To think Primary School Teacher could be a great job?

[greyskiesandcarpet]

I hear so many negative things about teaching nowadays, but I wonder how bad primary teaching is, in comparison to any other demanding corporate job? This isn't me washing over the fact that some of the job must be really tough, but I want to hear some positive stories. I know a couple of people that couldn't deal with the stress of corporate life, but have excelled in teaching.

It used to be a great job. I am lucky enough to remember the time when it was. When kids weren’t anxious, when teachers weren’t stressed, when parents weren’t aggressive, when paperwork was manageable, when head teachers often timetabled themselves into class, when HMI inspections were focussed on positive support in order for the school to do better and were conducted by people who had served their time in schools and knew what was what, when children were encouraged to read books not screens, when play was seen as young children's work, when creative subjects and pe were given proper time in the curriculum, and good healthy school lunches were cooked on the premises from scratch and almost every child ( and teacher!) ate them.

The pay was rubbish though, my student grant was almost as much as my first teaching salary.

I could have written this! Makes me so sad. I still volunteer at the school I recently worked at and there is a new teacher who is just so demoralised - he is just a different person to the one who started in September. It’s so sad.

I can imagine he's not the only one sadly. 😞 It really does suck the life out of you.

I’m a primary teacher and I love my job. The 9-3 part of my job is amazing. Teaching children is wonderful, I love creating resources and planning but the extras on top of that can be overwhelming and exhausting.

I’ve only been teaching for 8 years and I’ve already seen a massive difference. There’s far more violence in schools now, even primary. So far in the last year I’ve been kicked and punched whilst heavily pregnant. I’ve had shoes and chairs thrown at me, I’ve been sworn at and this is from children aged 5-11.

The excess paperwork and the demand of the job can be exhausting but I wouldn’t change career. I enjoy what I do and do it all for the children.

I’m not a teacher but have worked in schools and would say that how good it might be would depend on the area, the management of the school and what your particular class is like. People usually think reception is amazing but if you have thirty children with little or no support and several children with additional needs then that could be tough.

And how do you actually know this? Not just be told but actually know

The reason I wanted some positive stories, is to see if there were actually any! I've read hundreds and hundreds of posts from teachers who don't enjoy their jobs and the reasons for not enjoying it!

Thank you for those who highlighted the positives (and gave me some of the downsides too)!

I love it. It’s hard work, there’s a so much to do in my own time and parents can be so negative as well as other members of staff.
It’s hard now I’ve got my own children.
I find it so emotionally draining.
But I love it and I love being with children.

SpringerFall · Today 10:50
MrsSkylerWhite · Today 09:07

Our kids’ primary teachers loved their jobs, without exception.
**
And how do you actually know this? Not just be told but actually know”

Why on earth would they lie (one was a good friend, kids in the same class).

The reason I wanted some positive stories, is to see if there were actually any! I've read hundreds and hundreds of posts from teachers who don't enjoy their jobs and the reasons for not enjoying it!

Almost all posts from teachers say that they love the actual teaching (unless they are dealing with unmanageable behaviour), but that there are other aspects of the job which they hate or find well nigh impossible.

Teaching ought to be a great job. It might be a good, mostly enjoyable job if you are lucky enough to work in an unusually nice school with enlightened and supportive SLT and good behaviour. Workload still high though.

It could be a lovely job. It’s a huge amount of work for a small amount of money. It’s relentless. No matter how hard you work or how organised you are you can never catch a break.

If teachers could work 40 hours like normal people then yes, it could be a lovely job. But unfortunately you work 60+ hours and it ruins your life.

Put it this way - my headteacher wished me happy birthday then pulled me into her office and gave me a bollocking as soon as I walked in the door because she thought I was undermining her authority. She had told me not to use a strategy (that I know the rest of the Trust are using) but she hadn’t given me anything to replace it, so I asked a few of my colleagues what they did. Apparently, sharing practice is wrong. Bearing in mind I’ve just come back after a year at another school and just didn’t want to get something wrong. Nothing productive came of it at all, it just turned into a bit of an argument. Happy birthday to me.

