Teacher Life: 8–3 or 24/7?

Is teaching really an 8–3 job… or is it a lifestyle that never truly clocks out?

In this episode, we pull back the curtain on what teacher life actually looks like beyond the classroom doors. From common misconceptions like “summers off” and “done by 3” to the emotional and mental work educators carry long after the school day ends, we’re having honest conversation about the realities people don’t always see.

We discuss the invisible workload, the heart teachers pour into supporting students, and the challenge of creating boundaries in a career that easily becomes 24/7. Along the way, we share relatable moments, personal reflections, and a few laughs about the things only teachers understand.

Whether you’re an educator, a parent, or someone curious about what teaching truly demands, this episode offers real talk about passion, balance, burnout, and protecting your peace while doing meaningful work.

Because teaching may not stop at 3 o’clock but it also shouldn’t take over your life.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

I'm Miss Jane. And I'm Miss Durden. And welcome to the Bell Ringer. Class is officially in session. Hey y'all, or welcome back to another episode of The Bell Ringer. On our last episode, we talked to parents and about how important it is to show up. But today we're talking about what teachers carry every single day. So the pressing question is: is teaching really an eight to three job or does it follow you home? So, first up, let's talk about some misconceptions, some things that people think teaching is. So, first one that's very popular, we get the summers off. Absolutely. We do not get the summers off. School, first of all, we don't really even have a summer. Because if you look at it now, our school count, our school calendar doesn't end in May. It ends in June. It ends in June. And then if you're an educator who works a summer program, then you work from the end of the school year up until July. Next up, you're done at three. And in reality, we can't clock clock out until 3 15 anyway. But if there's due, if you have duty, um, if there's a faculty meeting, if parent night, parent night, you know what? Literacy night, numeracy night night, we have swap night, we have the list goes on and on of the things that take place after school. If you're the sponsor for an organization, so if you coach, if you are the sponsor for the academic bowl team, if you're the sponsor for spelling bee, the list goes on and on of all the things that we have to do beyond three o'clock. Next up. Now, this one is because people will always use this one to make teaching the highlight of it all. And they when they tell us that we get paid during the summer. All right, so we do not get paid during the summer. Teachers are actually nine-month employees, so our checks are just slit between the 12 months. So now technically we're not getting paid. We already did the work, and they're just stretching our salary across those two months.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

In our case, a month and a half.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Very true, very true. Next up, it's just lesson plans and teaching. Teaching is so much more than just the lesson plans and getting up in front of the class and teaching is so much more. And then one of the last misconceptions: people not realizing the emotional labor. It is, if you think of one adult in the room with at least 15 to 20. Some classes have 25 to 30. So that one adult and all of those children, the different emotions, the different personalities, the different situations. Right. That's a lot. That's a lot on one person. It's a lot. When they I think there's also a shift when a class, you know, classes develop their own chemistry throughout the school year. And once the chem, whatever that chemistry is that's established, that's when the other problems come in. I know today, I think like they start acting like brothers and sisters. Right. So just imagine so just imagine having 20 children in one household all together. Right. The situation, you know, the situations, the lat, the laughs, the disagreements, all of those things together. It's a lot. And not only that, when you when you're in that, when you're in that space and children develop a relationship with you, and you become their safety net, it releases a lot of other problems and things you have to address as well.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

