Emma & Tom's Pgce Podcast

Just as we were shutting up the podcast shop for the end of the academic year, Estyn (the school inspectorate in Wales) published a thematic report on the teaching of maths in Wales's schools. It concluded that there was too much variability in the quality of teaching, and not enough subject-specific support for those teaching maths. This reminded us in some ways of the ITV news story back in September 2024 which prompted us to turn around a rapid-reaction episode. In this case, we decided to hold on until the new year and release a 'normal' episode featuring some expert discussion of the report and its implications. We're joined in our temporary studio by Cameron Stewart (programme leader for PGCE Secondary Maths), Sian Wickersham (PGCE primary maths specialist) and Laurence Hooper (just graduated with a PGCE in secondary maths), and they have plenty to tell us! We chose to extend a bit beyond our normal one hour limit and hope you find this useful. You can find the Estyn report here: https://estyn.gov.wales

Welcome to season 8 of the podcast! So…. You want to become a teacher? You’ve come to the right place. In the third iteration of this popular topic, we’re joined by our colleague Rhian Wyn Griffiths to talk about becoming a teacher. While we’re quite focused on how to come and be a teacher with us in Wales (after all, it’s what we know best), there’s plenty here that’s relevant to people elsewhere. So pour yourself a cuppa and settle down to hear us discuss why you’d want to do it, what the job is, what it ISN’T, how you can make sure you really know it’s what you want to do, and how you can prepare. Rhian’s also got news of a brand-new programme here at Cardiff Met: The PGCE Secondary Route to QTS for School-Based Employees. Available to those currently employed in schools in Wales but without Qualified Teacher Status, this provides yet another route into one of the most exciting professions there is. To find out more about our own programmes, you can look here. The Educators Wales website is here. Thanks to

One of our podcast traditions is to take a moment to reflect on the season that's just been (season 7) and get ready for the one that's about to land in your feeds (season 8)! After a hasty move across campus to avoid our power-tool wielding enemies, this episode was recorded in a temporary studio at the end of four straight days of recording. We've got plenty we're pleased with from the last year, and lots of interesting things lined up for your ears from 5th September onwards.Emma's not going to be around quite so much next year, and indeed, this was her last recording session for about a year, though listeners will hear her for a good while yet because of the way our recording and release schedule works. When she elegantly fades out in a few months' time, our colleague (and friend of the podcast) Sian Wickersham will be keeping her seat warm. Sian is a primary specialist, and was formerly in a senior role at the Ark Schools multi-academy trust in England, so has plenty of interesting perspectives to bring.

We’ve reached the end of another year of podcasting, and ready to give you all a summer break from our dulcet tones. To wrap up our seventh year in front of the microphones, we’re delighted to welcome back Richard West from Stanwell School. Richard’s here to contribute to our occasional series of episodes unpacking the nature of different subjects as they are experienced by pupils in the classroom. This time around, it’s the turn of physics: a subject with a fearsome reputation, a shortage of teachers and a whole host of myths that Richard’s keen to take on. In the course of our in-depth discussion, Richard shares his passion for the subject, his pitch for why we should study it, a call for more physicists to consider teaching it, and plenty of interesting goodies to make us all think. Thanks to Richard for giving up his Friday evening to record, and to you for sticking with us for another year of podcasting. We’ll be back (hopefully…) in September with version 3 of our So You Think You Want to be a Teacher e

When we heard that Finola Wilson from our friends at Impact Wales had published a book, our first reaction (after congratulations!) was to realise how ridiculously long it’s been since we last spoke to our fellow Welsh education podcasters. Long-time listeners will know that we visited their HQ in Caerphilly (and Tom has particularly fond memories of hauling the sound equipment through an incredible downpour of rain) just before Covid to talk about the sterling work that they do in schools. Now, Finola has made a trip in the opposite direction to visit our studio and talk about how we support disadvantaged pupils to achieve the best they can. As she explains, disadvantage covers so much more than poverty (though this is an important angle, as several of our past episodes cover) and the keys to mitigating disadvantage lie not only with those in charge of strategy and policy, but with individual teachers in their classrooms. In this extended interview, Finola gives us some golden bits of information from the bo

It's something of a tradition to haul Emma in for a doctoral progress check, and today she's digging into her chosen research approach: participatory research.If you listened to Emma's last episode, you'll remember that she examined her own research worldview and values, and concluded that she couldn't find out what she needs to know without making her participants into co-researchers, which makes for a complicated setup! Today she's telling us what her participants said about what and how she needs to go about discovering how new drama teachers learn to be teachers. If you're not a drama person, there's plenty in the discussion about how to involve the subjects of your research in shaping the project, and that's likely to be relevant for the increasing number of teachers doing their own research and enquiry, whether for an MA, doctorate or as part of improving their teaching. Thanks to Emma for the update!-------------------------------------------------------------Recorded in studio D0.18 at Cardiff Metropo

