Too many teachers?!

[Mercy]

dd has just started in Yr1 and I knew that her class was going to have two part-time teachers (one of whom is the Deputy Head, hence the need for 2 teachers).

From what I can gather though, they actually have 3 teachers; the DH on Mon/Tues/Weds, another teacher on Thursday and yet another on Friday. There also seems to be about 3 classroom assistants who all work on different days. I have only been formally introduced to the Deputy and one assistant.

dd is finding it hard enough settling into Yr1 as it is and I don't think the staffing situation is helping (may even be the cause tbh).

I don't think this is acceptable but wanted to find out whether anyone else's child is in a similar situation - and any views on this from parents or teachers.

Thanks

[PrettyCandles]

We've been, and are again, in a situation where ds had two teachers, in Reception on a 3/2 split for nearly two terms, now, in Y1, on a 2.5/2.5 split. But each time the classroom assistant has remained the same throughout the week. Ds doesn't like change, but because of the consistency coped perfectly well. OTOH, when he was in Reception with one class teacher only, she was off ill for 3w and the class had a succession of fill-ins, sometimes from the regular staff, sometimes from agencies. Ds got very upset by this, as did many of his classmates. I don't think it's a problem to have more than one teacher, as long as there is consistency and the children understand that certain days/activities/subjects will be taught by certain teachers. But I would not be comfortable with both the teachers changing and the support staff changing all the time. It's too much for he children to absorb at this age.

[mrsdarcy]

A year 1 class at our school has got a jobshare as well as, as Malory say, someone else to cover PPA time. We can't afford to have a floating teacher to cover PPA time so we have to use TAs as well.

The jobshare is new this term, with 2 new members of staff. I know the governors' staffing committee (which I'm on) agreed in principle to a job share but asked if the teachers could meet at recruitment stage to see if they would work well together.

The parents of children going into that class were told last term about the jobshare arrangement, but not how the role would be split, or even what the class is called, which I think can be quite important to 5 year-olds. I'm happy with the jobshare in principle but not with the lack of reassurance given to the parents.

[NikkiH]

My son had a job share when he was in year one with one teacher taking him Monday and Tuesday and the other doing weds, thurs and friday.

He never minded it but I found it a bit of a pain as I found one of the teachers really unapproachable and it was useless asking her anything to do with things that happened on days she wasn't in - like which spellings they had to learn for the following week - 'cos she just wasn't interested!

It was also difficult if he had to have time out work out who would be taking him on that day and then remember to tell them about it while they were in school.

Didn't do him any harm academically or in terms of his enjoyment of school which was the main thing (in my view!)

[portonovo]

No, I don't think there's a problem, as long as there's good communication.

My youngest has two job-share teachers, one Mon & Tues, the other the rest of the week, although they occasionally swap to take account of courses etc.

They also have another teacher Friday a.m. while the teacher that day has her PPA time. All the PPA time at our school is carried out by teachers already at the school, so for example the job-share teacher who takes my son Mon-Tues does PPA for other teachers 2 days a week and music lessons the remaining day.

We have 3 sets of job-share teachers at our school, some of whom have job-shared at the school for 16 years, and it has always worked really well. They seem to communicate well and always both turn up for parents' evenings - unlike other schools I know where job-share teachers take it in turns to do parents' evenings, so you don't get to see both teachers.

I would chat to the teachers about how your child is settling in generally, not just with regard to the different teachers.

[Mercy]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

My other concern is that the parents have not been told of this arrangement, I don't think some of them even realise. We went to the new clasroom towards the end of the summer term to meet the teacher (the children were there too) and no mention was made of the other teachers or assistants. I only found out through my dd who is now thoroughly confused as to who these new people are.

Anyway, I think 2 teachers sharing is fair enough but 3 is not acceptable - not in Yr 1 and not without informing the parents

[NumbskullNinja]

Can you chat with the head to clarify situation, mercy? Does sound overwhelming to me and trasition to Y1 is often something of a shock for children anyway, ime.

[Mercy]

Ninja - you never see the Head around, it's a big city school!

Bump for the after school crowd

[NumbskullNinja]

Go to his/her office? It's a management decision this sort of thing- you need to go to the top, imo.