Talk me through a teachers work load… why is it so hard?

[Mummame2222]

So, I adore my kids primary school teachers, they are all wonderful. I admire the work they do, I could never, ever do their job.

I supported all the strikes and believe teachers when they say they are overworked and underpaid.

I’m just curious how their time is spent. The holidays you have off each year does this average out your working week? So say you work 60+ hours during term time, what are you doing during half terms and school holidays?

Just trying to get a better understanding of how their job is so difficult, and like I said, I believe them and support them, I would just like to be better equipped and more knowledgeable when I stick up for them as the inevitable ‘yeah they get so much holiday’ argument always comes up when I try to!

The ads show the actual annual salary, generally.

So say for example you have a student who has ASD or dyslexia or dyspraxia - you're telling us you wouldn’t be informed of this? How on earth do you ensure each student gets the right support from you in that case?

The best way to describe it is this. I need to plan a 60 minute lesson for 30 children. Generally three different ability levels so three slightly different tasks, make resources, photocopy resourced, Consider the SEND children - one working on a personalised curriculum, can't read or write, no TA support, one with processing difficulties, one dyslexic. One child recently bereaved and needing lots of emotional support. Then I need to mark and assess the work of the 30 children ready for the next lesson. And I get 6 minutes of paid time to do this. 5 lessons a day, 5 days a week. It's impossible.

Typical day as primary school teacher:

7:30 arrive, review x5-6 lessons for the day, trim worksheets to be stuck in books (30 or more pieces of paper), check/reply to emails
8:30 set up morning work, hand out books for first lesson
8:45-10:30 - teach, mark a little in class but can't do much else.
10:30-10:45 children's break, either on duty or mad dash to the loo and tidying classroom/setting up next lesson
10:45-12:30 - teaching
12:30 - 1:30 - lunch. Scoff some food, inevitably get pulled out to deal with behaviour, tidy classroom, set up for next lessons. Log safeguarding.
1:30-3:15 teaching
3:15 - 3:30 - dismiss class, catch up with parents
3:30 - 5:00 - marking appx 150 books, can take 1-2 mins per book minimum. Log behaviour/safeguarding incidents. Phone parents. Finalise a few resources for children with specific additional needs for next days lessons. Review planning based on marking. Tidy classroom.

Some days none of that after school work can be done if there is a staff meeting. Some days there is 2 hrs PPA which can either be used to do some planning or marking but also gets used to deal with behaviour if the class aren't behaving for whoever is covering.

Planning a lesson generally takes as long as the lessons x2 in the early days of teaching but gets much quicker with practise. I'd say for an English lesson it would take me 45 mins - an hour to plan and find or make good resources. Lots of schools buy in planning from companies these days but there's often a lot of prep to do still along with making sure all children with different needs can access.

I'd use holidays to get ahead with planning and try to do the following 6 weeks' planning and making resources. But planning has to be adapted by how the children respond so it can only ever be loosely planned that far ahead so needs to be worked on throughout the term.

On top of the daily work there's things like:

EHCP reviews
Additional meetings with head/senco/parents
Writing SEN/LAC/EAL reports
Writing end of year/mid year reports
Preparing class assemblies
Parents evenings
There are so many behaviour and safeguarding issues in schools these days and they all need reporting and following up
Recording assessment data on whatever database SLT chooses
Updating displays

All of this is for a standard teacher with no additional responsibility. Most teachers also lead a subject or an area such as school council which is an additional workload that usually doesn't come with extra time although some school timetable half a day every 6 weeks for subject leaders.

I've left teaching and been working in another field for a year. I'm not senior but the workload is incomparable. I actually work in education at the moment in an admin role. My manager is constantly complaining about school staff being too busy to do the things she asks them to do and huffs that she is also busy. I just smile and nod as she's got no idea what it's like working in a school. It's constant fire fighting, everything that lands on your desk is urgent and important. Loads of fun but highly stressful!

The OP clearly means if you take the hours worked over the year is it more than the average hours worked by people in other jobs.

So are they working much more during term time but for fewer weeks of the year than most workers. So over the course of a year is it more or the same as everyone else.

I don't have a clue whether teachers work more hours annually or not

Their holiday is not unpaid. They get £xxxxxx per year. How it's divided up throughout the year doesn't mean they are unpaid. It's an annual salary.

It's like with uni fees or school fees when people complain that the 3rd term is bad value because they are not being taught much. It's exam time. But The fees are not per term. They are per year and divided into 3 and just paid each term. Same with teachers pay. The holidays aren't unpaid. They are paid an annual salary

OP I know what you mean. I don't know why so many people are so dense.

