Secondary Page

Supporting the teaching of Earth sciences at all levels

ESTA’s main contribution to teacher education at secondary level is through the separate medium of the Earth Science Education Unit (ESEU), set up by Oil and Gas UK in association with ESTA. ESTA also holds an annual Secondary workshop for members. ESTA Secondary workshop. This event is held on a Saturday once every year at the Science Learning Centre at Keele University.  ESTA members interested in teaching at this level are invited to attend this event and take part in a range of workshop sessions.  In 2014 workshop sessions included: • developing a specification for mineral awareness work in schools, • writing a guide for setting up a geology club, • looking at and commenting on videos and resources produced by the UK Groundwater Forum, • ideas for future PESGB-ESTA projects and competitions, • a pocket guide on fieldwork, • future ‘Blasts from the Past’. Members who are interested in finding out more about next year's workshop or joining this workshop should contact here. Earthlearningidea The Earthlearningidea team seeks to produce a teaching idea every week, at minimal cost, with minimal resources, for teacher educators and teachers of Earth science through school-level geography or science.  If you would like to submit an idea to be added to this global support network,there is a template available here and an explanation for the template here.

Report from the Secondary Coordinator, 2015-2016 November 2015 Meeting with Department for Education Officials Following a meeting with these officials, DoE Official Stephen Stanton will be visiting ESTA at the ASE Conference in Manchester on Friday 8 th  January, 2016. Geology Teacher Training The OAKS SCITT linked with Keele University is offering three places for geography/geology or science/geology teaching with government bursaries.  The application website will be opened in November.  Prof Chris King will be the geology tutor. A-Level and GCSE Geology in England, Wales and Northern Ireland The geology GCSE criteria consultation has finished and preparation by WJEC to develop a new specification is underway.  The A-Level consultation has just opened. ESTA Conference, Cardiff The ‘Bring and share’ session on 28 th  September was as packed and frenetic as ever with a very welcome huge range of contributions.  Many of these will be written up for publication in the next Teaching Earth Sciences. ESTA Secondary Working Day – Saturday 4 th  June, 2016 This is planned – at a venue to be decided. ASE Annual Conference, Birmingham University – 6 th  – 9 th  January 2016 ESTA’s ‘Our Earth’ theme, as outlined below, has been approved by ASE. January 2016 Meeting with Department for Education Officials DoE Official Stephen Stanton visited ESTA and ESEU at the ASE Conference on Friday 8 th  January.  He did thank us for our invitation and said that he had a better idea about the work of ESTA and ESEU and our perspectives on Earth science education as a result of the visit. Geology teacher training The OAKS SCITT linked with Keele University is offering three places for geography/geology or science/geology teaching with government bursaries.  By 24 th  January, positions for 2016/17 had been offered to two candidates. A-level and GCSE Geology in England, Wales and Northern Ireland Preparation by WJEC to develop a new GCSE Geology specification continues under the auspices of Pete Loader.  The A-level Geology consultation has now closed. WJEC has begun work on the new specification (and I guess OCR has too).  OCR is undertaking a research exercise to seek data from schools and elsewhere in support of A-level geology.  It has been agreed that this will eventually be published under the auspices of ESTA. ESTA Conference, Cardiff – 26 th  September, Bring and Share The ‘Bring and share’ has been written up and submitted to Teaching Earth Sciences. ESTA Secondary Working Day – Saturday 4 th  June, 2016 This is planned – at a venue still to be decided. ASE Annual Conference - Birmingham University, Wednesday 6th – Saturday 9 th  January 2016  The overall attendance at the Earth Theme was better than for many years, with the greatest numbers being at Iain Stewart’s lecture and the two ESEU primary workshops. I don’t have figures for attendance at the ESTA Primary workshop on the Saturday.  Figures are below. Geographical Association Annual Conference, University of Manchester, 7 th  – 9 April 2016 ESEU will be running the secondary workshop session ‘Earth’s surface activity, from fast to very, very slow’ at the conference on the Saturday morning. International Geological Congress This will run in Cape Town, South Africa from 27 th  August – 4 th  September 2016 (see: www.35igc.org). International Geoscience Education Conference GeoSciEd VIII will be run at Campinas, near Sao Paulo, Brazil in August/September 2018. Earthlearningidea Earthlearningidea’s success is continuing; we have exceeded 2 million downloads, and last year we achieved a mean monthly download of more than 48,000 per month. Our International Year of Earth Science Educator Stories This was launched late in 2015 and more than 70 stories have so far been offered from around the world.  They are appearing every week (on Thursdays) during 2016 and beyond.  The stories are aimed at passing experience and wisdom onto the next generation.  Anybody who has contributed anything to geoscience education is welcome to submit a story for publication.  Each story is 1000 words long with photos of the storyteller ‘doing something’. See for yourself at: http://www.igeoscied.org/?page_id=396  Happily several ESTA members have already offered their stories – but all are warmly invited to do so – to Chris King, please. Plans for a new Foundation for Earth Science Education Although ESEU at Keele closed at the end of December, a service level contract was agreed between Keele and Oil and Gas UK, to allow previously-booked 2016 bookings to go ahead.  The future for ESEU and a new Foundation for Earth Science Education remains uncertain, although discussion continues and a stakeholder meeting to review possibilities is provisionally planned for March. Chris King