We welcome Dr Fiona Heath-Diffey to the studio today to talk us through her doctoral research into the experiences of primary student teachers getting to grips with the idea of teaching PE. Fiona has previously joined us to talk about physical literacy - the idea that PE lessons should give pupils a lifelong healthy relationship with exercise and their bodies, rather than teachers taking an elitist view centred around creating elite sports people. In her research, Fiona uncovered some compelling stories about primary student teachers as they worked on their PE teaching skills, and about how their own lived experiences of sport and exercise had a bearing on their learning. Thanks to Fiona for battling through some serious lurgy to tell us all about it!——————————————————————Recorded in Studio B2.15 at Cardiff Metropolitan University’s Cyncoed Campus on 7th March 2025

For teachers it's the Easter break, and so we like to bring you another of our selections of the interesting, humorous and strange things we have been reading or otherwise consuming lately. This time around, Tom's taking a look at what it's like to be a 'progressive activist', while also musing on the power of the legally-enforced lunch break. Meanwhile, Emma has a book recommendation and a bit of a rant about the dusty old tropes wheeled out every time a TV drama is set in a school. Many laughs were had along the way, and we hope it whiles away a bit of time for you too. (And don't tell our colleagues where we hide when we're trying to get work done!) Normal service will be resumed in two weeks' time. ---------------------------------------------Recorded in Studio B2.15 at Cardiff Metropolitan University's Cyncoed Campus on 11th April 2025

Back in our non-camera-enabled studio, we've got some thoughts for you today about how observation can be made more purposeful. Often found as an initial activity at the start of student teacher placements, it can sometimes be a missed opportunity if student teachers simply stand at the back and try to make sense of what's going on in a busy classroom in an unfamiliar school. That's why we got some top-quality school colleagues in to discuss the challenges of making observation purposeful, and some simple strategies to give things a little more structure. They produced some clips, and we're bringing you those today. After that, we flip things around and look at those moments where mentors are observing student teachers and giving feedback. What can we do to make those experiences even richer? We hope there's something in there to get you thinking if you work with student teachers, whether inside or outside Wales. Thanks to all our colleagues who helped with this project: Sioned Dafydd, Lucy Donovan, Nia Locke

Back in our normal studio, we welcome Professor David Egan back to the podcast. David was last with us taking about the poverty gap in education, and today he’s here to tell us about a report he’s written into the recruitment and retention of secondary school teachers.The report ranges widely around lots of important questions about what is shaping up to be something of a crisis for the profession, not just here in Wales but across the UK and, increasingly, internationally. David and his team have tried to find out why primary seems more attractive than secondary for people seeking to learn to be a teacher (despite primary teaching being really hard work), and what goes on once teachers get a job in a school. Are secondary school working conditions fit for a 21st century world of WFH, and do school leaders have the tools they need to develop their teachers professionally throughout their careers?All these questions and more make for an interesting discussion with David. You can read the whole report from Davi

We're in the 'other' studio today which, to our delight, is not bristling with cameras! Apologies to the very small club of people who watch our episodes on YouTube.Emma was recently asked to review a book for the National Drama subject association: Teaching and Learning Shakespeare through Theatre Based Practice. Today we bring you an extended chat about the book, what it brings to those who want to use theatre based practice to help pupils access the work of Shakespeare, and what wider themes we can draw out for teachers in general. Thanks to Emma for doing all the hard work on this episode, and we'll be back with our normal camera-enabled service next time. ------------------------------------------Recorded in studio B2.10A at Cardiff Metropolitan University's Cyncoed Campus on 28th February 2025

We make no apology for having based several of our episodes around the person that many student teachers report is the single most important person in their teacher education journey: the mentor. They're the school-based colleague who looks after the student teacher on placement, gives them advice, feedback and support, and assesses their teaching. It just so happens that one of Emma's many jobs is to be on the team that supports those all-important mentors, and today we're joined by Sian Wickersham, who's another member of that mentor support group. In this episode, we chew over some of the difficult issues that arise in trying to define the role of mentor, how the university can support them, and what research tells us about some of the tricky contradictions that sit at the heart of the job. --------------------------------Recorded in Studio B2.15 at Cardiff Metropolitan University's Cyncoed Campus on 12th February 2025.

