Head over. Ohh.
Come back to that episode ohh. He might hang on, hang on, Just.
A minute. My name is Dylan.
Hello. Hang on guys.
Go on, I'm ready now. Yeah.
OK. Hi, everyone.
Right. Don't explain to the views what
just happened. No, the viewers, the listeners,
No, not really. Every single week before we
start because obviously, as you know, we had the same start
every week. Meet me as quickly as I can
saying hello everyone. And I say to Hayden, Are you
ready? And he goes, Yeah.
And then I start talking and he immediately bends over to grab
his water, his mouth obviously a metre away from the mic there,
not ready to say my name is Hayden and we have to stop.
So he decided this week my name is Hayden.
That's the problem. I don't understand the problem
here. I think this is a good start.
I I do too. I always think in my head of new
listeners. I know we have a lot of
returning listeners. I just always think of new
listeners going. No, I am.
A parent teacher. This is episode sounds
interesting balancing the being a parent and teaching.
I'll click on this I reckon. That doesn't matter.
I reckon they listen through that because it's funny, and
then they stop listening when you know what a spray bottle is.
Drip that. Guys, last week you listened.
Dylan didn't know what a spray bottle was.
You described it as something like ohh yeah, you put the
pressure in. The pressure pushes all this
water out. What will he come up with today?
I couldn't remember the word for a spray.
Bottle So I just described what happened in one.
It's alright. I've had a week away with you
and it's been great because I get to see I just have a bit
more insight into you all the time.
And you are you are like a walking meme.
You're just funny. Well.
Like the fact that the fact that we lost the bike lock keys and
then and then you found them at home.
The old story. You lost the keys right where
the bike was locked up and then we had to give the bikes back at
the end of our centre parks trip and obviously one of his bikes
to him and he couldn't find the keys for.
It I didn't know what it was. And we joked, we, we, we joked
whilst we were there, like, ohh, it's, it's probably in some of
Dylan's clothes that have been packed away because that's
Dylan. That's just classic him.
No, no, no, it wasn't. It wasn't got home.
It was literally in his shorts pocket.
I felt, I felt a bump in my shorts.
I was like, well, I'll just take that.
Wear the shorts again. And then I put the short time so
funny. So it was in a ones that I
packed away. Hmm.
We'd unpacked everything and obviously a bunch of the shorts,
but I wore them for like half a day and I was like, why them
again? So put them on and I was
bumping. I was just playing with Rory and
I said, well, just take that out.
And what is it was geese that we spent half an hour looking for
in the morning. But you know, I'm glad he got an
insight into my life. Do you want to be careful
because people are listening to this?
Who? I'm not sure they are.
Who did go back to work last week?
They've had a whole week at work.
So yeah, are we gonna pretend that we also went back to work
or we gonna just massively talk now for 10 minutes about our
holiday? We.
Had. I think we should rub it in
their faces. Yeah.
But we had an extra week off. We did, and that's probably the
right thing. To do so, we went in the box
who's been Centre parks. There's no, because I've never
now I have raised his hand for anyone listening, don't know
what to expect. And it was actually, it was
really quite good. It was really good.
Yeah, it was really good. It was really nice.
I think we had low expectations, probably more because of the
fact that we were taking our 6:00 and 8:00.
Months for me because you were going.
This guy is going to be annoying.
Yeah, yeah, I had very low expectations.
I thought if I don't wanna big up too much and and be like, oh,
we're gonna do all these things and then realise that actually
we're gonna get there, we're just gonna be nap trapped
constantly by our children. But they were pretty good,
weren't they? Got on with it and we kind of
got around their naps. Yeah, I thought.
We just they just let them nap when they.
Felt sorry for Rory though when I got home when I was chatting
to my parents obviously afterwards and I was right and I
was like I don't really know. Poor boy got no attention
because River was just so loud and annoying all the time.
I even. Blessed.
She's not annoying. She was annoying restaurants.
The restaurant she was. She doesn't stop.
She's just like I'm constantly moving around.
Yeah, she's constantly moving. It's hilarious.
Ohh Paul Rory blessing we just say really nicely and his pram
just like that's OK mummy and. Daddy, get your dinner.
I guess the difference is we parent properly so.
That's it, isn't it? That was a running joke.
It's weird because what we do is we just, we just tell our
eight-month old don't do that. And he doesn't.
He doesn't. And then you must just let your
six month old run, right? Yeah, I do.
Yeah, she's running around the house.
Yeah, she's knocking the door down at the.
Moment, yeah, we're gonna talk about parenting in this episode.
We'll leave that for now, but any talk about syntax?
Bit more can I say one of my highlights.
Yeah, one of my highlights, I'll go back, one of my highlights
was every single time we booked something.
You having no idea how anything worked in centre parks.
That was fun. So the 15th time, so we like
we'd, we'd booked all this stuff and we went to, we went to the
table tennis, which we have to book, obviously you have to book
a table tennis table. And so I went out, paid for it,
got the paddles and stuff. Anyway, So, and we, we just, we
just stop when we want. Do we, Hayden, you know
everything else in this place where you have to book a time
slot because then the next person to book a time.
Slot. Well, she didn't say.
Do you think that we just stay on the for the is no, OK, no
clarify with the? Person I wouldn't they don't
tell me you go there you go, there you go.
Enjoy your on table. 3 scuse me these three is a £20, so I
assume that's a lot of get me started on the features mental,
but 20 everything at Centre Parks is extremely expensive.
Yeah, extremely expensive. So Hayden didn't understand
that. So when it was the 19th time of
buying something expensive, he still tried to clarify
something. Do that because it's quite
expensive. Stepping into play is wrong with
what? No, Hayden, Everything's just
the more expensive. Here, listen, right there it
goes deeper than that, right? Well, was that was that this
restaurant was. Messy.
Guana, that's a guana as Mexican.
And most meals were like £15. They weren't 1516 quid.
They were, they were. And this one, the ones packed
with rice, which is like 50 kilos, Yeah, not, not the ones
that come with like two piece of dip and tortillas and Tesco's
the one I got. So the fajita stack was like 21
quid and I was like, hey, that's going to be, that's clearly
going to be more then there's like 5-6.
More, it was 19. Pounds.
It wasn't it wasn't, it was a very very small tray of chicken
but we got stopped at the bottom anyway because they put on some
boiling things like it says ohh sizzling.
Can't eat it though can I cause it's now stuck to it.
My favourite dinners are the ones that aren't actually cooked
yet and still cook on your table.
Right. Yeah, they burn in front of you.
It was just a joke. It was an absolute joke.
But one thing that was a massive.
Highlight you tried to say 5 minutes ago.
What was the and you enjoyed this as well?
So me and Dylan have not been eating sugar?
No, but this week. Well, can we not talk about
ourselves with the same boat here?
Like me and Dylan have both been not eating sugar.
So just a bit of clarification. I I did it for five months,
you've done it for about 5. Weeks.
No. About 3 months in.
You know what is it? No.
I'm's.
Easter. No.
When was Easter? No, that was that was one time
ago, that six weeks ago. Ohh, I've gone about two months,
two months, two months with no sugar.
But for this all day we were like, no, let's just enjoy
ourselves. So, so obviously we took
advantage of that because we're complete addicts to sugar.
So we completely took advantage of that and we ate 27 Krispy
Kreme doughnuts. Come on.
Between us and our partners. Yeah, but still we had, we
bought three boxes of Krispy Kreme doughnuts within the four
days. They're bloody good.
Though they were really good. Bloody no, I'll do it again.
Yeah, it didn't. Weird though, because when we
came to buy that, Hayden didn't go to the cashier.
Well, actually there's a lot of doughnuts here.
I just bring something down, that's all.
That I'm used to them being expensive.
I'm not used to my chicken fajitas and Tesco tortilla
wraps. Bring 20 lbs.
It did go into Tesco and when we got back and I saw the Krispy
Kremes there and I had a little look.
They are less expensive here still.
I know it's Krispy Kreme and I think they just bump up.
Yeah, I don't even. I actually at no point, Jack.
We're paying for those Donuts. I didn't want to point, you
know, paying £9 on table tennis. Do we get to play table tennis
long? We want to make no pounds for
this table tennis table. I assume we get to play it until
we don't want to play it anymore.
What's that 16 LB for 12 donors? Thank you.
See you later. Ohh whatever, whatever.
How are the Rapids? Ohh, the Rapids.
Well, wait a minute. The Rapids.
The number one draw to Elvedon Centre Parks, where everyone
beforehand said which centre should go to, and they were all
like to Aldi's amazing. Oh my God, you need to go there
because the Rapids are so good. Yeah, those closed all week.
Yeah. Really annoying.
Literally closed all week.
When is it closed? We're here from Monday to
Friday, so let's close Monday to Friday.
Ohh. Right.
So you didn't think to just put that over, you know, like a
period of maybe like Thursday to Sunday?
Yeah, two people might be. Paying and they get like this
start and the end of their holiday.
No, none of those do the whole week that we're there.
