To think that YES, you can have reasonable hours and a good work/life balance as a teacher

[WistfulForTravel]

I'm 22, a 3rd year Primary Education BEd student, I love my degree and every assignment and placement cements the fact that teaching is my vocation and is what I want to do as a career.

However, I've been getting a lot of negative comments from my aunties and neighbors about how I'll never have a life again, how most of my waking hours will be consumed with thoughts of work, how I'll never even have one day to truly relax during the 13 weeks off, how it'll be a 7am - 9 pm job, etc.

I know teaching is more full on than some jobs, but is it really this intense? I am friends with a few teachers and they seem to have a healthy work/life balance (time for guys/sports/hobbies, at least one full weekend day off, out 1-3 nights a week) They have no kids though. I imagine it would be very different when you have kids.

Is it possible to practice effective time management + work very hard during the week so you can have the weekend off?

As much as I've enjoyed my course and look forward to my first class in September (eek!) my philosophy is more a 'Work to Live' not 'Live to Work'

verycold - there is a big difference between being surprised that a PGCE student thinks she can plan sufficiently in 20 minutes and deeming the 7 pages per lesson some schools expect "necessary" A balance is needed. The problem is the amount of unnecessary paperwork demanded from teachers - it's not just planning, it's data analysis, pages of proof that students from various groups (SEN, G&T, EAL, LAC, PP etc etc) are making expected progress, pages of intervention strategies, department SEFs and so on- the workload is ridiculous, especially the amount of this that does not directly benefit the students. I think teachers on this thread have stated what is expected of them, rather than insisted that it's necessary - mostly to point out to a pp that her insistence that 20 minutes per lesson is adequate is erroneous.

I do think I have a work/life balance, actually.

During termtime, I have work. In the holidays, I have a life. It seems a reasonable trade off, tbh.

Although saying that - dh has a management role in a largish company. Lots of travelling & pressure, but a fair bit of autonomy over precisely how he gets the job done.

His 'working from home' days generally involve rather fewer hours slaving over paperwork than my 'school holiday' days do.

OK, the long summer break is the exception, & a welcome perk of the job it is too; but during Xmas/Easter/half terms I'd expect to do something with the kids for a couple of hours in the morning, then settle down to work for the afternoon & usually do another stint in the evening.

(I do refuse all requests to run extra tuition in school in the holidays because childcare simply makes it unviable.)

I'm not actually moaning about any of this, because I thoroughly enjoy planning & creating resources, to the extent that I look forward to the holidays so that I can get stuck in. My job's great: I get a respectable salary for something I love doing, so what's not to like?

But it does wind me up, just a tad, when there's a perception that I get 13 weeks when I'm paid but don't work, when the reality is that there's more than half of those 13 weeks when I work but I'm not paid.

Ah now, I love a bit of data analysis. Getting to grips with data was one of the most important things I did as HoD to improve our results. That and making sure that the data was valid...

Oh and 'vocation' = low pay. Same with that other vocational job, nursing.

And buying teaching resources out of that low pay. A copy of a set book required to teach an English unit to a year 6 class? School won't have it, so you get it yourself from Amazon. Don't lend it to another teacher, because you won't see it again.

Come back in 5 years, OP.

Oh yes, specs are always changing in secondary too. The advantage of working in a core department though is that there are lots of people to share the planning.

I might do one task (eg a set of reports, or a new programme of work) over the holidays, but that's it. There are many holidays when I bring nothing home with me (though the internet has changed this a fair bit, can always be researching something now or checking emails!)
I am not a skiver; would be known as the opposite I think. I have been doing this a long time and maybe that helps. Not in England which I think helps an awful lot.
Hopeclearwater keep the stuff in your attic for the next time the Vikings are popular again, it will come!

I was just going to say to Hope - never throw anything out as it all comes around again. It's like baby names. Goes in cycles.

Pipbin I know this is the norm for some people, but is it the norm for professional jobs?

The thing is Gennz that for many people, not all but many, work ends when they clock off at the end of the day or shift. That to me is a good work/life balance.

I don't think I know of anyone in a professional career who could truly say they clock of at the end of a shift & that's it.

Some days I must admit I do think, god it would be nice to work in a shop, you just cash up the till at the end of the day, lock the door & your're done for the day. But then I like my job, it's interesting and I like the people I work with. I wouldn't trade these things for the luxury of "clocking off". I am constantly connected to work in the sense that I check emails & sometimes work on weekends. I have an autonomous role which I like, but it means that I'm the only person who can do what I do so I need to be available. I choose to view my iPhone/remote access as an enabler of work-life balance (e.g. I can pop out of the office to do an errand or something while still responding to emails, or on a day sick I can still log in remotely and finish off urgent work). I still have time for family, exercise, etc - I just don't have absolutely bright lines between work time and non-work time.

