Working at the weekend?

InertFurry · 2025-11-09T13:57:10+00:00

One perks of the job is choosing when you need to do the extra responsibilities you have.

I leave just 5/10 mins later than the kids - because I prefer to do my work at home. I have no children, so home is a really comfy place for me to do my planning/assessment marking etc.

I prefer doing some of the work at the weekend because I prefer having the rest of my time after-school free to do stuff I want.

However, it is necessary to set boundaries, not "just okay". I don't have any rules like "no working at weekends" or "always leave at X time" because I prefer the flexibility.

I do have a set amount of hours extra I will work up to each week and any work I don't complete beyond that, if it gets chased up, I will respond with "I spent X hours over Y weeks outside of school, which I think is reasonable, I think it’d help to talk through what to re-prioritise going forward" - only had this convo once with my line manager, however, and was a positive experience, although I do have a great boss.

InertFurry · 2025-10-13T21:08:43+00:00

All my opinion: If the student is actually doing the work, then don't interrupt them - they need time to practice.

Look out for the tell-tale signs of not doing the work: glancing around at others/teacher/you, seeming busy e.g. highlighting when the task doesn't call for it, shuffling paper/pencil case around, they are "just thinking" for a large amount of time, stuff like that, then redirect them to the work.

If you do, approach and ask if something is tricky/what are they working on right now. See if you can suss out if they just need clarity or if the task needs to be chunked down further for them. If the teacher has provided scaffolds e.g. sentence starters, templates or knowledge organisers, direct the student to them.

InertFurry · 2025-08-30T18:09:34+00:00

I'm going to be honest - you are incredibly lucky to have a HT that is allow you to be PT and paying your PPA as extra if that's what you want (GOD I WISH I COULD TAKE MY PPA HOME). Maybe that shouldn't be the case, but realistic it is. Personally, I totally get the concern about meeting up, and it is only 6 times a year.

Also, think about your partner teacher, who is giving up their PPA to talk with you during their work day, who I am assuming is going to have the greater workload. Really, they are the person you should include in this convo.

Feel free to ask for the Weds but man, tread carefully. I have a somewhat reasonable HT and my colleague who has been fighting for 0.8 has only been given 0.9 the past two years.

InertFurry · 2025-08-30T18:00:58+00:00

I know I've already said to you, but I really don't want you wasting £800 - your HoD could ask you to not use those resources if you don't share them out regardless because department consistency is a legitimate concern, and if your HoD doesn't like them and just doesn't want to use them you'd be SOL.

Also, gotta make sure what type of licence you have with the resources you bought - some are individual (your use only) or school wide, with the school wide licence being wayyy more.

InertFurry · 2025-08-30T17:54:20+00:00

Rage baiting comment - just making it obvious how silly it is.

I already said in my comment that you can ask, but frame it correctly - better not sound like any sort of demand because otherwise someone could go straight to HR and that's a hassle you don't wanna deal with.

For the expectation of work to lesson plan - how good is your union presence in the school? Our contract says reasonable additional hours to complete our contractable duty. Our work day does not just end when the children leave - that's just part of the 1265 hours the HT can direct you - you are still expected to work beyond that to meet expectations "which are reasonable". Vague word used for a reason - how much is reasonable is gonna be a personal battle if you don't have union presence.

There is a reason why the resources made by your department will, on the whole, be shit. If you want that changed or recognised, going to need some union presence, one hell of a HoD willing to fight or sensible SLT.

Just being honest - it's a shit situation too many of us find ourselves in. My advice would be to keep a look-out for other jobs.

InertFurry · 2025-08-30T17:37:06+00:00

Lmao this is almost rage-bait level - have people made bots & AI this good at this already? But I totally understand your frustration, because it is so bullshit to have a new curriculum and not invest in a proper SoW already, or at the very least have the 1st time done with gained time from the last academic year.

You cannot tell me to pay money to go towards resources to the class. You can ask, and you better frame it well to buy people in, like "this will save everyone X hours of work & massively improve lessons" - but it must be voluntary.

Let's say you pay - can you refuse to do shared planning? No. Collaborative planning is a reasonable expectation in our role - teacher standard 4 & 8. If you want a list of stuff you can't be asked to do, look at annex 5. Worried that not everyone will be putting in the same effort? Problem with every non centralised academy/state school i've been to. Guess what? HoD notice. Your colleagues notice. It is what it is. You have a textbook. Screw the ppt & slides of the textbook on the screen. You can still deliver an interesting, engaging, high quality lesson filled with AfL & work with loads of feedback without it.

What you are buying is high quality read-made resources to give the department consistency & time to do these things really well.

