192. Cost Of Living Nightmare, Sick Day Pressure & Using A.I. Safely [Listener Q&A]

0:00 Hello everyone, I got back to that episode of Teach the Repeat. My name is Dylan. And my name's Hayden. And we are going out for a Curry later and it's all I can think about. Oh yeah, all I can think about. Does anyone else get that when they know they're going out for dinner and it's just it takes over my mind? We are, we are at the, I think it's an age thing. I do think we're at the age now where that is the most exciting thing that can happen in our lives. Right, because it's so rare, it's still all being timed so that the, the the kids have to be completely asleep. Yeah. And away, away. Give a draw, Daddy. Away. Let's put the kids away. Yeah, you. Go go to the cot and you realise all the cutleries in there. And you're like ohh God where's the kids Mommy, I need something to eat my soup with.

0:41 Just dip my Chai. Oh God, wow, welcome back to another episode. It's Q&A, so. Well, no, we're very serious. That's no, that's allowed in the Q&A. Yeah, it's the hunt. It's the unhinged. Yeah, episodes, it's all good. My favourite ones. Yeah. Using my child as a utensil to drink my soup. As we're on the topic of being being unhinged, can I tell you something Not so unhinged, but kind of impressive? Well, it has to reach a certain level of unhingedness to be allowed. Well, I don't know, maybe it's. Just me? Well, let's just judge it. You can judge it yesterday. Yeah. I went to Tesco's with the purpose of doing this, by the way. It's I'm glad it paid off. Sorry thinking. I think I know what you're going to say. Of course you do, because you know why I go to Tesco. There is only one reason you it's Little Tesco, by the way, Let's make that down the road from us. Little Tesco is is dangerously close to where we separately live.

1:28 By the way, again, all new listeners, I think every time they do, we put the kids away and and Tesco's down the road from us. I think they're getting the wrong impression sometimes. No, we live close to each other with our separate families. Close to each other, Separate rooms in the same house. Very close. You could say really close. Stop it. And Tesco is is is dangerously close. And when a Tesco is dangerously close, it only means one thing for middle-aged men with low addicts, right? Right. So, you know, I was going there and I thought to myself, and bear in mind the point of we're recording this is like a week and a bit after Easter. If anything, it's more than a week and a half. It's nearly two weeks away from Easter, right? And I was like, I wonder if they've got any eggs left because when I went in there a couple of days after Easter, they had all this reduced to clear stuff.

2:11 I was like brilliant and cheap chocolate. I bought loads obviously and. You ran out, clearly. Ran out. Ran out. I ran out that day because I ate them immediately and I went there thinking I really do fancy some chocolate. Guess what One Easter egg left? One big giant crunchy Easter egg. Crunchy was a crunchy 1, and clearly it was left because it's ludicrously priced right and to people thinking well I'm not going to buy that because I'm not stupid. This guy though? Whoa, Mr Stupid's walked in quick. Get the one egg out. Put the one egg out on. The shelf reduce to clear, it's only £7.50 now. Thank. God, I was going to say that I I don't believe you see a big reduce to clear thing. You're like right time to fill my boots. 67 lbs Yeah. Looks at the little The best thing thing about Tesco is you look at a little tag and it tells you the price per kilogramme of stuff I love because that's the only metric.

2:55 You can actually compare. That's not a Tesco thing. You know, that was by law brought in that you have to do that which because it got into trouble, I'm going to very quickly now public service announcement, it got into trouble for not correctly labelling it like properly on there, especially when it came to club card prices, right? So it wasn't really telling you the actual price you were getting because obviously club card price is just a complete sham. They put the, the price is ridiculously expensive and they're like, oh, what's what's that? This bottle of juice is now £2.50 on club card prices. I'm sorry, what? What was it? It was £8.10. What? What? For a Tropicana. Why was it ever that much? But they got into trouble because they weren't label labelling really clearly price per unit so that you could actually compare it. Because most of the time you just see a yellow thing. They know it's psychological.

3:35 Oh, yellow club card price must be cheap in the trolley. Yeah. And they weren't properly labelling it, so it's not. They all have to really clearly label that now. Fair enough. Well, I looked at that and I thought £7.50 reduced from 15 lbs by the way, which is what those Easter eggs were. You know that the giant, the the quote unquote giant ones. It's just bigger box. Yeah, yeah, but the eggs are a bit thicker. So is it where like you actual crunchy? That's right. Yeah. Those like thick ones which is which is very nice. Which is what people have tuned into this podcast, this. Exactly that, right? And they're in, they're, they're hooked at this point. Have you finished it? What? Yeah. Oh my God. I bought it last night and it's gone. I finished it this morning before I came round here to record. I'm not joking. That's in fact, that's all I've eaten today. You are pathetic. That's all. I've eaten. You are. Pathetic. I am. I am. It's 950, so it is in the morning and all I've eaten this morning is the rest of that egg.

4:19 Oh my goodness. Right, let's go into the first. Anyway, first question which is kind of linked. Sick days. Oh because I think if you eat one of them in the morning maybe you will be sick. Sick days? Why is it actually impossible to fully rest on a sick day? Just calling SLT to tell them I wasn't feeling well was awful. I had to be convinced by my partner that I should stay home. Just feels like I have more work to do and also feels like I should be working whilst I'm I'll. Any things you guys did to maybe make sick days a bit easier? For example, did you have cover folders or anything like that? I guess one more positive is that my immune system is getting. Stronger. Yeah, that is true. I'll tell you what though, can resonate with that. I don't know about you, but I I never, ever, ever had a sick day where I didn't at least feel some level of guilt.

