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School not using Video Conferencing but lashing out the homework

AmberGold

I have three children under 12, none of their schools are taking the opportunity to avail of the latest technology to provide lessons.

Given WhatsApp, Teams and Zoom etc are free this is disappointing as all we seem to have is teachers flinging homework over the wall & lots of it at that.

I appreciate teachers have their own children to look after but an hour or two a day wouldn’t be too much to ask.

Is this unique to the schools my children attend or are our educators missing a trick, I’m thinking about contacting the principal of the school to voice my concern.

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jrosen

I seriously doubt there will be any consequences for teachers.

I really wish there was a better system. Reward those who really work well and work for their students. There needs to be incentives to work harder. It must be difficult to be in a role working your bum off for the same money as the **** teacher in the class next door.

As a parent I am more often disappointed in a teachers approach than impressed.

Dravokivich

HerrKuehn wrote: »

well i suppose they could say that you are unable to work from home then.

They expected someone to just go out and get one. As in, why wouldnt they.

CinemaGuy45

jrosen wrote: »

I seriously doubt there will be any consequences for teachers.

I really wish there was a better system. Reward those who really work well and work for their students. There needs to be incentives to work harder. It must be difficult to be in a role working your bum off for the same money as the **** teacher in the class next door.

As a parent I am more often disappointed in a teachers approach than impressed.

Many of them need to be sacked and their union needs to be broken.

I believe in worker rights and proper treatment of employees but lazy people should be fired.

History Queen

CinemaGuy45 wrote: »

Many of them need to be sacked and their union needs to be broken.

I believe in worker rights and proper treatment of employees but lazy people should be fired.

You don't understand Unionism if you think they are there to protect the lazy worker. If we didn't have teachers unions our pay and conditions would be eroded further and there would be an even bigger teacher retention crises. I don't disagree that lazy workers should be fired but the mechanism to allow that to happen could adversely affect the hard working teacher. Teaching is hard to measure in normal circumstances (easier at the moment to see which teachers are working and which are not). Even within the working group it may be hard to measure how hard each teacher is working.

Today for example I uploaded a pre recorded powerpoint that took me an hour and a half to create between adapting a ppt I had and recording my voice over it explaining the slides and annoting it. (And another hour to upload but I'm not counting that as working time)If you ask my students how much work I did with them today they'd say 23minutes because that's how long the presentation was.

HerrKuehn

Dravokivich wrote: »

They expected someone to just go out and get one. As in, why wouldnt they.

In my experience in companies, working from home is typically something the employee is looking for. The company wont pay for a computer or broadband or anything like that. Given the current situation I would imagine if an employee said they can't work as there is no broadband in their area they would be expected to take leave, paid vacation or unpaid.

CinemaGuy45

History Queen wrote: »

You don't understand Unionism if you think they are there to protect the lazy worker. If we didn't have teachers unions our pay and conditions would be eroded further and there would be an even bigger teacher retention crises. I don't disagree that lazy workers should be fired but the mechanism to allow that to happen could adversely affect the hard working teacher. Teaching is hard to measure in normal circumstances (easier at the moment to see which teachers are working and which are not). Even within the working group it may be hard to measure how hard each teacher is working.

Today for example I uploaded a pre recorded powerpoint that took me an hour and a half to create between adapting a ppt I had and recording my voice over it explaining the slides and annoting it. (And another hour to upload but I'm not counting that as working time)If you ask my students how much work I did with them today they'd say 23minutes because that's how long the presentation was.

I agree there are hardworking teachers and you sound like one of them fair play but there are also a lot of lazy teachers and the union has made sure these lazy buggers never get their marching orders.

It is not complicated or hard to spot a lazy employee in the private sector these people don't last long.
I agree unions protect pay and conditions however lazy workers erode public support and lazy teachers during this crisis have caught the eye of the public.

lulublue22

I would love to know where you and all these teachers you know work. I am a primary school teacher. We have been teaching on line since before Easter. Every week we have a staff meeting where all staff outline what they have taught so far for the week. Each Friday a list of topics taught , resources used , learning outcomes etc, contact with parents and work on various polices is emailed to principal and forwarded to the BOM. No teacher in my school would get away with thinking they are on holidays. As a staff we have too much pride in our work to sit back and do nothing. I would suggest you encourage all those teachers you know who think they are on holidays to have a bit of pride in their work and perhaps suggest to your principal a weekly staff meeting where all teachers are held accountable for what work they are or are not doing.

Murple

teachinggal123 wrote: »

I know a lot of teachers who have the exact same attitude. Radio silence for the last 40+ days and no intention of doing anything.

Today is the 19th day that schools have been closed.

Dravokivich

HerrKuehn wrote: »

In my experience in companies, working from home is typically something the employee is looking for. The company wont pay for a computer or broadband or anything like that. Given the current situation I would imagine if an employee said they can't work as there is no broadband in their area they would be expected to take leave, paid vacation or unpaid.

