Lockdown has made me realise I work too hard. Aibu to go pt? Any other teachers?

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My working hours have been so much better teaching online from home.

Along the lines of 50 hours a week rather than 80. And that is before the commute is taken in to consideration.

I dont want to go back to 80

I’ve got used to this better work life balance now.

So I’m going down to a 50% timetable.

Are there any other teachers doing the same? Found how nice life is with fewer hours? Of course I’ll still be spending half my time on non teaching tasks.

I was intending to retire a year ago, but have stayed on to help see the kids through the pandemic. Which I am still doing, but will only by working 2.5 days a week next year

Things I do not do in lockdown or during remote learning

Break duty
Lunch duty
Setting up classroom
Tidying away classroom
Requisitions
Practice practicals
Set detentions
Run detentions
Change displays
Investigate bullying incidents
Lock up at night
Open up in the morning
Litter picking, or supervising litter picking
First aid
Looking for lost property
Tracing owners of found property
Refereeing sports
Issuing text books
Chasing library books
Assemblies
Checking cctv
Sharpening pencils
Counting equipment in and out
Disinfecting teachers desk
Logging out in one room and logging back in in another
Inspecting uniform and planners
Fielding parental phone calls
Supervising medication
Bodging together the blinds in my room
Rationing exercise books
Confiscating phones, and looking after confiscated phones and other valuables
Issuing merit and demerit points
Taking registers and chasing absences
General admin etc

Actually there is a lot more but I think you get the idea

Teachers should be working during set hours ( like nurses) and shouldn’t have to take any work home. If it can’t be done between 8-5 then it doesn’t get done.
I stopped bringing work home after the last lockdown. If it doesn’t get marked in school it doesn’t get marked.
I had one day to write 25 reports, there was lots of cutting and pasting. I’m fed up with the workload tbh and our willingness as teachers to work on our days off. I’m not doing it anymore.

@ConsuelaHammock

Teachers should be working during set hours ( like nurses) and shouldn’t have to take any work home. If it can’t be done between 8-5 then it doesn’t get done. I stopped bringing work home after the last lockdown. If it doesn’t get marked in school it doesn’t get marked. I had one day to write 25 reports, there was lots of cutting and pasting. I’m fed up with the workload tbh and our willingness as teachers to work on our days off. I’m not doing it anymore.

Good for you! I wish more teachers would just say no. It’s worth at least trying that tack before deciding to leave the profession altogether, isn’t it?

It’s a slippy slope to leaving teaching altogether! I did and I know many others who realised it’s a special kind of all consuming (well considering the pay grade). I like teaching, I like kids… I do not like schools I’ve realised.

I used to work PT as a teacher. I now work full time (primary) and I hate the demands it puts on me. It's incompatible with having a family, IMO, other than the holidays which are of course great for family time. However, I am constantly either rushing off from school at 4.30 to get my kids to something or other, or leaving my kids in after-school club until closing time so I can attempt to get things that need to be in school done. DH is a teacher too so not much help! Either way I always end up having to work in the evenings too.

Part-time was better. I worked 0.6 and had a day to sort home stuff, attend an exercise class etc and a day which I devoted to preparing school stuff. Now I teach more and have no time other than evenings and weekends to prepare it and I'm struggling to keep on top of everything, and support my own DC to be honest. As I get older, I am more physically tired from just being "on" with 30 small children all day so the evening and weekend stuff is killing me. If you've got the opportunity for part-time, I would grab it with both hands. I would like to go back to part-time but my school are very reluctant and part-time primary teaching jobs seem to be like hen's teeth these days.

Sorry, wasn't very clear. I meant rushing off at 4.30 to get my kids meaning I need to do extra work at home.

Hows your union? Can you change school?
I am at my 4thb school and it really is the best fit.
Our union are strong and they manage a good relationship with SLT. Any new initiatives or policies have a workload audit before being passed. Every minute of directed time is transparent with some left over. Teachers can pass parental contact/bullying/uniform on to our Pastoral Team. Marking workload was an issue so we are now asked to mark one key assessed piece each half term for each year and the rest is self marked or peer marked. We do one break duty a week and only on a day with a non contact before or after. All displays are done by support staff.
It is still busy at times but if things don't get done they don't get done.

I went part-time long before kids, just for a better work-life balance. Less pay, of course, but I was happier with a less stressful life and less money. I was happy to have my teaching spread across the whole week - which made the timetabler happy - I didn't need a day off, just the ability to get the planning and marking done without it eating every evening and weekend.

As a teacher in Scotland I always feel so bad for colleagues in England. It sounds absolutely unmanageable. I hope part time gives you the work/life balance you’re looking for.

I took it one step further and left completely! Mind you, my experience of online teaching was appalling with my workload increasing hugely due to an unsupportive SMT who just kept adding more and more pointless admin along with the huge increase in online marking.

I miss the children. I miss the camaraderie of the excellent team that I had the honour to lead. I do not miss the spineless idiots that I had to work for.

Do it and enjoy your time!

