New career as teacher?

[baconsandwich]

Am thinking of retraining as primary school teacher. Am 45. Am I mad? Anyone else out there taken the plunge at this age? Do they even want mature teachers anyway?

Do a search on here, your question has been asked and answered a lot of times.
The job market in Primary is ferocious at the moment.

I would look at how many vacancies there are in the area you want to teach. The number of primary jobs out there at the moment is not great.

It is not impossible to get a job but you will need to be fanastic and lucky.

Why would she be insane, teaching is a great career, if you can get a job.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/1309995-Thinking-of-switching-careers-to-become-a-teacher-thoughts
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/employment_issues/1249429-Thinking-of-re-training-as-a-teacher-would-love-to-hear-from-teachers-who-are-Mums-x-post
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/primary/1249427-Thinking-of-re-training-as-a-teacher-would-love-to-hear-from-teachers-who-are-Mums
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1148869-To-consider-quitting-my-job-and-training-to-be-a-teacher

Just a few to get you started.
Unless you are prepared to work very long hours and struggle to find a first post and enter a profession with a very high drop-out rate and one that is very child-unfriendly and inflexible, I'd think twice.
Why a primary teacher? What is making you think of it now?

What other skills do you have to offer a school once you have trained? Sports, MFL, Music?
Many teachers now have a Masters degree on entry.

Don't be fooled into thinking it's an easy job with short days and long holidays - if you want to do it becasue you truly want to then don't be put off but the reality is that it fits in a lot less with family than a lot of jobs - yes you get school holidays off but there are inset days and you have to do a lot of planning etc which takes up a lot of time at the weekends and holidays. Also you have to be in school generally by 8 or before so there is still childcare to be considered and IME few CMs will take DC before 8 or charge a lot extra for the pleasure - also you will not be able to just walk out of the door at 3 o'clock so you need to have after school pick up - admittedly for less long than some jobs but then there are meetings and other commitments that can go on well into the evening. You will never be available for assemblies and school plays as you will be working in your school and you can't take a day's holiday in termtime to look after DCs, dental appointments or other calls on your time - you can only have holidays in term time so you will always have to pay top whack on your holidays and you can't be 'flexible' .Childcare is slightly easier if you teach in your DCs school but that produces a whole lot of other problems in itself - wouldn't recommend it myself. And there's the whole thing about teaching a ghstly class of difficult kids then having to deal with your own tired and grumpy DC when you get home - not everyday but it does happen.
BUT I love teaching and wouldn't do any other job- God knows I've often thought about it on a bad day - if you feel you want to do it becasue you really want to teach then I'd say definitely go for it, it is a sort of vocation, if you are doing it because you think it might be anice thing to fit in with a family forget it now!
Go and get some experience in your local primary school helping out and tell them you're interested in becoming a teacher and talk to them- try a few schools each one is different. The PGCE is a gruelling year and hard work so if you're not cut out or committed you won't get through it anyway.
If I haven't put you off then you should become a teacher because all this shouldn't matter a jot if it's what you really want to do it - you can always fo supply work untill you get a job - it's a good way of getting a toe in when a position opens up and you'll have a good idea if it's a school you want to work in too. Good luck and welcome to the club.

I don't know whether many teachers join the profession with an MA, although many PGCE courses offer partial credit towards and MA.

Another way of looking at it is that teaching is one of the most rewarding professions out there, if you need to you can oftenleave work at 4pm which makes it very child friendly, flexible working hours - you can come home early and catch up when the children go to bed, you have the long holidays, decent pay and a great pension - although as a late entrant this is limited.

But it must be said that you teach in a lovely school Molly, is it private?
A lot of the jobs with less competition are in very challenging schools and leaving at 4pm would be frowned on by all of the schools I've worked in unless it was a one-off.

No I do not teach in a private school, and whilst I would not claim to be teaching in an inner city school I have done my fair share, and still felt that teaching was a great job. In all the schools I have worked in staff have left at 4pm if they needed to. As long as you get your work done, it does not matter where you do it, unless it is a parents evening.

