Teachers’ time: behaviour, school management systems and “Blockages”

Time pressure in teaching is not a new phenomenon, with teacher concerns around "administrivia" common in many school systems.However, the forms that this administrative work takes, and why they are experienced as problematic, are not well understood.In this article, we draw on data generated through the Teacher Time Use app, alongside two school case studies undertaken in public schools in Queensland, Australia.We examine how a particular form of teachers' administrative work (the logging of student behaviour and learning needs on a school management system) contributes to feeling time poor.In particular, we argue that the Queensland school management system "OneSchool" is an example of a "blockage", or debilitating "slow down, that occurs within the flow of teachers" work.The concept of blockages helps to explain how administrative tasks add to the intensity of teachers' work and can contribute to stress and burnout.Our analysis suggests that a drive towards digital technology as a solution to the problem of teachers' time pressure may be misguided and may exacerbate the problems that it seeks to solve.