Someone said earlier would you take a 25% pay cut, and take the 12 weeks & do your job in the remaining time ... I have to say I would be massively tempted! The idea of having 12 weeks away from the office where I could do some catch-up work, but also do some other stuff would be incredible. 12 weeks full time work at 40 hours a week added to the other 40 weeks of the year equals an extra 12 hours a week ... for 12 weeks holiday I would certainly consider that trade-off.

Maybe you can if you don't have children but even so, teaching is a very very stressful job and takes over your life. Very very hard to do it and have any kind of life outside.

Pipbin your salary estimates seem very low? Almost all experienced teachers that I know are earning a heck of a lot more than £31K. Unless they really aren't doing any special role beyond ordinary classroom teacher. But that's surely very unusual by the time you're approaching threshold. I earn over 37K, I've been teaching 8 years and I'm a bog standard HoD.

I'm absolutely horrified by the level of planning required for people like Twllbch on page 3. That is totally ridiculous, soul destroying and surely has no significant benefit to the children. S/he describes the kind of planning I did on PGCE and NQT year then never ever again!

Honestly, that crazy government idea about us independent school teachers going into state schools to raise standards sounds like even more of a joke now - we do not know we are born!!!

Here's my guiltiest teaching secret - I sometimes back-plan!! (I also backdate my diary. I don't know why - some crazy need to have everything in black and white even after the event!)

I also sometimes differentiate by outcome. I see no problem with this whatsoever. In fact I see some distinct benefits to it. Sometimes children like to feel that they haven't been singled out for an easier task (and they can tell when a task is easier!) I use outcome quite often with one particular class because of one particular child with ASD who I have totally failed to train out of making comments about waiting for their 'dummies task' or 'baby work' or 'bottom group stuff'. It's upsetting for the other children who need it but this child doesn't understand that and is just saying it as they see it.

Outcome is also useful when the whole year group is working towards the same end result. Our children sit external exams at 13. There are no different levels in my only exam subject and all children, even those with significant SEN have to do a paper that is GCSE standard despite being in Y8. There's only so long I can keep giving Y8 children of Y5 ability who have to do Y11 level work a differentiated by task task! At some point (I'm talking practice paper time) they have to start just doing what they can.

EvilTwins - how much differentiation do you do for Drama? I find I don't do a lot at all and am now feeling guilty! I don't force children to take part in anything they don't want to do but the whole class generally works on the same tasks. I suppose I think of Curriculum drama and dance as a bit of an add on, almost all my time and energy is spent on extra curricular performing arts and teaching English.

Pipbin your salary estimates seem very low?

Not estimates. Regular main pay scale. I've been teaching for 6 years and am on £31.5k

www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6000186

I'm returning very late to this thread.
I was asked if my dh did all the other stuff as well as work.
Yes he does. He does most of the ferrying to afterschool activities -we have 3 kids doing various things 4 nights a week and I prefer to stay at home in the evening and sort stuff out and he prefers to do the driving about.
We take turns doing the supermarket shop and with the cooking-though both of us are 'would never cook anything that takes longer than 10 minutes to prep' types. I could go on at length about our household chores (he's polished the shoes, washed the sofa covers and filled in passport forms today), but suffice to say that yes it's fair.
He does do schemes of work(to answer other question), but the head gives them time off timetable for that or he does it for half a day in the holidays. He doesn't do off the cuff lessons. There's a lot of mention of reports on this thread, but they're comment bank things at his work and take 30 minutes per class. I think having a human head really helps too. Dh's head told him he had to take the day off work in a couple of weeks when I'm having an operation-dh and I had been planning to let my mum come with me!

The stress in our lives doesn't come from either of our jobs. In fact I'd say it's less stressful because both of us work in education and have never had to worry about childcare in the holidays or being home late from work (other than parents evening).

The stress in our lives has come from bereavement,ill health and ds1's special needs. Those things really do seem to put work in perspective and make us both pretty determined not to let work take over our lives.
However, if you're working at schools like some posters have described (which seem to be breaking many union guidelines), then I can see how you'd feel very differently.

Okay, but 31.5K is therefore in the middle of the payscale, not the top. You haven't even gone through threshold yet have you? (will that be the end of this year or next, I can't remember if it's 6 or 7 years). You'll then go onto the upper payscale and start earning a lot more.

