Supply teaching, like any job, can be absolutely amazing and have you skipping home on your toes, it can also give you the worst tension headache and have you repeatedly asking yourself why you put yourself through such stress for a wage packet.
Yesterday I experienced the latter.
I got a last minute shout to cover in the afternoon in a school I've not been to before. The brief was simple: year 6 or 3 (school haven't decided yet), French but no planning required as school have resources and a package they'd like you to follow. Brilliant, no problem at all. Except...no planning, two year 6 classes back to back, both of which who have had a different supply teacher for French since the start of term, no TA support, no information on the classes I was teaching (numbers, key personalities etc), it was a windy day, plus they'd had parents' morning and MacMillan Coffee Morning....it was awful! Truly terrible.
I had to interrupt their class teacher's PPA, something I never do and have never done before, knowing full well how precious uninterrupted PPA time is.
The class TA tried her best to reassure me that they were usually a good class...but I'm not and indeed wasn't, convinced.
I rarely do this but that school is one school on my strike list, I will be thinking long and hard before I take another booking there. Harsh? Perhaps to some but if I compare the school to the many others I've been in and I think about the fact they've had different supply each week, I'm not sure the whole error lies in the brief from the agency. Plus, I'm mindful of the class TA's comments later concerning the habitual behaviour from the very children I had issues with. Either which way I count myself extremely lucky that I'm able to be in the position as a supply teacher in which I can take control of my working conditions.
Maybe not quite one strike and you're out but almost there....