So we got some conversation though.
Yeah, yeah, completely pointless.
Yeah, we got they were like ohh, really sorry about that.
Here's a day pass to come to pass.
A day pass is 3 hours away. Mate, we're not going to come
for a day. Are we gonna come for a day?
We are going to come for a day for a 45 minute table tennis
session, which Hayden still understand.
It's the table tennis free when I get here, no?
Can stay possible then yeah, that's not going to.
Pass it literally just to get in because that would be.
Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, yeah.
Go, go. And we're not paying for
accommodation. Yeah, and you can come through
the gate. Thank.
You hello before you on the swimming.
What's your room number? We don't have on all.
We can't then. Large number.
That's the other thing it every time.
Every time we bought something. So we're in the shop and you buy
something and they go lodge number, please.
And the first like three or four times through role play we will.
Yeah. But the first, the first three
or four times we were like, I just ignored it and I was like,
you just do it. You didn't think about it.
Then I thought about it and we got to the till, so let's do the
role play now. So I've got to the tail.
I'm just checking. I'm just telling you.
Stuff. I think we're gonna go with the
whole bit of shop. Yeah.
What you need for dinner, Hayden?
We need chicken. OK, well we just walked past the
stricken. Why you talking here, discussing
with me when you're? I'll play you and Aiden next.
You carry on, you do your bit to me.
Right here we go. Thank you very.
Much. Hi there.
You're right. Do you want it back?
No, we don't need the back. OK, £400 if you'd like one
anyway. Doughnuts there number please.
And yeah, it's it's 967. What?
Sorry, just to click on swinging.
Why? Why do you take the?
I'm gonna break in a minute. Sorry, Sorry.
What was that? Sorry, just wondering why do you
take the large number? Ohh, it's just, it's so we can
just like check stock, stock count and all that sort of
stuff. Yeah, alright, that's weird.
Because that's £22.40. Thank you.
OK. Ohh.
Alright then, I'm not really satisfied with that answer, but
I'll just pay and then go off and we finished.
We walked off and then had them like went are we right in
thinking that the the number of the lodge that we're staying in
doesn't affect whether they need to restock that chicken?
Tomorrow I know nothing to do with restocking.
Absolutely so. Straight away I was just like,
it's marketing. They're gonna sell that
information because they know who's staying at Lodge and if
they've seen it, we've got 27 Krispy Kreme Donuts.
Then they're obviously going to be like.
Well, these guys, well, what did I say on my Facebook like
within? An hour?
No, it's like, was that was it? That was that evening you had a
Krispy Kreme advert and he hadn't searched.
He just literally, I actually genuinely never buy them.
Yeah, that was like a treat there.
So I never seen that. Before I got here, Yeah, it's
crazy. So then we went back the next
day and asked someone else who was clearly less you know?
I'm sorry. Are we.
There we go. Hey, love.
Yeah, you're right. Yeah, very good.
Thank you. Just go.
Can I all kind of page number? Yeah, Yes, 967.
But just wondering not ask this to anyone yet at all.
Just for the first time wondering why do you take that
large number? Oh, it's just for marketing
reasons. Thank you.
And then we went. So that is literally the first
one lied to us or didn't know and just guessed.
Yeah, but at least guess something logical that makes
sense because the stock control, so we know how much chicken to
stock into your fridge and your lodge.
What? Matt, my, my team, my highlight,
my highlight was after months and months of obviously we, we,
we go to each other's houses quite a lot.
We have dinner and stuff, but always the babies need to go to
bed. So you know, we have to leave at
certain point. You know, Rory's bedtime has
been about 6:00. So that's usually the cut off on
me. We'll go off.
Or if you're at ours, maybe you'll stay a bit later cause
rivers just up still, but then you have to go back for river.
And it's one of those things we didn't really think.
We thought, well, have babies is lovely.
We spent some time together, but we do lose our evenings where we
just say, you know, have dinner, then play some games, just
chatting, just get to a late one.
It didn't happen anymore. We had the baby.
Yeah. So we were like right centre
parks, banging. We're in the same place.
We've got the travel cots for the kids.
We put the kids down. Like both kids were down most
evenings by 8:00 at the latest. So we're like, are we having a
nice few evenings together? So how did that panned out?
Nice. Yeah, really good.
We took loads of games, actually filled, struggled filling my car
up because we had to get so many games, yeah, to get there.
And yeah, we didn't. You didn't use a single.
One of them because exhausted. Everyday.
So we just, we just literally sat on the sofa and chatted
absolute rubbish for like 45 minutes until one of us was too
tired and then when one went to bed we were like not in.
I think I would say we were all asleep probably.
I don't know you guys, but I was definitely asleep within 15
minutes of going in my room and we weren't in on to our rooms by
about 10. Ohh, yeah, yeah.
I I would say, I would say if someone knocked on our door at
half ten. No, I was like, yeah, yeah.
Just hilarious. So we literally have built up so
much that we get some of our own time finally.
And honestly, my, my Lauren came in.
I was like, anyone actually want to play a game?
I've got to say that you were no absolutely anything worse.
No, you were laying on the floor with your legs up or something.
We were just good. It was nice actually.
Really enjoyed just chilling out and talking for a bit without
the kids. Around, yeah.
Sleep. Yeah, it was.
It was kind of nice and one mad thing that happened.
So we did say right, our school has this extra week off and most
schools don't. I'm sure some other schools do.
The same I think I know one or two locally out of like 100.
And sometimes they do it in different half terms.
Anyway, I don't even get this week.
But we went away and was like, what's the chances we're going
to see someone? We know It was like because
realistically, if you're a kid and if your family in our
school, that is the week to go away and send the box is a
classic family. That's why we do it is cheaper,
Yeah. It makes absences less likely.
Yeah, exactly, exactly. Just it makes complete sense.
So we thought, oh, we'll probably see some kids from our
school. Basically we didn't, we heard
that one there. But what we did bump into, what
we did, what we who we did bump into.
What we did? Is one of our teachers.
We had no idea. Literally one of our staff
members, our colleagues, went away.
Because we were swimming on the first day and we changing Rory
and you. Everyone knows everyone's
teacher voice. Yeah, of course.
And I just heard this voice from like must have been like one or
two across from me. Yeah, yeah.
And I was like, that's it. That's our colleague, Saint
Laurent's colleague. And I saw you and I was like,
he's. Here I was like, Are you sure?
Here I I swear to you he's here. So we spent like honest, like a
day and a half afterwards of me like really doubting myself.
I'm sure, I'm sure it was sure was him.
And then he turned up and he was like hello.
And I was like, and it must be really weird for him because he
walked up to me and said hello and I was like, you're here.
Like it was like. We knew it.
I knew it. We followed you here.
Yeah. So yeah, that was.
That was funny. That was funny yeah.
But yeah, that was sent box good trip yeah, pretty solid 8 out of
10 yeah, would have been would have been 9 out of 10 with
Rapids, but I'd do it again. We we probably.
Will assuming that rappers are good, Yeah, one more thing
before we do a Jingle. Go on then.
We got a message this week from someone talking about how their
school's doing a mock general election.
And at first I'm like, oh, that's interesting.
Yeah. I was like, that's really
interesting. How would they, would they, you
know, vote for Labour and the Conservatives?
No, but all it is, it's it's the act of voting that they're
practising. And what's happening is if
you're a teacher, you can run to be Prime Minister of the school.
So. So the teachers, SO11 OHH, like
your assistant teachers and stuff, They, they're all putting
their hat in the ring and someone messaged just tell us
about it and telling them their ideas and we had any ideas and
stuff like that. And that's such a cool idea to
get the kids engaged for the general election.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And because what they've got to
do is they've got to write a manifesto.
So they've got to come up with some ideas.
Yeah. But they have to be realistic.
And if they win a lie, yeah. Realistic, yeah.
We're not going to raise your expectations of your work at all
for the whole duration of my parliament day one.
You need to do more. You need to do more work.
But yeah, she was saying how it like, if you win, you actually
implement your ideas and stuff like that.
And she was like, ohh, what? What's a realistic thing that
you could put in her manifesto that the kids would want to vote
for? And I was really interesting
because I imagine some people might just go crazy and say
stuff which is completely not, you know, free pizza for
everyone every, every day during maths.
And it's like, well, the kids obviously love that, but it
wouldn't be plausible. Yeah.
And it got me thinking, like, what would actually be a
realistic thing if you had to write a manifesto to be Prime
Minister for school and you had to get the kids on side so it's
not just their teacher where you just think about outcomes and
literally to win votes from the children, but something that
could be implemented in the classroom.
I was like, oh. That's quite narrow actually,
Yeah. What's the budget for my
campaign? The budget all, let me just
check the school budget one second.
We've got no money whatsoever, so.
So just this is important. Like the real election?
Yeah, it's very important for my campaign.
Well, I will. I get to use a big red bus or
not? How many of its privately funded
and has a massive lie on the side?
OK, that's good. I will be.
I will be offering the pizza everyday to the kids. 350
million slices of pizza every single.
