Career change to a TA

[happytiredmummy]

I've worked for years for the same company doing something that pays ok, but i'm pretty bored of. I'm a single parent to two children and feel like my twenties have been taken up with being a mother and now is my chance to retrain into something I want to do. Has anyone ever retrained as a teaching assistant? Did you go down the route of an apprenticeship or volunteer in a school first? Also if further down the line I wanted to become a teacher is that something I could also do? I have decent GCSES 10 A-C's

Hello. I'm a teacher but I was a TA for four years before. I never "trained" for my roles and had no childcare qualification. I did have a good degree but that was it. I would start looking at the local council website and applying now! Try and volunteer in a school for a few hours to get some experience but I wouldn't worry too much about qualifications. Be warned though- although the holidays are good, the pay isn't. As a TA your pay is divided by 12 to cover you over holidays so is less. My last position (in London) was about £950 a month. It is a great job though! I think I preferred it to teaching if I'm honest!

P.s. Regarding the teacher part- you would need a degree first. Then it's a year to train or you can apply for a teaching degree which is three or four years. The training on the job can happen but you have to have a degree first and then you work towards a postgraduate qualification whilst working in a school. There are lots of pathways but you do need a degree.

I worked as a TA while I did an OU degree then by that time my school valued me enough to keep me on and support me to do my ITT while still working at the school and now I’m a teacher there - if you can find a friendly school and work really hard it’s a good way to do it.

I'm a TA at my children's school. I have no directly relevant qualifications past my degree and being a parent. I don't currently have plans to become a teacher as the TA job fits in with my family. As Stardustmoon says, the pay isn't good. At all. It's a good thing I'm not doing it for the money!

I've also heard from some people that some schools overwork TAs and treat them like skivvies; it's not my experience so far but it's worth being aware of it. Either way, it's important to go in with no illusions that it's an easy job reading with glowing children delighted to learn with you.

Definitely be aware that a lot of schools are using TA as a cheap way to cover for teacher absence/non contact planning time on a regular basis etc, leaving you taking the whole class and effectively having to teach them.
Certainly it's not the level of responsibility that a lot of our TAs went into the (badly paid) job for.

Every one of our TAs also works in the before and after school clubs as well as doing being a mid day supervisor too, to make enough money.

I am delighted by your username, Max!

The pay is appalling. What you see advertised is prorata. Most holiday is unpaid.

Everyone of our tas has a degree. And it has been that way for ten years.

If you want a career id suggest going to the local college to discuss options. Last time i was there the courses woman was telling me about a HR job there, which was term time only too. And it was significantly better than TA pay!

@CommanderShepard Thanks.

Try to volunteer first because the realities of the job are sometimes different from what you think they might be. I have volunteered in a primary for almost a decade. I do it because I love it and I don't need to work luckily.

First I had to undergo a volunteering in school course provided by the school, mainly covering things like safeguarding and disclosure, policies (first aid being a huge one) then confidentiality/professionalism, reading with some children so they can see your interaction skills.

I do have a degree and maths and English GCSEs. Both my children attended the school so I was already known by some staff as I started when Ds2 started reception.

LSAs (Learning Support Assistants, the new name for our TAs) are often asked to be cover supervisors so basically a teacher for non-core subjects so PE, geography, tech etc. There is an increase in pay of about £1 per hour so a couple of quid a day. The take home pay for LSAs is paltry but the benefits are no childcare costs.

Once you are in a school you can see that LSAs have little responsibility outside of the classroom and can leave at the end of a school day, teacher's days are much longer, often starting before 8 and ending after 5 or 6.

Responsibilities vary from, generally supporting learning within the classroom, doing intervention work with small groups or 1 to 1, display boards, photocopying, trimming sheets so they fit into their books etc. School trips both day trips and 1-2 night residential trips means you probably won't even make minimum wage as you'll work through your unpaid lunch and possibly before or after the normal start time.

But, I keep doing it because I love it. The school are fantastic, the staff are wonderful and go above and beyond for the children, and the children are fab.