Matt Lovegrove 
"I believe that God has a plan for my life and that I am living that plan at the moment."
Matt trained as a primary school teacher after a year as a volunteer youth worker. His first job was as Year 4 class teacher at a school in Reading.
Here Matt shares with us his thoughts on:
- What makes him an enthusiast for teaching
- How he came to be a teacher
- The difference he believes he makes to his pupils' lives
What led you into becoming a teacher?
From an early age I was interested in working with children; as a secondary school student I helped with the young people's groups that my church offered and as I grew older I started taking on leadership roles within some of these groups.
I first experienced working in a primary school during a gap year that I took in which I worked as a youth worker for a church in Essex - I was given the opportunity of visiting a local school one morning a week in order to help build bridges between the school and the church. I thoroughly enjoyed working in this school, and it was around this time that I started seriously researching routes into primary teaching.
Ultimately it was my enjoyment of being a positive role model in children's lives that led me into the career of teaching.
What gives you a buzz about being in teaching?
Pretty much everything that teaching involves. I thoroughly enjoy building bonds with the children that I work with and their parents and carers. I like knowing that I have opportunities to positively impact the lives of young people and that the skills that I teach children are the skills that they will need in order to be successful when they are older. I enjoy working closely with other teachers during a school day and value the importance of staff working together in order to achieve shared goals. I enjoy preparing for lessons and trying out different approaches to teaching and learning.
Would you describe teaching as a calling or a vocation?
A bit of both. I believe that God has a plan for my life and I would like to think that I am living that plan at the moment. I'm not certain, but it may be that my calling in life relates to working with young people. The vocation that I chose to live this calling was teaching.
Whether it is a calling or a vocation, I know that I am extremely happy when teaching and I believe that it is the right career for me at this current time.
In what ways do you think you have made a difference to the lives of your pupils?
I would like to think that my pupils see that I have a positive outlook on life and that I deeply care for them and am interested in their lives. I try my hardest to build excellent relationships with the students I teach and I hope that the children I work with feel able to approach me at any time. I like to have fun with the pupils that I work with and try to plan activities for them that I believe they will enjoy.
Some parents of the students that I have worked with have commented about how much their children have appreciated me teaching them; comments such as this are great to receive and help me in confirming that teaching was the right line of work to chose.
What would you say to a Christian who was thinking of going into teaching?
I think that teaching is a brilliant career and I would recommend it highly. If you are considering a career in teaching spend some time in a school getting to know what is expected of teachers and how things work in schools. I would recommend spending time working with youth groups at your local church if you haven't yet done so in order to experience the types of skills that you will need to have to teach.
At times teaching is extremely demanding, so be prepared to be challenged, but understand that at the same time it is a very unique and rewarding career.
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. . . spend some time in a school getting to know what is expected of teachers.
At times teaching is extremely demanding, so be prepared to be challenged.