Is teaching really so stressful?

[summertime06]

Really trying to get my head around this without getting flamed. I have a good friend who is a teacher, part time since having kids, doing the same hours as me (I'm not a teacher), 3 days a week.

For the past year or two, all I ever heard when we met up was how stressful her job was, how difficult it was to be a teacher and a mum at the same time etc etc. I get that there's work to be done outside teaching hours, but I do the same in my completely different job and just get on with it, I think it's part of the job when you get up the pay scale/responsibility level a bit. Any time I did mention that things were similar in my job, I was put down, I couldn't possibly understand how stressful it was to be a teacher?!

And now she's made the decision to take a career break for a few years because there's just no way she can continue to be a teacher and a mum to 3 young kids. That's fine if that's what she wants to do but she's making out that she's been left with no choice but to make this decision because teaching is just so difficult. Is it just me or am I missing something? I get that it can be stressful as are lots of other jobs, but there are surely also lots of advantages? Not having to sort out summer camps and childcare during school holidays? Is it really so much more difficult and stressful compared to other jobs? I genuinely want to understand!

I am a teacher and have been very lucky in my career ; I've moved around, worked in very different schools, specialist settings, been a Local Authority advisor. The hardest job I have ever done is mainstream primary teaching, with a range of 7 years of development in any given class, woeful resourcing, crappy leadership, and I'll informed, over entitled parents. I won't do that bit ever again.

Too busy marking this evening to rtft....

But no, teaching isn’t stressful - it’s a piece of piss! That’s why there are people queuing up to be teachers

I think it depends on the school.
One school SLT were useless bullied the teachers and had no interest in helping with behaviour. Behaviour was truly awful. No backup at all. If you asked for help with rude/dangerous/unruly child you were then shouted at and threatened with capability.
When someone is being a danger to you or yourself are you fearful to ask for help?
That’s just one of the reasons Teaching can be worse than any other job. Sometimes you have no option but to take the abuse or leave.
Name me another job where that happens...

One of many examples

Child swears and throws a chair at you.
Threatens to key your car when you ask them to sit outside the classroom.
Call SLT for help.

And then get told it’s your fault...

Glad I’m not at that school anymore but it nearly broke me

My OH is a teacher. Never works holidays or weekends.
He gets stressed with marking and observations but that's it. He always leaves school on time. He has a few issues with kids here and there but nothing really difficult.
Perhaps he's suited to it which is why it's not that stressful but he isn't stressed outside the classroom and he has no lessons at the moment as Year 11, 12 and 13 (his main classes) are done with exams.

He always says he doesn't get why teachers say it's as difficult as it is. "Work smarter not harder". However, he ALWAYS says it's not the same for primary school teachers and that they have it worse and he could never do their job

However, he ALWAYS says it's not the same for primary school teachers and that they have it worse and he could never do their job

That’s interesting-I wonder what exactly it is that is so different?

As a primary school teacher, we did a swap session once where you taught a different year group for an afternoon. The YR/1 teachers all swapped with y5/6. All of us said it was bloody awful and we just couldn’t (or wouldn’t!) want to teach the other’s Key Stage!

I think this depends massively on a) the individual b) the age group and c) the school.

Re a) my family is full of teachers, they do regard it as reasonably stressful, but honestly tell me they do not do the hours regularly listed on here and all have progressed well. I notice they all share common natural traits - very organised, patient, resilient among other things. I think a lot of people end up teaching, attracted by salaries that aren't bad relative to other professions, and the prospect of longer holidays etc. I'm not sure all those people are naturally suited to it iyswim? Eg i was quite tempted by it as a career but recognised I wasn't organised enough.

b) secondary is different to primary. Primary does seem to involve a different kind of patience/emotional engagement. My mum in particular has this, coping with the needs of 30 small children on a daily basis doesn't seem to "stress" her, although like anyone, busy periods involving report writing or updating planning make her more tired in the same way I am when I am in the busier phases in my non-teaching job. I couldnt do her job. But she couldnt do mine, we have different stresses. The secondary teachers I know work shorter hours than primary (in various subjects). They start early but are out the door at 4.30pm and do not spend every evening working as many teachers suggest.

I would say that this doesn't include the first 5 years of teaching. My sibling worked a lot more in those first years as didn't have a bank of experience to draw on in terms of planning, issues with pupils etc. I was in the first 5 years of my job at the time and on a training scheme, we lived together & our hours were similar, both often working in the evenings or even an occasional weekend. My sibling worked in other jobs prior to teaching and seems to be unusual among teachers in acknowledging that in office jobs you don't just walk away at 5.30pm, working in evenings is sadly not limited to teaching.

