It’s recently come to my attention that here in Victoria “the first day of Term 1 each year must be a student-free day in all government schools to allow for appropriate planning to take place for the arrival of students”.
Maybe I’m missing the intricacies of teaching but didn’t teachers just have 5 weeks of student free days over the Christmas break? What’s the go with this lark? Why is an extra day required? Do they really just take 5 weeks off and do absolutely no work?
^Misspells the word paid.
Then proceeds to bemoan the number of kids who supposedly can't read and write properly.
Lmao.
You don't need to be educated to make a fool of yourself.
Many of you work in private industry. If these were your results in your job how long would you last for?
Err what? In your private job are you judged based on how an entire national industry is going?
If teaching is so well paid - why aren't you a teacher?
PFD.. what a scam.
Classroom prep….. LLM will take care of that.
My teacher wife is going to love this hot take. Fortunately she has a little free time to be told at the moment, because she'd bite my head off for the after hours interruption to her work at home.
It’s horrible that she’s working on what is nominally her holiday. That fifth week should be allocated for prep work so people don’t need to work on their holidays.
Yeah I'm talking about all the extra work she does in the evening, during term, to deal with the day-to-day of the job. They earn their breaks and then some.
It’s horrible that she’s working on what is nominally her holiday. That fifth week should be allocated for prep work so people don’t need to work on their holidays.
If you have a job (god only knows who would employ you) would you lose a week from your holidays to prep work for when you return?
Pupil free/staff development days allow staff to prepare for the term/year.
This 5 week break is our annual leave where no work should be (but is still sometimes) done.
The other 'holidays' throughout the year are relief from face to face teaching, and teachers are often (in my experience, anyway) working during this time. This time is often used to mark and give feedback on assessments. Some of this simply isn't possible during the term, especially in a high school environment, where reporting schedules are staggered to make processes feasible e.g. report marks are due on X date, report comments due to a supervisor on X date, final corrections from supervisor done on X date, but imagine this for 6 year groups.
In my experience teaching a HSC (VCE in Victoria) class in 2024, the way their assessments are scheduled (as they finish in Term 3 and sit final exams in terms 4) mean that their assessments are often scheduled for end of each term, so that teachers mark the assessments and provide feedback during the breaks and ensure students get it all back day 1 of the next term ready to implement the suggestions.
Others have already debunked the 9-3 working hours myth above so I won't repeat it all, but this really is the one time of year where we can mostly switch off like other industries when they are on leave.
Another reason why these days are needed, especially at the start of the year, is to prepare classrooms, familiarise ourselves with the students we will teach (based on collaborative documents/discussions from teachers of the previous year), and set up any start of year events.
In a high school setting, there could be major events like sport carnivals, preparation for the distribution of timetables/diaries etc. I work in a school of 1200+ students, and it is a significant effort from members of staff to create cohesive and efficient processes for all involved. These processes do change from year to year depending on fluctuating enrolments as well, so it is not just a 'set and forget' process.
Curriculum and syllabus documents are often evolving, with revisions or entirely new syllabi being released for teachers to prepare for and deliver to students. This takes time to plan for and implement, so these days are often used for those purposes. Before you say let ChatGPT etc do it all, there are regular news stories about how these platforms give incorrect/inappropriate responses so even if we do use it, we would still need to fact check/adjust it to suit our students, so it doesn't reduce our workload as much as you think.
To wrap up, the pupil free days are quite necessary for all sorts of reasons, and yes, teachers don't do (or shouldn't be doing) much at this time of year because it is our annual leave period without work responsibilities. Note that some still end up working for all sorts of reasons (new school, extra keen, teaching new subject etc)
teachers don't do (or shouldn't be doing) much at this time of year because it is our annual leave period without work responsibilities
Looking at the NSW school calendar it looks like you have 5 weeks and 4 days of continuous leave for Christmas (not including other breaks), followed by 4 school development days. I guess I just don’t understand why 5 or even 4 weeks of leave isn’t enough, with the other days allocated to “school development” so that nobody would have to work on their leave?
Don't quote me on this, but there may be a set number of school weeks per year (~40?), and as the year isn't exactly 52 weeks, with the addition of leap years, there will be years where the length of the holidays will fluctuate. It's probably in our award somewhere.
