Extra classes

jordanbag · 11-12-2019 8:14pm #1

New poster with a query.

Background: in my fifth year teaching in my school, language teacher. Some teachers in my school offer an hour extra classes on a weekly basis to LC students (maths, french, Irish, biology, music...etc).
As mentioned, I'm a French teacher in my fifth year in the school. Presently I have sixth year French. Another French teacher has the other sixth year French class. The teacher is established and he gives an extra class to his LCs on a weekly basis.
As mentioned, I have the other LC class. Management have hinted to me that I should also be offering an extra hour a week after school to my French class. I have ignored these hints, on the basis that I am on the new scale (earning 560 a week), I have three other exam classes aside from this French class (two JC and another LC class in my other subject and two fifth year classes. I feel completely burnt out enough as it is. Without moaning, I already do around ten hours of work a day between teaching, prepping and correcting. That said, I am feeling under significant pressure from management/ students to offer this. Does anyone have any advice? I will have LC French again next year, so I will have the same issue then.
In case anyone is wondering, we have five 40 minute classes a week.

On another note, management want me to facilitate a French exchange in July (bring our own students over then for a week). I want to refuse as it's obviously my own holidays, but I feel under pressure to accept. Does anyone have any ideas? I feel that teaching is entirely "survive or die" nowadays.

spurious · 12-12-2019 1:57am

Management are pressurising you to do extra work for free during the year?

AND during your holidays?

I am trying to be polite in terms of what I would say to them.....

Say no. Tell them you are well able to cover the course in the allotted time.

Let management take the children to France.

Have a look elsewhere for a job. That place sounds horrendous.

2xj3hplqgsbkym · 12-12-2019 2:46am

Do you have CID ?
I would say no but I have a permanent job

jordanbag · 12-12-2019 9:35am

Hi guys, thanks for the replies. Yes I have CID, it’s my fifth year in the school. To be honest I just needed advice to be sure that I wasn’t being unreasonable. It’s a very pressurised environment for sure.

RealJohn · 12-12-2019 11:27am

On the extra classes, I used to do that (not due to pressure from management) but found that they were of no significant benefits and gave the impression that I wasn’t able to finish the course in the allotted time, so I stopped.
If you can finish in the allotted time, I would say that that’s what you say to anyone who hints at it. You might add that you’ll consider offering extra classes to students who are giving you extra work that they’ve done in their own time to mark, and if they do, you can consider actually following through on that, depending on the numbers (but you can still decide not to, even if your whole class start doing that).

On the summer exchange, I would have one question for whoever suggested it: How much extra will I be paid?
Whether you do it or not depends on the answer to that question (and again, regardless of the answer, you still don’t have to do it).

Parents, students, and managers expect a lot of teachers these days. If you’re in a secure position, your answer should be “what’s in it for me?” You might be able to answer that yourself, or someone else might have to answer it, but either way, you should ask the question.

Don’t allow yourself to be exploited.

TheValeyard · 12-12-2019 7:24pm

jordanbag wrote: »

Hi guys, thanks for the replies. Yes I have CID, it’s my fifth year in the school. To be honest I just needed advice to be sure that I wasn’t being unreasonable. It’s a very pressurised environment for sure.

You have a CID

Tell them to fcuk off nicely. You're doing the job and probably a lot more already.

This is what happens when management go off to the Principals conference and come back with BS ideas!!

doc_17 · 12-12-2019 9:50pm

You can hint back at them that you’d like to be compensated. As for going to France? Be careful, you could find yourself doing it every year.

byhookorbycrook · 13-12-2019 11:50am

In my opinion, giving extra classes gives the impression that you can’t cover the course in class . I’ve seen secondary teacher friends do this and they found that many students didn’t listen in ordinary class and then expected the teacher to give hand outs a la grind schools , to “ give them all the answers .”
It’s a slippery slope and not one I’d venture on.
As to travelling with an exchange group, I have travelled with really well behaved groups on overnight / a few nights away .I knew the children were good , but was absolutely exhausted as I hardly slept , even though the children couldn’t go anywhere , as my room was outside theirs. It’s a massive responsibility- not one I’d be taking in with secondary children and especially in my holiday time .

doc_17 · 13-12-2019 12:54pm

byhookorbycrook wrote: »

In my opinion, giving extra classes gives the impression that you can’t cover the course in class . I’ve seen secondary teacher friends do this and they found that many students didn’t listen in ordinary class and then expected the teacher to give hand outs a la grind schools , to “ give them all the answers .”
It’s a slippery slope and not one I’d venture on.
As to travelling with an exchange group, I have travelled with really well behaved groups on overnight / a few nights away .I knew the children were good , but was absolutely exhausted as I hardly slept , even though the children couldn’t go anywhere , as my room was outside theirs. It’s a massive responsibility- not one I’d be taking in with secondary children and especially in my holiday time .

