Questions about Teacher's Maternity leave!

hsal

Hey! If there are any teachers who have taken maternity leave I have a few questions:

I am due May 6th so I even if I only taken 6 weeks, I won't be back in time to see the end of the school year. 

Has anyone else been in this situation?

1. When did you tell your principal? I will most likely need a long term sub.

2. How did you go about end of the year grading? Or grades if you missed a marking quarter during your leave?

3. How do you balance still writing lesson plans and being involved at school without actually being involved at school?

 

I was working at a restaurant during my last pregnancy so it's all different this time around! Thanks for any help!

Five Months to Plan

1. When did you tell your principal? I will most likely need a long term sub. I told him at 13 weeks. For me that meant telling him during the summer, but I did that becuase I did not want to wait till school started. 2. How did you go about end of the year grading? Or grades if you missed a marking quarter during your leave? My sub did all grading including report cards. We have an online gradebook program. The school gave her access and I gave her the grade book. 3. How do you balance still writing lesson plans and being involved at school without actually being involved at school? I had all lesson plans, master copies, keys etc done by the time i was about 37 weeks. I gave her a huge binder for each class. I know many teachers though where the sub does all the planning for the lesson too. My sub just had to follow everything I already had done. It took some time, but it was worth it for me. I was on leave from Churstmas till march. So I know exactly what they had done in that time period.

mommymegan831

Maybe I'm cold, but when I'm on maternity leave I'm gone and my only responsibility is my kids.  My 1st leave I took from March to the end of the year.  The principal put in a long term sub who did all the grading and planning.  For baby 2 I was out in May and June and she put in subs to cover each of my periods.  It was 8th grade so I felt bad I missed graduation and other year end activities, but I was dealing with a newborn and toddler at home and couldn't be bothered trying to arrange sitters or keeping them quiet during 8th grade activities.  With #2 I was also out September and October.  We were able to afford for me to take 6 months with each and although it was a little rough coming into a class someone else had already started (and kind of messed up which is why they gave the classes to me rather than a different position I was going to take), I'm so grateful for the time I've had to be a SAHM and just focus on my kids.
I also told the principal at after my 1st tri for each kid.  After I told the principal it was up to them how they wanted to proceed.

honeybee111

I was out for different times of the year with both my pregnancies.  With DD, I had her in January and took the rest of the year off.  With DS, I had him in May, missed the end of the year, and the start of this school year.  I'm going back to work next month.

1. I told my principal after 1st trimester with both kids - maybe 13-14 weeks?

2. For DD, the sub took over all the report cards and grading - all my grades are on my school laptop, so it was just showing her the program.  With DS, I did my end of the year grades before I gave birth, and the sub signed off on the report cards and handed them out to the kids.

3. I didn't write any lesson plans while on leave.  I met with my long term subs before they started just to show them around the classroom, give them my laptop, keys, any TEs, and to go over classroom management and routines.  The subs were responsible for all the lesson planning.

dglvrk2

 

1. When did you tell your principal? With both pregnancies (I'm 21 weeks with LO#2 now), I told my principal at 9-10 weeks.  I was feeling pretty sick both times and figured she should know before she saw me barfing etc. I was also starting to pop out a bit with this pregnancy....

2. How did you go about end of the year grading? I'll be out for winter trimester grades this time.  I'm showing the sub what assessments to give and when before I go on maternity leave.  Our report cards are online, so she'll complete them and I'll review them before they go home to the kids. 

3. How do you balance still writing lesson plans and being involved at school without actually being involved at school?  I'm not going to be there and/or involved much.   I stayed away for the most part last time as well.  I'm going to have weekly emails, phone calls or meet off campus for coffee with my ML sub, so we can catch up.  Otherwise, my job is caring for my newborn, not teaching.  I teach fourth grade now and taught second when I had DD#1.  For sub plans, I wrote very explicit plans for the first two weeks of school.  After that, gave curriculum maps and pacing charts, but left the specific plannning to the sub.  I'll have weekly homework and our official assessments ready for the sub this time too. 

hsal

Thank you for all your input ladies! I feel a little bit more prepared now. I was really stressed about how to juggle a toddler, a newborn, and the duties I really wanted to leave behind. We do online grade books as well and since it will be the end of the year, many things will be wrapping up.

I had an appointment today but next week I go back for an ultrasound (silly machine broke over the weekend while they were moving offices ) but I figured I would tell them mid-October, right around 10 weeks.  

Thanks again for all your input!

tigersgirlgv

I've been a long-term sub for two teachers on maternity leave and in both cases I was responsible for all grading and lesson planning. As others mentioned, the teachers both left a week or two worth of plans and then I followed the teacher's guides to plan the rest of the time. The other teachers on your team can also help your sub with planning. I would send occasional (maybe once a week) e-mails to the teachers if I needed something, but I tried to let them enjoy their time at home!

jen39171

I'm a little late to the party, but I want to say that I agree with what others have said. With my first, I was off for the entire second semester, but had a full 5 days with my sub in the room to transition ahead of time. I teach elementary school, and I left her a list of topics to cover and gave her access to my filing cabinet and a flash drive of things I'd created in the past. She used some of it, and I found some awesome stuff in my cabinet when I came back that she left me. My principal asked me to leave a week of sub plans, but the baby came early and i didn't have it done. i called my sub over the weekend and gave her the short version. Report cards were due 3 days after my son was born; I had everything completed but the comments, but managed to get them done here and there (I think mine might have gone home a day late). My sub did all the report cards for the last 2 quarters. I'm pregnant now, due in February, and plan to take at least 12 weeks. I'll leave my sub a similar list of topics to cover, but we will have to somehow collaborate on a report card. In all likelihood, I'll leave the grades I've completed and let her add her own grades and input them. We'll talk about it beforehand. Whichever of us taught the majority of the marking period will do comments (and I hope it's not me. They're the worst!) My principal is on maternity leave now. She knows I'm pregnant, but I'm not going to talk to the interm about a long term sub, it can wait for her to come back.