How to Become a Secondary School Teacher

Series Summary

Good writing is an important skill that can be used in a variety of media. Whether it's writing a meeting agenda, a toast, or a magazine article, the ability to effectively communicate to a large audience stems from knowledge and execution of proper writing techniques. With such knowledge comes an understanding of the distinct differences in writing styles between creative writing, journalism, technical writing and informal writing. In this free video series, a writing instructor and former classroom teacher provides teaching ideas, writing tips and advice for publishing and repairing books. Discover how to become a secondary school teacher, how to preserve books and how to break into comedy writing. Learn about joining book clubs, reading books online and writing vision statements as well. Become a better writer and teacher with this information on education.

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Laura from youngwritersworkshops.com and I'm going to talk about how to become a secondary school teacher. Secondary school or generally high school, middle and high school, is a specific credential in most states. So that means if you're going to teach at this grade level you need to earn a bachelors degree and a credential, a secondary credential. Now this is generally focused on a single subject, such as English, social studies, mathematics. So you would be focusing more specifically on that subject area. Having some course work in your undergraduate background is helpful but not required usually. It depends again on your state's credentialing system, so that could be you would look in to. But the more subject area expertise you would have the better you'll do in most of the credentialing you know, the certification tests and also as a teacher it's great to have that expertise to draw on. So as you're preparing to become a teacher really focusing in on your subject area and becoming more of an expert in that subject area it's helpful for your future as a teacher. At the same time having experience with the age group is helpful. So any volunteer work you can do, getting involved with high school youth groups that you have access to as a volunteer is a great way to really become comfortable and to also have something great to put on your resume. There are professional organizations, for example National Counsel of Teachers on English or National Science Teachers Association are two specifically that you can become a member of as a student. That's also a good thing to have on your resume and gives you resources for teaching in your subject area and a way that connects with other people in your field that are also a great learning resource. So some of the things to keep in mind are getting experience with the age group, really honing your professionalism in your subject area and joining a professional organization that will give you more resources as a teacher and more colleagues to connect with. So those are some things to think about when becoming a secondary school teacher."