Professional Development
If you are a lecturer or professional teaching animal related subjects, we offer behind the scenes opportunities to help you keep up to date with the latest developments in zookeeping, husbandry and conservation. We also offer a range of initial teacher training workshops that can help trainee teachers in planning offsite visits and how to embed conservation in their lessons.
Initial Teacher Training Workshops
We run initial teacher training workshops that can help trainee teachers improve their skills and knowledge. We show how easy it is to plan a visit to the zoo and how teachers can embed conservation and animal behaviour in their lessons.
ITT Workshop: Planning a School Trip - Primary Level
From risk assessments to educational activities, this session will increase your confidence in how to organise a school trip. Understand the pros and cons of learning outside the classroom and discover how you can get the most from a school trip to the zoo. Tailored specifically to primary level education, in this session you will get to try out some educational activities and view some of the artefacts.
Detail:
- Discussion of the benefits of learning outside the classroom, some of the cons of organising a school trip and how to overcome them.
- Group activities to develop 'to do' lists for before, during and after a trip to the zoo. This will include discussion, a guide to completing a risk assessment, trying
out some education session activities and evaluating the session.
- A short visit to see an animal accompanied by the conservation education officer.
ITT Workshop: Planning a School Trip - Secondary Level
From risk assessments to educational activities, this session will increase your confidence in how to organise a school trip. Understand the pros and cons of learning outside the classroom and discover how you can get the most from a school trip to the zoo. Tailored specifically to secondary level education, in this session you will get to try out some educational activities and view some of the artefacts.
Detail:
- Discussion of the benefits of learning outside the classroom, some of the cons of organising a school trip and how to overcome them.
- Group activities to develop 'to do' lists for before, during and after a trip to the zoo. This will include a discussion about some of the challenges of taking secondary school students on a trip, understanding what your aims are for a trip, how you can ensure that you achieve your aims, a guide to completing a risk assessment, trying out some education session activities and evaluating the session.
- A short visit to see an animal accompanied by the conservation education officer.
ITT Workshop: Animal Behaviour
This session will introduce you to the basics of animal behaviour and how behavioural studies are used by the zoo. The session will also show you how a behavioural study can be designed and developed for use as a scientific investigation with students of all levels. This kind of investigation can be used to teach ‘working scientifically’ principles
and lends itself to cross-curricular teaching.
Detail:
- Discussion of what is meant by animal behaviour and how it might be useful to study it?
- Understand the difference between innate and learned behaviour. Look at some examples of how animal behaviour studies are used by the zoo.
- Carrying out an ethogram activity. A discussion about what an ethogram is and how to design one to fit specific teaching requirements. This includes designing ethograms for different Key stages, how ‘working scientifically’ content can be integrated, designing activities to be cross-curricular, followed by going and
carrying out an ethogram on one of our animals accompanied by one of our officers.
ITT Workshop: Animals in Danger
From rhino poaching to bonobo habitat destruction, this session will discuss some of the threats many of our animals face in the wild. In this session you will discover how these issues can be raised within teaching to aid understanding of the challenges that conservation faces and the perspectives of different stakeholders. We will also discuss ways that we can improve a student’s connection to nature, ease eco-anxiety and
empower them to take action.
Detail:
- A discussion about some of the main threats to animals with the opportunity to view some of our artefacts.
- A demonstration of how an activity might be used to educate students about the main dangers to a specific animal.
- A mini debate group activity to introduce the idea of different stakeholders in conservation issues, showing how this kind of activity can be done with students.
- A discussion about how students could suffer eco-anxiety and how we might deal with this.
Carrying out an activity to show how we can teach students about the dangers to some animals whilst also increasing their connection to nature and empowering them to take action. This will include a visit to an animal accompanied by one of our education officers.
- A short group activity to devise a small interactive task for students.
CPD Days
Keep up to date with developments in zookeeping, husbandry and conservation by booking onto one of our CPD days. Only available for lecturers or professional teachers who teach animal related subjects, shadow our zookeepers or vets to gain behind the scenes knowledge that can take your industry experience to the next level.
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To book a place on one of our CPD days or ITT workshops please email bookings@twycrosszoo.org
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