To think my HOD is being a bit of a jobsworth?

A little goodwill goes a long way.

I think this is your heads decision rather than the hod? As hod I’d have no issue but also no authority to authorise it. Maybe that’s been made clear on mat leave or maybe your old hod just did without checking.

Isn't the expression 'left, right and centre'?

I think, in the current climate where many other people’s jobs have adapted into very flexible or remote roles allowing parents much more scope to pick up/drop off at school (alongside a huge retention problem in teaching), it is unreasonable of the HoD not to agree this. If you piss off the few remaining teachers we have left, who will we have left to teach our children?!

I was once told by a (job sharing) optician, that teachers shouldn’t be allowed to jobshare as children deserved to have just one teacher. This really annoyed me! Interestingly, in my year group that year, both full time teachers were off for long periods with stress and had weeks of different supply/TAs and cover whereas the class taught by me/my jobshare partner didn’t have a day off all year.

Make your case to the head.

Abuse by decision.

Perhaps the HOD is worried that this will become a common occurrence? That swapping days for X, Y and Z when suits (and I know that's not the case but he/she doesn't know you as you've been out in mar leave) will become the norm.

Their concern might be that the other staff/ kids won't know who is in on what days and that can be a bit unnerving.

Just putting another viewpoint out there though, but I agree that it does seem unreasonable.

Yeah but hardly unsettling for the pupils!

Put in a formal leave of absence request. It’s be approved at my school depending on previous absence levels. Then they’ll have to find cover for you anyway!
Being a teacher does not mean you should miss out on life.

it's not just bloody teachers who may have to miss their kid's first day at school.

No, of course not, and they can start threads if they are cross if their annual leave request has been denied, if they want to.

OP, your HoD is being a jobsworth-it’s things like this that are making people leave teaching next, right and centre-there is just no need for it, other than micromanagement. Can you go to your head instead?

Ask the principal/ head teacher

YANBU.

I consider the setting of expectations and the establishing of routines not only absolutely vital at the start of the year but very much a 'proper lesson'. I think that's what the OP meant.

Total knob jobsworth. Knobsworth if you like. I'd definitely politely challenge him about this

Interestingly, I had a very similar jobshare set up and it worked brilliantly for many years.

I also learnt towards the end of my time teaching to not ask for things like this but to inform - rather than saying 'do you mind if...?', I'd say 'just to let you know we are going to swap these days blah blah'. Managers are less likely to come back to you if you go in with a statement of fact. They can, of course, pull rank if they want to but I found they usually didn't. Give it a go next time - it works really well.

He's being such a iobsworth!!

I think they’re being incredibly unreasonable. Are they fairly new to the role? I’m not a teacher but a bit of flexibility and understanding goes a long way in most jobs to keeping up morale and goodwill amongst staff.

Would your HOD notice if you just went ahead and did this? I don’t think I’d be brave enough after having my request turned down but if they’re not very present it could work. Or be sick, but you’d probably need more than one day to pull that one off without looking as suspicious…..

Your mistake was asking for permission - I’d have just gone ahead with it and then asked for forgiveness of anyone actually noticed!

Yeah, I think this is a bit rubbish. He probably doesn’t want to be seen as lax at quite an early point in the role but it really doesn’t sound like there would be a detrimental impact from you swapping so it’s a bit daft.

"Women in their 30s are, numerically, the biggest single group leaving teaching, according to new analysis seen exclusively by the BBC.
More than 9,000 of them left teaching in England 2022-23, compared with just over 3,400 men of a similar age.
In a report called Missing Mothers, researchers urge more family-friendly policies to halt the exodus."

Saw this today and thought of this thread www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c51yzv95wg9o

exactly
i’m with the HOD
two members of staff in a job share
both their first day back in after a year y
and first day back for the school

and they want to ease in to their first class and change already

I'm inclined to agree, @muggart . You know how prescriptive learning is nowadays, with targets and outcomes.

I think this is a good point actually.

In the first post the OP sounded totally reasonable but if she presented it to the HoD like she did in later posts, implying they weren't going to hit the ground running, maybe that's why he pushed back.

I'm just wondering if the HoD responded negatively to the idea of lose "warm up/getting to know you" which may have indicated a certain casual approach, which may not be the case.
They could easily have swapped, I would allow it, but if the school is following the enacted curriculum, he will want to be assured that proper lesson planning is in place.
That is all.

I don't know what the OP would be planning, but my definition of warm up work would be getting to know the children, helping them gel as a class, introductions to the subject, making classroom rules and expectations clear. All very useful stuff.

The children should do proper work, of course they should.
I'm sure those teachers do, bur claiming it's not really an important start doesn't help their argument.