The Pros and Cons of being a teacher

Random question - do you have to take a PGCE in the subject you do your degree in?

OP, I am considering becoming a teacher. The pay isn't that bad (don't understand why people are picking that out as a con) especially considering the holidays, the holidays are probably one of the main attractions for me. I know what you mean about wanting to feel as though you're doing something useful. My main concern is how I would deal with badly behaved children - I think I would like to be in secondary as it seems more interesting and I don't deal with small children that well but I think infants would be much 'easier'. Especially being a girl, at my school the teachers seem to get nothing but abuse, and the women and mainly the new women seem to get the worst, I've seen boys actually physically hurt them, swear at them etc. even ending in one quitting and changing her mind about teaching. The female teachers that are scary though are really really scary like so scary even the staff are scared of them and they make people cry when they keep them behind after class haha. Have you considered doing something along the lines of teaching but not actually teaching? - my mum used to teach and she hated it but now she has moved into helping children who are learning english as a second language and she also does work training teachers. and she says it's a lot more stressful, the money seems to be good as well, especially for the teacher training albeit the hours are less and more eratic.

Do you teach in a private or state French school? Are there big differences between French and English schools (specifically state)? And are the children any better behaved, or is that pretty much the same as in Britain?

I'm (hopefully) doing an assistanship next year and was just looking for a little insight into French schools; if it goes well I may decide to move to France and teach after graduating. Or just move to France. I'm fed up of Britain...

I teach in a private school. You need the CAPES (=PGCE) to teach in state schools. Technically your PGCE should be valid, but my aunt (who taught in British schools for 10+ years, used to be a headmistress, speaks fluent French, and has a PGCE) was repeatedly knocked back from posts in French state schools, being told her PGCE wasn't recognised. She has now lived in France for over 10 years and translates for a living instead.

You don't really learn English any earlier in French state schools - my boyfriend only started to learn it in his state school when he was 11, which is the same age as children start to learn French here (but then again he did start secondary in the mid 1990s so perhaps things have changed since!). After a brief conversation with my boyfriend, it seems that not much is different - they have an equally useless SATS/GCSE equivalent that you take later on (the brevet de college) and then they take the baccalauréat rather than A Levels. French universities have no initial selection apart from for medicine, but everything hangs on your first year exams as to whether you get thrown out or whether you get to stay on (for all subjects).
I can confirm, however, that the behaviour is exactly the same regardless of whether you deal with French, British, American children...

If you're looking for work in French schools as a bit of work experience, you are most likely to be able to get this in independent/private/international schools. Make sure you go for the schools marked 'sous contrat' rather than 'hors contrat' as the sous contrat schools have a connection to the government, meaning they are inspected more often and that standards tend to be higher. Hope this helps and feel free to PM if you have any questions

And for the person pointing out the crappiness of the pay - it's not about what you earn, but what you get with it! My pay out here would be considered pretty low in Britain, but I live very well on it.

How is it untrue? I know for a fact at my school (I'm talking about secondary here) the teachers taught the same things more than once in a day. In my school, My English teacher had 3 higher set GCSE classes, and so yes, she taught 3 sets of classes the identical syllabus. Same goes for other teachers too. And yes, you do teach the same syllabus for years with it hardly changing.

You sound very naive. You have put too much faith in the TDA campaigns. As an advertiser, surely you know better than to believe everything that is advertised?

Most people on my teacher training course work 12-15 hour days. As my mentor put it today, "it doesn't get any easier when you're a teacher".