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I appreciate the perspective that you’re coming from, but I come from a family of educators. They do have occasional in service days over the summer and obvious

I appreciate the perspective that you’re coming from, but I come from a family of educators. They do have occasional in service days over the summer and obviously are expected back at work a week or so before classes start. Other than that, it very much is a three-month vacation, one that shaped a large part of my childhood.

jedberg 7y ago
The distribution seems bi-modal. My wife was a teacher, and she had maybe one free week the whole summer, between development classes, curriculum work, and so on. On some summer days I would leave work at 7pm and then join her in her classroom until 8 or 9pm where she was just finishing up a 12 hour day. Then there were other teachers at the school who took off on the last day of school and you didn't see them again until the week before school started. Those were the teachers that were still teaching material from 30 years ago that all the parents dreaded their kids getting.
- rorykoehler 7y ago
  Similar experience for my wife. Some teachers just don’t give a shit and never update their curriculum or materials and repeat the same drivel over and over. She on the other hand spent the majority of her free time developing new material and kids actually looked forward to her lessons.
  - cookieswumchorr 7y ago
    I would get suspicious in my wife was going to work for 3 months while her colleagues enjoy their vacation
kbenson 7y ago
My understanding is that it's also often heavily weighted to the early years, unless you have someone else's lesson plans to use (and even then, you probably want to prep and maybe do a dry run). Just like any job, if 90% of what you're doing is new to you or something you have to develop yourself if vastly different than if 10% of what you're doing is new or something you're developing yourself. Given the actual in class time doing the lesson plans is fairly static, that means the non-classroom hours of the day, or your own time, is what is required to make up the slack. I imagine teachers of fields that have lots of changes (or of districts or states that adopt whole new curriculums) have it worse than some others. At least if they care about doing a good job. It would be interesting to hear what your family members have to say about their first few years teaching compared to later years, and what period your memories correspond to.
- ultrarunner 7y ago
  I wrote a whole story about a family member being incredibly inefficient in preparing for a class she got (but was completely unqualified for, save for a masters in education). It turned out to just be really depressing, so I'll just say this: 1. Teachers in positions new to them probably do have more work to do 2. A lot of that work may be due to their own inefficiency having not yet learned the role. 3. That inefficiency ends up being paid for with a) time and b) stress, including family stress. 4. Even still, I sincerely cannot remember a single time in my childhood where we were not traveling all summer long. 5. Fortunately budget cuts can end nonsensical programs and save everyone the hassle :-/ What a weird period of time that was.

jedberg 7y ago

The distribution seems bi-modal. My wife was a teacher, and she had maybe one free week the whole summer, between development classes, curriculum work, and so on. On some summer days I would leave work at 7pm and then join her in her classroom until 8 or 9pm where she was just finishing up a 12 hour day. Then there were other teachers at the school who took off on the last day of school and you didn't see them again until the week before school started. Those were the teachers that were still teaching material from 30 years ago that all the parents dreaded their kids getting.

rorykoehler 7y ago
Similar experience for my wife. Some teachers just don’t give a shit and never update their curriculum or materials and repeat the same drivel over and over. She on the other hand spent the majority of her free time developing new material and kids actually looked forward to her lessons.
- cookieswumchorr 7y ago
  I would get suspicious in my wife was going to work for 3 months while her colleagues enjoy their vacation

kbenson 7y ago

My understanding is that it's also often heavily weighted to the early years, unless you have someone else's lesson plans to use (and even then, you probably want to prep and maybe do a dry run). Just like any job, if 90% of what you're doing is new to you or something you have to develop yourself if vastly different than if 10% of what you're doing is new or something you're developing yourself. Given the actual in class time doing the lesson plans is fairly static, that means the non-classroom hours of the day, or your own time, is what is required to make up the slack. I imagine teachers of fields that have lots of changes (or of districts or states that adopt whole new curriculums) have it worse than some others. At least if they care about doing a good job. It would be interesting to hear what your family members have to say about their first few years teaching compared to later years, and what period your memories correspond to.

ultrarunner 7y ago
I wrote a whole story about a family member being incredibly inefficient in preparing for a class she got (but was completely unqualified for, save for a masters in education). It turned out to just be really depressing, so I'll just say this: 1. Teachers in positions new to them probably do have more work to do 2. A lot of that work may be due to their own inefficiency having not yet learned the role. 3. That inefficiency ends up being paid for with a) time and b) stress, including family stress. 4. Even still, I sincerely cannot remember a single time in my childhood where we were not traveling all summer long. 5. Fortunately budget cuts can end nonsensical programs and save everyone the hassle :-/ What a weird period of time that was.