School calendars at an individual and state level are quite a delicate thing, with many annual events booked a year in advance for the corresponding week/day, so this may also influence why we just have 4 X 10 (with 11 once in a while/year) to keep things stable.
The increase in development days in NSW was negotiated by the union in the recent deal. Personally I think 4 straight days at the start of the year is too many, and we could have done with two of those going to the end of the year so we have time to clear/move classrooms and do other tidy up as necessary.
The late announcement of the extra development days at the start of Term 1 also affected the planning of many schools, as they now can't stagger start dates (7, 11 and 12 on day 1, all students day 2 etc) to allow for smoother transitions, and bookings for things like swimming carnivals and even some camps could no longer run as the extra mandated development days were announced.
P.s. I didn't neg you, by the way.
i used to work in a school as the IT guy and i can tell ya, that the day the kids go on holidays so did the teachers at 3:30pm Friday arvo… and not back til the thursday or friday before the pupil free day to start planning the year. so yes to answer your question yes. they went on 5 weeks holidays and did not work. but saying that the other working teaching weeks they work their arses off, sometimes they start at 6am and dont go home til 9pm because of the before and after school extra curriculm work they do, so i always appluded them over summer when they take off on friday! they work fraking hard!
I think we need a OP-free day.
In fact, make that a couple of years
Yes, they are on a great wicket! And they got there by being the most whiney victims of any profession.
Constantly complain about low pay and poor conditions.
I used to feel sympathy for them until I realised, they chose their profession, and they choose to stay.
If it wasn't worthwhile, they would move on and do something they enjoyed.
They're supposed to be "programming" during most of the school hols, but from what I've observed, little real work goes on during those periods.
Not to discount the horrors they have to work with, but again, if you can't handle the heat, choose another job, don't constantly whine and expect parenting (aka daycare workers) to suddenly improve.
There are many good teachers out there, but the bad get paid the same as the good. Apologies to the good teachers out there (and just because you think you're a good teacher, doesn't mean you are!).
Constantly complain about low pay and poor conditions.
they are on a great wicket!
Wow it's almost like collective bargaining works.
They're supposed to be "programming" during most of the school hols
Yeah okay any further comment from me is a waste.
They do move on, hence why we have a teacher shortage
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/work/australias-teache…
People forgetting they also have a couple weeks "off" between terms also, so much downtime, so much complaining.
It's like you haven't read any of the comments. Those "down times" are to finish all the necessary admin work to allow them to continue to teacher students.
The only complaining I see is from ignorant people who know nothing of the profession.
I find it amusing that there's always comments about needing/deserving "down times" to finish all the necessary admin work etc but I have yet to see any mention of
A full-time primary teacher teaches 21 hours and 45 minutes face to face teaching
each week. A full-time primary teacher also receives 2 hours of relief from face to face
teaching.
(from Clause 16 Allocation of Duties in High Schools in the school teachers award from a couple of years back)
Teachers - 28 periods per week plus up to 3 periods per week for sport. (This equates to 20 hours and 40 minutes per week)
A “period” in a high or central school is defined in clause 2.46 of the school teachers award as a 40 minute teaching period
To me that looks like around half of the day at work is allocated as face to face teaching with the rest for admin etc.
Have you done marking before? Have you made lesson plans? Have you called parents to raise concerns about kids? Have you had to stop assaults occurring? Deal with emotionally hurt children? Random injuries? Etc??? You have no idea how many hours all this takes but (profanity) yeah they only do "half" of their time face to face.
You have no idea how many hours all this takes but (profanity) yeah they only do "half" of their time face to face.
Have you actually taken the time to read what has been written before replying with your butthurt feelings?
Find me any other 'professional' job that that gets half their work day to do their non-core functions.
I don't disagree that a teacher's job is filled with way too much admin/box ticking but at least don't try claiming that the'downtime' is needed for admin without mentioning that half of the day is already allocated for exactly that.
Your comments about 'have you done this/that/the other show a clear lack of understanding on your part of what is involved in many, many 'professional' roles. Maybe if teachers had spent some time outside the 'education bubble' they may realise they are not the only ones taken advantage of.
Teachers do pretty good these days. Their salaries are decent, they get 12 weeks a year annual leave (3 months!) and their long service leave is accrued regardless of where they work or how often they change schools. What other job offers these perks? And they are still whinging that they are hard done by because kids suck?! Talk about entitled. Go work in an office and you quickly realise that your coworkers are just as bad an unruly kids.
