The job of a teacher is not designed to be completed within 40 hours a week. It’s assumed that teachers will provide additional labor by coming in early, staying late, and bringing work home on a regular basis….all without compensation.
So, how can we change this norm?
One way is to amplify the work of teachers who have resisted that pressure to be the last person out of the building each evening, and who are willing to talk openly about how they have streamlined and reduced extraneous expectations.
You can hear this in a secondary teacher’s story in episode 250 (about lesson planning), in episode 256 from four different educators, and now in this elementary teacher’s story.
To be clear: you may not be able to work exactly your contractual hours (depending on your personal teaching context and workload. This does NOT mean you’re doing something wrong: it means systemic change is needed. A realistic goal for you might be to reduce the amount of time you spend working on nights and weekends as a starting point.
Listen to Samantha’s story here for some hope + inspiration that it IS possible to do a great job for kids without working endlessly for free. She shares:
How she tracked her work hours, and what she learned from doing it If Samantha never takes work home, when does the work get done? Samantha's lesson planning and material prep process — how she walks out every single day with the next day's lessons and materials set out and ready to go Why people are always curious about the logistics of streamlining, but the mindset behind the actions has been Samantha’s most powerful shift How she stopped worrying about being perceived as someone who doesn’t really care or isn’t truly dedicated to kids (and how her colleague’s perceptions of her changed)Click here to read the transcript and participate in the discussion or, join our podcast Facebook group here to connect with other teachers and discuss the Truth for Teachers' podcast episodes.
