You have to be a really resilient person to be an effective teacher. It is a bloody stressful job and often thankless. Take comfort in knowing that you will learn as you progress through placement and career and that you are a lifelong learner as a teacher.
You need to have a backbone, and what I mean by that is: if somebody is acting out, you need to take a stand and say 'no, that's not right'. I supervise student teachers as part of my role and I have seen quite a few of them who cannot control a classroom at all. There are just some people who aren't meant to be teachers. When kids sense that you don't have control, they know this and they'll walk all over you, so it's really important to know the behaviour management procedure in your school and how to apply it.
Teaching is not simply delivering content in front of students - this no longer is the case and will not cut it in today's profession. First and foremost, the ability to reason and build relationships with young people is critical to success as a teacher. Second, being adaptive is also crucial. You are often presented with challenges and situations at a moment's notice so you have to quickly think on your feet and be prepared to go outside of your comfort zone and change things up. Third, you have to
like kids (even the younger ones). As a teacher, it is unrealistic to expect that you'll be able to hide away just teaching VCE. Especially in the first few years of your teaching, you will most likely not be teaching Year 12 and in majority of cases that i've seen (so take this with a grain of salt), you'll be given a junior class (or multiple) as a means of developing your teaching practice and demonstrating it.
brenden would probably be the best person to comment on the TFA program since he is currently doing it - but as a teacher with 3 years experience I can comment on some of the aspects you have raised:
However, if I do TFA I can’t do any education units, thus learning all the teaching stuff just before I become a teacher.
You know, it's actually not the worst idea. Having gone through an academic masters program in teaching, I really like and value the idea of 'on the job' training (or internships) purely because they are a realistic expectation of what you'll encounter when you start teaching yourself. I found my academic degree to be (for the most part) quite useless and just a stepping stone. The placements/practical experience is where you learn majority of things because you get real feedback from real teachers that have a current understanding of the profession.
Originally, I was thinking that I was going to be able to handle how intense the course is and working with students from low socioeconomic areas, but the past couple of months at work has been making me question myself.
What do you mean 'handle how intense the course is and working with students from low socioeconomic areas'? Having had experience in all three of the main socioeconomic schooling environments (low, mid, high), I can say that while schools that are considered 'low' are often much more challenging, I found that my first school was one of the most valuable experiences and has shaped me as a teacher. I now work in a high SES school and the difference is significant. I would respectfully ask that you take the view: 'what can I get out of this experience' rather than 'these kids are going to make my life hell'. If a low-SES school is that much of a big deal for you, then simply try to find a school that isn't. Every school has its challenging students though, regardless of what SES it is. Even at my high-SES school, there are quite a number of students who require intervention. I would also say that teachers should WANT to teach these kids, as they are the ones who really need high quality teachers... anyway, that's just my view on it.
They don’t pay us over time (so I could be back for 30 mins and not get paid) and I’m too scared to say anything about it
If pay is something that is a significant influence to you, then i'd say teaching perhaps is not the career for you. Like I said earlier, teaching is often a thankless job and one of the reasons is financial. My own personal experience involves preparation and marking probably a good 3-4 hours when I get home from work on a daily basis. I get one full day off on the weekend and the other day is spent working. The work-life balance sucks but it's so rewarding. I love my daily interactions with my students and I feel so privileged that this position gives me the opportunity to work with these young people.
I’ve been getting a lot of abusive and disrespectful customers recently and I am able to hold myself together while on the store floor
Yeah, in the classroom you'll get that too. Just understand that you are in complete control of your classroom and most (if not all) schools have a discipline policy in place that you can follow and a referral process to somebody higher up if you aren't able to deal with it yourself. As a graduate you are supported to develop your capacity as an effective teacher. Just remember that it's never personal and there's a WIDE range of reasons why kids act out.
I’ve started looking into getting tutoring jobs, but it’s kinda hard since I stuffed up all my exams. I don’t really have appealing scores. I mean they’re good, but not what a lot of tutoring joints want.
While tutoring might look good on a CV when you go for your teaching job, it is not entirely reflective of what makes a 'good teacher'. One-on-one tutoring is a completely different ballgame in comparison to teaching a class of 25 young students, which is what you'll most likely get in the government system. Don't let the 'i stuffed up my exams' thought prevent you from pursuing teaching.
Because I’ve been behaving like this, I’ve started to wonder if TFA, or even teaching, is the right path for me.
My advice would be to try it out and see how you go. When you go out on your first placement round, you'll know straight away whether you've made the right decision or not. If teaching is something you genuinely want to do, do it and do it for the right reasons. If you genuinely want to teach, you will put all these things to the side and take a leap of faith.
I’m doing a bachelor arts, majoring in psych and minoring in lit studies. I’m going to do behavioural studies and linguistics as electives, which probably won’t help me really get a job.
Cool, so you'll most likely be teaching Psychology and English/Literature if you decide to go down this path.