Secondary Teaching 2

The career prospects of newly qualified teachers have been buffeted by the recent cutbacks in education, but secondary education remains an extremely popular career move for graduates of all ages.

Dr Fiachra Long, lecturer of the Postgraduate Diploma in Education in University College Cork, believes that this popularity is driven by the special nature of the teaching role.

’I think teaching is a career that people cannot avoid really if they feel attracted to it. I believe the old idea that teaching being a calling of some kind is true, especially in the sense that teaching is an important aspect of Irish culture going way back,’ he says. ‘Even though the prospects are fairly poor in the immediate term, there’s always the possibility that things will improve a little and that permanent jobs will become readily available.’

Besides UCC, the one-year full time Postgraduate Diploma in Education for aspiring second level teachers is also available from NUI Galway, UCD, NUI Maynooth, and Trinity College. Variants in the form of a diploma that specialises in business, languages, music, or physical education and a two-year part time version are provided by the University of Limerick and Dublin City University respectively.

Applicants to these courses are required to have a relevant primary degree that will enable them to teach at least one Leaving Certificate subject. Visit www.teachingcouncil.ie for a full list of every degree in Ireland that fulfils this requirement.

Traditionally it was common for those considering a teaching career to gain experience in substitute teaching before committing to the postgraduate qualification. According to Dr Long however, nowadays ‘most teaching agencies discourage non-qualified teaching or contact, and in the current economic climate, there’s less and less chance of people working in schools who are not qualified.’

This is not necessarily a negative outcome, as substitute teachers ‘can be called into a classroom at a moment’s notice without any preparation or training.’ A few of Dr Long’s students have had a negative experience in this situation and their preparation for the PGDip in Education has not benefited as a result. Overall however, he believes ‘working with children in some capacity is a help always, just to see what it’s like.’

The NUI institutions (NUI Maynooth, UCD, UCC and NUI Galway) run a points- based application system for the Postgraduate Diploma in Education, with points awarded for previous teaching experience. Trinity College and University of Limerick’s selection processes involve an application form and interview, while application is made to the part time DCU programme through the Postgraduate Applications Centre (PAC).

Shane Deere was successful in applying to his current course in NUI Maynooth thanks to the extra points he amassed through substitute teaching. A graduate of IT and Telecommunications in the University of Limerick, Shane worked in IT in Ireland and as a plumber in the US before setting his sights on a career in teaching.

Having ended up in IT because it was his father’s profession and its boom status at the time, Shane is like many of his fellow PGDip students in experiencing a desire to teach after some years in another career. Indeed, he views his life experience as a real benefit to his teaching.
‘If I had come straight from my undergraduate degree, I’d be 21 and teaching in a local school where all the lads would know me. It would be difficult because you’re on the same level,’ he says. ‘You have to be friendly with your students, but you also have to have to some distance there; it would be very hard to teach when you’re that young.’

Other life experiences, such as providing grinds to fellow students during his degree in UL, and training in new recruits while working in IT have also stood to Shane in his teaching placements so far.

Shane’s degree enables him to teach Computer Studies at Leaving Certificate level, and he is seeking to bolster his career prospects by becoming qualified to teach maths as well. To achieve this, he is undertaking maths modules by distance learning with the UK’s Open University.

Applicants to the PGDip in Education should be committed to the task, as an enormous amount of dedication is required during an extremely packed one-year programme. Besides modules in wider pedagogical issues such as education and development, educational psychology, special needs education and curriculum studies, students will undertake modules in two subject areas that they wish to teach in a second level school.

Microteaching is an internationally practised method of teacher training, whereby students are taped teaching peers initially, before moving on to a real classroom scenario. According to Dr Long, this practise helps with isolating and identifying performance in a wide range of teaching skills: presentation, facial attitudes, gestures, movement, liveliness, questioning style, ability to monitor learning, etc.

Students are generally required to complete 100 hours of classroom teaching during the year (applicants to the DCU programme must have a guaranteed teaching placement of at least 200 hours). ‘It’s been good,’ says Shane Deere of his classroom experience so far, ‘but it’s very daunting when you’re standing up in front of your first class. Although I was doing a bit of subbing last year, it’s still not the same really. Teaching as a part of the course lets you reflect on your performance – to see where you can improve and what you did wrong.’

Shane and his fellow classmates are to undertake a teaching and learning assessment whereby they carry out a small research project on an aspect of their teaching delivery that needs to improve. ‘I think I will probably work on my questioning techniques,’ says Shane, ‘the type of questions I ask, and my delivery in terms of distribution across the classroom – making I sure I don’t leave anyone out.’

Casting our minds back to our schooldays, when rambunctious classmates would cause young student teachers such discomfort, it is easy to understand why Dr Long recommends students avoid over sentimentalising the teaching profession.

‘It’s easy to romanticise the contact that students will have with children in a classroom. Sometimes the ride is a bit bumpy during the initial teaching period, but it settles down. After all, the opportunity to encounter and work with young people – the freshness of it – is one of the major attractions for people going into teaching.’