Doing a PGCE with young child

[liltshake]

Has anyone done this? My son is just 3. How did you find it?

Following as I am wondering about doing the same thing from September 2026 when my little boy will be 3yrs 8months. Wondering whether to go for it or delay until the year after when he is at school. I also have a daughter who will be 6 when I am hoping to start.

hoping for some useful insights…

I did it.
Most tiring year of my life.

@MrsKeats can you expand on that a little? What did your typical day look like? Did you manage to have days ‘off’ with your child or were you preoccupied with studying or planning? Thanks

My DH did his when our eldest was a baby. I really wouldn't recommend it, he hardly saw her. The first year or two of teaching are enormously time consuming. I couldnt have got through it with small children.

Did it while my DD was 7 and DS was 12. Was difficult. Long days, no time at weekends. At least you get holiday together. You will have to accept that you won't be spending a lot of time with them for 9 months.

Ended up leaving teaching after 2 years as I never spent any time with them, and I felt like I was slipping away from the family. But that's a different post altogether!

Did it when mine were at school (twins age 5).

It's very long days. You are observing/teaching while in school and then you have preparation for lessons on top of that and you also need to do your academic reading and write your essays.

Some pgces require a project/extended essay as well which is a substantial amount of work.

You need a lot of support at home.

Very long days.
Uni work as well as teaching work,
So much to know.
It's very hard and tiring.
A lot depends on whether you have a good mentor for school placements too.

I didn’t do it with a small child but friends did and it looked so hideously hard. If you are set on teaching, I suggest looking at school-based training. There’s still a lot of additional work but you’re not trying to split yourself in quite the same way, and I believe it has the advantage that you spend most of your time in the same school (normally one additional placement somewhere else) whereas on my PGCE I had 3 placements, and each could have been quite far away.

Good luck!

Single parent to young teens at the time. Horrific. I didn't manage to complete it. Subject teacher went off sick on day two so I was planning and teaching from the start, as well as after school meetings, parents evenings, after school clubs, break supervisions. Then home to write essays and write reports on your planning and teaching. Easily a 70 hour week, plus a long commute, as they can send you anywhere.

@daffodilandtulip the class teacher on my final placement was off with stress before I even got started! They ended up hiring long term supply to be in the room babysitting me. As it happens it was all fine, but didn’t give me a great impression of the career 🙄.

Lost a third of my hair, took 6 months after completion to feel myself again. Missed 10 months of my DC growing up.

I was a lone parent at the time with a lot of support but even those living at home with parents and no commitments found it incredibly hard.

During the Easter break I decided not to teach after graduation. It was a waste of a year.

Hardest year of my life and my children were 8 and 12 at the time.

Absolutely no way. As previous posters have said, the hours required per week are massive. And if you make it and start teaching, the hours won't be much better. You'll never see your DC.

@QueenOfWeeds I just had the deputy pop his head in now and again because apparently that's supervision. If they can't support students learning then they won't be supporting you in your career so no thanks.

My friend did it. It was a challenge. What kind of network do you have around you - any parents who can help with childcare or nursery pick up?

Do not under-estimate how exhausting classroom work is. You do a full day at school and then come home and mark and lesson plan. Can you manage that and still deal with small kids.

Do you have a DH who can do all the childcare, drop-offs and pick-ups? If not, I wouldn’t consider it as logistically it would be a nightmare.

I did it with a five year old as a single parent 25 years ago. It was hard going and I needed a village to get me through it. Knowing what the programme involves now and the rigours of the ECF for new teachers, I wouldn't recommend it unless you are hyper focused and organised.

Thanks everyone! Just the answers I expected to be honest. I have a very supportive partner but we can’t really afford full time nursery and I don’t want to spend that much time away from my son.

@DJSteves im not exactly hyper focused and organised! 😂

I have to add, that although I don't teach now, and that training year was the hardest year of my life - I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

I miss teaching everyday. I dream about it often.

I can't teach, because there are too many battles I am not prepared to fight. But many do. And many cope and many thrive.

You don't know what you can achieve till you try, and if you've got a supportive partner you're a lot further along than many.

Good luck op x

If you really want to explore teaching, I’d recommend going for an unqualified class teacher role (they do exist!) and doing school based training such as the TES Assessment Only route which takes a couple of years. Definitely do some research as there’s other options too. May as well continue to earn a salary whilst learning on the job, plus no difficult essays. There may be assignments but it’s not as heavy as the stress of a PGCE (I did TES route, DP did PGCE).

I did a part time PGCE over 18 months, it might be worth looking into that option?

I did a PGCE long before having children, and no one I knew on the course had them either. Even then, most of us were highly stressed from the workload and felt insane relief in the holidays and when it ended. A significant number of people dropped out due to the workload.

I left teaching after 3 years (again, long before I had children) because I found the stress and work-life balance too much. I was in school 8-5 every day, going home with another hour or two of work each night and usually spending another half or whole day at the weekend working as well. Parents evenings, school events, training courses, staff meetings etc would all take away from my after school time for marking and planning, putting more pressure on the other days. In the holidays, at least one day would be just flat out catching up and another would be trying to get ahead on planning. Easter holidays at least 2-3 days just to write annual reports. I'd just started dating my now husband and I'm surprised he stuck around with my lack of availability and the fact I was always knackered on the weekend.

The workload obviously decreases as your career goes on, as you already have planning and routines etc in place. But looking at my friends now who are 10 years in and juggling childcare and teaching, I don't regret my choice to leave ever.