What teaching means for me: Leigh Douglas

Ever since I was younger I had always known that I wanted to pursue a career that involved working with children. To begin with I wanted to be a paediatric nurse but decided this wasn’t for me as I feel my emotions would have got the better of me. I then opted for the route of becoming a social worker however due to family members past experiences working in this sector I had decided this also wasn’t for me. I wasn’t ready to give up my dream of working with children so I tried new things and took a class in Secondary school that involved teaching the class and creating lessons. From my skills and qualities from this I then took it a step further and took up working in a local primary school once a week. I wanted to do this to try the teaching side of things and to see if I had found my potential career. Whilst doing this I realised how much I enjoyed teaching, in particular primary.

The more experience I got in the primary school the more it pushed me to apply to university. As before this I hadn’t even considered university an option as I was torn between what I wanted to do. Knowing how much of an impact I could have on the children at this important stage in their live was incredible as I felt I could guide them on the right journey to adulthood.  Teaching is helping the young people grow to be the best possible version of themselves that they can be.  The idea of being a part of that intrigues me more and more every day. I want the pupils to be able to trust me and understand that I care and that I want the best for them. Within my classroom I want the pupils to be honest with each other and be able to trust there fellow classmates too.

For me being a teacher is not only about teaching the young children but also learning new things every day for myself. I will be faced with challenges some good and some bad but it’s about finding the best possible way to face these challenges and overcome them to get the best out of myself and my pupils. I want to have an open learning environment where the kids feel like they can come to me with any issues and we will find the best possible way to address them. Teaching is about helping the pupils how to overcome their problems themselves where possible so that they are ready to be faced with the real working world and help them to become polite, hardworking members of society. Like Anne Isabella Ritchie once said “Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime”.