To email headteacher about this

YABVU.
It almost sounds like you're telling the head how to do their job.
This sort of thing often happens in schools - many teachers are women, many women have babies.

Dd1 had a couple of years of this.

She's just finished her GCSEs. Predicted to do very well. As I've said before, this will make not one jot of difference to your dc's outcomes.

Even if the class did have the one teacher, anything could happen. Illness, time off for other reasons, leaving part way through the year because of shit from parents.

Play the long game op and think of the bigger picture.

With respect, I'm very glad I don't teach at your school.
I'm a part time job share (2 days). I could work full time if I wanted, but I refuse because of the stress of the job.
Consistency is all well and good, but be glad your child has stable, qualified teachers at all who are relaxed and still enjoying the job.

But carry on, join the army of 'those parents'. I'm sure the part time teachers will be thrilled about the complaints and one of them will gladly step out of the way and the other will go full time.
In reality, both will find it bloody insulting and question why they bother at all, hand their notices in and your child may end up with supply teachers for the majority of the year.

Dramatic I know, but it doesn't take much at the minute. My own wonderful headteacher is leaving education because of petty shit like this.

The thing that’s most fascinating is you are “mostly very happy”. You have said the situation is “not badly managed” and generally support PT working as have “benefitted yourself”.

So beyond something nondescript about consistency, what is the problem - specifically?

OP I don't understand how you see this relating to next year or what you would be asking for. Do you expect the two classes to be left in tact next year and not "mixed up"? Are you anticipating one class having part time teachers again and the other not and angling for preferential assignment for your child?

In my school and most schools jobs shares are usually occupied by the more experienced teachers who have had kids. I usually find that schools offer these positions to teachers they don't want to lose as they are very good teachers.

OP I don’t like job share teachers quite honestly - my experience was that with a 50:50 split neither of them took actual responsibility for anything, they contradicted each other in ways that upset the children (one would say on Tuesday X was allowed, then the Thursday teacher would tell them off for doing X ), there appeared to be zero handover between them (child A would repeatedly thump child B on Wednesday morning, on Wednesday afternoon the other teacher would move them to sit next to each other) and messages from parents were never passed on. It wasn’t great, although I think some of it was down to the particular individuals.

That said, no child has the same adult all week and in the current climate having full time qualified teacher cover is doing well. Lots and lots of teachers are part time (being human and all) and that has to be accommodated somehow. It’s not all about what’s best for your child.

You can protest all you want, no sensible headteacher is going to take a blind bit of notice of parent opinions on this kind of thing. Teacher allocation will have been done for actual reasons, many of which you will rightly have no idea about. All you can do is make the best of it.

I’d reframe your thinking, for multiple reasons not least this is outside your control. Mob rule of parents is generally not how schools operate. You don’t have the context of the Head.

Define ‘consistency’? Justifying a job share has a high threshold so consistency will be something these teachers are v well aware of.

1. It’s knackering being a teacher. Someone potentially fresher from PT working is advantageous
2. Different personalities and teaching style is advantage
3. Some independent schools have subject teachers and children rotate as they would in secondary, also advantageous
4. More broadly, keeping good teachers by allowing job shares is advantageous

You don’t know the detail of the cohort of children in your class vs others, and specialisms of why teachers may have been chosen.

But crack on as the Head likely hasn’t considered any of that and is just trying to piss you off and purposefully get low attainment scores.

The less people want to go. All the good teachers leave and they struggle with funding and its a spiral.

Don’t think they’ll have considered it at all tbh.

When dd3 was in a class (year 6) and the teacher was ill and needed an operation I did feel annoyed that the head didn’t organise for consistent cover. Dd had 6 teachers that year. Parents complained so they organised for the other year 6 teacher to split his time across his class and the other so messed up both classes. (I have twins so a dc in each). I mostly felt for the poor teacher trying to keep 60dc on track with minimal support from a mix of supply teachers. That said, dtds were happy and did far better than expected in the sats so I was glad I stayed quiet. Sometimes we think things are big issues when actually they’re not.

YABU - do you really think they haven’t already considered all options??? Don’t make yourself “that” parent that’s talked about in the staff room.

A bit late to the party, and you have already conceded but for anyone else thinking of this, then it would be exceptionally unreasonable. If an individual wants to ensure your child has continuity of education from the same teacher, then they’d need to home school and teach them themselves.

Also it is often the case that a class has one teacher but actually that teacher does 4 days and another does one!

what makes you say that one teacher is more stable than two? I would say the opposite- having two teachers is a lot more stable

I job shared for two years. We were both very experienced teachers, but we each had different subject strengths and enthusiasms. So we were able to create a timetable that meant the children had the best of both of us!

We also managed the transition really carefully. We had a huge hardbacked A4 notebook as our daily diary. So every incident, every issue or problem with a child, every bit of unfinished work and every sanction, was known about and picked up by the other teacher. There was no means of a pupil trying to play us off against each other ( they soon realised it wasn't going to work!)

So yes, I understand your discomfort, but it really can work very well.

Remember no class gets one teacher 5 days a week they will have at least one PPA session covered by a HLTA/TA if done well a job share can certainly avoid this. My 2 friends are in 2 and 3 days a week and they do PPA at home so their classes get teachers all the time

also job shares are often experienced teachers who have children who don’t want to work full time - both my friends have 20+ years experience but simply don’t want to commit full time - same with their job share

and the time Dd had a job share was the best yesr - the teachers balanced out each other and were relaxed from a good work life balance

But if they have the same two teachers for a year, that is consistency? I don't know what you are worried about. 2 is fewer than average worldwide! But of course, they might not last the year, many teachers leave - but that could equally happen with one teacher

You make it sound like they have had 4 adhoc teachers. They have had two consistent part time teachers for most of the year. One qualified teacher covering a two week period (many classes around the country do not even have a qualified teacher). Then a qualified teacher covering for the remainder of the summer term with the other consistent part time teacher. I’d say this has been well managed and you would have nothing to gain from sending an email.

Forgot to add, the other year 6 class had consistent teachers in year 5 and then the other experienced teacher in year 6. It felt very unfair. I assume the other class had more challenging children, but didn’t help my DD.

You’re very welcome! I actually just remembered that BOTH my PGCE placements were in classes with job shares.

One was with two very different, and both great, teachers. They were able to relate well to all the children but the class were hard and needed nurturing, plus humour, plus boundaries, plus the kitchen sink thrown at them… and together, the teachers provided all that! It was also helpful as each teacher came in fresh and had more stamina as they had less time with a hard class, so less burnout.

The other was just a lovely class with two absolutely outstanding teachers who I learned a lot from. All the children I worked with benefited a lot from their teachers, I feel.

I would much rather my child had a good job share than one class teacher who was just fine.

Wishing you and your DS a happy academic year 😊

2 teachers for half the week isn't inconsistent and if anything it might be more interesting for the kids than listening to the same teacher drone on

I wouldn’t email them as it won’t make a jot of difference, however you’re not unreasonable to be a bit miffed by it. We had one year of similar changes and then the followed year (which was year 6 so an important one), we were given a teacher that had been out of role and working as a TA for a few years with the promise of an experienced year 6 teacher returning from Mat leave after Christmas. Another teacher in school then handed in their notice and the experience teacher took that class when she returned! It was a pretty crappy end to what had been a good school up to then.