Absolute rubbish on so many levels. My brother is a STEM teacher and I went into IT. There is absolutely no way I would do his job. Not only do they do face to face teaching they are required to do a massive amount of work outside hours. Class preps, marking, policing the grounds during breaks, school camps, counselling students, parent teacher nights, dealing with entitled and even abusive parents, etc. Jobs like mining have amazing perks. Politicians only gave a short number of sitting days in parliament as well.
One of my uni lecturers said I would make a great teacher but there was no way I was going to cause myself that sort of grief.
If your office job goes away who is going to suffer? If teachers go away then society is stuffed. As they say. “If you are reading this then thank a primary school teacher”.
You never fail to make me laugh. Most of the "extra" work you describe is within normal working hours. Dealing with abusive parents is no different than dealing with abusive customers. Jobs like mining have amazing perks because they are difficult and dangerous jobs. Spending your time in and air-conditioned classroom is not difficult and dangerous.
Teachers in effect have "gone away". One third of kids can't even read and write properly let alone tackle anything advanced. That's a complete disaster. Our idiotic governments have tried to fix the problem simply by throwing tonnes of money at teachers and it has just made the problem worse.
"that sort of grief" <— This just shows us that you've never worked a difficult or dangerous job before.
Please get a clue your opinions are terrible.
No, this extra work isn’t done during “normal business hours”. A lot of it is done outside normal business hours. Ask a teacher about their work instead of assuming. You think when they go on school camps they go home and leave the kids on their own? If you think teachers jobs aren’t difficult and dangerous you haven’t been following what is happening out in the schools.
It is your opinion that is terrible because you make a lot of assumptions with no real knowledge. But that isn’t very surprising.
@try2bhelpful: Do you think I don't know any teachers? I know quite a few indeed. I've also worked in schools before. I liked the kids, most of them were great.
No teachers jobs are not difficult and dangerous. Not even close. I have worked in difficult and dangerous jobs. You're dreaming if you think they are.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: There are lots of jobs in mining that aren’t dangerous or difficult but you are still paid a lot of money to do them. Frankly, give me mining any day over teaching. I could do with amassing the money and the FIFO days off.
Please specify which jobs you consider difficult and dangerous so we can see if we agree with your assessment. it would be nice to compare them to actual list. With mining the issues tend to be well known and you are following safety protocols. With teaching you could be faced with a child with a weapon or being physically attacked and this could come with little warning. Teachers have classrooms full of immature people going through a myriad of emotional issues. Parents require the teachers to deal with this whilst still having the discipline over the kids to teach the curriculum.
There is variation between schools and the issues are getting worse. There are increasing reports of aggressive behaviour from students and parents. Schools are having difficulty filling teaching positions. Young teachers are leaving the profession after short periods and older teachers are reaching retirement age. I dint think most teachers are in it for the good “conditions” and perks.
Yes there are more dangerous jobs but they tend to pay more and have better perks. I would argue that teaching is up there in difficulty because of the baggage that comes with certain pupils and the expectations on teachers. If it was just turn up and give a lesson to people eager to learn it then a piece of cake. The reality is not so much.
@try2bhelpful: I don't think you would last very long in mining lol.
The fact that you even have to ask what a difficult or dangerous job further demonstrates you have no idea what you're talking about. You say so flippantly that it's fine there's safety protocols. They exist because if you don't follow them you die. You can also die even if you follow the safety procedures. This is not to mention other shit industries where there is no safety at all. These places tend not to get many visits from worksafe and the pay can be truly awful too.
It should never get to the point where somebody could get physically attacked in a classroom. It's because problems get swept under the rug and absolutely no repercussions that these situations happen. You make it seem like teachers are just completely helpless. The teachers are the system. The teachers are the hierarchy.
Eject the problem kids from the system. Many of them are beyond help and will never be educated. They will simply traumatise and interfere with other kids.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: As I said there are plenty of jobs in the mining industry that aren’t dangerous or difficult. They also tend to be well paid. Just a fact. They aren’t all out there with their spades ya know.
The teachers might be the system and the hierarchy but they can’t control what the kids or their parents decide to do at any given time. Personally I prefer not to blame the victims of violence rather than the perpetrators.
