Which is more difficult PGCE Primary or Secondary (anyone on the PGCE?)

From what I've heard from PGCE secondary folk, could be expected to create 13+ lessons a week in their first few weeks of placements along with lesson material etc. Whereas, Primary PGCE are only teaching a few lessons a week. Is the PGCE a lot more easier with regards to workload and pressure etc?.

Reply 1

TraineeLynsey

Original post by Le290

Who told you primary PGCE students only teach a few lessons a week? Nonsense.

Any teacher training course is extraordinarily tough, regardless of age group or subject.

If you are considering this as a career and plan to make decisions based on what you perceive to be the 'easiest' route, you will very quickly become a drop out statistic.

Reply 2

Airfairy

You can't compare secondary and primary at all. They are both hard work!

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Reply 3

tom_tom_tom

Im doing Secondary at the moment, its a lot of work yes but so is Primary, they are two completely different set ups.

Also who told you, you have to do 13 hours of teaching in your first few weeks is clearly not well informed. My suggested was up to 10 hours end of first placement then 13-16 at the end of the final placement. You are not thrown in at the deep end quite that much...

Reply 4

MissNeedhamMFL

Agree with the above, both age ranges come with their own strengths and difficulties so to try to compare the two is impossible.

Also, whoever told you about the teaching hours is very wrong.From somebody currently do a secondary PGCE, I can confirm the following:First few weeks in school (3 days uni, 2 days school at my uni) were purely observations. Both within and outside of your faculty. In our first four week block, the expectation was to teach a minimum of 8 lessons over 4 weeks (i.e. 2 per week), but you were, of course, allowed to do more if you felt up to it. Then in the second four week block, we were expected to be on 50% timetable (around 12 hours per week) by the end of the four weeks but again, you build your way up to this.

Now I'm in my 'main' placement. I spent the first week observing and getting to know my new classes. Then the idea was to build upto 50% over the following few weeks (equates to about 10 hours in my new school) and will eventually build up to a 75% (of a NQT!) timetable which will be about 14 hours per week.It's all very well set out and nothing is set in stone, it's between you, the school and the host teachers to decide what fits best in individual circumstances. Some older trainees with more classroom experience are happy to throw themselves in at the deep end and get on with it. Others, like myself, choose to build up the hours over time to slowly ease you into it.

Reply 5

username892469

I'm on a primary PGCE and we were doing 3 days a week (about 16 hours of teaching/classroom management) by the end of our first placement. We will be doing 70-80% (an NQTs full workload, 21ish hours) throughtout our final one. So from the sounds of it, my Primary course actually does more hours than the Secondary people posting here.

But that's irrelevant because it's not the number of teaching hours that makes up the bulk of the work in my experience. I think it likely all evens out between Primary and Secondary as to which is more demanding, both as regards teaching time and other duties.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 6

Kathyyoung244

Original post by TraineeLynsey

Put it this way I was teaching (primary) 15 hours by my 10 (out of 12) week on placement in my first placement . This was really difficult given I was doing a primary placement I a secondary school. Meaning I have sort of a mixed experience. I honesty do not think either one it easier , but is suggest actually shadowing both a primary and a secondary teacher for atleaste one full week so you can really , really get a good understanding of what your waking into X

Reply 7

bioroo

Original post by MissNeedhamMFL

Hmmm... That's quite interesting and shows the variation between sec pgce courses... We didn't have anywhere near as gradual build up in lessons... After a block of uni, our first placement was straight in with 13 teaching hours a week, we had an 'observation' week, but very few classmates did just observe that week... Most were teaching by the Wed/Thu...