Meet the teacher: Biology teacher Emma Williams on rediscovering her love of teaching

Having abandoned dreams of being an artist because she felt she “wasn’t good enough to pursue it as a career”, Biology teacher Emma Williams says she “fell” into teaching.

“I did a bit of a weird A-level combination of Art, Biology and Chemistry,” she smiles. “I prefer Biology to Chemistry because I don’t love doing mathematical calculations, but I do love telling stories - especially factual ones. I never really liked English, because I like facts and I loved how in science, especially Biology there are so many interesting stories to tell.”

Those two loves; facts and storytelling, combined perfectly for a potential career in teaching, so having taken a couple of years out during her studies, Emma decided to give it a go. And, she wasn’t the only one as her sister also went on to become a teacher - initially in Biology too, before setting up a Psychology department at Wirral Grammar School. 

“Neither of our parents were academic - mum was a housewife before later on being an usher in the local Magistrate’s Court, while my dad worked at Ford Halewood from 19 until he retired - but they were both very switched on and impressed on us the opportunity that education could provide. They actually moved us out of Liverpool and to the Wirral, just so we could attend the grammar school here. I’m a bit embarrassed about it now, but dad even insisted we take elocution lessons because he feared having a strong Scouse accent might hold us back. There was never any pressure, but they absolutely supported both of us to get the best-possible education,” remembers Emma.

Having taken the opportunities her parents gave her, Emma set off into the classroom where she would spend the next two decades teaching.

Against the lows of feeling unable to control 20+ kids in a school which took on a lot of excluded children from elsewhere, to the highs of having a student approach at the end of the year to share that she was planning to study Biology at university after Emma had ‘opened up her brain’ to the subject, Emma’s love of sharing information remains intact.

“I was concerned that I might be starting to burn out in the school environment where teachers spend so much time simply trying to manage behaviour. I love that at MyEdSpace, just like in a traditional classroom, you build relationships with students and really feel that joy in sparking something in somebody - even though you don’t meet them in-person."

"Before the lessons start you see students checking in and catching up with each other and even asking how I am. Then, when we get into the different topics it gives me a real buzz to see people saying stuff like ‘wow, I didn’t know that’, or ‘ooooh, now I understand’. After every lesson, I still feel the little adrenaline boost I did when I first started teaching. It’s really cool and it has completely reignited my love for teaching.”

Outside teaching, Emma lives with her husband and two Hungarian Vizslas, Star and Dio, who keep her (very) active. “I used to rescue cats - at one stage I had eight - but my husband has always been a dog-person and these two have really won me around and now I am a full-on dog-convert. They have so much energy, so it’s great that I now have the flexibility to get out and enjoy long walks with them”, she laughs.