Congratulations on being offered a place on our PGCE primary School Direct programme.
The following information has been provided to ensure you are ready to begin your career in teaching and prepare you for the professional and academic expectations of your PGCE Please do make sure you check this blog regularly and work through all of the information and tasks provided for you as this will ensure you are able to make a positive start to you training programme.
As you prepare to start your PGCE, please do make sure that you have met all of the conditions attached to your offer by the stipulated deadline.
This will include:
- DBS documentation
- GCSE confirmation or equivalency tests
- Degree confirmation
Please note there are drop in sessions for your ID checks to be done on campus between 1pm & 3pm on the following dates:
Dates to be updated for 24-25
If you have any questions relation to your conditions, please do contact our admissions department at pgce@yorksj.ac.uk
Please also note that our admission team will be available on our face-to-face induction day which will be help as York St John University on Saturday 10th June. There will be more information about the university induction day to follow but do save the date in your diary.
Calendars
The following calendars show the days when your university training will take place. Please note that these are just your YSJ training days and not those provided by your alliance. For Esk Valley, Wonder and Polaris students, all of your university training will take place at York St John. For Campus Tees, Middlesbrough (MSTA) students, some of your university training will take place in York (blue days) and for those days showing red, your training will take place within a local school, but delivered by your university tutor. Please make sure you access the calendar that corresponds to your alliance and be aware that these are still in draft form and may change due to timetabling requirements.
Reading is a fundamental skill that unlocks learning across the whole curriculum. As primary school teachers, it is essential that we promote the joy of reading, as research shows that those children who choose to read, develop academically and socially. Therefore, you must become a role model for the children in your class and promote the value of reading across the whole curriculum. To support you with this, we have provided you with the following list of recommended texts. Please select the age range that you will be teaching and spend some time over the summer enjoying examples of children’s literature. There is no need to buy these texts but I would recommend visiting your local library and accessing the children’s section. Happy reading.
Developing your General Knowledge
As a primary school teachers, you are required to teach the full range of National Curriculum subjects and areas of the EYFS Framework, and although we acknowledge that each teacher will have curriculum strengths, all teachers need to develop a secure grounding across all subjects. To support with your broader curriculum knowledge, we request that you spend some time reflecting on those areas where your general knowledge is weak and begin to gain experience.
To facilitate this, you should visit local museums, art galleries and places of worship as these are rich sources of curriculum knowledge.
The following is a useful website to locate museums and galleries in your area.
https://www.great-days-out.co.uk/museums-galleries/north-east-england
Subject Knowledge audits
The following audits have been written to ensure you are aware of the level of subject knowledge required to be a primary school teacher. The audits are a formative tool and enable you to reflect and identify areas of personal need. The audits cover key aspects of the English, mathematics and science curriculum content and to ensure you are prepared to teach these, revision in weaker areas will be needed during the summer.
Please access the audits via the links contained within the following word documents. Once completed, record you scores on the same tracking document and record any revision work you have done as preparation for your start in September. Please note that these audits will be repeated before you begin your final placement to demonstrate progress. You should be prepared to show your subject knowledge audit scores with your alliance in September as areas of development will inform your early targets. Please also save your completed subject knowledge trackers electronically because you will need to upload these onto your electronic portfolio (Pebblepad) at a later date.
Suggested reading and resources have been provided to support your revision and again these can be found in the documents below. These should be a starting point and not a definitive list. Please be as proactive as you can be and use the time over the summer to revise and build confidence in areas where develop is needed.
We would suggest that you complete the audits before your face-to-face induction day (Saturday 15th June) as we will be holding subject knowledge taster events on this day and you can select the most appropriate workshops that will support areas of development