(Secondary) History PGCE

Top reasons to choose this course

• You'll train to teach with an Ofsted ‘outstanding’ provider.
• 2nd in the UK for education courses  – Guardian University Guide 2025.
• Placements opportunities with schools in large, small, urban and rural settings.
• Enrichment opportunities to teach age 16–18.
• Learn in our specialist classrooms that replicate those used in schools and our curriculum centre with its 30,000 resources for student teachers.
• Brighton has an expert team who have their own successful experience as education practitioners.
• Our teaching graduates benefit from excellent employment rates that are consistently above the sector average.
• We have a dedicated team to help you after you qualify, through our Early Teacher Career support programme.

Edward and Rebecca chat about how the PGCE enabled them to become history teachers

Course structure

Two-thirds of your year will be spent teaching, under supervision, in schools. Our tutors and mentors will advise and support you throughout each placement. You will receive comprehensive feedback during this time, enabling you to see where you are doing well and where you could improve.

The university works in partnership with schools and colleges to provide a high quality programme of support, ensuring a sound relationship between theory and practice. You will benefit from undertaking two placements in two schools or colleges, with the opportunity to visit additional schools or colleges as part of the 'Peer Observation' programme.

In your teaching role you will introduce pupils to key developments of the past and support them in becoming critical thinkers with a deep understanding of how Britain and the wider world has been shaped. You will empower pupils to ask complex questions, gather and weigh evidence, work through arguments and develop perspective and judgement.

You will be encouraged to approach your teaching strategies creatively, to aid the progress of your pupils and your own emerging skills as a history teacher. You will learn and practice a variety of teaching approaches and innovative classroom practices on this programme. Your learning will involve:

• tutor and student-led seminars and presentations
• practical workshops
• group-work
• drama and role play
• media-based activities
• tutorials
• sessions by visiting specialist lecturers
• independent directed study
• external national courses
• active learning and a range of history pedagogies.

You will have access to multimedia training materials, giving you the opportunity to develop your confidence and competence in the use of digital technologies. Our multimedia suites are regularly updated to keep up with technological advancements in classroom teaching provision. The Curriculum Centre and Falmer Library on campus contain a wealth of history materials that you can draw upon to use in the classroom.

We will support you in the development of your subject knowledge by:

Areas of study

A number of support systems are put in place before and during the course, to help students develop their subject knowledge in key history curriculum areas. 

There are four strands to this course: subject study/subject education, education and professional studies, school placements and professional practice.

Course content is kept up to date with changes in local and national initiatives and legislation, so you will be confident that your working knowledge is based on current theory and practice.

The subject study/subject education strand builds upon your existing expertise in history and provides you with the opportunity to develop skills, knowledge and understanding of history in the secondary school context. You will consider the learning and teaching strategies that are relevant to the specialist subject in supporting pupil progress.

The education and professional studies strand will give you a thorough understanding of the learning process itself, including an appreciation of individual differences. The study of the principles and practices of learning and teaching is through both school and university settings, allowing you to develop practical competencies, supported by analytical skills.

By the end of the course you will:

• refine your understanding of pedagogy, including an appreciation of current and emerging educational theories and debate

• understand how the progress and wellbeing of learners is affected by a range of influences and know how to take account of the principles of equality, inclusion and diversity.

The school placements/professional practice strand is intrinsically linked to all key strands of the course and is designed to enable you to develop the knowledge and skills necessary to thrive as creative, informed and critical professionals.

You will engage in target setting and action planning, and reflect upon your learning in order to make improvements as you progress through the emerging, embedding and enhancing phases of trainee teacher development towards meeting the Teachers’ Standards and the award of Qualified Teacher Status at the end of the course.

School-based training

Ofsted identify our approach to training in schools as a key strength of this course, with an excellent balance between university tuition and school-based training.

You will spend a minimum of 120 days on school-based activities, with your training shared between the university and the partner school. 

Your school-based training will include observing teachers, working with individual pupils and groups of pupils, team teaching and independent teaching. Your training will also entail completing specific subject tasks and developing your knowledge of school policy and effective practices.

You will maintain a professional training portfolio and be supported to review your work critically and analytically as well as to set appropriately challenging targets. We will also develop an action plan with you to identify strengths, development needs and actions, so that your practice is continually developing.

Key aims of the school-based training:

• advance the development of your professional attributes, skills, knowledge and understanding
• provide a variety of practical and specific experiences that enable you to critically analyse your professional practice and take responsibility for your own professional development
• enable you to work collaboratively with colleagues in order to develop an understanding of the ways in which the attainment, development and well-being of all learners can be achieved with a unified support and teaching system
• provide opportunities that enable you to adopt a creative and constructively critical approach towards your practice, supported by appropriate reading and research.

During your school-based training, university tutors, school mentors and teachers will support you and take shared responsibility for your professional development.

