(Un)educated 📚 My Life As A Teacher, And Why You Should Never Become One

Christopher Owens 🔖 As one advances in age, the feelings that we once had toward our teachers should soften.

Barely alive bags of skin and bones animated purely by coffee and a hatred towards your class gradually become human and sympathetic as the years progress. We realise the work they put in and shudder thinking about how we joked about them and their private lives.

Recently, such recollections have been at the front of my mind due to news about potential strikes, burnout and violence in education. It’s clearly a bleak time to be a teacher for a multitude of reasons: parents have outsourced parenting to schools, society undervalues genuine education but still expects its children to be up to standard, endless bureaucracy.

So this is a timely release.

A stand-up comedian and co-host of the Triggernometry podcast, Francis Foster did his time in the trenches as a supply teacher in places like Dagenham and North Wales. Partly traumatised by his time getting punched in the balls by unruly kids and partly rejuvenated thanks to the incredible success of Triggernometry, it’s a book that was close to being shelved: originally listed for release last year, the original publishers developed cold feet due to Foster (and Triggernometry) being well known for having no truck for identity politics and woke culture.

Thankfully, Constable Publishing stepped in and rescued the book, and good on them for doing so as this is a hilarious yet sobering read about the reality of teaching in Britain in the 21st century.

When discussing his time at a secondary school in Hertfordshire, Foster talks about the worst day he had as a teacher:

I had been informed first thing by the head of drama that I was needed to teach her “rather tricky” year 9 group as she was away on a course. She looked at me and uttered the ominous words, ‘You’re going to need your wits about you’.
This is teacher code for ‘you are about to descend into the depths of hell and an hour in this group’s company will make a tour of Afghanistan seem delightful in comparison’.
Year 9 is frequently the worst year group to teach drama to, for a couple of reasons. They’re thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds, so they’re in the full unpleasant flush of adolescence. They’re awkward, moody and crippled by insecurity. The last thing they want to do is get up in front of their peers and perform. Secondly, many of them won’t be doing drama for GCSE so they have no emotional investment in the lessons. It’s the most toxic of all combinations.

But things go from bad to worse:

As I entered the gym and looked around, I realised that this entire experience was going to be horrific for everyone concerned. But mainly for me. The group was scattered across the room and it looked like they were enjoying an extension to their break time. They were drinking fizzy drinks, eating crisps and chasing each other round the gym. This was already shaping up to be a disaster.
I inhaled a huge gulp of air deep into my lungs in an effort to create a voice that sounded calm and authoritative. It ended up coming out sounding more like an emasculated squeak.
The kids were taking out the gym equipment, including the pommel horse and the monkey bars. From appearing to be an uncooperative rabble, they seemed to be working well as a group. The apparatus was gradually and effectively being built in front of my eyes. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
I realised that I would not be teaching a drama lesson. I would be attempting to stop a PE lesson and it was thirty kids against one teacher. The worst thing was, I didn’t know who the well-behaved kids were, I didn’t understand the group dynamics, I didn’t even know their names.

Also, being caught with his zip down probably didn’t help matters.

As you can read, Foster’s style is swift and breezy, akin to hearing a good pub tale. Even when he goes off in tangents that initially doesn’t, you gladly go with it because you trust Foster. Plus it helps that there are plenty of hilarious moments and observations to keep the reader turning the page.

Interestingly, despite the subtitle, there is never a case made for why one should never become a teacher. Sure, the desperate circumstances are made clear, but I didn’t come away thinking that Foster had made a catastrophic mistake going into teaching nor did I think that the profession was beyond saving. Instead, my admiration for teachers grew and it reinforced the necessity of teachers to guide young people into successful personal and professional lives. Similarly, there are hints about having problems involving mean girl pupils and their parents who believe every word their “wee angel”© says but it’s not elaborated on.

With the morale of teachers at an all-time low in 2026, let’s make this the year that we have honest discussions about the future of teaching, and (Un)educated should serve as the basis for such conversations.

Francis Foster, 2026. (Un)educated: My Life as a Teacher, and Why You Should Never Become One. Constable. ISBN-13: ‎978-0349021508

⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.