Career Advice for Teaching Job
Top 5 Career Advice for Teaching Job
Teaching job, although not the most lucrative, can be rewarding if you are interested in teaching. There are several decisions to be made if you want to make a career as a teacher. Following are the top five career advices that can help you start and progress in your career as a teacher.
- Deciding
The first stem is to decide to become a teacher. If you do not like teaching itself, than this is not the right career for you. As a teacher you have to be very good as well as fortunate to get some appreciation of your work. Students in general can be quite difficult and there would be times when you will feel that all your hard work is getting you only student hostility in return.
You should also decide which age group you'll like to teach as well as which subjects. You can take several steps that will help you make these decisions. Before committing to a teaching career try working as a substitute as well as volunteering for teaching jobs. You should also search online to get an idea of what's in store for you as a teacher. Additionally you can take the help of a professional career advisor to determine if you have the aptitude for teaching.
- Qualification
To get a good teaching job you'll need qualification as well as experience. For any teaching job in public sector you'll need a certification related to teaching as well as relevant certifications in your own subject. If you don't have a teaching related certification, but have good knowledge of your subject you can get a job in private sector teaching institutes but get the relevant certifications as soon as possible. You can take the help of a career counselor or research online by yourself to find out which certifications and / or courses are appropriate for your situation.
- Selling Yourself
Just like in any other profession, to get a good job in teaching career you have to sell yourself to the employers or convince them that you are the right person for the job. For this you should prepare a good resume especially targeted at the job you are applying for, build a portfolio mentioning and containing samples of your previous work, practice and develop your interview skills. You should also prepare for expected interview questions.
Having an online presence as well as a good network can greatly help you in your job search. This'll not only increase your chances of getting selected but may get you information about new job opportunities as well.
- Keep Your Teaching Methods Engaging
Once you have received a job your success in the career would primarily depend on how good are you at your job. To be a good teacher, only the knowledge of the subject is not enough. You should try to make your teaching methods more engaging. There are several things you can try to make the classes interesting to students and to increase student involvement.
Small surprise as well as scheduled test can keep the students on their toes. You should plan your classes or lectures in advance and divide the longer topic in to sections. A 5-2 approach can be very helpful in engaging students. This involves five minutes of teaching and 2 minutes of discussion / doubts clarifications and asking questions about the things you have just covered. You can also use technological aids such as PPT and multimedia presentations to make your lectures more interesting, comprehensible and engaging to the students.
In general the key to success where student involvement is concerned is keep trying, observing the responses of students to the new methods and not to get frustrated.
- Make Adjustments in Your Teaching Methods
Not all the classes or students in a class are similar or respond in similar fashion to different methods. You should always pay attention to the response of various students and be ready to made adjustments to your teaching methods on the fly. In general you should divide each lecture into small parts with definite goals and objectives. After teaching a part, check how much the class has understood by asking questions and based on the feedback make adjustments in your teaching methods. Additionally for a successful long term career in teaching you should always strive to increase your knowledge; both of your own subjects and those that are related to them.
A career in teaching requires aptitude, hard work and a lot of patience. But if you like and have a passion for teaching this can be very rewarding. You may face many obstacles especially in the beginning of the your career as most organizations prefer to hire candidates with some job experience; in the long run teaching is a comparatively slow changing and once you have some experience there is also good job security.
The average salary given to english teacher is $55,000.