In relation to “problem children” please answer all of my questions rather than a simplistic comment that provides no solution. So would say a child that stole a credit card and committed fraud was beyond being educated? That would be news to Stephen Fry and his Cambridge education. We need a better solution than just throwing away children.
WCON
@try2bhelpful: Yes not every job involves going underground but you have to be willing to go to remote locations and do the shifts. People who have families will probably not want to do this. I don't want to do that.
No-one has to control what others do. You screw up, you find yourself in front of a panel of people (maybe staff and parent council I don't know) and you prove to them why you get to stay. The parents will be embarrassed, the kid may feel some remorse or embarrassment if they're not already a sociopath and the show goes on till they screw up again. Next time it will probably be the look-for-a-new-school-time or if no school will take them the parents will have to figure out what to do with them. They are the ones who created the problem so they can take responsibility. The rest of the kids know that they are now protected (as they well should).
I have great sympathy for any child that suffers abuse particularly from those whose job it is to protect them. That sympathy follows a sharp end when they pass that abuse on to other children. At that stage they are probably beyond help. It is not within the scope of the education system to be fixing those kinds of problems. All they can do is to alert the authorities when they feel the child is in danger. The priority is to protect the kids that have a chance at gaining an education.
The credit card example has nothing to do with school. The parents will get a knock on the door from the police and they will have to go in and explain themselves.
If you feel so strongly about "throwing away children" then maybe you should put your money where your mouth is. But that might be too much "grief" for you.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: Wow… I just went back and read a second post.
"Eject the problem kids from the system. Many of them are beyond help and will never be educated. They will simply traumatise and interfere with other kids."
Yeah, you're really showing what kind of person you are with comments like this.
Holy crap…. Let me guess we should just mince the elderly up into soylent green as well?
Damn, you a special kind of something aren't ya lad.
Can tell exactly what kind of person you are with comments like this. Jesus mate, if you haven't already never breed.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: I'm curious what "difficult and dangerous" jobs you've had in mining if you're complaining about teachers earning $100,000. I'd be pretty surprised if there was such thing as a dangerous mining job sub-$100K.
@johnno07: Not sure why people are obsessed with all the mining job details? There are many jobs in society that are dirty, dangerous and low paid.
Our idiotic governments have tried to fix the problem simply by throwing tonnes of money at teachers and it has just made the problem worse.
governments have tried to solve the issue by disempowering teachers, adding more legislation and guidelines that prevents teachers doing their job and standardised testing.
If you have a kid who doesn't want to be in the classroom and constantly disrupts everyone, and you aren't allowed to discipline them, you aren't allowed to fire them, what do you think happens to learning? This isn't the same as an office job at all
@greatlamp: I agree with you on all of these points.
The bullies and classroom clowns don't get removed from the classroom and often get protected status due to their sometimes traumatic background. Of course these kids should be removed and either channeled into an appropriate situation or simply ejected from the system to become the parents' problem. However they are kept where they are to keep the numbers good on paper for the school and the system in general.
I will agree that teachers do not receive appropriate backup from the higher ups due to the above. However, the higher ups ARE teachers as well. The leading teachers, the vice-principals and the principals etc.. They get paid very highly to fix these problems.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: Just wondering exactly what you think the principals can do to fix these problems.
What defines a problem child in the first place? Where do you intend to move the problem kids to? Children don’t have the intellectual or emotional maturity of adults so how do you find discipline that is effective when they act up? How do you deal with parents that are struggling themselves with mental issues? Take the kids off then, perhaps, but fostering services are already over stretched. Care homes have an appalling reputation.
We can all see there are problems but the solutions are complex and difficult to address. If it was easy it would already be fixed. The rules are generally a reaction to something that was badly handled previously.
Imparting knowledge is the easiest part of being a teacher, it is the baggage of expectations that happens outside this brief that is the real work.
@try2bhelpful: Well for a start they could stop covering up the problems. These principals are on huge money so it's no wonder they want to protect their positions.
It is well beyond the scope of the education system to interfere in familial problems. It can do nothing to improve the lives or mental health or whatever of parents and families. The education system is not a baby sitting service where all kids automatically have a place regardless of their conduct. It exists to educate young people in the various disciplines they will need and that is it.
