Mistakes are bound to happen.
When a mom innocently shared a photo of a small typo spotted on her five-year-old’s homework assignment on social media, she received an unexpected lesson on teacher burnout.
In her TikTok video, with overlay text that read, “The homework our five year old came home with,” the surprised mom zoomed in on the assignment’s instructions that read: “Please can you help your child to be able to read these red (tricky) words. Its is their challenge for the weekend!”
Anyone with a basic education level can quickly figure out what’s wrong there.
Whatever the surprised mom’s intentions were with exposing this minor error, commenters were quick to defend the teacher, blaming the flubbed typo on the educator’s long hours and never-ending to-do lists.
“Teachers make mistakes too. Unless you are in education, you’ll never understand how many different things are being juggled. I guarantee that teacher has noticed that mistake and is kicking themselves for not double checking. Just be kind,” quipped one commenter.
“Are teachers not allowed to make a typo? It’s one extra letter,” questioned someone else.
One teacher even admitted to doing something similar.
“I’m a teacher with a masters in Creative writing and literature and I make many mistakes typing up homework on Friday afternoons as I’m absolutely exhausted. It’s 5.45, I want to get home to my own kids and I have a humongous to do list I’m bringing home with me…”
“Do you have any idea how busy teachers are this time of year, this is clearly a typo, as they were probably rushing, doing 15 jobs at once,” someone else jumped in with.
And teachers aren’t just burned out; many are also underpaid.
A Florida middle school teacher recently went on a social media rant about how low educators’ salaries are these days, despite inflation.
“My home was purchased in 2016 for around $160,000,” said Kristen (@kristen_fl). “My income as a teacher at that time was about $40,000. Today, in 2025, my home is worth about $350 to $360,000. My income as a teacher — with a masters’ — is about $54,000.”
“How are people buying homes?” she asked. “How are people purchasing homes at these prices?”