You seem to be missing the point. This thread is about why arent teachers working. We've both just presented a valid one, but this isnt acceptable becuase.... teachers...

jrosen

lulublue22 wrote: »

I would love to know where you and all these teachers you know work. I am a primary school teacher. We have been teaching on line since before Easter. Every week we have a staff meeting where all staff outline what they have taught so far for the week. Each Friday a list of topics taught , resources used , learning outcomes etc, contact with parents and work on various polices is emailed to principal and forwarded to the BOM. No teacher in my school would get away with thinking they are on holidays. As a staff we have too much pride in our work to sit back and do nothing. I would suggest you encourage all those teachers you know who think they are on holidays to have a bit of pride in their work and perhaps suggest to your principal a weekly staff meeting where all teachers are held accountable for what work they are or are not doing.

Imagine needing to be encouraged to do your job that your paid for! In most industries you would be shown the door and rightly so.

jlm29

Dravokivich wrote: »

You expect people to be able to afford to just go and buy a laptop? If my job told me to do.that, I'd have to explain I didn't have the money to.

In fairness, someone said earlier that their eyes were sore from squinting at a phone. You can pick up a tablet for less than €50 that would do the job to a degree. That same person said they lived a good bit more than 2km from their school. They’ve probably saved in excess of €50 on diesel over the last few weeks

Murple

teachinggal123 wrote: »

I suggest that all parents (also students) keep a detailed record of the exact level of contact they have from each teacher. This should include material sent out, meetings held, homework corrected, emails responded to, etc. Keep a similar record of contact from the school principal.

Parents can then contact a variety of people/bodies if they feel the teacher has underperformed, and will have proof to back up their claims. They can contact the following to complain about underperformance:
The school principal

The school board of management

The ETB

The Teaching Council

The Dept. of Education

Local politicians and the media (Joe Duffy anyone?) if all else fails

Teachers might be enjoying the sun and "on holidays" now, but I think there will be consequences when things get back to normal. There is already a huge amount of public opinion against the way some teachers are not performing. Maybe there will be no consequences (my own colleagues think this) but I think there will have to be.

First point is if a parent has that amount of free time they would be better spending it helping their child rather than counting up emails and documenting meetings and to be honest, that is what most parents are doing.
Secondly, I know many teachers who are reporting that they are setting work, emailing pupils and parents, providing online lessons, waiting on with to be submitted for correction etc and are getting a handful of responses in some cases and none at all in others. I know a number of secondary teachers who have been providing online lessons following normal timetabled lessons from day 1 of the closure. They have been getting less than half the class showing up, particularly for the first lessons of the day.
Also, where are you getting this 'huge amount of public opinion' from? The vast majority of what I've read and heard, other than on boards, is praise from parents for the engagement from the school or guilt that they are not able to get the work done with their children. A small number have complained that they are getting too much work from school and don't have time to do other activities.

teachinggal123

Murple wrote: »

Today is the 19th day that schools have been closed.

42 days since March 12th by my count ... but you are correct that there have been 19 working school days since then.

So I'll change my original comment to ... 19 days of complete radio silence from many teachers. Yup, that sounds a lot better!!

lulublue22

jrosen wrote: »

Imagine needing to be encouraged to do your job that your paid for! In most industries you would be shown the door and rightly so.

Yes but it amazes me the amount of people who know these lazy ineffective teachers who have spent the last 40+ days not engaging with anyone ( though schools have been closed for 19 days or so) . I genuinely don't believe that teachinggal123 is a teacher - I've worked in a number of schools and that type of behaviour would not be tolerated at all. If she / he is then I think a gentle reminder / bit of encouragement to take pride in their work and to do their job ( and perhaps work on changing the ethos of their school if that is how it operates) as opposed to tarring all teachers with the same brush on a public forum is perfectly justified.

CinemaGuy45

teachinggal123 wrote: »

42 days since March 12th by my count ... but you are correct that there have been 19 working school days since then.

So I'll change my original comment to ... 19 days of complete radio silence from many teachers. Yup, that sounds a lot better!!

I read that post you made a few days ago I admire your honesty.

There are lazy people in every job we all see them it's just harder on almost impossible to sack some of them.

Dravokivich

jlm29 wrote: »

In fairness, someone said earlier that their eyes were sore from squinting at a phone. You can pick up a tablet for less than €50 that would do the job to a degree. That same person said they lived a good bit more than 2km from their school. They’ve probably saved in excess of €50 on diesel over the last few weeks

You cant reasonably expect someone to work with any proficiency off a 50 euro tablet?

teachinggal123

Murple wrote: »

Also, where are you getting this 'huge amount of public opinion' from? The vast majority of what I've read and heard, other than on boards, is praise from parents for the engagement from the school or guilt that they are not able to get the work done with their children. A small number have complained that they are getting too much work from school and don't have time to do other activities.

