Can you be a good mum and a good teacher?

[twinkletoesimnot]

'I didn't feel I was a good mum, or a good teacher' www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51yzv95wg9o

I see lots of threads on here asking about retraining as a teacher and if it is compatible with family life.
The above article goes some way to explain it.
I went into teaching quite late (37) when my last child started reception. I am fairly lucky that I am allowed to leave to get her from school once a week during my PPA and that our schools are federated so we have the occasional event or trip together.
However, there is no wrap around care at her small, rural school (not that I could afford to use it!) and my husband has had to swap jobs to ensure more flexibility so that he can do most drop offs and pick ups.
The biggest thing for me is that it is incredibly hard to find a work/life balance.
On an average week I work approx 55 hours and there is always more to do.
I always feel that if I'm doing a good job at school then I've dropped the ball at home and constantly guilty / thinking about work when spending time with my family. In this summer holiday I agreed with my husband that I would not do any work until the last 2 weeks of the holiday.

I cannot imagine being able to do my job effectively with a baby or pre-school age child. I am in awe of those that do.

This really needs to change.

I know that there are other jobs where this will be similar and am not trying to say that teachers are special before the bashing starts, but this is a real problem.

I feel that I consistently put other people's children before my own.

As you say lots of people work those hours but without the holidays

I’ve done 25 years, my son asked me last term (after I’d lost 18 hours a fortnight of year 11 and 13) why I was never at home. I’m planning an exit strategy.

I’ve taught for 17 years and now have 2 young children. I basically say no to anything that impacts my family life, and find I can have a good balance.
I’m HoD in a large secondary school and am lucky that my school is family friendly, I work 4 days a week, am allowed time off for school plays, sports days, certificate assemblies.
I think it’d be really hard to have young children in the first few years of teaching but it’s definitely possible.
for me being able to enjoy the school holidays with my kids is a huge bonus

Ah I literally just read that article then saw your post! Yes, I think it's pretty impossible to do both well! Teaching takes up so much time and energy and 55hours + a week plus home life mum responsibility is just not sustainable🫠... I left teaching in 2019 due to burn out and was diagnosed with M. E....after 2 years off due to illness I became a support assistant for disabled people and do occasional tutoring, it's way less stress and I have more flexibility with my hours. I have a little one on the way and personally don't think teaching in the school system is currently a good fit for mum/work life balance but there are ways to teach outside of the school system that can provide more flexibility for family life🙏

I had to become part time to be able to manage it. As a secondary teacher that has plenty of downsides.

I always got lots of split classes with non specialists so I ended up having to do all the planning and marking for the full time job in half the time. Proportionally, I did way more additional hours outside of school than when I was ft because as a pt you lose all those lunchtimes, breaktimes and before and after school windows where you can get work done.

I also couldn't apply for any tlr's....unless I wanted to do the full role for pro rata pay. I also had to jump through hoops to prove I was worthy of my ups pay.....other ft colleagues were able to do this through their paid tlr roles but I was made to do similar but unpaid roles.

It would've been really hard to br ft with young kids and it's not much easier to be pt. The only family friendly bit about teaching is that you don't need to pay for childcare in the holidays...which is handy given that my pt hours only just covered the childcare term time.

It is a shame because in many ways teaching should be a profession which is more compatible with raising a family due to the holidays

I'm not a teacher but from my casual observations of friends who are teachers one of the main issues seems to be the difficulty in going PT (2/3/4 days). If you work in a school where management are more open to PT teaching staff and acknowledge that lots of teachers have their own DC then I'm sure that helps a lot.

All professions will lose some staff who chose to become SAHPs, however good or bad the working conditions are and that is no different to lots of other professions but I'm sure that more can be done to make life easier for those with a family

I am still tempted to move into teaching, I feel like I’m failing at being a mum and at my job all the time, I feel like this is a common theme with all working mums so I have that feeling down 😂 I have to say no to stretching opportunities and focus on my basic job to try and achieve any basic work life balance. Guess having to say no wouldn’t be the best at the start of a career, I might have to wait till my kids are a lot older

No.

I’m a single parent of a small child. Teaching a long time before I had him. Now a HOD on 0.8 (0.8 of the pay, 100% of the responsibilities…) and going to stay pt while he is in school so I have breathing room. Not sure how long I can manage for, because I can’t afford to be pt but I can’t survive if I’m not.

There’s only so many times you can be at the end of your capacity before something has to give.