All the schools I've worked in, currently a leafy one, have expected you in by 8am and not leaving before 5pm. A teacher constantly leaving at 4 would be considered as not acceptable, and it would be mentioned by SMT.
What with staff meetings, clubs, extra key stage meetings and uploading data to computers, along with all the other bits that are part of the job, I don't see how leaving at 4pm is possible even if you take marking and planning home.

I am retraining and am 45 this year
Consider GTP as well, you train on the job and get a salary and loads of experience
Is hard work but amazingly rewarding. Am scared about getting a job though.

I start at 8.15 and leave at around 5, although in a recent placement staff seemed to leave earlier and I was often last in. I plan most evenings and weekends.

But yes I agree that it is quite likely that you will need to start in quite a challenging school as they have much more staff mobility. But if you can hack it that is no bad thing and sets you up for a very successful career.

On a more general note schools offer different challenges. On the whole I do not face many behaviour challenges, although that is also because I am quite a senior member of staff and I am quite old. I would hope that after a decade in the classroom I could get the buggers to behave. However there is a lot of pressure to get results, particularly those A* and they write so much because they are not messing about. My marking load is far greater than it was in a challenging school. I am also expected to be on top form every lesson, whereas a challenging school was much more forgiving. However I would 100% recommend teaching to anyone, especially with a family.

Most data entry can be done from home, I have this afternoon entered in my mock exam marks from home, rather than staying late on Friday to do so. I did not say that everyone left at 4pm, just that if you needed to you could. I am at work for about 7-7:30 and leave between 6 and 6:30 pm, but that is because my children are older and tend to be in clubs and so on and I live almost next door to where I teach. Lots of our staff with young children leave at 4pm and nothing is ever made of it. When it comes to revision classes I always volunteer to do them afterschool so that colleagues with young children can leave early.

I think there is much more paperwork in primary than secondary. I do very little paperwork and I don't spend that much time in the holidays working either. This half term I will work two whole days. The first two years are very difficult but I think that is the case for most professional careers.

Do you teach secondary Molly? All the talk of A* is confusing me.

I started my PGCE aged 48, and celebrated my 50th halfway through my NQT year last year. If I had known before I started the hours I would be working, I would not have done it. But I'm glad I didn't know, because I love the job. I feel v selfish though because my youngest DC, who is 8, is unhappy that she sees less of me than she did before I changed jobs. However, I figured our generation is likely to end up working til nearly 70, and I would rather be doing something meaningful than be in my old higher paid, shorter hours but rather pointless job. It is a fantastic job, but don't underestimate the workload.

molly you sound a lovely colleague

Yes I do teach secondary, maybe we just work much less than primary teachers. Maybe the OP should consider secondary teaching.

Ninah I can be a right grumpy cow if you pinch my coffee or leave my classroom a mess.

I retrained when only a few years younger than you.

(I could say that I have been running away from my vocation for the last 20 years....)

Finding a first job is ferociously competitive. I was REALLY lucky and found one through personal recommendation, though it is quite a challenging school and I commute a LONG way. I teach not quite full time, which makes it marginally more family-friendly, and I have a head who doesn't care what time we arrive or leave as long as the work gets done. I choose to work at home late in the evening (so I leave school promptly, pick up children, do lots of mum-taxi stuff, cook and eat supper and then work), while another member of staff never takes work home but is at school till late every evening. Other heads may encourage more 'presenteeism', it's an individual school culture thing. Obviously staff meeting night is a late one, and teachers in many schools are expected to run after-school clubs.

Think carefully about how you will manage while you train. Again, I was lucky enough to live within striking distance of one of the few places to offer a part-time Primary PGCE. A full-time PGCE is hard work and long hours. GTP and SCITT places are like gold-dust and for GTP in particular you need extensive previous experience in a school.

It depends on why you want to re-train. If you cannot imagine any other job, are prepared for hard work (it's no harder work or longer hours than e.g. a management job in a company which is what I did before - but it is 'lumpier' and takes over your life to a greater extent!), have good flexible childcare arrangements and there seem to be a realistic number of local teaching vacancies, go for it!

I wasn't criticising Molly, but one of the challenges in primary is the sheer range of subjects you have to teach, and research before you teach and plan for and make resources for that you often can't reuse for a few years
Secondary teachers work as hard, but differently I'm sure.