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PGCE Primary Postgraduate Certificate in Education (3-7)
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Year of entry
2025/26 -
Course duration
Full Time: 10 months
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Year of entry
2025/26 -
Course duration
Full Time: 10 months
Gain experience and knowledge of teaching in early years or Key Stage 1. Benefit from our outstanding facilities and well-managed placements, and qualify as an early years teacher with our PGCE Primary Education.
Our Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) Primary pathway leads to the award of Qualified Teacher Status (QTS), giving you the experience, the opportunity, and the knowledge to work in both Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) settings and infant/primary school settings.
The EYFS is a unique phase of education which involves learning through play and first-hand experiences both inside and outdoors. This phase leads into Key Stage 1, where children really start to engage with learning to read, applying their mathematical knowledge, and making sense of how the world works.
Choose the early years pathway if you are interested in early learning and early child development. By choosing this pathway, you will experience both the EYFS and Key Stage 1 phases, and will therefore be highly skilled in two curricula. If you are interested in the rewards and challenges of being an early years expert teacher, choose this pathway.
Your tutors are internationally or nationally renowned experts, and their research regularly has a direct impact on school curricula and learning techniques, both in the UK and abroad. As experts in their field, their research also directly informs the focus and content of your course.
Learning takes place through a series of lectures, practical seminars and workshops, where interactive and discussion-based techniques will encourage you to engage, reflect and challenge. Sessions may include:
- participating in workshop-style sessions with your peers
- attending presentations by subject experts
- working on tasks in groups
- having individual tutorials
- visits to schools or other education settings.
Alongside your University tutors, you will be taught and guided by a team of committed and experienced University-trained school mentors.
Placements
Placements enable you to develop the skills and knowledge valued and desired by employers. You will build your confidence in the classroom, and gain practical teaching experience. Placements also provide you with the opportunity to connect with potential employers and build your professional network.
You will have plenty of opportunities throughout your PGCE to apply your developing skills to real-life settings. We have strong partnerships with over 300 local schools and are renowned for our relationships with these partner schools.
It is a testament to the strength of our partnerships, and the regard in which our graduates are held, that most schools in Berkshire employ at least one graduate of the Institute of Education.
Climate and sustainability education
At the University of Reading we believe that climate and sustainability education is everyone’s responsibility. This is why we have set out our vision that all initial teacher trainees should be able to access training that empowers them to effectively incorporate climate education within their teaching across all levels and subjects as part of our National Climate Education Action Plan. Across all of our ITT programmes at the Institute of Education, you will learn about:
- what is happening to our climate, how to help children learn about climate and sustainability in an age-appropriate and accessible way, and how to develop your own positioning as a teacher
- climate justice, the impact of current and future changes to our environment and climate on ourselves and others and implications for teachers
- how to translate knowledge and theory into change and personal action through building climate and sustainability education into your planning, teaching, and children’s learning.
Visit Partnering for the Planet to find out more about the University of Reading’s world-leading work in climate science.
Facilities
The Institute of Education is based on our historic London Road campus, which has undergone a £30m refurbishment of the classical Oxford-cloistered quadrangle to create a dedicated, world-class education centre.
We have created dedicated spaces for the teaching of specialist subjects such as music, PE, drama, the sciences, ICT, and art, including:
- modern laboratories
- musical studios, including an electronic drum kit room and a recording studio
- well-equipped art studios and facilities for the practise of work in drawing, painting, sculpture and mixed media
- studios for wet photography and printmaking, including silk screen.
Alongside these fantastic facilities you will also find places to eat and drink as well as plenty of green space.
The Learning Hub
We have an incredible collection of teaching resources housed in the Learning Hub. A treasure trove for teachers, the Learning Hub contains an extensive selection of teaching aids for loan or reference, from big books to puppets. A printing and binding facility, and technical equipment library are also available for your use.
Research
The quality of our research was recognised in the latest Research Excellence Framework (2021), the system for assessing the quality of research in UK higher education institutions. 98% of our research is of international standing (REF 2021, combining 4*, 3* and 2* submissions – Education).
For more information, please visit the Institute of Education website.