AAT Tutor

Fizzbang

I might have an opportunity of becoming an AAT tutor, I have been asked what levels I am able to teach.
I am a full member with no further quals, am I able to teach levels 2, 3 & 4, or just 2 & 3?

I would be grateful if someone could advise me on this.

Many thanks

Jo Clark

What an exciting opportunity

Is this at a local college/adult ed?

I'm not sure what the answer is. I guess you could teach all levels if you feel confident enough. Has the prospective employer not told you what qualifications/experience they require you to have? You may want to consider studying PTLLS to help with class planning etc.

Good luck.


JC

Fizzbang

Very exciting!

Yes it is at a local college, they asked me if I could teach all levels so I am bit confused. Dont ask me why but I am under the impression that you need to be qualified one level above to what you can teach. For instance AAT qual can teach to level 3, CIMA/ACCA or other you can teach level 4 but not 100% sure.

Nps

I would assume you'd need a teaching qualification (PGCE or PTLLS). Knowing a subject and having the skills to teach it are 2 completely different things. I have a low level teaching qualification (not even sure if it's recognised outside of my previous employment) but quite often, tutors have no prior knowledge of the subjects they teach (ie. given a new policy, computer system, Act of Parliament etc, and told to read it, digest it and then teach a class about it the following day).

Without any formal teaching qualifications, you'd have no knowledge of the scientifically proven different ways that people learn, the psychology of learning, how to assess progress, class planning etc etc. It's really not as simple as just passing on your own knowledge, the actual teaching is a whole subject in itself.

I'm imagining that if I was a student, and had paid money for a course, I'd be a bit miffed if I found out that the tutor had no teaching qualifications unless it was clear that they were a naturally gifted teacher.

I've looked into the PTLLS course myself, and the courses are fairly short and not that expensive in the whole scheme of things.

Fizzbang

Thank you Nps1976 for your reply,

I am fully aware that teaching qualifications are needed and these will be on my to do list as these qualifications require teaching hours, so I wouldn't be able to pass these before hand!

I can do better than imagine! I have been a student, paid money for a course and was more than a bit miffed to find out that the tutor had no subject qualification and real life experiences to share but had teaching qualification instead just reading from a book/powerpoint presentation, I could have done that at home for free!

I on the other hand have been a full member since 2006 and have 12 year real life experiences under my belt ranging from bookkeeping to management accounts!

I would also like to point out that I have tutored level 2 for a short period of time, I also had Ofsted sit in on one of my lessons and I received very good feedback on my course planning and the delivery of the lesson engaging all students (and I had a mixed bag of learners too).

wabisabi

Hi Fizzbang

I don't know if it's of any help, but I work in a large FE college, and it's very common for someone with substantial industry experience to be given a contract on condition that they work towards their teaching qualification while in post.

You don't need any teaching hours for PTLLS - you do three 'microteaches' to classmates over about 12 weeks. I think you need 30 or 40 hours for CTLLS but you would easily make these up if you were in a teaching post.

Where I work the contracts tend to be part-time and / or temporary to start with. FE is no bed of roses, largely due to the changing educational environment and workload, but I think it could be very rewarding.

Best of luck

Wabisabi