Teachers : what's the worst thing about the job now?

[Floursacktabletop]

I've name changed , but been here many years and teaching for 22 years.
Dreading going back on Monday. For me , the worst bit is the increasingly poor behaviour of students and the continual parental complaints and allegations.
Anyone else dreading it and fancy a solidarity thread?

Parents who forget that in the hour long lesson, a class of 30 gets 2 mins each of my time, excluding any whole class teaching I need to do. So, no I can't offer lil Johnny 1:1 explanations every time, or give Martha 7 reminders to work.

How do you know that particular parents are not interacting with their children and that they’re stuck on screens all day? Do the paremts actually tell you that or do you just assume?

Absolutely. My God, the amount of times ‘anxiety’ has been used as a catch all for just about bloody anything.

Parents who refuse to allow children to feel uncomfortable feelings or be pushed slightly outside their comfort zone and instead make sure their kid is constantly appeased are seriously the bane of teachers’ lives.

It's very easy to spot.

The children tell us it. I ask them what they did in their half term. The majority will say ‘nothing, just played in my xbox’

I'm not a teacher, I dont have the patience nor the enthusiasm. I do have great sympathy for you all though. My family is full of ineffectual parents and I struggle to enjoy spend time with most of the DCs. They all seem to think they will be "influencers" and one of my cousins DC has a youtube and tiktok channel at the age of 6. There's always excuses for tantrums and poor behaviour and never the lack of boundaries, unrestricted screen time or lack of time spent doing stuff outdoors.

Wiggleyfingers
I fully sympathise, but can I just say the insecurity is from that we don't understand how the child is doing. Results of assessments aren't shared, there is no subjective data sent home that schools have plenty of, and in the two meetings we are given vague reports with no indication of how they are actually doing. Or told okay or well - what does it actually mean?? There is no context well okay or welll excelling or well enough or well for themselves or well as in top of class/year? Is it A,B,C,or D or what percentile are they? Or where they are in age/months? This would have been a lot more comprehensive but schools don't send any such data home (because then parents ask questions I guess) and it causes anxiety and indirect questions and extra workload, less directly. And speculating

This absolute fuckwittery.

Bob is going to fail his GCSEs because he's choosing to communicate that he's an absolute asshat in numerous ways. I have been communicating this up the line since the start of year ten.

No I will not give up my breaks and lunchtimes to "support him". He can try paying attention and doing the work.

No I can't "give him some revision materials". He has been given a gazillion and done fuck all with them.

My behaviour should now be communicating that failing his GCSEs is his choice.

Don't forget that if you don't show willing, you'll be picking on Bob and he'll likely be moved to another class, where the parents can start again and waste another teachers time... before that one starts picking on Bob as well....

I've been teaching a core subject for 15 years and still love it.

I do think the training for new teachers seems inadequate and a small minority of my colleagues only want to teach the high achieving and compliant ones.

I think better training and more SEN training would help all teachers.

How old is your child?

If anyone is this stressed / overwhelmed / discouraged by their work, then their annual leave entitlements are irrelevant…🫤

I'm absolutely appalled by this thread. My youngest child left school 12 years ago but I'm now caring for my 4 year old reception class granddaughter so back in the education system and have noticed the difference in just 12 years.

Direct email access to teachers was the first thing and then the teacher trying to get kids into school but prevented from doing so by neurotic attention seeking parents all needing a word at 8.20 in the morning.

Don't get me started on the parents bloody WhatsApp group. That's just a frenzy of fretting and worrying about issues that are minor (in my 60 year old eyes). It's micro management of children, their feelings, picking their friends etc. All things a 4/5 year old should be navigating for themselves because it's how they learn and grow and develop their own resilience.

Most shocking was learning that in a Class of 25 children there is one teacher and four TAs because 3 children are non verbal and one is SEN.

I'm full of admiration for teachers. I'm still in awe of how a child is taught to read and write. Her little hand writing her own name and sounding out phonics. It's miraculous and we have only done one full term.

Keep going if you can, we need you.

Bob is very welcome to do one... but no one wants Bob.

I have a reputation for being a Bob whisperer. My strategy is to absolutely unequivocally communicate that I can and will let them fail. Or they can work with me.

What’s your overall experience teaching in such an area?

Love teaching but hate ‘edutwitter’ culture, many MATs (scandals waiting to happen) and having to listen to self styled gurus (usually idiots) who are being paid for by said MATs

24 years in. Secondary ebac subject.
I agree behaviour.
And I’m lucky. In an inner city school with high deprivation, but an excellent SLT, lots of support, not a blame culture etc. So the behaviour is more a sad thing, because it’s not getting any better and there not a lot we can do, rather than ‘I’m getting blamed for the behaviour’ like some shit shows I’ve worked in.

Be careful, with some of our parents, you could be accused of threatening Bob or being unprofessional

Micro managing and fretting sums it up. Where has the eye rolling and "bloody kids" vibe gone with parents?

The parents, without a doubt. From whom stems the behavioural issues.

What breaks me the most is the ones who want to be in school, they want to learn, they enjoy learning and are desparate for more, but they can't learn because of the ridiculously high levels of SEN and behaviour issues.

Teaching now is 80% crowd control, 19% dealing with parents and 1% actually teaching.

Screens, or more to the point the impact of screens on behaviour, focus and concentration.

Complete lack of resilience from both pupils and parents.

Don't forget that come September once the results are in (not quite fully cos the SLT haven't had time to fiddle with them yet for the website),
You will have to write a report on what you did for Bob and his mates that fucked up their grades and tried to fuck up others grades, to prove that you actually did what you said that you did so that you don't get put on an improvement plan.

As per usual teachers moning about their workload, some of my family are teachers, straight out of Uni into teaching no idea how the real world works.

Workload, behaviour, lack of parental support. I gave a child a detention for drinking in the science lab after being asked not to. It’s basic safety. Parent got in touch wanting my side of the story. Child told them he didn’t have a drink… apparently a few sips doesn’t count. Another child, drinking in science lab after having been allowed out to have a drink 10 minutes earlier. Given a detention. Parent gets in touch and I am told that the child will not be coming to the detention… as we only had books out and not chemicals the parents view was that it was not an issue. As the teacher I am ultimately responsible for the safety of all the children in the lab. Happy to say I’m not out of teaching.