Primary or Secondary?

Q. I read in one of your books that you have worked in both primary and secondary schools. I am training as a secondary school science teacher, but I'm starting to think that I would be happier and perhaps better suited to working in a primary school. As you have worked in both do you have any advice?

A. I went in the other direction, i.e. secondary to primary, which is easier apparently. The issue with primary is that there are parts of the curriculum that you have to cover on your course in order to be able to teach them (i.e. things like maths, reading, etc.) It used to be that you had to do a set number of hours but we are talking years ago that I qualified.

Have you spent some time in a primary as part of your course? If not, try speaking to a local primary and see if you can go in for a morning to observe. The two are very different (obviously). With primary you have just that one class, and you have to be able to teach all the subjects. If the class are tricky there is no escape! If you love your subject then you don't get to spend as much time with it as at secondary. (This was why I changed over).

I would speak to your course tutor and see if there is any chance of you moving over to a primary course at this point, but make sure you are really committed to the idea before you do that. One other thing to consider is that there are generally less primary jobs out there and they are harder to get. As a scientist you are in demand at secondary level.

Did you have a bad experience on your first TP? There is such a huge variation between secondaries that you might find that you are much happier in your second placement. Hope that helps, let me know if you have any more questions.