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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Teaching isn't compatible with parenting

479 replies

treehugga · 03/04/2011 17:06

So you think there are short days and long holidays, well hollow laugh! Am I the only teaching 'widow'? My DP seems to spend all of his evenings and weekends working, which doesn't make me a smiley mummy this Mother's Day after yet another day of sole childcare while lessons get planned, reports written and whatever-else for the little darlings. Some mitigating points:

  • when he's not working, he's usually great at domestic stuff and for this reason I count myself lucky
  • he is a perfectionist
  • I know one other teacher (who also works ridiculous hours) but maybe he's just avoiding family life.
So, put me straight, am I the only one or are there more?
OP posts:
scottishmummy · 06/04/2011 00:15

i love the behaviours and foibles of folk when the chocs appear
oh oh only one for me im so dainty as they grab handfuls
the circler's who ooh ahh and walk around tin with steely gaze before pounce
the fly dippers,sneak a few when think no one looks
and the out there chomper.drips saliva and keeps going.stops for no one
and glue gum avoiders

itsalarf · 06/04/2011 07:29

Yes. I am probably a "fly dipper", kidding no one, not even myself.

FunnyBumbleBee · 06/04/2011 07:46

itsalarf- so true. Yesterday i saw teachers eating those disgusting little cheap fairy cakes that cost about 50p. None of them would buy them in real life but they were actually complaining that someone had eaten them all! And at my school a tin of roses put out at 8.30 is all gone by break at 10.50. And that's when we're all supposed to be teaching!

googoomama- it sounds like the type of headteacher you have has something to do with absence and workloads. In a larger school there is much more flexibility but it is also the culture of the school that everyone is taken care of, not just the children...

janajos · 06/04/2011 17:52

I am HOD and teach 3 full days a week (job share). I stay at school until 5.30 on the days I work, I often work through lunch and I will do a maximum of 2 evenings a week at home marking. Anything that doesn't get done in that time, doesn't get done!! I teach at a very high achieving school where there is a lot of pressure on all staff to ensure that the kids reach their potential (get A*!!! :o)

I think that he is not coping and needs to ask for help. My first HOD used to say to us all 'just good enough is good enough!' we need to remember that.

FunnysInTheGarden · 06/04/2011 22:35

janajos very true. I think that you really should be able to cope with a normal teaching job. If both are working fulltime then maybe one or both of you need to scale down, but if you are not coping with a FT teaching role in your own context then you do need to have a think about where you are going with it.

Caz10 · 06/04/2011 22:53

Oh janajos I wish I had your HT!! If ours was going to say something like that it would be more along the lines of "nothing is ever good enough"!!

I am in Scotland so HMI ratings are different from your Ofsted ones I think, but when we got 4/5 "top" ratings and the 5th was the 2nd best rating, he talked continually about what we had done wrong to get "marked down" Angry

Oh and I will eat ANYTHING that appears in the staffroom Grin, literally anything!

LDNmummy · 07/04/2011 00:34

treehugga depending on the type of environment (type of school, size classes, staff members to delegate to and extra responsibilities), I think being a head of department is a heavy workload. Maybe he hasn't adgusted since taking the position and he hasn't caught up with it yet?

scottishmummy · 07/04/2011 00:37

hasn't adjusted 20yrs teaching?3yr hod.how long you give it them ldnmum?this isnt nqt territory

ilovesooty · 07/04/2011 00:47

Perhaps there have been new school initiatives/change of SMT/departmental changes/a new syllabus during those 3 years.

But of course...you don't have to know anything about being a HOD to pontificate...

scottishmummy · 07/04/2011 00:49

even non teachers and folk not shacked up with teachers can opine

well i never

who'd have thunk it

LDNmummy · 07/04/2011 02:14

Scottishmummy you really have an axe to grind here don't you.

Did a big meanie teacher do something nasty to you like make you stand in the corner with a dunce cap?

Caz10 · 07/04/2011 07:34

Trying to stay out of the bunfight, but one of the "features" of teaching is that it never stays the same. If you'd been teaching for 20yrs in Scotland you could have seen 2-3 entire changes of curriculum. A new system is being introduced at the mo- it renders a lot of stuff useless tbh and it's back to the drawing board, lots of extra paperwork and longer hours for a lot of people over the next while.

mitochondria · 07/04/2011 08:46

Scottishmummy would know all about that Caz, due to her extensive teaching experience.

nottirednow · 07/04/2011 08:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

cory · 07/04/2011 09:08

As the child of teachers and an academic teacher myself, I'd say that it always surprises me when teachers speak as if they were the only ones who had to work long hours and take work home. Or as if they were particularly badly paid for the work they do. I think it is easy as a teacher to end up in a kind of bubble where you think work in the private sector is a kind of Schlaraffenland where everybody gets paid megabucks for eating expensive lunches and not doing any real work. Like when some of my academic colleagues seem to assume that if they could only bring themselves to move over into the private sector, firms would be chasing them with enormous pay packets Hmm

