the curriculum as well as guidance on how to tackle them. Aimee's chapter looks at using philosophical inquiry with primary age children and how an hour a week of thinking deeply and discussing interesting questions together can improve teamwork, mutual respect, problem-solving skills, as well as writing, reading and mathematics achievement. Contributors include children's literary legend and former Children's Laureate, Michael Rosen; and Professor Teresa Cremin, Professor of Education (Literacy) at The Open University in the Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language Studies and is available now through a number of outlets. Speaking following the book's publication Aimee expressed her delight at being involved: "I am delighted to have been invited to contribute to this very important book, which reflects how passionately the School of Teacher Development team at BGU feel about a broad and balanced curriculum for our teacher trainees and their pupils" If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher! If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps. 'A Broad and Balanced Curriculum in Primary Schools: Educating the whole child' is edited by Susan Ogier and published by Sage. -
BGU join the Lincoln Book Festival 2019 to Celebrate the life and legacy of Queen Victoria
This September staff and students from Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) joined the Lincoln Book Festival to celebrate the bicentenary of the births of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert with ‘V for Victoria!’ with a series of events from 23rd to 28th September capturing the ways in which the city connects the life and legacy of Queen Victoria. From the most recent publications on Queen Victoria, the British Empire and Victorian authors such as, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, John Ruskin, and Janet Ross, but also Ada Lovelace, Charlotte Brontë’s publisher, William Smith Williams, there were exciting events for a variety of interests. BGU has been collaborating with the Festival for a number of years and that relationship further increased this year spearheaded by Dr Claudia Capancioni, Programme Leader for English at BGU, whose specialism is Victorian Literature. Staff and students were actively involved in the festival programme’s activities with our trainee PGCE students in English and Drama and staff opening the festival by leading workshops for school pupils who took part in a creative writing competition, Flash Fiction, and the creative writing programmes run by First Story and Writing East Midlands with the Society of Authors for Fiction. Later in the week BGU sponsored ‘If Words Could Kill’, an evening with Claire Harman and Ambrose Parry (aka Chris Brookmyre and Dr Marisa Haetzman). There was murder most foul in this two-part author event with Harman’s Murder by the Book, which focuses on a true crime murder that shocked Victorian London, and the thrilling new novel, The Way of the Flesh, Parry wrote about the hunt for a killer in 1847 Edinburgh. The University's involvement continued on Friday with Dr Capancioni introducing Janet Ross, a Victorian historian and biographer who entertained guests such as William Gladstone, Robert Browning, Mark Twain and Virginia Woolf at Poggio Gherardo, her villa near Florence. In Leaves from Our Tuscan Kitchen: or How to Cook Vegetables, Janet recorded the recipes of Giuseppe Volpi, her cook for over 30 years, which her guests loved and requested - George Frederic Watts in particular. Published in 1899 and still in print, it appeared at a time when vegetables were considered only as an adjunct to the main course, this recipe book has become an established resource for all British chefs interested in Italian food. Together with The Cheese Society and The Straw Collection, ‘In the Tuscan Kitchen of Janet Ross’ offered a taste of Ross’s recipes through sampling the cheese she used, accompanied by Tuscan wines. Since the summer, the city of Lincoln has contributed to an array of national events including the series organised by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, which will be the topic of the forthcoming lecture by the V&A director, Tristram Hunt, at Lincoln Cathedral on 10 October. If you are interested in finding out more about studying English at BGU, visit our website, contact our Enquiries Team or join us on one of our Open Days. -
Academics' Wellbeing Research Expands to New European Audience
Having enthralled attendees at the British Education Research Association (BERA) special interest group, last month, Teacher trainee wellbeing research led by academics at BGU has reached a European audience at the European Conference on Education Research, organised by the European Education Research Association (EERA). Dr. Emma Clarke, Aimee Quickfall and Shaun Thompson presented the well-being research at the conference in Hamburg to an international audience of education researchers. The trio presented on behalf of the wider team at BGU, which also includes Sue Lambert, Hannah Wells and Dr. Claire Thomson. The pilot study, conducted in 2018/19, tracked the journey of PGCE Primary students in terms of their well-being and used photo-elicitation; participants took two photographs a week that summed up their experience, as well as drawing timelines and recording their challenges and resources for well-being. The project also looked at the teacher training experiences of students in Finland, Denmark and The Netherlands, where the team investigated how different programme structures supported well-being. Aimee commented on the opportunities the conference presented: "We were delighted with the response to our presentation. Colleagues from Australia, Europe and the UK are interested in learning from our pilot findings and getting involved in further research with us. We will be building on these connections to further improve trainee well-being at BGU, and the well-being of trainees in universities across the world." The pilot findings are now being shared with the new PGCE Primary cohort to support their well-being journey to Qualified Teacher Status and beyond, and a main study is being launched to roll out in the UK, Finland and Denmark in 2019/20. Emma explained the motivation for this follow on work: "We really want to use our research to support our teacher trainees, which is why our pilot findings are already being used to make modifications to programmes and shared with trainees." If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher! If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps. -
Sensory Bus Visit Helps Students Break Down Barriers in Education