Or on your own. Excellent advice above, couldn’t have put it better myself!

Treppen · 17-12-2019 1:08am

Say no if you don't want to, but I wonder will you face a backlash from other staff. keep a close eye on grades from a range of students, if they are performing well in those other subjects except for yours, then I have no doubt the finger will be wagged. Although, these days we don't have the same access to LC or JC grades with "GDPR" :rolleyes: Those in senior management will have access to and be comparing grades though, and walls have ears. What I would do is have a look at the mocks results on eportal or vsware and keep a record.

In many ways it shows what happens when a union is weak in a school and people don't understand precedent. I remember one year our woodwork teacher was assigned way over the class size quota, he had it out with the principal and the principal told him there was no other way, so the teacher just locked the doors and let the students stand outside for the duration of the class. After a week the issue got sorted and it never happened again.

It's probably a very academic focused school (or else maybe the students are always away with sport and aren't pushed to catch up themselves). The flip side of this may be severe pressure on students to get the points, especially if they are doing an extra 4 or so classes a week on top of their normal timetable. Maybe if they did a mindfulness study in the school to assess the student's mental well-being, it might throw up some interesting findings.

Trips away during holidays: I've done it and didn't mind taking my turn, but I have to say, it was thrown open to anyone and the organising teacher never put pressure.
If it was in July though and I was being asked to organise it, I'd definitely be of the understanding that it would become a yearly thing. Maybe say to the Principal that you'd have to run it by the language department.

Grueller · 18-12-2019 8:26pm

jordanbag wrote: »

Hi guys, thanks for the replies. Yes I have CID, it’s my fifth year in the school. To be honest I just needed advice to be sure that I wasn’t being unreasonable. It’s a very pressurised environment for sure.

Say no and say it firmly. This type of drivel is one of the main reasons I left teaching. I will probably go back in the next year or two off of my career break on job sharing.

joebloggs32 · 19-12-2019 11:16pm

jordanbag wrote: »

New poster with a query.

Background: in my fifth year teaching in my school, language teacher. Some teachers in my school offer an hour extra classes on a weekly basis to LC students (maths, french, Irish, biology, music...etc).
As mentioned, I'm a French teacher in my fifth year in the school. Presently I have sixth year French. Another French teacher has the other sixth year French class. The teacher is established and he gives an extra class to his LCs on a weekly basis.
As mentioned, I have the other LC class. Management have hinted to me that I should also be offering an extra hour a week after school to my French class. I have ignored these hints, on the basis that I am on the new scale (earning 560 a week), I have three other exam classes aside from this French class (two JC and another LC class in my other subject and two fifth year classes. I feel completely burnt out enough as it is. Without moaning, I already do around ten hours of work a day between teaching, prepping and correcting. That said, I am feeling under significant pressure from management/ students to offer this. Does anyone have any advice? I will have LC French again next year, so I will have the same issue then.
In case anyone is wondering, we have five 40 minute classes a week.

On another note, management want me to facilitate a French exchange in July (bring our own students over then for a week). I want to refuse as it's obviously my own holidays, but I feel under pressure to accept. Does anyone have any ideas? I feel that teaching is entirely "survive or die" nowadays.

Any teacher who provides extra classes on a regular basis is doing no one any favours. They are bringing the profession into disrepute.
You are a competent, trained professional. You can deliver the course in the allotted time. The students also already have 28 hours tuition per week with revision and homework on top of that. If each teacher of a leaving cert class went down that road the students would also suffer burnout.

It could be argued by a malicious parent that a teacher providing extra classes must have been a poor, even incompetent teacher as they had to rely on extra classes to get their students over the line.

Extra classes

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