The actual teaching part of the job is a delight - it’s hard work but worth it. It won’t be the kids that take you down, it’ll be the adults…

It’s like any other profession. There are good things and bad things. There are fantastic workplaces and toxic workplaces.

On a good day it’s amazing. On a bad day it’s soul destroying. Even on my worst days though I always cast my mind back to how mind-numbingly boring I found sitting in an office with the same people all day.

If you enjoy the following: answering a variety of insane questions that have nothing to do with the lesson, dealing with entitled parents, dealing with disrespectful behaviour, working with ever relabelled and repackaged practices and organising a never ending procession of tasks.... Go ahead. Don't forget to exist on permanently heightened levels of adrenaline and stress which sends your body into burnout. Oh and if you're experienced, prepare to justify your existence. You're expensive. Why aren't you SLT yet? You can't just be 'a teacher' anymore when budgets are cut to the bone. What's your 5 year plan? Don't forget to make sure the children make accelerated progress even though you don't have a TA or any way to meaningfully teach a huge range of abilities as a single person in front of the room. It used to be a passion for me. Now it's not. It completely wrecked my wellbeing.

I agree that so many people’s passion for it is squashed by workload and the attitudes of adults who are meant to be supportive but are actually toxic. It’s very competitive but no one will actually tell you that, they put on a show of working as a team

Post COVID it is a living hell.

Pre COVID most teachers I know loved their job. Now, most are looking for an exit strategy.

Are you in a demanding corporate job looking to change?

It just seems odd comparison criteria.

Were you thinking they are similar in terms of hours but teaching teaching was much lower pay so there must be something rewarding about it?

All I can say, as a non teacher working in a variety of schools, the happiness seems more about school culture than age of child.

It's shit, really shit.
I used to enjoy it, but every year behaviour gets worse, SEN increases and support gets reduced.

It's not teaching anymore, it's managing. All you're doing is trying to keep a lid on multiple emotional children who could explode at any moment, with nowhere to go and no adult to supervise them and help them calm down, whilst also trying to teach them a very badly designed curriculum.

I'm fed up, and I only work two days a week. unfortunately though the holidays are good so I feel a bit trapped.

50% of the job is great. The 30 something hours spent actually teaching or planning creative lessons, as great as I always thought it would be.
The other 30 something hours? With made up paperwork, admin, phone calls, meetings, time wasting exercises? Everything I didn’t want in a job.

What exactly did COVID do tho? I am struggling with this myself. It's so bizarre how out of nowhere behaviour has plummeted. Is it a generation thing? I'm finding people younger than me are incredibly in tune with being individual and bucking the system when schools are meant to create a community of like minded people. Not children that seem to delight in sticking out.

Behaviour mainly. Children can’t share, take turns, conflict resolve, concentrate, focus, work hard, demonstrate resilience, speak to anyone respectfully and politely…

Teaching sounds dreadful, but a lot of the things that seem to stress teachers out are the same in many corporate roles. Ofsted? Try an audit! Taking home your marking and planning? Try having your teams pinging all hours. Disruptive and rude children? Clients are worse.
The only difference is often the salary. I work in a high pressures job but wouldn't do it for what a teacher earns.

Don't do it! There's always teachers on here moaning. Put me off ever teaching

Disruptive and rude children? Clients are worse.

A single disruptive child can prevent you doing your job for every minute of your day. They exist right in front of you the whole time, not on the end of the phone once a day/week. And they disrupt every other person in the room. They make situations snowball, with other pupils recognising that you're vulnerable in that situation, and joining in.

Of course a class of 30 will have more than one of those pupils who you're constantly trying to manage, often with restrictions on what you can do and what strategies you can use. And of course you're supposed to actually teach while trying to keep control of those pupils and your entire class

I'm not demeaning the client issue, but managing disruptive behaviour is an entirely different kind of stress, which the two ex-corporate teachers who joined my school found almost impossible. They both left within two years.