Tag Archives: CPD

the ASE–your first call for quality Science CPD.

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I’ve been a science teacher for 15 years, and in that time I’ve only had access to a limited number of good CPD events intended for science teachers.  True I’ve had access to additional training in my role as a subject leader and an AST, but I can count on one hand the number of inspirational courses I’ve attended that have been intended for science teachers.  Until recently that is because this year I’ve taken part in a variety of CPD activities organised by the ASE (Association of Science Education) and can honestly say that I’ve yet to experience any that have been more useful (or indeed more enjoyable).

Recently the East Midlands region ran a half day event titled “Unleashing your creativity” with distinct sessions for primary and secondary teachers (although you were free to attend whichever you wanted).  The event was scheduled on a Saturday so that participants didn’t need to take time off work, and the price was reasonably set at £5 for members (and free for student members).  Nearly 50 teachers gave up their free time to attend, and feedback from the event was very positive.  I attended the secondary workshops, run by Helen Pollard who was speaking about practical physics.  The sessions were very hands on and gave delegates ideas and activities that they could slot straight into their own lessons, I certainly found them very enjoyable and useful.  Primary candidates were equally enthusiastic about the workshop they had attended.

Helen Pollard demonstrates modelling electric current using a rope



Activities from the Primary science workshops



Photographs taken from the event.

 

If you aren’t a member of the ASE I’d recommend joining – not only do you get regular publications specific to your phase and a network of like-minded science teaching professionals but you get access to a range of CPD activities that are of excellent quality and very reasonably priced.  What more can I say?

Science CPD (Continuing professional development) using podcasts

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mp3playerPodcasts are short audio programmes that you download and play at a time convenient to you.  You can listen to them on your PC, on your MP3 player or even your mobile phone.  I download mine using the built in ‘Podcast client’ on my Nokia phone, but iTunes is perhaps the simplest and easiest way to access podcasts for most people.

I tend to listen to podcasts on my drive to school and when I’m walking the dog – and I’ve picked up ideas for experiments and lessons as well as broadening my scientific knowledge.  My favourite science podcast is ‘The Naked Scientists’ and I’d recommend if you only listen to one podcast you listen to theirs.

I’ve listed below some of the podcasts I find/have found useful – let me know if you know of any good ones I’ve missed out.

The Naked Scientists (Podcast link/iTunes link)

BBC Science in Action (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Science Weekly from the Guardian (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Lab Out Loud (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Dr Karl and the Naked Scientist (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Scientific American (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Nature (Podcast link/iTunes link)

The Tech Teachers (Podcast link/iTunes link)

Science CPD (continuing professional development) Science Websites

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laptopScience websites provide two opportunities – access to content to keep subject knowledge up to date, and specific information about teaching science.  Many of these are written by teachers for other teachers – often as a blog (a website where entries are in date order).  Note as with Twitter, not every article you read on these sites may be Science related.

I’ve listed below some of the more useful science websites I’ve found – if you know of any I’ve missed off, do add them in the comments below.

Some of the websites will offer you RSS feeds (with a little orange symbol) which means you can read updates from these sites without having to visit them – you just need an RSS reader.  Google Reader is my RSS feed reader of choice – you simply ask Reader to follow the sites you are interested in and you can read the updates for all the websites you subscribe to within one tool (from any computer).  Look here for helpful videos.

You can click here and see the articles I’ve read  and thought were worth sharing (and you can even subscribe to this list in Google Reader!).

Feel free to leave a comment or use the ‘Contact Me’ option if you have any questions.

Science CPD (continuing professional development) Using online communities

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The best kind of CPD I’ve experienced comes from other practitioners.   Online communities provide an opportunity to interact with other teachers at a home and place convenient to you.  Ideas, resources and video can all be shared online.  I’ve list below the two most useful ways I’ve found of interacting with other teachers online.

TES online

The Science forum on the TES (Times Educational Supplement) has plenty of enthusiastic teachers who are willing to answer queries, share good practice and act as a sounding board for your ideas.  The board is organised as a series of topics, and you can either start a new topic or respond to an existing topic.  The board can be used anonymously so you don’t have to reveal your identity if you are afraid to show your ignorance.

tes1

Twitter

Twitter is a website that lets you post short messages (140 characters or less).  People follow you and you follow other people – you can direct questions to individuals by putting @theirtwitterID at the start of a message.  To make twitter easier to use, you can use a third party program like Tweetdeck (which can also post Facebook and other updates for you too!).

Follow me on twitter and say hello – I’m cleverfiend (because fiendishlyclever was too long to be my user ID)

To speed things up I’ve created lists of the science teachers I follow on Twitter (note that the teachers may talk/twitter about other topics as well as science).  You can simply follow my lists and therefore follow the same professionals that I do.

Science teachers in the UK

Science teachers outside the UK

A word of warning about Twitter.  You hear some teachers raving about twitter saying its the best thing since sliced bread and how their PLN (personal learning network) helps them develop as a teacher.  I find it’s like shouting in the wind.  The signal to noise ratio is extremely low, and many of the teachers on twitter (including many of the ones I follow) are only there because they like to hear the sound of their own voice rather than to engage in meaningful dialogue.  I do stick with it though because it has proved to be useful on several occasions.

There are many other educators on Twitter as well as science teachers.  Once you find someone you like have a look at the people they follow and follow some of them yourself.   You can search Twitter for the #ASEchat tag – these are all posts (Tweets) by science educators using the Association of Science Education hashtag (#ASEChat).

twitter_logo

Others

There are fan pages on Facebook but I’ve yet to find anything of value for CPD.  You can also engage in discussion with individuals through their blogs by leaving comments.  I know online communities have been set up in the past using the Ning platform but the people who run these tend to be ‘tech hippies’ jumping on every bandwagon that comes along rather than an overworked science teacher!

Let me know if you find a good online community that I haven’t mentioned – I would love to hear about it.