Day, single day. And then when someone questions
me about it after I've never happened, never happened.
That didn't happen. That didn't happen.
Did happen. OK, cool.
So, I mean, that's kind of cool. Do you have an idea of what?
I didn't know. She mentioned that she's gonna
try and implement some golden time.
And I was like, why school doesn't have golden time?
That's a nice thing, isn't it? Like a 50 minute?
And the only thing I said was I'm trying to think of how to
win kids votes over. Hmm.
And something that's realistic. Kids love seeing their teacher
suffer in like a in like a, you know, in a horrible way.
But like, you know, silly. Yeah.
It might be like they get the chance to be the teacher for 20
minutes a week or something. You know, there's the roles
reversed a little bit, something putting the teacher in a
situation where the kids are. In charge of the teacher and
everyone laughed until they get like really like ohh let me.
Out one of the kids ride the bus through the playground.
That's his teachers, banned for life.
Yeah, yeah, that's part of it. And they never have.
Done it. Yeah.
Never did it. Never did it.
Yeah. When the police come, nothing
happened. OK, we're gonna ignore.
That cool? That was a nice idea that we
ruined. It was pretty cool.
That's cool. And I want, I want to do
something with our school. I don't know what though.
I'm, I'm, I'm sure like in assemblies that we talked about,
but it's a big thing, isn't it? It's.
Something, you know, you get caught doing that.
They're lefty teachers trying to push their agenda.
I just want to pick on a on our Instagram, I've done a few anti
Tory reels just and it's, it's directly, it is anti Tory OK and
it's not pro Labour and we talked about as many times it's
not pro greens, not pro anything.
But it is my personal opinion on being anti Torii.
I have lived through a Tory government my whole adult life.
I've seen austerity happen. I think things have got very
much worse and in in my professions, especially in
education, I think things are terrible compared to what they
were 10-15 years ago. So my personal opinion is that I
hate them and I want them to never be in power ever again.
So obviously I'm gonna do all I all I can to convince other
people. That's my opinion.
Yeah, if you disagree with me, that's fine.
If you're wrong, but that's fine.
No, I'm joking. Genuinely.
If you disagree with me, then whatever.
But I'm going to still say my opinion because that's important
on, on those posts. I have one person posted saying,
well, I hope that this is not anything to do with your job,
but because actually it's illegal to say anything
political in the classroom. And I just, I did like a
civilised like reply like this is nothing to do with my job.
It's my first opinion. But what I really wanted to say
was like, shut up, shut. Up, yeah.
People random people on Instagram thinking they could
tell me what's important to do my job or not.
So I am not I'm not a bloody anti Tory.
I don't walk in and go. I bloody Tories in charge.
I've. Seen him do that.
Don't, don't, don't. I'm too busy going and teaching
them how to read so they can find out for themselves
eventually. The Tories about this is the
labour market so. I'm just reading a bit of calm
marks. But no, I don't bring politics
into the classroom. I don't think politics should be
in the classroom remotely, no. And they can just work out
eventually themselves. Cause I'm gonna teach them to
read. Do you know what to do?
Numbers. You teach them to do maths.
Most people are left anyway when they're growing up because they
are big, they're part of a society.
I don't know why actually, but most people are quite left,
aren't they? When they grow up.
When they're younger, usually. I think in most of my
collections left there was a teacher Tapp survey that I saw
which was from teachers. What's their political?
Outlook. So it was a poll but just
teaches. Yep.
So currently Labour are on like 40 to 45%, Tories are on 2025%.
Something sure and reformer on like. 15 but in general, not
teachers. That's in general, yeah, that's
in general. And the teacher was really
interesting because it was pretty much exactly what I
thought. So Labour were running about 60
to 65%. Hmm.
Then it was like the Lib Dems on 10%.
Then it was Green on like 5%. Like it was, it was those three
parties, the Tories and Reform are both less than 10%.
Yeah, like a good like 5% ish each.
Yeah. And I was like, yeah, that
pretty much that, that that is my experience.
You know, one in 25 Conservative as a teacher.
That's about right I'd say. From what I've seen.
Get mad if I do find it. I do find it.
Not bad, I just find it. I'd love to pick someone's
brains. They've got different.
As a teacher, but yeah, it's what especially someone's been
doing it a long time. I've been teaching for like
10-15 years. I would be interested to be
like, what different priorities? Yeah.
What do you like about it? Honestly, be interested in that
from anyone. If someone's listening, right,
and is is a conservative voter and is in education, can you
genuinely please get in touch with us and we just wanna talk?
Yeah, no, just a nice chat, like down in your level, bend down,
do some restorative talk, get them on side.
Yeah, be cool and I'll be interested.
I was just joking, pretending that we're gonna no, but I do
actually want to know because it is genuinely interesting for me.
Why you would do that, I don't know.
Anyway, that's enough of that. That's a long intro.
That's enough of that. Let's play the Jingle.
We'll talk about the fact we're heading into time, 6A little
Pollard on Instagram, and then we'll get into pole balancing,
parenting and teaching. Wow.
OK, Hayden, quick one between these two options.
Have you just come from the golf course or are you just come from
the sailing Boat Club? Actually I've just come from
work. Can I have your number please?
Hayden's wearing a very middle class polo right now.
That's that's right, that's right.
Polo is a middle class. You mean a polo?
I'm wearing a polo. You look like one of those, you
know? You look like you're wearing
chinos on on your underneath and some boat shoes and cardigan
wrapped around your shoulders. And.
To me, the benefits of the free market and how capitalism is
best and stuff like that, Yeah, yeah.
So we can. Yeah, well, that's got a bit too
far, isn't? It a little bit little bit too
far but next time they will see lights.
Again, only one of us plays golf.
Yep, and it's not him. We're in time 6.
Yep, look at me like ohh, yeah, yeah, we're in term.
Six Time 6 is a really busy one. What's your favourite thing
about Time Six last summer? The weather.
Is it genuinely I just love getting outside with kids.
Good job in England. I know, yeah.
If we're lucky that is. Yeah, yeah.
Just getting outside, genuinely, it's my favourite thing.
I always think of that as like a.
That's a nice. Memory where?
Where does it rank in your terms?
So we ranked holidays before term 6, the last term of the
year. Where does it rank?
It's actually quite hard. I was about to go with one, but
then I immediately doubted myself because actually term 6
towards the end when it gets a bit or disjointed sometimes and
then like the kids know, especially in the sex, they know
they're going to another school. Yeah, nothing on the back like
the last few weeks. The behaviour always dropped
massively because I like what you gonna do about it.
I'm I'm never coming back in a. Few weeks.
I don't know. Probably is is up there though,
even one or two the Christmas time.
Yeah, I like that one as well. Yeah, it's a nice time.
Good. The two terms with the least
actual teaching. That's interesting.
That really tells me a lot about how.
You take two terms with a bit of enrichment in them.
Yeah, yeah, people on Instagram would have an absolute field day
about that. You don't wanna date holiday
Difficult feature. Your favourite terms are the
ones where you're not teaching teaching.
Ohh got 13 wings are not enough for you?
Bloody lefty liberal woke teacher.
Wow. Yeah, you captured that audience
well. Thank you, dear loved one Time
six though Time 6 is great sports thing.
Sports day is my favourite day. Yeah, yeah, And it's what's
really been. It is frustrating, I'm not gonna
lie, but I'm not gonna do anything about it.
Is that we've missed sports there since we're part time,
it's always at the end of the. Week we haven't we.
In fact, we missed most things. Anything you know, all of the
fun. Stuff.
When's non uniformed? Friday.
When's children?
Friday. OK, no problem.
When you gonna do that? Afternoon.
Friday. Yeah.
Number day. Friday.
No problem. OK.
Sports day, right? Friday.
That's cool. That's interesting.
Summer Fair. Thursday.
Ohh. Still off?
Yeah.
We do get a bank holiday, we can't complain.
But yeah, I love time Six turn 6 is amazing.
Just like you said, get outside as much as possible.
What's your favourite thing? Then I so my favourite thing,
sports day. But I think sports day should be
even more of a thing. I think sports day should be a
huge sports week. No, but maybe.
But I think sports in general need to be put on so much more
of a pedestal in school. I think it's one of the most
important things that actually gets decimated.
You know, we don't touch certain stuff.
It's like sacred. We don't touch maths and English
in the morning. We just don't like maybe maybe
once or twice a year for like a trip or something.
But it's like, no, no, we're not gonna do pretty sacred time.
Yeah, we're not gonna do groups in Mass in English.
That is what is gold Standard Time science is kind of one
little level below that where one of these groups get out.
Yeah, groups. Groups still.
History. Go and do some reading groups.
Come on. We talked about it last time.
The wider curriculum is just a joke and how it's treated like
it's. Doing art, not doing anything
then in this curriculum. So off you go.
Would you like? That you've done for 17 times in
a row and you still don't understand it as well.
You won't understand it now for the 18th time, but.
No, I hate maths. Clearly.
