Register for our FREE CPD course before 7 June!

Our face to face CPD courses are EPV approved and will be in Cork and Dublin

Two BFGTOEU CPD courses will be held face to face in Cork and Dublin. These CPD courses are EPV approved and will run in the usual format of 20 hours over 5 days, from 9.30 to 2pm. They will be provided FREE OF CHARGE, including some EU resources and free tea, coffee, and lunch on each day.

We will run an online 3 hour CPD course which is not EPV approved. This aims to support teachers who cannot attend the CPD courses in Cork or Dublin in a more light-touch way. This CPD course will count towards training which is required for the BFGTOEU award scheme.

As usual, the CPD course focuses on developing critical thinking and deliberative skills among our youngest citizens through hands-on, fun and engaging activities and games.

Since places are limited and to avoid over-registration, there will be a deposit of €25 requested from the registered participants to hold their place. This deposit will be refunded at the end of the course within 10 days. The participants will be contacted regarding the payment of the deposit once registration is finalised.

 

Why do this CPD course?

  1. Because it’s full of practical tips and activities. It shows you how to find and use all the resources on the website while also connecting with Looking at Our School 2022 and the School Self-Evaluation guidelines. 
  2. It’s an interactive course to develop students’ critical thinking skills. It discusses all successes and failures of the EU itself and of teaching about it! 
  3. It gives you the confidence to go into the classroom and inspire your students to become active citizens.
  4. It’s FREE!
  5. It could give you ideas about new ways of teaching about active citizenship.
  6. We’ll have a short information piece on eTwinning projects, European funding for you and your school, the easiest and best way to open a window from your classroom onto other EU classrooms.
  7. You start building your connection with UCC. 
  8. It allows you to apply on a first come, first served basis for an entirely subsidised study-trip to Brussels in April 2024. Very limited places.

REGISTER HERE BEFORE 7 JUNE

From 14 to 18 July 2023, the CPD course will take place in University College Cork. Free car parking in Visitors’ car park off College Road, can be provided on request.

From 14 to 18 August, the CPD will take place in CEEDS, Aras Rualach, Neilstown Rd, Clondalkin, Dublin.

SCHEDULE FOR THE WEEK

DAY 1

9.30 to 2pm

 

 

 

DAY 2

9.30 to 2pm

 

 

DAY 3

9.30 to 2pm

 

 

DAY 4

9.30 to 2pm

 

DAY 5

9.30 to 2pm

  • Investigating the way in which the BFGTOEU website can support teachers’ individual practice of teaching active European citizenship
  • Discussing critical pedagogy in teaching and agonism
  • Applying critical pedagogy and agonism to teaching about active European citizenship
  • Enabling teachers with sufficient & relevant pedagogical content knowledge on the EU (LAOS 2022)
  • Connecting BFGTOEU to the SPHE and SESE curricula.
  • Discussing cross curricula approaches to teaching involving SPHE and SESE, history, geography, literacy and numeracy.
  • Demonstrate Symbaloo (ICT) and Wakelet
  • Recognise how the EU works and what Ireland’s role is in it
  • Understand different levels of decision-making (European, national, local)
  • Demonstrate website’s interactive games (ICT)
  • Understand key concepts of the EU using children’s literature, connect with literacy.
  • Use the SESE working scientifically approach to analyse the book and its relevance to the EU
  • Discovering ways to connect with the Primary Language Curriculum and connecting it with the introduction of Modern Foreign Languages in primary school.
  • Explain the Customs Union and Single Market
  • Describe the four freedoms of movement and their essential role in the EU
  • Identify Schengen area versus the Common Travel Area
  • Enable teachers to design and implement high-quality and engaging learning experiences on Ireland and the EU (SSE – individual practice)
  • Highlight the connections with the numeracy curriculum regarding the activities on the Single Market
  • Explain Brexit
  • Discuss the consequences for Ireland and the EU
  • Discuss the EU’s values
  • Analyse what the challenges are regarding those values
  • Discussing parallels with schools values (LAOS, 2022) and the relevance in teaching about active citizenship
  • Connect meaningfully with the SPHE curriculum Strand Myself and the Wider World
  • Identify the EU’s successes
  • Critique the EU’s successes
  • Discuss the EU’s shortcomings
  • Put the EU’s shortcomings into perspective
  • Discuss the main challenges the EU is facing
  • Summarise meaningful connections with the SPHE curriculum Strand Myself and the Wider World, the SESE curriculum ‘working scientifically’ approach, the history and geography curriculum and the literacy and numeracy curriculum

Our last CPD in 2019: what a week we had!

A delighted crew of teachers at the end of our very first CPD course

We ran our very first CPD course in UCC with 35 teachers and principals from County Cork and Dublin. Many came without much of an idea as to what to expect. We organised the CPD course into a two hour interactive lecture in the morning, often using Mentimeter to prompt questions and discussion. In the afternoon, we split the group into three and organised three workshops for each on the following topics:

  • What is a Union?
  • The symbols of the EU
  • What about Ireland in the EU?
  • Decision-making in the EU
  • Travelling in the EU
  • Playing with the Single Market
  • and much much more.

This is what the teachers thought of BFGTOEU…

  • Learning about decision-making in the EU through drawing
  • Our EU council summit on the migration crisis

Feedback from the teachers

Come and join us on our next CPD course!