Tutoring while having 2 small children - any experience?

[dycey]

Very grateful for any sharing of tips / experience.

I am a Primary school teacher with 6 years experience. Currently on matnity leave with my second baby. I went back part time (2 days) after my first child and still have a job in a great primary school... Inner city London, brilliant place, outstanding, nice teachers, amazing kids etc... I am now a cover teacher.

Although I am aware how lucky I am to have a 2 day a week peremanent position I find the prospect of returning to work in the summer quite hard and want to consider alternatives. Aside from the wrench of leaving my baby (have done it once so I know what it means), need to find childcare, balancing home work etc, earning not enough for childcare blah blah.

Wondering about trying to Tutor instead.

We live in West London (hammersmith, sheep bush, west Kensington) and I have experience of teaching key stage one and two, am qualified in key staff 2 and English for key stage 3 (funny middle school qualification).

How much do you think I could earn?
Will most uptake be for coaching for private schools? How would I get experience of teaching for the tests? Anyone got any tips on this?
Would all work be after school? Weekends?
Does anyone have any experience of finding childcare for sporadic work? I have a toddler and a baby.

Very grateful if anyone has any ideas for me.

I know I would be giving up a pension and a salary and paid holidays. I know it's only 2 days a week but I did find it quite tough last time (2 long days away from my kid and wonder if more self employment could work better for me). Am I deluded? Is tutoring quite hard???

Thanks in advance!

You could earn as much as you are prepared to do. You decide what hours you do. In London you are well placed to build up a thriving clientele. At least while your own children are young you won't need to worry about leaving them for a whole day at a time. Work from home maybe?
Teaching for tests is just plenty of practice and making sure you have past papers to hand. Good luck

I'm not sure what you could earn in London, I suspect more than I charge in the NW (between £25 and £30 an hr for GCSE/A-level). You will find that most tuition will be after school and weekends unless you get home educated students. Some childminders will take on baby sitting, could you OH not help you out with this? You would have to register as self employed. Tutoring can be difficult, it depends on the student/family. I'm not a primary specialist so I don't know that market too well.

Thank you for your responses - I am attracted to the self employment side of things but agree with cat64 about the downsides. Sure these are also true.

Hard to weigh up!

Dm started tutoring when we were aged between about 4 and 11. She would tutor in the dining room and we knew that except for emergency she wasn't to be disturbed. She always made sure she had 10-15 minutes between people so she could check we were okay.

I'd have thought unless you can do 11+ in your area there might not be enough people in it. It also takes time to build up people by reputation. Dm started with only 1-2 people. She finds it fluctuates, so it's not going to give you a guaranteed income, and summer holiday she rarely does any. Some years she'll have 10-12 people, some coming more than once a week, other years maybe only a couple of regulars and a couple of fortnightly, or as they need it.
But being a maths tutor going up to degree level she can be fairly choosy.

You could try advertising and see how you get on. If you seems to be getting enough interest then you could consider jacking your job in, possibly going on supply work to suppliment it. Or you may be able to see that it isn't financially viable.

Don't forget to work out tax though when you're looking at it financially.

Thank you DeWe. At least being in London there are so many people and there's always the 11plus to aim at. However I am rubbish at weighing up the financial side vs the being with my kids side . It might be a real headache to tutor, with it being so bitty and fluctuating etc... On the other hand, from where I am at the moment it seems a good way to avoid being parted for long days from my baby.

Considering childminding too or doing school pickups etc for cash as that way I don't need to pay for child care. But obviously this is all worse for my career than staying in school.

Not sure I really care about that at the moment - never was much of a career teacher and feel that going down to 2 days a week has been a bit of a nail in the coffin for my career anyway!

All opinions very welcomed and thanks to those who have offered thoughts.

You could find out about marking opportunities for KS2 SATS but this only works if you like marking!

Depending on your degree subject/ area of expertise you could try one of the pre-school education franchise type activities e.g. baby signing, craft activities, or music with mummy and run a class at a local hall. The advantage is that dcs can come too and you don't need childcare! This may work out longer term than tutoring.

Experienced tutors round here (London outskirts) charge £35 per hour. (But you might need to charge a little less to build up a client list fast. Then once you feel very confident and have a track record of success, add new clients at a higher rate.) They do anything from catch up work with children who are falling behind in literacy and numeracy, to 11+ or common Entrance prep. Much of the prep is to bring pupils on so that they are comfortable working a couple of years ahead of State Nat Av targets, as they need to be level 5 by end of yr 5 to be in with a chance of selective education.

Nearly all your work will be between 4-8pm each evening, or at weekends, as obv, they're at school during the day. If that fits with your other commitments it is probably quite lucrative. One tutor I know books assessments during holidays, which is a clever way of keeping the money coming in during the quiet months.