I love art. Get out of here, you take.
What's that you live for? Art that we do three times at
all time I speak. It's time for you not to do art,
honestly. But it's it's similar with
sports with one saying, I think sports should be as sacred as
maths and English. Yeah.
And it be like, but some people, but some children don't like
sports. Some children don't like
reading. We force it down their necks.
Some children don't like maths and we make them do it every
day. Is that you were allowed to,
not. Like sport actually has a a
genuine physical benefit to you as.
Well, yeah, exactly. That's ohh.
You know, some kids aren't very good at sport.
Get them moving and you understand what you're saying
right now because it's the same as maths in English.
Some kids aren't. Some kids aren't very good at
being healthy. Stop that.
Just let them. Yeah, it's, it's like, and you
know what, even if they stop halfway through and they've done
more than nothing. Yeah.
And some of them don't do anything outside of school.
It's really important. Like health is, wealth is is.
Wealth is health, as Gove said, as it wasn't Gove, it's just
just, you know, we can just use it as punishment.
Been naughty you naughty, naughty, naughty kid.
Get outside, do 10 laps around the field.
So then why? The thing is, I just think
sports, they should be a huge event.
Yeah, I think, I think you should go all out.
I think it should be a day. I don't like how sports they
turned into half day for a lot of schools.
Like no, no sports day. Just do some teen parents in.
Yeah, get the parents. Medals, stickers, or whatever.
Have winners, we said this a million times.
Have winners like it's OK to have participation things as
well as winners and and don't panty these people like there
are no winners in schools. One of the first things I
remember saying in this podcast that winds me up because the
winners all the time in school. You only need to be in
celebration assembly to see that there are winners all the time
in school. So we can't have winners
anymore. We're raising a woke generation
of angry people you don't know how to lose.
It's like, well, I like this character that's.
God, yes, your alter ego some Yeah, I've seen a lot of
Instagram comments in the last week of weirdos who just like
someone said, I've gotta go back to Instagram thing.
Someone said this is where this character come from.
Someone posted, I just did a meme.
It was first of all, I did an Obama meme where it was just
something Obama said. It was nothing to do with Obama.
It was just Obama saying this thing.
I made a meme about it, right. Yeah, I've started a war
teaching me a teaching me. Literally it was it was not even
political. Yes, Obama was just saying, hey,
what the heck are you talking about?
And my caption I put with it when someone who's never stepped
foot in the classroom starts telling you how easy teaching
is, that classic thing of no, you're not done it before, but
like teach other easy don't know.
Like you have no idea. Yeah, so some someone commented,
like loads of people commenting on that just anti Obama stuff,
like the worst president we've ever seen, the most divisive
president in recent history and now his mannequin Biden's
cleaning up Banana Republic. It's like dude, this is just a
mean. What's a mannequin?
Have interest? I just translate maniac.
I realise the mannequin is also a word.
Damn it trying. To catch you.
It's an underfed mannequin I think.
But anyway someone commented on it going right.
This is exactly what they said on this has nothing to do with
anything right. They literally commented going
those who can't do teach. Those who can't teach
indoctrinate children. What?
That is you, Dylan. Right.
I really, I didn't reply. I really wanted to say this is
the person I'm talking about. You're the person.
I'm talking person never in education who is like saying
where are you right now? I actually wanted to reply going
those who can't put a coherent argument together comment on
random people's meme Instagram page.
Those who comment on who can't come on random meme Instagram
page are. Complete nonsense and don't be
me. I don't buy.
I didn't. I didn't, I didn't.
But the overall point there, I suppose, was everything I was
saying. I've forgotten completely what
we're. Saying about the meme, yeah,
don't go to sports day. We're talking sports day.
I see. I I've done with that guy.
You've done, I mean. You've got completely, yeah.
The office, I think sports is really important.
There will be winners and stuff. I just think it should be
massively picked up. I think it's really important.
Do you think there's one thing and it's very much related to
what you just said, picking the kids that do the events.
Don't say again, what what is your opinion on that?
Because a lot of people will say just pick everyone, get everyone
has a go, everyone has a fair chance and all the races.
Or do you pick the kids that are the.
Best, right? So OK, let's flip this because I
have a slightly watered back opinion of what you're having in
a maths lesson. Do we only let the children who
are really good at maths do maths?
No, of course everyone does maths.
So during a sports day, everyone should do something.
Yes. Correct.
If you've got a part of your sports day, which I think you
should have, which is celebrating excellence in sport.
Yeah. And, and like the, the, the best
races in your year group or something.
Hmm. You should have that.
And you should pick the best children as well.
So the, you know, the the other end of some people say to you
like only the best people should be in sports day because only
the best people get to do, you know, they love art and they get
a chance to do and they get a chance to do.
Well, OK. But also everyone does art.
When we do art, everyone does maths when we do maths, when we
do a sports day, everyone should do sports day.
It should be a celebration of sport, should be very positive.
We should be pushing as many children began to do it.
Whether they say, ohh, I'm not sure they want to do this.
It's like, OK, well let's find a way you can.
Can you be involved in a team game maybe rather than an
individual one, where you might feel embarrassed because we
don't want you to feel embarrassment, But the the best
children should get the chance to show off how good they are.
Yeah, and also, there's a bit of planning involved from us, isn't
there? Like you wouldn't you just avoid
doing a race? Like, I know this kid.
I've taught these kids all year. I know that this kid here is the
literal fastest kid in our school.
And I happen to know that these other five children are probably
the slowest in this year group. Let's put them all in a race.
It's like, no, let's not do that.
You probably would in the same way you differentiate in class.
Yeah, exactly. You probably just make the races
and different games and things fail, like you just said, so
everyone feels comfortable, has a chance to to participate and
win and not feel embarrassed. But then, yeah, like you said, I
do think it's really important to not then some people just go
that way as well. They just do that.
Like, no, it's completely fair. Everyone's in one heat.
And it's like, no, actually, Joe, what?
I think the top six fastest runners probably do want to
actually have a race against each other to find out who's the
fastest. Let's do that as well.
Let's give them a chance. You should.
I think schools should build a culture of like, records and
stuff. Yeah Pinata, I think that's
great granny like you know again and all but some people might
not reach that record correct. That's how records work and
they'll learn that during their time in school was like ohh, but
it shouldn't have that no no, it's OK for a child to know that
someone else is better than or something that's where they're
gonna learn isn't it in school because they don't have those
opportunities to learn in school what they're going to become 18
year old weirdos who think the world revolves around them.
But you exactly right. I need it to be told much
earlier that I wasn't the. Best person in the world?
Instead, I was told repeatedly that I was the cleverest person
in the. World it still is that actually.
And in primary school, I'm not even joking, in primary school,
it was very much like always very skipped a year group, went
up a year group, but was always told you're so clever, you're so
intelligent. And then I went to secondary
school, into a grammar school and that that went, that
disappeared. And that was really weird like
that. I think earlier should have been
instilled in me that you can, you can be good, but you need to
learn, you know, there are people going to be better than
you always. And that was a really weird
dynamic for me stepping into secondary school because I was
the only one from my school who went to secondary school and all
of a sudden I was just another fish.
The other kids went home. My second just go, Yeah.
I was the only kid in my class to go to secondary school.
Were you? No to that, yeah.
But yeah, I just. I think sports, they should be
huge thing. That's my point now nice cool
talk about your. Pole quick poll.
We will get into parenting I promise and had this poll on
Instagram and I want to tell you 2 facts about it because it blew
my mind. One of them did anyway.
And so simple politics. Really cool Instagram page
making politics accessible for loads of people really coming
into their own in the general election.
A lot of people who wouldn't be at all really interested or
bothered at least get to see him.
Like really digestible form. Run by guy called Tatton
Spiller. He used to come into schools.
I was gonna say I recognise that.
Name. Yeah, he came in and did an
assembly. I think he still goes into
schools now and again, just about making politics accessible
for people, is really passionate about that.
Yeah, I think what he does is amazing.
So they posted a news like every day they post like a carousel of
different news. It's just a gift to people who
don't want to read the papers and stuff.
And the first one was a poll about how teachers are using
their own money to help children and support students and which
we all know happens a lot. So I did my own one, I shared
that and I did a poll and it was simply have you used your own
money to support your pupils? And the three options were yes,
all the time, rarely or never. Sure.
So first interesting thing. No one who voted on that poll.
Hundreds of teachers on our Instagram.
No, no one voted. Never.
Wow. So everyone who voted, maybe
some people didn't vote. I don't know who who were never.
But no one who voted, but never. So everyone spent some money.
I can say I've spent some of my money.
I'm sure you spent some money. It's just it's it's completely
normal, as shown by that poll. Yeah, I think 20% said rarely
and 80% said yeah, all the time. Wow.
And, and and that shocked me because I didn't know it was
that high. No, but I dug deeper and I think
I found out why it shocked me. OK, so I went in a little bit
deeper in. OK, I would say 95% of the
people who clicked. Yeah, always, I always spend my
money with females. Yeah, 95% of the people who
clicked rarely were males. No way.