I like to have facts so when people start moaning and saying things like 'but they get such long holidays' I can say, no. Over the course of a year the average teacher works xxxxx which is xxxxxx more than the average worker.

But like you I don't know the facts and figures so coming on a forum to ask would seem reasonable. But apparently not

In practical terms, the holidays are paid. Teachers get an annual salary paid in 12 equal chunks.

In legal terms, the holidays are unpaid; the contract specifies a certain number of days etc.

This often comes up and I think it's a bit of a red herring, but you can see why "both sides" stick to their guns.

How many jobs have 12 weeks holiday?

@twinkleto because senior leaders demand that every lesson be personally tailored to each class and child to ensure 'maximum progress' 30 kids on average in a class all with different needs....

I think recruitment numbers speak for themselves on the pay / holiday etc. If it were a ok paid job, with such good holidays, I think a lot more people would be going after it. So why not then?

@chuggachug

I don't have a clue whether teachers work more hours annually or not

I don't think it's the number of hours that is what makes it tiring. It's the pace of the day & the number of students you deal with & the fact that lots don't especially want to be there. So it's all of these things combined. However this is regularly discussed on here - I think you & OP are acting as if it's never been discussed. There are regularly threads on here where teachers list all the things they have to do during a normal school day. Yet you're both saying you don't get why teachers are tired out.

@chuggachug

So are they working much more during term time but for fewer weeks of the year than most workers. So over the course of a year is it more or the same as everyone else.

Yes it's much longer hours in term time & it is likely same number of hours compressed into a term.

It's hard to explain how tiring it is without sounding like we're complaining. Personally I would rather work long hours for 7 weeks and then get a full week off. I like the longer holidays & so am prepared to suck up the long days.

@oprahwindsock

How many jobs have 12 weeks holiday?

Not many but there are plenty where you can get more holidays as the years go on. Things like civil service, nursing.

This is nursing:

Everyone that has worked longer than 10 years is entitled to 33 days annual leave a year.

So 33+8 days bank hols should be in the region of just over 8 weeks.

This is a local council job which is also just over 8 weeks

35 days (252.0 hours) plus 6 public holidays (43.2 hours) - after 10 years' continuous City of Edinburgh Council service at the start of the leave year.

Lots of jobs you can accrue TOIL and take up to 2 extra days a month. My cousin is an engineer and can take 2 days in addition to his Annual Leave.

This thread has been really interesting. It’s staggering that the expectations have increased but the means to make this happen hasn’t.

I guess in the 80s/90s when I went to school, safeguarding was largely ignored and children who were behaving badly (for whatever underlying reason) were sent to the head. I remember some children not being in the classroom for long periods as they would have been in a room on their own, or just didn’t attend.

There would have been no question of having individualised learning: as pupils you had to just sit there quietly and you either understood or you didn’t. I remember doing a lot of cutting and sticking myself, the teachers would just sit at the front of the class and do marking then. Parents got the occasional letter but didn’t get involved. Our teachers used to go on quite long holidays. I’m sure we only had one school secretary so there must have been very limited admin to be done. I only remember there being a headteacher and one deputy, not an SLT, so I think the class teachers had a lot more independence to do things their own way. It’s sad.

I do think that things need modernising so there is more support to get the job done. We should pay more tax (and also have fewer days where we have to bring in costumes etc so school can be just teaching rather than all the other stuff).

For people confused about the pay in the holiday or not.

Are you paid at the weekend? Your salary is split into 12 equal payments across the year so weekends must be paid as they are in the year?

Teachers contracts are the most bonkers contract out there but loads of other jobs have annualised hours or odd arrangements like 6 weeks out at sea 3 weeks at home.

It’s all very well saying teachers knew what they were getting into - yes, but that’s not what we’re dealing with now, if we started 25 years ago! The holidays absolutely do help but I spend the last two weeks of summer break on exam results analysis, re-marks and action planning for the new term. If I leave this until term starts it’s too late. I’m in this week for revision, unpaid.

A huge issue in terms of recruitment is that pay hasn’t kept pace with workload or inflation. My salary in 2006 should now be worth £25k more than I’m actually earning if it it had risen in line with inflation.

Thank you for this thread. I've been teaching secondary for over 10 years now, got a young family. I absolutely love my job. With my qualifications I could go into a better paid industry job but it really wouldn't fulfil me in the way teaching does.

