Student 'can only do' 8.30-3.30

[SpringisSpringing]

I'm fairly new to teaching so I really don't know what to do. I don't want to be responsible for failing someone.

It's just not enough time. I don't get the chance to talk to her properly.

She's okay. Not great- but if I actually had time to mentor her she might get better!

Lucy, that sounds exactly like 'the norm' that I experience, though I don't think the uni specify the '5pm' bit. We would never expect a student to stay longer than that, and one leaving earlier - say 4pm onwards - wouldn't be a problem, as long as the student checks that is OK.

Yes, you have to remember that for me it is 6 minutes per lesson that we 'share' daily - ie that she teaches to my class or that she observes me teaching or we co-teach or whatever. I agree that 30 mins per 'separate class group taught, with each of the teachers responsible for each group' would be unimaginably onorous.

lucy I think it is beyond ridiculous that universities are setting time limits like that, in the midst of a recruitment crisis. It doesn't even fit the ethos of some schools. If I found a student at work at 5pm , I'd tell them to go home!! (although I wouldn't be there as I would have gone at 4!)

I think our local uni has a line about 'conforming as far as possible with the working hours common within the setting'

Maybe the OP should have asked about availability by email or phone? The student may have told the OP what hours she could stay in school but not necessarily the hours she could have been available and responsive for the necessary teacher input outside of those hours.

It seems to me that the OP is not really communicating very well here. An established teacher should be modelling problem solving/ ways to work around fixed objects. Teaching is about dealing constructively with reality after all, starting with what you are given and building on that as best you can.

There is usually more than one way of getting things done, even the necessary adaptations and tweaking. If the supervising teacher is taking notes while observing these can be relayed. It's quite possible that being able to absorb this info later on when there is time to reflect on the feedback can be more productive than verbal feedback on the spot or right at the end of the school day.

OP please seek advice from the university. I had a student teacher who would only work these hours and it was a disaster - for her and for me in terms of having to pick up the pieces with my classes. The university will have made the workload expectations clear. If she cannot manage this, she needs to defer until next year. What was her report like from her first placement? Without regular mentor meetings at an appropriate time, she will not be able to act on feedback or communicate effectively with you! How will she manage doing CPD after school as she will also need to do that and all the other directed time to meet her standards!

PS. Apologies for the lack of paragraphs, not sure how I managed that!

Changebagsandgladrags I think your situation illustrates very succinctly how institutional discrimination works against women who have young children. It's appalling that you could potentially be put in such a difficult position, especially when the teaching profession is experiencing shortages. It's time for universities to recognise that student teachers have families and that most do not have free, live-in childcare available.

Hear, hear Maths
I am a teacher who can only do directed time 3 days a week on account of child care. Luckily, this causes no problems for anyone at my school, and there are other colleagues in my position too. I take a couple of hours of work home most nights, work / do clubs at lunchtime etc, but it works for me.
When I have a student, we work around it, and I make sure I am available for evening Skype calls as and when required. Not saying you should do that, though.

OP, this is easily resolved. Just speak with the person at your school who oversees student placements and the university placements people, explain the hours your student teacher is present, and ask for advice on what you should do re meetings etc. Really simple.

Our training provider makes it clear that student teachers are not expected to come in as late as possible and leave on the bell.
Firstly, if you consider they don't do open evening or every parents' evening then they are nowhere close to hitting directed time (if we count that).
It's not about presenteeism. It's about being able to do the role they have signed up to and part of that is meeting with their mentor weekly (me) in a timetabeld session and also speaking to class teachers about lessons, checking in with them etc.
Where a student teacher doesn't do that and there are issues or concerns that is the first thing I ask when have you been talking to class teachers? When have you asked people for guidance?.

I once had a student who was coat on and ready to leave 10 mins before the bell and spent most of our mentor meetings staring out the window or checking thwir watch. Apparently they had 'no time' to speak to class teachers, 'no time' to speak to me as her mentor, 'no time' to do the required preparation, 'no time' to plan lessons (despite being given detailed schemes of work that they just had to adapt) and then complained to the training provider that they didn't have time to mark and they didn't have time to act on feedback from staff (which they were having to send by email because the student couldn't be arsed to speak to them). Their teaching was appalling. I filed a concern with the training provider.

I think training partners need to be more upfront and realistic about the expectations of student teachers.

I had one provider tell me that a placement school could be in Hull. That's 1 hour 40 minutes just to get to the outskirts of Hull, never mind to a school. I wouldn't find out till September when it's too late to make any plans. If that happened, yes I wouldn't be able to do much more than 8.30-3.30. When you apply for a job, you make informed choices about location and plan accordingly.

