Rosie Tootell

“Teaching provided me with the opportunity to share my love of Classical Civilisation and Ancient History with others. I had a great A level teacher at college who made tasks interactive, interesting and informative. I’m lucky to be learning from her now in my teaching capacity.

I found lectures and seminars very interesting and useful. Learning class management techniques, as well as the theory behind teaching (such as questioning techniques, forms of assessment and why they’re used) was indispensable.

You should try to get voluntary teaching experience. This will help you to get a feel for teaching and whether it’s right for you. A PGCE provides insight into what goes into teaching – planning, creating resources, the theories behind teaching and learning, and what is best practice.

Placement was a great opportunity to learn different approaches to teaching. I found it difficult at first to speak in front of 20+ students. I enjoyed interacting with students, getting to share really cool subject information and seeing their reactions, praising students who had done fantastic work, answering challenging questions.

The best thing about my job is the students. Classical Civilisation is quite a niche subject, so students are usually really interested, asking lots of questions and generally we have a lot of fun during lessons. I’ve found the balance between fun and discipline quite challenging – making sure that students enjoy themselves but at the same time making sure that work is done on time and to a high quality. It’s difficult but rewarding when this balance is met.

My advice to trainee teachers is plan! I try to plan lessons at least one week in advance. It’s less stressful knowing what’s coming up, and it also gives you plenty of chance to amend lessons based upon student progress and feedback. And don’t let one bad lesson or day get you down. Reflect upon why it went wrong, how you can improve, and treat the next one as a clean slate.”

To find out more about studying this programme, please view full course information for PGDE Post-14 Education.