Library Guide - Education and Childhood

The library has a comprehensive collection of books related to education, childhood and teaching for you to find and read. You can use LibrarySearch to search for the books you need. To search for a specific book just type a few words from the title plus the surname of the author(s) into the search box. You can also search for a topic then filter to Books (or Ebooks) under Format in the left-hand column. If you get stuck – please ask!

We use the Dewey Decimal System to classify the books so it’s easier to find them. Each classmark number refers to a different subject, and can be found in a different location:

• In Augustine House (Cantebrury), the lowest numbers are on the first floor and the highest numbers are on the third floor. Remember to check the different areas housing the 7-day loan (open shelves) and 4-week loans (moving shelves).
• In the Drill Hall Library (Medway), all books are in one continuous order on the ground floor, with 7-day and 4-week loans shelved together. The lowest numbers are immediately next to the library entrance.

You will find the majority of the Education and Childhood Studies books around the 370s classmark (on Floor 2 in Augustine House or in the Silent Study Zone at the Drill Hall Library). These are some useful classmarks to note:

• 155.4 – Child psychology
• 305.23 – Children
• 370… – Education
• 370.78 – Educational research
• 371.102 – Teaching
• 371.2 – Leadership
• 371.26 – Assessment
• 371.9 – Special education
• 372 – Primary education
• 372.21 – Pre-school/Early years
• 373 – Secondary education
• 374 – Post compulsory education/Lifelong learning
• 375 – Curriculum
• 378 – Higher education
• 379 – Government and policy
• 650.14 – Career coaching

Books about teaching a particular curriculum subject are shelved with that subject in the library (e.g. teaching primary mathematics is at classmark 510.713).

Practical teaching books, children’s books (e.g. fiction, dual-language) and resources/equipment that you can borrow, are in the Curriculum Resources collection in Augustine House (Floor 2, west wing).

At the Drill Hall Library in Medway you can also find children's fiction - these books are kept in the Family Room.

You can request for books to be sent between the campus libraries for collection as intersite loans.

Ebooks

Wherever possible we also obtain all our books as ebooks, which can be accessed on or off campus, 24 hours. Just click on “Link to CCCU ebook” in the record on the LibrarySearch and you will usually have the option to read online or download a copy.

You can also find a collection of ebooks and audiobooks in Overdrive (find via LibrarySearch/Find databases A-Z). This includes a curated collection “Inspiration for teachers” collection.

Journals are an important source of scholarly information – think of them as academic magazines that contain articles written by researchers. CCCU library subscribes to journals covering all the subjects taught here.

Print journals
Most journals are online, but you can browse printed copies of some journals on Floor 2 of Augustine House in the Silent Zone (west wing). These are shelved in alphabetical order of the journal title. These are for use in the library only.

Online journals
Use LibrarySearch.to see which journals are available to read online. Make sure you Log In first with your CCCU username and password. You can search for journal articles across all the journals simultaneously using the main search bar to search for a topic, then limiting your search results to "Academic journals" under Source Type on the Digital Resources tab.

To find a specific journal try entering the title of a journal into the search box, or use the “Find e-journals by title” link. You can also browse e-journals by subject, using Browzine. This software allows you to read a journal like an e-book, so you can look through the whole journal rather than just individual articles. There is an app so you can use it easily on your phone or other mobile device.

There are hundreds of journals relevant for education. A few suggested journal titles are:

Education: British Educational Research Journal, British Journal of Educational Psychology,, British Journal of Educational Studies, British Journal of Sociology of Education, British Journal of Special Education, Curriculum Journal, Education 3-13

Early Childhood: Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, Early Child Development and Care, Early Years: An International Research Journal, European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, International Journal of Early years Education, Journal of Early Childhood Research

Open Access Journals
The Directory of Open Access Journals includes journals such as the European Journal of Counselling Psychology. Open access journals are usually scholarly, but the difference is, the publishers of these journals believe in making their research freely accessible to anyone with an internet connection. This means that you (or your institution) do not have to have a subscription to the journal to be able to read the articles they publish.

Professional journals
In addition to academic/scholarly journals, the library subscribes to practitioner journal collections designed for teachers and education professionals. Find these via LibrarySearch/Find Databases:

• Intered News, lesson plans and articles for teachers and education professionals with access to 8 journals including Early Years Educator; Primary Teacher Update; and Nursery World.
  
