Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to (a) ensure that teacher training is using a trauma-informed approach to educating new teachers and (b) assess the adequacy of the delivery of that approach.

The mandatory initial teacher training (ITT) Core Content Framework (CCF) (2019) sets out the minimum entitlement of knowledge, skills and experiences that all trainees need to enter the profession in the best position possible to teach and support their pupils. This core content must be covered in full for all ITT courses that lead to Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). A link to the framework can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/974307/ITT_core_content_framework_.pdf.

It is for accredited ITT providers to incorporate the CCF into curriculum that are appropriate to the needs of trainees, and to adapt them for the subject, phase and age range that the trainees will be teaching.

ITT courses must be designed so that, by the end of the course, teacher trainees can demonstrate that they meet all the Teachers’ Standards at the appropriate level. This includes Teachers’ Standard 5, which requires teachers to respond to the strengths and needs of all pupils and to have a secure understanding of how a range of factors can inhibit pupil’s ability to learn, and how best to overcome these.

Following the award of QTS, all early career teachers are entitled to a two year induction underpinned by the Early Career Framework (ECF). In 2023, the department undertook a review of the CCF and ECF, and in January 2024, the new ITTECF was published. From September 2025, this new framework combines and replaces the CCF and ECF into one framework, which sets out the training entitlement during ITT and the two year induction. The department worked closely with the Education Endowment Foundation to ensure the ITTECF is framed around the best available evidence of what defines great teaching. Trauma informed practice is an emerging field of research and the evidence base is still developing.

The quality of ITT provision is assessed through Ofsted’s routine inspections of accredited ITT providers. Ofsted provide critical and independent quality assurance of all ITT provision that leads to QTS.