Once a student starts to abuse their schoolmates or interfere with normal instruction then it is up to them and their parents to demonstrate why they should be allowed to remain at school. If they are not there to learn then what are they there for? As I said it's not a baby sitting service. The exact details of how many chances they are given doesn't really matter. All that can probably be decided on by the school council or whatever.
Children from traumatised backgrounds are probably beyond reach by the time they start passing on their abuse to other children. The mental well-being and academic progress of the school poplulation should never be sacrificed to try to save these kids. It's simply not realistic.
I guarantee you that once these useless parents figure out that they will have to look after their kid full time you will get some very well behaved kids in the class room.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: So you still haven’t provided the headmasters with any practical solutions on how to deal with these issues when it comes to children.
There are a lot of reasons why kids are disruptive and problematic. You don’t’t just dump them like garbage. They learn violent reactions from those around them, so start with fixing that. In an ideal world parents would be teaching their kids to behave properly but if they don’t the child shouldn’t suffer for It. You would stack rejection on top of the violence they might’ve experienced through their lives?
I guarantee you that your comment on parents is a load of bullshit. The kids are much more likely to suffer more than be well behaved.
@try2bhelpful: I literally just said to stop covering the problems up. That would be a start.
It doesn't matter why kids are disruptive. It is not baby sitting. The education system cannot fix broken kids. It is well beyond the scope of teachers to be fixing these problems. You seem to be focus on the suffering of the child but not the suffering they are causing for others.
We don't dump them because they are garbage. We remove them from the system because the system cannot solve their problems. Maybe somebody else outside of the system can but that is up to the parents and extended family to solve.
If the child is afraid of rejection then they will toe the line. If they are not afraid of rejection then it won't matter.
The comment about the parents is valid. I don't expect broken kids to be well behaved. I don't expect them to improve or change.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: The headmasters are trying to deal with the problems you are just trying to sidestep it.
I don’t think headmasters are covering it up.
At what point do you throw these kids out? If they talk in class, if they lose their temper and swear, if they can’t stop crying. There is a spectrum of behaviour involved and a number of ways to address it. The last thing should be throwing them out of school.
What happens to them after they are thrown out? They are part of the education system even if it isn’t the mainstream. There will be a headmaster involved somewhere.
Children are all our responsibility. I do not expect children to be broken beyond repair. I also don’t think telling them to behave or they will be rejected is helpful either. We need to understand their backgrounds and determine what presses their buttons to change their behaviour.
@try2bhelpful: Remember how I said I worked in schools before? I have some experience around this. The reason these problems don't get dealt with is because either the problems get covered up so it all looks good on paper or the dysfunctional kid gets protected status because of their traumatised background. They are more or less free to continue abusing other kids at will.
I'm not talking about minor transgressions. I'm talking about kids who will never receive an education and will just drag the others down with them.
I do not expect children to be broken beyond repair. I also don’t think telling them to behave or they will be rejected is helpful either. We need to understand their backgrounds and determine what presses their buttons to change their behaviour.
You are expecting teachers to do all of this? They are not child psychologists.
There are some very traumatised kids out there that are a direct danger to other kids around them. How far do you let it go before somebody gets beaten half to death? As I have said many times repeatedly the system cannot fix these kids' problems. It is well beyond the expertise of teachers to do this yet this is what you want from them?
Children should feel protected when they are at school. They should know when the finish they day that they will be ok. This can only be a possibility if the dangers and distractions are removed. Stop pulling on the heart strings for children that can't be helped by the system.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: You have an ironically uneducated view of education. Wtf happens to a kid when you "dump them"? Just go happily home and play videogames until they reach life expectancy? No, these are the kids most likely at risk of anti-social behaviour. But I guess you need something to bitch and moan about in your local Facebook group.
Funny… I've had bricks thrown at me (one went through a window and I got covered in glass), once copped an apple thrown full speed when I wasn't looking in the side of the head and have been assaulted many times (one kid punched me straight in the nuts).
But please tell me that teaching is all peachy and easy with no chance of being dangerous.
You absolute uneducated fool you. Spoke like a person with no actual clue to the reality of what happens at schools.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: Read one post and it was enough mate. Let's pick 2 of your ingenious quotes -
"Spending your time in and air-conditioned classroom is not difficult and dangerous." and ""that sort of grief" <— This just shows us that you've never worked a difficult or dangerous job before." - My post is in direct response to these two quotes, since you seem to think teachers just stand at the front of the class and the kids all just sit there listening to what they say.