So the reason why there's such a discrepancy is there's far fewer
males and. Teaching men don't care.
But I said I just skipped it. That's what I'm trying to say.
You saying that men don't care, women do.
No, OK, listen, I'm not going to say anything.
I want you to commentate on this.
I'm going to stay completely neutral other than give you the
facts, which is clearly women teachers spend more on extra
stuff and and ploughing in. Not all of them, obviously,
because some men voted all the time.
Some women voted rarely. Yeah, but they're general.
But it wasn't much. They're very clearly was a huge
skew towards men rarely do it, women do it all the time.
What's your thought on? That I don't really know.
I think it plays into stereotypes, isn't it?
That's all it does. Like I think we could go really
deep with this I suppose. But at what point the stereotype
should become a fact? Because that's just a fact now.
Well, that's what stereotypes. But yeah, well, no.
Cause stereotypes like exaggerated and they're not
always good to go off because it doesn't mean.
Yeah. So for example, if we said
beforehand most women spend more money than men on the class,
Someone Like You shouldn't, shouldn't fall into those
stereotypes. So.
But now we've got this data that is just a fact.
It's like if you said it now. So I said, oh, bloody
stereotypes. But no, no, here this actually
is. True, that's the blurred lines.
Sometimes stereotypes. Not just true.
That's, well, usually the stereotype.
Rooted in truth, aren't they? Yeah, yeah, like you said, they
get exaggerated and then they get manipulated and played on
and people use it for negative things.
But the actual, the root of a stereotype is usually because
there is a an actual underlying fact.
Yeah, to show something and. How you interpret that is up to.
You. Is that from your from your
experience though, is that shock you or does?
That it doesn't shock me at all, to be honest with you.
I think it's cool that you found that.
But I'm, I wouldn't say I'm shocked.
I'd be shocked if it was other way around.
I'd be shocked if it was like, yeah, men were saying all the
time they spend the money and women rarely.
I'd be like, ohh, that doesn't fit with my stereotypes, my view
of, you know, teachers. Do you think that that links
into like men are more likely to push themselves like find
themselves further up on the career ladder?
In terms of what I mean, there is, you know, it's just this is
my job. We're going to do my job.
If it's not working, I'll move somewhere else.
I'll leave the profession or I'll just go into a role outside
the. Classroom.
I think it's linked to the gender stereotypes than
education, full stop. Right.
I think, I think there are lots of gender stereotypes in
education and they're all just kind of interwoven a bit between
male and female, for a start. You know, it's still a
profession dominated by women. And it's like, OK, well, why is
that? And I think if you look into the
why is that, you'll probably find the same reason, the same
answer for the for why your poll came out like that as well.
It's like, well, yeah. Because stereotypically women
are more caring, more motherly, all of that kind of stuff.
Not everyone obviously stereotypes.
And I think with that comes the answer to your one is that yeah,
why is it women that are spending more money than in the
class and not men? It's OHH that's the same answer.
Can I stay in the classroom longer?
As well. Yeah, yeah, I guess so.
In general, I I feel like every time we say something here,
yeah, we're not saying everyone. And then we, you know, we, we
spoke. I remember what episode it was.
It was ages ago. We've done a lot now.
Ages and ages ago last year sometime we, I can't remember
why, but we mentioned the fact that the percentage of men in
teaching isn't representative the higher up you go in terms of
like the hierarchy of the school.
So it was some, I'm just making up numbers now.
Let's say it was like 10% of teachers are our men, whereas
20% of SLT and head teachers were men.
So it was like, OK, so there's disproportionate amount of men
rising up the ranks. Why is that?
And you play again into the stereotypes of, OK, the men
aren't as caring and, and maybe they as as the women, they don't
want to stay in the classroom. They want to rise up the career
ladder and make more money. And if they want to make more
money, probably less likely to spend all of their money on the
class. I don't know.
I just think you could probably go down a massive rabbit hole.
Yeah, I was just trying to get you to say something got
cancelled, so keep going mate. Yeah.
Ohh, there. No, I think it's interesting.
I'd love to hear because probably people do like whole
studies on this. Yeah.
So it'd be really cool to find. Out and again, like what?
Well, just wanna reiterate is that's just a fact.
That is just what happened in this poll.
Yeah, most of them, many said, really most of the women said
all the time. And I just found it really
interesting. Let's play the Jingle one more
time and we'll have a nice short chat about balancing parenting
and teaching and just, I guess, reflecting on the fact we've
been parents now this school year, basically.
OK, how it's affected things. Wow.
Hmm. Hello everyone, welcome to
another episode of Teaching Repeat.
My name is Dylan. Dylan, which is the Jingle Mate.
Sorry, we bulk. Don't tell them we record 10 at
a time. And we just predict the future.
Imagine. Imagine we get to the end of
recording one episode and we're generally quite knackered.
Literally, I don't know why. Because we'd sit and talk like
this. Yeah, not recording.
I made you tie me out anyway. Just in general being around.
So we've been parents now for pretty much this school year.
Both our children were born at the start of the school year.
I felt like it was a weird few weeks starting back knowing that
my partner is about to give birth, I was about to become a
father and I just moved house as well.
That was a really weird time one.
But since then, obviously we've we've had our children.
River came along in November. Yeah, I've got that.
Yeah. November.
November the 19th. Very good, very good.
Yeah, because I know because it's two weeks after Rory Anna
month. Ah yeah, nice.
So anyway, I guess this part of the episode is going to be all
about balancing being a teacher and being a parent because we're
new to this. So we're going to reflect on how
we've managed to do it for the first few months and then
probably, yeah. And then probably project a bit
on how we plan to do it in the following years because, you
know, it's weird because we have this child now for at least 17
1/2 more years. So yeah, that's quite a long
time, isn't it? And depending on who wins the
election, I don't think it does depend.
I think it doesn't matter who wins.
No, no, it might be 50. Years.
I I suppose you're listening to this as well.
You might also be in the boat of being a kid or.
Being a kid. Please.
No, I hope not. Yeah, you might be a bit of
being a parent or knowing you're gonna be a parent in the future.
Yeah, at some point you plan on becoming a parent and you
probably thinking how on earth can balance all thinking?
Hell no. And actually, let's hear.
From doing it right now. This might confirm.
Let's put on a different podcast because it's nothing to do with
me. So I guess my first point to
you, Hayden, is how much do you regret it?
Ohh fights. Not at all.
Dylan. My child is precious.
My lip was quivering. Keep it together.
No, I jokes aside, it is the best thing I've ever.
Done well, just funny enough that you said that obviously
didn't plan this, but I was I watched the Tick Tock the other
day and it was a woman just talking to camera saying I
haven't have children in their 30s.
Just classic to the point where she's like, oh, I don't know
what to do. I don't know if I want children
or not. And she said, I wanna, I want
people to comment down below if you had kids and if you regret
it was like, because everyone that I had no have kids always
say you won't regret it. Regret it.
But I'm like, but there is a part of me that's worried that I
just will though. Yeah.
So does that exist? And I look at the comments
section. It was really, really
interesting because there was a huge variety of people.
Yeah. And there was some was one of
the top comment on it was brutal.
But she even said in the comment, I'm being brutally
honest here. She said I love my kids, but I
absolutely regret it. She was like, I would I really,
really miss my life and time and everything before having kids.
Even though I, I love my kids, I do regret having yeah.
And I was like, wow, that's interesting.
Then the next comment below, it was like, you'll never regret
it. It's given my life purpose.
It's a love that I've never experienced before.
And you know, I love my life now.
Yes, it's more exhausting and knackered and I miss elements of
my life before, but I would never, ever go back.
And I was like, well, there's the two complete opposites
there. When someone asks you for your
opinion, do you always give other peoples instead of your
own or is that just what you doing?
Sorry. How long is this going to take?
Finish, finish. I want to make him laugh and
tell my large number. I'm stuck, I know.
I wonder how many types of comedy is going to go through
before he gives me that. I'll give you some more.
No, no, no, don't. For me personally is generally
the best I've ever done because honestly, when you know, in, in
the mornings when he wakes up, it's really annoying me wakes up
at 5:00. Like I completely get what these
people are saying. It's really, I'd never be up for
that time ever. And I'm knackered and I'm like,
I'm actually annoyed sometimes. And I go, oh God, could you just
not have got up at 5 for the bloody 57th day in a row?
Like, but then you go over to him and he's got his head up and
he's smiling and I'm like, I love you so much.
And we go, we go and play for two hours and it's fine.
Like for me personally is genuinely the best thing we've
done. And I, I wish.
I wish I'd done it sooner, I think.
So regret is not the right word. But what's the biggest thing
then, that you miss real life? What's the biggest impact to
you? Yeah, it's something that you
had previously and now you don't have.
It I was someone who absolutely never really planned anything,
so I went with the flow kind of thing.
Well, what I mean is like, I wouldn't.