4:59 And I'm like, oh, should should I just go in? I don't think I would have felt, I didn't feel that when I went to Tesco, felt sick. I was like, I'm just sick, I think for guilt. Oh no, who's gonna? Who's gonna manage? Holders, yeah, the stomps, the stomps and the profit and the yield. Oh no. Exactly right. But I did feel that every single time in teaching, even working in a in a nice school, I still felt guilty. And they didn't make me feel guilty, I just felt guilty anyway. But I felt more guilty in a nice school if anything, because I was in an environment where everyone supported me nicely and I was like, oh, I don't want to actually, I really don't want to let anyone down. And it felt like I was, which is which is insane when you're I're I'll not letting anyone. Down. And I felt even more guilty than that. You know what I mean? Like whatever you felt, I felt it more. Well, I whatever you felt. Plus Infinity plus one, yeah, is what I felt. Oh God. So firstly I just want to say, yeah, I think that's quite normal for some reason to feel like that. I've definitely had days where I worked on my sick days genuinely where I was like, oh, I'm at home. I currently be with the kids, but I can sit in front of a computer.

5:49 I can sit in front of a computer and get stuff done. I suppose it's. Just your normal state, isn't it? Yeah, literally. Yeah, I do think there's, I think there's a like it's a tricky 1. It's a really tricky one because we're teaching it is intense. I don't think people realise how actually teaching is genuinely physically demanding and it's it's stupid. What I'm not saying is it's not the same as working in the sewers. Like I'm not saying it's physically demanding and therefore it's the same as every physically demanding. Yeah, right, exactly. I'm not saying I'm saying it's more physically demanding than you might think. And what what that that kind of brings up a grey area where you know, you you can be genuinely too. I'll to stand in front of the class and deliver an essence properly, but not I'll enough that you can sit in front of your laptop and do a bit of work.

6:31 That's true. It's a weird middle ground. However, I again, always just err on the side of you are a human being after all. If you do take a sick day, just have the day off. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I would ask, but I understand again, maybe you can attest to it while you did it because but again, teaching is a job where the the work is never done and it can feel like actually it's a net good for everyone, just for me to do a bit of work today. Sometimes I see it as a bit of a win. I'd almost be like, it's cheeky. I'm like I'm, I'll, I am too. I'll to be in front of the kids. I could just do some work and I don't have to do some planning. At the weekend. So did you get like a hint? Yeah, literally. And I'd be like, and then I'd feel even more guilty because technically that's cheeky now. Because I'm like, oh, now I'm now I technically am doing work that I would have done later on because I should have been teaching right now. Or should I be doing this?

7:13 Or should I just take the day off? Really genuinely, 9 times out of 10 I actually just should have taken the day off because if you're ill, ignoring the mental side of it is not actually good. Like obviously like you are still fatigued in your mind. You should, if you're physically I'll, you should just have a break completely. Let your mind rest as well. That is what you should do. But yeah, I often didn't. It's tricky as well because the way the the job works where you've got to do some work outside that planning and stuff. The illness for example, I remember being I'll I was on ill on a Friday and I always felt again like I was taking the Mick because oh, it's a Friday. I can't help being I'll today like I am just I'll even though this does give me now three days off for the weekend rather than just two, but I am ill. But then the illness would like continue into the weekend, but then I, I would have had to do some work at the weekend. So, so I was planning on doing a bit of planning at the weekend so that I could get ready for the week after. I am ill, right?

8:06 Yeah, but I did actually, it wasn't even being cheeky. Now, I had to do that work otherwise I wouldn't have any lessons for the for the week after that. So it was a weird thing where I was like, OK, I have called in I'll on the Friday, which means I specifically can't be in front of the kids teaching the lesson. But there's there's no like system for calling in I'll to do the work that I'm not paid to do anyway, which I've got to do to do the job like that. It's like a really weird remind. You of how much from mugs we are as teachers, isn't it Yeah, exactly. It's like, Oh, no, I'm too. I'll to do all this, the five hours of unpaid work that I do every single Saturday. What do I do? Oh, there's no system because you're, you are being taken for a mug. Yeah, by doing that. I think this is basically what this person's errand towards. Maybe we could round up this question by just summarising it in terms of having some kind of cover folder maybe. So I remember we had cover folders where, but it was simply more the cover teacher would know to go to the cover folder, they'd know exactly where to find the lesson. But I've provided that lesson as well. I think going one step further, and I think this is OK. And there's lots of people who push back and say, no, it's not. Children should always get everything that's adaptive and then the needs and the exact moment. Chill out.

9:03 It's it is OK to just have a backup lesson. Yeah. A lesson that can be just stand alone. Let's just say for English one day it's a standalone comprehension lesson that you just have. You're not for emergencies. Yeah, you don't plan to use, but actually if there is just a day where, oh, I'm off sick and I can't do anything and nothing's been planned for whatever reason, yeah, then just pick that up and go mass. I can think of a million mass investigations or stand alone lessons that are, you know, relative for that child's age and that that can be suitable that I won't necessarily need to use but could use. Yeah, I could think of a lesson for every subject like that. And I think I personally think having that as some kind of store is not only good for you as the teacher. I think it should be a school wide policy definitely. Because then SLT can step in and actually arrange cover and arrange sorting out someone being sick.

9:49 Because the way it currently happens is it seems to be that it's put on colleagues. Whereas something like this, which is just more across the school guide that we have a Bank of resources for each year group. If someone's I'll use one of these, make sure it's logged somewhere that that class have done that lesson so I don't know again in six months and then go on to the next one. I think that's reasonable. Definitely, I think that's very reasonable and I don't even think it's that bad, even though I think that's better. I don't think it's that bad when the fall back is if you're in a multi form school, which a lot of people obviously are, If it is just a case of saying to one of your colleagues, look, so and so has called in sick this morning. I'm not going to hassle them to upload a bunch of stuff for today. They have that I can't. I don't know where their planning is as your parallel classes, whatever. Can this class just use your lesson for today?

