[clivehawkins]

It's often thought that teachers have a pretty easy life - long holidays and few hours in the classroom - but we know different, don't we?

I don't know about where you work, but here in Italy paid holidays are almost unheard of for teachers at langauge schools. Therefore, make hay while the sun shines is as true as ever.

My question to you is how many hours can somebody work before the quality of the teaching starts to dip? I'm currently doing an average of 32 hours per week but previously it was nearer 40 and I felt that I was just going through the motions. I cut some private work and now I have a few precious extra hours to prepare better lessons and, more importantly, to have a break. I had to say no to offers, which was hard to do.

How are your workloads?