Kieran McTaggart, Director of the Donegal Education Support Centre, with Teachers and course facilitator Derek Brennan at the recent 'Pupil Wellbeing through PE'
These courses are specifically designed to offer teachers the opportunity for professional learning and development and they are underpinned by active learning, coherent content, and a focus on pupils' learning and enhanced teacher engagement
While the summer of 2024 may not have seen a lot of sunshine, it was great to see a large number of primary school teachers throughout Donegal signed up for a Summer Course, organised by the Donegal Education Support Centre.
In all, almost 20 face-to-face courses were offered. These courses are specifically designed to offer teachers the opportunity for professional learning and development. They are underpinned by active learning, coherent content, and a focus on pupils' learning and enhanced teacher engagement.
This year the Donegal Education Support Centre offered courses all over the county from Clonmany (Teaching Nature in our Local Place) to Donegal Town (Amuigh Faoin Spéir) and from Dungloe ((Digital Storytelling) to Rathmullan (Gaeilge: Caint, Comhrá agus Craic).
The Education Centre hosted CPD courses in Digital Innovation with Lego Spike & Beebots and the Teacher Artist Partnership, a course designed to support and enhance arts in education. Several courses took place in Letterkenny and the surrounding area which included Learning Through Play, Primary Language Curriculum, Digital Innovation and Pupil Wellbeing through PE.
An Grianan Hotel, Burt was the location for the popular ‘Chess for Social & Cognitive Skills’ course while Gartan NS and the Glebe Gallery in Churchill was the perfect location for the ‘Supporting Teachers’ Wellbeing through Art’. As always engagement with digital technology to support inclusive learning was popular with courses in Digital Creativity in the Primary Classroom taking place in Creeslough and Buncrana.
Teachers who wished to upskill in Special Needs Education engaged in ‘A Physiological Approach to teaching Children with Special Needs’ (Stranorlar) while those interested in Relationship & Sexuality Education, completed their course in Moville.
Mr Kieran McTaggart, the Director of the Donegal Education Support Centre would like to thank all the primary school teachers who participated in their summer course programme this year. He would also like to express his thanks to all the local tutors for their excellent delivery and facilitation, to the Centre staff for their hard work and commitment in organising these courses and to the various venues and schools for hosting these courses. The Education Centre is already planning for next year and is hoping to introduce several new Summer CPD Courses.
