To career change to primary teaching?

Sorry - I was replying to this post and managed to clear the quote.

Teaching in secondary is challenging- not in primary. You can scale the pay scale by becoming slt.

Maybe. Maybe not.
What about the worry of seeing a 4 year old go home into an environment that you suspect is abusive but being unable to protect them? When concerns have been reported but nothing can be done because it’s all a bit vague (nothing disclosed, just a few things being said which don’t feel right, a couple of bits of odd behaviour, and parents where behaviour is ok on the surface but mum won’t say anything without glancing at dad and it all feels very ‘off’).

I don’t think you can guarantee you won’t worry in the same way.

@RedYellowGreenBlu Are you dead set on primary? I enjoy my secondary role. There are so many opportunities for career progression too.

Could have written this myself.

I switched career into primary teaching at 50. I think I may have posted on that other thread, can’t remember. There are many things that I’ve found fabulous about teaching:

• always being active
• being with children, really fun, lively and challenging
• great colleagues
• lots of variety

• PGCE year when I did almost nothing at all for the family - that was hard for them and hard for me (guilt, sense of wrong priorities).
• I have more sleepless nights than in any previous job ever. Usually related to emails from parents which quite often are dashed off in the heat of the moment or after some wine and can absolutely disappear into nothing or equally blow up into something horrendous.
• Extreme highs and lows - of emotion, of workload, of everything.

This isn’t a job I’d leap into again if I’m honest and certainly isn’t a job where your stress levels would be reduced.

High stress, high workload and lower wage though?

I love teaching but I work four days. I spend the fifth day working and still have to fit some into weekends and evenings, but it’s more manageable. Is it something you could consider- the pay is appalling but if you would love teaching we need all the teachers we can get!

A colleague of mine switched from corporate to teaching a few years back. They're now leaving teaching because they originally left corporate because they "didn't want to work 100 hour weeks anymore", and found they worked the same hours now.

If you're burning out, teaching is not for you. You will still have similar worries all day - that you didn't make the right call regarding a child, that litigation is brought against you, that some parent will take to social media or the press and your name will be mud. And you will do all of that for a pittance and zero autonomy.

I'm leaving teaching as soon as my mortgage is paid off if things carry on the way they are, even though I live and breathe the job. But even with meticulous organisation I am currently at the end of my capacity, both mentally and physically.

Teacher of a decade here and sounds like you need to volunteer but to actually ask to shadow a teacher aka don't go home at 3.30. See them assess, plan, resource and reply to "I'm just checking, not complaining" emails from parents.

Might be wrong, but I think the children obviously give me the satisfaction in my job but I feel like being able to make a to do list and finish it (i imagine hard deadlines in law but again i may be wrong) would give me ultimate job satisfaction right now. Therefore I never feel good enough because I know there's always something else I can be doing.

From what you say about your reasoning for wanting to leave law, I think you will just be changing the problems to a new situation but with less pay.

What is your teaching experience?

If you’ve been coping with the stress of a high stress corporate job like law or accountancy you’ll be fine. Go for it, you only live once!!

If up to half the children in a classroom are needing additional/different support to the universal offer, we surely need to be questioning the whole system.

Absolutely agree with this. So much need and so many parents wanting a bespoke experience for their child and blaming you when it doesn't look like they'd hoped. One person can only do so much.

I teach and don't often have big worries about it so don't find it stressful in that sense. I do very often think about it for many of my waking hours though - little niggles the minute I wake up, all evening, on Boxing Day or other times you'd expect I'd have forgotten about it. It's also a 'stressful in the moment' sort of job. Sometimes I have days of meetings/paperwork instead of being in class and I cannot believe how fresh I feel when I go home, even when having dealt with pretty heavy going stuff.

At present, the thing I find hardest is the levels of SEND in the classroom - can easily be 35-50% of children in the class needing adjustments. There is just so, so little support for them compared to even 5 years ago. If up to half the children in a classroom are needing additional/different support to the universal offer, we surely need to be questioning the whole system.

Have you thought about teaching law in a college or university? They will likely put you through your teaching qualification.

Sometimes change can be as good as a rest! If you’ve always wanted to do it and there is a route in for you and you can make it work financially. Why the hell not. You only live once and you can always return to law. Teaching is hugely dependent on what year group you teach, the ethos of the school and SLT - there can be positive teaching experiences. There are also private schools, international schools, boarding schools, village schools - it’s not all doom and gloom. Yes the workload is high but most experienced teachers can manage it and you have to be a person who is firm with their own boundaries. Engaging with children all day, planning what’s best for them and their education is going to be a lot more dynamic than drafting documents and client meetings - hopefully that’d be what you want! Best thing about teaching is your only ever a maximum of 7 weeks away from a break!!

I love my job. I'm part time in a good school about to go back after my second mat leave. It's definitely getting tough with higher needs coming through and less support and money to deal with it. Ultimately it comes down to your school. Many schools are toxic and they have very unhappy teachers. Get a good school and it can be great. It isn't family friendly though

Unless you have a young family at home and are the sole childcare for every school holiday! 😅 I’ve never recovered since I had my own kids too.

family of teachers here. Exceptionally challenging but incredibly rewarding. If it’s your calling, do it. Term time is exhausting but you do recover in between

I think if you're in any way burnt out, teaching will only make it worse

am burnt out

I would say that's the reason given by most people on leaving teaching.

I would seriously recommend you look at the Facebook page, 'Leave teaching: exit the classroom and thrive' and spend an evening reading some of the posts on there.

I think people need to go into teaching with their eyes wide open as it's a very different place to how many envisage it. I like working with and communicating with children; that feels like about 30% of the job.