C) my mum worked in a school in a deprived area that at one point entered special measures in Ofsted. She has often mentioned this period as exceptionally stressful & I remember her working a lot and family life being compromised a bit at times. I can imagine staying long term in a badly struggling school would be extremely stressful, more so than many other jobs, but I don't think schools are allowed to remain in such dire straits indefinitely, usually there are changes of leadership etc and thinks return to a more even keel.

I do think teaching is a stressful job, and I also think the payscale (excluding becoming a head etc) tops out a level that is not on a par with similarly stressful/responsible jobs. However, I do think there's a tremendous feel good factor. I think some teachers who have never worked in other areas can't always imagine that an office job can be extremely stressful too, albeit a bit better paid, but often lacking that feel good factor of helping young people.

Er...im an ex teacher.....am now working for nhs...not as stressful. Sorry op yabvu.

'Feel good factor! ' pmsl!

just for the fact that you have to spend all day, every day with 30 odd of other peoples' children makes me think teaching is one of the last jobs i could ever contemplate doing.
dd is at private and there are only 12 in her class, even that would be more than i could cope with.
so yes, YABU. i went on a school trip once at her old primary school. by the time we got home i had to self administer gin and have a nap as i found it so wearing. god knows what it must be like all day every day 🤯

And that's before you take into account not just crowd control but having to hopefully teach them something, complete a load of paperwork and comply with never ending changes and bollocks from academies and OFSTED, parental complaints for telling off their little shits beautifully behaved and motivated offspring, etc etc

i would not do a teacher's job for £500k and 20 weeks a year off

. I couldn't really figure out if teaching was so absolutely awful that she had to give up the career she'd worked so hard for, or if it was just as generally stressful as many other careers and just over and above the level of stress she was able to deal with...

And what do you think now people have answered you?

I do think teaching is a stressful job, and I also think the payscale (excluding becoming a head etc) tops out a level that is not on a par with similarly stressful/responsible jobs. However, I do think there's a tremendous feel good factor.

There was. I used to feel good about helping young people. Then I stopped feeling good, because it became like a perfect storm: too many parents complaining about nothing or backing up their children regardless of how they behaved; too many weasle SLT indulging that and appearing unable to support their staff; too many of the students just plain apathetic and not valuing their education.

Sometimes it felt like I (and my teaching colleagues with me) was the only person who gave a shit about their education or my mental health.

The feelgood factor of helping young people doesn't feel like that when often, on MN and in the press, we are accused instead of causing them stress, bullying them, upsetting them, over examining them or told we have to cure all of society's ills, because no one else can or will. These things do not make one feel good.

I used to get the feel good factor-in the early 2000s things were better. I think it’s been the last 8/9 years where things have been so awful that I don’t get that any more.

What I do get is the guilt factor.

The feeling of failing children because there simply aren’t the resources-namely me as that’s al that’s left-to go round. 30 children, no TA and a classroom that is falling apart around my knees. The lights flicker and we can’t afford the bulbs, so I turn them off in the end and teaching in darkness is not good either. The ceiling is falling down, the trays are broken, the windows are decaying and the toilets groan for ages when flushed. It is flushed a lot.

Despite teaching very young children, the pressures of the current curriculum-phonics, phonics, phonics, with other bollocks like ‘fronted adverbials of time’ thrown in for good measure-I am seeing increasing mental health issues that I’ve not seen before. Self harming, school refusing and quite genuine anxiety about being at school. Little children should not be subjected to such a curriculum. Stuff we used to teach I. y3 is now in year 1/2. Why?

With regards to mental health issues-we suggest parents take them to the doctor. The GP refer parents back to see the school nurse or counsellor-neither of which we have?! CAMHS are on their knees so any referral-even when there is self harm/comes to nothing. EHC plans are issued with minimal or no funding. We have no TAs to run interventions with or even to just have a little chat with the children. The head even serves dinners in the kitchen as we have insufficient staff.

Amongst all this, I am still expected to ensure each child in my class makes expected or accelerated progress. With no glue sticks and no TA, in 3 (or 5 or 7!) part lessons with 5 way differentiation, with learning objectives stuck in and comments about their learning plus being marked in the right colour ready for the next lesson. If the progress isn’t made, I am accountable which directly affects my PMR and my pay scale.

I now feel helpless and guilty, very rarely ’feel good’ .

I used to think like you.....then I married a teacher !
I’m an accountant & have regularly worked 50/60 hour weeks but good god my job has always been easier than my husband’s teaching - plus I’m paid twice as much.

@summertime06 depends what professions you’re talking about. I’m only an accountant so lead a very luxurious life where I get to shit whenever I want, do my work in my own time & never deal with anyone shouting / crying / punching each other.

