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.

Listen, life’s short.

Don’t beat yourself up about this. You’ve trained and tried, and realised this may not be the career for you.

And that’s OKAY!

Don’t feel like you have to teach. And that teaching is your only option. The world is your oyster. You will have so many transferable skills.

Don’t worry about any time or money wasted. Time moves on, you can always make more money.

Put your mental well-being first. Don’t go into something you don’t want to do. Especially if you’re losing sleep.

One of my dear dear friends is HoD for English in the grammar system. He is the epitome of the perfect teacher-he’s absolutely outstanding and totally inspirational. But he teaches top set KS4 and KS5. Won’t go near years 7 and 8. I think that’s the only way to survive.

I appreciate the emphasis on language, and I agree that how we speak about SEND matters. But it’s equally important to acknowledge the practical realities faced by teachers in mainstream settings.

Describing the role as involving “extra requirements” isn’t about framing SEN children as additional or burdensome, it’s about recognising the additional demands placed on teachers due to a system that often lacks the time, resources, and structural support for true inclusion. This includes writing IEPs, managing EHCPs, coordinating with external agencies, and adapting lessons, all while meeting whole-school targets and navigating standardised testing.

We can hold both truths: that inclusion is a moral imperative, and that it currently requires more from teachers than the system is realistically resourced to support. Naming that isn’t deficit thinking, it’s advocacy for the change we need.

Teachers are placed in very difficult positions WRT SEND. It's usually not that they don't want to support children. It's the tension between inclusivity and standards, with OFSTED historically pushing for standards whilst parents tend to push for inclusivity. Example, teachers are not meant to teach outside of the year group content, and in some areas recently differentiation has been discouraged as well, as "limiting" children, with a move to "adaptive teaching" instead. So I see SEND 7 year olds who literally cannot write their own name or follow a two step instruction sitting in a lesson about igneous and metamorphic rocks or doric, ionic and Corinthians columns in Ancient Greece. It's crazy. Recently I watched a year 2 class where a spelling group who can't yet write CVC words was doing the year 2 spellings which was "ti" making the "sh" sound. Apparently OFSTED had said they must all in the class be "exposed" to these spellings....

Doubling the pay won't change you feeling you can't do it full time.

Everyone has different skills and not everyone is suited to all aspects of teaching, my niece completed her PGCE and decided she wasn't suited to it/didn't enjoy aspects of it and went a different route, two other family members are teachers and don't appear to have any more of a stressful job than other family members/friends.

Perhaps you will feel more comfortable as you gain more experience, or if you don't think that will happen there is no shame in admitting it is not for you and trying something else.

Do you think that's big and clever? ETA you thought it was so witty you even name changed to post it. 🙄

Whenever I hear of someone retraining to teach I just cringe. In my last school one woman who did this lasted a week. She’d left quite a nice job as well.

There are so many posts from people saying, "I'm thinking of retraining as a teacher, is it a good idea?" and then ignoring all the comments saying that the workload is unmanageable, the pressure is grinding and the parents and children are out of control, because they have a romantic idea about what teaching looks like.

There are also so many posts from people who went ahead to retrain as a teacher and are shocked that the workload is unmanageable, the pressure is grinding and the parents and children are out of control.

People like you should try out the job before piping up. You wouldn't last a minute, I'll bet.

Get out while you can. Teaching is not a viable career anymore. Save yourself years of brutally hard graft that will leave you bone tired. Nobody will appreciate your efforts, least of all parents and SLT. You went into this with your eyes open, but didn't experience it on a visceral level until now. Leave.

100%. It's a cultural lack of respect that has filtered down to leadership, parents and kids. The pay is the least of the issues. That said, if you tally the hours worked and the sheer stress involved, the pay isn't much either.

If you can’t do it you can’t do it.
Money isn’t going to suddenly change that.

I think the reason you hear a lot of teachers airing their difficulties is that it is a strangely lonely profession. Management, parents and children can be highly critical of everything from your planning, to your dress sense, and presentation. I think you’re wrong to think teachers aren’t respected though. Some of my children’s teachers are very much the best people I have ever met.

Move somewhere where education is valued:

https://www.nasuwt.org.uk/advice/pay-pensions/pay-scales/pay-scales-scotland.html

Exactly this. Holidays are spent being ill, recovering, doing life admin, going to appointments or preparing displays, planning and marking.

I left classroom teaching after 20 years last December. The best thing I ever did for my MH and my family. Wish I'd have left sooner.

Do you think parents in general are aware just how bad the situation is currently in schools regarding teacher retention and recruitment?

@LucilleBluth ,

What subject do you teach?

What specifics do you and don’t you enjoy about teaching? What are your strengths and weaknesses?

There are loads of teachers on this site who can give you good advice.

Hi! Teacher here - taught full time 27 years and have done two at 0.8. Better work/life balance.

It’s not a job for the faint hearted that’s for sure but with good prep, good colleagues, good support and a massive sense of humour there are many rewards. Sounds like you can’t see the wood for the trees. Only do exactly what you need to do right now and drop everything else. Meet with your mentor/ manager and get some help and perspective,

You do have to adopt a “nobody died today” frame of mind and crack on. It does get better xx

I’ve been teaching nearly 20 years and love it. I wouldn’t want to do anything else, however, I have the hide of a rhino and am very good at my job. It is hard work but very rewarding. If you find the right school it can be good and the pay is fine plus I love my holidays. Saying that I worked part time for a long time when my children were little. It’s not easy with young children.

Train driving takes an enormous amount of training. It's a lot of responsibility too. Not to mention you're likely to be the instrument by which someone dies at some point in your career.

It's mad to me that so many English teachers think they're paid enough. My mum is a primary teacher working all the hours god sends in a difficult school and she always says the pay is fine. There's not many developed countries that pay teachers so little. They're paid more in Scotland. Not sure about Ireland but I get the impression it's a much nicer job there mostly. My Canadian husband is shocked by the low wages and conditions for teachers in England. Why is their labour worth less than in other places? I see a predominantly female workforce being taken advantage of and selling itself short, no wonder there's so much burnout.

So hard of thinking. "Pushing buttons" to control a vehicle weighing tonnes, and often carrying dozens of innocent people?

Could you be more snobby and ignorant?

I did my PGCE in 1993 and loved it. Also loved the next 30 years. Then went "Academy" and had to teach other people's schemes of work. Awful.

I took a 25k pay cut (I taught for 14 years and was UPS 3 with a TLR for head of department) when I left 18 months ago. I set up my own business and work 3.5 days a week now instead of full time (or 65 hours in teacher talk). I am so much happier and so much healthier! I see my own children, I spend time with my partner and I don’t feel like I’m drowning in a pile of work that gets bigger and bigger while simultaneously having time to do said work taken off me. My hair is no longer falling out and my blood pressure is a lot lower 😍

You could double my previous salary and I wouldn’t return. I would only ever consider a return when the workload was significantly reduced and the support for SEN pupils increased, including but not limited to a much higher level of support staff in schools. If everyone in the education system was given the time to do their job properly, it would be a much better place and the experience of children would be vastly increased.