Jon Platt Term Time Holidays

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Imagine thinking keeping kids off school for 2 weeks a year was important to their education. Some of you should teach Amateur Dramatics.
 
chrismpw said:
This isn't a rant .... just putting a point of view to rectify a few points mentioned by others in this thread as it's a subject close to my heart.

I've spent nearly 30 years being pathetically grateful for the summer break. It isn't just a big a break break, as many people think. All the teachers I know spend at least half of it de-stressing and becoming human again. Then you get a fortnight to go away with your family as a normal human, then you spend the last week re-stressing getting ready for the term ahead. What's more there is zero flexibility to have a break when there's a cheap holiday on offer, when the weather's good or have a day off to watch a test match, or go to the world cup etc.

Also - the school holiday is an opportunity for children to explore things other than academic progress - make new friends and do different things. All I remember from my childhood happened in the holidays. Sure I learned stuiff in school, but couldn't rememebr any experiences other than facts rammed down my head. Further, it is an absolute necessity for the mental health of those working in such an intense environment to have a lengthy break. I've seen more teachers suffer from nervous and mental breakdowns than I care to remember - it is always a horrible, horrible event and can destroy their own families. There are those that say that "well they chose the profession" - but the trouble is by the time you realise the demands of it, you are mortgaged up to the hilt.

Furthermore - those who complain about having to have to look after their OWN children at home for a few weeks, should have seriously considered that before going ahead and having a few minutes wriggle pleasure in the sack!

Long ago I gave up justifying the apparent long holidays to those envious eyes as it serves no purpose to do so - talk of how they're needed is meaningless until you've experienced the job first hand. All I'll say is that society gets a very good deal from its schools. It employs some of the most highly trained professionals in the country and pays them around half what you'd pay a plumber, or a garage engineer for an hour. The profession is always under attack from the media and politicians and the implication is that we constantly need telling how to do the job. the reality is that many, many parents look on schools as a free childminding service at its beck and call. Despite the propaganda the govt keep spewing out, there is a recruitment and retention crisis right now - teachers are leaving in their droves. I'm paid less than I was 6 years ago - even before you take into account inflation, for the same work and I'm quitting this summer - 5 years too soon to draw a pension.
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My god. I've read some tripe on GOT but I think this takes the biscuit
 
Reidy's Bottle Of Grecian said:
So the factory worker, the policeman etc
The Engineer that has to make components to 0.001" or 0.01mm consistently on shifts with a boss that treats them like a rag out of the bin
the poor sod on a zero hour contract for minimum wage & all those that live their working life with the threat of being made redundant constantly hanging over their heads

do they not have to deal with stress in the workplace ?

The absolute worse case I've ever seen put forward to justify the amount of holidays that the profession gets, what about the parents that have to use up their holiday allowance for the 'training' days etc.

Teachers have always provided an essential service to every child that's ever grown up in this country, but having Educated us please don't then take us for fools.

As far as I'm concerned you can't argue about the none flexibility of your holidays when you get so many.

There are also many workplaces where only a certain percentage of the workers may be on leave & in those cases if you don't get your holidays in quickest then they get turned down, I know of a case involving a mate where they all stuck their holiday forms in and he put in for 2 weeks in the summer, others did as well & he was told that it was too many & theirs got approved because of their length of service, then because in all the other weeks of the summer holidays the numbers allowed off had already been filled up he was told that it wasn't possible for him to book any during that period (it's only 3 sets of fortnights don't forget) he was told that there were odd 'long weekends' where he could be off where the numbers were in work. Many places also have folk that only work 'term time' hours so they're short staffed and its hard for full time staff to get time off in the holidays.


1 other thing that gets me is giving kids homework to do over the holidays, and my lad got a LOT of it when we were going away for a week, when he mentioned that we were going away & he wouldnt be able to do it he was told that he could just do the detention for not completing it then ... I made sure that wasn't happening straight away.
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You say teachers get so many holidays but most of the time work has to be done over these breaks such as marking and planning etc. It's a myth that teachers just put their feet up during all this time off. It's far from it in fact.
 

Mozza1987 said:
You say teachers get so many holidays but most of the time work has to be done over these breaks such as marking and planning etc. It's a myth that teachers just put their feet up during all this time off. It's far from it in fact.
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And whilst you're marking a few books everyone else is at work
 
jaycee said:
I honestly cant mate i think it was Miss Threllfall something like that,never learned a word of French but never missed a lesson
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Miss Roxburgh was mine. Something of the Teri Hatcher about her. She was amazing. Not as amazing as Miss Shepherd the English teacher though. Imagine a super-fit version of Rebecca De Mornay. oh yeah.
 
The Cowboy said:
Miss Roxburgh was mine. Something of the Teri Hatcher about her. She was amazing. Not as amazing as Miss Shepherd the English teacher though. Imagine a super-fit version of Rebecca De Mornay. oh yeah.
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We had three female teachers,one for girls gym who was basically a comedy caricature for female sports teachers,one for domestic science( cooking) who looked like the thing and the french godess
 

Mozza1987 said:
You say teachers get so many holidays but most of the time work has to be done over these breaks such as marking and planning etc. It's a myth that teachers just put their feet up during all this time off. It's far from it in fact.
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It's still roughly 13/14 weeks a year, you're not marking/planning for 10 of them (which is what you'd need to be to equal the average holiday allowance of most of us)
 

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