In short
- Teachers in England reported an average of 46.9 working hours a week in 2025, and general administrative work topped the list of tasks taking too much time.
- Across OECD countries, lower secondary teachers spend about half of their working time teaching, according to TALIS 2018.
- A session costs the same teacher time with six pupils or fifteen, so merging small sessions within your cap saves hours.
- No study has measured how much time better session scheduling saves, so count your own hours before and after a change.
Every reading session costs a teacher's time: preparing, teaching, taking the register and following up. The cost is the same whether six pupils come or fifteen. So the way sessions are scheduled decides a good part of the workload a reading program creates. This article reports what official surveys say about teacher workload and its causes. It then shows where session scheduling adds work, and how fewer, fuller sessions and less admin can take some of it out. It promises no number. It shows you how to count your own.
Can smarter scheduling reduce teacher workload?
Yes, within limits. Scheduling decides how many sessions teachers run and how much admin surrounds each one. Fewer, fuller sessions within the school's size cap mean fewer teacher hours per unit. Doing sign-ups, lists and registers once, in one place, means less admin. No study has measured the size of the saving for reading sessions. The figures in this article are examples, so count the hours in your own school.
What surveys say about teacher workload
Three large surveys describe teachers' working weeks. All three rely on what teachers report about their own time.
| Survey | Who took part | Selected findings |
|---|---|---|
| Teacher Workload Survey 2019 (Walker, Worth & Van den Brande, 2019) | 7,287 teachers and leaders in 404 schools in England | Teachers and middle leaders reported 49.5 hours in the survey week, 21.3 of them teaching. Most said they spent too much time on marking, data management and general administrative work. |
| Working lives of teachers and leaders, wave 4 (IFF Research & UCL Institute of Education, 2025) | 10,808 teachers and leaders in state schools in England, surveyed in 2025 | Teachers reported 46.9 hours a week on average, and full-time teachers 50.1. Of teachers and middle leaders, 71% said they spent too much time on general administrative work. |
| TALIS 2018 (OECD, 2019) | Lower secondary teachers in OECD countries, full-time and part-time | Teachers reported 38.8 hours a week on average, 20.6 of them teaching. In a typical lesson, 8% of class time went on administrative tasks such as recording attendance. |
The trend in England is down. Walker, Worth and Van den Brande (2019) found that hours fell between 2016 and 2019, mostly because teachers spent less time on planning, marking and supervision. In the Working lives survey, teachers reported fewer hours in 2025 than in any earlier wave since 2022 (IFF Research & UCL Institute of Education, 2025). Yet general administrative work has stayed at the top of the list of tasks teachers say take too much time, in every year of that survey.
Workload also matters for keeping staff. In the same 2025 survey, 89% of the teachers and leaders who were considering leaving state schools in England gave high workload as a reason.
None of these surveys looks at reading sessions. They cover all of a teacher's work, in England and in OECD countries. What they show in general is that a large share of teachers' time goes on work other than teaching, and that admin is the part teachers most often say is too much.
Where reading sessions add to the load
A reading session creates work before, during and after the class. Some of that work grows with every session you run. Some grows with every pupil, and some with every round of scheduling. The table sorts the tasks. It comes from practice, not from a study.
| Task | What makes it grow | How to reduce it |
|---|---|---|
| Planning the session | The number of units, if every session for a unit uses one plan | Write one plan per unit and reuse it at every time |
| Teaching the session | The number of sessions | Run fewer, fuller sessions within the cap |
| Collecting sign-ups and chasing pupils who have not chosen | Rounds of scheduling and the number of pupils | One sign-up round per unit, with a deadline and a default |
| Building a list for each teacher | The number of sessions | Let the sign-up list be the register |
| Taking and entering the register | The number of sessions | Record attendance once, in one place |
| Following up absences | The number of pupils who miss | A weekly review instead of daily chasing |
| Rebuilding the timetable | Rounds of scheduling | Recount and adjust instead of starting from scratch |
Fewer, fuller sessions: the arithmetic
Teaching time is the largest cost that scheduling controls. A session costs the same teacher time whether it is full or a third full. So the saving comes from not running sessions you do not need.
Example (invented numbers)
Grade 7 has 90 pupils. The school's cap is 15 pupils per session, and sessions last 45 minutes.
Before: the timetable was built class by class. It runs 12 sessions per unit, with 7 or 8 pupils in each.
12 sessions × 45 minutes = 9 hours of teaching per unit.
After: the coordinator surveys free times and merges sessions where pupils can make the same slot. The new timetable runs 7 sessions, none above 15.
7 sessions × 45 minutes = 5.25 hours of teaching per unit.
Over a term of 10 units, that is 37.5 fewer teaching hours, if every merge holds.
The numbers are invented to show the method. Your saving depends on how many small sessions you run now and how spread out pupils' free times are. How Many Reading Sessions Should You Run Per Unit? shows how to find the smallest workable number.
Rules for merging
- Never go over the cap. Two sessions of 9 do not merge into one of 18 if the cap is 15.
- Merge only where pupils can make the new time. Ask them before you move anyone.
- Keep a small session that is the only time some pupils can make. Attendance matters more than a tidy timetable.
- Keep groups that are small on purpose, such as a group for pupils who struggle.
