Teaching OMG!

[LucilleBluth]

I have been training to teach this year. I started my PGCE as a 43 year old in September 2024. I’m about to finish it-well I say that. I’m feel like I’m hitting rock bottom with two weeks to go. I have worked in schools as support staff before so I wasn’t totally blind and I have good friends who are teachers, but oh my god, it is such hard work. The workload is insane-the kids are lovely but I’m dealing with so much extra stuff like SEN, EAL is off the charts, behaviour, kids without equipment and who can’t cope unless a lesson is chunked and scaffolded so much I may as well spoon feed it.

I don’t feel I can do it full time so I applied for a Cover Supervisor role-15 qualified teachers applied for a £21000 year job, I,didn't get it. What’s the point

Teacher pay needs doubling. I’ve been awake since 1am.

I started my own business as I had a particular skill that could and did make a lot of money. That said I worked 90 hour weeks for a few years, easily double what I did in teaching. Zero holidays , compared to 15 weeks previously. No pension compared to a brilliant one before and no sickness benefit compared to taking time off whenever I wanted (not that I abused it like most).

after 5 years, I realised teaching is for most a career people fall into that they are not suited to, going from school to university to school again should not be allowed, it gives a one dimensional view of the world.

teaching really is an easy job for people with the right skills

Teachers are allowed to swear out of the classroom or when retired.
They don’t get every weekend with no work though. Not saying other professions do, but teachers dont. Pension no longer fantastic. Good, but not fantastic. It’s very easy to manage a teacher out - it’s really not secure. You can teach in the private sector too.
i assure you I had 35 years of experience. You on the other hand - maybe you did a year or two decades ago, maybe not.
Say what you like, there’s a recruitment and retention crisis so they would have you in a flash if you really want it and it’s pretty clear it’s not as good as you would like to suggest or there would be queues (as there used to be).

Why is there a crisis in recruitment and retention then?

Not your problem now…..crisis? I think not, try recruiting in The private sector for skilled staff, it’s very very challenging. I was 10 years in teaching at a secondary comprehensive and yes every year was the same. You learn how to do the job, you don’t learn particular new skills. Curriculum changes were great, they made it more interesting.

I see @DevonCounty felt the need to name change to post this stuff. If she's just trying to get a rise out of people it really is pathetic.

If she was any good and it's such a stroll I'm sure she could return to the profession very easily.

It was a short post ! But yiu do know people can disagree with you

There’s a crisis. A quick google would show you this.
Edit: every year was the same? So you’ve had 1 year of experience 10 times? A good teacher doesn’t have 2 years the same.

Where did I say that you couldn't disagree with me?

But you haven't answered the question which frankly says a lot about your time and capabilities in the classroom.

Does your husband run a free school that makes teachers clean and serve food?

Don’t want to. Once it gets boring it’s time to get out. Just like if you are a teacher now and don't like it get out, don’t feel sorry for yourself.

A petulant response. which is not surprising.

Like many I have left.

But I still disagree with your premise that teaching is easy.

Of course it isn't easy. She's just goading.

I did PCGE when I was 22…20 years ago. I remember being so stressed I was on sleeping tablets towards end of the course and a fellow pGCEer saying “just got to get through this…and then we get jobs and keep doing it!” And it hit me it wasn’t the course, it was the teaching. I got a job in financial services which paid 20% more at entry level and has been way cushier. I find education really interesting but I 100% made right choice. The pay has got worse and the workload higher, I really don’t understand how anyone is attracted into profession.

Either you've never taught, or never taught past 1999.

You should start writing the government campaigns! They will meet their targets in no time with how astonishingly easy the career is.

I did a PGCE in primary education as a mature student and found it very stressful. To all those people who are asking why the OP didn't realise how hard teaching is, I think it's very difficult to know until you actually experience it. It looks easier from the outside, for example, observing as a Teaching Assistant.

I agree

it really is a breeze

Yet, there is a huge recruitment and retention problem...

No teacher thinks that 35 years experience is 1 year 35 times. That's just obvious nonsense.

Teaching IS easy, and fun, and all the other good things that people have mentioned. What isn't fun is all the admin, lack of support staff, ridiculous expectations from SMT, horrible entitled parents.... the teaching is still the best bit. Its all the other bits that suck balls.

People think it's going to be easier than they're told. I can't tell you the number of trainees who have watched me teach, think it looks easy, then had a rude awakening.."but they're fine for you!" Yes, but I've put hours of work in to make them manageable, keep them engaged and keep on top of all the needs

Quite......

PGCE year is the worst for paperwork. It’s horrific having to evidence every little thing and actually do the job - it does get better. I’m not saying it’s easy or light in terms of workload, far from it! But you get quicker and more efficient with experience. Resources you’ve spent days over are now done and can be easily and quickly tweaked. Students with SEN and EAL are daunting but with experience you become more apt at adapting. I’m 9 years in and have found a good school that fits with me - the first couple of years newly qualified were intense but I have a good routine now. Don’t be disheartened. It’s such a heavy job and I completely see why people are leaving the profession in droves but if you can stick out the first couple of years, things do get easier!

Good points, @moanamovie . It definitely gets easier and you get quicker with tasks, and adapt more quickly to students' needs..

I love being a teacher and also hate it. I cried tears of pride when 'my' Year 11s left the school - remembering the Year 7s that had entered five years earlier. Some of them will go and do great things - some probably won't... Teaching is not for idealists but for pragmatists; you can't and won't win them all.

You sound like you are already a good teacher as you are striving in your classroom to teach the perfect lesson, to have high standards and ensure all pupils learn. Think of the kids you do teach and do help, not just the ones you don't. And that you will never achieve the impossible of perfection.

The school I teach in a tough inner city comp in an area of very high deprivation with EAL, SEND and poor literacy in every classroom - for me it is about living my values that every child deserves a decent education. This means behaviour is tough, the kids are often traumatised and living in poverty and sometimes lessons are a total disaster. But I know that me being there and giving a shit is better for them than me not...

Cut yourself some slack, you sound like it has been an exhausting year in a hard setting. It will never be as hard as this as you will have greater autonomy, less scrutiny and being treated as a colleague rather than a trainee. Your mentor is no doubt struggling too but sounds like a bit more support may have helped you.