Teachers and flexible working - thoughts?

[mids2019]

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/21/uk-teachers-should-be-allowed-to-work-from-home-education-secretary-says

I think this sounds like a good idea but it will have any impact on children's education? How will it be managed?

Not good if you are in a 2 form entry school and need to plan together or you work in a shared teaching space
So many of these workload initiatives work much better at secondary than primary.

I will be honest. It’s completely bonkers

Is this just a gimmick then to try and stem teachers leaving? Is this actually attractive to the teaching fraternity.

What 🤣

Absolutely bizarre.

What are we going to have next. Midwives working from home.

I presume it would be a choice to work from home or not? So if you and your colleague wanted to work together, you could arrange that.

I work in a multiple-entry primary school. We mostly divide up the planning rather than do it together, then adapt for our own classes.

Teachers should be able to do paperwork from home? I don't understand why this keeps being trotted out as though it's new. I've known plenty of people who either always take PPA from home or who are 'paid for their PPA' (part timers who are fully timetabled for the days they work but get paid extra for PPA time that they aren't in school for). That's been the case for the 12 or so years I've been teaching. It's not new and won't solve the retention crisis.

I think it would be really valuable for certain tasks. I am a subject lead and doing things like mapping progression in a particular skill from EYFS to Y6 takes a certain amount of quiet thinking - not always easy in a busy staffroom. |

I work in a 2 form entry school. Each year group pair of teachers plan different subjects, so one will plan English whilst the other plans Maths and swap over every half term. They also divide up the remaining subjects for planning. So there’s no need for them to have PPA at the same time.
PPA in the first and last week of each half term has to be taken in school so they can medium plan out the forthcoming 6 weeks - it works really well,
With regards to marking, we are able to mark alongside the children during most lessons, good practice shows that this approach works best.

The only thing that would make my teaching job easier would be a reduction in workload. Having PPA time at home wouldn't be that useful for lots of people imo.

As it says in the article:

About 10% of teachers’ non-contact time, when they aren’t teaching, is supposed to be ring fenced so they can do marking and lesson preparation in school and not late at night or over weekends. But many report this is taken up with other work demands.

PPA is very little time. Lots of people don't live that near their school. Almost all teachers do hours and hours of work outside of their hours in school anyway. I don't see how it would be that much help really.

I'm all for it. It's not reducing contact time, it's PPA. So in a working week when I have three hours non contact time I can either come in late or go early, or do midday appointments I never get to do in a usual week.
It does make a different to professional autonomy. It's not going to be massive unless people start going down the dixons route and I'm fascinated to know how they're finding it

Why?

Not every school allows teachers to take it from home. Also, timetabling means it's not possible always either. I have one slot from 11 am - 12 noon, for example. So I think part of the suggestion is that it could be given in bigger blocks. Some schools around us now give one day out off the classroom in every 10 to work where you choose. I would imagine that is a big timetabling change for many.

I agree that it won't solve the retention crisis but it might help some.

Teachers are micro managed. I work many hours at home in the evenings and at weekends. Yet if I want to leave five minutes early in my prep time I have to ask permission. If I have a medical appointment, I need to provide evidence of the appointment.

It's a badly thought-out, hopeless idea that will damage the cohesiveness of school cultures, induce even more laziness and avoidance in some staff and dramatically increase costs for additional support staff in schools. Most teachers do not live near enough to the school to pop home and mark for an hour and mist schools have very little timetable flexibility to give staff a block of 3 periods of time at home.

We do this already at my school. Primary, two intake. We know our usual timetable and what each person is planning so no need to be together for it.

I have even used my time to go Christmas shopping or to a concert (with SLT approval). As long as I’m prepared for my lessons and everything is up to date, they are happy. Lots of the teachers book their medical or dental appointments in this time so they don’t need time off and cover in the week.

If PPA tine is first thing or last thing, it makes sense. Arriving at 10am vs 8am for example, so a good solid of uninterrupted hours.

All sorts of jobs actually have time working from home... I know people in the Forces, medical professionals etc who have admin time at home! Why not teachers?

I mean... I don't think it's that helpful, but I don't see why you think it's bizarre. Teachers in German schools do not have to be in school at all when they aren't actually teaching a lesson (according to the teachers in our exchange partner school). Completely normal for them.

The biggest change that would make a significant difference would be to increase prep time. Ten percent is pathetic. It is nowhere near enough time. Schools give the minimum they are allowed to give. Schools are not supposed to use teachers for cover but they do.

It means your PPA (preparation, planning and assessment time) time which for a full timetable is roughly 4 hours per week.

It could potentially work in primary schools as they tend to clump their PPA into a morning or an afternoon. I don’t work in a primary though so I’m not sure. It wouldn’t work in secondary schools as we have to be there to register the students and our PPA is sporadic. It would be a nightmare to organise, not only for timetables but also for duties - we do morning, break and after school duties twice a week. Just another hair brain idea to try and make the career sound more appealing.

Totally agree! It is the only thing that would make the job more manageable.

I don't see some people are finding this so outrageous. My sister is a primary teacher and can work from home when doing paperwork as an adjustment for a health condition. She's still there in person to do all the actual teaching, it just means she can go leave a bit early when she has her PPE and do it at home in more comfortable surroundings. It's really helped her and has no impact on the children she teaches or her colleagues.

Judging by the number of supply teachers in my DC's secondary, its already happening - teachers off more time than they are in.

Agree completely.
6 minutes preparation AND marking time per hour taught.

In terms of WFH - some schools allow it, some don't, and how useful it is depends on if it's first/last thing in the day.
Secondary teachers rarely have all of it in a block, and to be honest a big block would make every other day of the week a full teaching day which is seriously hard going (sorry primary colleagues).

The PPA we have is ridiculous. We have 15 percent snd I still can't cope. Workload ridiculous, usually due to in-house BS initiatives thought up by SLT with too much time on their hands 🤣 teachers are leaving in their droves. The conditions are poor

4 hours! Primaries almost exclusively give an afternoon of PPA which is 2.5 hours at most.