taylweaver | The true length of a teaching day

So a certain friend once noted that perhaps part of the reason that teachers make less money is because they work a shorter day. Well, all I have to say to that is, if teachers got paid for every hour we *really* work, we would be a whole lot richer.

Take, for example, yesterday:

Hours of instruction: 4
Hours of supervision (lunch and homework time):2
Total paid hours: 6
Hours spent in the school building: 9 (6 teaching hours plus 3 prep hours)
Lunch break: none (I eat with the kids - see above)
Hours spent preparing before class: 15 minutes reading train books for social studies while eating breakfast
Break I took for dinner: 1 hour?
Time on the phone with friends: 1/2 hour
Time spent preparing lessons: The remainder of my evening (2 hours?)
Plus, throw some commute time in there. I may or may not have graded papers on the train yesterday - I can't recall.

So I spend nearly every waking hour of nearly every weekday working.

Oh, and did I mention that last night, I was even teaching in my sleep? Or maybe sleep is the wrong word considering the restless night I had... I kept dreaming about grading papers, so that I woke up feeling like I had hardly gotten any rest at all.

My job - a summer job, no less - is eating up nearly all of my time.

This frustrates me.

Especially because I am being paid very little for my actual teaching hours as it is.

Maybe the reason there is such a shortage of teachers in this country is that there is this sense that teaching is an "easy" job, with less hours. Well, it is if you don't spent any time preparing to teach your kids...

And now I am off to - can you guess? Yep- plan some more for tomorrow.