  
• Teaching Times Select Topics, Knowledge Banks,or Archives at the top of the page to read articles from key teaching publications: Creative Teaching and Learning; Digital Learning; Every Child Journal; Every Child Update; Inclusion Journal; Leadership Briefings; Learning Spaces; Master Classes; PE & Sport Today; Project-based Learning Resources; Professional Development Today; School Leadership Today; Teaching and Learning. The Classroom Resources section contains resources across the curriculum and age groups to integrate into classroom teaching.

CCCU library provides research databases which contain articles about education and childhood studies. These are all available via LibrarySearch – just click on the “Find databases” link in the left-hand menu and you will see an alphabetical list. Browse the list until you find the one you want. Useful databases include:

Bloomsbury Education and Childhood Studies: Chapters, articles and policy statements covering childhood and education around the world.

British Education Index: Key database indexing over 200,000 records covering all areas of education from preschool to higher education from UK published journals from 1975 onwards. See also Australian Education Index, Education Abstracts and ERIC (US/international education).

Child Development and Adolescent Studies: Book reviews and abstracts from journals, reports and theses about children; tick “limit to linked full text” to restrict to CCCU journals.

Intered and Teaching Times: Two smaller collections of practical education journals for teaching and educational professionals.

Web of Science: Large multi-disciplinary database includes over 160 education journals – with some full-text.

This is a special collection of teaching resources in Augustine House for education students, shelved at the back of Floor 2 (East wing). Explore these resources to inspire creative lesson planning and borrow to use in the classroom when on teaching placement.

You can find all the CR resources listed on LibrarySearch with “CR” before the classmark; use the filter “Curriculum Resources” in the left-hand column under “Location” to limit your results after searching for a topic.

The CR collection includes:

• Books on all the curriculum subjects shelved in the moving shelves. These have the same classmark number as the subject in the main library, but with “CR” at the start. e.g. mathematics at CR 510.., music at CR 780…, history at CR 900… etc.
• Children’s fiction is divided into Picture Fiction (PF), Junior Fiction (JF) and Senior Fiction (SF), plus big books. You can also find poetry, plays and literary collections.
• Dual-language books in many different languages shelved with languages at CR 400…
• Equipment for the different subjects is on the open shelves. You can discover a range of exciting resources to borrow including archaeological artefacts, musical instruments, geometric shapes, Jewish artefacts, microbits, maps, puppets, art posters and many more.

Please ask for help in the library to find any of these resources.

These organisations and independent bodies conduct and share research, which informs educational policy and practice.

• The British Educational Research Association (BERA) focuses on the advancing of knowledge in education and sustains an educational research community. The BERA Blog and the Ethical Guidelines for Educational Research may be of particular interest to students.
• Campbell collaboration contains systematic reviews of research evidence on the effectiveness of social interventions – look under Research evidence/education.
• The Chartered College of Teaching works to support teachers and connect them in a research-informed community.You could join as a member, or keep up to date through their news and blogs page and access free articles.
• Department for Education Research DfE current and archived research publications.
• The Education Endowment Foundation(EEF) is “dedicated to breaking the link between family income and educational achievement”. The charity summarises, shares and generates research-informed evidence on what works for teachers and leaders.
• EPPI-Centre maintains an online evidence library of reliable research findings through systematic reviews on social science and public policy. Technical reports and summaries are available.
• The House of Commons Library produces research and provides an impartial information services to MPs and their staff.
• NatCen is Britain's leading independent social research institute. Research covers all aspects of social policy and includes areas of Equality & Diversity, Children, Schools & Families, Social Inclusion.
• NASEN is a charity that exists to support and champion those working with, and for, children and young people with SEND and learning differences.
• National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) is the UK’s largest independent educational and children’s services research organisation. See the Publications and Research section.
• OECD The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development works on global issues and education is one part of its work. The organisation collects data, monitors trends, and forecasts developments to advise countries in developing policy.
• TACTYC - the Association for Professional Development in Early Years - provides research, news, papers and reflections for practitioners.

Check out these links for up-to-date information on education policy and curriculum.

• DfE Curriculum and qualifications: detailed information
• Department for Education
• Early years foundation stage (EYFS) Statutory Framework
• Education Policy Institute: EPI conduct research and analysis to inform the public, Government and decision-makers.
• Eurydice: how Education systems work in different European countries, plus comparative studies.
• Legislation.gov.uk: find and reference Acts of Parliament
• National Curriculum in England: Primary, Secondary, Programmes of Study
• Ofsted: news, surveys, thematic reports and school inspection reports.
• Policy papers and consultations search for Department of Education
• Schools, colleges and children's services: gov.uk
• Teacher Standards: minimum requirements for teachers’ practice and conduct.