That emotional labor part is it's big. I used to the difference between teaching and doing a nine-to-five, not to discredit. I I can go to bed and wake up. I don't know what I'm getting tomorrow. I don't know if a student's gonna come in sad, on edge, wanna fight. I literally like at a certain part of the year, I kind of get very angst, and I'm kind of like, what am I gonna get? I've had classes where I've had a great class and great times, and I'm gonna leave it right here. There have been some days where when I had children that were suspended, it was almost a relief. Or I remember having a parent text me and go, My child won't beat it today. And I was like, Whoo, thank you, Lord. Not in that sense and just being honest, because you just never know. And I used to say this students sometimes used to have those rough classes or just have a class, you got seven different personalities just in one student, and then multiply that by at least 15 to the max 25, 30 kids. So you're talking about 210 personalities, so it's almost like you're a supervisor. If I can touch a little bit on week where we get summers off, a lot of times we're recuperating because August is the hardest month of teaching, in my opinion. After March, April. To me, August is the hardest, and we're not talking about teaching like the bird, we're talking about teaching the profession because back to school is a lie, because as Miss James was saying, she has like her classes, like they're like brothers and sisters now, but you have to create systems in order to have your class to run smoothly. I can stand in the hallway, my students know what to do. Now, the emotional labor part is at this point is some that's just still trying to system. So that brings us to our next topic the 24-7, the reality teaching some talking points is thinking about students after hours. So, you all may think teachers get somersault and we're done at three. On Monday morning, I had four minutes dojos. I physically had to turn it off. I have had parents to text me up until midnight. Did I reply? No, I saw it like last night. So there are, for example, like today, tomorrow, my students will take the math ACAP. And both me and my teammate, I support her in math as a science teacher. We don't want to say we're stressed out, but we're just thinking, I'm like, is everybody gonna get a good night's sleep? Everybody's like, nobody's sick, everybody's safe. You know, sometimes I have had those academic worries, and I've also had those supporting um kids beyond the academics, like praying for children, wondering if they were in a safe situation. There's so much because I've when I first started teaching, I've dealt with divorced couples, couples fighting over custody of the child. The list goes on. X is planning, grading, and adjusting lessons. So thankfully, I am a science and a social study teacher right now, currently, and I hope to keep being that. So in our district, and I don't know if everybody follows this rule, you have a two grades per subject per week. I teach two subjects. I am expected to post four grades a week. So in planning what to grade, what not to grade, I do a bell ringer. If you have an assignment and they fail on it, but you want to also grading it was the hardest thing for me to get to. I think I finally got into got to a point where I know what to grade and what to wait. And when I first started, parents had access to power school or what was to see their children's grades, but they never used it. But at the school I work at, those parents see like I remember my first time putting in grades, and I was like, I gotta put in zeros, I gotta put in L's because y'all not doing the work. And my dojo was like going off, and I remember telling my teammates, she was like, Oh, they check they check grades, and I was like, Oh my goodness, they check grades because I was in a smaller district, so planning, I do science experiments, and I have to make sure I always do seven groups because the most in my class is always about 21 and 22, sometimes 26 students. So I try to do groups of three and four, so I have seven groups, a group may have four students in it, but I have to plan an experiment that on paper because literally think about it. Y'all think we just go in and teach, but the board has to be set. If I do an experiment, experiments have to be laid out. Do you realize if I just go in the classroom and say, Oh, we're doing an experiment and we're gonna see how salt, sugar, cornstarch, and baker soda how it dissolves in water to see if it's even soluble. Are they are they do they have solubility like all these big words? And then I have to teach the vocabulary. I can't do that all in one day. I have to teach the vocabulary one day, then I have to do an activating strategy that keeps them wanting to come back for more and an experiment. I have a 90 90-minute class. Within that class, we always have a about 45-minute break because it's either lunch, pe or um I'm or unified art. So when you take that out, well, it's really more than 90 minutes, but that 90 minutes goes by so fast because I have to do bell ringers, I have to do you know, science preparation. I have to explain what are we doing, and when you have a class of 20 plus kids that are just all over the place, then you think, oh, I could just go in there and do it. No, one's not listening, one's doing something wrong, especially when I have to, I'm not even gonna go down the road, but when I have to think about wearing goggles and and make sure they do everything right, make sure they're writing, make sure, and then I'm doing a science experiment, so make sure that things are not spilling. And then um, just going back to I can imagine for Miss James and adjusting lesson when a child doesn't get it, and even though we plan lessons and we adjust lessons, we also have what you call a pacing guide that tells us where we should be. So we shouldn't be you can't adjust too long, then you have to do small group, and small group is a whole nother um sense of planning.

