Teaching Methods in the UK

The UK Education system encourages self-study, discussions and practical work. The students may have time tabled classes or might be encouraged to do more of independent work for a substantial amount of time depending on the course.

Most of the courses would include the following teaching methods:

Lectures

Lectures serve to guide the students through the course material by explaining the main points of a topic and introduce new topics for study or debate. The size of the class is generally large often up to 100 students. The main advantage of this method of teaching is that the students get up-to-date information that might not be there in the text books and are provided with the core material for a subject area.

Seminars The seminars provide a platform to the students for sharing their views on a given topic. The students are told in advance about a topic and are required to prepare a presentation on it. The discussions that take place around the presentation often helps students to understand a topic better and help students to develop their communication skills.

Tutorials Tutorials give you focused guidance on a particular topic. The students meet with the professors individually to discuss their concerns about the topic that they have undertaken and thus seek individual guidance.

Practical Work The objective of this method of teaching is to give the student practical experience of theories that they learn in classes and to develop practical skills to help prepare for future careers. Practical work may be done individually or as part of a group.

Work Place Training In some courses the students spend some time away from their classes working in employment related to their course of study. This gives them the global exposure of the market.

Independent Study This is an important part of studying in the UK. Students investigate a topic in detail and develop their own views about it. This usually involves working individually or in a small group with other students to research a topic and produce written work or make presentation for a seminar.

Written Work This may include essays, projects, dissertations or assignments. These may be assessed and given grades.

Assessments The assessment may be in the form of essays, projects, dissertations, workshops, portfolios, presentations, performance in practical sessions or exams which can be either an open book test or closed book depending on the course.

Plagiarism A word of caution: This is a very important for students not to copy other people's work. In the UK doing this can result in students not being allowed to graduate. Plagiarism means presenting someone else抯 work as one's own without acknowledging the source or referencing. Advice is normally given on this in most programmes but, if not, you should check with your tutor for an acceptable way of referencing. All UK institutions treat Plagiarism as a very serious issue.