Lots of people have to take work home in the evening. Many people have to go on regular conferences abroad or drive vast distances for work every day. My SIL in the private sector can suddenly get told she has to go from Gloucestershire to Cornwall for the day to do a job. Neither she nor my BIL dare to turn down overtime at weekends because they are afraid of being the first to go when the firms cut down. Dh often has to drive for hours on short notice or stay overnight- and here we are talking a job with less pay than a newly qualified teacher's, after 25 years experience, a degree and responsibility for staff and heavy equipment. Have just realised what ridiculously long hours my GP works - and he doesn't have the option to save on childcare by taking work home with him.

mitochondria · 07/04/2011 09:26

Who has said that teachers are the only ones who work hard?

They do seem to be the only ones targetted as "whinging" or "saying they work harder than everybody else".

Not so. I'm always surprised, though, how many people think they know all about it having never done it. As I've said before, I wouldn't presume to know how hard it is to be a GP, or a nurse, or a solicitor or whatever.

But teachers - everyone has an opinion.

Acanthus · 07/04/2011 09:27

OP - if I may get back to your thread?!

It sounds as if his scorn for pre-made resources is a large part of the problem. As someone said earlier, no point reinventing the wheel.

cory · 07/04/2011 10:00

Mitochondria, the OP did actually start a thread suggesting how hard it was; the implication was certainly that it would be easier to have a balanced family life if her dh was in some other profession. You very seldom see people starting threads saying that nobody suspects how hard it is to combine a family with being a pest controller or car salesman. Personally, I think I have a massive advantage because I have the kind of work that I can take home and do at home while the children are sleeping, thus saving money on childcare. Difficult to do that if you have to work on a building site or at the other end of the country.

And for the record, I have been a teacher and am the child of teachers. But most teachers I know who do complain have little experience of work in the private sector.

FunnysInTheGarden · 07/04/2011 13:46

that's the thing cory a fair few teachers live in a bubble and have only ever worked in teaching. I would say there is more complaining going on amongst teachers than in other professions, and I know a LOT of teachers

LDNmummy · 07/04/2011 14:16

"Mitochondria, the OP did actually start a thread suggesting how hard it was; the implication was certainly that it would be easier to have a balanced family life if her dh was in some other profession."

Not so. She outlined its difficulties in her situation and asked if these difficulties were experienced by everyone. She did not at all imply anything but actually made an inquiry for experienced views. She did not state in her OP that teaching was the only difficult profession and neither has anyone else.

I think the point that is being made is that nowadays (not sure what it was like before), with the more demanding nature of teaching, good teachers are finding that they have to bring work home and get hardly any homelife if they are to stay on top of work targets.

maddy68 · 07/04/2011 14:38

I come from a business background and had a high powered high stress job, I then went into teachingand I can honestly say teaching is MUCH harder than my 'high powered' career
Its not too bad if you are a 'normal' teacher but as you go higher up the greasy pole you HAVE to put in the hours and that's not including the 'optional' stuff like supporting the school productions, certificate evenings, supporting the kids tournements etc etc.
I wouldn't change my job for the world but I do understand where the OP is coming from. I haven't made my own childrens nativity, sports day etc for years :(

LDNmummy · 07/04/2011 14:43

I did ask my DP about teachers who manage to get home without the extra work load and he said usually they are teaching at the lower end of the scale (actually he said these are rubbish teachers). DP is considered next to outstanding by ofsted ranking (though this is on the opinion of mentors and various heads). To maintain this is a lot of work. Some teachers make a good or satisfactory grade which means they could do far better and are average teachers at best in some cases. If you take your job seriously, you don't aim to teach at a lower average standard.

mitochondria · 07/04/2011 14:55

Ah, I dunno about being rubbish, LDNmummy. It does get easier the longer you do it, as I said I currently do about 60 hours a week, and manage to keep the weekends mostly free. I deliberately didn't apply to be HOD though, the opportunity came up when I was pregnant with my second child and I decided to stay as a normal classroom teacher. The "career" teachers put in more hours.

Making every single lesson "outstanding" would be a lot of work, yes.

Nice idea, but probably not realistic, without more time to prepare.

At the moment I think I'm settling to be a "good enough" teacher and a "good enough" mother. In an ideal world, obviously, I'd be outstanding at both.

LDNmummy · 07/04/2011 15:24

Oh no Mitochondria I didn't mean teachers who have weekends clear, teachers can of course manage that if they put in hours like you in the week and have honed their time management skills.

More as in teachers who seem to have all the time in the world to everyone else but actually are not teaching well at all. For instance, the type who hate their job and put in minimal effort because they don't care.

And yes I know it gets easier, am very much looking forward to that period, it gets me all giddy with excitement lol.

scottishmummy · 07/04/2011 15:40

your dh thinks those who dont do extra hours are rubbish teachers?curious