10:29 I don't think that's the worst thing in the world as a backup. The one thing I don't like is when the expectation literally is, and this has happened so much like this school clearly is, oh, if you call in sick in the morning, you need to upload your planning and send it all into the school though, so they can use it. Two things to that. I don't think that's a good policy. I think there are lots of ways you can counteract that. Like why is it in the morning that no one has the planning anywhere? Like surely there should be a school system where the planning's uploaded. Like we had, we just had shared drive folders when the planning was done, whether it was a week before or even a few days before the weekend, whatever, it was just uploaded to that folder. So at least if you were sick two days later, your planning was already there. Do you know what I mean? Like, there's just lots of things that can happen before it gets to the point where the, the, the typical school policy is, oh, yeah, if you're sick, you have to do some work in the morning, right, So that you can be sick.

11:13 Like, I hate that. Why does it get to that? If it gets to that, it's poor management. Of the school, I I agree, I completely agree and and it and it cannot, but it can also be just to put it back on the teacher a little bit. I think when it's immediate, I do think like I cannot imagine any point in my school career genuinely where if I was sick, like let's say a Tuesday night. Yeah. And therefore on Wednesday I was off There was there was genuinely never a situation where my lesson wasn't ready for that day. Yeah. Yeah. Like so so I do I do think that there comes something like upon you where it's I think it's reasonable to expect a teacher that if they're I'll the night before, well, the lesson is already there. It's already there. And if it's not, then you know OK sending an. E-mail. Like, yeah, like it's yeah, exactly. It's like there has to be something in place. And what I'm circling back to is what I said. I think even in that worst case scenario, I do still think there has to be a schoolwide policy of well, it's just batch of resources we can use.

12:06 That's what I think. I think that as well. Yeah. Yeah. There we go. Anyway, next question, go on. My head teacher has announced that in September she's looking at moving where teachers are going to teach. None of us want to move as we are happy where we are and staff have not been moved in around 10 years as far as I'm aware. All staff have questioned if we have an input in this and we're point blank told no. Coincidentally the latest we were here where where we will go is the day before the May deadline. That's interesting. So it seems either suck it up or leave. Shouldn't there be a discussion at least between staff and head teacher rather than just being dictated to? What do you think? I don't know. I don't think I agree. You know, go on. I'm a little bit like I think first. Hayden thinks you're wrong, listener.

12:48 I'm trying to be polite but my gut feeling is. What? What wrong about what? Go on, dive. Into it the the head teacher, your boss is well within their rights to move you to a different class because you're a teacher and and there's no part of your teaching contact that says I only work in year 4 and I have to do it from 10 years or more. If anything, take that. That's screaming out to me. Crikey, yeah, let's, let's move the staff around a bit. They've been in the same place for 10 years. For what reason? Just. Just to spice up the job a little. Bit why, why why do we need to spice up? If these teachers have been doing it for 10 years, know the curriculum at the back of their hand, clearly good are good here. Let's assume why. Why, why? Why? Is just to spice up reason OK? To spice it up was a terrible, terrible explanation. There's more to it, right? I was being polite and trying to frame it in a way where anyone just say what what are you talking about?

13:31 Actually, that is the worst reason, just to spice it up. The reason to me is, and I think there is absolute evidence of this just from my career. And I think it's, you know, there's probably more evidence out there in terms of other people experiencing it too. I think moving teachers around to get experience in different year groups genuinely, genuinely makes you a better teacher. I think if you are only in year 6 and you have no experience of any of the the stuff that happens before that, I don't think that makes you a bad teacher. But I do think it will potentially make you a better teacher if you go and teach in year 4 and Year 5 for a couple of years and then go back to year 6. I think year six teachers that have been in in previous years have a better holistic understanding of the journey through Key Stage 2 and are therefore better teachers when they are in any of those respective year groups. So just to spice it up is it was a terrible way of saying there is legitimate reasons I think that you can become you can be a better practitioner if you're not stagnating in the same year group.

14:18 Can you imagine? This long it's happening and you go into your head, you're like, why are you doing this? And the head just like just to spice it up baby. And you're like what? And they just throw some peri peri salt in your face. OK. I'd say if I was a head teacher, I'd do it just to rage bait my stuff, I think, and then I'd tell them the real reason. But I think there's weight in that, you know? Yeah. So I, I don't, I don't disagree with that. I don't disagree with the fact that at the end of the day, you contract, you're a teacher in the school, you're a key stage 2 teacher or a key stage one key stage 2 or primary, whatever it says. And therefore you can be moved. I do think in a school built around trust and respect and professionalism that I, I, I don't, I don't necessarily like this what it seems to be portrayed as the head being a bit like I'm the boss to get over it. I'd I have always experienced in my every single year in every school I've worked in that there is at least some kind of preference form that goes out or or a conversation that goes out every year for for a teacher to at least put their point across. Now it might be that they end up struggling to fill the year groups and someone doesn't get what they need or doesn't get what they want rather than say, but like some people might. I think that to me should happen. So the fact that's not happening to me, I don't think that's wrong.

