BA (Hons) Education with Integrated Foundation Year

Foundation in Knowledge and Skills

This module utilises your personal experience as a basis for enhancing skills and knowledge relevant to academic, professional, and personal development.

The module will support and encourage you to engage with higher education by developing academic skills and building confidence in their practical application.  It is designed to enhance employability and efficacy within the workplace.

The module aims to build resilience, communication skills, self-confidence and reflective ability.

Stories, Evidence, and Truth in Society

This module explores how stories, evidence, and claims to truth shape identity, society, and systems of meaning. You will investigate how individuals and communities construct narratives, how evidence is interpreted, and how truth is contested in social, historical, legal, and cultural contexts. 

You will examine how stories influence personal identity and collective memory; how narratives are used; how psychological processes shape our understanding of truth; and how creative and historical narratives influence society’s perception of reality. 

Through case studies and examples from literature, media, legal cases, and historical events, you will build foundational academic skills and develop confidence in analysing how truth is created, communicated, questioned, and validated.

Human Behaviour, History, and Justice

This module introduces you to the ways human behaviour, historical change, and justice systems shape one another.

Drawing on subject-specific areas, the module develops foundational academic skills while encouraging you to critically understand why societies behave as they do, how ideas of justice emerge, and how individuals and communities respond to change. 

You will explore how historical events influence contemporary social behaviour; how justice systems evolve; how psychological explanations inform decision‑making and social norms; and how social, political, and cultural forces shape the human experience. 

Project

This module is an applied piece of work related to your chosen degree. It will require you to apply the knowledge and skills developed throughout the foundation year and will enhance your ability to work individually and as part of a team.

During the project, you will develop in-depth knowledge of your chosen future specialisation. You will be encouraged to demonstrate creativity in the design, planning and execution of a project.

Childhood to Adulthood

This dynamic module explores the journey of human development from conception through to adulthood, equipping you with a deep understanding of how individuals grow, change, and adapt across the lifespan.

You will examine the cognitive, social, physical, and emotional transformations that shape identity and experience, and consider how these changes influence behaviour, learning, and wellbeing in an increasingly complex and evolving world. 

Bringing theory to life, the module introduces key psychological perspectives on development and encourages evaluation of their relevance across diverse cultural contexts.

You will gain insight into how development is experienced differently around the world, fostering a global and inclusive perspective. 

Through the exploration of real-world contexts—including a range of educational settings—you will develop the skills to apply theoretical knowledge to practice.

By the end of the module, you will be able to critically analyse developmental processes and transitions, and understand their implications for individuals across different life stages. 

Learning Communities – Children’s Learning, Children’s Thinking

This module explores the sociological influences brought to bear on our success as learners. You will draw on historical and contemporary theory and research into thinking, learning and development in order to consider how individuals can maximise learning opportunities for themselves and help others to learn.

You will also explore influences on learning, development and identity.

Science in Education and Society

This module introduces you to the subject, theoretical and pedagogic knowledge, and attitudes related to the learning of science in schools and early years settings, so that it is possible to build a scientifically literate population.

You will develop your understanding of the importance of science in society and educational settings and how science capital may be fostered and developed.

You will explore science-specific pedagogy in order to engage learners in science learning episodes, as you learn how to use the ‘outside classroom’ to teach science and foster engagement.

The module will consider the importance of cognitive science in the learning process, as you identify how theory and practice are linked so that they can recognise how research informs practice.

Diversity and Inclusion in Contemporary Education

This module aims to explore issues of equality and diversity within the context of contemporary education. Individual differences and attitudes towards these within contemporary education are explored in relation to other relevant contextual influences such as culture, policy and social systems.  

Inclusion, as a complex and contested concept, is examined in relation to individual differences, identity, and educational policy and practice.

The module will examine issues central to inclusion, human rights, equal opportunities and social justice. It will examine patterns of inequality and theoretical models will be used to inform analysis of contemporary policy and practice.  

Educational Perspectives

This thought-provoking module introduces you to the key ideas, movements, and debates that have shaped education over time. Drawing on historical, philosophical, sociological, psychological, and ideological perspectives, you will explore how different ways of thinking have influenced what education is, who it is for, and what it should achieve. 

You will critically engage with fundamental questions such as: What knowledge is most valuable? What should children learn—and why? How do political and social forces shape education?

Through examining competing perspectives, including child-centred, vocational, and critical approaches, you will begin to develop your own informed stance on the purpose and future of education. 

Speech, Language and Communication

This module explores speech, language and communication as fundamental aspects of human interaction, participation and human rights, recognising diverse ways in which people communicate and make meaning.

