Introducing the New To Teaching Essentials book, the perfect companion for ECT teachers and trainee teachers. We’ve filled this book with useful information and lots of really helpful pages to manage your professional development as a new teacher and help you to stay on top of the workload. As new teachers, you’ll have some tasks and paperwork that other teachers don’t, so we created this book with you in mind. Let’s talk a little more about who the book is for and what you’ll get!
Who is the New To Teaching Book for?
We’ve designed this book to work well for two kinds of teachers: new teachers who are completing their ECT period, and trainee teachers. However, if you’re getting our Teacher Training Planner, you likely won’t need this booklet as the Teacher Training Planner already has these pages. If you’re a trainee teacher who is spending most of your training year based in just one school, such as with SCITT, then we usually recommend the full Teacher Planner, as this is more appropriate for one year-long school setting. Then we recommend you supplement that planner with the New To Teaching Book, so you don’t miss out on all the pages that will be relevant for your training.
Here's what we recommend:
* New ECT teachers: Teacher Planner + New To Teaching Essentials Book
* Most trainee teachers: Teacher Training Planner
* Trainee teachers doing one, longer placement: Teacher Planner + New To Teaching Essentials Book
The New To Teaching Essentials Book works for both new teachers doing their ECT and trainee teachers as you’ll both be assessed against the Teacher Standards, you’ll both have regular mentor meetings, and you’ll both be doing lots of observations. There are lots of things which remain the same as you move from being a trainee teacher to a new teacher, in terms of continuing your learning and development, so we’ve made sure this book works for both of you.
What does the book look like?
The New To Teaching Essentials Book comes in our 4 brand colours, rather than our different cover designs that you’ll get on the planners. This is just because those cover design options change each year, but this book will be available year-round in this same style. So you can choose between mint, blue, yellow, and pink. It’s an A4 ringbound book that’s softback, so nice and flexible, and it has a plastic cover to protect it and make it more hard-wearing.
What’s included?
The ITT/ECT Framework - This outlines the Teacher Standards you’ll be assessed against. There’s a double page spread for each of these standards, with the standard detailed on one page and a dotted page on the other side. This is ideal for you to really get to know the standards and figure out how you’ll evidence that you meet each one. You can highlight, underline, and make notes on all the teacher standards, then use the dotted page to write further notes and plans. We’ve devoted a lot of space to these as they’re so essential to your first three years, as a trainee and then in your two year ECT period.
Assignment Tracker – These pages are brand new to the Essentials book this year as we thought it would be a helpful addition. Use these pages to track your assignments and tasks; there’s space to note the assignment, class, due date, whether you’ve done it, and the grade you got. Of course, this is really helpful for trainee teachers who will have assignments set by their course provider throughout the year. This can also be helpful for new teachers in their ECT period as you’ll be setting regular targets and planning actions you can take to meet them, so this is a great place to track those really key tasks and stay on top of them.
Mentor Meeting Notes – Use these pages to manage all of your mentor meetings. You can write on them ahead of time, if there’s anything in particular you want to bring up or ask in your next meeting, note it down so you remember when you speak to your mentor. You can then use these pages to note down what was discussed, your top three priorities, a positive to take away from the meeting, and the date for your next meeting. These meetings are key both for trainees and new teachers, so it’s great to have all the notes from all your meetings in one place.
Observation Notes – There are two kinds of observation notes pages: your observations from when you are observing other teachers, and notes from when you are having your teaching observed by another staff member. Observations will usually need to be written up formally, so it’s helpful to have a central place where you can write all of your initial thoughts and reflections, so you can refer back to them later and use them when you’re writing it up formally. These are guided pages that prompt you to think about the impact of what was done in the lesson, and reflect on things you can take away or develop in your own teaching practice.
Points of Pride – This is a memory keeping page where you can make note of some of the things you’re most proud of from the year. These are some of the most fun pages to look back on – training and your first years are such a whirlwind, it’s great to be able to look back and remember key moments like big accomplishments or your first school trip. We also think it’s really important that in the busy year, you have a space where you can take a moment to enjoy and take pride in the things you’ve worked so hard on.
To see a full run through of the planner, have a look at our video below. Find the New To Teaching Essentials Books here.
