Coping with Teacher Training days

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I'm new to education, DS1 in reception DS2 19 months old. But this is really going to get right up my nose. Teacher training days tagged onto half terms. 1st one Friday just before the weeks break.

How do mums cope? Ive got something planned - booked months and months ago and have to leave really early and now just checked diary and DS1 is home and I'm paying for DS2 to be in nursery!

Why cant they do these training days in the evenings or even Saturday morning like the rest of us? Why has education have to be so disrupted? Surely with the number of weeks off they get it wouldnt be too much to expect a few days to be put towards training?

Struth, we are self employed here, hubby never hardly gets time off, when we were farming we worked well unto the night, expected to get up at the crack of dawn, 7 days a week, working when completely exhausted and so hanging and no paid holidays!

So many families are struggling with childcare, trying to hold onto their jobs, and then this is slapped in our faces.

Surely this doesnt happen on the continent??

I'm not denying that Rusty but that is unusual given the hourly rate of a teacher compared to that of a playworker. Playworkers and TAs are very, very cheap comparatively. But no doubt a lot of teachers would be very happy to staff this sort of provision if they were paid their teachers' salary to do it. I would for a start.

I'm amazed that anyone thinks this person is unreasonable. I'm a teacher whose days in work don't match dd's days in school. When there is an INSET day at her school and working, there is absolutely nothing I can do about it.You can't get a child minder ad hoc, my school won't allow me to take her to work, I have no family nearby, I can't take the day off because I'm a teacher. Therefore this time mad Nana is coming to look after her. She is loopy but I have no other option. It is a regular problem.

Doubters, offer me a solution. I'd like to hear it.

I am feeling very grateful that my DC's school has an attached breakfast club and after school care facility that is open 50 weeks of the year (closes over Christmas I think).

I presume it must make enough to keep going and am sure inset days have more children attending.

It is a school of 250 pupils. It must be more difficult for a school with fewer pupils to sustain such a facility ie to have the necessary numbers (am not saying the school runs the out of school care).

Fivecandles, if a school does not currently have out of school care available, are you suggesting that for the 5 or 6 inset days a year it should suddenly conjure something up? The fixed costs would be large and the amount charged for individual sessions would need to be high to make it financially viable.

The school my children used to go to (we moved) had breakfast club but no after school care. I presume that people did find some means of looking after rheir children. Why is this so surprising?

OP yes it can be confusing when inset days seem to appear out of nowhere but leas will put a timetable up showing them for the year. Most areas will coordinate them fairly well although there may be some differences. On the direct gov website there is a useful page where you can find term dates for any lea in the country and these will show inset days.

When my DTDs started school (this September) and I went back to work (as a teacher - again, this September), DH and I sat down and discussed all our options and potential problems in terms of INSET days, evenings when he was working away and I had to be at school for directed time, before and after school provision and so on. We do not have family nearby, and the majority of our friends work. BUT we discussed the issue and came up with some solutions. WE did - we didn't expect anyone else to do it for us.

I find so much on this thread unbelievable - why is it anyone else's responsibility but your own to sort out who will look after your children when you are at work?

Well said EvilTwins. I agree totally.

Indeed - hear, hear.

Our DD is three and we have already discussed and made provision for her inset days and my inset days and my husbands xtra training days and he;s not a teacher.

...sigh....

I have a whole days training during next half term..

And another day in my classroom with builders to sort stuff out..

And about 2 days of marking and prep to do...

Ironicall I am paid 2 1/2 a week so next week am working 1 1/2 for free... and will be paying for child care.

Hope this appeases OP.

I hear very very little about other professions' work load and holidays. I mean stay at home mums have holiday all the time don;t they (!)

'why is it anyone else's responsibility but your own to sort out who will look after your children when you are at work?'

This is ridiculous. Eviltwins, if you are saying that you came up with a solution for having your children looked after while you were at work then this is precisely what YOU did i.e. made it someone else's responsibility.

If you or others have grandparents, friends, relatives or a childminder to look after your children then you are making it someone else's responsibility.

Why is it such a leap of empathy for you to realize that other people need to do this too but are not always lucky enough to have the grandparents, friends, childminder option??

They are in no way different to you - just working parents trying to make a living and care for their children as best as possible - the only difference is they have no one else to look after their kids.

The lack of ability to see beyond your own good fortune and consider others' situation is truly phenomenol.

'BUT we discussed the issue and came up with some solutions'

Whereas obviously dp and I did not think of this gem!!

Clearly it is a sign of our general fecklessness that our children's granparents are not well enough to look after our kids and that the friends who live nearby all work too (as teachers)

DP and I must remember to beat ourselves with sticks later for being so inadequate as to have no one on hand to look after our children for 4 random days a year.

Or perhaps we should take memoos advice and just give up our jobs so that we can be ready and waiting for these 4 days

Sheesh!!

I'm still waiting for somebody to tell me a good reason (as opposed to all this ridiculous negativity) why schools cannot offer care or club togetehr to offer care or LEAs cannot offer care during INSET.

OMG is it because there would be a danger of employing people to do some work???

Can't have that in this climate can we!!

Oh, the horror,employing people to do a valuable and needed job.

'Fivecandles, if a school does not currently have out of school care available, are you suggesting that for the 5 or 6 inset days a year it should suddenly conjure something up? The fixed costs would be large and the amount charged for individual sessions would need to be high to make it financially viable.'

Well, I have said several times, that where a school does not have out of school care there is likely to be an arrangement with one that does or perhaps there COULD BE or it could be the LEA that organises the care.

