KALAIVANI A/P R SANDRA

EVIDENCE FOR FORUM

Secondary teachers work with children between the ages of 11 and 18. They specialise in teaching one or two subjects from the national curriculum. National curriculum subjects means like ICT, mathematics, science subjects

Secondary school students would be more on your level as people to interact with, but you have to remember that a proportion of those students have absolutely no respect for authority and would be disruptive. Primary school teaching is possibly more rewarding as children that age are still blessed with a sense of wonder and so are generally far more receptive to instruction and guidance. However, just last week here in England, a 4 year old boy was banned from his nursery school after attacking his teacher with punches, scratches and kicks. Obviously the child has behavioral problems but the mother dismissed it simply as high spirits, and felt the school had acted unreasonably in banning her little boy. Are you really prepared for interaction with parents of all types - some of whom respect you and some who regard you as a necessary evil

Your role as a teacher will differ considerably based on whether you do Primary or Secondary, here are some points to consider based on experience; Primary + Your teaching is more about performance/entertaining the children especially in KS1 and early KS2. + You have alot more responsibility for the emotional development of the child, you are helping the child to establish what is wrong/right, how to interact etc + You can generally be more creative in your teaching approach. - Behaviour is generally better, but I disagree with what most people are saying here about it being easier...children in year 5/6 can be just as bad as secondary school - There can be alot of politics in primary school staff rooms - Some schools may be very relaxed with behavioural issues and alot of serious incidents are not dealt with - assessments are non-exam based and hence are very time consuming (even SATs results have to be cross referenced to teacher assessment) Secondary + There is more of a 'heads down' approach to lessons and hence lessons can be more productive + You can really thrive in your subject area! + Children are maturing rapidly so you are mentor to the pupil as well as their teacher + You can assess pupils easily, mainly through testing - You have to mainly stick closely to the schemes of work, usually derived from GCSE's - You may have to deal with much more challenging behaviour

KALAIVANI A/P R SANDRA - Involvement from parents is less In terms of paperwork, both jobs are the same One thing to consider is you can always transition from Primary to Secondary and vice versa with additional courses.. My advice would be to start in primary and work your way up into seondary - it could be really great seeing how children progress through their education

Both options can be very rewarding. I've taught both primary school and college. I've also worked with middle schoolers and high school students at church, so I've had a wide variety of experience. Some people say teachers who teach at the primary level do so because they love children. Those who teach at the secondary level do so because they love their subject area and want to share it. And of course, probably every teacher is somewhat a combination of the two . . . The other people who've answered this question make some good points - behavior issues are usually much easier and less threatening at the primary level. But there can be some very disrespectful young children. Another point in favor of teaching at the primary level, I think, is that it tends to be more hands-on and creative, although I wish more secondary teachers would rely less on lecture and demonstration and more on dynamic teaching strategies that get students involved in their own learning. There are some amazing secondary teachers out there who do just that. Check out some of the websites below. You might enjoy either option - I do. I probably enjoy the younger kids best, but that doesn't mean I don't get a lot of joy when working with older students. Since you've had a bit of experience with both, you could probably do either and enjoy it. One idea might be to go the primary route and add a middle-school endorsement if that's possible in your state. That would give you more options, allowing you to teach any grade from K-8. Best wishes!

Do you have a specialism, for example, history, and if so, how much do you want to use this? If you're really keen, then I would stick with secondary where you can teach 'your thing'. I am a primary teacher and teach more than 10 subjects a week, so you get more variety but apart from maths and English, don't cover anything in real depth, and even then with maths and English, you can only teach to the level of the pupils. If you enjoy secondary, you may feel that primary children are a less mature than you're used to. I love teaching Y3 but couldn't go any lower as I couldn't deal with the children being more needy and less independent. Why don't you try and get some work experience in a primary for 2 or 3 weeks to get a feel for it? Good luck in whatever you choose. Teaching is a great career and very rewarding. I love it!

