Making it as a Teacher

How to Survive and Thrive in the First Five Years

Victoria Hewett

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780429951619
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Éducation
• Subtopic: Éducation générale

Teaching is a delightfully rewarding, wonderfully enlightening and diverse career. Yet, at present, teacher recruitment and retention are in crisis, with some of the most at risk of leaving the profession being those in their early years of teaching. Making it as a Teacher offers a variety of tips, anecdotes, real-life examples and practical advice to help new teachers survive and thrive through the first 5 years of teaching, from the first-hand experiences of a teacher and middle leader.

Divided into thematic sections, Making It, Surviving and Thriving, the book explores the issues and challenges teachers may face, including:

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• Lesson planning, marking and feedback

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• Behaviour and classroom management

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• Work-life balance

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• Progression, CPD and networking

With the voices of teaching professionals woven throughout, this is essential reading for new teachers, those undertaking initial teacher training, QT mentors and other teaching staff that support new teachers in the early stages of their career.

I

Making it

We all take a different route on our journey to becoming the teachers we are or want to be. For some making it as a teacher can be a smooth ride, whilst for others it’s far bumpier ride.

For some of us, the experiences we go through during our training, NQT induction or initial years can make us doubt and question whether being a teacher is the right career for us; to debate whether we should continue this journey and to contemplate if we really want to make it as a teacher.

For those that reach this point, some will simply need a reminder of what it means to be a teacher, whilst others may need to find an alternative to their current situation.

Throughout this section we will explore what it means to be a teacher both in the professional and personal sense to act as a reminder for those less than satisfactory days. You will find top tips and advice on how to make the Teacher Standards work for you during your ITT and NQT induction and insight into the many challenges of the career. Insight of that serves to merely highlight current and potential troubles new teachers may experience as they enter the profession. We finish by exploring possible solutions to help new teachers to stay in the profession, supported with plenty of insight from those that have made changes, made it as a teacher and are now thriving in the profession that they love.

1	What it means to be a teacher

Let me start with a seemingly simple question.

What is a teacher?

You may be thinking that there’s a quite straightforward answer to that – something along the lines of a teacher is somebody that teaches, inspires and enables students to learn. But is that all?

A teacher plans lessons, learning and progress. A teacher supports, enables and facilities learning. A teacher also marks, assesses and reports progress. A teacher analyses and manages data. A teacher provides safety, consistency and opportunities. A teacher listens, guides and supports. A teacher acts as a mentor, counsellor and leader. Being a teacher is so much more than just the teaching.

Simply put the role of a teacher is extremely diverse.

Opportunity to think

What do you see as being fundamental to what it means to be a ‘teacher’?

When I think back to my school days I often wonder what made my teachers stay in the classroom. It couldn’t have been easy for them teaching in such a deprived area. I remember an occasion when a student in my class brought in a ball bearing gun and was shooting it at teachers and students alike, the day when a fellow student hit a teacher after having dived across the classroom at her; I remember the torment new teachers would receive especially those teaching religious education. My peers were awful at times. Yet when I returned to undertake a two-week placement before embarking on my PGCE seven years later, I returned only to see a large swathe of the same teachers sitting in the staff room. It made me wonder: what kept them there?

Why do people choose to stay in a job that is so challenging at times? What makes us want to be in those classrooms, those school corridors, those school offices? Far more important than the what or how of teaching is the why; why teach?

Opportunity to think

• Take a moment to really consider your answer to this question: Why teach?
• Was it …
• To make a difference? In what ways would you envisage this difference?
• To enthuse minds to love your subject? Why? What’s the importance of your subject?
• To inspire change? What kind of change would you expect to see?
• Perhaps take a moment to write these thoughts and ideas down to review and reflect on during those challenging moments.

As a teacher you will have good days; you’ll have bad days. Days that are overwhelming and tiring and days that leave you feeling awesome and euphoric. Days that make you believe you are the best teacher in the world, but also days that will leave you feeling like the worst. No matter how challenging the job becomes at times, it’s important to always remember the why. Why do you teach?

Remembering the why

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  Draw up a list of all the things you love about teaching for regular review and reflection.
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  Write your ‘why’ on a postcard and keep it on your desk or wall as a reminder.
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  Note down and keep messages of gratitude from students.
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  Keep a positivity box or journal and record happy moments from your classroom and school day.
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  Create a positive mantra for yourself, for those days when you feel you just can’t do it anymore.

Teaching is an incredible career, it is hard, challenging and exhausting, but when you see students’ progress, dream big and achieve, it makes every moment of negativity worth it. Just remember your why.

