Great teaching is a complex act that requires a balance of cognitive precision, high expectations, and effective emotional support. This is why the Science of Learning is the “Golden Thread” of the Great Teaching Toolkit (GTT), infused into every part of it – not just as a topic for teachers to study, but as the very method by which they learn.

Harnessing the science of learning for teacher growth

The GTT is built on a simple fact: the way teachers learn is very similar to the way pupils learn. So the GTT doesn’t just teach you about the Science of Learning; we harness it and infuse it into your professional development.

• Managing cognitive load: just as pupils need information in manageable steps free from extraneous ‘stuff’, the GTT’s Development Cycles break complex pedagogical theory into small, actionable chunks with instant links to classroom implementation. This ensures we don’t overwhelm a teacher’s working memory, while also bridging the knowing-doing gap quickly.
• Building mental models of great teaching: the GTT provides varied representations and visual models (such as videos and interactive tasks) to help teachers build their deep, flexible mental maps of what great teaching looks like in practice.
• Retrieval and spaced practice: rather than one-off training events, GTT members benefit from powerful reflection and feedback loops built in to their learning. By revisiting and retrieving new ideas over time, teachers can more effectively move from short-term inspiration to long-term classroom habit.

Sustaining the emotional engine

A diet of pure cognition is incomplete. If a learner – be they a student or a teacher – lacks motivation or feels unsupported, even the most evidence-based strategy is likely to fall flat. This is why the GTT leans into the emotional aspects of learning with equal scientific rigour.

Drawing on Self-Determination Theory, the GTT creates a high-trust environment that fosters:

• Competence: using personalised feedback tools and video reflection to provide a clear, non-judgmental reality check on progress, helping teachers see how well they’re doing, and feel both capable and successful.
• Autonomy: supporting teachers to build and exercise their professional agency to choose their own professional learning goals rather than imposing a top-down mandate.
• Relatedness: building a culture of mutual respect and shared expertise within teaching teams.

Why this matters for school and trust leaders

For senior leaders, the challenge with professional development is rarely the quality of ideas, but the gap between learning and lasting change in classrooms. By mirroring the science of learning in the design of professional development itself, the GTT directly addresses this implementation challenge. Structured, focused learning over time, combined with rapid links to classroom practice, makes it more likely that new approaches are adopted, adapted and sustained.

Crucially, this increases implementation fidelity not through compliance or monitoring, but because the learning experience is designed to align with how people actually learn. The result is professional learning that is not just more elegant in theory, but more reliable in practice, making meaningful impact more likely at scale.

Building true expertise from the ground up

By treating the cognitive and the emotional as two sides of the same coin, the GTT develops true teacher expertise. It provides the professional judgment to know when to push for cognitive challenge and when to dial up relational support. By practicing what we preach, the GTT ensures that professional learning is a scientifically grounded journey that mirrors the excellence we want to see in every classroom.

The Science of Learning isn’t just a set of findings from research; it is the underpinning architecture of the Great Teaching Toolkit itself. We recognise that for professional learning to change classroom practice, it must be delivered and experienced in a way that respects how the human brain actually works. By mirroring the cognitive and emotional strategies great teachers use with their pupils, the GTT makes professional learning a practical application of the science of learning.