15:30 Sorry, I don't, I don't think that's that the right thing to do where there's nothing at all. I think it's obviously it's acceptable. Obviously the head can do that. I'm not saying it's, it's completely wrong and it's broken. You should go to a tribunal about it because that's not true. But I'm just saying in in a school I want to work in or a school that I would want to manage, that would be a really key part of this process when I'm changing teachers around. To ask you a question to see if it changed your perspective at all. I'm just adding some context. This is not part of the question. This is just in my made-up one, right? Would it, would your answer be different if in the previous nine years where everyone's been in the same place, the head teacher did ask and they all consistently every single year said I just want to stay where I am. And the head teacher got to the point where like where they're thinking, I know there is way in being a better practitioner by moving staff around. Nobody wants to move around.

16:14 And I know I'm going to get the same answer for the 10th year in a row, so I'm just going to do the hard thing. Would it change your opinion? Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, it would. It would because in that, in that respect, the question has still been asked if it's the same people three years later. Well, I still ask the I still, I still got this information. We didn't ask them this year though. No, no, that's fine because I'm saying that's OK because it's the same people and I still have had that process of asking them. And that means the conversation has been open for a few years. OK. And because that conversation has been open, I think starting off with what do you prefer? What's your preferences before I make the decision that I've got to make at the end of the day, I think that's better than just saying, oh, I'm the head teacher, I'm going to change it right now. So as long as that conversation has been opened and then that allows you to have the conversation after all, right? OK, you've had the preference for year 4 few years in a row now.

16:57 I've kept you there. I really want to change it this year now and I'm going to change it. That's a much easier conversation and to me much more reasonable than simply going, I'm changing it now. I'm just not not mentioning anything. So I think it's it's about it being a process. And I think opening up, you just have to open up at some point, have a dialogue with your staff. Like they're not OK. They're my subordinates. OK, yeah. Like I agree, like they are just professionals. Dialogue is important. Open that dialogue. There is one part of this which makes me think. I don't know that I reckon. I reckon maybe the head is being that context we just gave there makes me think, I reckon the head wasn't doing that, which is this part here, the latest we're here. Where we're going is the day before the May deadline. The fact that they are purposefully not telling their staff where they're moving until. They just they have 12 hours to the 12 hours. Decide to quit, I think is a bit like that's a bit shitty in my opinion.

17:47 I think if you're going to do this and you like, if you know, even if you know it's still best for your staff ultimately to move around and it might even just, it might revitalise some staff. I personally think you can absolutely stagnate in the job of teaching if you're in the same class and teaching the same stuff year after year after year. 10 years is quite a long time to be doing that. And as a leader, you might think, I know they're super comfortable, but I want them to go into a new environment and revitalise their teaching practition, right? And, and I know that that will happen, but they're not going to want to do it. I still think you have to then give your staff the respect to say you might not like this. I think it's best for all of you. But if you really, really, really don't want to, I am going to give you an opportunity to leave. But as your boss, this is a change I'm going to be making.

18:27 There is no reason in my contract I can't make this change. It's really not that unreasonable to move a teacher to a different year group, but I'm going to give you a month's notice. Yeah. Yeah. I think forcing them to do it right before then that, you know, they might quit is a bit like, that's a bit mean. I don't think you need to do that. And and do you know what if if I was a head teacher in a school where me moving someone's year group after 10 years of being in the same one was a reason enough for them to want to leave, I'd want them to leave. And that's not even me being rude or anything, that's just me being genuine there where I'm saying if that is enough to tip you over the bar, then absolutely go and find a new school where they'll probably put you in a random year group anyway. Are you gonna go and find an exact year group in a different school? Probably not.

19:09 Yeah, to me, it'll probably get to the point where I'm just like, it's been years. This is the context. I think the context has to be really clear that you've worked with these people for a long time, You've opened that dialogue. If it's still a problem, then it's like, OK, I'll let you make that choice then. Yeah, Because I think most people would still just stay in the school they're at and just go to Year 3. Definitely and realise it's maybe not that bad like 99% of the time. So the head teacher might also. I'm just thinking something lay layers to this. They might, they might generally be looking at that school and thinking, honestly, half the teachers are really, really complacent and stagnating in these roles. They don't know it because they're just super comfortable. I don't want to say that to them because it sounds horrible. Yeah. So I'm just going to make the move. I know it all. I know I have a positive impact. I don't have to tell everyone that it's because, oh, you're all doing, not doing very well in your jobs right now. Like because that might sound, but they might be thinking that they might be thinking.

19:54 Sorry, listener, Hey, just gone for you. No. No, I'm not saying that because I'm in my own made-up scenario this might not be true whatsoever, but I can imagine a head teacher thinking I'm going to make this choice and it's going to come across me and they're going to think I'm being considerate. But I. Don't actually want to say to them the truth, which is I want to move you all around because I think you'll be better practitioners because you've stagnated in the same year group for 10 years. They might be thinking that. And I think there's just, there's loads of layers to this where I'm like, there is just a reality where perhaps it's just a good choice. I don't like the fact that they haven't opened the dialogue before. Yeah, that ultimately Trump's this whole thing for me. I think in this real life context, I think this head teachers probably just not being very kind about it. But I think there are realities where a teacher would want to make that change for good reasons. And the staff might not like it, but it's still a good reason to do it. OK, let's let's move on to another question where we can completely make up the situation and answer something that wasn't answered. Let's do that.

20:39 I hope that helps. I don't know this way that really helps You're you're an idiot who's wrong? That's just really gonna happen. Well done, Hayden. Just. Because you spent the whole last time doing that. The followers count has gone down by one. Yeah, sleep. All right, Next question is the last episode wasn't that bad. I just called everyone a shill. Study suggests children's happiness in school drops between primary and secondary. What could secondary learn from primaries? Obviously they work very differently. What? Okay, let's narrow it down to just simply, let's try and make it a bit more concise. What could secondaries learn from primary in the context of happiness? I can only speak very, very briefly about my own experience. Yeah, go on. I moved from a small one form primary school.

