Teachers' Workload: Reality or Fantasy?

Some Malaysians always bashed teachers for over-complaining on their jobs. Yes, sometimes I agree with that point. Yet, there are no easy jobs in this world unless it is a dirty illegal job. I am not going to say that the teachers are one hundred percent correct when it comes to complaining on the workload. Other jobs too have their own super workload.

Let me rationalised on what makes teaching job different from other jobs and why are the workload seems to be heavy on teachers shoulder alone. Are they just over reacted? Although I cannot provide a specific data regarding my arguments, but this is a viewpoint of a person who is working within the field of teaching. But remember to read this with an open-mind.

Okay, first of all we need to know the working norm of the teacher.

For other job areas - Malaysian Labour Law : Regulation of Employment; An employee shall not work on normal hours exceeding 8 hours a day excluding a period of rest, 5 consecutive hours of work without a period of rest of not less than 30 minutes and 48 hours in a week.

This is the reality of the working hours for the teacher.

We start our work at 7.30am until 1.30am (six hours) for a minimum working hours. Sometimes, when we have the meeting, we need to work from 7.30 am until 3.30 pm which is eight hours in maximum. These are the hours where teachers are expected to ‘teach’, not sitting at the desk by completing the clerical works.

In order to complete the clerical works, teachers need to stay a bit late for overtime work (non-paid) or bring back the piles of works home.

In a simple word, we go to the school to teach, and we go back home to do our work.

Teachers just love to complain! Just do the work! The government have given the salary increment, so why making these noises?

All right, if it is what you wanted us to do. We will just do our work by completing all the unnecessary documentations for the sake of the government, and for our own salary. Enough said. So, we will not bother the quality of education that your own children will receive. This is because we do not have enough time to deliver the best education, as we will be always busy working on our piles of unnecessary documents.

I beg to all of you Malaysians to just please understand, that the teachers are complaining just for the sake of the children. We need to focus and do something on our teaching strategy, enhancing the pedagogy skills, assisting the students’ development rather than messing around with unnecessary stuff that should not be done by teachers.

We do not want to have a meeting about ‘Have you done your files and documents because the PPD and JPN is coming?’ as this will just benefit the superiors. What we, the new generation of educators want is a meeting discussing on what are the best strategies that can make learning become more fun, more creative and innovative in this school? Can I implement the project-based-learning in the school? Can I do cooperative learning via Skype with the students in SK Taman Alami and a school in USA? These are the things that we want as these will benefit the students in their learning process and development. All for the sake of the children!

Frankly speaking, as a teacher graduated in Science Education, who are currently teaching English in the school, like it or not, I need to further up my study just in order to have a grasp of ESL pedagogy. There is not much that I can learn (in the context of English pedagogy) within the school, as the academic culture is not strong perhaps not just in this school but also throughout Malaysia in general. So, school is for learning. Teacher is meant to be teaching. Teaching is not just a chalk and talk. It is more than that. If the teachers are given enough time to teach and to prepare the lesson, I think it will not just benefit the pupils but also the society in general. As what an article in a daily tabloid said, “Let the teacher teach!” Let the teacher do what they are best in. TEACHING!

hafizm88

P/S: This is just my viewpoint as a new teacher. Pardon me for any mislead information or argument. I do stop complaining about my workload after reading some blogs on other jobs. Every job has its own challenges. So, keep on reading on others so you will be thankful of yours.