I trained secondary PE, but my first job was KS2 Y6 teacher; I was teaching maths, English, science, history, geography, art, oh and a bit of PE too! I absolutely loved it. I would say go for it, but be selective in the first job you take. Don’t get desperate and accept something you don’t really want.
I can’t imagine doing anything else (although I now teach secondary OP).

Its a great job as long as its right for you (i guess like most) But if its not for you then it can be a very very hard job.

Most people who bleat on about the easy life teachers have are just jealous of the hols, as which any job you get the highs and lows.
The best bit of the job is working with the kids in the classroom; there is a lot of mince that gets tagged along.

Unfortunately there is an abnormally high divorce rate in teaching, and alcohol use is high and high early mortality rate in teaching. Anyone who tells you its not a stressful job really knows SFA.

Get into classroom and see how you get on a bit of work experience you might love it more than you think, or realise it’s just not for you. Try and find out before you fully commit to any course.

no male teachers in my kids primary.. wiggy birkett did me proud can you fill his hair piece?

apart from the obvious flamings by the usual suspects, this is a brilliant example of how excellent STW can be to help people out!

Thanks to all for your advice etc. I’m thinking that, come Jan I’ll take a morning a week off into a school and do a couple of full weeks (holiday year stars in Jan and only have 2.5 days left).

take the point on board about it being a possible knee-jerk to recent events, but hope time in a school will prove that wrong.

The more i think about it and the more encouragement I get, the more its enthusing me!

Thanks again to all

I love being a teacher, I was a plasterer before which had nothing near the stress levels…however,the good times (99%) are so far ahead of the few embuggerances,that the odd inspection, bout of depute powerplay, 30 higher essays in my bag as we speak, are just part of it.

Project..you DO realise teachers are mostly civil servants,don’t you? 😀

Ming t m put all the negatives into one short sentence very well, but as a Primary Head they are half the challenge. Good schools are a very positive place to work despite the pressures. The hardest part is seeing some of the very sad lives our young people have to live with. As funding changes I am concerned that some school staff will spend more and more time dealing with these issues than ‘teaching’… But the best schools will deploy staff in a response to this. Specialist roles are now not just found in secondary schools, maybe a Primary could look to reinvigorate their curriculum with a History ( or other area) specialist teacher.

You could also look at other routes in to the profession: as mentioned work as a TA for a year. I have just employed a TA who retrained as a GTP. She is fantastic.

Get into a school, then a different one and then another. See if you like it then DO IT!

Yes and no, this was the answer I would get when I asked teachers about the profession where I worked.
I’ve just started a PGCE after working in a DT department for 3 years, I really enjoyed working with the children and in the classroom, it can be great fun if you are in an area that you are passionate about and the ideas that would come out of the children were inspiring. As for the holidays, boy do you need them, anyone that moans about how long and often teachers holidays are has probably never worked with children in that way, it’s full on under pressure all day, you need to be on your toes and on top of things, perform everyday and get the best exam results you can at the end of the year.
As mentioned get into schools to get experience but not just in the classroom find out about lesson plans, schemes of work, H&S issues, school policy’s etc., coming from a practical subject the amount of paperwork, information, assignments, reading lists and lectures that have been thrown at me in my first week is very daunting and the terminology used will have you reading everything 2 or 3 times trying to work out what the hell they are on about! I have a headache just thinking about it now. I’m 44 and it’s hard to adjust to studying and the resulting change in lifestyle, it’s 10 years since I was in that environment, so the sooner you do it the better!