21:23 I was the only one who went to my grammar school. The secondary school that I went to, I was the only one that went there, and that was sixth form. So six classes, right? OK. Across. Yeah, with a sixth form as well. Sixth form with a sixth form and huge. And the first month of me being there, I felt horrendous. I wanted to stay at home, didn't want to go into school anymore. It was too big. It was daunting. My happiness dropped off massively. So is there anything that school could have done or is it just simply the case of suck it up? That's just, well. I think I don't have to be, but I don't think you have to suck it up. But I think it is a case of the way the system is built where you have such a communal kind of, you know, primary school is so nurturing you with one person every single day.

22:07 They're often a bit smaller than secondary schools, and you're often with your same teacher all day. Yeah. Yeah. To change basically everything at once in a massive lead where you've been in this school for seven years of your life. You know, everyone at the back of your hand. The teachers are really close to you. Your teacher. You've got 1 teacher who's like your idol to to match everything up with then going to secondary school, which is huge. You're just a cog in the machine. You're going to seven different people every single day. Yeah. And they teach tonnes of classes, so exactly that super you don't. Have it's not as much and this is nothing against secondary school teachers, nothing against secondary school in general. This is just a simple look at how I personally think that the question what could secondaries learn from primary? I think it's really tricky to actually give that information because I don't think secondaries just aren't trying. I think that is his fundamentalist systemic issue where because of the way the two things are ran, that will inevitably drop off in my opinion. Of course I agree and I'm also wondering. I want to know your thoughts on this. How how much of the sort of happiness drop off in secondary school do you think is genuinely nothing to do with the school and attributed to the fact that when we grow up, Jake, typically secondary schools, we go through puberty and all emotions change it.

23:17 Like all of that stuff kicks in. Yeah. Like if you were just a guest, because obviously this is not. Yeah, of course. How much do you think is just attributed to that? And there's. Nothing we can do. I don't think it is I I think it'll be really kind of stupid and dark for us to sit here and try and say how much is attributed to whatever. Never do it though. I'm not gonna never give me a number. We are podcast Bros yeah. I think it's because of the woke 65 cent. It's the woke BLOB media. That's that's that's why yeah. No, I what I think it's just another reason. Yeah, it's just another reason why that happens in secondary school. And again, I can only think about my own experience where in that month or two when I first went to that school, it it you know, it was the same school that I loved two years later that I, that I, I look back at secondary school experience. It was an unbelievable school.

24:00 I loved it. I made such good friends. I had. It was, it was like a huge community by the end. Because you build that up again, but you have to go back to scratch. You have to start again from nothing. And when you have the context of your old school, which you obviously adore because you're a young child that is just naturally I was going to drop off and I did drop off. And I, I don't blame the school for that remotely. No. And again, you're like, you're saying you're going through puberty, your hormones are all over the place. You're just, you're in a new environment with new people. Yeah. The systems are different. The way you interact with your teachers are different. They expect, they probably you, you go to from being the oldest who knows everything at the back of their hand and understands it to brand new to a new institution that has new rules, new expectations.

24:40 That's usually higher. Homework's usually higher as well. Yeah, everything's bigger and it can just be such a poor moment that if the question is what could secondaries learn from primaries? The the only thing I really think could have a massive impact is to try and make that bridge a bit stronger and and have those links to set a primary school before they go. Ease it, more ease it rather than that drop off. Exactly that, yeah. Just just build up something a bit more. And when they're in 7-8 and nine, that key stage 3 journey, yeah, maybe just make it a bit more similar to primary school. Maybe just have a few more teachers who teach a couple of lessons. Yeah, maybe have more of a stronger link with your form. I don't know. I don't know the answer because I don't work in a secondary school and I think secondary schools probably do a lot of well I.

25:20 Was going to say this is more commonplace than when we went to secondary school already like I already hear stories of. This how many primary school teachers have you heard of? Because I've heard of a lot who have gone into a role in key stage 3 being an explicitly key stage 3. And their their role is essentially, of course they do teaching, but their role is essentially to manage the children in that, in that transition. I think, I think that's key. Like I what I basically don't want to do is sit here and say, yeah, secondary, it's so different to primary. I teach primary, kids are so happy they go to secondary. The whole, I don't think it's an issue with the people. I think they're doing the best they can 100%. But what I'm saying, I still think we can do something in key Stage 3 and it and it feels like a lot of secondaries are doing that. Exactly that the end of the day, it's a big change both personally for a child to go through those, those age jumps of teenage years and it's a big change literally going from the school setup of a primary school to a typical school setup of a secondary school, right? So those things are like, you've got to factor them in. We can't do everything about that. I just end with like 1 personal experience. I don't know if it's more widespread read for me, but I felt that a primary school, if I did feel emotional anyway, I really genuinely knew exactly who's talked to and exactly who to go to, who cared about me enough that I could just have these conversations like a family liaison officer or even just my teacher because like you said, I saw them every day constantly.

26:27 We didn't have said I just literally got taught by the same person all day every day. Whereas in secondary school, I do distinctly remember thinking, particularly when I was old, like 14/15/16, I was like, I have no idea who to talk to. Like when I'm feeling whatever I'm feeling, whether it's a negative emotion, I guess I just didn't know who to go to. And maybe there were people that people in place and I just didn't that bridge wasn't built enough for me personally. Other kids may be thinking what I knew exactly who to go to. But all I can say is I knew what to do in primary school and I didn't know who to go to in secondary school. So there could be some more work done there, maybe just to make that build that bridge, like you said, of care in a bigger environment where you do have seven different teachers every single day and not necessarily guaranteed you're going to get that one teacher like your primary school teacher who you feel that bond with. Yeah, definitely, for sure.

