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Science and Technology

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Science and technology within the primary classroom ‘Science is not taught every day in most primary schools’ (Ofsted, 2011). Primary school teachers face many barriers with trying to teach science with on average 1 hour 24 minutes a week dedicated to the subject (Wellcome, 2017). Many teachers were asked what are the barriers, if any, they experienced when teaching or leading science the top four categories were lack of budget and resources (35 per cent), a lack of time and curricular importance (22 per cent), lack of subject knowledge (11 per cent) and issues relating to setting up space or access to resources (10 per cent) (Wellcome, 2017). However, according to Wellcome (2017) more than 8 in 10 teachers think that Mathematics (84%) and English (83%) are ‘very important’ to the senior leadership team of their school, but this number drops to just three in ten (30%) when it comes to science, implying that the subject is not seen as a priority for primary teaching. Ma...
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Homework

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Homework is a global phenomenon and children in primary schools spend increasing amounts of time on homework (Baker and LeTendre,  2005 ). Primary school children range from the ages of 3 to 11 years old. Should these children be made to do homework? Ofsted (1999) set out guidelines that expected children aged five to seven to be set an hour’s homework a week and then rising to half an hour a night for 7 to 11-year olds. Ofsted (1999) also suggested that all schools should have a homework policy. Homework, ideally just means tasks that are assigned to students by teachers that are meant to be carried out during non-instructional time (Bembenutty,  2011 ). For primary schools within the UK, this could include reading to or with parents (Brooks et al, 2008). In England, many home reading projects have embedded home school reading into the practice of nearly all primary schools (Brooks et al, 2008). What effect does homework have? There are small amounts of evid...
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Collaboration

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Collaboration/collaborative learning, what is it? Collaboration was previously defined as ‘a situation in which particular forms of interaction among people are expected to occur, which would trigger learning mechanisms, but there is no guarantee that the expected interactions will actually occur’ (Dillenbourg,  1999 ). Today ‘A collaborative (or cooperative) learning approach involves learners working together on activities or learning tasks in a group small enough for everyone to participate on a collective task that has been clearly assigned. Learners in the group may work on separate tasks contributing to a common overall outcome or work together on a shared task’ (Education Scotland, 2019). Using collaborative learning approaches puts together children of mixed ability into teams or groups so that they can work in competition with each other to pilot more effective collaboration (Education Scotland, 2019).   For collaborative learning in the class...
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Well-being

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Well-being within the classroom and throughout the school is becoming a massive part of primary school’s curriculum especially with the new Donaldson curriculum. In the new curriculum there are six key areas of learning and one of them is health and well-being. Children and young people need to experience social, emotional and physical well-being to ensure that they engage fully with their education. This area of learning should help them to build on the knowledge and skills that they may already have but it will enable them to develop appropriate and positive relationships and to deal with tough decisions and issues that they will face in the real world (Donaldson, 2015).   White (2011) says that education for well-being involves preparing the children for a life of autonomous, whole-hearted and successful engagement in activities and relationships. White (2011) states that well-being education is built around gathering personal qualities on one hand and understanding on th...
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PSHE

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What does PSHE stand for? PSHE stands for Personal, Social, Health and Economic and it is extremely important that all children have a PSHE education. It is currently a non-statutory subject however all schools should teach PSHE which will be outlined in the new curriculum. (Department of Education, 2013) PSHE is a school subject which children develop the knowledge, skills and attributes they need to keep themselves safe and healthy, and also to prepare them for work and life in the real world. PSHE lessons can be proven to have had academic and non-academic outcomes for pupils when it is well delivered. (PSHE Association, 2018) PSHE is thought of and delivered to the children differently in each school. Some schools make it part of a Religious Education lesson or some integrate it into other lessons as a cross-curricular approach. While others deliver discrete PSHE lessons or use circle time. (Goddard, 2013) Goddard (2013) states that teaching and learning methods to teach PSH...
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Outdoor Education

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The outdoors has many benefits to everyone but especially children, and nowadays we are trying to get children outside during school time as much as possible. There is a massive drive for children to be outdoors and connected to nature. This can be seen through ‘Forest Schools’ which has now become a well-known approach in primary schools to get children outdoors. Louv (2005, p.34) has described “Nature Deficit Disorder” as ‘the human costs of alienation from nature, among them: diminished use of the senses, attention difficulties, and higher rates of physical and emotional illnesses.’ Many children may suffer from “Nature Deficit Disorder” because they do not get enough time to spend in nature or that when they are at home they do not get a chance to go outdoors and play. School is more than likely the only place some children spend time outdoors and Forest Schools has a massive impact on children getting outdoors and having fun.  Forest schools are providers of outdoor ed...
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