I don't doubt you, but could you point us to what you've been reading?

I'm asking because that is definitely not my experience and boards is representative of the opinions I've been hearing from parents (especially about primary school).

CinemaGuy45

lulublue22 wrote: »

Yes but it amazes me the amount of people who know these lazy ineffective teachers who have spent the last 40+ days not engaging with anyone ( though schools have been closed for 19 days or so) . I genuinely don't believe that teachinggal123 is a teacher - I've worked in a number of schools and that type of behaviour would not be tolerated at all. If she / he is then I think a gentle reminder / bit of encouragement to take pride in their work and to do their job ( and perhaps work on changing the ethos of their school if that is how it operates) as opposed to tarring all teachers with the same brush on a public forum is perfectly justified.

No tar no brush some teachers are working hard and some are very lazy individuals who in other sectors would have been righty fired long ago.

khalessi

Dravokivich wrote: »

You seem to be missing the point. This thread is about why arent teachers working. We've both just presented a valid one, but this isnt acceptable becuase.... teachers...

Actually the heading of this thread is, School not using Video Conferencing but lashing out homework, which would indicate teachers are working as homework is being issued. I presume this homework is being carried out and uploaded online. I have to photograph my chilren's books to get them corrected. It is just that the usual teacher bashers come out of the woodwork to bash.

It amazes me that the passive agressive nature of this thread is allowed to continue and I am wondering will it beat 50 odd pages of the thread from a few weeks ago before it is closed.

If you have an issue with how your teacher is interacting with your children, contact the school via email as this will be forewarded to the teacher or the principal.

Teach30

jlm29 wrote: »

In fairness, someone said earlier that their eyes were sore from squinting at a phone. You can pick up a tablet for less than €50 that would do the job to a degree. That same person said they lived a good bit more than 2km from their school. They’ve probably saved in excess of €50 on diesel over the last few weeks

Think you are referring to me! I haven’t saved any money on diesel the daily food shop still has to be done and my elderly parents can’t so no savings there I’m afraid.
Might look into buying a tablet but Nonetheless there is still the issue of rural broadband not being up to standard and its creating a huge divide. I’ve spend the day downloading work to correct and will do so tonight and then send feedback. Had I access to better internet this wouldn’t be as time consuming and I could get more work covered. Still love my job though!

jlm29

Dravokivich wrote: »

You cant reasonably expect someone to work with any proficiency off a 50 euro tablet?

I think I could reasonably expect that If squinting at a 4” phone screen to upload school work was giving them eye strain, as was mentioned earlier in this thread (at least I think It was this thread), that they might have used the Easter holidays to put another plan in place that would be a bit easier. If a laptop was not affordable, then maybe they could make do with a not ideal tablet, for the sake of their eye sight. I don’t think a €50 tablet is optimal, but you yourself seemed to think it outrageous that a professional might be expected to purchase a laptop due to the cost. I was just suggesting an alternative.

teachinggal123

lulublue22 wrote: »

Yes but it amazes me the amount of people who know these lazy ineffective teachers who have spent the last 40+ days not engaging with anyone ( though schools have been closed for 19 days or so) . I genuinely don't believe that teachinggal123 is a teacher - I've worked in a number of schools and that type of behaviour would not be tolerated at all. If she / he is then I think a gentle reminder / bit of encouragement to take pride in their work and to do their job ( and perhaps work on changing the ethos of their school if that is how it operates) as opposed to tarring all teachers with the same brush on a public forum is perfectly justified.

I am a teacher. But I'm not naming myself or my school on a public forum.

I can attest "that kind of behaviour" is definitely being tolerated in many schools.

Can I ask you a question? What can the principal do if a teacher says they are not able to work because of:
*no laptop
*poor broadband
*their contact is for school contact only (not online)
*home environment not suitable
*no skills or training in online teaching
*the multiple other excuses put forward by teachers on this thread

What exactly can the principal do? Serious question. TUI/ASTI will be up the principals ass if he/she does anything to sanction the teacher ... that is the answer.

All this is going on in my school - and I'm sure other school's around the country - right now. And the teachers on here know this. A bit of honesty wouldn't go amiss.

.

CinemaGuy45

khalessi wrote: »

It is just that the usual teacher bashers come out of the woodwork to bash.

It amazes me that the passive agressive nature of this thread is allowed to continue and I am wondering will it beat 50 odd pages of the thread from a few weeks ago before it is closed.

I assume you what you mean by bashing is SOME people be called out on not doing the job they are paid to do.

Nothing agressive from me lazy people get fired all the time hard workers get rewarded that is the way it should be would you not agree.

Stewie Griffin

@teachinggall123
I have to ask. What are you doing yourself in your school? I can't help noticing that you have not detailed your own efforts yet.