27:07 Completely agree, absolutely cool. Right next one. I'm looking at starting my reports for the end of the year and have previously been told by leadership that in no circumstances are we allowed to use AI to help write them. Any advice on how to get this job done quickly without tearing my hair out because I can't use AI? Or even maybe is there something I could go to my leadership with to suggest that actually I should be allowed to use it? Number one, if it's really that much of a problem and your school are like, oh, you can't use AI, do it anyway because they won't know what are they talking about? Can't you say I all right? Won't they know? Won't they know? Great question, champ. Well, it turns out that Bob Hash Colon had a great year. And that's all down to you like you, can't you? Can't the massive MD?

27:50 Yeah, exactly. Yeah, 100%. They can't tell if you actually put a little bit of effort into making it more personalised. Little Johnny had a Goodyear in Mass. You're damn right he did. OK, I remember being told a couple of years ago that my by the head teacher, he was like genuinely blown away of how good and personalised my reports were. And I was like wrote all of those of AII thought they are personalised because I gave it a bullet point list of all of the personal things literally from my brain that needs to go into it. But it formed a paragraph for me. And guess what? That paragraph was written considerably better than what I would have written after the 30th iteration of writing reports. I don't think we need to go into exactly how to use AI to write reports. We've done it so often. Go back and look at our episodes, just search reports in the little search bar because there'll be something on there that we've talked about previously. We've had Mr Peon talking about AI because he he has teach Mate that they do different reports.

28:36 So listen, it's a huge part of reports right now. What I do want to say is this because just based on the back of what your story that you've just said about the, the head teacher being shocked how personalised they were, and then you told him it was AII actually don't think that's good. I, I no, what let me really clear. I don't think it's good to use AI genuinely in an environment where no one knows that it's being used at all. Right. OK, I, I know we joked before about just use AI. Let me be really clear why there has to be really clear rules around safeguarding GDPR, OK, GDPR and safeguarding in general and uploading personal information to large language models, OK? So when we say, and I went a bit too far because when we say in there, just pretend, I actually think it's also acceptable to use it. And and you can't tell.

29:23 However, there has to be there's there's has to be some threshold where either you've done some training yourself or you've been given training around how to do it safely. That isn't breaking GDPR, that isn't uploading personal information and names of children to large language models to do that learning of yeah, yeah, just to generate your. Report. You know what? That is actually a really, really good point. The idea that even one person will listen to that and then use AI listen to me saying that and then use. AI full names. Badly with with breaking GDPR guys on T-shirt Pete said to do it is actually awful. So let's bring it back a little bit. I still think it's completely acceptable to use reports. But like Dylan said that if your school doesn't have an AI policy and you're deciding to go against the school's rules, which, you know, probably shouldn't do, but it's me saying anyway, yeah, you have to at least be GDP compliant yourself. So they've gotten compliance.

30:10 So anytime you ever used AI to write a report done. And ask you right now and I've said this before, but it's so important to say yeah, yeah, yeah. What did you do to make sure you were not breaching these basic things? Firstly, I'm just going to be really clear to people, there is a difference between us saying use AI when you're not allowed to and saying still use it safely. So I'm just saying there's two things. Panicky. Now, no, no, no, I'm not panicky. I'm just what you said. I was like, let's be really clear to people. Yeah, use it, but use it safely. It has to be done in terms of what I did when I wrote my reports. I, I was never, ever using the names of, of pupils. Yeah, not once. So I'd, I'd write bullet point list of the, the child that I was writing about. Like I'd have my Word document open with their name and maybe some data, etcetera. And I would have a script where I would have 567 bullet points and it would just be like one or two words, behaviour, attainment, F social skills, whatever it is that I want to include in my report because different schools will have different needs. So you just have that yourself.

31:03 I had this little script, 7 bullet points was like, cool. So then I sat down and I had the my class list and I'd be like, right, cool, little Jimmy, let's do him now. And I won't put that name in obviously. And it would say OK behaviour and I would say excellently behaved at all times. Sure. Done. So you keep it all nameless. Just really nameless, excellent behaviour at all times. As simple as that. That's like 6 words. Yeah, it's 5 words. It's. Yeah. OK, sorry. Next one. Social skills. Struggle to maintain friendships. This year has a couple of close friends. Yeah. That'll take me to. I know this. This is taking no effort whatsoever because I know the kids at the back of my hand. I just know it. That'll take me 3 minutes. Yeah. 3 minutes. Copy, paste. No names at all. Copy paste into AI.

31:47 I would. I would already be telling what I'm doing. I want a formal written report based the end of year there. It's for a year 4 class in key stage 2. Nothing to do location, nothing to do names, nothing at all that's identifiable for the school. Nothing that's identifiable for the child. Go say, OK, cool. Send me your notes. I send the notes in. It will generate a paragraph, copy, paste. And I'd say to it, whenever you would write a name in here, leave a blank. Yeah. Or put a question mark, whatever it was, whatever it is. So I copy it into the report. And what's great then is I'm going to read this through anyway and make any amendments. Yeah. What forces me to do that is the fact there's no names in it. Yeah, so you have to read them. So I. Have to read it through so there's no names in it. Now I copy it over every time there's a blank I write in the name and I'm reading the report.