Perhaps the reason you see it so much in the teaching profession - is it is such a goddamn hard job? You certainly couldn’t pay me to do it.

Junior Doctors / Nurses probably have the same all day, on your feet, relentless, continuous stress. Care workers perhaps. It really does depend which professions you’re trying to compare to.

Despite teaching very young children, the pressures of the current curriculum-phonics, phonics, phonics, with other bollocks like ‘fronted adverbials of time’ thrown in for good measure-I am seeing increasing mental health issues that I’ve not seen before. Self harming, school refusing and quite genuine anxiety about being at school. Little children should not be subjected to such a curriculum. Stuff we used to teach I. y3 is now in year 1/2. Why?

@fedup21. This is why I stopped primary teaching - I was a reception/ks1 teacher and felt that what I was being asked to do was mildly abusive for some children and making them very unhappy. I now work with secondary students with literacy and/or maths difficulties many of whom have mental health issues linked to years of feeling that they are failing at school.

Fedup21 you make a really good point about the lack of resources/funding. Bloody wish people would stop voting for the current party in govt as they have stripped school budgets bare and it's gone way too far.

And all the while we have Boris planning tax cuts.... noooooo. Investment in schools is so important and I think lack of it is currently a source of huge & unnecessary stress to teachers.

Investment in schools is so important and I think lack of it is currently a source of huge & unnecessary stress to teachers

Exactly.

If we weren’t teaching in ramshackle buildings, with insufficient staff, buying resources with our own money (class pencils and whiteboard pens were on my last Amazon order as we still had a month to go and not allowed into the stockroom till September), fighting for mental health referrals, mopping up the tears of stressed 6 year olds (and their parents) because of a narrow inflexible curriculum, I might just have the resilience to just put up with things.

But we are and I haven’t.

I do love your recruitment campaign for accountancy average:

come and be an accountant! You get to shit when you want to!

Why do I read these threads?

1. It's such a doddle that 30% of teachers leave the profession within the first 5 years (18% within the first 2 years).
2. There is a national shortage of teachers, especially in secondary Maths, English, Science & IT.
3. Apply here, please: getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/?ds_rl=1267576&ds_rl=1267576&gclid=CjwKCAjw04vpBRB3EiwA0IieaioBt-Go42Bpdh3Zmvy-wwd2cWN50rGEYpype1TCIe-8_UQpyUeubRoCtmIQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds They pay you loads to train these days. And then you can quit in a couple of years. As I've said, many do. All I want is for people not to attack teachers for venting. Half the people on here will be moaning about their own kids by day 4 of the holidays.

Haven't read the full thread, but I work in a nice school at the moment. We still have kids that self harm, have anorexia/bulimia, parents or siblings that are desperately poorly, kids themselves that are desperately poorly, kids that are carers, kids that are suicidal, kids with varying issues, kids that are bullied etc etc. I not only have to teach, I have to invigilate exams, do cover for when a colleague is away, support my friends/colleagues, plan, report, attend parents' evenings, work weekends, cope with the forever changing curriculum and exam board, be involved with co-curricular stuff...the list actually goes on and on. So not only do I 'teach', but first and foremost I have to look out for vulnerable kids and if I get that wrong, I am then held to account. Yes it's stressful and it's the hardest job I have ever done and I used to work long hours in a different profession. I still love it, but I can't sustain it and I won't be here till I retire....I've probably got 5 more years if I am lucky. Probably not even that. I am literally being sucked dry. Sometimes I tell my child for wittering on at home because I just need some peace and quiet. But it's not their fault at all. I feel horrible for that - I always put other people's kids first. One day that will change.

Yes it is. My DH is a teacher/ SLT and is at a fairly standard secondary.
It's normal for at least 30% of the pupils to have SEN etc so he ends up being able to teach less because he had to deal with the issues.
These children battle through the system, often with their parents refusing a place in a specialised school which would help them more, because of the stigma Most of them are lucky to pass any exams whilst taking away teaching time from pupils. So yes, it is stressful and is why we are so critically short of teachers.

Ex GF is a teacher at junior school and it’s a nightmare. Kids that still aren’t given the basics of behaviour by parents. Parents that refuse to interact with her because she is female and it’s against their religion, kids pick up on that and try the same: “my dad says that I don’t need to respect you biatch!” Threats of violence, drugs (8 &9 year olds). Boys trying it on sexually knowing there is little comeback. She and other teachers now refuse to be alone with any group. It’s now a teacher + at least one t/a at all times. Has been threatened by kids and parents including blades brought in to school