Overworked teachers

Part x post.

Some of the young teachers say class sizes are huge[no idea how huge]. I suppose only extra money can fix that.

I taught in post 16 state education for over 3 decades and averaged 60 + hours per week, except in the holidays. I never had a weekend off during termtime and rarely got home before 6 pm, especially as I took on more duties culminating in running a department of 16/17 full and part-timers. Holidays were taken up with preparing, creating new materials, updating, organising trips, work experience, writing new schemes of work, and developing own skills and knowledge.

But I did love my job and the young people I taught and guided.

However, denigration of teachers has become so common that it is no wonder fewer and fewer young teachers stay the course. I think the only countries where teachers are respected and held in high esteem are third world countries.

Of course smaller classes and more money are desirable. Of course, the stress is huge, but I think the worst thing is the lack of respect for what is a most honourable profession. This is the state of affairs in most First World Countries as my international colleagues so often confirm.

Does anyone have any idea how the terms, length of teaching part of the day, etc., could be changed to make things work better?

Have worked in school for nearly 30 years, so I do know what I am talking about. I have just advised my daughter not to train as a teacher, for all the reasons stated above. And for all those who envy the long hols, you absolutely cannot have time off for even the most urgent of appointments in term time - everything has to wait for the holidays, from dentist visits to plumbers fixing leaks. It's a nightmare, despite what non educationalists may think. I can't wait til my time is up.

I loved the classroom but I couldn't recommend it to anyone- the work load gives no time for a life. I was lucky to be able to do part time work or supply teaching, the only way to have weekends and evenings free.
There is a huge retention problem- teachers are leaving in droves.

13 weeks of holiday is laughable Gillybob ....if only .............
It is irritating that people see it and think it is all holiday- it certainly isn't!

Lilyflower - re your post on the first page I have to say I entirely agree with you. Good post. Hope you are enjoying your retirement.

I have taught since 1993. Recently retired and would agree with everything said so far. Teachers need lot of support from senior staff and governors. Not always there for them. One of the most frustrating things is having to teach in a way that u know is not the best but is imposed by some ill informed government department. Far too much interference! However there is nothing like the satisfaction of seeing a child do well thanks to one's help or teaching. I worked in business for 20 years before teaching and much as I enjoyed it there was never that same satisfaction. As a nation we need to acknowledge the input of teachers and work WITH them and listen to their views and experience. Rant over!

We home educate our 11 year old and strangely enough, nearly half of the other home educating parents I meet are demoralised, disillusioned ex teachers.

I do wonder where we are heading with the pressure on all the public service staff ( and in the private sector with zero hours and gig economy for example). It is truly frightening, and just what will happen to those children who dont have parents to read to them, take them places, show an interest in their education? Already the so called non essential subjects such as art, music, drama are being cut off the curriculum by head teachers having to make hard budget decisions. Some parents will be able to pay for these subjects out of school, but what of those who can't or won't? We will end up with a two tier education system, even excluding those who have already been able to vote with their wallets and take the private route. It seems to me that the state provision in education and health is being cut to beyond the bone, and those who can afford to pay are going to be ok but the rest of us will just have to get on with it. I dont know whether to be angry or sad or both, but I certainly am scared, scared of my future as I get older, scared of the future for my daughter who is training to be a primary teacher,scared of the prospect of my Mother losing her house to pay care home fees.....It is all bloody awful and nobody is doing anything about it. Sorry for rant

five pieces of homework for 5 year olds over half-term?

I take your point Jalima. I never saw the point of homework for five year olds but as a teacher you don't have any choice. I wanted to ask parents to read with their children. Not only the school reading book but a range of texts. I wouldn't have cared what it was. I also wanted to ask parents to simply spend some time talking to their children. Again about anything. It wasn't allowed because it wasn't classed as 'proper' homework i.e. I couldn't provide a paper trail for Ofsted.

However my point was that the holidays aren't really holidays for the teachers. They should be called non-contact time because that makes it clearer that teachers are still working just not in the classroom with the children.

Iam64 just reminded me of when I was first in one of the inner city schools and staff were discussing a parent who was a 'dealer" I thought "Ooo second hand furniture, or clothes?" It was of course other substances! I was very green in those days. I soon learned.

Your final paragraph sums it up vampire - this is what I see from the governor's perspective. I chair the staffing committee and see it as part pf my responsibility to listen to staff, to acknowledge their difficulties and to make sure that they hear loud and clear what a valuable job they are doing.

True education is being forced out; but good teachers work their tripe out to try and keep a vestige of it and it takes a serious toll on their well-being.

Vampirequeen
Undermined ,Ofsted were just two words amongst many my cousin used when after spending most of her working life dedicated to teaching hung up the towel saying enough is enough.
Teaching had been her life claiming she didn't have time to get married and have children of her own.
All the family were so sad for her when after only five years as head of a school, sought after by many parents for the excellent results it produced, she threw in the towel. Saying had she wanted an office job she wouldn't have bothered with university and she was continually losing excellent staff who too saw their careers nothing more than an office job.

What an interesting thread will informed comments from people who understand what teaching is like. Anyone who says they have it easy and get lots of holidays doesn't know much about teaching. As has been said, most teachers spend a lot of their 'holidays' working in school, or planning / dealing with admin . All the teachers I know are in school between 7 and 8am, none leave before 5pm and often much later than that. Home, quick bite to eat, kiss their own children goodnight, then planning, book marking etc till bed time.
We have a big problem with substance dependency/abuse in this country. We therefore have many children who may have been exposed to alcohol or other substances before birth. Their emotional and developmental needs aren't met consistently or at times at all by parents who are emotionally unavailable even if they aren't asleep or doped out. Levels of domestic abuse in families with substance misusing parents are higher than in your average family.
If you're teaching 5 and 6 year olds from this kind of background, you likely to have at least 6 of your 30 children in a state of crisis. Add the child who is autistic but said to be ok for main stream but who understandable is screaming and running about in the face of the melt down from a little lad who had no tea and arrived to late for breakfast club. Well, I'll stop there.

