IT'S like doing two courses at the same time. You're still a student going to college and you're also trying to be a professional, teaching kids at school. It's like living two lives."

This is just one of the many observations of H Dip students that they must be part-time teachers and full-time students all at once. Professor Desmond Swan, head of UCD's education department, says it's vital that practice and theory go hand in hand."Teaching practice enables the student to develop the skills of teaching including classroom management and structuring lessons."

It takes up to five years "to become the teacher you become," he says. The most common complaint of students is trying to find the time to fit in college, teaching practice, class plans, extra study as well as assignments. Niamh Johnston, a 21-year-old H Dip student at UCD, says: "The lecturers warned us that it wasn't going to be easy but I don't think anyone realised the amount of work involved. There's always something on your back - lesson plans, essays due, year plans or preparing for your supervisor to pay a visit. There's not much time for anything outside college and school." Johnston is doing her teacher training at Loreto College in Crumlin, Dublin.

For Edwina Hynes, a UCD H Dip student living on campus, the day begins around 8 a.m. After a morning at the school where she does her practice - St Joseph of Cluny secondary school, Killiney - she has to be back in UCD at 2 p.m. After lectures there are class plans, extra reading and often homework correcting to be done. "You're often shattered by the end of the day," she says.

According to Dr Philip Matthews, lecturer in education at Trinity College, Dublin, an increasing number of applicants to the H Dip in education programme at TCD have prior experience. "These students are arriving in increasing numbers every year. Because they have acquired some of the necessary skills, they re not complete novices and they tend to be more committed because they know what teaching entails."

The biggest concern of the H Dip students is not the workload, the hectic, schedule or the academics but class room discipline."Often the student wants to be liked by his or her pupils," says Dr John Marshall head of UCG's education department "although it's more important to be respected by them. We're very conscious that young teachers do the right things from the beginning because, with schoolchildren, first impressions last. If they start out wrong, they could spend quite a lot of time trying to recover.

Desmond Swan agrees. For some, learning to cope with students, standing on their own two feet in front of a class, keeping their cool and getting the work can be disconcerting. "It takes some of the student teachers by surprise to learn that their students may live a life that is totally foreign to them," he says. "This can be traumatic for some student teachers."

Observation of others in a classroom situation does help, says Swan. Microteaching or simulated teaching involves the student teacher teaching a mini-class of peers who take on the role of the pupils. The event is taped and afterwards there is a critique. "This is a daunting experience in itself," he says, "but it's invaluable even in terms of hearing his or her own voice as a teacher for the first time."

Trinity's Phillip Mathews says the H Dip year can be very stressful. Although student teachers can build up very good relations with pupils, it can be difficult for them to keep the necessary authority. Matthews believes that, if there is a member of staff to whom the student can turn to for support, he or she tends to do much better. "The level of support there is depends on the school," he says.

Niamh Johnston, agrees that support at the school itself is vital. "Because I went to the school, I have a great rapport with the teachers and there is a great support system there," she says. "If I have a problem with a class, I would go to a teacher at the school rather than one of my lecturers for advice. The other teachers are dealing with the same students and they know what's going on."

Another student had similar experience of teacher support. "The staff at my school are very dynamic," she says. "From the day I arrived the attitude from the teachers was `We're here to help'. I know some people doing the H-Dip and basically they're left to their own devices."

A MALE student at UCD feels that the co-operation is not doing him justice. He shares classes with his co-operating teacher which means for him, there is lit the continuity in his teaching practice.

"The most I see any one class is twice a week," he says. "Other H Dip students may have just one class and they see that class every day. I find it difficult to build up any kind of a rapport with the kids because I see some of them only once a week. There's just no continuity because the kids have two teachers for one subject."

Because he shares the classes with another teacher, he must constantly check with him to see what he's covered and what has to be done. "I feel like I'm borrowing classes and that the kids are aware of this and may not see me as a proper teacher," he says.