Being a primary school teacher is INCREDIBLY HARD or AIBU 🫠

[BoneTiredandWired]

Today alone as a teacher I have: Intervened in three fights. Had multiple restorative conversations. Given up both my break and lunchtime to sort out arising issues. Unexpected fire alarm chaos. Taught music and German and had a real laugh with my class. Saw real positive developments of my kids abilities. Shortly later spoken seriously and told off my class.
Dealt with multiple crying children who don't want to leave my class next week. Sang and coordinated our summer concert songs.
Written the last of 28 individually written reports for all my kids.
Tidied up and emptied my entire classroom.
Had a 2 hour after school meeting.
Cried on the way home out of sheer emotional exhaustion and having to be strong carrying the emotions of so many throughout the day.

I ❤️ my kids so so much, but teaching is HARD and so so much more than people think it is

@Fizbosshoes exactly. And this is what teachers are trying to do.

And throwing money just into education (which is happening anyway) won't help. All services need to be looked at. But if we can help our youngsters this will help the strain on adult services in years to come

Great, next time you deal with the police, thank them for the tough job they do and how you can't imagine what it's like.

Tbf, I have very little dealing with the police but, when I have I've had an excellent experience and I have thanked the officers. And been very vocal about it when others have run them down to me.

I hope you'll do the same to your children's teachers of you have them and to anyone else who criticises us unfairly.

Maybe because the police and my DH aren't asking for your empathy and understanding by posting how hard their jobs are? Maybe they just get on with it and don't solicit sympathy/empathy as you have...

It's awareness raising more than anything.

I haven't argued woth you about your husband's experience in the police. That's the difference. I haven't called him lazy, workshy or just not cut out for it. That's the difference.

The majority of children are affected either directly (because their specific needs aren't being met) or indirectly because the specific needs of those around them aren't being met which impacts on the ability to meet their needs also.

If I weren't a teacher, I'd still be very concerned about the impact on my child. My daughter has just finished her A Levels. One of them she has had to largely teach herself because there isn't a teacher to teach it.

That adults can't access MH support etc doesn't make it OK that children/education/schools/teachers are being let down. It just shows how widespread the problem is. Many of those adults are also parents and ultimately the bcluck stops with schools because we are the only public facing service that these adults and their families come into contact with every day.

There's no option for us to close our books or turn someone away; put down the phone and add someone's name to a waiting list and expect that to be good enough.

Next week? Don't you mean next month?!

You are amazing!

This has been my year too - I have a class who have been through a huge amount of trauma and a lot of SEN - I have struggled to juggle teaching them and being able to talk to them (they’re 10 so most of them want to go out and speak in a quiet space - which is often difficult as I’m on my own most of the time).

I have spent a lot of evenings crying because I feel like I’m failing them all - the ones desperately needing CAMHS or counselling at the start of the year have had nothing and I don’t want them to feel like they’ve been forgotten.

The education of this class has been affected the whole way through their school lives and there is no end in sight and they’re lovely and they deal with the disruptions well and I push them so hard and they work so hard but there’s years of gaps and a lack of support.

I love the job but workload as well as the emotional toll it’s taking is making me wonder if I should do something completely different.

Next week? Don't you mean next month?!

Not everywhere is England, Scottish schools break up next week and I think Northern Ireland might have stopped already.

The other professionals are so snowed under that they only deal with the very worst issues now - the rest of the awful issues remain on a waiting list and children struggle as there aren’t enough of those agencies now.

I remember when we could easily rely on other agencies to support and take on whichever issues (SEN, mental health, safeguarding etc) and it was amazing and it helped so, so much and things didn’t escalate like they do now.

There just isn’t the capacity now and schools are imploding.

Maybe because the police and my DH aren't asking for your empathy and understanding by posting how hard their jobs are?

So? Your dh can post about how difficult his job is on any forum he fancies. The fact that he doesn't do so does not mean other people aren't allowed to. And you are under no obligation to post messages of empathy (or indeed any messages at all) on teachers' threads.

