Supporting teaching of 11-19 physical science

SEP aims to stimulate innovative practice in school science through the production of novel, low-cost classroom resources and by supporting science teacher professional development. Over 10,000 science teachers have joined the SEP Teacher Associates scheme and SEP resources are now used in the vast majority of UK secondary schools.

Developed with the Weizmann Institute and the Nuffield Foundation, LSS is a teacher professional development programme which aims to develop higher order research and communication skills in pupils. LSS comprises classroom activities focused on the 6 skill areas of: information retrieval; listening and observing; scientific reading; data representation; scientific writing; and knowledge presentation. A Key Stage 4 version of LSS is being widely utilised. A more recent development is LSS for Post-16. These materials have been developed to support Advanced level qualifications in Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Applied Science and Science in Society. The Post-16 materials were piloted during 2009 and the pilot will continue during 2010.

SASP is a government-funded professional development programme (of around 40 days duration) which aims to give existing science teachers, without a physics or chemistry specialism, the deep subject knowledge and pedagogy they need to teach these subjects effectively. Following a successful pilot, the courses now take place in 10 centres across the country. GTEP is supporting the Institute of Physics and Royal Society of Chemistry to provide pilot participants with additional subject-specific and mentoring support for up to two years after completion of the course.

In recognition of the national shortage of Physics teachers, GTEP is supporting a project called the Marketing Initiative for Teacher Recruitment (MITRE) that the Institute of Physics is undertaking. This project provides bespoke marketing support to a selection of universities across England that offer Physics teacher training courses to increase awareness and improve recruitment. The initiative makes use of professional marketing expertise and experience from former GTEP projects and also addresses the budget, resource and time constraints that universities marketing services often face.

The Physics Enhancement Programme (PEP) is a partnership project with the Training & Development Agency for Schools (TDA) and the Institute of Physics (IOP) to increase the number of specialist physics teachers trained each year by recruiting from a wider degree base. PEP offers courses in physics subject knowledge prior to entering formal teacher training and provides support and mentoring during training and after qualification. The success of the mentoring programme has led to a pilot offering mentoring to all new maths and science teachers.

GTEP is working in partnership with the Open University and the Institute of Physics to develop a tailored programme of support for those leaving the forces who wish to train to become a physics teacher. The programme aims to recruit one hundred new physics teachers who would not otherwise have had a route into teaching and provides training in physics and education combined with ongoing mentoring support and professional development.