PGDE primary with a baby at home

Hey, so long story short I have a 10 week old baby and have been accepted to start the PGDE primary course at Strathclyde in August. Baby will be 5 months old by the time the course starts and I’m starting to panic about whether it’s going to actually be possible to do it.

Has anyone got any advice or able to share any experiences to help me decide whether to brave it or defer it a year?

Thanks

Hey, so long story short I have a 10 week old baby and have been accepted to start the PGDE primary course at Strathclyde in August. Baby will be 5 months old by the time the course starts and I’m starting to panic about whether it’s going to actually be possible to do it.

Has anyone got any advice or able to share any experiences to help me decide whether to brave it or defer it a year?

Thanks

I'm coming towards the end of a Secondary PGCE this year. There are some differences, but some things will be broadly the same.

What are your childcare arrangements going to be? On placement, I'm expected to be in school from 8-4 as a minimum, but on some days there are meetings that go on later. We're expected to stay for any CPD, parents evenings etc that usual staff do, so you are probably looking at a later finish at least one day a week.

You'll also have work to do at home in the evenings/weekends- a mixture of uni stuff such as essays and planning/marking. You may also be expected to contribute to school admin tasks such as report writing. Is your partner happy to maybe take the baby out or for you to go somewhere for 3/4 hours at the weekend to get this sort of thing done? Do you think you'll be able to work in the evenings after the baby has gone to bed?

Unis tend to prioritize placements close by for people with caring responsibilities, but you do have to have at least 2 placements and they have to match a lot of competing needs. This can be difficult to plan around and you may not get much notice of where your placements will be.

Also, sickness can be an issue. You need to do a certain number of days in school to get QTS- most uni courses build in about 10 days of slack to allow for illness, snow days etc. Very few people manage to not have any time off. Being around a lot of new germs when you're already tired and stressed is a recipe for getting ill. And you'd have to account for days when your child is too sick to go into nursery.

It's also a very stressful year. You're under pressure from a lot of different sources. You have to evidence everything you do. You have to deal with teachers who may do things in different ways and may put pressure on you to be someone you're not. You may deal with stressful/sad situations involving your students. You have the days when your perfectly planned lesson crashes and burns. You have to get to grips with essentially two new jobs and new ways of doing things.

There are definite upsides to teaching as a career long term, but the PGCE is very tough. If you have a supportive partner, family and friends, and flexible childcare, I can see it being possible. Otherwise, maybe waiting a year would be a good idea?

Thanks so much for your helpful reply! My partner works shifts so will be around for most of the time during the day and my mother in law who lives across the road is able to help out too. I have a tonne of supportive friends and family close by encouraging me to do it and offering their help so have no concerns about having plenty of help.

I know it will be a tough, full on year but my thinking was that it will hugely benefit us both in the long run. My current job is in residential childcare which is shift work, so when I return to work I could be starting at 3pm and not getting home till 4:30pm the following day, which I don’t want to do with a baby in the house. The place I live has about 7 primary schools close by so it would be ideal to get one of those! Realistically, if I were to be sent to a school 90 mins away, it wouldn’t be possible.

My thinking is that it would be easier in terms of childcare just now when she’s small rather than when she’s a year and a half.

I’m definitely under no illusion that it won’t be extremely tough, I’m just trying to think of the bigger picture and what would be better for my family in the future.

It sounds like you have a lot of support available. You could talk to your ITT provider now about where you might be likely to be placed. It's very unlikely to be 90 mins away- and generally if you get an awful commute for one placement, they try to give you something better for your other one. So, for example, I had a commute that was about an hour (longer in traffic) for my first placement, and now have one that's about 25 minutes.

Given you have lots of support around you, then I think it is worth giving it a go, and I agree long term it will probably be right for your family- especially in terms of holiday childcare.

I would be very clear with your partner + other support though that there will be times during holidays when e.g. you'll be writing an essay and will still need childcare help.

If things don't work out for you, there is often an option to take a leave of absence and go back a year later to finish off, for example, or to take away a partial qualification.

Good luck!