Teaching isn't compatible with parenting

[treehugga]

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?

how much..sorry

I am like that, ithaka. I always have my eyes and ears open looking for snippets for my lessons, whether from the news or documentaries.

That can be a problem, Nessy. An example is when it takes longer for you to mark a piece of work than the student originally put in.

MrA would love to be a classroom teacher again!! But my gin habit and our feckless pro-creating means that he has had to climb the greasy pole!!

But seriously, over the past academic year I have seen a few teachers in action, and it's truly a profession/vocation and I can see how hard it is to switch off and not spend every night planning.

As a lowly trainee TA I spend far too much headspace worrying about the class I work in.

Until I started working in a school I had no idea how much MrA had to do and what a responsibility he has in terms of planning, assessing and jumping through hoops.

Both my parents are teachers, and my mum's now a headmistress. Actually, it's a great job if you've got kids because it's flexible when they're little (you can do supply or part time if you need the dosh), you can go back to it without having to retrain, and you get the same holidays as your kids when they're school age.

That being said, it's very stressful doing all that crowd control and workloads are fierce and spill over into your leisure time during term. And once you've reached management level it's relentless. My mum gets to school at 7 am and doesn't stop until 10 pm, 48 weeks of the year. She's always taken Sundays off by being absolutely ruthless with her time, but she's the most disciplined person I know. I can quite see how others don't manage it.

wouldn't it just be a whole lot easier if teachers (for all years) had the exact lesson plans word for word telling them what to teach.

You wouldn't get a helicopter pilot being trained and then having to reserach certain techniques (that might be a crap example) but I know there are lesson plan outlines but if it was the same for every single school and they had to teach it in the same way, then teachers wouldn't have to spend their spare time thinking about how to explain gravity, for example, to their students. It would tell them 'we want you to show them this experiment - once they can do a), b) and c), they will achieved a level (whatever).

My dh is an English secondary hod(ofsted outstanding) and no he doesn't do anywhere near that amount of work. He's home by 5 .15 most nights except for meeting nights and takes our 3 kids to a lot of their activities after school-he can be home by 430 if there's a dr's appointment or something urgent.
He does an hour or so of work probably every other night, but wouldn't ever leave me at trhe weekend with the kids in the day. He does do a bit when he's watching kids at football or swimmin g lessons, but often chooses to go to the gym instead.
He did a day of work at half term, but that's unusual. Probably does 4 days in the 6 week holiday.
He is stressed-the usual hod stuff of being stuck between staff and senior managment.
I think he has a relaxed personality and works to live rather than lives to work. He's also been in the profession for a long time and has his priorities in order. Her's well respected and works hard, but he knows when to stop.

I do think my friends in Languages have more work to do and it it's a lot worse being an NQT than an experienced hod.

Your dh needs to get a grip and being a perfectionist is always a shit thing to be -for you and those around you. The mantra 'It'll do." is a good one to learn. Are his kids going to ythank him for all those hours?

Nessy

Move schools. It doesn't need to be like that. My school is similar. I just try to ignore it. I'm probably coming across as a beacon of calm here - my stress levels are through the roof, but I stand by the work-life balance thing - if at all possible, don't take work home.

We have lesson plans written for every lesson from years 7-11, but really, we are all different. I cannot teach in the same way as my colleagues, and not all my classes learn in the same way.

I would hate that, vintage.

Thinking about it, my OH is always up and out early in the morning - he says he is always first into any school he has worked at - so I think he does quite a bit of work done then, so he can get back home promptly, which suits him.

He did churn out mounds of paperwork at home just before HMIE came in, but apart from that, he certainly never gets stressed by the job, he loves teaching. It is obviously different and more stressful if you also have management responsibilities in the school - my OH hates all that, it was what he retrained to escape, so I don't see him going down that route. I have a decently paid job, so he doesn't need to.

Like TFM we do have lesson plans written for every class from year 7-13. But even with that in place you need to differentiate and sometimes somthing happen locally or in the news that you can use. Or you spot the class are interested in something and you follow their lead.