Students at Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) enjoyed a visit from the LINKAGE Sensory Bus as they explored innovative and unique ways to remove the barriers children with special needs can face in education. The LINKAGE Sensory Bus is a specially designed learning space filled with range of unique sensory experiences to aid children with special needs including an illuminated jungle space and a music wall. All of its activities are adaptable to the needs of specific children and can help support pupils in a wide variety of areas including expanding vocabulary and behaviour management. Niz Smith, LINKAGE Project Coordinator, described the potential benefits of the bus to both pupils and teachers: “Our goal is to provide children with special educational needs with an environment in which they have choice and control. Through their explorations they are able share and interact with their peers in ways they would not normally be able to, allowing them to become happier and calmer. The bus is also a great resource for teachers, particularly in rural schools who wouldn’t normally be able to access resources, they can find new avenues to help their pupils interact before taking them back to their classrooms.” Isobel, Riaz and Hadikah, all currently in their second year of BA Primary Education with QTS, were three of the students to spend time on the bus and they praised its potential as a training tool for teachers: “It was great to gain more insight into how we can support children with special needs. Once you’re immersed in the bus the theoretical strategies we’ve been learning in lectures come to life and really begin to make sense. It was a brilliant practical experience” If you would like to arrange a visit by the LINKAGE bus team to your school you can email Niz at niz.smith@linkage.org.uk. The visit to BGU was organised by lecturers as part of a module focused on learning how to support pupils with special educational needs. If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher. If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps. -
‘Inspirational’ First Cohort Complete General Practice Nursing Qualification
Last week Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) bid a fond farewell to the first cohort of students undertaking the PG Cert in General Practice Nursing. After nine months of blended learning in the classroom, in practice and using the Virtual Learning Environment, students are now able to work in General Practice with the range of skills a Nurse in this area is expected to have. Content covered over the course of the qualification included cervical smear taking, Immunisation and vaccines (including Travel Health), management of long-term conditions such as diabetes and asthma, Intermediate life support as well as mental health and support for carers. Speaking at an event to celebrate the students Nicki Walsh, Senior lecturer (and Programme Lead for Health and Social Care) at BGU, praised them for their commitment and example to future students: “The finishing students have been 100% committed to the programme and have not only developed in confidence but are a true inspiration for those who might consider General Practice Nursing as their preferred Career pathway. Students have had excellent support from their clinical environments throughout with clinical and academic supervisor supporting them in and around practice. Whilst sad to see these students finish at BGU, there are opportunities for further study on the MSc Primary and Community Care, as offering support future PGCert students. Further funding has been allocated to BGU by Health Education England for 10 places in March and the team at BGU look forward to welcoming next cohort of aspiring GPNs.” The PG Cert in General Practice Nursing is a specialised Master’s level programme which provides registered Healthcare Professionals, who are currently working in a Primary Care (General Practice) setting, with a learner-centred and practice focused programme of study, meeting their personal, professional and practice development needs all focused on local service demands. It produces high-calibre post graduates who are autonomous, reflexive, possessing of inquiring and analytical minds as part of their continued professional development required by their relevant Professional Regulatory body. The new PG Cert In General Practice Nursing joins the developing portfolio of courses at BGU which reflect current and future needs of the health and social care sector. Other current courses include Master's in Health & Social Care Leadership and Primary & Community Care. To find out how these courses can help develop your healthcare skills visit our website or contact our Enquiries Team. -
Academics Continue to Explore Teacher Wellbeing Around the World
Following successful presentations across Europe throughout 2019, Dr Emma Clarke and Aimee Quickfall of Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) took their well-being research to the Finnish Education Research Association conference in Joensuu, Finland. The research project charts teacher training well-being experiences of teacher trainees in the UK, Finland, Denmark and the Netherlands employing visual methodologies including photo elicitation, time line drawing and diagrams. The project team have had a lot of interest in the methods as well as the findings and are currently working with colleagues at Leeds Beckett University, The University of Manchester and King's College, London on supporting their well-being work. This latest presentation capped off an exciting year for the project team, which has featured contributions from several of Emma and Aimee’s colleagues at BGU including Shaun Thompson, Hannah Wells, Sue Lambert and Dr Claire Thomson, as they have also disseminated findings at ECER in Hamburg, a BERA special interest group forum in London and the UCET conference in Stratford. Following their trip to Finland Aimee commented: “It has been a pleasure to return to the University of Eastern Finland and to share our findings from the project with the teacher educators from Helsinki, UEF, Turku and Oulu.” Whilst Emma reflected on the UK and Finnish contexts: “The Finnish teacher education system is very different to ours - training lasts for 5 years and teachers graduate with a master's qualification. However, it is interesting that there are many similarities in the experiences of our students and our Finnish colleagues have been very supportive and engaged in the research.” If you’re interested in a future in education, our BA (Hons) Primary Education with QTS (3 year undergraduate degree), BA (Hons) Primary Teaching Studies with QTS (15 month top up degree), and PGCE courses are the perfect ways to begin or continue your adventure on the path to becoming a fantastic teacher! If you have any questions, our Enquiries Team are ready to help. Contact them today or visit our website to find out how to take your next steps.
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