SPEAKER_00 11:59

That's really good. And I really think like there is an entirely different workload when you think about the invisible workload, the emotional side of teaching, and really supporting kids beyond academics, because a lot of times, like I'm really big on the social emotional learning, because if students aren't okay socially and emotionally, we can't get them to master a standard. There's nothing they're going to be able to accomplish if something is pressing on them mentally or emotionally. I just thought of this just really made me think back to a school year that was really emotionally heavy. And that was my first class post-COVID. And one thing I noticed about my class post-COVID, a lot of them lost either a parent, a grandparent, like their primary caregivers during that time. And so that school year, I remember it being filled with a lot of grief. A lot of grief. So that was something, that was something we had to, you know, stop and address all the time. And that definitely carried over into like into my mind after three o'clock. Because you really, you know, when you uh truly get to know your students and you have a concern for them, some of that stuff you can't leave at school. Some of that stuff you truly can't leave at school, and you just want the best, even when you want the best for them. Um, some of those things kind of just can really weigh on you a lot. And I know for me, I had to really, really focus on developing a work-life balance. There has to be a balance.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Talk about it.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

There has to be a balance. There has to be a balance. I can reflect back to my first few years of teaching, fresh out of college. I was truly a 24-7 teacher.

unknown 13:53

Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

And I was a 24-7, 24-7 teacher. Um, taking papers home because I didn't grade them. I didn't grade them at school, so I'm taking papers home. I am cutting out, I'm making, I'm cutting out different things. I need to, if I need to um last when I was when I was when I had um a silhouette, I was creating bulletin board themes at home, all the works, all the works after school. Staying really late, getting there super, super early. Early, early, real early. Fast forward to now, I am a different educator. I'm a different educator. Rablo, if you know the song Bag Lady by Erica Badu. I just say carry that one bag. That one bag. And sometimes no bag at all, just my purse. Right. And I just start, and I'll be honest, I just started that this school year carrying, carrying nothing but my purse. Mm-hmm. And because you have to have you have to have those boundaries in place because that's where the burnout comes. It can it can be a lot. So learning to leave, learning to leave the work at school. I try to manage my time more during my planning, you know, during my planning periods and different times throughout throughout the day. That's when I need to get that stuff done. Because if I was if I was a dentist, like I wouldn't be cleaning teeth. Like once I leave the office. Yeah, like once I leave the office, I'm not cleaning teeth at home. If I was the manager at Chick-fil-A, I wouldn't be asking, like, well, telling you my pleasure at home. Like I wouldn't be working, like we're the only profession. We're the only profession where yeah, and it cares and it carries over. So you really have to develop those boundaries and be an eight to three teacher. Mind you, I am a teacher in other spaces, you know, in my personal life, like I do when I'm active at church, I go from Miss James to Miss Doreen at church, you know, and that's still a part, that's still a part of teaching. But that eight to three, that eight to three, I think it's all of the not the requirements. Well, yes, the requirements, what we're asked to do, what we're expected to do. Like some, like they think we're super men and superwomen.

SPEAKER_01 16:29

I wish I yeah, I could see my dojo sometimes. Are we are managers and micromanagers? We manage the parents as well as the students. Because like if I have to do a field trip, that's 20 questions. The night for the field trip. It's that people don't think about that. Like, people, and I have to like, okay, now okay, I gotta answer you at four o'clock or five o'clock, six o'clock. Like, they can't find their shirt. Can they still go on the field trip? Um, can they can my husband drop them off? They with their daddy and they forgot this. Can they bring the money here? Can I cash up? Like, it's so much of like, no, don't send me no cash up.

SPEAKER_00 17:06

Yes, and it but it can become so overwhelming. I know, like a lot of times if I send out newsletters, and that's between teacher and coach, I'll send out newsletters. And when I'm creating these things, I try to keep everything like I'm like, okay, I included this. Do I have everything? Does it make sense? All the things I try, I try to check off all the boxes to avoid a lot of questions. Like I want people to, I want parents to be informed, but every I haven't figured it out yet. Still, sometimes like you still get all those questions. So that can be that can be um a part of burnout too. Um, I think working a lot, I will say kudos to myself. I have worked before 2020, I was never a fan of working during the summer. I didn't work any type of summer school, right? After 2020, I worked every summer school, every intercession. So in reality, if you're working the full school calendar and then you're working summer programs and you're working intercession, then you're working the whole year. Right. And it doesn't stop. This past February, I did not work intercession. It felt it felt good, didn't it? And it felt honestly, it felt really good because when you're constantly when you're constantly going, you're constantly making decisions, you're constantly planning, constantly meeting, all those things, it can be heavy. It can be heavy, and then really depending on what you teach, because that that plays a part of it too. Like me teaching, like you know, you said that you teach science and social studies, and with me teaching fifth grade ELA. But when I think about if I were a third grade ELA teacher, I'm ready to tell my story, y'all.

