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That's true, and summers for teachers are lighter workload than most other professions. But it's not quite as rosy as some think.
For one thing, you're actually less flexible during the school year because you can't just take any week off for vacation, you can only during breaks when the school is off.
For another, you often have to prep during the summer, since it's very very difficult to prep for a class while simultaneously teaching it.
Don’t forget all the recertification stuff they have to do as well!
Does grade level affect your preparation etc?
Probably, but even a kindergarten teacher would have to prepare to an extent, since it's not just whether you know the material it's whether you can communicate it at the proper level. And for the lower grades you'd probably have to prepare a lot more fun activities and games.
In Portugal, teachers get a pretty long break during the summer, but I'm not sure if it's a full three months. The biggest pain for teachers here is having to move around a lot, especially before they get a permanent job. It takes ages to get there. Sometimes these moves are really far, and they have to uproot their lives and find a new place to live closer to their school. It used to be that teaching was a really respected job, almost like being a doctor.
Teachers always seem to struggle, but they do get 3 months off during the summer.