Did any teachers have it easy over last 11 weeks?

[PicaK]

I nearly lost my shit yesterday with someone who insisted most teachers have had an easy life and not doing a proper day's work during Covid.
I'm not a teacher but many friends are and I don't know any who haven't had a full workload. It's absolutely not the message that's coming across on social media either. Most teachers saying they've done more work.
But then I wondered if my snapshot was accurate.
Does anyone personally know any teacher who has coasted/had an easy ride? (I am not talking about your kids' teachers who you have opinions about but friends or family where you have more insight.)
I'm hoping it's a no tbh and I feel justified for feeling so put out.
Aibu
Yes - yeah the teachers I know have had it easy
No - you're right all the ones I know have worked as much if not more.

@MsTSwift

No ones saying all teachers are lazy don’t be ridiculous. Many of us are citing our recent lived experience of primary teachers downing tools. I accept they were instructed to by the government and heads so not entirely their fault. How would you feel in parents shoes?

There won’t be a recruitment crisis in a recession which sadly we now face I imagine many people that lose their jobs will retrain as teachers. And teachers leaving their jobs will have a tough time finding work in the private sector - if they’ve got any sense they would sit tight

MsTSwift

Everything I typed are posts I've seen on mumsnet in the last few weeks. There have been a lot of generalisations

Honestly, from some of the threads on here lately parents are woefully ignorant and ungrateful for the amount of work the teaching profession have put in to getting their kids back into school as safely as possibly given the circumstances.

I don’t think parents are ignorant or ungrateful- the reality is that teacher busyness for lack of a better word is variable, just as is the case in any workplace. Some teachers super busy and some not busy at all, like in any workplace. The difference with the teaching profession being that if you dare to suggest all teachers aren’t working 80 hour weeks, you hate teachers and think they’re all slackers.

I sincerely hope my kids teachers have had a bit of breathing space - in fact I know they have - just like any industry that can’t fully open due to covid.

DS is in year 7 and has not had much work through. One a week or every 10 days. And 6 weeks ago i got an email from his HOD saying she will be contacting DS to see how he is.

Still waiting.....

So with our experience, teachers have had it easy.

Exactly Laurie imagine a client reaction if you explained you hadn’t done their work because you were writing internal policies! You’d be out

Exactly Laurie imagine a client reaction if you explained you hadn’t done their work because you were writing internal policies! You’d be out You’d be a laughing stock!

The things that are taking more time than usual:
Planning - delivering content from home cannot just be done by plucking an old lesson plan or sow and sending it home. Every single lesson is brand new in my dept.
Recording lesson content - takes about 4 hrs to make each 30 min video and upload.
Marking - takes me about 12-15 hrs a week just for for kids who ARE doing the work (30% ish). In school, much of that would be verbal.
Planning and refining SOW for return to school and possible lost time in the Autumn (normally zero time as our schemes are up to date).
Responding to student queries/chats/checking in (again, normally verbal so much quicker)
CPD - we would normally do a twilight per week and the odd whole training day plus lots in our own time. Now, there's loads of mandated CPD to keep on top of.
Weekly phoning families (takes a whole morning).
Logging every single piece of work done by every child on whole school spreadsheet.
Corresponding with colleagues by email (so much more time consuming than a chat in a corridor).

Things that are taking less time than usual:
No commute
No duties
No after school clubs (usually run three)
No behaviour issues to resolve
No logging of behaviour issues

No of hours I'm paid for: 26
No of hours I usually work: 40ish
No of hours I'm working now: 50ish

Benefits : can go to the loo, can eat lunch with my husband, can unpack my food delivery during "work hours"
Disadvantages: miss the kids, miss the colleagues, spent at least £200 of my own money on resources, can see my garden but can't go in it (too bright for laptop), RSI, eyestrain, anxiety.

Tbh. Why is it anyone’s business?
if teaching is so easy then come on over!

In case you think I missed off the benefits list "being on Mumsnet at 9.20am," it's actually my day off today but I shall be working the rest of the day once I'm up properly.

Why is it anyone’s business?

Um, because my child deserves an education.

If I do get made redundant in the near future, teaching will be something I consider retraining in, absolutely.

But take care to read the posts from teachers who actually are working really hard, Laurie, and are close to nervous breakdowns, because they're closer to reality. Honestly.

