Elementary teachers: Taking a survey of sorts. Do you get any prep time during the school day? As in your kids are with another teacher and you have time to plan, etc. I know this varies from place to place, and I'm curious.
I know this is The Vent, so I will just say that if you get prep time, consider yourself fortunate!!
Yes, per our contract we get 45 minutes per day. They can occasionally use it for team meetings and we use it to plan with our team, but otherwise it's our time to plan.
If you don't have it, that's a shame. I'm guessing you're not in a union state.
We get about 40 every day this year that is prep time. Of course, that includes walking kids over and picking them up, so really about 35. One of those is collaboration time... I really can't accomplish much during that time for some reason. I piddle, but I am happy to have it.
Prep time for primary in our district! No way! The district is adamant we won't get prep time since we dismiss 25 minutes earlier than the other grades. That is considered our prep. Nevermind that we spend the majority of that time dismissing and supervising children.
We are lucky if we get 60 minutes A WEEK! Our substitute situation makes the prep teachers the first to cover a class without a sub and when they are out subs are not assigned.
Our contract has 2 half hours a week as prep.
I have worked in 2 different school districts. I never had prep time during the school day. We were required to stay after school, and that was considered our "prep time." I have been exceedingly jealous of many of my friends on PT because of their regular (and LONG) prep time!! Since this is the vent, I'll say that I've also been envious of those who have specials teachers (In both districts, I had to teach PE, music, and art along with everything else). I did have duty free lunch (20 minutes) at each district.
I get 84 minutes per day. Sometimes it is taken up with meetings .. approximately 2 -3 days per week for half the time.. so I at least get 42 minutes per day.. 2 or 3 days per week I get 84 minutes.
We also get 1/2 hour lunch. At my old school I got about 30 minutes per day. No lunch, we are lucky here.
We get two hours per week, generally all at one time. We can legally do anything we please with that time - plan, sleep, go out for coffee, meet with parents, stand on our heads. It's our time.
Most people plan and meet with parents. I've never actually seen anyone standing on their head.
I get 210 minutes per week. 35 of it is PLC. I also have an additional PLC of 30 minutes once a week where my grade level partner and I sometimes are able to plan.
I also have a 15 minute recess per day, about every other week.
Wow- things sure are different depending on where you are. I'm the original poster. Currently I get 2 30 minute blocks every third week. It's really more like 25, as I walk the class to PE. And yes, we have a union. This is only our 2nd year (of my 21 years in the biz) where we got ANY prep time. And as you can see it's pretty minimal. We do have a duty-free 45 minute lunch so that may be more than some.
We get 50 minutes daily, but we're only guaranteed 3 of those days per week as "individual plan time." The other 2 days are used for meetings. Our district bigwigs actually wanted teachers to have no individual plan time; they wanted to make every day some sort of "collaborative meeting." In contract negotiations the district bigwigs repeatedly stated that teaching is a salaried job and as such it's not their job to provide us with "extra time" during the school day to get work done that we could do after the kids leave . Our union had to fight really hard to get them down to the 2 days per week for "collaborative meetings."
Exclusive of morning and afternoon recesses and the lunch period, each Teacher on a full-time assignment shall be assigned preparation time free from supervisory, teaching or other duties within each cycle of five (5) instructional days. Preparation time shall be used for professional activities as determined by the Teacher, and will take place during instructional time.
Quote:
Effective August 31, 2012, each full-time teacher shall receive 240
minutes of preparation time per cycle of five (5) instructional days.
Quote:
Teachers on part-time assignment shall have the amount of
preparation time pro-rated as per their teaching assignment.
It took more than 30 years of my career before this language was negotiated into the Collective Agreement.
Inequities continue to exist.
Our secondary school colleagues receive 300 minutes per 5 day instructional cycle. They have received 300 minutes for at least the last 20 years.
45 minutes daily, required by contract. If the specialist is out without a sub, we can take pay or it has to be covered some other way. Lots of 45-minute recesses.
Per the contract, the principal may not schedule any regular meeting during this time. We do conduct one-time meetings (pre-observation, for example) during this time and most teams use at least one prep period for team meetings & planning.
And having read the rest of this thread, I'm apparently never ever leaving this district.
for what I have. We have 50 minutes each day when kids are at music, art, library or PE. Sometimes this time is used for meetings, but this is the exception. 30 minutes for lunch.
We have a different amount each day depending on our specials schedule. It works out to about 120 minutes a week, plus two Fridays out of the month we don't have meetings and the kids start 1.25 hours later than normal. One 45 minute plc meeting per week.
Per contact, I am supposed to get 45 mins 5 days a week.
I am self contained, severe class and I get my prep time only when we have specials which for my class is 3 days a week. The other two days, I put a slip in saying I missed my prep time and I am reimbursed in my paycheck the missing time.
Our union negotiated one 40 minute prep a day for every teacher in our district. Previously, teachers could wind up with 3 preps one day and none for two days. Two of these preps are plc meetings, so we actually get three a week.
