Mr Benjamin Taylor

Senior Lecturer in Education Studies / Early Childhood Studies

Ben Taylor is a senior lecturer in the Cass School of Education and Communities. He teaches on the Early Childhood Studies and Education Studies programmes. He is module leader for ED4034 (Pedagogy: Supporting Development in the Early Years) and its distance learning equivalent. Ben's research interests include looked after children, unaccompanied asylum seeking children and virtual schools.

ED 5.04, Stratford Campus
Cass School of Education and Communities
Stratford Campus
Water Lane
London
E15 4LZ
b.taylor2@uel.ac.uk

Summary

Ben Taylor has been working at UEL since November 2014. His career started though in teaching children and he worked for 10 years in various roles in three different primary schools in Kent, including one Pupil Referral Unit During this time he completed his Masters degree with a particular focus on specialist teaching in Physical Education and research on the effectiveness of ability setting in Key Stage 2, and the role of competition and cooperation in PE. From there he spent three years as a Study Support Manager as part of the now closed, Playing for Success initiative. This project saw study centres opening at sports grounds all around the country, offering an innovative curriculum of extended services for schools, children and families, all based around sport. Ben's centre at Kent County Cricket Club had a particular focus on engaging with vulnerable children and offering engaging activities to develop motivation, confidence and self-esteem. His next role, and the one he held until he came to UEL, was as Assistant Head Teacher of Virtual School Kent. A virtual school is a multi-agency team supporting health and education outcomes for looked after children (so not a physical school). Ben's role, as AHT was to work with schools, foster carers and social workers to ensure that the children in East Kent had the necessary support and resources to do as well as they possibly could. He also had responsibility for the outcomes for unaccompanied asylum seeking children. These varied experiences have been important in my move to UEL as the Early Childhood and Education degrees cover such a wide range of topics.

Accreditations

Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Prince 2 Project Management Practitioner

Quality Mark Assessor for primary schools, early years settings and extended services providers

Overview

I am currently studying for my Doctorate of Philosophy. This relates to my previous area of work: the support for looked after children. Specifically the research that I am undertaking focusses on the allocation of the looked after children pupil premium funding. This was a policy of the coalition government and has been continued under the current Conservative government. Pupil premium is additional funding paid to schools to help close the attainment gap between children looked after by local authorities and their non-looked after peers. My research focuses on how this funding is used, how effectively schools and local authorities use it, and how they know it has been successful.

Collaborators

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Research

Publications

Funding

Interests

Portfolio

I am the module leader for ED4034 - Pedagogy: Supporting Development in the Early Years, both on campus and the distance learning equivalent. I also teach on other modules, across the different levels and including both Early Childhood Studies and Education Studies.