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Teaching roles available in Primary schools

Deciding that you want to work with children in education is a worthwhile career choice but is teaching the way to go or would a role as a teaching assistant be better?

Both of these choices involve working closely with pupils in the classroom, helping them to achieve their potential and a doing a certain amount of planning and record keeping but the main difference between the role of teacher and teaching assistant is the level of responsibility and accountability.

The training that is required if you decide that you want to be a teacher is longer as you will need to study to degree level a chosen subject whereas a teaching assistant is generally required to have a good standard of education and possibly a vocational qualification for some roles. A higher-level teaching assistant would need to have studied for a level three BTEC in a subject relevant to education.

A teacher once qualified earns considerably more than a teaching assistant and has the benefit of better job security however if you want to work with children in a school environment but do not want to take on the responsibilities that many teachers have to deal with, a job as a teaching assistant may be more suited to you.