Why would I bother reading any more tripe. You're not a teacher. You have no idea what it's like to be a teacher. You're just the typical armchair warrior who gets his news from the Murdoch press and think you know better than everyone else.
Frankly, the only thing I will agree with you on is that in your case, yes your teachers failed you. But hey, they can't get it right everytime.
@OBEY YOUR MASTERS: Yeah, I'm the one who needs luck "bro".
Absolute clown mate.
I'd say good luck, but you've already shown you're kind of trash so it is what it is :)
Have fun though being that scummy :D
what most people don't get is kids don't suck.
it's the entitled parents that do.
Kids can suck as well. They might get it from their entitled parents, the peers they hang around with, the sites they visit, etc.
Nice joke.
If it wasn't, oh boy… you're a joke
You forgot leave loading. Most/all public service and agencies get the very-transferrable leave and LSL but not the time off (at least officially, but you know what they say about the diligence of government workers).
I'm sure any business with multiple locations under the same entity will have ongoing LSL accrual and portable leave balances.
Those school holidays include public holidays. There's no catch up for that.
So do people in other jobs have annual leave counted when it falls on those?
The effective holidays is therefore reduced.
You’re talking about maybe 4 days out of the 5 weeks of Christmas holiday. There is still another 6 weeks of school holidays throughout the year so it’s not as if they’re running out of holidays.
You forget public holidays that fall on term holidays - Easter a prime example.
I’m been talking specifically about the Christmas break.
This thread right here is why, as a contract teacher (so currently unpaid, living off the money I squirreled away last year), Im applying for non teaching jobs.
I would rather go back to corporate 9-5 permanent hell and gain the luxuries of flex and OT and not have to take home work or have to move jobs from threats and abuse than to continue to put up with this tripe.
I have never been so underpaid, over worked, undervalued and abused in all my working life. And that says a lot considering I was a female IT worker in the 90s-00s and that was toxic.
Y'all just delusional, disconnected and contributing to the exodus. Let me know how it goes when more imports take on your kids classes (because thats now the new 'solution' to fix the 'shortage')
Im out.
I thank you for your service to the children.
Personally I think you are doing the right thing. Parlay your experience into something like a project management job. Better pay, better structure and better appreciation.
The thing that I find extraordinary is what people who bag teachers think they will do if the flow of teachers stops? As people find there are better careers out there for them, and there is nobody left to teach the kids, then what are the options?
When we have someone on a forum bitching about one day to prepare the school for lessons coming up then we have reached peak petty.
This comment comes off as a bit racist. What’s wrong with foreign teachers? The best teacher I ever had was an immigrant.
This comment comes off as a bit racist. What’s wrong with foreign teachers? The best teacher I ever had was an immigrant.
Looks like he/she wasn't that good, 'cause baby look at you now.
Its not racist - its a reflection of current government policies that fail to address inherent failures in the system except to import foreign labour. Many of these are coming from UK, Ireland, Canada, India, HK, Malaysia etc.
It's not about race and using that as an excuse is a cop out and shows a gross lack of understanding for the industry and issues.
You are asking non Australian trained staff to deliver Australian curriculum to Australian students for Australian outcomes. The impacts on students is immense. They suffer when teachers fail to grasp local language, nuance, issues, social and cultural matters etc. For the same reasons you rarely see Australians teaching at non International schools overseas and why they struggle in UK schools - It's not the same.
There is no teacher shortage. That implies a lack of trained teachers. SA alone has over 39k registered teachers on the book but over 10k are not teaching anymore.
The government solution is to create more teachers. The public kick teachers saying we're lazy and must try harder. Meanwhile, we've woken up to the fact we can take our bat and ball and go play elsewhere
This thread right here is why, as a contract teacher (so currently unpaid, living off the money I squirreled away last year), Im applying for non teaching jobs.
Both my daughters are teachers. Youngest primary, eldest is/was a science (biology) teacher (24 years) and HSC marker. She quit her permanent position last and did casual teaching. Did 5 days a week at $564 a day.
Signed two 12 month contracts for this year. One 2 days a week at a selective high school and one 3 days a week at a special school. No lesson preparations, no marking papers, no parent teacher interviews. Just turn up and walk into the classroom.