I’ve have taught in the past (no PGCE, so unqualified). I know lots of teachers myself. I currently work in a profession where burn out is rife.

I’m definitely up for it.

That's good, then.

Bargainhuntbore
DS is in year 7 and has not had much work through. One a week or every 10 days. And 6 weeks ago i got an email from his HOD saying she will be contacting DS to see how he is.

Still waiting.....

Just a thought, contact them?

So with our experience, teachers have had it easy.

Incorrect in your experience your DS's teacher has had it easy.

As a teacher (secondary), it saddens me to see how much bickering there is between some parents and some teachers at the moment. I’ve always thought of us all being on the same side, the side of the child. Unfortunately I can see that this is not a view shared by all.
All I will say is for me personally I am doing everything I can to make my lessons as approachable to my students as possible. I’m a modern foreign languages teacher and I know for some of my pupils having to see new concepts and ideas without me by their side is very difficult. I make myself available online all day Monday to Friday, if I’m not in school. If it is not an issue I can sort by email or other form of technology it goes on my list to call the next time I am in school (currently once or twice a week, soon to be more). I feel like I am doing everything in my power to be there for the children I teach. In my opinion, there is more that could be done but unfortunately many schools are not equipped to deal with the current situation and sadly that is beyond my control.

Surely teaching children should be put above all that stuff (writing policies? really?!)

It is genuinely critical. School life has changed incredibly. We all need to be absolutely clear on the expectations at the moment to keep the children safe.

That said, I’ve also done some non-critical work on policies and medium-term planning in addition to everything else. It doesn’t need to be time-critical to be important.

Fully appreciate the frustrations of parents where schools haven’t communicated exactly what’s going on, I really don’t know what’s going on there. Our parents all seem very happy with what we’ve been doing.

@MrsR87 For what it's worth our languages dept have been amazing - they really stand out amongst the rest! Helpful, respond to emails quickly, they really help keeping ds focused and motivated, contacting me quickly when they thought he was falling behind - so there wasn't a big problem building...and it was my biggest fear that his French A level would suffer.

Sitting here with 11 year old and worksheet. New maths concept. They have provided questions on a worksheet. No explanation on method. No link or clue as to how to find explanation. We go on YouTube to find someone to explain it. I need to sit with dd during this process. My own work goes to hell. This is why some of us are a little tense. A video or even link to a lesson on the new topic would really help. But no.

One of my good friends (primary) told me he's basically just been watching tv and going on bike rides apart from the odd day going in to watch key workers children.

@GazeboParty that’s great to hear 😀

@MsTSwift

You say 11 year old, is this year 6 or 7? I’m the head of department and am monitoring the work that goes to pupils from the staff I manage. I would not be thrilled to see a new concept being given with no explanation!

Have you contacted the school and asked for help? If not, I would highly recommend doing so.

I have made phone calls and talked about 300 kids

I had to buy a headset in the end

Bargainhuntbore DS is in year 7 and has not had much work through. One a week or every 10 days. And 6 weeks ago i got an email from his HOD saying she will be contacting DS to see how he is

Yet another MN teacher-bashing parent who hasn't got up off their arse to contact the school.

Frankly I don’t want to sour relations. The heads sole focus is vulnerable families so I look like a witch if I question what is happening regarding education of everyone else. Believe me I appreciate teachers my default is teacher support most of my family teach both my parents now retired but struggling with this.

@MsTSwift

Frankly I don’t want to sour relations. The heads sole focus is vulnerable families so I look like a witch if I question what is happening regarding education of everyone else. Believe me I appreciate teachers my default is teacher support most of my family teach both my parents now retired but struggling with this.

It shouldn't sour relations. No head will have a problem with:

'I'm struggling to help JuniorSwift with x + y because I don't understand the topic myself and I'm also trying to work full time from home, please can you ask MrZ to either send explanations with the worksheets or a link to a video/website that will explain it.'

No reasonable head will be upset about this.

Don't struggle. You should not be in this situation so ask the people who are in a position to help you with this, i.e. your school.

Have you looked at the oak online academy stuff? It's not perfect but if my kids teachers weren't doing anything I'd send them there. It might not link to what their school is currently doing but in your situation the teacher could hardly complain if they were doing other work.

Often find young American men on YouTube who are “maths majors” give good explanations so not all bad 😁