Now the universities really need to be clear on what should happen in school. This doesn't appear to be the case if students don't know that they're expected to talk to other teachers etc etc (it seems common sense to me, but I'm not 21 straight out of university with no work experience)

I did my PGCE 14 years ago and students were not expected to stay much after he kids left. We met in free lessons during the day. We didn't have to immediately meet the class teacher to discuss every lesson, there was time out aside in the week. So how is teaching so different that we can't do that now?

I now work for a union as an adviser. I thought one of the issues in teaching was unreasonable expectations from Heads. Maybe the problem is other teachers.

I have spoken to teachers who have been told they aren't working a hard enough because they leave at 3.30 and get in at 8.25 of whenever directed time starts. So a lot of it is presenteeism.

And it discriminates mostly against women with children. Teachers are leaving in droves and we need teachers to be joining.

The idea that you fail someone for something like this is outrageous.

We only had to teach a couple of lessons throughout our PgCE

Blimey-that was nothing like mine! By the second (final) placement we were teaching virtually full time!

I think presenteeism is ridiculous but I do not see how this job can be done on those hours!

It wasn't expected for me to stay over when I was a student.

Time was made during the day for mentoring. My class teachers also weren't teaching elsewhere but were available for guidance and advice.

I did my PGCE twenty years ago. The class teacher and I met after school then to plan and then discuss my lessons. The university mentor came once a fortnight and we met after school to discuss feedback then as well. PPA didn’t exist then and there was no non-contact time so these things had to be held then.

Perhaps it’s different in secondary though!?

What about meetings and parents evening that are part of directed time? Would she stay for those?

I think that as long as she is doing her planning and marking at home, then you should cut her some slack. I worked with a trainee like this. We had a weekly mentor session, communicated during the day, emailed and obviously fed back after lessons on observation sheets or in person briefly. She would email me her lesson plans and then I made comments and emailed back. She worked hard, but didn't have the time to hang around after school. That worked fine for me. When she has her own job then she will pay for childcare I would imagine.

Is there a way she could train part time and therefore take a little longer to qualify?

Teacher training should prepare you somewhat for the realities of being a teacher. If she's left to think this is normal she'll have a shock when she gets a job and is expected to attend meetings, do twilight CPD sessions, hold parents' evenings, put up displays, wait with a child whose parents haven't turned up to collect them, discuss a parent's concerns, reorganise your classroom to accommodate a child with SEN etc etc...
It certainly wouldn't work in my school - I have children in my classroom from 8.25am.

@tulippa teachers can't be directed to stay at school after directed time. So yes to meeting, parents evening, cpd. But they aren't that regular (a meeting once a week).

Displays aren't a teacher's job, and isn't a class teacher's job to stay with child. In my kids primary they would go to office.

I do feel for the student as childcare is expensive and probably out of her reach.

My worry would be resourcing lessons when she is teaching full time. Marking etc can be taken home but you do sometimes need to physically set up in primary.

Tufted - yes they go to the office eventually but you would still have to wait some time to establish that the parent isn't turning up. It's not like 3.15 comes and all the children suddenly disappear from the classroom. It takes a good 10 minutes to make sure each child gets to the right person. And then another few to take them to the office. Also it would take me a certain amount of time to pack up a day's worth of books and get them to my car if I wasn't going to mark them at school, close down PC and remove pen drive, make sure I'm taking the right texts home to pan from....I just don't see how 3.30 is possible - 4pm maybe.

The idea that you fail someone for something like this is outrageous.
No it's not. If someone is doing the minimum hours in school they can, not engaging with training and making endless excuses why they can't do basic elements of training then they should not be teaching.

They were coming in as late as possible and leaving bang on the bell. Ofteb with coat on ready part way through last period and packed up (hardly using their PPA)

They weren't engaging with class teachers (before school/break/lunch/PPA/after school all an option. Email also an option. Didn't bother for any of them). - claimed they didn't have time

They weren't prepared for mentor meetings - no time apparently

Pulled up for poor subject knowledge - no time apparently to work on this (6 weeks non teaching preparation time too!!)

They were on a reduced timetable (had to be reduced from the already smaller trainee one) because of their endless claims they didn't have time to do things

Yes. I put a concern in and if it was a final placement I'd have failed them.
You only have to look on some of the school threads to see what can happen when people not up to the job are passed.

I meant if the time in school was the only reason. The school are responsible for allocated directed time for class teachers and students to meet.