New member

It is worth bearing in mind that teaching involves talking to a sea of heads, mostly nodding off or pre-occupied with texting their friends. There will be some one-to-one, but to them teachers are all weird, so any obvious difficulties you have with eye contact or mannerisms will just register as typical ugly boring teacher.

Where you may have an advantage is that, because you have to listen harder, you will appear to be a good listener. Also you will be less inclined to put on airs or act all superior, as you may find yourself relying on what you can do in any situation being much the same. That strangely will make you seem more accessible.

What you may have to do is put more effort into lesson plans and structuring your teaching, which is a good thing. NTs get lazy about lesson plans because they think their personalities will carry them through. Teachers on the spectrum will also tend to be more thorough about knowledgeable content.

Where I'd be cautious is that fitting in with other teachers is the more likely problem - too many petty, pushy, self conceited, difficult to get on with misfits - just like school all over again.

On the wider career front, try searching for "sector skills councils" on the web. I'd give a link but the Government has been mucking about with this, changing labels and websites, so it is a pain. There is still something called the sector skills alliance, which lists the sector skills councils with contact details and background.

The sector skills councils are responsible for training and qualifications in the sectors they cover, so you can get a lot of information about what you'd need to top up your degree to get into a given job, but also a lot about what these jobs entail.

I'd strongly recommend anyone on the verge of job hunting or currently unemployed and looking for new opportunities to look at these, albeit they are currently hard to track down. From an autism perspective they may give you some "edge" through being able to identify skills you are really comfortable with and know how these can be applied to jobs, so you can come over better applying for jobs.

It is worth bearing in mind that teaching involves talking to a sea of heads, mostly nodding off or pre-occupied with texting their friends. There will be some one-to-one, but to them teachers are all weird, so any obvious difficulties you have with eye contact or mannerisms will just register as typical ugly boring teacher.

Where you may have an advantage is that, because you have to listen harder, you will appear to be a good listener. Also you will be less inclined to put on airs or act all superior, as you may find yourself relying on what you can do in any situation being much the same. That strangely will make you seem more accessible.

What you may have to do is put more effort into lesson plans and structuring your teaching, which is a good thing. NTs get lazy about lesson plans because they think their personalities will carry them through. Teachers on the spectrum will also tend to be more thorough about knowledgeable content.

Where I'd be cautious is that fitting in with other teachers is the more likely problem - too many petty, pushy, self conceited, difficult to get on with misfits - just like school all over again.

On the wider career front, try searching for "sector skills councils" on the web. I'd give a link but the Government has been mucking about with this, changing labels and websites, so it is a pain. There is still something called the sector skills alliance, which lists the sector skills councils with contact details and background.

The sector skills councils are responsible for training and qualifications in the sectors they cover, so you can get a lot of information about what you'd need to top up your degree to get into a given job, but also a lot about what these jobs entail.

I'd strongly recommend anyone on the verge of job hunting or currently unemployed and looking for new opportunities to look at these, albeit they are currently hard to track down. From an autism perspective they may give you some "edge" through being able to identify skills you are really comfortable with and know how these can be applied to jobs, so you can come over better applying for jobs.