I'm hoping to reach 40K eventually and, considering we officially don't get paid for holidays, that's a scarily good salary! Pay is one of the real benefits to teaching imo.

What's ironic is that, in the years that most of us are working our hardest we're earning a pittance on M1!

not everyone gets to go through threshold either and there are only so many responsibility points going round and once you're an 'expensive' teacher it's really hard to move schools when everyone wants a cheap nqt. with performance pay coming in salaries will be squeezed still further - being their 6yrs as pipbin has been won't guarantee she's made it to the wage she's now on if the school massages so as to only put people up every few years when they're worried the union might actually get stuck in.

i wasn't saying the level of work is necessary btw - not as in necessary to education but yes, necessary to keep your job and not get ripped to shreds by the pass buck pressure and blame game.

my return to teaching led to me withdrawing my son from school to home educate him and deciding no way will i take the permanent contract i was thinking i'd be up for and to quite happily walk away at the end of the fixed term. i will carry on endeavoring to do the freelance bits and pieces i do and try to expand on that and if needs be take a part time whatever is going low pressure job. frankly i'll do whatever i have to do to keep myself and my son out of the school mangle.

The pay scales in teaching are quite good, but jobs requiring the equivalent hours generally pay a lot more.

I spent the bulk of my years in teaching working my way up between £25 - 30 odd thousand pa, including outer London weighting. The last few years I was paid more in leadership roles and working in inner London.

I now work for £32,000 pro rata for 21 hours, no work outside those hours and about one tenth of the stress!

To clarify £21K - £31K is the basic pay scale, with those who go through Upper Pay Scales to eventually UPS3 on £37K. That is ceiling for the majority of primary teachers, as primary schools don't have the number of TLRs that secondary schools have. So the statement "Almost all experienced teachers that I know are earning a heck of a lot more than £31K. Unless they really aren't doing any special role beyond ordinary classroom teacher." is written from just a secondary school perspective. Even primary teachers on the lower end of the scale have special roles as subject leaders, Year leaders, KS leaders, etc. with no additional salary. I know of many primary schools where, except for the SLT and one or two UPS teachers all the teachers are in the £21-31K pay band.

I would like to know which education related business you can run and make ends meet.

I took a severe pay cut and was fobbed off without a contract when I started a maternity cover. I'm being paid per hour I teach and get no PPA. I was too naive but needed the money. Union said it's legal, academies can do that.

It's not a vocation anymore, I've had the joy knocked out of me and I do it for the money. But not for much longer.

I'm speaking from a primary-ish perspective gruffalo but independent. I thought that our salaries were usually the same, just above or just below state schools but we do get paid for every extra responsibility we do so in that way, yes, we must be more like secondary schools. Sorry.

i'd also point out a 'special role' can be worth about 2k despite adding on an extra 5hrs work a week and only coming with one additional free period. for many it just isn't worth it - especially those with kids and other responsibilities. some schools are quite generous with the responsibility points, others offer 1 point for a role that requires massive amounts of time and coordination and a hell of a lot of additional extra stress.

think logically - even in secondary school - 6 teachers in your department one head of department role. beyond that 5 head of year roles (and in all the schools i worked in pastoral roles were high work and low pay) and a handful of SMT roles. there aren't that many to go round AND you're talking about people already doing 50-60hr weeks so even if you were offering 10k in responsibility points (and that's rare) how any people are going to be able to face it especially if they're in a school that keeps the staffing so low that they won't give you even a fraction of the time you need releasing from the classroom?

oh and do remember to think outside the london box too. there isn't a shortage of teachers everywhere and not everyone can just up and move. so if you're in an authority with plenty of teachers you don't have to offer much for responsibility roles and you know your staff haven't got much chance of going outside of your school so someone will likely take the bait for any career progression despite how underpaid the role is.

I have been teaching for over fifteen years and only just gone onto ups1 as there wasn't enough cash in the pot (said previous evil headmaster!). In my large primary (25+ teachers) just 6 are on UPS.

so a degree, 50plus hours a week and 15 years of experience = finally breaking the 31k boundary. yeah, us teachers, we're rolling it in

i think i mean raking - mixing my idioms up. so unfamiliar am i with either rolling in it or raking it in

Honeybadger, in small schools, like mine, you can have several responsibilities and yet no extra £2000 at all, let alone even one free period. I have one SMT responsibility and two subjects, all on a part-time two days a week contract and no extra cash/time at all. That works out at £14,00 for pretty much a 40 hour week - not that well paid ...