Your progress will be observed and assessed throughout your placement by university and school staff, followed by feedback sessions to discuss your development. Your e-portfolio will also be evaluated as part of the overall assessment.

Organising your school-based training

Our Partnership Office will organise the school-based training for you. Each year we organise over 2,500 placements for our students. We work hard to ensure that you have placement opportunities that will give you valuable and varied experiences in the area of education in which you are interested.

How it works

We will ask you to complete a placement information form when you start your course, and will use this information to match you to a suitable placement. We will consider your previous experience, travelling distance, the age ranges you wish to teach, and your current needs.

Once we have matched you with a placement, the team in the Partnership Office will confirm the placement as quickly as possible with the school or organisation. They will then contact you with the placement details. Almost all of our placements will be with partner schools or organisations in south-east England, most of them in East and West Sussex.

Meet the team

Gabrielle Rowles has worked at the University of Brighton since 2016 and became route leader for the (Secondary) History PGCE in 2022. She has also delivered professional education sessions for different universities since 2010.

Gabrielle completed her masters in Education as a Research Leader in her school in 2015. She was also involved in whole staff training and reviewing pupil premium interventions. She has 18 years of history teaching experience in different schools as a head of department, mentor and leader of staff INSET.

Gabrielle has worked with Oxford University Press as a consultant on their KS3 book series by Aaron Wilkes and has also designed resources for Brighton and Hove Black History group in their local history series. She loves using film, art, role play in her teaching and has written several ‘revision songs’ for pupils which they sing at her if she meets them as adults in Sainsbury’s.

Gabrielle also works for a community interest company called Boingboing which is linked to the university’s research into resilience for social justice. In this capacity Gabrielle delivers training, key notes and consultancy for schools across the country, supporting them to implement resilience and mental health approaches across the school or college. Gabrielle is particularly interested in social justice, inclusion and providing opportunities for staff, pupils and parents to build their resilience using an inequalities imagination.

Gabrielle believes strongly in promoting staff resilience, part of which is to hold onto our values about education and critical thinking and partly to ensure access to fresh air, healthy food and exercise. Sea swimming in the morning is a good bet if you want to know where she is before work.

Gabrielle Rowles

Ofsted 'outstanding'

Graded 'outstanding' by Ofsted for primary and secondary in our 2024 Initial Teacher Education inspection.

Ofsted commended us on many aspects of our courses saying:

• Trainees shine at Brighton’s long-established and highly impressive teacher training programmes.
• The care and dedication shown by staff towards trainees is superb.
• Trainees are at the heart of everything. They are valued and expertly supported throughout the course.
• The curriculum skilfully equips trainees in safeguarding, behaviour management and supporting pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).
• Trainees impress the placement settings they work in because of their professionalism and aptitude to apply what they have learned.

Facilities

Our facilities include a curriculum centre which contains more than 30,000 specialist resources for trainee teachers including books, DVDs, games and an online catalogue.

Our Falmer campus also houses specialist classrooms that replicate those used in schools so you’ll feel at home when you go on your school-based training and start your career.

Teaching facilities include:

• science labs
• art classrooms
• kiln room
• dark room
• design and technology workshop
• performance studio.

School Connect PGCE and School Direct Salaried

School Connect PGCE and School Direct Salaried are alternative routes to gaining Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). The University of Brighton works with a number of schools to deliver this programme across a range of secondary subjects as well as in the primary phase. 

To train as a teacher through the School Connect PGCE or the School Direct Salaried programme you need to apply directly to a school for a training place. Schools advertise their vacancies on the Department for Educations 'Find Postgraduate training courses' website. 

Find out more about School Connect PGCE and School Direct Salaried.

Course fees

As a postgraduate trainee teacher there is a range of funding available which you could be eligible to receive whilst you are studying:

• Tax-free bursaries and scholarships – these depend on the subject you are training to teach and your highest relevant academic award. 

On our website you will find information about other funding including:

• the student finance package from Student Finance England – tuition fee loans and maintenance loans
• Parents’ Learning Allowance
• Childcare Grant
• Care leaver’s bursary
• Disabled Students’ Allowance.

If you're not a UK citizen, you are unlikely to get help funding your training unless you have permission to live permanently in the UK.

The fees listed here are for the first year of full-time study if you start your course in the academic year 2025–26.

You will pay fees for each year of your course. Some fees may increase each year.

UK undergraduate and some postgraduate fees are regulated by the UK government and increases will not be more than the maximum amount allowed. Course fees that are not regulated may increase each year by up to 5% or RPI (whichever is higher).

If you are studying part-time your fee will usually be calculated based on the number of modules that you take.

Find out more

• Fees, bursaries, scholarships and government funding info for UK and international postgraduate students
• Student finance and budgeting while studying
• About the university’s fees by checking our student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf).

Campus where this course is taught

Accommodation

Local area

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Support and wellbeing

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