The Optimus blog

The blog that inspires leaders in the UK education sector

The Optimus blog

The blog that inspires leaders in the UK education sector

Initial Teacher Training

Nicky Thompson

Attracting and retaining career changers

Career changers can bring a wealth of skills and experience to the teaching profession. Nicky Thompson explains how schools can support and encourage new teachers from another sector. Seven years ago I swapped the boardroom for the classroom when I retrained to be a technology teacher in a...
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John Viner

The sums don't add up: recruitment, funding and teacher quality

A new academic year looms, and school leaders will again be trying to balance the books while hunting for high quality teaching staff. What can schools do to meet the recruitment challenge? John Viner shares options for 'growing your own'. It cannot have been the best news to welcome the newly...
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Jack Procter-Blain

Providing trainee teachers with meaningful SEND training

Initial teacher training should prepare trainees to work effectively with every pupil in their classroom, including those with SEND. Ever since the Carter review of initial teacher training in 2015, which reminded us that 'good teaching for SEND is good teaching for all children', practitioners and...
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John Viner

Where do new teachers come from?

Looking for fresh talent, or a pathway to a new career? John Viner outlines some of the many different routes into teaching. As a teacher trainer, it always astonishes me that, of the (usually) young men and women who we send out into schools with a shiny new QTS, so many leave the profession after...
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John Viner

The perils of school-based initial teacher training

Faced with declining candidate quality for teaching posts, we need to consider the variability of initial teacher training (ITT) and how it might be adding to our recruitment woes. The most recent Teacher Recruitment Index from the Times Educational Supplement reports that headteachers are unhappy...
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Lizzie Gait

Improving Initial Teacher Training: recommendations from the Carter review

The Carter Review of Initial Teacher Training (ITT) was released last month, detailing Sir Andrew Carter’s recommendations for ITT moving forwards. To save you time, we’ve summarised the recommendations for you. We hope you find it useful! The aim of the Carter review was to: define effective ITT...
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Gareth D Morewood

Never has there been so much change. Does anyone know what is happening?

We've brought back Gareth D Morewood's popular SENCology blog. In his first post, Gareth considers current tension in the profession and sets out three elements for an inclusive school in times of change. Education hasn’t experienced such change in decades, with changes to Initial Teacher Training...
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