It was like Wednesday. We're talking about your
lessons. Just to clarify my personal
life, if it was like Wednesday and and someone said to me what
you doing Friday night or what you doing Saturday and I I would
honestly have to reply. I don't know, like, I don't
know. Yeah.
Because either someone else has planned something that I'm going
along with, or I'll wait until Friday and then sort something
out. And then Saturday, I'll sort
something out and, and it's just like that, that freedom to kind
of do whatever I want. I would say, though, that by the
time Rory came around, I might look back now and feel like I
missed that. But I was 30 when Rory came.
I had my entire 20s of doing whatever I wanted whenever I
wanted. If I wanted to play golf, I
played golf. And I'd have friends who had
kids like two or three, four years earlier who'd started to
go down the road of like, Oh, no, I can't just come today.
Do you miss having friends? But they, they, they like I
can't, I can't come today because I've got to plan more
than two days in advance because I've got a child now and I
understand that more than ever. But I think I got to the point
where the grass always be greener.
And I'll look back now, but like, I wish I had my time, but
I got to the point where I was just like, I do want to get that
now. Yeah.
I was ready to make. I was ready to sacrifice my own
thing. Yeah.
And there are lots of people who aren't ready to do that.
And I think the one thing I want to get across right now, and I'm
saying it's the best thing ever. I'm not that person who's gonna
tell you it's the best thing for you ever.
I think that's it. That annoys me so much.
Yeah. People saying it's the best.
You have to do this. It's like, no, you don't at all.
If your favourite thing ever is going away on holiday whenever
you want and spending time with your partner as much as you want
and having you know if you've made that choice not to have
kids, crack. And if you're happy with it as
well, Yeah, do that then if you're satisfied with it and.
And your gut feeling is I don't want, I don't want kids.
You don't have to. You really at all.
I mean, that pressure is gone a lot.
I reckon generations ago that there was way more pressure.
Yeah, you've got to, you've got to have kids and the start of
family. Whereas now it's more like,
well, actually no, you don't have to if you don't want.
To well, do you think that's partly to do with like the
environment as well that we're bringing kids into?
Because I'd say that at these days, it used to be even like
even when we were in school, remember there was a huge thing
about like teen pregnancies and stuff.
It was massive. It was like, don't do, don't do
this. You need to have educate.
This is a huge problem in England.
And now we're at the point where it's like, or have a kid, don't
get to 30 and not have a kid, please.
Because there's so many people of our generation born in like
the the late 80s, early 90s, who are now, you know, passed into
their 30s, mid 30s, who still haven't had children.
And people in their 20s who are thinking, well, I can't, I've
not even got a house yet. Of course I can't afford to
bring a child into. Yeah.
Do you think that's another reason why it's shifted and
become more? Acceptable.
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. The environment and the economy
is a huge factor. I know.
I actually know lots of people who in one of two boats, they're
either thinking I might want kids, but I can't, I can't even
afford to live by my for myself at the moment.
So how could I possibly afford a kid?
So not having a kick as I can't afford it.
And there's people just just just don't want kids at all.
And they're thinking, I I like my lifestyle and it's and I'm
earning barely enough. So I just want, you know, I mean
they're just actively being like, Nope, don't want kids then
haven't even got a house yet. I'm going to rent and I don't
want to have a kid if I'm not in a house.
And they have that order almost of like, yeah, no, I have to
some people been very strict with like, I'm married, I'm
gonna get a house and then we have kids and they still very
much live by that. Yeah, that that order.
And it's like, yeah, but you know, your mid 30s now and you
haven't done the 1st 2:00 and it's not our choice.
It's because they're so unbelievably expensive.
Yeah, yeah. So I just think people are in
tough situations. Like what?
Like what was it for you? I want to dive deep into what
made you want to have kids? I or did you want to have?
I don't know. I don't actually know your
situation. Like was it just a bit of ohh,
this is kind of happening or conscious decision?
How how long did you want kids and that kind of those?
Kind of questions Is that classic kid?
I was like, I wanted kids my whole childhood.
Yeah. Like she's quite abnormal for
men. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think because again, I don't have said in the podcast, but I
was, if I think about my cousins, hmm, I'm the oldest of
my cousins and up until I was probably 141516, there was
always a baby cousin in the family.
So always, always growing up, there was a baby in, in the
family somehow that I was related to that I'd hang out
with and, and you know, my mum would be with her sister who's
who had babies. They're like 20 now, which is
crazy. Ohh, older than 20 cause I'm 30,
but it's always been a baby basically.
Yeah. And I always loved spending time
playing with them. I was surrounded by them and.
I hated it. Just yeah, I didn't ask you, but
I. Wow, the end of the.
Episode. I love it so much that I thought
I'm going to start a podcast with a man who looks like a
baby. Yeah.
Thank you, young face. I'll take that.
No, I've always wanted to and through my 20s, I think the
first half of my 20s I thought not yet, obviously, umm, then
then I got to like 2526 and I was like, I I probably would,
but I can wait. Yeah, I had that, that classic
thing of what you're experiencing now, which is, I
know I want kids, but I'm not really bothered by it.
Too much as long as I've known you that's I'd say that's the
state I've. Known.
Yeah. Even like, yeah, mid 20s, maybe
a little bit younger. I remember you being like, yeah,
I'd love kids. I'd have kids now.
Yeah, I was. Always like Jesus.
So I I would have a kid now if, if, if, if like my partner
falling pregnant, I'd have been like, OK, let's do it like 2526.
I absolutely would absolutely fine with that.
I would have wanted a bit more time to just play golf and I
wanted the stuff like. You've been cool.
With it, I've been absolutely cool with it.
Yeah. And I've been, you know, I've
embraced it and I would love it. I think then from like my 25 to
30, I kind of wanted to get more and it was more like, I do want
this though. And there were certain reasons
why we, we didn't quite do it that time or we pushed it on.
But then when we decided, right, we're actually going to properly
do this now we're going to actually properly try.
We're really fortunate it only took us like 2-3, four months,
which is we understand how lucky we are at that point because,
you know, if it, like some people takes years, that would
have knocked mean to 3233. Yeah.
Like so.
So I, I do understand how lucky I am.
And Rory came two months after my 30th birthday.
And I actually think in the modern day, when I was younger,
you said that to me. I've been gutted, Gutted.
If you told me I had my first kid at 30, I'd have been
devastated. Like, what went wrong?
Like what on earth? What happened?
Why? But actually, funnily enough, I
think in this day and age as we've grown up, that's part of
the course. And not anything, it's probably
like a couple of years. Yeah, yeah.
So so the the only thing I think now to myself is ohh, I do want
like 3. So I need to like yeah, I can't
be fat. I don't be 38.
Yeah, I need, you know what you're gonna say.
Yeah. And it might happen.
Yeah, that's fine. That'd be absolutely the same as
you. 20, think. Ohh, no, 30.
So I can't imagine being a situation where I don't want
another kid. Yeah, which I know I need young.
I know a lot of older parents who've had kids in their 40s and
it's like, you know what, When their kids are like 18 and
they're in their 60s or near 60s, whatever they always like,
they keep some youthful young, you know?
But you you weren't that bothered by having.
Kids, No, not at all. I was very different to you.
We were this is probably one thing that we're very different
on. I think if I, if I had a kid at
like 25, I would have had a breakdown, but genuinely,
because I would absolutely did not want kids like all the way
through my 20s. It wasn't until I didn't, I
didn't even I know this is going to sound really awful.
I'm just going to be brutally honest.
I didn't really like like toddler kids.
Like even in teaching, I was like, I stuck to key stage two.
I was like, I don't want to teach.
Too young, bro. Oh, that's very normal.
But like you said, you know you like babies.
We didn't. I didn't really have babies in
the family for a bit, but we're close enough age where I was
still like little kid myself, so I didn't really pay attention to
it. And yeah, so all through my 20s
I was like, no, no, no, not really, not really.
And it wasn't and it was a very quick switch.
So I don't have any. If you listeners, particularly
blokes, if you're in the same sort of boat, have had this same
experience. But I went from thinking
absolutely not. Were you also?
Very quickly to clarify, when you thought that, did you think
not ever or were you just? Like no, no, I was just not
right now. I I always had the idea was
like, probably want kids. You probably want kids, but had
reserved the idea. But you'd be gutted if it was
right. Now, yeah, absolutely would have
been absolutely even like 20. OK, that makes sense.
Yeah. Yeah.
But I got to maybe like 29. I was approaching 30 and.
Big thing isn't. It what it was, but it's so
bizarre. It's something in my head just
switch and and I was like, oh man, I want to I want a kid and
I really did want. I just I don't know what it was.
It was very bizarre, but. There's no tangible reason
behind it. I think there is a little bit I
think it was I was getting bored and you know how you said I had
I had my whole 20s to just be airless and normally do much
like we we bought we're very lucky because we had bought a
house and when I was about 25, so I kind of had that that
honeymoon period was over of like, oh, we bought has really
cool was that we lived in a house now for, you know, a few
years. First house, first house.
Yeah, yeah, sorry you're on your second.
