Teaching can be an education for the teacher as much as for the kids, and for those of us with children of our own, a lot of the things learned in a professional teaching career can help us in our own family lives.
If you are considering retraining for a new job now that you have a family, teaching is in many ways a good choice as your working pattern and vacation time will be relatively similar to that of your kids once they are in school. However, the practical benefits are not the only reason to consider getting your masters in education and starting life as a teacher as well as a parent.
Here are three ways that doing your masters in education online while you are at home with the kids can prepare you for a job that will make you an even better mom or dad:
See How Other Parents Do Things (For Real)
When you read parenting sites or books there is a lot of stuff that can make you feel a bit inadequate. Everyone seems to be perfect in terms of what they feed their kids, what their children play with and the extracurricular activities they do. However, as a teacher you will get to know the parents of all the kids you teach, and you can find out their ideas about things as someone who spends a lot of time with their child and knows they don’t live off of organic vegetables and listen only to Mozart!
Other parents can have some great ideas and it is always useful to hear about them, but perhaps not as they are presented on parenting forums!
Appreciate What School Life Is Like – Now
We’ve all been to school, but a generation ago, and things have changed a considerable amount. To be able to understand and relate to what the social culture between kids is like today and what kind of pressures your own kids may experience when in school there is really no better way than being immersed in it yourself.
Teachers don’t just teach, they resolve disputes between kids, help children who are struggling, and also deal with situations like bullying. This gives them a great deal of insight into their own kids’ experiences.
Learn How to Engage Your Kids in Learning
When you study to become a teacher, you’ll learn a lot about the psychology of learning and different approaches to educating that work with different types of child. This will help you get your own kids excited about interesting topics and give you ideas to make learning fun for them at home, too.
These are just three of the ways becoming a teacher can give you a boost to your parenting skills. That’s not to say that all the parents who are not teachers aren’t as good as those who are, but the training and experience teachers get can really only be a positive in this respect.