Reasons to Become a Teacher
Reasons to Become a Teacher
“…A teacher affects eternity, they can never tell where their influence stops…” Henry Adams
- By Kent-Teach
- 2 minute read
“…A teacher affects eternity, they can never tell where their influence stops…” Henry Adams
This encapsulates the profound difference teachers make each and every day. Your hard work and effort as a teacher shapes the lives of your pupils and positively influences their future. There are few careers that rival teaching in terms of job satisfaction.
1) Teaching is a rewarding and fulfilling career with unparalleled job satisfaction.
As many teachers will tell you, seeing a child’s eyes light up after grasping a new piece of knowledge is priceless. As a teacher, you are a guide to the world and enable children to fully maximise their talents, potential, and imagination. You help your learners to recognise their strengths and talents allowing them to decide who they are and what they want to achieve in life. Every day, you make a profound difference to the lives of every single child in your class as well as pupils throughout the school.
2) Teaching is far from boring – you can expect everyday to be different.
Due to the nature of the role, each day of your teaching career will be different. You will encounter new situations and challenges continuously. Teaching can be challenging and frustrating at times. But overcoming the challenges and finding solutions to each individual situation is part of the job satisfaction. Every day is different to the last and you will find each day is exciting and satisfying. Variety is the spice of life and teaching certainly provides this.
3) Teaching is the gift that keeps on giving.
As a teacher, you will find that the more you teach, the more you learn. You will learn more about yourself as a teacher, which will allow you to develop and modify your teaching style as necessary. You will also find out which lesson plans work well and which ones need to be edited. Through teaching, you will discover areas for professional and personal development as well as uncovering your own likes and dislikes. In terms of subject knowledge, this only improves the longer you teach. You will find yourself learning all types of interesting facts and improving your own knowledge on a range of topics. It is not only teachers who ask questions! Inevitably, your pupils will have questions for you about topics being taught. You will find pupils can ask questions you were not expecting and had not prepared for, which is outside of curriculum coverage. This is a wonderful part of the learning process. Simply be honest, explain that you are not quite sure of the answer but suggest finding out the answer together. Some days, you learn just as much as the children. After all, learning is a never-ending process!
4) There are many opportunities for you to grow, develop and achieve.
As a teacher, you will inevitably be helping to develop the minds of your pupils, expanding their academic knowledge as well as nurturing personal growth and helping them to understand who they are as a person. You will regularly celebrate your pupil’s achievements and be their champion. But, you are not only helping your pupils on the road to success. Teaching is a profession offering excellent career progression opportunities. CPD opportunities for teachers in the UK are fantastic and will help you to achieve your career aspirations. Progression in teaching ranges from becoming a Subject Coordinator (which means you are the lead for this subject and oversee the teaching in this field across your school) to working your way into leadership, such as taking on the role of Deputy Headteacher or Headteacher. There are endless opportunities to progress.
5) Diversity is championed and celebrated. Every teacher is different.
No 2 teachers will have the exact same teaching style or approach to the curriculum. All education staff have the opportunity to be a pioneer in the classroom. You will develop your imagination and creativity as well as your problem solving and reasoning skills.
6) Teaching develops key, and highly employable, skills.
Teaching will allow you to develop a rich and varied skill set. As mentioned, teaching is a diverse role with no 2 days the same. You will spend time planning lessons, for example, but you will find that the lessons often need to be adapted continuously to meet pupil needs. You will find that sometimes you are unable to move on from a learning objective as quickly as you anticipated, or you may find the children grasped the concept quicker than you expected. Adaptability is key in this profession. Moreover, you will be required to develop exceptional time management skills, the ability to prioritise a rich and varied workload and you will need strong team work skills as well as independence. All the skills you develop in teaching are highly transferable in and out of the profession.
7) Teaching is a profession to be proud of with daily doses of happiness and humour.
There are highs and lows in every profession but the highs of being a teacher outweigh the lows. You have the potential to provide a happy and safe environment for children to express their imagination and character. You are facilitating their success on multiple levels. Happiness and humour in your classroom can be very beneficial for wellbeing (both adult wellbeing and child wellbeing!) and allows you to finish, even a challenging day, happy and satisfied.
Kelly's Story
Since becoming a teacher I have been able to transfer my passion for the Arts into my working career through teaching a range of arts related subjects, including Art & Design, Photography, Design Technology and Drama. It is my belief that children and young people need to be given the opportunity to explore and experiment with multiple media in an environment that celebrates success.
I constantly seek to learn new skills and techniques and I strive to develop this into my teaching as well as developing my own art practice. As an educator I feel it’s imperative to learn, explore, develop, inspire and guide my passion for the arts on to a new generation of creative artists.
In my teaching career I have been given fantastic opportunities in launching new qualifications in Photography and I continue to do this at my current school by producing a cohort of budding Photographers into our current 6th form. I feel this is an immense privilege and facilitating these young people to become confident creative artists has afforded me one of the most fulfilling aspects of my career.
This year I plan to undertake a Masters degree in Fine Art with a Photography specialism part time along side my teaching role. I feel this will afford me the opportunity to grow and extend my own practice as well as inspiring the pupils I teach.