I didn't include recess in my time, but I should have. So I actually have 1 hour 45 minutes a day (4 days a week) and an additional 3 hours 15 minutes on Wednesdays. Math is hard, but I think it's 10 hours a week? I wish hours were 100 minutes long; figuring this out would be easier.
Each grade has a specials schedule Everyone in the grade has their time off at the same time.
Fifth grade has two days of PE, art, Music, and keyboarding. Each teacher has another separate 45 minutes for computer lab. They do Study Island mostly. You are in here with them, but can grade papers.
Third and fourth grade teachers have 5-45 minute periods.
Music, Art, PE, PE , and another one that is library sills or counseling on alternative weeks. They also have a 45 min computer lab scheduled at a different time.
We get 35 minutes for lunch. Each teacher in the grade takes a day of cafeteria duty for their grade. We have five teachers in grade so it works out.
We also have children who are behind in their schoolwork who have Refocus. They eat for 2o min. And then go to refocus. The teachers in the grade take turns with duty in the Refocus classroom.
Fifth graders meet in the library and have to call their parents to explain why they are in Refocus.
Class begins at 8:25 and goes to 3:06, we have morning duty, but the schedule is such that you only have duty once a week.
We have bus duty, two outside playground duties, and two inside duties, plus one duty in the library. We call that homework room, so kids can go in and get help from a certified teacher if they didn't get homework done.
Most of the teachers like this way of doing things because the teachers had control on setting it.
Elementary in my district must get 40 minutes daily; however, most elementary schools get more. When I taught elementary, I got 45 minutes daily. I was transferred to middle school and we have double planning, so we get two planning periods every day. We also must have 30 minutes duty free lunch.
Yep. This is where my huge envy comes from. I did love teaching, but I wonder if I would have stayed in it longer had I had some planning time. I kind of want to throw up reading how much time some people get (because it makes me sick how little we got, I guess? I don't know why that's the response I have! )
The regular teachers at my school get 55 minutes daily and one day is taken for a meeting most weeks.
I'm in sped so my time varies so much as I get new kids and have kids leave and change schedules. There have been times where I've had an hour planning, but as of now I have about 15 minutes.
We have a seven hour school day. I get an hour of prep a day and a 45 minute duty free lunch. IEP meetings are scheduled during prep and so are grade level meetings which at my school is time well spent. I think we are guaranteed three of the days to ourselves but many weeks it is four.
Our contract hours are school hours. We used to have to come 30 minutes before school started and stay maybe 15 minutes after (I honestly can't remember), but they made the school day longer and didn't want to pay us more so made sure we worked the same amount. During that time prep time during the day was shorted and you were only guaranteed maybe three of those days.
I get an hour during the day 4 days a week and 30 minutes the other day.
I also get 25 minutes of collaboration time each day during recess. We aren't required to collab everyday so I use that time for other meetings or an additional prep. We also have 40 minutes before school that is for meetings but it's also a prep time if we have no meetings. I probably have meetings 3 days a week which is considered high.
At the end of the day we have about 10 minutes once the kids leave and our duty day ends.
I guess I'll answer, even though I'm late to the party.
I get 50 minutes twice a week when the kids are in specials. This is actually quite a bit compared to many schools in the area, believe it or not. I'm in CA. I'd LOVE to have more...
We also have a 45 min duty free lunch and a 20 min duty free recess. We also have 30 minutes before and 15 min after school that are considered prep time, I guess...but our contracted day is 30-60 min longer than other schools in the area (I'm at a charter), so I'm not sure if that really counts.
Meanwhile, secondary teachers in our state ALWAYS get at least a period a day (45min+) to prep...not sure why that is...
45 minutes four days a week, 30 minutes once a week. Sometimes we lose our prep due to training or meetings (we hate when that happens!) We also get 30 minutes duty free for lunch every day. This is all per our contract.
We have 45 minutes five days a week. We also have a 30 minute lunch daily. I don't count our scheduled recesses since I almost always have kids in with me. We lost an hour a week a few years ago.
I have gotten more efficient over the years. This is my eighth year in 5th grade, so it's become a bit easier.
I had 50 min. prep time 1 day per week about 20 years ago. Then they created the famous minimum day on Wed. where our students are dismissed early at 2:00pm instead of 3:15. Our prep time is scheduled from 2:00-2:45 on Wed. (yes our teachers have bus duty, pick up duty, and office duty during this time) and then we begin the PLC, AVID, district meetings, etc until 4:00 or 4:30 . We are technically supposed to have 1 Wed. free per month ( from 2:00 on) but that seems to be taken up with grade and team meetings or SST's and I.E.P's. So no our classroom teachers really have no PERSONAL planning time.
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02-01-2017, 07:04 PM
I have been exceedingly jealous of many of my friends on PT because of their regular (and LONG) prep time!! Since this is the vent, I'll say that I've also been envious of those who have specials teachers (In both districts, I had to teach PE, music, and art along with everything else). I did have duty free lunch (20 minutes) at each district. 
. Our union had to fight really hard to get them down to the 2 days per week for "collaborative meetings."
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