‘Do you speak German?’
This post has been written by Classroom Secrets
“Good morning, Ellan. Do you speak any German? I have a day covering GCSE German lessons and no one else available.”
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I don’t speak any German, but I still went and did the day. The rest of the conversation centred around, ‘Don’t worry, there’ll be planning’, so I went along with it, and by the end of the day, I could at least say a sentence. This was a regular occurrence whilst I was working on day-to-day supply.
I qualified at a turbulent time in teaching. The Conservative government had just scrapped levels and the chaos that ensued completely destroyed any joy I had in teaching during my training year. So much so that I vowed I’d never do my NQT year. I even went on to start another degree, just to have something else to do; another option so that I didn’t have to take up a permanent teaching job.
It was whilst studying that I found the joy of day-to-day supply. I couldn’t commit to full-time or even regular hours, so I agreed to be the teacher on the books that filled the gaps when a supply teacher was needed for a day. At first, I worked in secondary schools as my PGCE was in secondary science. I think that in all my time supplying in secondary, I did one day of science and it was physics (my subject was chemistry). I covered ICT, art, English; you name it, I covered it. I learned something about every subject on the curriculum and I loved every minute of it. The best part was that if I didn’t enjoy a particular school, I never had to go back. Wonderful.
Cut to a couple of years later, I’d dropped out of my second degree as I wasn’t really interested in it and I was now supplying full-time. I decided to take on primary supply. It’ll be fine, I reassured myself. What could go wrong? I’ve turned up to lots of schools teaching all kinds of things and it has always been fine.
I don’t think it’s possible to have been any more wrong. You see, the thing that I relied on when supplying in secondary was that I wasn’t expected to know every subject on the curriculum, so planning was almost always given. There were textbooks and other teachers in departments. It was all fine. What I was completely naïve about was that I was now expected to bring planning. I was expected to have resources and ideas. Oh. I had none of those things and no experience whatsoever in teaching primary anything. I also often arrived at schools where the partner teachers were adamant that they didn’t share planning.
It was at this point, I started looking online for what was available resource-wise. I started with TES and primaryresources.co.uk, as there was a lot of free resources. I found that the quality of the resources varied greatly as they aren’t really regulated in any way; they’re just uploaded by individuals. That’s not to say there wasn’t some amazing work on there, it was just more pot-luck as to what was available. So I looked to a paid subscription. I needed to be able to rely on someone to provide me with something of quality. True to my nature, I didn’t buy just one, I bought three or four different subscriptions and they became my lifeline. I didn’t care about the cost. I just needed something to tell me what to do as I didn’t have a clue. They were BRILLIANT.
After my time on primary supply, I felt confident in taking a permanent job in a primary school, where I remained until I took my current role at Classroom Secrets. Pre-made resources played a huge role in my persistence. I can fully imagine had they not been a thing, I wouldn’t have continued supplying in primary at the very least. I might never have completed that NQT year I was so adamant I’d never entertain.
What are your experiences of working as a supply teacher? Have you done day-to-day supply or have you been more long-term in one place? What is your advice for supply teachers? Let us know in the comments below!