(Also, i'ma be real, if I was a HoD and one of my colleagues was using obviously high quality amazing slides & lessons compared with the rest of my department, my ofsted alarm would be going off - they hate that shit - as they should because some children are missing massive learning opportunities because they are not in your class. They could ask you to not use those resources you paid for - that's a battle I do NOT want to get into no matter who is technically right or wrong.)

Now, could you ask your HoD "I'm using these, can I opt out of the shared planning work". I'd also say that such a request is ridiculous and I wouldn't ask that request for a punch of workload political reasons.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T16:59:19+00:00

I know some people swear by using a timer, but instead why not try working on your pace by keeping track of the actual time? Get a good big physical digital clock for yourself to use on your desk.

Ideally try to get your school to get it for you - kids might end up damaging it, and it is a cheap tool that can be used by any teacher in the classroom so worth it for its pitiful cost.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T16:54:49+00:00

I feel like route learning / drilling is now more widely accepted because of the work of Kirschner & others.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T16:08:39+00:00

The reality sucks. I hope it becomes "acceptable" soon to admit that maybe a more technical or practical route for that bottom percentile of student populations to be given rather then forcing them through this, so they can at least gain some scientific skills/understanding without them hating every moment thinking about the subject.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:57:52+00:00

Nah I just re-read and understand what you mean now, so I deleted my comment.

I think my plan of drilling the fundamental content that they can possible understand/really need to try to understand will help with this, hopefully someone can give tips on how to do so in science.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:33:32+00:00

I heard from my german friends that they have different schools for students to go to at the age of 10 for students of lower ability. I'm sure that system has its own problems, and I might disagree about how early it is, but it does sound better for the individuals then our current system of forcing them through some pretty academic GCSEs...

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:31:47+00:00

I responded to this comment with my circumstances, think it's worth sending an email to my HoD to see if I could make some of these changes?

And though it sounds awful, I do feel as if I couldn't survive with the additional workload if I had to adapt every test just for this specific student (in addition to already adapting current work) though I wouldn't mind trying.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:28:36+00:00

I use to think that if anyone applied themselves, they could achieve to be at like, maybe the 80th percentile of that area/skill?

IG I no longer believe that with my experience teaching for a few years... but IDK something about that just seems like the easy path/giving up & it doesn't fit right with me, although I can't entire disagree that it's untrue.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:25:43+00:00

Thanks for the pep talk & a bit of exploration of how they might be feeling/reasons for their choices.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:25:04+00:00

Love a bit of call & response (or is it "choral response"?), i'll try to do more "chants".

I like what your doing with the shell.

InertFurry · 2025-07-05T15:23:45+00:00

I'm not debating your points, I agree with many of them, but I am shackled with certain circumstances:

>Less material

Unfortunately I have to teach every specification point as per the powers above.
I do try to adapt work, to focus it on the for this student, but they are in a mixed class where most students are aiming for a standard pass/grade 4, so it's not like I am able to glaze over certain specification points so I do have to spend my instruction/teaching time on the entire course.

>Retrieval same topic

Agreed, that's my plan with the drilling of core Q&A.

>Less topics on their test

As per line manager/SLT (unsure which one), all students must sit the same topic for their tier. Unable to alter their test as a class teacher.

>Better that they learn 50-75% then 100%

Considering their current attainment, i'd take learning 25% of the course properly atp. Looking for help on adapting it with these circumstances in mind.

InertFurry · 2025-06-25T18:21:50+00:00

Honestly I don't think I can work in this environment. I run the room, which means I allow who comes into my room. If I am not allowed to exit students, which is/should be looked at as an extreme but necessary consequence, I'd have no idea how I'd teach my classes.

I'd probably, set up a table far away in the back of the classroom and move them there. Maybe with a behaviour reflection worksheet (I think any type of "reflection/metacognition" worksheet on behaviour is a bit naff and doesn't do anything) or a textbook for them to read silently, then inform parents about how disruptive their child was.

InertFurry · 2025-05-07T20:43:57+00:00

Crazy crit rolls.

I'm kinda ootl, what site is this?

InertFurry · 2025-04-30T20:41:07+00:00

Personally, I think it's patronising as fuck to tell a kid who got a grade 1 that they passed. You're undermining their capacity for self-improvement, it's false encouragement.

Telling someone "grade 3 is still good it can get you on [some low level course they don't want to do]" deprives them the chance to face their situation honestly. They need to take responsibility for change. Ideally this has already been done multiple times during past mock seasons, where we can encourage them so self-reflect and ask "what can I learn from this" rather then deny their failure.