Her husband was an AP at a primary school. He is now in a well paid corporate roil with NSW education dept.
Yes they are.
If the handful of pupil free days bothers you, then you probably should not have had children.
That's what the kids think
The expectation is that kids are taught at school during term time. Where would you draw the line? 4 day weeks, 3 day weeks? Occasional school opening?
Evidently at questioning the status quo.
These forum rants are getting dumber and dumber, holy (profanity). Only Jan and it’s already reached peak stupidity.
as an ex-teacher, holidays were time away from work, while pupil-free days were at work having meetings planning schedules and new management rules and procedures for the forthcoming term or semester - checking enrolment lists, who was going to be doing what, setting up electronic records systems some of which were new and hugely time-consuming - and maybe even some updated new training if there was time left over.
Holidays should be a time away from work. I just don’t understand why the entirety of the five week Christmas closure is considered by the majority of users here to be sacrosanct as a “holiday” for the teachers. Obviously teachers will need time to prepare for the upcoming school year and an appropriate amount of time should be provisioned. A single day clearly won’t cut it. Many claim they already do work during the period (although others such as yourself have suggested otherwise). I think it’s problematic that the current arrangement is basically leaving it up to the teacher to draw the line and determine how much of their “holiday” they want to “sacrifice”.
At the extreme, if you allocated the entire fifth week of the school closure period towards PD / preparing for the new year, there’s still four weeks of Christmas holiday left for the teachers (in addition to some breaks between each term). I don’t understand why 5 weeks holiday + a pupil free day on Day 1 is instead the most reasonable option.
Well it certainly surprised me how many pupil free days are tagged onto public holidays and normal school holidays and even during term time. I recall one month the school didn't teach my kids for a full 5 day week for the whole month. When the kids were young it meant my wife and I having to take significant time off during term time in addition to normal school hols to look after them and paying for expensive child care.
Unfortunately I work in the private sector so I'm used to working long hours, little time off and meagre pay rises where striking would achieve nothing whilst paying huge amounts of tax for my kids education.
I would have thought that spending a day during the 7 week summer holiday or the multiple 2 week holidays during the year could be spent preparing, but apparently not.
Then you have end of term parent interviews which can't be done after 5pm for some reason, so another pupil free day and a day off work to attend.
I would have thought that spending a day during the 7 week summer holiday or the multiple 2 week holidays during the year could be spent preparing, but apparently not.
Do you work during your holidays? And 7 weeks? I'm liking this kind of inflation.
And the 2 week holidays blocks are relief from face to face teaching, and I've addressed how many teachers work during this time in a previous comment.
Some teachers, especially those who are also parents, do take these 2 weeks as 'holidays', and simply work very long hours during school terms to ensure they can completely switch off.
Then you have end of term parent interviews which can't be done after 5pm for some reason, so another pupil free day and a day off work to attend.
Schools can't win regardless of when they schedule these meetings.
During school hours and parents complain about having to take time off work, reduced income for parents, lazy teachers etc.
After school hours and parents complain about kids missing extracurricular activities, family time etc. Never mind that teachers could also be parents and are affected by these meetings as either party.
If you feel strongly enough about the scheduling of events and pupil free days in your context, feel free to join your school's P&C and try to change it. The schools I've worked for collaborate quite well with their P&C, as it is bad for business (enrolments) if parents are unhappy and decide to take their kids elsewhere.
Some schools have the pupil free day to make up for staff working extra hours on such events.
After and before school events like band/sport practice, interviews, camps (which is a whole other can of worms) are a grey area for what is expected and what is not. Private schools can sometimes have higher expectations on staff as they tend to pay more, and state explicitly in job ads that they are expected to do things like Saturday sport.
My step daughter is a primary school teach and does long hours. She's will go in during her holidays to setup her classroom and will buy things out of her own wallet…
I still wind her up about only working 8.30am-3.00pm and having 12 weeks a year holidays.
I bet that's why she hates you
That’s a bit off-colour
And this whole post isn't?
Questioning the professionalism of people who sacrifice fame and fortune so that society can benefit.
And this bloke thinks it's funny to torment his step kid about it.
Wait until you hear about how every private schools has the entire week off for planning and development activities!!
You spend more money, but have your kids at less days of school. That's not value for money
You spend more money, but have your kids at less days of school.
