Prioritise subject knowledge as an ECT (Early Career Teacher)

If you’re a new teacher – an ECT – your first priority should be to develop your subject knowledge. The fact that you know your subject inside out will naturally breed confidence in you; it’ll develop your authority; it’ll help you engage with your students; it’ll help you answer questions and address misconceptions that they have, and overall, it’ll help you build a better classroom environment.

“What about lesson planning?”

Well, yes, learning how to plan lessons is obviously key as well, but that is the how you’re going to teach. Before that, comes the what and why, which comes from your in-depth subject knowledge. The content is a compass for you, giving you a clear idea of the destination you want to get to. Lesson planning is a way of mapping out how you’re going to get there, but unless you have a clear destination in mind, the map can be confused and outright obsolete. If you’re a subject expert, you’re more likely to be able to confidently plan lessons and your delivery because, again, you have a very clear idea of what you want your students to know, which allows for more creativity and flexibility in the methods you’ll use to get them there. You’ll find it easier to be an adaptive teacher.

Obviously, a deep understanding of the subject matter will instantly communicate and establish your authority. Why? Because you’re credible. You have insight. You have expertise. You’ve got deep roots in your subject matter. Ergo, you’re able to put yourself forward as an authority and you’ll command respect because of that.

Furthermore, you’ll find yourself happier. Lesson planning is fun. It allows you to be creative. The passion you have for what you teach will influence your planning and you’ll find lots of different ways to get it across to your students. It’s intellectually stimulating. It’s like solving a puzzle and trying to put all the pieces in place, then seeing how things play out. It actually gives you unlimited opportunities just to be creative and to constantly refine your practice – basically, you won’t ever be bored.

Finally, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of time. Being a teacher comes with a million and one other things to learn about and do (not least the art of pedagogy). Developing expertise in your subject provides you with a solid foundation – a layer of expertise in one thing, that will only be built on and refined as you develop expertise in other areas like pedagogy, behaviour management, SEND, and others.

So in conclusion, subject knowledge is the cornerstone of your teaching career and the authority and passion that you’ll convey might just inspire your students to take up further study in your subject. You’ll have inspired the next generation of historians or musicians or physicists.