As a mother I understand how significant and inspirational one person can be in a young persons life. From seeing my daughter come home from nursery consumed and stimulated by her teachers I understand how precious and important this role is, I aim to be that role model that others.
Juggling my teaching career along with motherhood and my own art practice can be challenging at times. Over time however I have learnt to focus on the things that are most important to me. I include my daughter in as much as possible that way she is exposed to as many stimulating, artistic experiences as possible.
The best part about my job is that I can continue to make a positive, meaningful impact to the young people I teach. Inspiring children, making students passionate, enthusiastic and excited about the arts and the possibilities they can lead on to is endless. I know that I will always inspire to want to do this. Creativity is for life and teaching is the most satisfying and rewarding way that I can do this.
James’ Story
My sport is triathlon and consists of swimming, cycling and running. I train twice a day, 6 times a week and race around 12 races a year. Following work at the London Olympics, I decided to leave mainstream sports and try something that I hadn’t before. I could swim…but only to stay alive and not in a fast way. Following coaching and endless training, I came 7th in my first complete tri. One and half years after this I qualified for the GB age group team and subsequently came 9th in Europe.
My sports and recreation have influenced my teaching hugely. They have made me more patient by being fitter and therefore happier and stronger physically to meet the demands of teaching. They have taught me, and the children, perseverance and courage to try new things. They have also taught me to never give up on my dreams, as I always dreamed of representing my country and thought that this may never happen. Furthermore, my passion for minority sports has swollen, with me organising many primary school triathlons thus benefiting the children who wish to try all three disciplines. I have also introduced many children to local athletics clubs where they may previously have feared taking that step. My life is a 3 way balance between my family, my teaching job and my sport – kind of like a ‘life triathlon’. Just like my actual triathlon training, I never feel that I am working effectively in all three elements; but life and triathlons have taught me that you have to accept that you can never be constantly be effective at all three and the key is accepting that fact, and making the best of what you can do.
Laura’s Story
I started playing rugby in my second year of university where I was studying for a BA in Physical Education with qualified teacher status. I soon fell in love with the game and the new family I had gained. When I had finished university I moved back home where I had been lucky enough to find a job at King Ethelbert School in Birchington, Thanet. I was keen to carry on playing rugby but I also wanted to meet more like minded people. I joined Canterbury rugby club in September 2005, the same month as I started my new job. Just like my university team they were warm and welcoming and I soon made some lifelong friends.
Being part of a sport’s team has allowed me to become a confident and resilient person. I carry these qualities into teaching and the pupils, in particular the girls, can see me as a role model. People are always surprised when I tell them I play rugby as they tend have a stereotyped image in their head of what a female rugby player looks like. Challenging this view among young people makes them more excepting of others.
Rugby and teaching really have played a massive part in creating who I am today.
Stacy's Story
There seems to be an awful lot of bad press surrounding being a teacher at the moment. Long hours, workload and stress are all things that at some point or another I am sure every teacher in the profession has experienced, and I am no different. When I was asked to write this blog I started reflecting on my 14 years as a performing arts teacher. The truth is, it hasn’t been easy, in fact sometimes it has been the hardest thing I have ever done. I’ve faced challenges in almost every aspect of my job, but do you know what? I have LOVED it. I’ve loved the buzz of a busy day. I’ve loved reaching inside myself to find new creative ways of doing things. I’ve loved the feeling of belonging to a team and working with the most inspirational adults I’ve ever met, and most of all I’ve loved making a difference to the lives of the students I’ve taught. I know that sounds like a huge cliché, but it really is true. When you strip it all away at the heart of everything a teacher does is a child whose life and future you have the opportunity to change. What can be more important than that? I have had the most incredible and exciting roller coaster ride over the last 14 years, which culminated in my being awarded KM Drama Teacher of the Year, something of which I am extremely proud of. Teaching has given me such huge confidence and has made me believe that anything is possible.
I’ve had many conversations in the past with teachers who are considering joining the profession or who are at the start of their career and are wondering how they can be the best teacher possible as well as maintaining a bit of private life sanity! You hear so much about work/life balance and I can understand why people are concerned. Being a teacher is one part of me, an intense part, but one part nevertheless. I am a wife, a mother, and a friend first and foremost and I try to put this at the centre of everything I do. Before I went into the teaching profession I was a performer and that remains a huge part of my life. I make time to be in shows, sing with bands and take regular dance classes, and that in turn makes me a better teacher. I can connect with my students because I really do understand what it is like to commit to rehearsals, learn lines, deal with nerves and all of the things that go along with being a performer. It’s great to be able to exchange stories and experiences with my students. We see each other’s shows and I have even been lucky enough to have shared the stage with them on a few occasions. If they can see you up there on stage practising the things you teach, it makes your relationship in the classroom much stronger and allows an environment of mutual respect for the arts.
I have learnt so much from working in education and the performing arts sector, and this has enabled me to fuse these two important parts of my life to move my career into an exciting new direction. I have recently set up a theatre-in-education company called Storytales Theatre. We take performance and workshops into school in order to inspire a lifelong interest in the arts. I still teach along-side this, and I really do feel content about the balance I have between all the things I love in my life.
