Ellie Markham (Music and Popular Music)

Ellie graduated in 2014 and is now a primary school teacher.

What does your job involve?

There’s never a dull moment as a primary school teacher, right from when I get into school at 8am until I leave at 5:30 I’m busy rushing around. The day’s activities involve planning and resourcing lessons, organising the classroom and children, ensuring a balanced curriculum is taught and incorporating the various events that occur day to day in a primary school. It is a tiring but very rewarding job that allows you to use your creativity on a day-to-day basis.

How did your course prepare you for your job?

As a primary school teacher all your skills are utilised through the school, as a musician I am able to offer various after school clubs and further in my career I will be able to become the subject coordinator for music. I also took the work placement module in third year of university that I carried out with Education Opportunities; this involved planning and teaching a morning of musical activities for a visiting primary school class.

What are your top tips for students wanting to work in your field?

My top tip would be try and get as much experience in schools as you can while you’re at university, make the most of the careers department's links with schools. You learn a lot during teacher training but nothing compares to first hand experience.

What was your best experience of studying at Liverpool?

Meeting incredible musicians through the course and immersing myself in the thriving music scene of Liverpool. The city is an excellent place to study music, there is loads going on and if you want to go into teaching there are many schools willing to offer voluntary classroom experience.