2.1 Supporting teachers
Jean Ionta works as a pupil support assistant at St Patrick’s Primary School in Glasgow. ‘Pupil support assistant’ has been the preferred name for teaching assistants in Scotland. They often provide both specialist learning support and more general support to teachers. While filming at the school, we focused on Jean as she went about her work with children and staff. We put these aspects of her work together to give a sense of her day and the professional and personal skills she brings to her role.
Activity 3 A day in the life
As you watch the following video, note how Jean goes about her work, how she describes it, and how others portray her contribution. Note in particular how she puts an emphasis on children’s social and personal development and her part in this. Jot down your thoughts in the box below.
Transcript: Video: Jean
[CHILDREN PLAYING]
[PIANO PLAYING]
Discussion
Near the very end of the video, Jean states that she feels ‘the children are relaxed with me’. This is a comment that appears to point to the many relationship-making opportunities that are shown in this video. Learning-support work fosters the making of relationships with children in a way that is perhaps not always possible for qualified teachers. They often need to stand back to adopt more of an ‘overseeing’ and leadership role for large groups of pupils. In their close work with children, teaching assistants can have important and different teaching opportunities. We would argue that, perhaps more than teachers, teaching assistants have openings to develop approaches that are ‘intuitive’ (Houssart, 2011) and ‘nurturing’ (Hancock, 2012).