32:28 Oh actually I don't like that wording. It's a bit off to change that, or I wanted to make sure I put this in about the club. Actually, I forgot to write that. Write that in. So what you're doing here essentially is you're writing the report, you're putting every bit of information in through the bullet points. It's just putting it into some prose for you, which reads nicely and is professional. And then you're going through editing anyway because you're adding in the name to me. That process for me produced the best reports ever, ever, ever. And. Shaved lots of time off absolutely right. And I know for some people, and it's interesting, I've had discussions about people that were like they swear by doing exactly that and they really like the time that goes into an effort is putting the bullet points. Basically. There are some people I did this once as well and I thought it was quite good where I just I had the meta list of bullet points that I wanted, like you said, like I'd have a thing that says something about behaviour, something about attainment, something about this, this, this and this. And then I would literally use a voice to text like, so when I talked AI and I just literally tell it rather than me typing it down, I'd literally say this, this and this, this kid, this does this.

33:24 They behave really well. A couple of friends, they struggled back in turn 1 with this thing. And then I just, I didn't have to type it. I'd just tell AI to do it that way. So that saved me a little bit more time. But I do realise that you have to be quite confident just to reel it off the Dome without stopping and thinking whilst you're typing. And making sure that you don't accidentally just say, oh, yeah, and. And Ava, his mate. Yeah. Just be careful you don't say so exactly when you're typing. You can curate it. That's true. That's good point, yeah. So I think I basically it's gone off on a tangent slightly. I think I think it is absolutely should be used for reports because I think hopefully for some people who are unsure about maybe the personalisation aspect of it, I'm hoping that's explained how it is still actually quite personable. Yeah. Because it has to come from you. It can't be made. It can't be plucked out of thin air. Absolutely. So when you said, or maybe even something I could take to my head to suggest why we should be allowed to use it, maybe you can to summarise some of this conversation we've just had. That shows how it can be completely GDPR compliant, completely safe and also produce really good personalised reports.

34:13 Still take that conversation to them. That ultimately is better, jokes aside, than just saying to them, yeah, whatever, and going off and hoping that you follow. GDPR compliance. Yourself and potentially risking your job. Maybe don't do the thing I said at the start, which I'm now thinking. No. And if no, but I think it is about safety. If you're for example, a lot of the products out there that do report generation, they are GDPR compliant. It's a company, they, they will say we have built this to be GDP compliant, We've built this to be safeguarding compliant wherever it might be. So then you know, you can put in what you want. It doesn't save anything either. It will tell, it will make sure for you. So that's when using that kind of scaffold around it, rather than just going to a large language model, you have your own.

34:53 That's where it can be better to do because you know, it's protected. You can still do the large language model, which is just your own personal account. You just have to be very mindful of the fact that you cannot give any identifying features away of any children. OK, reverse everything I just said about being safe. Go back to the the original 1 where I was saying be reckless and be a rebel. If you're really worried about doing it just school you can't be bothered to have the conversation with your school. Just use something like Teach My AI or Rocket AI where they put all that scaffolding for you and they've made it safeguard to compliant and do it anyway. Should we make our own one? I think we should, yeah. Should we? It's going to be called. It's going to be called Teach Sleep, Report, repeat. Oh. Teach, sleep, report, repeat. You kept repeating. But I just want you have to do more than one report. That's true. So teach. But you have to teach and sleep before you do your next report. Yeah, I was.

35:36 Yeah, between. Each one takes a few months. We'll work on it. We'll. Work. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, next question. I love teaching, but I cannot afford to live. Doesn't that isn't that 2026 in a nutshell? There pretty much just someone saying who's got a job that as a professional, I can't afford to live. Brilliant. I'm single, in my 30s, I rent and I can't save a penny. At what point is it irresponsible to stay in a job that you love but that keeps you financially stuck? It feels like any jump into a new career would mean a pay cut that I can I cannot afford even though 5 to 10 years down the line I would be in a better position. How normal? How normal is it? Very, very normal. I feel like it really like we're living up to the name repeat in our podcast because I feel like I hear this sort of thing a lot. Like you're worried about this sort of thing asking similar sort.

36:20 Of questions I I very clearly, very quickly anyone listening as well. I'd love to know if you can leave a comment down in the Spotify section or whatever, wherever you are listening to this. How many people that you work with have you had this exact conversation with where they say these words? I would love to find a different job, but I don't know what to do. I can't afford the pay cut. Yeah. How many? I I, I, so many people said like it's, it's scarily high as a percentage of teachers I've worked with who genuinely think that it's like it's genuinely like 25. Percent isn't isn't that so like depressing on society though? Because simultaneously that person is saying typically I don't earn enough money in this job. Yeah, to live my life properly. Yeah. And I can't quit because other jobs I earn even less.

37:03 Yeah. Like how old? Like, and but that's, that is genuinely like, firstly, there are other jobs that earn less than the teacher. Yeah. So when we talk about teachers not earning enough, it's not us being rude to those people as well. It's just saying, yeah, God, that's crap as well. Yeah, exactly. But this is a job where you get a qualification, you go to university, it's professional. It's very important. You should be able to afford to live as a single person in this society. If you work as a full time teacher. What we, what we're talking about, you should be able to afford to live. But the point, the point also is that regardless of that, even when you go into a career which has more of a, let's say the ceiling's much higher of what you can eventually earn, you have to put the grunt work in at the start where you're not earning as much. Now that's easier to do when you're 22 because you might be living at home still, you've not moved out yet. You can take that hit because, you know, OK, I'm going to earn 20 grand for four years as a teacher. I'd be on 30 grand by the end of that. Wow.