An average day for me as a full time core subject teacher.
Get in for 7:30.
7:30-8:30 - check and reply emails. Usually at least one query from a parent, one request for information from the SENDCO about one of my students, response needed from my head of department. Check everything is prepared for the lessons that day. I usually print at least one set of worksheets in that time.
8:30-9:00 - tutor time, register, record lateness, check uniforms and complete that days activity (could be reading the news, PSHE type activity etc)
9:00-10:00, 10:00-11:00 - 2 lessons. I liken lessons to a performance. I am on my feet for the whole hour engaging with students, either whole class teaching or working with small groups. I do a lot of "live marking" - meaning I give feedback and mark the work in front of the students so they can make improvements to their knowledge at the time. Otherwise it might be a week before they see me again and they may have forgotten what we were working on.
In the minutes between lessons I have to record any behaviour concerns, reward students who have done well and also mentally switch to the next class.
11:00-11:20 student break time. I usually have at least one student come and speak to me about homework or a question. I try and speak to them then or make an appointment for them to come back and see me at lunch. Quick run to the toilet if there isn't a queue and then back to my classroom to set up for period 3. Once a week I have duty where I go straight from my lesson to my duty spot to supervise students then back to lessons.
11:20-12:20 lesson 3 of the day. Feeling tired now. Practical work needs absolute focus from me to make sure that the students are being safe.
12:20-13:20 - scheduled planning time. I get myself a hot drink then catch up on emails, plan a series of 2-3 lessons, send resources to be photocopied for the week, place equipment orders for the next week. I often also need to follow up on behaviour or ring a parent.
13:20-14:10 - student lunch. I might carry on with my planning for 20 minutes and then go and sit with colleagues and eat lunch. I will normally have a student come to talk to me again about homework/ a question about the topics.
14:10-15:10 last lesson of the day. I have to be extra engaged as the students are often tired and not able to focus. I will have taken this into account when planning activities and may have chosen something a bit more creative / interactive for this lesson. Depends on the class.
15:10-15:25 once a week I have after school duty. Otherwise I follow up on anything from lessons throughout the day, quick toilet break, get a drink and tidy classroom.
15:30-16:30 - staff meeting once a week, normally a subject, pastoral or CPD meeting. The rest of the week I use this time to follow up on actions from the previous meetings, plan lessons, speak to colleagues to share ideas, collaborate etc.
16:30-17:00 - carry on planning, set room up for the next day.
If I have mock exams etc to mark then I tend to use this time to do those or take them home and do them in the evening/ weekend.
We also have 10x open evenings/parents evenings where we are in school until 8pm. Often straight back to a normal day afterwards.
We are also often asked to cover lessons for absent colleagues which takes planning time away from us. I find this very stressful as I don't always know the class or the subject so there is often a lot of behavioural issues and cajoling to get the work done.
It's very full on and I do need evenings and weekends to recover. Holidays are time to recharge but I find I am often quite run down and get ill a lot at the beginning of holidays, especially at Christmas.

Oh I'm not arguing. I could not do it. It's a job with extraordinary stress points and then periods of down time. It suits some but not others. I would be exhausted which is why I don't see the holidays as some sort of gotcha thing from people who use it to counter the argument that teachers work hard. I see it as a job that's full on at some times of the year with periods to recuperate.

Doesn't seem to meet the SEN Code of Practice though, about class teacher responsibility for SEND pupils or the Teaching Standards.

@Karlah I know the needs of everyone of my pupils through their iep's which I can access all the time. My lessons are then differeniated in line with that.
Eg
Irlens (overlay)
Scheduled comfort breaks.
Lsa support.
Break down tasks.
Small tasks to gain praise.
Toilet breaks (regular)
Whiteboards

There are hundreds. And I would be expected to know them all if ofsted came in.

They can, and do BUT every year, the plan has to be adapted and annotated for the class you have, with adaptations for their needs. Sometimes you have a class whose attainment is so low, they cannot access what you used last year. Then you have to replan completely. You also won't always get through exactly the same amount each lesson. That means that yojrnolanned starter fkr the next lesson from last year might be on work you haven't yet covered. So you have have replan that and all the subsequent work. Because if slt come in, you need to be teaching the exact lesson you have planned and put on the system.

@chuggachug

I see it as a job that's full on at some times of the year with periods to recuperate

Yes that is basically it. I prefer it & don't moan about work load as if I do a long day, parents evening etc I know I will get some time off at some point to make up for it.

I like the fact it's varied & never boring. I find teenagers good fun. Well most of the time.

And if you teach ever changing topics it often needs rewriting in a bigger sense, frequently.

I taught A level Superpowers as a topic. With recent changes including Trump, China, Russia and other things it changed yearly how and what we had to include for students to produce relevant analysis of soft Vs hard power etc.

And you have to read a lot to keep up with a level specification and up to date knowledge

And in smaller primaries, children can be in the same class for 2,3 and sometimes 4 years so you need 4 years of topics, activities, etc on top of the adjustments for SEN , class ability etc all planned and resourced. After all, no child wants to study the Romans for 4 years in a row!