Yeah, I didn't go on TV and win loads of money.
And maybe you should. My life, I felt like it was
lacking a bit of. Purpose.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I think that's what it
was. I just felt a bit empty.
Yeah. And I kind of filled that in my
brain with I think I'm having a kid would fill that and it did.
So there's the end of my story is I think that is why I'd say I
don't regret having children is because it has filled this weird
purpose hole for me. And I am someone that just I,
you know, I constantly need something like our business like
teaching was great for couple of years and I don't need something
else. We started a business that was
great for couple of years. We started a podcast about
constantly needs something so having having a baby, it fills
that and and more. So has it been then, because
we've let's reflect on the six to eight months because my, my
first point that's just get out there.
So we have to talk about it anymore.
Is that the number one thing that we did to help with the
fact with parents now is that we went part-time.
Like we are so present and I'm so grateful that I'm able to be
really present with Rory where we work.
My school's 10 minutes away from my house anyway, and I only have
to go in three times a week during time time.
Like the amount of time I get to spend at home and being in
control of my time doesn't mean that whole I'm always here.
We could run the business and we do other things and you know.
We're. We're around that.
Yeah, that that you know, I am literally 2 rooms away.
Yeah, I'm very grateful. I don't wanna put people's backs
up about that because I think most, no, no, but no.
But but all I wanna say is like we we've gotta talk about
personal experience and I think we can't now talk about our six
to eight months experience about just laying the fact that I
don't everyone to hear how lovely it is that we spent so
much time. Our kids are not realise that
it's not because you're choosing not to if you're working full
time like it's because we're fortunate enough that we are at
home. So when I ask you now, how's it
been? Hmm, in that context, how has it
been? Great.
No, I don't know. I don't know what to say really.
It's nice that we are around so much.
It's nice. But however, I will say there is
a big misconception I think from a lot of people that we know
that on those days, on those days we're.
Working on days off, are you going?
To say our days off. Yeah.
Because they're not. And actually, if anything, we're
busier than ever at the moment. I think.
I don't know about you, but I think before we were quite
scatty. Yeah.
So if on a Thursday and Friday
we're like, let's have a couple of hours off and do something,
we'll just catch up on the weekend.
Now it's a bit like no weekends. A bit more sacred now actually,
because I want to spend time as a.
Family and wider family, that's when they're.
Yeah. So on Thursdays and Fridays now
when we're on our part time days, we're at home we're so I
find that we're more busy than ever and we will do like a 10/12
hour day. But do you find it's made you
more productive outside of school like and like in terms of
everything having the. Kids so much more, so much more
productive just getting it done. Just getting stuff done in
certain time frames. Thinking I don't have any other
time to do this. I have to do it.
I can't just procrastinate. I've got to get it done.
What about you? Yeah, yeah, I think, I think
exactly that. I think it's just made me, it's
made me more organised in that respect.
I I, you know, I feel guilty if I'm spending more time on
something that I have to umm, I feel guilty, right.
Doing anything that doesn't have to be done.
That isn't with worry. Rory.
Yeah. So what a big example of this is
we went out for lunch the other day, Lauren's parents came to
see Rory and we had to nip out to get something because we're,
we're ongoing decorating the house.
So I think we have to go out to get some paint or something like
that. We had to go and get something
and it was something where realistically is both of us
needed to go to decide what we wanted in the house.
So a lot of Lauren's parents around, we were like, oh, do you
mind just looking after him for a bit?
We done a couple of times where we just nipped out and left Rory
with them, which is again, fine with grandparents.
That's lovely. But we went out and we were
like, yes, and lunch. So we, we got some lunch and we
went to ask, you know, like a proper restaurant 1st.
And it was actually the first time we'd gone to do that
because we only have nipped out to the shop or something.
Yeah. And we were like, we ordered our
food and we've been in the restaurant for like 10 minutes
and Laurence phone notification popped up and her background is
a rotating Marcel Rory pictures or something.
And so Rory's face popped up and I nearly started crying.
Like, I'm not even joking, honestly.
Yeah. Little while.
Yeah. But I, I literally honest to God
was I had to sell a phone away because I couldn't look at him
because I felt so much guilt in that moment.
Yeah, not that we've gone out, but the fact we were doing
something we just didn't have to do.
So we didn't have to go for lunch.
We could have just nipped to the shop and gone home again.
And Long was like, you you've been to work.
Like, yeah, but I know you're with him.
Yeah, I know you're with Matt's mum.
And I know that I have go to work, so you're home with his
mum. But there was something about
the fact that we didn't have to be enjoying ourselves.
Like I've never felt guilty for enjoying myself.
And it was the fact we were both out doing it.
I felt horrendous. I felt horrible guilt, if you
felt that at all. Yeah, Honestly, no.
Because you don't love your child.
Yeah. No, no, I don't know.
No, I think we're very different with that.
Yeah. You're really.
Really, I think as long as long as you safe, hmm, and and happy
that I'm happy, you know, I mean, that's it.
So when she's with my mum or Lauren's mum, I know that she
loves being with them and she doesn't like, you know, if she
was one of those papers then got really upset, but she didn't
want she like detachment, then I'd probably feel quite guilty.
But because she's just absolutely fine and loves it.
As long as I know she's safe and happy, I'm just that's fine.
But we did our first thing like that as well.
The last month we went out for a Sunday roast and it was because
the mind Lawrence Anniversary seven years and yeah, we went
out for for a roast dinner. With seven-year Itch.
Seven-year itch yeah yeah, we've got roast dinner.
That's. What ours is.
And that was kind of, but we were like, oh, this is nice,
isn't it? Because obviously restaurants
were babies, especially with our baby.
Jesus Christ is just a bit of a nightmare.
But I didn't feel I didn't feel guilty at all.
I like I said, I think I would if.
She was the Royals, Having a bank was having a great time.
It was my own personal like. Yeah, ohh God, that's a you
thing that. Very much, yeah.
And you're a bit like that you anyway.
I mean, I know you get quite anxious and nervous like about
leaving him or whatever. Yeah, yeah.
I just, there's something about, you know, I spent the first two
weeks of his life staring and making sure he's breathing and
like, yeah, like, honestly, like looking back now, I think it's
insane. It's of course he's breathing.
He's a bit like, of course it is.
But I sat up and for hours, and I'm not even exaggerating, for
hours I would just be staring at his chest looking for small
movements. Yep, Yep.
OK, cool. Not like to state that.
And I was like, no. No, no, no.
Because he worked. He might.
That's Might. Just stop.
Stop. Moving and if it did, stop it
because I'd obviously make it happen again.
Yeah, I didn't know what to. Do anything?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, let's talk because look at
the time, like an hour in. Let's quickly talk about work
and and parenting and just how it's affected.
I'm gonna ask you a very open question.
How do you think having a child has changed your life as a
teacher? It cemented the direction it was
going in any way, which was far less drive and desire to go
above and beyond. I think it was already happening
and it's already on that trajectory for a lot of teachers
because we're fed up with rising workload, squeezed pay and
seeing other professions get on. Only this week there are
statistics put out about teacher retention and recruitment.
Again. The government missed again
their target for recruitment teachers.
They missed it nine out of the last 10 years that there is a
reason why this is happening. And when someone smuggling on
the Internet says, well, why don't you leave then if it's so
hard, I, I want to shake them and say we are.
And that's a massive problem. We don't have enough teachers to
fix it. That's what's happening.
So if that's your, if that's your way of fixing this is for
the problem to get worse, then you have no idea what you're
talking about. And so I think I'm not going to
pretend that it completely changed my outlook on teaching
because I don't think it did. It just cemented what I was
already going the path down and now I'm 100% there.
I'm like, I am not going to do anything that I don't have to do
in that job, which is not a detriment to my my children in
my class. Yeah.
So, for example, if there is a display to be put up and that
means I have to stay in school from half four till five when I
could go home to Rory, I won't put the display up.
Yeah, because I've made the decision that that is not
detrimental to my children's progress in my class.
What if it's in your classroom? I again have made that decision
that as a teacher I can teach the children well.
And if I can do it in the car, if it's if it's absolutely vital
for whatever reason, then I will try and make my teaching
assistant get some time to do it during the day or me if I get
some time during PA. Yeah, but like I said in a few
episodes ago, which my top tips I think for a teacher while
being that we did prioritising what is best for my class and
doing those things first and when I run out of time that that
list stops. Yeah, so you know, it's funny
cause what you said is very logical and actually how most
jobs work ever. Yeah, I know.
I think, I reckon a lot of people are listening right now
thinking that's it makes you sound bad.
It makes you sound lazy. Lazy teacher doesn't do the job
properly. That's what it.
Sounds like it's, it's, it's insane because what we always
like miss out on these lists. And when we say stuff like this,
when I say as a teacher, I'm not, I'm not saying from half
four till five to do a display. What is not even remotely
thought about is the amount of time I put into planning my
lessons and delivering them that day and then marking them.
So it's like, hey, that we, we kind of just forget the job and
then we judge people on how much extra they do for free.
