Do any teachers still enjoy teaching?

[Gooseybby]

I come from a family of teachers and know many more in my social circle - they are uniformly negative about it/always off with stress.

I always avoided it like the plague, but now thinking of retraining.....is this stupid? Or is there anyone out there finding it enjoyable/a decent career?

Christ - hope you've got a tin hat at the ready!*

Haha I know! Allow me to explain.

Controlled assessment was absolutely horrific and malpractice was widespread. 100% exam makes things much fairer.

In the precious spec for GCSE English lit which I taught, it was positive to achieve an excellent grade WITHOUT HAVING READ A FULL BOOK.

you could do extracts for CA, bits of poetry and some short stories and voila.

Now we study full texts in detail, students learn each of them in depth and the benefits are huge.

@reefedsail

I love it, but I'm in Special Needs which is infinitely better than mainstream to work in (imo).

Yep. In the right Specialist school, the job, though exhausting, is so much more rewarding than in mainstream (again, imo).

I do know special schools that are harder though. When you're dealing with volatile and difficult children, you need really supportive management.

I do love it. I love it a lot. But I’ve moved up 2 year groups and obviously things are very different now I’m general so it seems like a different job. I do still enjoy it though and hope we can keep going with in class teaching.

I love my job. I hate marking and data and pointless meetings, but the actual being with the kids and teaching them bit? It's all good. Lockdown was hard, because we lost all the little everyday interactions that make teaching so interesting. I teach around 300 kids a week, large classes, practical subject, it's completely exhausting and bonkers and exhilarating.

My favourite things are (I teach secondary)
The kids calling out 'have a nice evening' or 'thanks for the lesson Mrs Whattodo' as they tear out of the classroom at the end of the day to catch the bus.
The in-jokes with your classes
The constant recommendations of programmes to watch on Netflix/videos to watch on YouTube, Tik Tok dances demonstrated. It just makes you feel younger. No-one at work talks about mortgages, house prices, stockpiling loo roll, or when the car needs servicing etc.
When the shy ones finally make eye contact and talk to you about things.
When they spend form time reading the news and then you have discussions about current affairs.
The lessons when sometimes you go completely off piste and end up teaching them something completely random!

I love it!!! Today I laughed so much at something funny a Y11 boy said & I was still laughing as I drove home!
Teenagers can be brilliant, lively, friendly funny, interesting amazing people!
Don’t get me wrong, some can also be absolutely awful and have the capacity to ruin things for everyone.
Thankfully there are more hardworking, genuinely lovely teenagers than not.
I love the ‘teaching’ part of the job.

Oh I hope so! My DD's teacher seems like she loves her job. Not sure about DS's teacher - not because of DS, he's a "delight to have in the class", apparently - but I don't know her well enough to judge.

I hate the thought that my kids' teachers might resent it. It's such a tough job, must only be made bearable if you enjoy shaping young minds.

I love teaching. It's bloody hard right now but it's not like this forever.

The not teaching part.... I love a lot less.

The school and managers make or break it. I too had previous careers outside the classroom. It's a far more intense expert in every way than a "normal" job but I wouldn't change it.

Now we study full texts in detail, students learn each of them in depth and the benefits are huge.

Fair enough!

18 years in (secondary). Still love teaching. I enjoy being a teacher. But it does take over your life. I’ve seen the job make plenty of people really miserable (it’s made me pretty miserable at times). It’s not something to do because you can’t think of anything better. No harm in giving it a bash, just be honest if you don’t love it and get out before it’s too hard to leave.

25 years and really enjoying it (bar one group that just are on board yet). I’m in a new school and the dc are better behaved, more motivated, politer, it’s a breath of fresh air.