SPEAKER_01 19:06

I'm ready to tell my story.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

I think girl, I think one day, well, we'll have one episode that's strictly dedicated to third grade and the literacy act, because that's another topic, that's another topic. So, you know, creating, but you know, create there is a need for boundaries, and no matter where you are, no matter what grade level, you have to identify those boundaries, those things that things that are becoming emotionally draining for you, you have to learn how to put some boundaries on it. And honestly, if you're not your because if you're not the best version of yourself, how can you be any help to children in your classroom? Right. Burnout, burnout can really be real.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

I would say, and I know you're finishing up, but I would say, and I didn't talk about it because y'all don't want to fall in the timestamps, but I got a little time when I taught third grade. I got to this when I had 15 students of small class, but I was lyric, and I'm not gonna go into it. But it was my first year after three years teaching all subjects, and teaching all subjects is a it's a it's self-contained and um teaching your own discipline, two different things, and they have their perks, or being departmentalized, as they would say, has their perks. The per I love that perk of that class, but I remember, and I'm gonna say this as she was talking about boundaries. I thought about, and this is what made me want to leave third grade or do something different. Or I remember the focus on reading, and I remember planning my whole group. I planned from 805, but that my students came at 75. Like, I planned everything. I remember telling my parents this is when they should get here, they need to get here because this is I would send them a list of our schedule and what everything entailed in our schedule. And I when I would conference with parents, I say when they're walking in at 8:15, they've missed a lot, they have to unpack, do this, all these things because this it's the literacy act year, and we don't want them to be held behind because I have to do paperwork on each child, I have to conference with each parent to prove that they understand what is going on. Doing that was a lot, so when we talk about ending at three, let me just tell you this: my conferences were at 5:15, 5:30, because I had no other time because I worked an after-school care job, and I'm not even gonna get into all that, but just to make money because just like y'all got y'all job, we got loans. Well, I have loans and things like that too, from getting that other degree. And I remember one time, and it's on my my Instagram. I used to make these little videos, and everybody called me like the station queen, small group queen. I would plan for that lemonade cut, and I remember one time I said Be out of here on Friday, five o'clock. School got out, all the kids were gone by three o'clock. Went in my room. I did not leave till like 6:17. Came back to school the next day because we had an event. Talk about working Monday through Friday. I was there on a Saturday because we had a parade. And I remember being in my classroom for an hour and a half as we waited to go to the parade, then staying to continue to work and still was not done. And my first couple of years, I never did that. I used to come early, stay late, and it would took, but I remember going, this gotta give, and then learning how to use that time, learning how to use my students to do certain things, and learning how to use my friends to do certain things. And that is why I want to kind of go and talk about if we're done with boundaries, talk about real life relatable moments. So you know you're so I just want to put this tip in anybody that is my friend besides Miss James. Shout out to our to Jasmine, because she's definitely cut things. Shout out to the the children at church growing up. Shout out to, I mean, I've had people to do the classroom. You know, I've always have you need help in your classroom. Oh, I always got something for you to do. And so there are little things. So what I have on here, you analyze kids' behavior in public. I cannot diagnose a child, but I automatically go, automatically go, you know, use your inside voice. Like if I see children running, like this happens a lot. If I see children running, I'm like, we don't run in the I remember loading a train one time and speaking out loud and going, I was on the way to New Orleans, and I said, Okay, everybody need to get in their seats because the the attendant is saying, get in your seats and sit down, put your stuff things up after you have sat down and cleaned your seat, and somebody yelled from the back, you know, she a teacher, and it ended up actually being a principal, but yeah, it's just I'm um I'm always prepared for different things. Oh, this is my favorite. This is fun. You got a pen? I always got a pen. I always have a pen, I always have a highlighter, colorful pens like that. Uh, this is cute. Doreen remember this from school. I used to love posting notes. I don't do post notes no more because now it's technology-wise, but I love that app that's sticky, and I love the notes on the MacBook. And they have the Stickies app on the MacBook, and they have Google Keep. Those are my post-notes now. I don't need another journal, but I always get excited when I see a journal with an apple with a pencil. Anybody who's seen our pictures, like y'all know the apple and the pencil is what we do. And what are some things that I just can't turn down? I get excited over pre-sharpened pencils. You do pre-sharpen pencils, like pre-sharpen pencils, they a lifesaver, they a lifesaver, and you you're so specific with them, and you call adults uh so this is bad in a sense. I have this way, maybe you could comment on it. I have this condescending way of talking down to people and explaining stuff, and I'm like, wait, I'm not done talking. Because I had this way of explaining how to get from point A to point B. But I feel like I'm teaching it like so. If you go in the room and you look to your right, so the room is yellow, and then you're gonna look to the right, you're gonna see this, this, and they like, can you just go ahead and talk? But I have this way, I used to tell this lady used to always do this, and I just like I feel like she's talking down to me. And then I realized when I started teaching, I talked down, like, correct your grammar. You is not, you are, you is always plural. Let's talk in complete. Oh, they're they are there, there, and there. I will not talk to a guy, and that's probably why y'all probably heard from me. I would not talk to a guy when I realize you do not use there and there, and please don't be a teacher and not use those correctly. But, anyways, some fun things about teaching and things that you know in real life, what happens when you a teacher almost 24-7, and it's always in your mind, girl.

