Becoming a Primary Teacher, by Alison Chidwick

I always wanted to work with children and I think I knew I wanted to be a teacher since I’d been playing schools with my elder sister, Louise (which basically consisted of making registers and calling out names of imaginary children - all of whom poor Louise had to answer for). I thought briefly about becoming a speech therapist… until I realised I would be required to do a Science at A level, and quickly went off the idea!!

University was never something I really considered; I thought it was for clever high-flyers and I was quite a ‘home bird’. However, after a chat with the careers advisor at college I learned I would need a degree to complete teacher training, so I started filling in UCAS forms.

Leeds was one of my first choices from the start. Although I’d not been there often I’d heard good stories about the shopping and nightlife (a priority of course). Also a friend, in the year above me was at Leeds Met doing Primary Teaching and living in the halls of residence which sounded good. He spoke highly of the course, the university, the halls, and Leeds as a place, and I began to cross my fingers that I would get in and started studying hard for my A-levels.

In the meantime, I was gaining more experience in primary schools. My mum worked in a primary school as a support assistant, as well as working in the office and I had helped out at her school now and again, listening to readers, helping with mounting etc. I returned to do some work experience here supervising groups in reception, as well as working at two other local primary schools, voluntarily. One of these schools was very ethnically diverse and I enjoyed working with children from a range of different countries, cultures and religions, for many of whom English was their second language.

When I arrived in Leeds I expected hard work - I knew teaching would be a tough degree; and a tough career. However, it was particularly hard when friends on other courses were in uni a mere 8 hours a week and we were going in for 25!! What with all the settling in, meeting new people AND going to university, I was a very busy girl!! I think it’s fair to say in the first year I had a very satisfactory work/life balance!

My first placement was at an inner-city school with a very large ethnic minority. Children were from a range of socially deprived backgrounds, including refugees and asylum seekers and 30 different languages were spoken by the children in total (with only about 200 on roll). I began to learn more about EAL and in the year 4 class I was working in, supported a boy who had no English at all. I tried to imagine what school would be like for him, how baffling and intimidating it must be to not understand what is going on around him. I tried to find ways to assist his language development, using a lot of talking, pointing at objects and him repeating me.

The next year I stayed in the same school and followed the same class up to year 5. Further challenges were presented from working with EAL children and I learnt effective ways to overcome these. I realised that even if an EAL child is fluent in speaking English, they still have specialist linguistic needs, which are unique to each individual. My third year placement was at a school with 97% of children from an Asian background, all of whom were EAL learners. In the year 2 class I was in the children had a variety of language needs and many of them required help with widening their English vocabulary, both in conversation and in their writing. I found strategies such as using a lot of speaking and listening, and allowing children to use their mother tongue when appropriate, helped children’s language development.

Needless to say the workload increased over the four years and my work/life balance sometimes seemed like a work/work balance. At times I juggled a part time job, teaching practice and several assignments and only my determination and desire to become a primary teacher kept me going. For the final placement, I was in a ‘leafy lane’ school. This was a big change as the school had hardly any EAL learners and much less ethnic diversity. However, my interest in EAL led me to study this for my dissertation. As an English specialist, I decided to research the support given to EAL children in the literacy hour, and how included they are. My findings showed that practice varied a lot from class to class, and from school to school. This means the inclusion of EAL children is very much down to individual teachers and they are responsible for the inclusion of any EAL children in their class. I will take this knowledge into my career and my interest in EAL will continue.

I was extremely pleased that not only did I manage to complete the course (and still want to be a teacher!!) but I also achieved a pleasing mark for my dissertation and will start my first teaching post at a school in Leeds in September, which I am very much looking forward to. Becoming a primary teacher is certainly not easy; to be honest there have been times when I thought I wouldn’t make it. The final year seemed impossible at times - doing teaching practice whilst applying for jobs, and trying to visit as many schools as possible, and there’s A LOT of competition…but the advice I would give to anyone is that if you really want to do it and are passionate about becoming a teacher. Then you WILL do it!