Snippets of insight

Each and every one of us will give different reasons for joining the profession. For some it will have been their lifelong aspiration; others may have only considered teaching as they came to the end of their degree. We all have different reasons, but ultimately it is the students we teach that become the focus of our why.

I posed the question “What does it mean to be a teacher?” to some Twitter friends from across the spectrum of positions and different contexts for their insight. Each statement gives vision into our role, our values and our strengths as a profession.

“It means you get to help positively impact and influence the next generation and that they undoubtedly shape and influence you too. It means every day you go into school is a day full of huge potential. Being a teacher means your working life is full of meaning so long as you keep your purpose for being in the classroom at the forefront of your attention”. Adrian Bethune, Teacher and author of ‘Wellbeing in the Primary Classroom – A Practical Guide to Teaching Happiness’. Tweets as @AdrianBethune

“It means having a set of values about the importance of education, about how to model and build positive relationships with young people & learners, about how to value and encourage all learners. It means we keep trying and that we never stop learning ourselves. It also means we build and value relationships with colleagues, parents and all other stakeholders for the best interests of our pupils”. Gill Rowland, Senior Lecturer at Canterbury Christ Church University. Tweets as @gillrowland1

“Being a teacher means having a really emotionally and intellectually challenging career where you get the wonderful opportunity to share your passion for your favourite subject with the next generation”. Jo Morgan, Maths Lead Practitioner, Harris Federation and UK Blog Award Winner 2017. Tweets as @mathsjem

“Being a teacher means allowing the children to grow in their values, in the appreciation of their environment and of each other. It means having a love for culture in its many forms and a love of life. Get this right and the students love of learning and having high expectations of themselves will follow”. Andrew Cowley, Deputy Headteacher and author of ‘The Wellbeing Toolkit’. Tweets as @andrew_cowley23

“The meaning of being a teacher is that all your students learn what you want them to learn. That’s it. All the beautiful aspects of education funnel through this. It’s a straightforward goal that is extremely complex to achieve”. Rufus Johnstone, Lead Coach. Tweets as @rufuswilliam

“It means being human; being able to establish rapport with colleagues, parents and children. It means that you will never stop learning professionally or personally, and that you will handle whatever the day brings, all whilst you continue to make children fall in love with your subject”. Maria O’Neill, Pastoral leader (ESafety &PSHE); Founder @UKPastoralChat. Tweets as @DaringOptimist

Takeaways

• Keep a written account of why you want to teach, whether it be a list, a quote or a message on a postcard. Put it somewhere accessible for those challenging days when you need a reminder.
• Keep messages, cards, etc. you receive from students over the time. Take a look at them and remind yourself of the positive impact you’ve had if and when you’re struggling to remember why you bother.
• We all have different reasons for becoming a teacher and different interpretations of what it means to be one, but at the end of the day, we all put our students first in our why. Remember them, even on the days when a student’s choices have resulted in your negative mood, they are still growing and learning. Show them compassion but also that choices have consequences.

2	Meeting the standards

Teachers in the UK are expected to work within a set of eight government-specified standards that provide the minimum level of professional practice and conduct expected of qualified teachers.

The standards are initially used to assess those in initial teacher training (ITT) in order to award qualified teaching status (QTS). They also create the backbone of job profiles, performance management and day-to-day teaching once qualified. At times they are used to assess the performance of teachers under scrutiny within capability measures.

As an NQT mentor I recognise the importance of the teachers’ standards as a guide for both new and more experienced teachers, but in my experience far too often they are used as a tool for accountability, rather than to support professional development and growth.

The teaching standards shouldn’t be something you worry about, instead they should guide and support your practice. In the UK, ITT students and NQTs are expected to demonstrate how they are meeting the standards and the impact of their actions, whilst later on as you progress through the years and become more experienced, the importance of these standards changes. They become the backbone of day-to-day teaching; they influence and guide performance management targets; and they become more of a guide for great teaching and learning.

How to make the teachers’ standards work for you

During the ITT year and as NQTs it can be difficult to find the time to reflect and collate how the standards are being met. To make it easier, Bethan White, who I mentored as an NQT, and I worked together to simplify this process over the course of the academic year 2017–2018. We wanted to ensure that the impact folder wouldn’t be a massive burden and instead would support Bethan in striving for excellence in her practice.

Together Bethan and I have come up with our top tips to help new teachers to reduce the workload associated with evidencing the standards during the training and the NQT induction process.

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  Create a digital portfolio – Most ITT courses and NQT induction programmes allow the production of a digital portfolio. We cannot recommend this highly enough. It makes it much e...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of figures
• Contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part I – Making it
• Part II – Surviving
• Part III – Thriving
• Part IV – Conclusion
• Index