We all know the classic caricature of a teacher: tweed jacket with elbow patches, thick glasses and apple in hand. It may not be that way any more (for most of us, at least), but there are definitely things that this job does to you that other people can find a bit...odd. 

Here are some of the strangest ways teaching can affect your life:

1. Over-analysing culture

This happens mostly to English teachers. We train our students to take nothing for granted when it comes to literature; every sentence and word needs to be zoomed in on and unpicked, scoured for authorial intention and hidden symbolism. It’s perhaps no surprise, then, that it can spill over into your own enjoyment of culture. 

Want to just read a book? Impossible. It’s the same with films, particularly those that are book adaptations. The death of Curley’s wife just isn’t the same when you are evaluating her placement on the hay and the light creating the image of a halo. You see the world differently now; get used to it. 

2. Existing on caffeine 

School days can be a whirlwind. You rush from lesson to break duty to lesson to lunchtime detention with barely enough time to breathe, let alone eat. And so coffee becomes your friend. Your best friend. 

There have been days where I have downed so many coffees - and nothing else - that by the final bell I’m totally wired, full of energy and with eyes as wide as a bush baby’s.

I didn’t even drink coffee before I was a teacher but now I couldn’t get through a school day without it.

3. Bulk-buying stationery

We all know the financial constraints schools are facing and I don’t know a single teacher who hasn’t spent their own money on resources and stationery to use in class.

Constantly replenishing glue sticks and pens can be an expensive habit, however, so looking for bargains becomes a default behaviour. 

Before I was a teacher, I’d spend my Saturdays propping up the bar, but now I can be found in the local pound shop, scooping up glitter glue and Manila folders like they’re lost treasure. 

4. Hoarding 

Most people’s attics are full of old furniture and childhood toys. Not teachers’; especially the ones who have been teaching for a while. Their attic spaces are like a Narnia of resources, books and boxes of things stored “just in case”. 

I remember a colleague bringing in some textbooks she thought might be useful, which turned out to be older than me.

They say everything in education comes back around again at some point. Maybe those old OHP sheets will come in handy one day, after all.

Haili Hughes is an English teacher at Saddleworth School in Oldham, Greater Manchester. She tweets @HughesHaili