To ask teachers on mumsnet what ‘behind the scenes’ things your job involves

[Humbersausage]

I have always found it really interesting how most of the work teachers do is never seen by parents or students. Aibu to ask teachers what bits of the job there are that we don’t see. In other words Aibu to ask what the ‘trade secrets’ of teaching there are?

@converseandjeans only on Fridays? Slackers.

Boring stuff = writing reports. Analysing and interpreting data, planning interventions, organising letters and resources. Marking mock exams and class work. Dealing with behaviour incidents on the corridor, orders for new resources. Phone calls/e mails home. Sorting filing and paperwork. Appraisal and target setting for the team. Some meetings. Tidying and sanitizing.

Fun stuff = finding and reading research material relevant to subject/education. Professional development. Organising assemblies and virtual xmas activities (normally would be live). Mentoring students in tutor group phoning and feeding back to parents. Sorting new display. Marking some of the more important and interesting tasks. Some meetings.

The OP is on another tread in the Corona virus section saying teachers have not done enough to step up, be patriotic and do their bit and absolutely ought to be agreeing to carrying out swab tests on their classes. OP is most getting their arse handed to them but presumably this thread is aimed at trying to prove teachers aren't actually that busy. Not sure it's working.

hugeackmans so OP isn't asking out of interest in case she decides to do a PGCE 🤔

Nope. Can't link but it's the thread asking about a delayed January start

Planning, marking, creating resources, finding resources, finding a computer that works, finding a free computer, finding a printer that works, subject reports, ehcp goals, asd goals, writing social stories, seating plans, feedback, writing detailed session plans for every session, changing scheme of work, writing behaviour logs and incident reports, putting info into the college database, planning tutorials, differentiating resources, meetings, writing achievements, logging IT faults and issues, 1:1 support, take photographs, create assessments, plan and create backup/cover session resources, write personal tutor reports.

Senco and Safeguarding, lots of multi agency meetings with social services, therapists and the sen officers. Costing provision maps for EHCP pupils. Logging of safeguarding concerns. Paperwork evidencing everything.

Can we just note as well that nobody on here is “whingeing”, complaining or trying to say they work harder than any other job or don’t get paid enough! It’s just a straightforward set of answers to the question. Classroom teaching, the stuff the average person thinks is “my job”, takes maybe 10% of my actual energy. It’s probably the easiest part of the whole job, and certainly the most enjoyable.

The upsetting neglect we see.

This term, there were two siblings who (not for the first time) came to school with mouldy lunches (uneaten bits from the Friday, left in their bags until the next week. We're not in the UK - no school dinners). A 5-year-old who told me details of his mum's sex life with her new partner. And the girl whose parents underfeed her and forbid her from joining in class parties because they are so controlling about what she eats.

Yes, all reported to social services, school is aware etc. But the weight of responsibility/feeling of dread is huge. I worry so much about these children, especially during the holidays.

Meeting with other agencies or phone calls/ emails chasing them.
Things like half-termly looked after children reviews, EHCP reviews, child in need meetings, TAC meetings, non-statutory meetings to support are often off-site and in hours that fit room others (ie I would need extended childcare to pay for). Then governors meetings etc, can end at 9/10pm as everyone wants them after dinner at home with the family. Twilight training at school, visiting other schools after school for training that we’re further from home: It’s surprising how many late nights added up between us.

Safeguarding meetings with other agencies
Submitting lesson plans for “review” and ensuring they have all the right buzz words
Finding evidence from children’s books for standardised teacher assessments
Moderating assessments with other teachers or schools
Filling in child protection forms
Attending staff meetings
Physically preparing things for children to do in their lessons e.g photocopying, buying resources etc
Writing notes to TAs about how you would like them to support a particular child the next day
Having behaviour meetings to plan how we can help a child not to be excluded
Keeping insanely detailed diaries of SEN child’s struggles in class for evidence for applying for funding
Tidying the classroom
Sharpening pencils
Marking according to the latest marking policy e.g 2 stars and a wish
Finding a jumper that a mum is sure if in school and child can’t find - discovering it in another child’s bag in another class
Negotiating PE/IT suite/ library slot swaps with other teachers
Uploading data to systems or reviewing it and writing reports e.g boys are doing less well in writing
Starting new initiatives

Some of these things are meant to be done by support staff in theory but in practice if you want pencils to colour with and your unfunded SEN child needs help, then you might just have to do it yourself (I do try to give jobs to children sometimes but depends how fiddly!)

Overall the actual ‘teaching’ part is probably about 25% of the work, stress etc which may explain why people don’t understand how stressful it is.

I’m not teaching this year but on average I worked somewhere between 55and 65 hours per week. I was pretty typical of colleagues.

planning, marking, resourcing (those sheets of paper won't laminate themselves!)

reviewing schemes of work, where you're up to, working out what you have left to teach vs. how many teaching hours vs. the need to do some revision

pastoral care of tutor groups - dealing with anything and everything that comes up from friendship group issues, teen anxiety, more serious safeguarding issues which need to be passed on etc.

endless data input, doing stuff to generate the data to input (assessments, mainly, which need setting and marking)

generating publicity material (private school) which means whizz bang activities that photograph well

lunch time catch up lessons for exam classes

lunch time catch ups for students who are not in exam classes

after school lessons for exam classes

running extra-curricula activities and competitions (see publicity, above)

jumping through hoops to make books 'pass' book scrutiny

supervising detention (on a rota)

duty at break/lunchtime/afterschool (standing around in prominent places to watch what is going on)

revising or producing materials sent to parents on exams, homework, options etc.

calming down a particularly highly-strung colleague

attending briefings

reading and responding to emails

calling or emailing parents about students either from an academic or a pastoral perspective

engaging in CPD activities (some of which are 'enforced', some of which are voluntary - so keeping up with changes to exams is particularly time-consuming at the moment!), I read to keep my 'A' level subject knowledge current, review social media groups for teaching ideas (and shortcuts), read subject-relevant blogs of respected contributors etc. etc.