I'm intrigued - do you also go onto threads where people are talking about how hard they are finding their health condition (for example) and angrily say 'Why do all people with IBS assume that nobody else's health condition is hard to deal with?! My auntie Mabel has psoriasis and she's never asking for sympathy on Mumsnet!'

It's not a competition. Teachers are not making it a competition. They are just talking about their own experiences and the state of the education system. If you're not interested in that, why not scroll on by?

Last I checked this was AIBU not TeachersNet? I have an opinion that teachers do not have a difficult job in comparison to most out there, and I voice it - that's how the internet works. Frankly I don't understand why anyone would care enough to try to convince me otherwise. Not everyone needs to agree with you, if you don't like the opinion scroll past. This isn't a circle jerk after all.

I have never once heard anyone moan about teachers other than students. Not like Kill the Pig graffiti or the media and protest groups lambasting everything teachers do. Don't think teachers fear for their lives going to school either. The workload of teachers is a complete non issue for most people and the parents who are affected only about the specific teacher and school. And that relationship is for the teacher to manage without needing the country to provide praise and validation. If it's too tough a job, teachers can quit and do other roles and the country will rely on immigrants more as has happened for nursing and childcare. No one needs to martyr themselves. The regular complaining just annoys people more than encourages to support.

@OodlesPoodle as I have already said, my DH is in emergency services too, so I mainly agree with you.

But..
School police officer? Nope we do not have that
Counsellors? Nope we do not have that
Therapists? Nope none of them either

I think you are ignoring the many many posters who keep reiterating that it's not about whose job is hardest. We're all professionals and should respect the roles we all play in society.

But what people are pointing out is that there is a lack of awareness around what the job actually entails now, and what the harsh realities are. It's as if someone thought your DH spends his days peacefully walking the beat and saying allo allo allo what's all this then to pesky children caught stealing apples from a tree!

And this being a parenting forum, I'd imagine there's a fair few people here who are interested and/or concerned about the environment their young people are in.

And this being a parenting forum, I'd imagine there's a fair few people here who are interested and/or concerned about the environment their young people are in.

You really think parents who don't know what's going on with their child in school are bothering to read MN to find out? Since when do parents need internet forums to tell them how their specific teacher in a specific school is impacting their specific child.

And a post complaining about how hard the job is in AIBU is not going to garner their sympathy...When a lot of these parents also have tough jobs? Or wait i forgot, no one works as hard as teachers. How many times have you spoken to your local bin man or retail worker or council employee to find out how hard their job is??

If you want to make an impact, why don't you talk to the parents of your students? And if that isn't working, complaining on MN isn't going to either!! There's a skill to influencing people and moaning or having a more grandiose view of your role in a child or parents life isn't the way.

As an aside, plenty of kids who do awfully in school end up just find at a later stage. Plenty of kids get homeschooled by working parents and do fine. School is just one aspect of a child's development and within that the academic curriculum is a part. It's really not the be all end all and anyway it isn't the responsibility of just one teacher across the child's life - every teacher is different anyway.

Here we go again with the ‘no one works as hard as teachers’ said by no teacher on this thread.

your dislike and distain for teachers is bizarre. And the more you post, the more obvious it is that you have no idea about teaching. Having a grandiose idea about our role- what an extreme leap.

why do teachers need to find out from their bin man how hard their job is? This is a post about teaching specifically not public sector jobs in general. most teachers on this thread, if not all, would have empathy with every other underfunded public sector job but they don’t need to mention it on a thread specifically about teaching.

It does make me laugh a little bit how annoyed you are that teachers dare comment about teaching on a thread about teaching and haven’t mentioned their bin man 😂

Yes Scottish schools finish next week, we also have too many teachers here I know plenty who can’t get permanent positions. I often wonder what the difference must be like down south because I have teachers in the family and they all love their jobs.

I think on MN posts like these get people’s backs up because they are posted almost weekly and it gets a bit grating, especially when we are about to enter the summer holiday period and most of us are not going to have six weeks off, in fact most of us will be lucky to get that off all year so maybe read the room a little eh?

