How much holiday do you think teachers really get?

[Fairenuff]

I was reading a thread about inset days and inevitably it led onto the amount of holidays teachers get and I was wondering whether Joe Public thinks that the teachers get the same number of days off as the children?

Alright, they are not actually in the classroom, but the teachers I know all work during holidays (and also evenings and weekends). My estimate would be that they plan a fortnight summer holiday with the family and the rest of the time they are planning, assessing, marking, report writing, etc.

Perhaps they should be renamed 'child holidays' rather than 'school holidays' to help clear up the confusion?

FWIW I love working with 6 year olds. Really love it. It is great fun and greatly rewarding. But there are times when it can be extremely stressful. Some 6 year olds can have very challenging behaviour, and can present with many difficult situations, and their parents can do also.

I do find the 6 year olds easier to deal with than when I worked in secondary I admit. But it is very different things I now deal with - the 1--% need of attention, the behaviours are different but there all the time, temper tantrums, etc.

Adorable children but sometimes very stressful situations.

Ignore first comment - was thinking it was from elsewhere

I work with 6 year olds and agree they can be extemely challenging. The poor teacher spends her time checking her assessments of levels, planning the lesson appropriately, preparing the resources, delivering the lesson and then the children go to their tables to do their work which takes anywhere between 3 and 13 minutes. You barely get time to draw breath before the first one shouts 'finished!', waving a few marks on paper in the air triumphantly . Keeping them focussed for longer is just one of the challenges.

No, I don't find it stressful, usually. There are better days and worse days, yes, but comparatively stressful to my previous job? No.

Do teachers work hard? Yes. Do other professions work hard? Yes. Do I work hard? I think so, yes. Do I suffer from stress? No.

:)

Of course not every school is like ours. I get that.

I have to say that I found secondary very stressful on a daily basis in my second school. I find my primary job (albeit not teaching) less stressful - stressful some days, not other days.

But then my DH is a solicitor - high salary, good benefits - but he doesn't find it very stressful - nothing like when I taught secondary, he enjoys his job, and even as a partner doesn't do as many hours as I did when teaching.

As I said before - I think SMT are often the key in schools as to how hard a job is. But also - some schools are easier than others. And also - some people work in different ways and have different expectations. Amd so much more.

How many do you have in your class? Did you say 15?

, surely?

13!

As FallenCaryatid says, I can see why she isn't stressed!

13 would definitely be less stressful than 30 - infact we will have 31 in our Y1 class as of next week.

Well, I think Feenie said teachers don't work hard - or at least FE teachers and teachers of young people with complex additional support needs don't.

Which would explain why my DH doesn't whinge about his job and thoroughly appreciates the holidays.

13 and hardly any paperwork. Oh yes!
But I suppose I could have gone into the private sector and had that.

Yeah, would you like to go back and quote me on that, ithaka? I said - and I have direct experience to draw upon, since I am a primary teacher and dh is an FE teacher, that it was very different, and you couldn't compare the two. You misread it and went off on one about how of course your dh plans, assesses, etc - but I didn't say he didn't.

I stand by my comment that you cannot compare the two - that was my only point. The pressures are immensely different.

And your point was that your dh doesn't work in his holidays. Great! Well done him. Still not relevant to primary teaching - as I know first hand.

You will notice, ithaka, that even when you tried to draw on me to say it was easy, I said it wasn't. Just different. I suggest you reread.

MY OH used to teach at Oxford. Now that really did seem a doddle!

I think we teachers need to take some responsibility for creating this culture whereby everyone feels they have to work non-stop.

I do quite a lot of work. But, special circumstances and parents evenings excepted, I never work past 9pm. I do more on a weekend so that I have most of my holidays.

I see so many teachers around me close to absolute burn-out. We put so much pressure on each other to be perfect, to do everything, to give all of ourselves. It really isn't necessary, but anyone who doesn't is branded lazy (and in line for redundancy it would seem). I'm not sure about this 'work to rule' thing, but if union members (myself included, I admit I've ignored it) were to actually only do their contractual obligations just for a short while, I'm sure this culture would change a little.

What I'm saying is, we put on the pressure. SMT can only get away with applying more and more because we let them. Everyone jumps through all the bloody hoops, through fear. If we were all to take a happy medium stance, it would be so much better for everyone. The children too. A stressed out teacher on the verge of a nervous breakdown is no good for anyone.

It depends a lot on the school but my dh is a secondary teacher and in the past year took off about 3 weeks over summer, about 1 week of the Christmas break, and not even a day or an evening or a weekend since Jan, until this June 1/2 term. Things seem to be calming down a bit at last. He sits at home most evenings & weekends answering emails, planning, tracking, phoning students' parents, marking, developing resources, doing other teachers' work

orangeandlemons - Everyone is different and I did say these people could be very good at their jobs. However I do believe it is abit different going into a teaching degree straight after A Levels and and going into teaching after working for a while.

The one person re-took the same A Level twice in a row and the other person didn't work very hard throughout and was given a place on a teaching degree when the rest of their results were poor too - and only got in because her mother rang and begged lots of universities to let her have a place. Maybe a degree does negate but that doesn't change the fact I believe that these people were let into a degree with very poor results.

I want my dh to work in your colleges! This is one of the busiest times of the year setting up and running summer school. He gets his main hols off though end july/aug then back on around 20th for registration
Those at FE - do you / your dh also teach evenings, weekends and summer school cos that's the norm round here. We have classes 48 weeks of the year, for instance

No summer school or evenings, back on 20th Aug for enrolment though. My dh works hard, but the job doesn't really compare to primary teaching. I have more job security though - but in some areas of primary education that's not the case either these days.

No weekends either....

Let's just cancel inset days altogether and get our 5 days extra holiday back.

^ yes please

My parents were teachers; they really didn't seem to get that I only had 25 days vacation which had to cover all holidays, visiting family, getting household projects done etc. Sorry no, I can't come and see you in the summer if I want a fortnight break with DH and DD.

I remember them doing some preparation work in the last week or so of the summer hols but dad had plenty of time to do things like paint the house - the sort of things we just don't have time to do ourselves.

Yes, teaching was stressful...mum used to come home from her class of well over 30 infants and be totally wiped out for an hour or so... but most other jobs you wouldn't even be on your way home by the time she'd rested.