What fixed costs?? The school building is designed and ready to look after precisely those kids. Although it would be open for the INSET with all the electricity and other costs that go with that it would only be half used (for the staff) so in fact it's perfectly sensible to use it to offer out of school care too.

As for the cost to parents, sadly playworkers are paid more or less the minimum wage as far as I understand it.

Are those of you who just like to put obstalces in the way not listening to those people on here who say that their school already offers this care and IT WORKS.

Are you so negative and selfish in other areas of your life or just in this one??

Hey, I'm alright Jack so I don't care about you lot!! It's such a horrible attitude.

Since when was it good fortune to organise yourself childcare?

If you are both working parents it is essential to have a plan for childcare for if the child is sick or if there are training days or holidays. Holiday leave only goes so far and employers are not going to be impressed if you are unreliable.

Those who do not have grandparents around have to have arrangements in place.

Not to do so would be irresponsible not a lack of good fortune.

Well, the reason in the near future is likely to be that there will be no spare money in either school or LA to subsidise such facilities and not enough parents are willing to pay the true cost.

Are you being deliberately obtuse Fleur.?
It is good fortune to have someone who can look after your children for 4 days plonked randomly in the year.

If my children are sick, I take time off work but I cannot take time off work (teaching other people's kids) for my kids' INSET.

PARENTS pay RUSTY. If it is a question of holiding on to your job or not holding on to your job then you pay. This is what happens in before and after school care and holiday club.

DP and I are NOT disorganised because we do not have someone to look after our children for 4 randomly plonked days.

We have care for them for every other day and mornings (either oursleves or before school club or holiday club) but not for INSET.

Where do you get off? That really is a horrible, sneering attitude.

'employers are not going to be impressed if you are unreliable'

No shit Sherlock!

I imagine some of you lot would have something to say if your kids' teachers didn't turn up to teach because they had to look after their own kids during INSET yet, amazingly they are supposed to be able to both work and care for their kids or they are disorganised and irresponsible!!!

Well, that wasn't our experience at the school I work at last time we consulted about running a breakfast club - only one parent would have been willing to pay the true unsubsidised cost. More would have been happy to use it if it had been heavily subsidised, but we simply didn't have the resources to do that.

Well, that's YOUR experience Rusy and yet, amazingly, before and after school care and holiday clubs DO run successfully all over the country and if they didn't a lot of parents like me couldn't go to work.

INSET days are the final straw for many working parents because, whereas, there is usually some sort of provision during holidays and before and after school there is usually nothing available during INSET.

Yes, I know there are successful wrap around care clubs, but I would expect that many of them are subsidised.
I would also not be surprised if those subsidies are not available in the future - the commitment to wrap around care was a Labour thing - I don't know the current government's take on it, but I suspect it might not be high on their priority list.

What is your point though Rusty? Subsidised or not, a lot of parents depend on them. They will need to make their own calculations about whether it's still worth their while working after paying for childcare but if that childcare doesn't exist then they CANNOT all work.

fivecandles Sat 23-Oct-10 21:37:12

You're making a lot of assumptions there TFM. Of course the staff that manage the before school club ARE available in early mornigns.

Don't be so dogmatic fivecandles often the staff who provide before and after school care are TAs earning a little extra so they will be attending the INSET training too

You say between you and your husband you have worked in 15 -20 schools so that makes you an expert ... well in England there are 17500+ primary schools so I'm sorry but experience of 20 schools doesn't mean you know it all.

My youngest goes to a tiny village primary with no after school care or, afaia, links with another school which does.

One thing: the Head Teacher has a holiday home in America so she saves up inset days to the beginning and end of half term.

Two things: I have older DCs at secondary whose inset days are completely different, so regularly have one weird day where DS2 is on his own at home, or the two older ones are around and he has to go in.

We manage because I don't work and usually arrange something with friends, but I keep telling myself I must get around to asking the school why it can't co-ordinate with the secondaries.

Last summer, DS2 didn't have an inset on the last day of term and the head denied permission for us to take him out to go on holiday. We went, as it was the only week available, and I'm not saying this was the end of the world, but co-ordinating days seems more considerate and reasonable to me.

My point is that there are likely to be fewer, not more, after school & breakfast clubs in the future, and that it is unlikely that Local Authorities are going to want to set up new facilities for inset days.

I'm trying to show you that the 'negativity' you are complaining about on this thread is simply pointing out the practical problems that exist - it would be great if there was a way to get round them, but simply having a 'positive' attitude isn't going to get anywhere without action.

Have you asked your DC's school, or the responsible LA why they don't provide childcare on inset days - and what was their reply?

No, mrz, it is YOU who is making assumptions and this is obviously a favourite line of yours. It is not always or even usually TAs who manage before school provision. At all the schools I know people are employed specifically for this job.

And you know what you could employ extra people to do this if you needed to.

And you know what as others on this thread have said it could WORK.

But you carry on mrz, just carry on putting obstacles in the way of a perfectly sensible solution to the problem of INSET for working parents.

Perhaps you could ask yourself why you are doing this. Does it make you happy to think life should not be any easier for working parents? Have you got something against working parents?

Well, why don't we all just throw our hands up in despair Rusty!!

In fact, what's the point of anything? I'm surprised some of you manage to get up in the morning with such an attitude of doom and gloom.

Thankfully other people are more positive and practical.

And as they have told you on this thread this system is working just fine in various schools where perhaps there is just a little bit more positive and sensible and compassionate thinking!