Grounded in a rights-based and inclusive framework, it moves beyond deficit-oriented and diagnostic models to focus on removing barriers within environments rather than locating difficulty solely within the individual. 

You will develop an understanding of the wide range of speech, language and communication profiles across all learners, and how these are shaped by social, cultural and educational contexts.

Emphasis is placed on universal and targeted approaches to communication-supportive practice, including the design of inclusive classroom environments, the use of visual supports, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC), digital technologies, and multimodal forms of expression.

Global Citizenship: Living and Working in A Diverse and Interconnected World

Compulsory module

This module allows you to critically engage with some of the key global issues of our times and prepares you to think beyond your immediate locality about how you are connected with people and environments that you may never have seen.

Special Educational Needs and Disability – Engaging All Learners

You will learn how to plan, implement, and evaluate the effectiveness of interventions that contribute to removing barriers to learning, including the use of Augmented and Alternative Communication (AAC) AAC and ICT.

Professionalism and Collaborative Practice

Optional module – SEND specialism

This module will enable you to develop your knowledge and understanding of working in different contexts with children and young people who have a Special Educational Need and/or Disability (SEND), and their families.

You will examine the roles of key professionals in health, education and the social care, and how they need to coordinate their services to benefit families and individuals who have a SEND.

You will consider the importance of collaborative practice between professionals from different agencies.

Forest Schools Principles and Practices

A forest school is a journey of self-discovery and awareness in the outdoors in which participants are given the freedom to explore their surroundings, themselves and others through their curiosity and imagination.

The approach is heralded by some as inspirational but described by others as re-branding of old ideas giving questionable impact.

This module explores principles that underpin the forest school approach and reflects on evidence for its effectiveness.

Professional Placement

The professional placement will enable you to further develop, apply, and reflect on the core areas of sports therapy practice and to draw on, and review, the profession’s evidence base. You should develop new knowledge and skills while in practice-based settings, in addition to applying, consolidating, and reflecting on the learning gained in the University environment. You will also develop a network of professional contacts to be established that could greatly aid future employability.

The World of Play

Compulsory module

More information on this module coming soon.

Independent Project

Compulsory module

The module will explore research approaches and design through a series of seminar sessions.

You will also receive tutorial support from a designated tutor, who, at key points, will provide formative assessment.

Most of the learning will be independent, making use of journals, research methodology textbooks and policy developments in your field of interest.

Work-Based Placement

This module consolidates the placement experience in Level 5 and will serve as a context for the Independent Project to be submitted after Easter in the final semester.

The module provides you with an opportunity to work with children and young people in a professional setting. The placements are organised by you in conjunction with relevant staff and provide you with a choice of approved setting, according to availability. Settings may include, for example, special school, day nursery, family support teams, out of school provision, libraries, community play or youth scheme, medical provision for children or young people.

You will be enabled to demonstrate your capacity to engage in the workplace alongside professionals and to learn by observing, doing and reflecting on their performance. You will learn to support your own development by keeping a learning journal or diary which incorporates targets and self-evaluation.

Creativity, Technology and Learning

Compulsory module

This module will enable you to investigate, both academically and practically, how innovative technologies can be used in learning and teaching in a wide variety of mainstream and specialist educational settings.

Learning From and Within the Community

Optional module – Education specialism

This module is designed to provide you with an opportunity to investigate a variety of organisations and groups that operate within the local community that have an educational element to their work. You will have the chance to create an educational project for an organisation in the community.

Do the Right Thing: Moral Issues in Education

Optional module – Education specialism

This module examines key themes that traditionally underpin western moral philosophy, including:

• utilitarianism
• duty-based theories
• relativism
• absolutism
• rights theory
• and pluralism.

You will explore how the underpinning concepts of western ethical thought have developed historically and their relevance to education.

For example, unless one understands the basis for deciding whether something is right or wrong, how can one justify promoting or sanctioning it?

The content of this module will enable you to use knowledge and understanding of ethical issues to inform their practice and approach to teaching.

Understanding Families

Optional module – SEND specialism

This module examines the impact that having a child with a disability has on the family. You will identify the social, economic and psychological factors affecting families who are bringing up a child who has a special need and/or disability. This will lead to discussions about how professionals from different institutions should work with families to overcome some of the challenges that families face because they have a child with a SEND.

Disability Studies

Optional module – SEND specialism

This module allows you to examine the history of disability rights, the implications of the SEND Code of Practice, and the various contemporary definitions of “disability”. You will also consider the role of critical writings of Foucault and Bourdieu within this context.