Job share teachers

[beentoldcomputersaysno]

DD will be starting Y2 in September. There will be two teachers, one doing three days and one doing two days. There will also be a TA for three days a week, split between the two teachers. For any teachers that have been in this position/parents with children in this position, have you found this worked better/worse generally, than just with the same teacher throughout?

Both my dds have had job share teachers a couple of times at primary school. It's been fine every time. Some of their teachers have been better/worse than others but job sharing doesn't seem to have had any bearing on that. Dd2's favourite ever teacher was one half of a job share in year 2 (the partner teacher was good but this one was the best apparently)

If the teachers are both solidly good teachers, you will be getting the best of them and your child will have the benefit of two, different but equally good teachers who are slightly less tired and frazzled than a single full time teacher.

In my experience this can work well.

Thread on this very recently here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/primary/4292231-Year-2-part-time-teachers-how-did-this-work-for-your-child

Tbh OP, it's not like you can do much about it, is it? No different to your child being assigned a teacher that you/they don't like. Any job share I've worked with have been excellent teaching partners, it takes a lot of collaboration and there's usually a phone handover when the teacher 'switch' happens. That ensures both are up to speed on any issues.

Two happy, energetic teachers are better than one burnt out teacher, without a doubt

So generally a positive then?

Dd1 had one in reception. Both excellent. Mon-wed was more of a crack the whip type, thurs and fri much more relaxed. Suited them perfectly (little ones getting tired at the end of the week!) and she thrived. DD2 starts with them in September, I’m thrilled.

We’ve had this several times over the years. The only time it was really hard, was when the job share was changed half way through the year, meaning ds had 4 teachers in a year (I can’t remember exactly why, but I think it was something to do with maternity leave and The other teacher Handing her notice in for personal reasons). He struggled a lot the second half of the year with all the change and he couldn’t really get his head round which teacher it would be on which day. But that kind of thing can’t be helped, it’s just one of those things.

But, he had a job share after that and it was the same consistent teachers all year and it was fine. My dds have had job share teachers and it’s worked fine for them with no issues. Especially good if they aren’t a big fan of one of the teachers as it’s only half the week they have to be with them (we can’t all like everyone, however hard we try).

Its an excellent set up.

Is it normal to have a TA for just 3 days? We didn't have TAs when I was at school a million years ago! Another year group has 2 TAs, so I guess they focus on where there is need? School seems exceptionally strapped for cash, although this is probably the norm.

Also thanks for link to other thread. My concern is that her teacher in reception was inexperienced, seemed very disorganised, seemed to wing it a fair bit. Y1 teacher was also inexperienced, but had clearly planned a lot in advance, seemed much more capable and tried to cater to different abilities and was a great teacher. If there were two teachers like this teaching the same class, one would effectively end up carrying the other/have to strongly manage the other which would burn the good teacher out! I like the points about playing to each other's strengths and not being so burnt out by splitting their time. They are all new teachers to the school, so I guess we'll just wait and see. Seems very common for job share from what I've now read and good to know it mainly works out.

It worked well with the job share partners I had. Was certainly a better teacher on the days I was in. Other half was in school doing another job so could communicate for one jobshare and for the other we crossed on Wednesday lunchtime so had chance to catch up, then I would stay on and do planning in school so all finished and four days off!

I used to be a job share teacher. It worked well because we both had different strengths. We communicated well. I'm full time again now and can say I honestly did a better job when I was part time because now I am too tired and don't have time to plan, mark and prepare in as much detail.