Compulsory modules

Education Past and Present
This module will introduce you to the history of education and how it has developed since Victorian times. Not only will you explore important policies and the impact they had in shaping our education system, but you will also see how many of the debates we have around education today have their origins in the past. By exploring the educational experiences of people from different periods of time, including undertaking an interview with someone from a different generation, you will be able to see how we can learn from the past to potentially solve the issues of today as well as reflecting on your own experiences of schooling.

Education Identities and Spaces
This module explores what it means to ‘be’ a teacher or someone working with learners in the 21st century and what the biggest challenges are currently facing the profession. Alongside this, you will have the opportunity to explore different places and spaces where education and learning take place, many of which are outside of the formal school environment. Your learning will be facilitated by field trips and visiting guest speakers and there will be opportunity to reflect on your ambitions as an educator and plan your future career.

Understanding Learning in the Classroom
To know how to teach children effectively it is essential to understand how they learn and so this module introduces you to a range of key psychological theories and models which underpin and explain how young people develop in the classroom. In advance of your placement and other work-based opportunities, you will also be encouraged to think about how these models can apply in real life and use them to transform yourself into an informed and reflective practitioner.

Becoming a Social Scientist
This module transitions you to university scholarship and introduces the employability and professional skills that a social science degree provides through a range of action-focused activities. You will learn vital academic and professional skills and competencies that will allow you to thrive in the first year of your undergraduate studies and throughout your degree.

Optional modules

Children and Learners in Society
This module explores the ways in which children and learners are portrayed and understood within wider society. By looking at a range of films, television programmes, newspapers, and social media platforms you will examine the assumptions we as adults hold about children and learners and their role and place in the world around us. This will then be compared to other countries around the globe to offer comparative analysis.

Compulsory modules

Educational Inequalities
Understanding the role that education can play in helping children overcome different forms of disadvantage is one of the most pressing concerns of the modern world. In this module you will visit and work with the local community of Stoke-on-Trent and/or Newcastle-under-Lyme to try and understand not just why inequality occurs in society and how it impacts a person’s life chances but also, by creating audience-facing learning resources, what you as a teacher, or as someone working with young people, can do about it.

Diversity and Inclusion in Education
Our society is now more diverse than ever before and this module explores approaches to teaching which seek to support children from marginalized communities whether as a result of their gender, ethnicity, where they live, or for those with Special Educational Needs (SEN). You will be encouraged to develop your own classroom-based interventions, based on academic theory, to tackle these issues and to develop a questioning and critical mindset. Delivery of this module is supported by visiting international academics sharing their perspectives on these issues.

Social Science Research Methods and Data Analysis
How can we know the world and the societies around us? This module introduces you to the core social science principles of designing, implementing, and analysing social phenomena with a focus upon education. You will learn to identify and analyse data sources that might be used by social scientists in real world situations. From quantitative surveys to qualitative interviews and ethnographic studies, you will explore methodological approaches to understanding education and society and develop practical researcher skills that prepare you to carry out original research.

Social Science at Work
This module introduces you to possible careers for social scientists and links to the work you are doing in your subject core and option modules asking the question ‘how can we mobilize academic study into the real world?’ You will also be encouraged to prepare for placement work that you may pursue, alongside reflecting on your social media footprint; developing your personal/professional brand, and digital networking platforms.

Optional modules

Critical Issues in Higher Education
With nearly 50% of 18-year-olds going on to university this module explores the big questions relating to higher education. In particular, what is the purpose of university? Who is it for? How should it be funded? You will also be encouraged to reflect critically on your own experiences to date of being a student, what you feel you have gained, and what you feel you need to develop to achieve your career goals.

Work Placement for Social Science
This module gives students studying subjects in the School of Social Sciences the opportunity to contribute to the world beyond the University, in any workplace where the specialist knowledge, research, analytical, and communication skills developed as part of your Social Science degree can be used and can make a difference. Education students will have the opportunity to undertake their work placement in a local school however, should you wish, other options are available which may include charities, community groups, criminal justice agencies, campaign groups, public services or another suitable opportunity identified by the student and approved by the module leader.

Compulsory modules

Educational Policy: Making Change
Politics makes a huge difference to people’s lives and nowhere is this truer than in education. Understanding how political ideas and ideologies shape policy and how this in turn changes the lives of children is one of the central features of this module which aims to prepare you to think critically about education practice. You will act as the role of ‘change-maker’ in this module, devising your own educational policy or manifesto and presenting it to external audiences.

Education Trends and Futures
What are the biggest challenges facing education globally today and what will these look like in the future? More importantly, how will today’s students look to solve them? This module encourages you to reflect on how the world will change in your lifetime and encourages you to design educational solutions to some of the problems that will emerge. These issues include the rise of A.I., the increasing need for ‘technological literacy’, the impact of mass migration, and climate change.

Independent Research Project
This module gives students the chance to devise and carry out their own small-scale (8000 word) research project. Working with a supervisor, projects can be on any educational topic (broadly defined) and will include a review of literature in your chosen field, a discussion of methods involved in your data collection and analysis, as well as a write up of your findings. This module consists of workshops organized around thesis writing as well as dedicated one-on-one support from your supervisor.

Engaged Social Science
Moving on from the previous skills modules, you will further consider how your degree can link to a range of life skills and careers through engagement with community groups, activists and people working in public and private sectors. You will be supported in your next steps either through transition to the workplace or postgraduate study.

Optional modules

What is Education For?
Should schools teach children moral values and how to be a good person? What does a good person look like? Are some values ‘better’ than others? These are important questions, and this module will help you to make sense of them by examining how historical and contemporary philosophical debates can shed new light on important educational issues. You will also be given the chance to design and trial teaching activities to test different ideas of education and philosophy in the classroom.

Work Placement for Social Science
This module gives students studying subjects in the School of Social Sciences the opportunity to contribute to the world beyond the University, in any workplace where the specialist knowledge, research, analytical, and communication skills developed as part of your Social Science degree can be used and can make a difference. Education students will have the opportunity to undertake their work placement in a local school however, should you wish, other options are available including local government agencies or third sector organisations, charities, community groups, criminal justice agencies, campaign groups, public services or another suitable opportunity identified by the student and approved by the module leader.