PGCE vs GTP with 2 small children

[trackies]

Hi,

I have worked in IT for 15 years and thinking about a re-training as a secondary maths teacher in a couple of years time. I would like to start training when my children are both at school, to give myself a chance of passing. By then my children will be aged 6 and 4. I will be 41.

My question is, with 2 small children, would a PGCE or a GTP be better? I know that with a GTP that you are thrown in at the deep end, but a PGCE is also extremely demanding. I'm not worried about the financial differences. I know that GTP is financially better. I just want to give myself the best chance of coping and passing whilst having a family.

There are 2 GTPs within 10 miles of where I live, whereas I would have AT LEAST 1 hour commute to London Uni's for a PGCE. Univeristy of Hertfordshire also does a part-time PGCE but it is 35 miles away, so approx 1 hour commute by car. DH thinks I should go for a GTP as we have a GT Partnership within 10 mins walk of home. So the time i save on commuting could be spent on studying/working if I managed to get offered a place.

Any advice on which route would be better for someone with children, would be great.

Thanks.

With two small children you really need to go down the route of less commuting.

If you do a PGCE with an hours commute as well you'll never see your kids during the week.

As you probably know, the GTP is really hard to get into. If your GT partnership is able to find you a school that will support you, I would go for that one. There is no guarantee of a job afterwards (nor with the PGCE) but training 'on the job' gives you a much better idea as to what teaching is all about.

GTP would give you more stability to plan around for childcare and so on. You have much longer placements in one place and therefore know what to expect (as much as you ever do in teaching) from one week to another.

I took the PGCE route myself and found the university based sections to be very useful to me overall (however I didn't until I had been teaching a few years and had stopped worrying so much about what I am doing, planning, long term plans and so forth and could actually take the time to be a reflective practitioner and started to build in more of the pedagogical grounding I'd been taught into my plans and schemes of learning).

The university sections are generally very flexible and with young kids they will do their damnedest to get you a close by posting. I had an hours commute every day to my 2 schools in Bristol (both being very close to the Uni) whereas others without kids (or with older kids) had to go to schools in Wales, Devon and even Cornwall.

The other advantage of the PGCE that I found was the support you got from fellow students. We set up a support website that functioned for a couple of years after we graduated where we shared best practice, moaned at each other and generally gave each other support. This was very useful after our first uni section where we all went our separate ways and were thrown in the deep end.

I personally preferred the PGCE route myself but I think in terms of the feel and suitability that this is an individual thing. If stability for long term planning is what you need the GTP is more likely to suit you... but I still work until 7pm some nights at school 9 years into teaching but that is because I can't work as easily at home. If you find you can work after the kids are in bed (mild ME causes me to crash after I relax so often my way of coping is to keep going at work and then crash when I get home) then the option that will get you home to do so will be best.

I don't think you really need to be worried about having a better chance of passing with one route over the other.

I would recommend going for whatever fits in best with family life. It sounds like the GTP is more practical for you.