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hi everyone, i have been teaching in primary school for 6 to 7 years now and i still find the long days hard, tiring, those never ending paper work, rude parents to deal with on daily bases cause they drop their children at the door and come into the class, childrens behaviour, putting up displays, 30 APPs for core subjects, differntiating core subjects incuding meeting your SEN kids needs, managing all the adults in class, doing your cross curricular plans, marking, making resouces, meeting targets, setting targets, parents evenings, 3 times a year report writing, playtime duties, chasing lost uniforms, sending notes home about lost library books, etc etc very hard work and i feel teaching is a hard job. when people ask the question how is teaching job, i bet its an easy job? noooooooooo is my answer and then i start exaplaining why and how hard it is. what annoys me is that i know some secondary teachers who say teaching isnt that bad. so i am woundering, has teaching in primary school become harder now, is teaching in secondry easier, has anyone made the switch from primary to secondary.

Done both. Secondary is an absolute doss compared to primary. You can get away with just teaching your subject instead of the mountain of other bits and pieces which you rightly list as a primary teacher (a few of which apply to secondary teachers...but only a few, and certainly it involves less of the pastoral stuff). Most of all, most secondary teachers have the luxury of teaching the same lesson to several classes during the course of a week. In my case, this meant on average 3 classes with the same lesson - meaning a third of the planning and resourcing, and you get to make the lesson work better with each go at it. By the third lesson, you can practically deliver the lesson asleep. On the other hand, secondary teachers have vile teenagers to deal with. I'd rather work until close to collapse than that.

I second the 'it's different'. If that different is something you personally find easier, then, yes, it's easier. Equally, it can be harder. Sorry that's as useful as a box of frogs, but it's very similar to Literacy APP - all a matter of opinion. Personally I prefer Primary a million times over. But I also think Primary is a million times 'harder'. Far far far more work in terms of pointless paperwork, far more treated as a small child always having to prove you haven't done the wrong thing and far more laminating. But find the parents easier (really, yes) and the behaviour far far far and away better (despite everything, I've still yet to be stabbed or punched in the face in a Primary by someone larger than me. Both happened to me in Secondary schools, on more than one occasion). The biggest difference in my experience was the paperwork to be honest - in Secondary my planning consisted of one line for each lesson - it was for me, and me alone, I never had to hand it in, I only ever did 'proper' lesson plans for observations (rarely then) or Ofsted. You were judged on your your end of year exam results. I worked in about 8 different secondary schools over the course of my training and secondary 'career' and this was the case in all of them - however as always with schools, I believe this is a very individual school thing, so the next Secondary could have needed the kind of indepth, breathe in, breathe out, scripted lesson

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plans for every single lesson that I've had to do in all of the Primary schools I've taught in (quite a few as I was stop gap supply for about 18 months or so). Hope that helps a bit :)

I teach in a secondary school but do work with feeder primaries so I have a bit of a view of both. I think the workload for both jobs is ridiculous, a system shouldn't rely on people having to work that hard to keep things going. Primary and secondary are very different in nature and I don't think either is an easy job. I would agree that primary probably has more preparation. At secondary level staff are almost always part of larger departments and if things are organised well then people work as a team. Each school and type of school brings with it pressures of its own.
Working in a middle school I have seen both sides of the coin. (although no GCSEs obviously) I worked for two years as a subject specialist. This was great as I could repeat lessons and reteach sometimes with up to three groups. Technician availible to set up practicals, collect photocopying etc (Science) This year I am now a Year 6 teacher teaching my class of sets for nearly everything, this is so much harder as every lesson needs to be planned and can't be repeated. all practical activities I need to set up. I enjoy teaching Year 6, but teaching only my subject and possibly 1 or 2 others was easyier compared to this.

It always puzzles me when people think and say that being a primary school teacher is easy. Some people just think you PLAY with children all day. It annoys me because teachers do work very hard... I would have thought that primary and secondary are different in terms of difficulty.

Sulla, I too have worked in both. However, I totally disagree with you regarding teaching the same lesson over and over again. If you are a core subject specialist ( as I am) every lesson is different and the pressure to get grade C GCSE at the end of it is huge! Also, differentiating between a group who are so weak ability that they are almost rendered illiterate and then teaching an A Level group is very very very hard work and requires extreme planning! Admitedly, if you are not a core subject teacher it is different but core subjects are under intense pressure to produce the goods - it is their subjects which are reported on and which inspectors focus the greatest intensity on. Just as hard as primary but in a different way. Also, several teachers I know have left

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secondary becuase of behaviour etc for primary and not gone back.