I'm a FT teacher with a 2yo and a newborn. Term times we only manage because DH went part-time and I live for the holidays even more than I did before. I also see friends in other professions who are working in office 5 days a week 9-5 with an hour commute and I think that they have it much harder because they don't have the longer holidays to decompress properly. Having said that my school is very good about work-life balance, I generally arrive after 8 and leave before half 4 and a lot of the time can get away without doing loads at the evenings and weekends, of course I could always do more but teaching is that type of job, but it would be much harder at my old school where you were looked at with raised eyebrows if you left before 5.

I used to be full time with two kids on my own but it was impossible. I had to drop to 3 days.

I think it is somewhat easier if you were teaching pre children. I could not have juggled very young children and teacher training.

I think you CAN be, but you need such rock solid support around you, that for many it becomes very difficult. That support needs to come from all sides too, you workplace, before and after school care/ clubs at affordable prices, someone to help you when it's parents evening etc. when I had my kids I stepped down from SLT and went to 0.6. I've gradually crept up and going back to a full time TLR position in September, kids are 8 and 6.

Not sure I could have done it any earlier though, and not in all schools.

Am I as good a teacher as I was before? Yes and no, I can't spend hours making things look pretty, but I'm still a decent classroom practitioner!

I also agree with @Timeisnevertimeatall I am in AWE of the new teachers/ trainees who have small children. They are super women and seeing them get through it, and enjoy it, and compare it to their previous careers has kept me in the profession!

No you can’t be both.

I was always tired when l was teaching. It made me grumpy at home.

I was never tired when we’d had an inset day. But teaching itself is exhausting.

Short answer no. You are expected to put other children before your own. God forbid you ask to attend your own children's rewards assembly etc.

I managed two years doing both a mum of two small children and teaching until I had a breakdown walked out and never went back. I've left teaching now and have a much better work life balance and am a far better mum

I think you have to think about being a good mum in terms of providing a stable home life, food, shelter and love. Much more than did I pick up from school once a week and see an assembly.

I also think teaching doesn't fit brilliantly with childcare hours or patterns and doesn't go into the pay scale for a nanny a bit like nursing and police, so it's hard to do as a lone parent.

I find this bizarre. With the holidays that teachers get, this would probably be the only full time job where you get to spend all your holidays with your kids. Can't think of anything better than that for your kids.

And yet teaching is haemorrhaging mothers despite the holidays, so what goes on in term time must be particularly shit.

I went part time when I came back from maternity leave to cope, but as a PP says, it was like the school felt it was doing me a favour. My timetable was unbelievably shit, with no full days off even though I was only 0.6, and a patchwork of bits of time off here and there on a two week timetable. If I'd had to put my child in nursery I'd have had to quit teaching, it would have been impossible, but I was lucky to find an extremely flexible childminder who was happy to have my kids at random times.

My school is still shit for part timers. The fight that had to be had for part timers with kids in nursery to have a full day off each week, and for that day to be the same day so you could book a nursery place was ridiculous. Also, part time = no promotions.

I left teaching because I couldn't see any way I'd be able to balance teaching with having an involved family life. I was barely keeping afloat without children.

I have friends who juggle teaching and parenthood but it's very stressful for them. The only ones who are coping are the ones who've been doing it for years so aren't having to do much totally from scratch and their childcare is the long nursery hours not school ones.

I don't see how any teacher in the first couple of years could put in the hours required and manage school aged kids as well.

Let's just say I found a doctorate much easier, which was pretty much round the clock work. I could not finish my teacher training because we couldn't manage having children ontop of it. It felt very shitty at the time that I had to leave but it was the best thing. I thought I would end up dead if I stayed in the training and trying to be a mum (DH does work stupidly long shifts so that was also a factor). If you have a support network it can be done I suppose but I didn't have that. I'm so hard working and I loved it, just couldn't juggle the demands of the pgce (secondary).

Well for a start, most teachers do end up working for several days of each holiday, so it's not quality time with the kids. You might be able to get away with not sending them to formal childcare, but you're not having quality time with them.

During term time, I was physically present in school from 8-5 every day and then had another 1-2 hours of work each evening and a half a day at the weekends. So not a great deal of quality family time there either. And that's with me working through a decent chunk of my "holidays", so add on even more hours if I did want to make the holidays completely work free for my kids.

I don’t actually know anyone in full time teaching with small children. They’ve all gone part time or quit!

I often used to see teaching mentioned as a very ‘family friendly, career but it is very inflexible in term time.

I am now they are older - I didn’t feel it when they were primary aged.
There was always someone there for them for everything at school, but it was never me.
Now they have a better life because I stuck to working full time and earn well.

You are always putting other people's children before your own emotionally and physically

I felt like a shit mum and teacher you can't do both well