EXPLORING TRAINEE TEACHERS’ ICT SKILLS AND THEIR IMPACT UPON FUTURE PGCE COURSE DEVELOPMENT

Trainee teachers have as one of their training goals to develop the ICT skills required for professional effectiveness, planning and teaching.

However, their experience in their school-based teaching practice is very varied and trainees find there are differing levels of digital equipment available for the presentation and organisation skills that will make them more effective in the classroom.

This report looks at the range of equipment trainees on placement in schools in partnership with the University of Warwick have experienced in their classrooms. It details their confidence at using the schools’ Virtual Learning Environment (VLE), the skills they currently feel confident using in delivering the content of their lessons and the methods they use to collate their professional evidence and showcase their skills. Connections are established between different areas of high skill and skills deficit, highlighting action points for the trainers and schools in future years. As ICT becomes a prerequisite for effective professionalism in the majority of workplaces, trainee teachers need to be able to demonstrate their ability and model that professionalism to tomorrow’s workforce – where currently 28 million employees use ICT daily in their jobs (eskills uk 2014).

The study also considers the future implications for ICT skills and knowledge impacting on teacher, pupil and worker skill sets, making recommendation on future actions the University might take to address these.