If you’re a passionate educator looking for new opportunities to help students reach their academic goals, you’ll need a compelling teacher cover letter to go along with your CV.
Follow these three tips to learn how to write a cover letter for a teaching job.
Tailor your teacher cover letter to the role
Headteachers are looking for teachers who possess not just the basic skills and qualifications required to head a classroom, but for candidates who are also a good cultural fit for the school.
This is why it’s essential to write a unique cover letter for every application.
Writing a unique cover letter shows employers that you’re serious about the job, and that you’re aware of what it takes to succeed as a teacher at their school.
To find inspiration for your cover letter, you can use the:
- Job advertisement – Look for keywords that appear multiple times in the job description and list of duties. These are great keywords to include in your cover letter to prove that you’ve understood the requirements of the school.
- School website – Use the website to find out more about the types of events the school organises and what kind of projects students have been involved in. Then, mention these in your cover letter and explain how you’d use your skills and work experience to contribute to similar events and projects in the future.
- School’s mission statement – Look up the school’s mission statement and explain in your cover letter how your own goals and values align with it.
Here’s a good example of how to target your teaching application letter to a particular school:
This applicant mentions the school’s mission statement at the start of the cover letter to immediately grab the employer’s attention.
Highlight your greatest accomplishments in the classroom
As a teacher, it’s important that you monitor your students’ learning progress. This allows you to intervene in case their marks drop, and to evaluate whether your teaching methods are working or not.
To demonstrate that you understand the importance of results and hard numbers, quantify a couple of your greatest professional achievements in your teaching cover letter.
You can even use bullet points in the body of your cover letter to highlight a few key moments that you want to show employers.
Here’s an example of what that looks like in practice:
By including numbers and percentages, this applicant proves that their teaching methods help students succeed.
Emphasise your soft skills on your teacher application letter
While hard skills such as computer literacy, subject knowledge and curriculum planning are necessary skills for an educator, it’s soft skills that separate a good teacher from a great one.
Soft skills are qualities that influence your teaching style and how you interact with your students. Having a strong set of soft skills will allow you to better connect with pupils and understand their individual learning needs.
Here are some key examples of soft skills to highlight on a teacher application letter:
| Empathy | Active listening |
| Communication | Creativity |
| Leadership | Mutual respect |
| Patience | Time management |
| Cultural competence | Trustworthiness |
| Constructive feedback | Friendliness |
| Collaboration | Calmness |
| Responsibility | Problem solving |
| Open-mindedness | Curiosity |
| Stress management | Humour |
| Adaptability | Conflict resolution |
| Observation | Positive reinforcement |
This teaching applicant does a good job of drawing attention to their soft skills in their cover letter:
This candidate’s cover letter works because they highlight their ability to adapt their teaching depending on the student, making sure each pupil gets something out of the lesson.
And they’ll really impress the employer if they use complementary professional templates for their CV and cover letter.