CinemaGuy45

Stewie Griffin wrote: »

@teachinggall123
I have to ask. What are you doing yourself in your school? I can't help noticing that you have not detailed your own efforts yet.

If you go back through her posts I believe she has in fairness.:)

James Bond Junior

I am the principal of a large primary school in the middle east. We are 100% online for the past 6 weeks and after a slow start we are in the swing of it, with 93% attendance this week. Teachers are sitting at laptops and delivering live video lessons all day.

Talking to my Irish teaching friends back home, the will to work online ranges from totally wanting to get to work to finding any excuse or downright refusal. It can be done, even for small kids but the reality of the situation is parents need to step in. They are the primary educators no matter what, so it falls on their shoulders with teachers helping and facilitating.

My advice to parents is, try to stick to the daily school routine, ask the teacher for the timetable and stick rigidly to it including snack and lunchtime/playtime. Keep stress to a minimum, youtube and google is your friend.

And to any teacher who says they can't do it, bar not having a genuinely reliable internet connection, there is zero excuse not to be teaching online in some way. Google classroom, Class Dojo, Zoom, Google hangouts, Microsoft teams l, TES blendspace, Twinkl and many more applications are free at the moment so check them out.
I had two teachers try to pull the "poor broadband" card which was suddenly fixed when the prospect of salary stoppage was raised. Can't work, can't pay. I am dropping into online lessons unannounced as if I would in real school and teachers are working as hard if not harder than they would in real life.

PM me if you are a teacher or educator looking for advice, I was where you were now 6 weeks ago and all is good once you are willing to settle in, keep an open mind and try. My father is principal of a large school in Ireland and on my advice they are delivering live and recorded lessons also. If the will is there, amazing things can happen.

slipperyox

bit surreal, teachers talking on web cams to teenagers sitting on their beds in pajamas....

You need rules and a proper procedural system before implementing this OP. If this was mentioned 6 months ago, you'd be laughed at...

What happens if you accidentally upload a wrong file on your personal computer... can you be sued? Dam right a good lawyer would find ptsd with the kid. Your employer would deny any responsibility, and leave you out to dry.

CinemaGuy45

slipperyox wrote: »

bit surreal, teachers talking on web cams to teenagers sitting on their beds in pajamas....

You need rules and a proper procedural system before implementing this OP. If this was mentioned 6 months ago, you'd be laughed at...

What happens if you accidentally upload a wrong file on your personal computer... can you be sued? Dam right a good lawyer would find ptsd with the kid. Your employer would deny any responsibility, and leave you out to dry.

Dial Hard

slipperyox wrote: »

What happens if you accidentally upload a wrong file on your personal computer... can you be sued? Dam right a good lawyer would find ptsd with the kid. Your employer would deny any responsibility, and leave you out to dry.

This is a possibility for anyone working with a computer, whether from home or not. It hasn't stopped literally millions of people working.

lulublue22

teachinggal123 wrote: »

I am a teacher. But I'm not naming myself or my school on a public forum.

I can attest "that kind of behaviour" is definitely being tolerated in many schools.

Can I ask you a question? What can the principal do if a teacher says they are not able to work because of:
*no laptop
*poor broadband
*their contact is for school contact only (not online)
*home environment not suitable
*no skills or training in online teaching
*the multiple other excuses put forward by teachers on this thread

What exactly can the principal do? Serious question. TUI/ASTI will be up the principals ass if he/she does anything to sanction the teacher ... that is the answer.

All this is going on in my school - and I'm sure other school's around the country - right now. And the teachers on here know this. A bit of honesty wouldn't go amiss.

.

I don't expect you to name your school on a public forum I do expect that you engage with your principal re doing the job you are supposed to do. Honesty works both ways. I can only speak for myself and my experiences which is what I have been doing in all my posts. Not one primary school teacher in my school or those that I know outside of my school have ever raised the issue of contract for class teaching only. Neither I nor any of my school colleagues have training in providing on line learning. I have family commitments that I work around. There are 4 in our house using broadband including a LC student. ( Both my children's secondary school teachers have been absolutely fantastic by the way) I still do my job. As do my colleagues and my children's secondary school teachers. But obviously my experiences could not possibly be the norm because they do not fit the stereotypical teacher bashing that goes on here.

Are there teachers not pulling their weight - of course there are. As are many others in many other situations who are now wfh. Do I think parents who are unhappy with how the school is operating should contact the teacher / principal/ BOM re same of course I do . But spare me the
All the teachers I know think they are on holidays they are doing nothing guff as if it equates to every single teacher in every single school in the country doing nothing. I would suggest that if this is such an issue in your school you would be much better off addressing it with the principal and BOM of your school. Though I presume it's much easier to make generalisations across the board as to tackling the issues in your school.