"wouldn't it just be a whole lot easier if teachers (for all years) had the exact lesson plans word for word telling them what to teach."

But that removes any creativity and halts the development of teachers. I know of schools where they want lessons to be planned and delivered by dry powerpoints. Teaching is more than that.

IME what ruins the job and places teachers under stress/pressure is having to constantly justify what they are doing wrt to 'objectives' set that are maybe irrelevant to a setting where you are taking in an intake of kids who have no functional verbal, numeracy or social skills.

Teachers are not just teachers, they are also frontline mental health practitioners, social workers and social engineers.

Just scan this forum for what is expected of teachers. Delivering lessons is like 0.000001% of the job.

YANBu this is the same for Uni lecturing. Totally horrendous as far as family goes. My family are suffering due to my job so Im changing.

To answer your question OP - in my personal opinion, it may be compatible with parenting but I don't think it is for me. I would rather SAH and take advantage of part-tome and flexible opportunities. Harder for dads though if he's the main earner - could he drop his TLR?

This is turning into my usual Friday evening drinks with teacher friends 'it's all so stressful' 'how can we work less hard and continue to be good teachers' 'gah management pressure' 'gah HMI pressure' '... but the kids are nice'

ditto fallenmadonna - I despise using other peoples plans. One plan does not fit all staff/all classes. Shared powerpoints have just ruined lessons imo.

Pooey - I'm core dept. Have taught in 4 very different schools in 4 different regions - workload the same. I think it comes with the subject and the fact every student does it and how they do impacts on the schools reported performance. I know eg. the geog dept have a very different job to mine

sorry called you pooey, phooey!!

im getting really scared reading this, i start my PGCE in september and have 7 little ones at home!

No worries Messy

Agree with that Nessy. I've had some interesting talks with the head of MFL in my school about the consequences of the EBacc for his department. He is feeling the heat.

A head of MfL is being upgraded from 'subject leader' with attendant TLR to 'head of faculty' with a whopping rise in TLR so he's happy with the EBacc!

I'm obv not, as an Arts teacher, we're being squeezed massively by the head's obsession with it.

It really doesn't have to take over. I know loads of colleagues who DO allow it to and get into competitive who can leave the office the latest type things but with good planning and a approach that allows it to be just a job and not the be and end all, it can fit in well. DP and I both teach and manage to be around a lot for our DS. We are both good at what we do and the head, kids and parents have no complaints. cherrypez don't let this freak you out its is perfectly manageable ( admittedly some schools / heads can make over the top demands but I wouldn't say ours was especially family friendly and requires staff to be available until 6 on many nights of the week). we alternate, and DS has dinner and bath with one of us every night.

Head of faculty might have a bigish TLR but the work load and pressure (especially in a national challenge school) is quite tough.

As a caveat for the OP this time of year has always been the busiest for my DP.

Be gentle with me.... I've never posted in AIBU before but I have lurked for a while.

I'm a teacher with 2 children 6 and 3. My son is currently being assessed for ASD and his behaviour has gone right off. Because I work full time he goes to breakfast club and After School Club and he is exhausted. I struggle to arrive early enough in the mornings to get organised as I have to drop each one of my children at a different location. I try to leave at 4.30 each night but I then struggle to get enough work done at home. I currently have a class of 34 and at least a third are challenging with 10 having IEPs. I have been told by the head that I am not doing my job properly and I am on the verge of collapse.

I have just handed in my letter asking to go part time.

Its not actually a child friendly profession in my opinion (apart from the hoildays)

I'm going back to work full time in September when DD is 10 months so I truly hope I can make it compatible somehow! I had horrendous morning sickness for 20 weeks and managed to keep going then so I hope it won't be worse than that. When I'm at work I think I do about a 50 hour week and I could do it in less being more organised and I have extra responsibilities. No one except the head works a 70+ hour week at my school.