The TDTS approach is well-aligned with three of the seven recommendations in the Education Endowment Foundation’s guidance report for “Improving Secondary Science”.
- Pillar 1: Build on the ideas that pupils bring to lessons
- Pillar 3: Use models to support understanding
- Pillar 5: Use practical work purposefully and as part of a learning sequence
Following the development and delivery of a pilot TDTS course in Herefordshire in 2018-19, teachers cited specific evidence of increased pupil engagement, understanding and improved cognitive skills when they implemented the TDTS strategies.
There was evidence from pupils of deeper thinking, greater confidence, greater contributions in class and improved behaviour, with particular mention of positive impacts for the less able and less engaged.
About the course
A TDTS course for KS3 teachers has been developed, following a pilot with nine secondary schools in Herefordshire in 2018-19. As with the primary course, the four training days of TDTS are spread out across a school year, with teachers trying out project strategies with their classes between the days and sharing their experiences and good practice so as to maximise the opportunities for mutual learning and the sharing of good ideas.
There is a clear framework that ties together the project strategies and this is embedded in sound educational theory. Our ideas are not all new but pull together a range of good practice in science education. All of the TDTS strategies support progression in ‘working scientifically’ and on each day of the course, the strategies are exemplified through a particular curriculum content area or ‘Big Idea’ in science (e.g. Particles, Forces, Electricity, Energy, Inheritance, Genetics and Evolution). All teachers who participate in a 4-day TDTS course are provided with a hard copy of all the resources in a TDTS folder as well as access to electronic versions of the resources.
How we can help
No further TDTS courses for secondary schools are currently planned, but following positive evaluation outcomes from our pilot secondary TDTS course in Herefordshire in 2018-19 we remain keen to work with other educational partners to provide further TDTS courses to secondary school clusters in particular regions.
We are not currently able to offer TDTS courses for individual secondary school teachers to book. If you work for an educational partner and are interested in the possibility of working with us to provide a TDTS course to a cluster of secondary schools in your region, please get in touch and we are happy to discuss possibilities with you.
We are happy to help with any queries you may have about TDTS. Contact us at email@example.com in the first instance or call us on 01865 810000
“What an extraordinary training experience – full of inspirational ideas for improving my science teaching.”