But Lillie you are unlikely to be threatened with violence, have something thrown at you or be told what a f-- waste of space you are (by the children). If you discipline a child you are unlikely to be grabbed by a parent and told to - leave his/her child alone. You will not spend your time trying to teach children who have had a traumatic weekend because mum's boyfriend put all the house windows in when she threw him out.
I've taught in inner city problem schools and nice suburban middle class schools and I can tell you it is much easier to teach when children are from a settled background. Yes it is still a stressful job and you work far more hours than anyone imagines, but at least you can teach, you're not a cross between a police man and a social worker. Trying to keep everything under control and at the same time trying to monitor children and ensure they are safe.
I remember when I first started teaching some married women on the staff of the Infants school went home to lunch everyday and sometimes did their shopping. The head only ever walked through the door at 10mins to 9.
Things needed to change but a little balance would be nice!

Hello? Faster pace of work? I don't necessarily think so.
State school. students going to university/getting into Oxbridge. ✔️
pushy demanding parents?✔️
(At one school I taught in, said to have the highest % of graduate and postgraduate parents in England, most the daddies were research scientists at Unilever up the road and the mummies lectured at Bedford College down the road, training the likes of teachers. (Or so it seemed)
School trips in the holidays? ✔️

Oh and shorter hols than our independent school peers.

"Small classes, supportive fee-paying parents, great resources, shorter terms and longer holidays........oh! how the other half lives."

He he, Anya, but generally, a faster work pace, more expectations, very demanding fussy, unrealistic parents, holidays spent conducting trips away. The job is full on! It isn't any easier, just different.

GG2 how refreshing that someone who hasn't been actually interfacing in the classroom can have the insight to understand what we are saying. I am seriously worried that my DD (a secondary English teacher) who is standing in for her HoD who has gone off with stress, will break under the strain. And she has two young children to try and raise,

I feel sorry for teachers. I am whacked after looking after two little ones never mind a class of 30, much as I love children to bits.

My GS is determined to be a teacher of maths and single sciences. He is already a mentor and a tennis coach. When he was little I used to sit on the floor surrounded by teddies and he was the Headmaster. He seemed to assume the roll.

However, I do know that teaching is a hard job. People complain that teachers get too much time off. They obviously discount the marking of students' work, supervising students on trips, Parents and Teachers meetings, Staff meetings and Teachers training days, plus emails these days advising pupils of what is happening in the CCF and other extra activities.

My OH had a friend who always wanted to be a teacher. He was and unfortunately he taught in a very rough school. He lost all confidence and finally committed suicide. Very sad.

The holidays are for the children not for the teachers
five pieces of homework for 5 year olds over half-term?

I mentioned primary school teachers, as for some reason I know quite a lot of young ones of those sort. I only know 1 person who works in secondary. He is finding it hard, but I couldnt go by one person only.

GillT57 says they are "used and abused". That is what it looks like to me too.

The one newish primary school teaching that I know who is coping so far, says her key is not to take on too many extra responsibilities.
But she has only been doing it for 2 years so far, so we shall see.

gettingonabit - interesting that you say it is bad for supply teachers too.
The person that is leaving was offered a part time job not in teaching, and is planning to supply teach on the other days.

GracesGranMK2 Teachers also have fewer powers and authority. My niece was put in a headlock by a 12 year old in the school yard. His mates were egging him on. She was so angry and just wanted to knee him in the goolies, but knew she couldn't.

Nevermind breaking up kids fighting with each other, you are not allowed to defend yourself against a student with the body of a teenager. Her neck was sore for a month! The union rep was all hand-wringing and useless.

I am not a teacher but, for a couple of years before retirement, I did work in a school. As I never had the necessity to interface directly with the young people I should have had an easier time and, indeed, I believe I did but ... education (which ever level) is very different to any job I had outside it. It is hugely stressful.

For a start so much has changed but the job analysis of teachers has not. All that has happened is that anything new is divided up and shared amongst the teachers. You may think that happens in 'industry' but old and unnecessary parts of the job in a business will deemed to be redundant and the job re-crafted. This cannot happen in education - the teaching must go on.

The management of education is another area where often the poison chalice is handed out. So many jobs in teaching have responsibility (to the point of life and death) without authority (even over the children to some extent). Yes, this happens in middle management in other areas but I have never seen so many senior managers hanging on to the authority they have. In the businesses I have worked in good managers do not want to 'keep a dog and bark themselves' they let people get on with what they have been given to do. Add to that the rhetoric poured on teachers on-line and in the press (here for instance) and why would you want to do it.

What is happening is people do not. Whether you think their working conditions are unreasonable or not they are leaving. You will not have the say. All you can do is tell the government to sort themselves out. It is becoming harder and harder to recruit. Classes are growing in numbers and lessons are shortened. More teachers are engaged on none-salaried contracts and have little loyalty - why should they have to an industry that has none for them. These are the people who will make a difference to our DGCs - surely that matters.

In our divided society it seems that, wherever the division, each side looks at the other and thinks them both wrong and stupid but that really doesn't solve any problems. By setting the wider society against teachers (in this instance) the government does us all a disservice.