Before Christmas, our 28 Early Careers Teachers (ECT), both first and second year, across the Trust celebrated a highly successful term. The ECF Programme is predicated on evidence based practice and strives to develop in our practitioners new to the profession a desire to embrace the latest research and practical classroom pedagogy in order to underpin their development.

Working with Ambition Institute and The Three Rivers Teaching School Trust, CET has successfully delivered CPD conferences on the power of effective teaching, the science of learning, the habits of planning, sustaining wellbeing, implementing change and the importance of professional development, coupled with clinics on deep thinking to our ECTs.

Our ECTs say the following about their experiences so far:

  • The framework is comprehensive, it combines pedagogical progress with support for the person behind the teacher. It is an effective way to develop practice as wellbeing is monitored and supported.
  • The in-person conference in Year 2, Term 1 encourages longevity of teaching, in discussing how to stay present and organised, reducing stress. After all, the Early Careers Framework was introduced as a way to keep teachers in teaching.
  • So far, the programme has been beneficial in helping me to reflect on my practice and how I can improve the teaching and learning in my classroom. The course gives advice, strategies and approaches for dealing with every aspect of classroom practice, from giving clear instructions to behaviour and how to ensure you are embedding knowledge
  • I enjoy the teaching and learning support session provided by Senior Leaders in my school and by Ambition Institute. They keep pedagogy fresh and current and improve daily teaching by refreshing knowledge from the PGCE and training years, and introducing new ways to implement it within lessons.
  • Shorter sessions and smaller chunks show the Early Careers Framework is mindful of time, whilst keeping professional development in the forefront of the minds of ECTs and mentors.
  • An enjoyable experience where I’ve felt myself making a lot of progress in a short amount of time.

We also need to give a shout out to our mentors who are the mainstay of our ECTs in their schools. These mentors, support, coach and develop our ECTs and, at CET, we are tremendously fortunate to have the best of the best when it comes to mentoring. The job they do is second to none and they are an instrumental part in developing our ECTs to be the practitioners and, ultimately, leaders of the future.