@ConsuelaHammock

Teachers should be working during set hours ( like nurses) and shouldn’t have to take any work home. If it can’t be done between 8-5 then it doesn’t get done. I stopped bringing work home after the last lockdown. If it doesn’t get marked in school it doesn’t get marked. I had one day to write 25 reports, there was lots of cutting and pasting. I’m fed up with the workload tbh and our willingness as teachers to work on our days off. I’m not doing it anymore.

Working 8-5 with 13 weeks annual leave and every weekend and Bank Holiday off?

Doesn't sound too bad.

It certainly doesn't sound bad does it?

Sadly not what most teachers do? Read the OP.
When do you think parents evenings/open evenings/concerts and school trips happen? 9-5?
What about results day? Revision sessions? In the holidays?

I dropped a day and it’s perfect. I still work on my day off - probably 9-3ish on average, but it mostly gives me the weekend back, (other than at busy times of year eg report writing etc)

And it means I’m able to pick my kids up once a week, and take them to the park and things.

YANBU to want to go part time but to be honest your list sounds like complete martyrdom. Why are you opening up and locking up every day? Why medication and chasing library books?
Do you teach primary or secondary because your list is contradictory for both. Why would you be sharpening pencils?

For the 7 billionth time on MN, teachers are not given 13 weeks PAID holiday. We get a similar amount of paid holiday to many private sector employees and then a number of unpaid weeks. The annual salary is simply divided into 12 payments as a matter of convenience. It's one of the reasons teaching is comparative lower paid than other professions which require a similar level of education/qualifications.

I agree with the general sentiment but the majority of the stuff you list is not done by teachers at my school but by support staff, so it does vary. I worked more hours in lockdown as my (mostly) sixth form students were producing a lot of work, presumably due to lack of tempting alternatives. Mind you, I used to work in the arts so the idea of actually having IT people (rather than vaguely prodding at a malfunctioning server and hoping) was a novelty when I came into teaching...

But yes, I think going part time to wrestle your work life balance back is worth it, if you can afford it and have checked the impact on pension etc.

This is why I've left teaching in schools and now tutor from home.

I've been teaching for 17 years, but only 5 of those were full time (1 of which I was on mat leave for). So I've been part time on 0.6 (3 days a week) since dd1 was born 12 years ago and I have no intention of going back to full time ever. If I can help it that is 🙏

I genuinely think if I hadn't have been part time, I wouldn't have lasted in the profession as long as I have done! Part time is definitely the answer to a better home life balance when it comes to teaching IMHO.

I think the only reason why I’ve been able to finish this year in one piece is the fact that I’m part time and work with a brilliant job share so part time is great.

You have to be aware that in a job share you should be seen as 1 teacher in terms of responsibilities not 2 teachers or you do a percentage of a full tune staff member’s work. I have been caught out on this in the past in terms of expectations for attending meetings, running clubs and doing break duties.

I taught from home last year (not this year, since the majority of my class have been in school throughout). It increased my hours by quite a bit but I was teaching a mixed Y1-4 class then and was doing separate daily sessions for each year group, as well as individual booster sessions and endless meetings. At the same time, my toddler was at home and needed entertaining. Just not doable and way too stressful. I prefer to be at school.

However, there are lots of things I do not do when I'm at school:
Requisitions
Practice practicals
Set detentions
Run detentions
Lock up at night
Open up in the morning
Looking for lost property
Tracing owners of found property
Refereeing sports
Issuing text books
Chasing library books
Assemblies
Counting equipment in and out
Disinfecting teachers desk
Logging out in one room and logging back in in another
Inspecting uniform and planners
Supervising medication
Bodging together the blinds in my room
Rationing exercise books
Confiscating phones, and looking after confiscated phones and other valuables
Issuing merit and demerit points

However, I teach Year 1 at a school abroad. Much more relaxed here. I wouldn't want to go back to the hours I used to do in the UK. I generally manage my 40 hours per week (full time contract) quite well and don't do much more. Having daily PPA helps...
I found going down to 0.8 in the UK didn't help me that much. I was still doing a full time job for less pay, which was rubbish. (Granted, I taught Year 6 in that time...so could have just stayed full time, really...)

Snoozer - I emphasis the ‘should

But yes 8-5 and the holidays and weekends off would be super. If only it was a reality.
I genuinely think teachers have been mugs for too long. The more you do the more is expected. It’s not fair and it’s just not possible to balance work and home when you give teaching 100%.

I doubt anyone is actually regularly working 80 hour weeks plus commute on top, teaching or not. This is 12 hours straight every day without weekends and breaks. Grads in investment banks - the ones who end up having heart attacks from exhaustion - do not work this kind of hours.

@Iheartbaby if you don’t like the thread then don’t read it. The thread title said any teachers feel the same. Are you a teacher?

teachers moaning again

Teachers at breaking point again.

I was in a 12 month teaching contract last year and the teacher I was covering for returned to post. I didn't manage to get another position and supply was thin on the ground so I started a non-teacher job working from home. It is 37 hours per week and I only get 30 mins lunch per day - it also involves weekends and evenings. Often I am in the middle of something that requires working after my finish time ... but despite all that, the work life balance is so much better. I shut the laptop and that's it until my next shift- evening work means a late start, weekend working means I get a day off in the week. With teaching, evenings and weekends were in top of full time hours!

YANBU.