So there you go. I’ve started my teaching career. It was fun to begin with, seeing new faces (well, except one – one of my best friends surprised me by telling me she was on the course too!) and making a fresh start. Recently I’ve become rather apprehensive about a career in teaching and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s the new curriculum, maybe it’s fears about class management, maybe it’s a feeling of jealousy when friends who were on my course at uni tell me their PwC starting salaries of £28.5k when I’ll be lucky to get that after five years.
However, reading through my future assignments is what’s unnerved me the most. We have to write an essay including 2,000 words about a topic and 2,500 words about how that topic is taught in schools (primary and secondary). As it’s science, the topics are divided into biology, chemistry and physics – unfortunately for me, the topics within those headings are very narrow.
I decided back in September 2007 when I applied for my PGCE that I’d apply for physics instead of chemistry – after all, nearly of my degree was in physics, so I thought I’d be alright. I was kidding myself really: out of the thirteen Physics modules I took in my four-year degree, three were in mathematics and no less than five were in atomic, molecular and quantum physics – certainly not things on even an A-level syllabus. I’d be extremely confident with the topics in the chemistry PGCE, as the remainder of my degree was in chemistry. But even that was just physical chemistry. Damn me and my bright idea of doing a degree in two sciences to make me more employable – now I just know a little bit about two sciences rather that a lot about one.
So that’s my dilema – I hate physics really. I love the nitty-gritty mathematical stuff like atomic physics or solving the Schrödinger equation, just nothing that gets taught in schools. And I love physical chemistry – again, that’s just mathematical. So what am I doing training to be a science teacher?
Posted by penglet 