Advice on finding a Teaching Assistant role in primary schools

[PensAndPanic]

Hi everyone,
I'm hoping someone can offer some advice.
I'm trying to find a Teaching Assistant position in a primary schools, but I'm struggling to get my foot in the door. I've applied for vacancies online and have also contacted local schools directly to ask about opportunities, but unfortunately I haven't received any replies.
I'm really keen to work in a school and would love to gain experience, but I'm not sure what else I should be doing.
Has anyone been in a similar position? Are there any agencies you'd recommend, or are there certain times of year when schools tend to recruit more Teaching Assistants? I would like to start in September if possible.
Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

What are you currently doing for employment. TA jobs have got more competitive. You don’t mention if you have experience. Have you thought about midday supervisor route 1st to get experience. Although midday supervisors have limited wages. Many TAs were midday and allows the school to get to know you. Have you a min level 2 qualification? Volunteering at schools is not as easy as it used to be due to dbs and insurance as well as they need to be confident about confidentiality. If you have a relevant qualification already then signing up with agencies might lead to a permanent position. You could try https://mynewterm.com

My advice - run for the hills 🏃‍♀️.

Most TAs are SEN support and you need experience of this. Often essential

Have you done the qualifications?
have you been volunteering?

Many TAs are former teachers or have education degrees these days

Do you have any relevant qualifications?

They’re like gold dust in DC’s school as they’re term time and school hours. its also an indie so the TA role is still the traditional class helper; reading, setting up activities, supervising breaks, doing arts and crafts and activities. They’re all mostly really overqualified for the roles, but don’t want a FT teaching role.

In state schools, they’re all pretty much SEN support now; is this what you are looking for?

Volunteer for a couple of terms until a post comes up. Just a couple of hours a week listening to kids read etc. Also the midday supervisor route, as suggested. If you don’t have a degree, you could do an apprenticeship into a TA role, schools often use this route as it pays peanuts.

As someone who’s done it I do not recommend it!!!
But assuming you don’t have any classroom experience your best bet is to either volunteer or become a lunch monitor and get your foot in the door that way.
Any experience with Sen children will also help

I always see this on MN but it must be area dependent. I've worked with many TAs and I think one has been degree educated. We also don't get loads of applicants despite being a fairly desirable school.

A lot of ours are employed through agencies.

Can be school dependent too. Having worked as an agency TA in lots of different schools and contexts, it wasn’t unusual for pretty much all the TAs to have degrees in the more affluent schools.

I have one myself, but I’m done with the role now.

Thank you for all the responses.
I have a degree in Education and have done TA part-time before. I am currently working as a nanny, so I do have experience looking after children. I have noticed that most TA positions are for SEN areas, which I unfortunately do not have experience in. I want to get some full-time experience in a classroom before starting a PGCE (with QTS).