SPEAKER_00 26:22

Yes, I uh and honestly, now this one I have to keep to myself, but in reality, I need a grammar police badge. I am so you are Elizabeth. I need a badge. I am so I am so into grammar. Um looking at looking at what I look at, different posts. Sometimes I don't share things. I won't share things. Why if the grammar is incorrect? I cannot help. No subject verb agreement at all. I I I cannot, it bothers me. It bothers me. And you don't capitalize I like I is the first thing is learn to capitalize in school, and you got a lowercase, yes, yes, and I'm like, if I teach, if I teach fifth graders, you know, and I work with them on correcting their grammar, there's no way that I should see the same mistakes from an adult, right? But are you smarter than a person? Oh, yeah, I'm with yeah, I'm so I'm with you when it comes to that. So Jamise, would you say teach your life? Is it eight an eight to three or twenty-four-seven?

SPEAKER_01 27:33

So it's a little bit of both because it's my job, and the real reality, even though we get off as you all say, at 3 15, but we explain to you what we do, it's it can be a 24-7, but you have to so both. It could be a 24-7, but you have to physically check yourself out at 3. Just like I'm here recording a podcast, I've checked out, but my students, I'm always thinking if I go into the store and I see something, oh, my students could do that. It's just constantly like we think about each holiday. What other profession thinks about each each holiday and what you can do for St. Patrick's Day, and what you not only Valentine's Day and what you can do for Earth Day and Pi Day. The list goes on. So I I say both you say both, and you know what?

SPEAKER_00 28:32

I I agree, I agree with you. I believe that it can realistically be both, it really can. But the thing is, those boundaries are so important, and you can be passionate, but you still have to have boundaries, it's so important because teaching in reality it does not stop at three, but it shouldn't take over your whole life. Don't allow it to take over your whole life, and I do believe that when you are, you know, truly walking in your purpose, you're a teacher all the time, you're a teacher all the time, so that's okay, but we do want our teacher friends who are listening to please remember even though we may do it all 24-7, please have boundaries because we want you to stay happy and healthy. All right, y'all. And that brings us to the closing of episode three, Teacher Life 24-7 or 8 to 3. We say both. Until next time. And in closing, I'm Miss James.

SPEAKER_01 29:41

And I'm Miss Durden.

SPEAKER_00 29:42

Thank you for listening to the Bell Ringer. Class is officially in session.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Don't be late.