The cap matters because group size has a cost too. Blatchford, Bassett and Brown (2011) observed 686 pupils in 49 primary and secondary schools. In smaller classes, pupils received more individual attention and had more active interactions with their teacher. The Education Endowment Foundation's toolkit entry on reducing class size finds benefits hard to achieve until classes are smaller than about 20, and only when teaching changes. Choose the cap with that in mind, then fill sessions up to it, not beyond.
Less admin around each session
In both English surveys, most teachers and middle leaders said they spent too much time on general administrative work. Scheduling creates a good deal of it. The steps below cut it down. They come from practice, and no study has tested them for reading sessions.
- One sign-up round per unit. Open it at a set time, close it at a deadline, and place pupils who have not chosen. Avoid rolling changes by email.
- One list per session. The sign-up list is the register, so nobody types names twice.
- One way of recording attendance. Use the same rule for 'present' in every class, recorded in one place.
- One weekly review. Spend ten minutes on a fixed day instead of chasing absences every day. How to Track Attendance in Reading Sessions sets out the routine.
- One plan per unit. Every session for the unit uses it, so teachers plan once.
The pattern is the same throughout: do each task once, in one place, at a set time. Let Students Choose Their Session sets out the sign-up rules that make this possible.
Count the hours before and after
A promised saving is worth little. A counted one is worth a lot, because you can show it to staff and leaders. Count one unit before you change anything, and one unit after.
- Sessions run and minutes per session. Multiply them for teaching time per unit.
- Pupils per session. Divide the pupils present by the sessions run.
- Admin minutes. Ask the coordinator and two teachers to note the time spent on sign-ups, lists, registers and follow-up for one unit.
- Teacher hours per pupil present. Divide total hours by the number of pupils who attended. This is the number to compare.
- Attendance. Check that it did not fall. A saving that costs attendance is not a saving.
Minutes noted by staff are rough. Measured the same rough way before and after, they still show the direction of change. If you change the timetable and want to know whether attendance moved, use the test in Does Flexible Scheduling Improve Student Attendance?.
Where the savings stop
Scheduling controls two parts of the workload a reading program creates: the number of sessions and the admin around them. It does not touch the rest of a teacher's week. It will not reduce marking in other subjects or the time spent on behaviour. Be careful, too, not to count the same saving twice when reporting it. Hours saved by merging sessions and minutes saved on admin are separate figures.
How iRead handles this
In iRead, admins or teachers publish several sessions for the same unit, and each student enrols in exactly one, the one they can attend. An optimizer proposes the schedule that seats every student in the fewest sessions, and the school's team approves it. Attendance is recorded automatically, for sessions online or in school.
The core principle: Every session costs a teacher's time, full or not. Run as few as your cap and pupils' timetables allow, do the admin once, and count the hours.
See it in iRead: An optimizer proposes the schedule that seats every student in the fewest sessions, and the school's team approves it. Attendance is recorded automatically.
See how sessions workKey takeaway
Scheduling cannot fix teacher workload on its own, but it controls the number of sessions and the admin around them. Cut both with care, keep the cap and attendance intact, and measure what you save.
Frequently asked questions
How can schools reduce teacher workload?
Start with the tasks teachers say take too much time. In England's Working lives survey, general administrative work topped that list in every year. For reading sessions, run fewer, fuller sessions within your cap, and handle sign-ups, lists and registers once, in one place.
Do fewer sessions mean bigger classes?
They mean fuller sessions, not larger ones. Keep the cap the school has set, and merge only sessions that run well below it. Group size matters: Blatchford, Bassett and Brown (2011) found that pupils in smaller classes received more individual attention from their teachers.
How many hours can better scheduling save?
Nobody has measured it for reading sessions, so be wary of any promised figure. The saving depends on how many small sessions you run now and how spread out pupils' free times are. Count teaching and admin time for one unit before the change and one unit after.
How many hours do teachers work?
In England, teachers reported an average of 46.9 hours a week in 2025, and full-time teachers 50.1 hours. In TALIS 2018, lower secondary teachers across OECD countries reported 38.8 hours a week, counting part-time teachers, of which 20.6 hours were spent teaching.
Sources
- Walker, M., Worth, J., & Van den Brande, J. (2019). Teacher workload survey 2019: Research report. Department for Education, London (National Foundation for Educational Research). www.gov.uk/government/publications/teacher-workload-survey-2019
- IFF Research & UCL Institute of Education (2025). Working lives of teachers and leaders: Wave 4. Summary report. Department for Education, London. www.gov.uk/government/publications/working-lives-of-teachers-and-leaders-wave-4
- OECD (2019). TALIS 2018 Results (Volume I): Teachers and School Leaders as Lifelong Learners. TALIS, OECD Publishing, Paris. doi.org/10.1787/1d0bc92a-en
- Blatchford, P., Bassett, P., & Brown, P. (2011). Examining the effect of class size on classroom engagement and teacher-pupil interaction: Differences in relation to pupil prior attainment and primary vs. secondary schools. Learning and Instruction, 21(6), 715-730. doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2011.04.001
- Education Endowment Foundation (n.d.). Reducing class size. Teaching and Learning Toolkit, Education Endowment Foundation, London. educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-evidence/teaching-learning-toolkit/reducing-class-size