Christmas Holidays? For Teachers It’ll Probably Be Weeks Fighting A Work-Induced Cold
Finish at 3? 13 Weeks off a year? Don't make me laugh. What free time we have is often spent recovering or battling illness
- by Jon Berry
If you’re a teacher, there’s one thing you won’t want for Christmas, but there’s a very good chance you’ll get it: some horrible variant of a cold, cough or debilitating viral infection. I have no idea whether or not empirical study has ever been undertaken about this phenomenon, but most teachers will recognise it only too clearly.
Like those stories of physical strength whereby people lift motorcars from trapped victims, teachers manage to keep going until that final bell rings before collapsing in a spluttering, rheumy heap. It’s long been one of the curses of our honourable profession that we have to ward off jibes about the length of our holidays. My unequivocal advice to those new to such sniping is to never engage: if people genuinely think that you work from 8.30am until 3pm with a full 13 weeks off a year, then let them revel in their ignorance – there’s not much that fact and reason can do about it. All the same, if I were charged with running our education system, I’d be pretty alarmed by this. I’d have to ask myself why a profession whose members rely on energy and commitment – physical and mental – are allowed to run themselves into the ground in this way.
I wouldn’t want them using their leisure time warding off illness and fatigue. I’d rather they were recharging batteries doing the things they loved. I’d want them reading for pleasure, watching films, climbing mountains or just plain lazing around watching rubbish telly. And there’s a good reason for this. One of the many pleasures of being a teacher is encountering ex-pupils in shops, pubs and generally out and about in the local area. I’ve had hundreds of conversations with such people over the last 40 years, and the dialogue always follows a pattern. After introductions and reminiscences about their classmates and my colleagues, they will drift into memories of me as a teacher. Very recently, an ex-pupil now in his 40s, recalled a daft assembly I did with colleagues in the guise of the Herb Boys (not the Spice Girls, geddit?). Mothers with unbelieving teenagers reminisce about wild parties that followed successful school plays. Sometimes, much to my great delight, individuals tell me that I turned them on to reading particular authors and – what ecstasy for a teacher – how I imbued them with a love of Shakespeare, poetry or creative writing. I do have to observe, however, that no one has ever thanked me for being a brilliant deliverer of the national curriculum or for collating their data so assiduously.
Teachers have no objection to working hard. It’s what they signed up for and what they expect to have to do. They want to bring creativity and energy to their classrooms – and I happen to know this because of the extensive work that goes in to my own research and writing.
But what drains teachers and tires them to the bone is the excessive time and trouble required to record, tabulate and log what they have already done. Such activity could almost have been designed to exhaust and demoralise.
Time spent in the classroom is where the real energy needs to go. A teacher who loves her subject, and who has the drive and verve to communicate it, is what we all want for our students.
We’ll get such teachers if we allow them the leisure and relaxation to pursue their own passions and then bring them to the classroom. They’re more likely to do that if they don’t have to spend Christmas fighting off workload-induced aches and sniffles.
Dr Jon Berry’s book, Teachers Undefeated available now via Amazon. To order multiple copies, contact the author at j.berry@herts.ac.uk