So yeah, we all go, OK, well, it's we all teach all day.
We all plan lessons, all market. Let's put that in a box.
The only thing I'm actually going to judge you as a teacher
is all the extra stuff where you stay later.
So if you do that, well, you're a great teacher, aren't you?
Look, you're fantastic. Displays your pub and look at
that amazing thing you did and you state cross country.
Yeah, Jackie is like, well, you didn't do that.
You must be awful teacher. So we we are completely ignoring
this box here which is full of my full time job, that that's my
job there. My job is the planning,
delivering and marking and assessment of lessons.
Do not judge teachers on how much of the extra stuff they do.
That's insane. OK.
So do you think being a parent has impacted the main bit, the
bit in the box for you or do you think you still do that as well
or as efficiently or as, I don't know, passionately as before?
I do the same as what I did before Rory.
Hmm. But what I did before Rory was
different to what I did at the start of my career.
So again, just reiterating that point that I I was on this
journey anyway. I'm reducing my workload.
Yeah. I was already on this journey
where I didn't plan everything from scratch, which I used to
do. I was already on this journey
of, OK, I'm long in the tooth enough now as a teacher to not
have to do everything intricately on the slides
anymore. I can deliver a good lesson,
almost adlib knowing what we're going to do.
But just modelling stuff and doing it together.
That was already happening. Rory didn't.
Rory didn't actually change the trajectory he might have.
Accelerated it, yeah. So if I look at the quality of
your teaching, if I could go back in time and actually just
just assess you as a teacher, the effectiveness of you doing
your main job, none of the outside stuff, none of the above
and beyond stuff, you wouldn't, you wouldn't say that that's
dropped because of quality. Thanks as well.
I know, but money that that hasn't dropped for you because I
know you and I just want to make that really clear because I
think that that makes a big distinction between doing that.
We still take our job very seriously and do the job
properly and kids learn really well still.
To really important job, to really important job.
And you're right, because we can give the impression sometimes
that we're so flippant. About stuff, I don't care about
the job. No, I care just as much as I
always did about the job. It's just that we never talk
about the job. We talk about, like you said,
all of the stuff that goes around it.
That is just a weird expectation that you just do for free in
your own time. Sacrifice, be a martyr to
education is no, I'm not going to do anymore.
No, it's like, honestly, I got in.
I got in at half seven this morning to prep my lessons and I
delivered them and then I marked them after school.
Yeah, I am leaving at half four. Hmm, no, I'm not.
No, I'm not doing. That.
Yeah, yeah. Because actually, I, I know this
weekend I'm gonna do some planning as well.
Yeah. Because that's not been done for
next week. Yeah.
Because we've changed our curriculum and we're doing this,
you know, these things happen and and I, I work.
I I'd say I work most weekends at least you know.
At least every other. At least every other and when I
do it's at least an hour or two so like.
Which is just not what would happen if you were just doing a
different job where you know you left your work.
I'm not saying I have a job to stress free either.
That's like a really annoying thing that gets posted to me
online on Instagram and stuff. It's like, well, we have a have
a stressful job. So I didn't say anything about
your job. Me saying that teaching is
stressful was not me saying that your job is not just stop.
It's not a race to the bottom how hard we've all got it.
Yeah, we are. Just my experience is that it's
a tough weird job of weird. Expectations which can make it
work. You gotta make what you've got
work a lot of times and people, I just want to finish by coming
back to this right when people say you mentioned this, when
people say just get another job, then I hate that argument so
much. And if you ever use that
argument, please, please, please stop using it as a really,
really nonsense argument. I'll just get another job.
We know people can get other jobs, but we also do want
teachers and we do want nurses and we do want police like just
telling them go get a better job.
Then it's like no is that doesn't fix the problem.
So please stop using Argon. Anyone.
So just got 55 insurance brokers and no teachers.
So OK, well, no one's teaching our kids though.
Yeah. And I would add to your point
and, and again, I'm not saying about insurance brokers, we need
them, OK? I'm just saying we need a
breadth of different careers. Moving on from your point even
further is we want to be teachers.
I want to be a teacher. I wish that I felt like my
teacher wage was enough to supplement my family and was
enough to support my family, but it's not.
So I can't control me getting a pay rise.
So that's why we started our business.
Yeah, we can control how much we market and grow our business and
we can see a tangible return on on hours we put into that job.
For example, we're opening up a service for year four and year
six children. We currently have a service just
for year five children. We're about to triple our our
services, right. Even, you know, let's just say
it goes kind of well, we might add 50% to 100% of our revenue
next year, OK. That means that the time we put
into opening that business, opening them avenues, now it's
going to have a direct link to the amount of revenue we get
through our business. That's not what happens with.
Teaching. No, the more time you don't get.
Anything. You don't get anything.
For us, there's no retention bonuses.
Either, yeah, it's nothing. There's nothing to to keep keep
us in the job. And that's why people are
leaving. We have a crisis.
Hmm. Crazy, right?
One minute 10. I've got one last question.
One minute, one minute 10. One hour 10.
You got to keep it quick though, OK, Because I want to ask.
This is the last question. This is the last question,
right? About teaching Do you now treat
teachers differently if if you know their parents and why if
you do? Two parts of this question.
Instinctively, yes. When I sit and think about it
for five seconds, I get annoyed at myself for doing that and I
make a point of not doing it. OK, why do you instinctively
treat teachers differently if you know their parents, the
teachers that aren't? Parents, because I've
experienced not being a parent and being a parent and the
insane difference in amount of time and and freedom I have is,
is I can't ignore that. I know how incredibly different
life becomes once you have a baby, even down to just simply
the time in your life. Ignore the fact you have a
lovely, you know, card now you love with all your heart and
you've got all this, I mean, attachment and stuff.
OK, ignore that for a second. Quite simply, the amount of time
I have, any amount of sleep I get, any amount of functionality
I have is less after having Rory.
So when someone tells me they've had a baby, my initial thought
is, Oh my God, are you OK? How are you getting on?
And if they say I need to rush, I can't do that tonight.
I need to rush off because I've got a child.
I'd be like, Oh my God, that's fine.
Whereas if someone says I need to rush off, I don't want to do
that. Your gut instinct is just ohh,
OK, you know, I don't have that sympathy straight away.
However, immediately when I when I have that, because I've said
before, well, I don't want to do I've got Rory, I'm going home.
I then after three seconds ago. And if anyone else doesn't want
to do that just because they don't want to, that's enough of
a reason. Equally fine.
Yeah, that's fine. It's not because I've got a
child, it's because it's extra work and I think you should be
compensated for it. And and if you if you me having
a child doesn't mean I get a get out of gaol free card and you
don't, everyone still has. To be smokers break.
Yeah, is, is, is completely. And I know having a child is
important and we're growing in society and we need people to
replace those that don't care. Times of the job.
I I really really really think that there shouldn't be a
difference in how it treated. No.
So let's treat everyone like they've got a kid.
Yeah, that's one way to do it. That should be the default it
really. Isn't and there's there's two
ways people go down. Same with like, ohh, these
benefit cheats. There's always two roads you can
go down, go down the road of treating everyone and and
knowing some people will take advantage of the system or you
don't give anyone anything knowing there are people who
need something and it's like, but you can make people more.
But me personally? What do you mean?
As in, like, if you treat them like they don't have kids, you
can manipulate people into doing more stuff.
Well, have kids. So, you know, you can go home.
You can go home. That's all I'm saying.
I'm saying there are two options.
Treat everyone, give them stuff. Yeah.
And then what I'm saying is don't don't manipulate people
because they don't have. Kids, I'm saying that's the
other option. Don't do that.
No, no, because I'm saying you'd also not be treating people to
have kids like they don't have kids.
Yeah. So they miss out.
Yeah. I'm not.
They wouldn't be. I've.
No one would manipulate me. I've had a kid.
Yeah. They don't manipulate me if I
didn't. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But that's just my point, though.
Benefits. It's just like, no, there's
scroungers. There's no one should have
anything. It's like, no, I'd rather
someone take advantage than somebody needs something or get
it. Yeah, so me too.
I think I've really misunderstood your point.
No, it's fine. It's good place.
Terrifying. But I don't know what you.
Mean I was. Just gonna got any one one
minute, 12 minutes. Was just an analogy.
Would be two seconds since morning 10.
Yeah. So you've got time.
Time. Wow, it's been long episode.
Another one where I said let's do a short episode today.
Yep, and another one way you say let's do a short one and I say
OK, and I just ignore that because I know we'll just change
forever whenever guys follow us on Instagram at Teach P podcast
and I'm thinking we might have a new artwork for our podcast
soon. Ohh can't wait to not like.
It Yeah and not do anything for it and just moan yeah, classic
Hayden not doing anything moaning about everything yeah.
Gene, any artists out there wanted to sign us and artworks
to veto Dylan's version? Of it Any dentists out there?
I want to check my teeth ohh. Let me know, Don't be them off
again. Guys follow us like us, rate
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