“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.” – Antoine de Saint Exupery
Teacher workload is the most complained about and oft-cited reason for our educators quitting the profession in flocks. And yet, it’s definitely a cause for mockery amongst our fellow peers who simply can’t understand how we’re drowning in scripts and simply don’t have enough time.
We’ve all been there: we’ve been belittled, ridiculed, and our indispensable role as educators has been reduced to peanuts.
But we’re not here to rile up teachers to protest against the clear unappreciation we face or the unmanageable teacher workload. Sure, our peers only see the extended holidays that they dream about.
We feel you.
What they don’t see is the insurmountable scripts that await your marking every week. They don’t see the time and effort that goes into planning lessons every single day.
The Teacher Workload Crisis
In 2015, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) union surveyed its trainee and NQT members. Their findings were concerning to say the least; out of those who had considered resigning, 76% cited heavy teacher workloads as the reason and more than 54% said that they didn’t think they’d be teaching in 10 years’ time.
That’s not even the worst of it.
81% of teachers said that they don’t have enough time to participate in hobbies; 80% don’t even get time to relax! The survey concluded that in order to improve work-life balance for teachers, there needs to be less unnecessary paper.
See, these aren’t just figures: these are teachers and students’ lives. A whole generation will face the consequences of these figures above. The reality is that looking after our teachers is just as important as looking after our students! Too much teacher workload can result in teachers not being able to nurture their students in the same way.
When our experienced teachers quit the profession, we have a vacuum of experience and knowledge that simply isn’t being transferred to students. In dire situations, students face being taught maths by P.E. teachers and Science by the Literacy Co-ordinator.
But all is not bleak. The survey also revealed that 75% of teachers joined the profession out of a desire to make a difference, and 80% of teachers said that they taught because they enjoyed working with children. In other words, they don’t want to leave; however, if their teacher workload continues in this same vein, we’re all in trouble! We certainly don’t want to see them extinct like the dinosaurs…
Have you ever wondered what Harry Potter would’ve been like if J.K. Rowling hadn’t been schooled? Now let’s imagine a world where Shakespeare didn’t write so prolifically – his teacher just had too many scripts to mark (!) and didn’t give him due attention. If that doesn’t sound ridiculous, this is the fate of our pupils. This is the future we’re dealing with (as a side note, they would have to pay homage to their teachers for getting them so far.)
It’s a tragedy.
So why is it in our interests to help manage teacher workload?
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More time to relax means renewed energy in classroom (it helps to get a good nights rest!)
It’s true.
Contrary to belief, living on copious amounts of Red Bull will not give you wings! David Dinges at the University of Pennsylvania found through research that adults must have eight hours of sleep every night. Late nights and coffee don’t have the same rejuvenating effect of a good night sleep and positive mindset for the day. As teachers, we must take care to build and maintain and healthy routine for sleep. Why?
Because Dinges’ research continued to show the effects of having only six hours of sleep a night for two weeks. The result was similar to being cognitively drunk! It’s been said that ‘teaching is the profession that teaches all the other professions’, yet what can an overburdened, sleep-deprived teacher really, well, teach?
By helping to manage teacher workload, the positive energy that comes with sleeping well could actually promote better grades and even more students to enjoy learning!
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Teachers can bond with their students
The high turnover of new teachers means students won’t have the benefit of maintaining a connection with their teachers. And in the midst of a teacher retention crisis, students and teachers are losing the chance to bond and develop learning. This bonding experience shouldn’t be understated, for it can be a real determining factor in pupils lives and the decisions they make.
Furthermore, in the life of a student, having experienced teachers quit is simply disruptive to learning. Managing our teacher workload provides more incentive for our educators to continue their job, cultivate their students learning and even pursue their own academic studies. As we recall, 76% of teachers who’d considered resigning cited heavy teacher workload as the reason.
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Higher success rates
It’s no surprise here that keeping teachers in classrooms will benefit children’s education for life.
Why? Because less essays to mark means more time to teach which means more children pass.
Now you can have your cake and eat it.
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