You may also like to investigate Childlink. This is a database available through the university, covering policy, legislation and related material (e.g. news, statistics, research reports) relating to children and families in the UK and Ireland. It does not search for journal articles.

Find out about legislation and how to find statistical data.

• Acts of Parliament and other legislation
• A chronological list of all Acts of Parliament related to children, schools and education since 1721 is available on the Education in England website.
• Publications and records of parliamentary business, classified by staff of the House of Commons Library.

• Department for Education statistics : DfE publishes official statistics on children and young people. You can also explore national and regional level data using the education statistics service from the Government.
• Research and statistics search relevant to Department of Education
• Office for National Statistics: UK’s largest independent producer of official statistics.

Useful sources for historical research in education.

• Digital Education Resource Archive (DERA): A digital archive of documents published by the government and other relevant bodies in the areas of education, training, children and families.
• Education in Englandis full of original source material relating to schools and education, and includes a useful timeline of events, policies and reports.
• Times Digital Archive: online database available via LibrarySearch which includes every page, from The Timesnewspaper from 1785-2019.
• UK Government web archive includes videos, tweets and images dating back to 1996.

Keep up to date with current developments and debates in education through subscribed databases and free news sites, blogs and alert services.

LexisLibrary Newspapers (UK) is available via LibrarySearch/Find Databases. This is a forty-year archive of full text news articles from a range of UK national and regional newspapers. It is updated with news items daily. It includes access to Times Educational Supplement (TES) and Times Higher Education Supplement (THES).

Education news sites

• BBC - Education
• Guardian Education
• The Independent - Education News
• The Times - Education

Blogs

• BERA Blog shares research-informed comment and opinion on educational issues in an accessible manner and is edited by a small team.
• NFER Blog offers up-to-date comment and analysis based on what research evidence shows on key educational issues.

Alerts
Rather than searching for news and information, there are services that you register with that send news on your chosen topic directly to you:

• Google Alerts set up alerts for Google to email you with new content from the web on your chosen topic.
• Education Endowment Foundation’s regular news alerts which you can register to receive by email.
• JournalTOCs is a large, free collection of Tables of Contents from academic journals. Sign up to receive alerts when new articles are published from a particular journal or on a topic.
• NFER email alerts include NFER Direct and blog notifications.

In addition to reading texts, you can find a wide range of visual and audio sources and media to learn more about education.

• Box of Broadcasts (BoB) is an on-demand TV and radio service and includes most major UK channels, including BBC, Channel 4 and Sky channels. Record programmes to watch back and create your own playlist. Find via LibrarySearch/Find Databases. Sign In with your CCCU log in details to register.
• Kanopy is a large, curated catalogue of over 30,000 educational documentaries and classic films. Browse the categories of Education Documentary and Teacher Education Development. Find via LibrarySearch/Find Databases.
• Teachers TV from Education in Video provides access to 3530 instructional videos from DfE in 2008 for trainee teachers. Find via LibrarySearch/Find Databases.
• University of Oxford podcasts from its Department of Education.
• TED Talks (Education) shares videos and discussions “exploring the latest thinking on how to build a better school”.

There are lots of websites for teachers which provide lesson ideas and downloadable resources. Remember to always check the copyright of items that you want to use. Here are some suggested sites to look at – you will be able to find many more!

• ActionAidschool resources on humanitarian issues.
• BBC Teach thousands of free curriculum-mapped videos, arranged by age-group and subject.
• BookTrust recommends and reviews books to get children reading, plus news and articles.
• Books for Keeps is an independent children's book magazine, offering hundreds of reviews and interviews with authors and illustrators.
• British Library a great collection of online resources. View unique collection items and read expert commentary.
• Christian Aid offers educational teaching resources for schools.
• CLPE Teaching Resources offers teaching resources to improve teaching and learning of language, vocabulary, reading a writing from early years to Year 7.
• NRICH mathematics resources for early years, primary and secondary from the University of Cambridge's Faculty of Mathematics.
• STEM learning thousands of free-to-access, quality-assured resources to support the teaching and learning of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects.
• Teaching Ideas and Twinkl both offer resources, games and activities across many subjects.