Are those days the same though?
A friend's kids school hours are 8:30 - 3:30 whereas at the public school nearby they are 8:50-2:50.
That may be less days but 5 hours more per week would probably more than make up for it.
I have always thought that rationale was ridiculous, like students are machines that will remain 100% productive for that extra 40 minutes. They don't. Getting any work out of students after lunch time is a Sisyphean effort.
I think the idea is that teachers having PFD’s allows to better prepare school based systems to better educate students.
They have come about by Departments of education in consultation with unions as both see the benefits of this type of preparation before the school year or term starts proper.
It makes little sense to suggest that such school preparedness can happen when teachers are on holidays.
Haven’t read the comments and I’m not a teacher but I work in a school and that first day includes setting up the classroom and trying to put together as much resources or personalised student items as possible and really it’s not enough time to get everything done before students come back. Remember it’s usually a totally new class and sometimes room for the teachers and at my school everything gets stacked to the side for deep cleaning at the start of holidays so it all needs to be moved back
Yes, thats right, but usually the "first day" that is "pupil free" isn't used for setting up the classroom. My wife does that a week or two in advance and I generally go in to help. Moving tables, setting them up, putting chairs in places, moving stuff around the classrom, decorating it. My wife will start printing name labels and creating them in the next week or so, I also get roped into that with my Tech Skills and a bit of Photoshop.
The first day should be collobaration and planning, not classroom setup. But might vary from school to school.
You've caught us out. Now rather than whinge about us, join us instead.
We need more teachers. Maths is the best field of teaching. No marking stupid essays, no running around a field. Just standing at a board with kids in rows. Very little lesson prep, "Page 389, every second questions."
Lots of holidays and not bad pay.
We don't need no edu-cation
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm,in the class room………
This is the way. Check in with your peers for 15 minutes a week to make sure you're up to the same section at the same time. Job done, repeat next year.
What about bank holidays? Those poor bankers work so hard.
Have always thought that whinging bankers was a spoonerism
With teacher shortage comes high tern over of teachers. The pupil free day also gives new teachers opportunities to become familiar with the school without students and meet their new colleagues.
We also do a lot of printing for our classes, which cannot be done without being at school. We also prepare our classroom environment (although many teachers go in BEFORE the pupil free day to prepare their classroom).
There's a teacher shortage at the moment. Just saying 🦥
What don’t we have a shortage of? Wasn’t there a big stink about yoga instructors being on the list?
I mean, id argue it's a announcement problem, Just include the monday back as apart of school holidays, except for teachers… They get those extra holidays cause the pays crap and the conditions are crap. Outside of building sites where else can your day be interupted by 2 people having a punch on and yoir expected to break it up and deal with kids all day? I dont think 1 day is too much to ask…
Just include the monday back as apart of school holidays, except for teachers
There is probably some legal crap behind it. Which is why it is a "pupil free day" for Day 1.
Some jurisdictions do that. It’s still a bit silly to start the term on a Wednesday.
You realise the 4 weeks over the Xmas period is their actual accrued annual leave right?
I know it's hard for the uneducated to understand basic concepts, but teachers need a damn break to.
Like I always say to my mates that have a cry about teacher holidays - If it's such a great gig, go study for four years and join us! Funnily enough, none of them have taken it up yet (some even scoff that they'd lower themselves to such a crap career).
There's a reason why we have one of the highest attrition rates within the first 5 years of teachers careers… and it's not because it's a super easy job mate.
Right and they should be free to totally unplug during those four weeks. After those four weeks are up, the kids still won’t go to school for another week. So given that the teachers can prepare for the upcoming year in that 5th week of Christmas break why does the first day of Term 1 need be a pupil free day?
Right and they should be free to totally unplug during those four weeks. After those four weeks are up, the kids still won’t go to school for another week. So given that the teachers can prepare for the upcoming year in that 5th week of Christmas break why does the first day of Term 1 need be a pupil free day?
I would give up if I were you.
You made an arse of yourself by posting rubbish, so why keep proving it?
Ok boomer
Ok boomer
Now you have proved how big an arse really you are. Keep going, it won't be long before you are an elephants arse.
I am not a boomer, as I've stated here many, many times.
If got news for you. Even inner city schools in VIC are struggling in high socio-economic areas too.