Plus how teachers acted on here during Covid still sticks in my mind and I did lose a lot of respect over that period, they way a lot of MN teachers spoke about the children they teach was awful and how they proclaimed loudly that if schools ever opened again all teachers would die of Covid and we would be stepping over their bodies in the playground and, my personal favourite, how teachers were more likely to contract and die of Covid than nurses and doctors on Covid wards and anyway said doctors and nurses were paid to ‘risk their lives’ like that. It was just collective madness.

People do post a lot of bollocks about teachers.

I often wonder what the difference must be like down south because I have teachers in the family and they all love their jobs.

I think it’s the difference in contracts, teachers here have a clear 35 hour contract with a maximum of 22.5 contact hours. The surplus of teachers here though is due to local authorities cutting teacher numbers for budget reasons, Glasgow city has cut a huge number of posts alone so teachers coming out of their probation year can’t get permanent contracts.

That was a very odd reply to my post, you quoted me but didn't actually respond to much of what I said?

I would imagine most people don't understand the realities of your husband's day to day either. Hearing from the people who actually do the jobs helps raise general awareness I think.

I think the message coming across very clearly, which you can't seem to see, is that teachers can have a HARD job. Not the hardest. No one is saying that. Also that lots of other people, particularly public sector also have hard jobs.

I don't think anyone is trying to compete

Ironically although there aren’t enough teachers for our schools in England some schools are having to lose some teachers either through natural wastage or redundancy because they don’t have sufficient funding. But again this will result an adult, any adult, fronting a class. But maybe posters like @OodlesPoodle will like a non teacher teaching their DC as their disdain of teachers is very clear

OodlesPoodle

You are either underestimating or ignoring the amount that teachers have to deal with before the police and other services kick in.
The amount of assaults in schools that the police and other services is immense,

And this is from someone that knows that teachers are not the only ones that look after children

All jobs have their pros and cons. I can’t imagine being a social worker or nurse is easy but they don’t get 15 weeks leave a year.

Teachers don't either.

@Inkyblue123 the holidays are wonderful, no one would deny that. But please don't fall into the trap of believing they are paid! Annual leave allowance is the fairly standard 28 days etc.
The rest is unpaid, so newer teachers especially have to supplement with other work. Still worth it tho I'd say.

I think you are ignoring the many many posters who keep reiterating that it's not about whose job is hardest.

Many teachers here may not directly say they have it worse than others but they imply it by their hyperbole. I scrolled through the first few pages and then bored myself, but here are some examples.

On any one day, a teacher can also be a social worker, dietician, occupational therapist, speech and language therapist, nurse, PCSO and psychologist.
This kind of comment is ridiculous. No teacher is performing at a level of these other professionals.

My daughter is starting school in September and I won't even get to take her in on her very first day 😢 Neither will I be able to do any school drop-offs or pick-ups. And this includes many many other working parents.

In teaching you are required to function on so many levels simultaneously or in rapid succession, often very unpredictably Try being a junior doctor oncall. And other stressful jobs.

You can't hide at your desk, nip to the loo for a cry or keep your head down in the way you can at lots of other jobs How many jobs can you do this in? Retail? Waiting tables? Nursing?

Most parents really don’t have a clue how dire it is. So? Most teachers, like most humans, don’t have a clue about the challenges of many other jobs.

what sets teaching apart in many ways is that it is rare to be able to leave work behind when you get home This is just mad. Many people in professional careers can’t leave work behind.

This are examples of what some people find wearing.

@HeavingSuitcase yes teachers aren’t at the level of those other professionals but for many children a teacher is the closest that they will get to anyone providing such a service. Have you not seen the posts about pupils who are at suicide risk and they are on a 2 year waiting list for CAMHS. So who is the person who will be having to provide as much support as they can whilst they wait for the required fully trained professional, that would be the teacher.

When teachers say it is dire, they are talking about education sector not their job.

Why people are happy to accept this for their children amazes me.