Today we welcome Kelly Bubbins from Willows High School in Cardiff. Willows is located in a part of Cardiff that's not without its challenges, and as Kelly tells us, assumptions about what that means for the aspirations pupils can have for themselves were a big problem for the school. This translated into poor behaviour and low aspiration, and the school decided to have a reset of its policies to see if something could be done about it. Kelly explains to us how, after the school looked outwards to other organisations, and to research, it settled on a strategy that was Marmite to some, but quickly showed results for the pupils and teachers. After initially importing approaches from elsewhere, the school then evolved these so they were a better fit for their own context. The results of that are in in the form of a glowing Estyn report hot off the press, and we're grateful to Kelly for helping to explain the story behind what happened. --------------------------------------------------------Recorded in Studio B2

Today we're all on our own without a guest, because we're presenting original Cardiff Met research! But our colleague Sioned Dafydd is with us in spirit as she was a key member of the three-person research team that carried out this work. Today we're looking at what happens when student teachers change from one school placement to another, and when they move from their initial teacher education into their first job. In particular, we're focusing on the part that Wales's Professional Standards for Teaching and Leadership have to play, but many of the issues we uncovered are universal for all of us who work with new members of the profession. Using the results of interviews with student teachers and their school-based mentors over the course of a year (plus a final interview with three of our participants once they had secured jobs), we pieced together what goes on when new teachers make the transition from one school to another. With a little help from theories by Wenger, Maton and Korthagen & Lagerwerf, w

In a very impressive move to win 'most dedicated podcast guest', today we welcome Dr Rachel Shanks from the University of Aberdeen to our studio in person! For obvious reasons, our original request to Rachel involved a down-the-line interview, but we were very happy indeed to be able to instead welcome her to Cardiff after an epic train journey from Scotland.Rachel has had a major impact on school uniform policy in Scotland following her work with students to analyse the policies of a huge number of schools in the country, and today she joins us to discuss this often under-appreciated aspect of school life. As we found, the more you dig in to what seems like a relatively simple topic, the more interesting cans of worms get opened, and regular listeners to the podcast will know that's just the way we like it!The discussion ranges across Rachel's around such knotty issues as affordability, sustainability, comfort, and why schools feel the need to have uniforms in the first place. If you want to find out more ab

It’s that festive time of year again, and hopefully anyone involved in the world of education is relaxing after a very long Autumn term.We’re back with our usual Christmas offering - though we’re out of our normal studio as our friends in the Sport Broadcast and Media programmes are having a busy last week of term up on the second floor. In a partially successful attempt to cut the duration of our epic Christmas special, we’ve limited ourselves to four items each, and as ever, neither of us knows what the other one is about to bring to the table in a white knuckle ride of an episode recorded as close to the end of term as we dare…We hope you enjoy the resulting chat, and it whiles away a post-Christmas walk or two. We’ll be back with our normal service in two weeks’ time. Merry Christmas from Emma & Tom!——————————————————Recorded in studio D0.12 at Cardiff Metropolitan University’s Cyncoed Campus on 19th December 2024.

One of the perks of hosting the podcast is that we get to invite people who’ve influenced us to come on as guests, and in our world of teacher education, there are few people who’ve had more influence on us than Professor Trevor Mutton from the University of Oxford. Co-author of a huge number of articles and books that have shaped our thinking about how new teachers learn, we’ve been privileged to work with Trevor for a number of years. Now, we’ve managed to get him into the studio to discuss an article he’s co-authored about Initial Teacher Education, whether we as a profession have a clear story to tell about how we educate new teachers, and why that matters. But the discussion ranges more widely than the article, looking at how teacher education policy in England has moved in a different direction from that in Wales, and chewing over some of the really tricky questions around what we believe about what it means to be a profession. The article we were talking about in the main discussion is: ‘Learning to th

Teaching people to be teachers can feel like a bit of a head-spinner - it can get meta quite quickly! But teacher educators (in school or in university) are also part of a wider group of slightly unusual people who teach people to become public-service professionals like social workers, youth workers or police officers. In all of these cases, these educators have moved from a professional role to a role teaching people to do that job. While our colleagues looking after students in their work placements still do their original job too, in the case of university-based educators, they have left their original job role entirely and are trying to carve out a new position - not quite a 'normal' university lecturer, but not a teacher/social worker/whatever any more, either. We're delighted to be joined once again by Dr Louise Allen-Walker, together with Dan Williams who's making his podcast debut. They've been investigating clinical supervision - a supportive process which is a key part of many of these professions

It's time for another 'delve' (!) into the world of AI, and how large language models have found their way into the world of education. Following our episode last year with Karl Jones, today we welcome Mark Lester from the library service into the studio. Mark's been keeping an eye on all things AI for a number of years now, and has some interesting thoughts for us on where it might make life more productive for students and those who teach them. He's also got some insights for us into the challenges and risks, where some of those red lines might lie, and some unexpected down-sides of the rise of the machines. Thanks to Mark for joining us, and as always we'll be back with you in a fortnight!--------------------------------Recorded in studio B2.15 at Cardiff Metropolitan University's Cyncoed Campus on 6th August 2024