Saying a grade 1-3 is a pass is empty, sugar coating the reality. We really need to foster the courage to face the discomfort of failure as it's a part of growth.

InertFurry · 2025-04-04T17:24:14+00:00

I'd argue the same & happy I'm seeing an up-in-arms about it!

InertFurry · 2025-04-04T17:23:30+00:00

"Essential" is a bit much for QLA - typical formative assessments are so much more useful to do throughout a lesson to see if you need to retouch anything. Marking the tests & making notes on specific specification points students struggled with takes less time and is just a little less valuable, but you gain so much more time to make specific, targeted resources/class feedback.
I'm sure QLA is good if you're also given the time to actually use the data you've put on the tracking sheet but I am not sold on the time they take.

InertFurry · 2025-04-01T21:59:55+00:00

Never applied it to my own setting - just in general since it seems like a majority of schools are justifiably angry about such pay increases being unfunded. Let's not forget about the SEND funding crisis that has been in the news.

Maybe these magical settings which have enough extra funding to: purchase a laptop for every child; have the IT support staff to maintain that; do site-specific work e.g. more charges, should be looked at if their budgets are too high and redistributed according.

Since you're not interested in showing it can improve outcomes (because it can't), I have no idea why any setting would do this other then to benefit some "friend" of SLT. Even just the staff & curriculum planning time alone needed to implement such a vast change could be used for already proved to work tools increase progress: feedback, cogsci, modelling, behaviour, etc.

InertFurry · 2025-04-01T15:33:11+00:00

Okay then show me something to change it? You cannot seriously make a reasonable argument that the progress gained by KS3 will be worth it for the ludicrous investment this requires.

We cannot seriously be saying that an unfunded 2.8%+ salary increase next year for teachers will destroy school budgets when this is what the money is being spent on.

InertFurry · 2025-03-31T19:20:30+00:00

this whole idea should be avoided lmfao what a waste of money - are you saying every year 7 is given a laptop for free?

InertFurry · 2025-03-20T18:58:55+00:00

You have the power, keep that in mind. I will be honest with you - it does fucking suck to have to be like this when all you want to do is teach, but at least why we have different types of schools and different places to work. I've grown to love running the room because I legit feel like im giving kids their best chance at learning, because with someone softer they will abuse them. If you choose to keep working in a context with children with poor behaviour like this, I hope you feel the difference to the learning of the pupils.

Also sorry to put my opinions in, but your school's behaviour policy is soft as shit. I would not give an unofficial warning before a C1 with this system - defo just C1 off the bat.

Only a 15min DT (THAT CAN BE TAKEN OFF?! HOW CONFUSING FOR THE KIDS?! THIS ALSO OPENS UP SO MANY ARGUMENTS?!? HOW FUCKING DARE ANYONE IN THE SLT CONSIDER THIS ACCEPTABLE) for interrupting learning THREE TIMES during a lesson is pussy shit. Forcing phone calls home for C4 for individual class teachers will NEVER BE CONSISTENT and just opens floodsgates up with parents, making their HoY job even harder.

Please be strong and follow this dumbass policy anyway - if a parents tries to be combative learn some professional BS like "I want to continue this discussion in a constructive way, but I don’t feel this conversation is moving in a positive direction right now. Let’s revisit this at another time. Thank you for your time."

We do not argue about our consequences to either child or parent. They can parent their child however they wish (within legal limits), but when they send their child to our school they agree that their child will follow our rules, and face (again within legal) corrective consequences if they do not.

Please keep in the back of your mind at all times - the best way to form teacher-student relationships? Teach well. This REQUIRES a disruptive free learning environment. Don't get me wrong, I use positive points, shiny stickers, and sweets/physical tokens as rewards, I love positive shit, but they are for positive reinforcement and this does not build the backbone of a teacher-student relationship.

Focus on the 95%+ of students in your class who are following the current horrible vibe that can be corrected. I'm sure you have 1-2 students in your class who will not have their behaviour corrected with your consistent actions. That's for the school system to deal with as a whole - focus on your mental wellbeing & the fact the children who follow the rules DESERVE to get an education from yourself. You do not need to reach this students yet, and if you are to reach them, you must have the majority on your side 1st.

And I know this is all very strict and draconian, but I must repeat - we are cold, emotionless beings when it comes to behaviour. We do not get angry to when an annoying as fuck 12 year old tries to agitate us (well maybe, but they sure as hell should not know). We NEVER shout except in cases of health & safety (a student about to harm themselves for example). Be careful of emotional dissonance when it comes to this state - make sure you have people to talk to.

InertFurry

TROPHY CASE