37:56 Teaching's much better for the short term. But that person also knows that as a childhood surveyor, by the time they're 35, they'll be on 80 grand. Yeah, right. So as if you're in your 30s now and you're thinking, oh, gosh, I wish I could do that. That would be great. I could earn lots more money. But you actually, at that point in your life, can't afford to do the four years at 20 grand. Then people get stuck like this. Yeah, definitely, definitely. It's it's a horrible feeling horrible. Like I I what? What do you? Because I feel like you quite often have opinions on this. You're laughing. You could say that about anything. Yeah. Yeah. Just click that. But you, no, you have, you have, I feel like you have quite a strong opinion on like almost like a motivational opinion. Normally you, you quite often will say something along the lines of find a way to do it.

38:36 Do you know what I mean? Like. Yeah, but I, I, again, I hopefully when I say this kind of stuff, I, I absolutely want to make clear to people now that I I hate it when you hear these gurus online saying just work harder like you. Yeah, I hate, it's not like me. It's the opposite of me. Should be really clear. That's not what I think. I hate it when I say I'll just work harder. You know Simon Squibb. Yeah, right. Fantastic. What he's doing. Look him up, genuinely look him up. He goes around with a with a microphone. Ask people what their dream is. Yeah. OK. Yeah, yeah. Nice content, lovely. It's great. Everyone should have a dream, right? If everyone did that, we wouldn't have fundamentally important roles happening in our society. It is a nice thing, and I don't want to be the person to say people shouldn't follow their dreams. Like, what a ridiculous thing you'd have to end up saying. However, we do need teachers.

39:29 Yeah, this, this person in their 30s who's single, who rents, who can't afford to save up for a deposit to get their own house, who can't afford to save money and invest for their future. That person doesn't need someone to come along and say what's your dream? What do you want to do? What do you want to do? What do you do? If you do anything, what can you do? Yeah, go and do it, man. They can't do it. They would have done it if they could, Right. So there has to be a middle ground. That's my point here. It should be completely normal and acceptable that you can just work as a full time teacher and get on in life. That needs to be the baseline in my opinion. That's not happening right now. Yeah. So that if you're a single person on one income living on your own, you need to be able to sustain yourself properly in any job you do in a society that's remotely functioning. OK.

40:12 That's the that's the baseline, the next level, which is where I come in and say, look, OK, let's look at your individual situation and what you can do as an individual. Now ignore the fact everyone can't do this. I know everyone can't do this. And I think as generic advice, it's just awful. And it just makes people feel bad for doing what is an absolutely acceptable thing in their life, ends up making them feel bad for thinking I'm not getting by. And this job that I'm doing, you should be getting by. And it's not a you problem. It's a system problem. Next level up, though, you're talking to someone on an individual level. If they're single in their 30s and they rent and they can't afford to pay money, I'm actually trying to help them. I'm actually trying to help them now. And I'm saying, OK, look, we all agree this is nonsense, but this is the situation we're in. What can we do about it? Yeah, Option one, go to a lower paying job and take the hit for a bit. Let's look at your finances. You literally can't afford to do that.

40:53 There's nowhere local you can move to to rent for less because that's the level of rent that's not an option for you. What else can we do? OK, you are a teacher. Can we reduce your workload so that you can spend more of your holidays trying something different? Yeah. You get 13 weeks off a year. I, I granted for you personally right now, I bet you work for loads of those 13 weeks. How can we reduce that workload to stay within your, the quality of your teaching that doesn't impact that, but that gives you more time. That is definitely something we can action. Cool. We've made more time now. OK, cool. Now that I've made this time, how can I spend this time either doing something I'm passionate about or something I'm good at? Yeah, hopefully it's the same thing. But whatever it might be, it could be, it could be literally anything. It might literally be tutoring because that's your job. Can you do some tutoring? Can you put yourself out a little bit more? Can you do a few social, social media posts, all actionable small things that you can at least try. It might not work, but you can at least try to do that. These are the 2 levels that I'm working at and this is what I want to make really clear to people. That bottom layer is the most important one. You need to understand that it is not a you problem that you work as a full time teacher in your 30s and you can't afford to save for a deposit right now.

41:54 That is a systemic problem. That is not a you problem. You should carry no burden of that as a personal guilt whatsoever. The next level though, is where I think what your point making is that I talk about this. What can you do? I think there is still always something you can do though, and whether other people choose to do that or not is their prerogative. But for you, if you want to try and do something, there's usually something that you can try and do. And it might not work, but it might, and you'd at least like to try. I like, I always like that analogy and and I do think it falls into that risky area of just saying people just work harder because it's basically saying sacrifice your hard earned time off and use that to maybe try and retrain in a new job. Use a percentage of that time, if it's a small percentage to try and learn a new skill or get qualified so that you can transition into another job without having to just straight up quit and then spend 2 years training on no income.

42:41 I get it. But it's sort of like like you said in that exact situation though, you're talking to that exact person. They're saying, what can I do? That is an option though for you. You don't have to do it. You don't have to do it. I did think of an option free. You're already, I know, I know. It's going to be mental option. Free if you're in this situation, just get married to someone random who earns income and then you. That will help if you rent. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that's option free. Can I marry you? You how much do you earn? That's the only question that I need to know in this. Situation, you'll find that we earn exactly the same amount of teacher. I know what you earn in that Case, No. I need someone not that sugar partner who earns. More to my sugar marriage, daddy.

43:25 Ohh, gosh, I hope that I hope you understand what we're saying there and I think it is important, right? Let's stop there. And these questions we've still got here to go through. Let's not just forget they exist and leave them in the next week, every week. So we'll carry on next week and we'll actually use all the questions we get sent. We love it when you send us questions. You can find the link down below to join our WhatsApp community. It's completely free. Before we go, Hayden, anything you want to say? Well, if you do join the WhatsApp community, you can moan at Dylan for moaning at you on the podcast versos and you can get a Direct Line to him. So do that. Inspire the next rant. See ya.