If a teacher in a secondary school...

[Methenyouplus4]

Had a lifestyle type blog about family life/recipes/ days out etc, would you feel it was inappropriate?

Content include would photos of them/their family and would cover where they had been (but only after they had been e.g. reviews of local attractions).

I'm asking as I have wanted to start a lifestyle type blog (as a hobby) but worry it wouldn't be deemed professionally appropriate as a secondary teacher. There would obviously be nothing offensive/ to do with my job and I live in a different county to where I teach but still, teachers generally have to be very careful about what they share in public.

Would it bother you if a teacher at your child's secondary school had such a blog?

Grannyben "My daughter's went to a local Catholic school which only had about 300 pupils. One of the male teachers had most of the pupils as fb friends. He was late 20's, married with 2 young children. The thing is he was highly trusted by pupils, parents and other members of staff, he had no ulterior motive. This teacher actually messaged all pupils to congratulate them on their GCSE results and, again when they had completed their a levels and degrees."

Sorry but that sounds really inappropriate. It would only be appropriate if the girls were now adult women who had left school.

How do you know what his motives were/are? They may be absolutely fine. But they may not. The fact he is married and has children is pretty much immaterial to me.

I've no reason to think he is completely innocent, I've also no reason to think he is not completely innocent. But if he is then he is very foolish to do this and these actions could easily be misinterpreted..

If the teachers need a way to communicate with the pupils it should be through letter or email in an email account for students which is totally appropriate and run through the school. Social media is not really meant for teachers messaging their pupils.

chitofftheshovel "Like granny my sons teacher from primary is a follower (or whatever it's called) of his and others instagram accounts - all totally above board, and actually quite nice to have an adults pair of eyes on it."

I think this is also a bit strange. And assuming it is all fine it is also a false sense of security. The teacher may or may not read it and even if they did notice anything odd/strange/offensive, unless it was massive would they really think to contact you?

My friend who is a teacher never accepts Facebook requests from ex pupils and even does thing like go swimming in another area from where she teachers because bumping into 'Miss' at the pool is likely to be quite embarrassing for her.

As a former teacher, I wouldn't do it, op.
You also realise that once it's out there you can't ever "unhave" it? (Even if you delete it, search engines like the WayBackMachine will find it; and people may have saved/downloaded the stuff. Then it will end up photoshopped and passed around. Not worth the trouble imo.

The best photos on line are always quirky shots of the back of people walking through bluebell woods in funky anoraks! Why do we need to see faces. People are usually too keen to put their kids faces everywhere.

My kids are exceptionally beautiful, don't we all think ours are! But because ds is adopted we have not digital footprint for him at all. It seems strange to want to invite comment on family members from stranger about things you do, and I do think the chances of photo shopped pictures cropping up are very real. Kids know no much more about technology usually than we adults do.

It's a nice. Why not write an old fashioned diary just for you and close family, keep it for when they are older to look back on. Just an idea.

I was just going to say that there are a lot of bloggers who have happily included their children, and then belatedly changed their minds. Have read a few of those type of posts as above.
I wouldn't have it identifiable at all tbh. So no face pictures. I have a friend who ran a very successful lifestyle/ mommy blog similar to your idea, but not identifiable. I loved it as I knew it was her and so read it that way, but it was equally as accessible (perhaps more so) with a veneer of anonymity. She stopped blogging when her husband died very unexpectedly. I think it raised a lot of questions about authenticity for her. She now uses her personal fb page for the same types of posts. That way she can be as authentic as she wants, and include personal photos etc, and keep her privacy intact (and that of her now teenage kids).

Kids know so much more ... (even how to type, which clearly I do not!)

little how sad about your friend's husband.

Greyhound we live in a v small community - dd1 frequently lifeguards for her teachers and their offspring frankly no one would be able to do anything at all if they were worried about being seen doing it in rl. That's a different thing to creating an everlasting accessible photographic online record though!

I'm a marketing manager for a school. From another perspective - what happens if you write something less than flattering about somewhere which then affects the school?

So you either end up writing something completely vanilla and bland or you write your honest feelings with potential consequences. And students will definitely look you up.

I wouldn't recommend it - as pp said, keep a diary.

Miss Meth

I think it's fine, but I wouldn't use your real names. Loads of bloggers have screen names, and nicknames for their partners, DC etc.

ittleoldladywho I am not sure what your post means to me? Do you mean about my friend not going swimming where she teaches?

That's her call, she has her reasons for not doing it.

I don't mind what people do at all.

yy we x-posted. I just thought it was interesting because here your friend would just have to not go swimming. No criticism implied - just an anecdote as here the kids see their teachers out of school doing all sorts of things (it works both ways - I had to take a friend to the hospital and she insisted we hide behind a pillar for twenty minutes as there was a teacher at the reception desk).
I think I was just ruminating on the differences between seeing a teacher do something in rl (like swimming with their kids) and putting it on a public blog to be disseminated. It feels different - just pondering about it.

little we are lucky we are relatively rural but lots of pools in area and my friend doesn't live in the area she teaches in.

If you must use pictures of your kids find an arty way to obscure faces (blurry, from behind, eating big cake etc) in my job I have been made aware of innocent pictures from blogs etc being photoshopped as child abuse pictures , it probably would never happen to you as there are a billion family blogs out there for perverts to choose from. And you would probably never ever find out they had done that to your kids photos....But do you really want to even risk that??

My head teacher had a blog.

Found it by accident about four years ago (maybe 5!) it had the very similar name to a magazine I was looking for. Got hooked reading it! At the time, I had absolutely no idea it was my head! In fact, I didn't know til a good 3 months down the line! Her profile stated that she was a mum, wife and teacher and lived in (my county).

It wasn't til I rooted through old photos that I began to recognise stuff and there she was, standing in her garden with her family!

I felt like a bloody stalker! Gobsmacked, horrified (not sure why!) and terrified she knew!

To this day she has no idea that I found her blog (by accident!) some people at work know (told them in strict confidence).

i stopped reading it cos I felt a bit uneasy reading about her 'life' outside of school. It didn't feel right. I felt like I was violating her privacy despite the fact her blog is competent public!