Skills needed to be a teacher

Teaching is a job that requires a range of skills. Some skills you’ll learn through your teacher training and develop throughout your career. Other skills may be more natural or abilities you’ve developed through your life experience and previous jobs.

A career in teaching gives you the opporunity to develop new skills, as well as bringing your existing unique strengths to the classroom.

There’s no one 'type' of teacher that works, and so you're able to make the job your own.

Ben, maths teacher

Subject knowledge

One of the most important skills for teaching is enthusiasm and knowledge of the subject you want to teach. This allows you to answer questions your pupils have and be creative in how you help them learn.

You can build your subject knowledge in several ways. For example, through a degree in a subject, your teacher training, or conversations with your colleagues and pupils. If you do postgraduate teacher training, your provider may decide that you'd benefit from a subject knowledge enhancement course.

Developing your subject knowledge does not end when your training does. You'll be expected to stay up to date in your subject area to teach the national curriculum and help your pupils explore their curiosity in your subject.

Being passionate about building and sharing subject knowledge will help you inspire your pupils to learn, and fulfil their potential.

Ensure you have a genuine passion for education and a commitment to helping students succeed. Teaching requires dedication and enthusiasm, as you'll be influencing young lives and their futures.

Mark, maths and business teacher

Teaching methods and techniques

In your teacher training, you’ll learn all the various ways you can teach. This is also known as pedagogy. You’ll be equipped with a toolkit to put into practice during your teacher training placements and throughout your career.

Teacher training will allow you to experiment with the best tone of voice for your own teaching style. Observe as many teachers as you can and cherry-pick the techniques and skills that they use for your own classroom. I found that having a quieter voice required pupils to listen more actively. It was an excellent way to manage behaviour!

Jane, teacher training adviser

People skills

As teaching is a very people-focused career, your people skills are important. These are natural attributes you develop through your life experience and previous jobs.

People skills that are useful as a teacher include:

adaptability
communication
creativity
empathy
organisation
patience
problem solving
resilience
self-awareness
teamwork

These skills will help you build relationships with pupils, colleagues, and parents or carers. They’ll also help you manage your workload and adapt to the changing needs of your pupils and school.

Some skills you need to be an amazing teacher can't be taught - kindness, caring, empathy and a passion to help others. If this sounds like you then the job satisfaction is unlike anything you will have experienced elsewhere.

Jodie, primary school teacher