Teaching Assistant CV Examples & Writing Guide

This CV is for a teaching assistant who started in a KS1 reading intervention role and now supports pupils with special educational needs (SEN) in a primary school. Schools use teaching assistant, learning support assistant (LSA), classroom assistant and SEN TA for the same or overlapping jobs; use the one in the advert. Name and schools are made up. The numbers come from the kind of records a TA actually keeps: EHCP progress sheets, reading assessments and intervention group lists.

Teaching assistant posts often draw 50 to 100 applications through Teaching Vacancies, a local authority portal or a trust's own system, and the headteacher or the SENCo shortlists them in a few minutes each. Four things decide who gets a call.

• Do you meet the person specification? There is no single legal minimum qualification for teaching assistants in England, so each school sets its own. Most ask for a Level 2 or 3 Certificate in Supporting Teaching and Learning (or a teaching assistant apprenticeship), GCSE English and maths at grade 4/C or above, and an Enhanced DBS check; higher-level posts ask for HLTA status. State what you hold in the personal statement.
• Which pupils have you worked with? Key stage (EYFS, KS1, KS2 or secondary), whole-class support or SEN, and specifics: autism, SEMH, EAL, phonics intervention, complex medical needs, pupils with EHCPs. A CV that says "KS2" and "pupils with EHCPs" gets matched to the vacancy; one that says "assisted pupils" does not.
• Can you handle behaviour calmly? Team Teach, MAPA or similar positive handling training, plus one bullet with a behaviour result, answers this question before the interview.
• Will you be there every day? Teaching assistants are hard to cover. Full school years at one school, an early gate or breakfast club duty, or a note like "missed 2 days in the 2024–25 school year" all count.

“The CVs I call are the ones that tell me the caseload and what changed for those children. "Supported a 1:1 pupil with autism; incidents went from daily to weekly" tells me more than a page of soft skills. And I check for the Level 3 qualification and the DBS before I read anything else.”

A good teaching assistant bullet names the pupils (how many, which group), what you did with them, and what changed. You do not need a percentage on every line; a group size or a frequency is enough. Seven rewrites of the lines that appear on most teaching assistant CVs:

Headteachers, SENCos and online application systems look for specific words. Use the ones below that you can actually back up, and group them so the reader finds the SEN or the reading skills in one glance.

• Teaching support: small-group work, 1:1 support, phonics (Read Write Inc., Little Wandle), reading and maths intervention, following the teacher's plans, adapted activities, reading with individual pupils.
• SEN: EHCP outcome and SEN support plan tracking, adjustments and adapted resources, behaviour support plans, visual timetables, now-and-next boards, reward systems, ABC observations, sensory breaks, personal care where required, Makaton.
• Behaviour and safety: Team Teach, MAPA or similar positive handling, the school behaviour policy, lunchtime and playground supervision, incident logging (CPOMS), safeguarding and reporting concerns to the DSL.
• Assessment tools: phonics checks, book-band reading assessments, running records, WellComm (speech and language), EAL assessment, progress checks.
• Technology: Google Classroom, Seesaw, interactive whiteboards, Lexia, Times Tables Rock Stars, CPOMS, SIMS or Arbor.
• Working with people: taking direction from the class teacher, communicating with the SENCo and families, confidentiality, a second language if you have one.

Three lines: years and key stages, the pupil groups you know, your qualification (Level 2 or 3 certificate, apprenticeship or HLTA status) and one result. Write a career objective only if you have no classroom experience yet, and even then say what you bring, not what you hope to gain.

Schools take on new teaching assistants every summer because turnover is high, and some recruit through teaching assistant apprenticeships. What they need to see is that you meet the person specification, that you have been responsible for children in some setting, and that you will not be thrown by challenging behaviour. Build the CV around those three points.

1. 1Sort out the qualification first. If you do not have a teaching assistant qualification, enrol on a Level 2 or 3 Certificate in Supporting Teaching and Learning (or look for an apprenticeship post) and put the start date on the CV. Check your GCSE English and maths grades too. If you already have an Enhanced DBS on the Update Service, say so.
2. 2Turn any time in charge of children into experience entries: babysitting and nannying, holiday clubs, Scouts or Guides leader, youth sports coaching, tutoring, nursery work, volunteering in a classroom. Give ages, group sizes and how long.
3. 3Add customer-facing or team jobs in one or two lines each with a number (customers served, team size, cash handled). They show reliability and calm under pressure.
4. 4List coursework that matches: child development, psychology, health and social care, early years courses, a teaching assistant certificate in progress, Paediatric First Aid.
5. 5Write a short career objective that names the key stage you want and the days and hours you can work; many teaching assistant posts are term-time only, part-time or include lunchtime cover.

Requirements for teaching assistants are set by each school or trust, so name exactly what you hold and check the advert and person specification for the local rule. These are the items UK schools most often ask for.

• Teaching assistant qualification (often essential or desirable). A Level 2 or Level 3 Certificate in Supporting Teaching and Learning, an older NVQ, or a completed teaching assistant apprenticeship. Write it plainly: "Level 3 Certificate in Supporting Teaching and Learning, 2024". Many person specifications also ask for GCSE English and maths at grade 4/C or above, or Functional Skills Level 2.
• HLTA status, for higher-level posts. Higher Level Teaching Assistant status is assessed against the HLTA standards and suits TAs who cover classes and lead groups on their own. List it with the year; only list it if you have been awarded it.
• Background check. An Enhanced DBS check with a children's barred list check is standard for every school post in England and Wales. If you subscribe to the DBS Update Service, list it as current. In Scotland the equivalent is PVG scheme membership, and in Northern Ireland an Enhanced AccessNI check.
• First aid (often required or desirable). Paediatric First Aid (12-hour) for early years and primary roles, or Emergency First Aid at Work, with the year.
• Positive handling and de-escalation training (strongly preferred in SEN roles). Team Teach, MAPA, PRICE or the school's own programme. Name the one you completed and the year.
• Optional but noticed: Level 3 Early Years Educator for nursery and Reception roles, Makaton, speech and language training (for example ELKLAN), autism training, safeguarding and Prevent training, and a second language.

Many people searching "how to write teaching assistant on a CV" are postgraduate students who taught seminars or labs or marked work for a lecturer (often called a graduate teaching assistant, or GTA). That is a different job from a school TA, but the same rule applies: numbers and outcomes, not a job description.

• One page for almost everyone. Two pages only if you have 10 or more years across several schools and roles.
• Order: contact line (include your Enhanced DBS and Update Service status), 3-line personal statement, experience by school with 3 to 5 bullets, education and qualifications, skills.
• Use the school's title in your headline: "Teaching Assistant", "Learning Support Assistant", "SEN Teaching Assistant" or "HLTA". Shortlisting panels and online systems both search by title.
• Write school years the way schools do ("Sep 2021 to present", "2024–25 school year"). Term-time-only contracts and summer holidays do not count as gaps.
• No photo, no date of birth, no pupil names or photos, no full address beyond your town or city.
• Plain single-column layout, standard font, PDF. Many schools also ask you to complete their own application form as part of safer recruitment, so keep the formatting simple and the facts identical in both.
• Mirror the advert's words once each: "SEN", "EHCP", "small group", "phonics", "behaviour support", "EAL", "Team Teach", "Level 3", "lunchtime supervision". Then run the CV and the advert through the cvplex ATS checker to see what is missing.
• In the US the same job is often called a paraprofessional or teacher aide, the document is a resume, and federal rules set the qualification (a college degree, college credits or the ParaPro test). This page follows UK conventions.