HOW TO FIGHT SCHOOL-RELATED STRESS

Although developing a positive outlook and turning problems into opportunities are effective tools in the battle against burnout, they are not enough to stop the cycle of self-defeat. To avoid the damage that burnout can cause, you also need to be proactive; you must prevent the buildup of the small stresses that eventually lead to distress and burnout. Consider some of the following strategies when you create a proactive plan to prevent toxic stress from consuming your life.

·        Place great value on your personal time. Working long hours every day is a sure path to burnout. You need time to just be yourself. School will always be there.

·        Allow yourself time to make effective transitions from one class to another. This is particularly difficult when you have many classes each day. One way to manage this is by having an opening routine that your students can do independently. This will free you to make the mental, emotional, and physical switch from one group of students to another.

·        Keep a flexible attitude. Get into the habit of looking for solutions instead of dwelling on your problems. If you are open to alternatives, you will be able to assess your options much more quickly.

·        Everyone benefits when you delegate responsibilities. Decide who you want to do a task, clearly explain how you want it accomplished, and then step back and allow the people you selected to get busy.

·        Plan ahead. When you know that you are approaching a tough time at school, find opportunities to prevent or solve problems and not just suffer through them.     

·        Take good care of yourself. Teachers tend to be nurturing people who focus on
the needs of others. But to succeed in taking care of others, you must take care of your own needs. Allow yourself time to rest, relax, have fun, exercise, eat well, socialize and enjoy life.

·        Slow down. Stop rushing from one responsibility to the next. Here are some ways to slow your life down: take time to eat lunch, allow yourself at least ten minutes to relax with colleagues at some point during your day, and use a journal for reflection.

·        Put some fun in your instruction. Plan activities that you and your students can look forward to. Few teachers experience burnout while they are having fun.

·        Pace the intensity of the work. Learn to plan your instruction to allow for some less arduous teaching periods. For example, you should not be “on” day after day. Instead, allow your students time for independent work, small group work, or even activities such as viewing films related to the subject under study. Being “on” all the time will quickly exhaust you.

·        Add structure to your life. Routines will prevent many stress-inducing problems.

·        Start to put together a network of supportive and positive people who can help you. Being connected to others is an important way to avoid the stress that can make every day miserable.

·        Take command of as much of your school life as you possibly can. Establish realistic long-term and short-term goals for yourself and then strive to achieve them.

·        Think before you act. If you plan your responses to unpleasant situations you will prevent many problems. Situations that you should think about before you act include dealing with incomplete homework assignments, angry parents, defiant students, cheating incidents, tardy students, and other frequent classroom disruptions.

Overcoming the Dreaded February Funk

“Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.” ~Carl Sandburg

The signs of February Funk are obvious: you find yourself flipping calendar pages counting the days until Spring Break, petty workday annoyances multiply, routine paperwork turns into overwhelming stacks, and each school day threatens to become drudgery.

If February finds you struggling with February Funk, you are not alone! Many teachers agree that even though the calendar may say differently, February is really the longest month of the year. Winter’s gloom seems to last forever as leaving your warm, snug bed each morning to face a chilly classroom becomes a harder-than-ever challenge.

One of the best ways to overcome February Funk is to be proactive in how you spend your time at school. Gaining control of the time you spend on your school chores will enable you to be productive through the dreary winter days of February. When spring break finally arrives, you will be able to relax and fully enjoy your hard-earned vacation.


Tips for Managing Your Time at School

Overcome your February Funk with these tips for gaining control of the “coin of your life." (Most of them have been adapted from First-Year teacher’s Survival Guide.)

1. If a task will take less than three minutes, do it right away.

2. Plan how to manage routine tasks such as taking attendance or making lunch and other counts. While you may have to tweak your plan occasionally, routines will save time, increase accuracy, and decrease stress.

3. Keep you calendar or planner in an accessible spot so you can refer to it often. Use it to record tasks, appointments, and other information you’ll need to remember as you plan your workdays. Be diligent in writing down your tasks and you will soon be more efficient.

4. Use a “To Do” list to keep your days organized. If you would like a template of a list other teachers have found useful, please email Julia with your request.

5. When you plan a unit of study, make up the tests, quizzes, and other handouts as quickly as you can so that you can photocopy them well in advance of when they are needed.

6. Assign each student a number corresponding to the number on your class roster. Teach students to put this number beside their names when they head their papers. When you are ready to grade papers, just put them in numerical order so that recording grades is a simple task.

7. Remember to use your biological clock whenever you can. If you are not a morning person, don’t set aside time in the morning to accomplish detailed work. Do it later instead.

8. Create a template for parent contacts so that you can record the details of each contact right away. If you would like a template that other teachers have found useful, please email Julia with your request.

9. You don’t have to grade every single paper your students complete.

10. Deal efficiently with mail. Act immediately on items that require a written response. Throw away or recycle junk mail. File catalogues for later use.

11. Few things are as tempting and as time-consuming as checking email. Work out a schedule where you check email only at certain times of the day. Most teachers find that checking email three times a day is enough to stay informed without wasting time.

12. Set up equipment early just in case there are problems.

13. Share materials, handouts, tests, and other instructional resources. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Find instructional materials and lesson plans on the Web or talk with your colleagues about what they have used successfully.

14. When you need to distribute different types of materials, spend time before class begins filling containers (plastic bags, plastic cups, coffee cans…) with the materials so students can pick up a container with all the materials at once. They can then get started right away without fuss.

15. Be sure to use electronic files to save time and paper whenever you can. Being able to electronically edit and then reuse handouts and tests will save you hours of time.

16. Consider keeping a binder in which you store your hard copies of lesson plans, handouts, and other materials for each class. If you have this all together, you won’t have to waste time searching for missing papers among your scattered files.

17. If you have daily class routines that require verbal instructions, put the directions on a transparency so that you do not have to repeat them each day.

18. Delegate as much as you can. Even very young students can accomplish many routine tasks such as putting up posters, distributing materials, tidying the room, emptying pencil sharpeners, or keeping the supply area clean.

19. Use your planning time well. Group your tasks so that you do not have to make repeated trips to the copy room, office, media center, or other areas.

20. Reward yourself when you set and achieve your goals. Too often teachers are so busy taking care of their students that they overlook the importance of taking care of themselves. Celebrate your achievements!

If you have a time management tip that you would like to share with your colleagues everywhere, please feel free to submit it! Just click on the Discussion page to get started.


Use Small Blocks of Time Wisely

One of the frustrating aspects of a teacher’s life is that there is never enough time to accomplish everything. While the general shortage of extra time seems to be a problem, large blocks of time are in especially short supply. Interruptions and schedule changes fill a teacher’s days.

You can cope with this by learning to be an expert at accomplishing much in small moments. This is possible with determination, preparation, and practice. Those minutes add up.

Still not convinced? Here are just some of the things a focused teacher can accomplish in just a few minutes.

In fifteen minutes you can:

• Grade the objective portion of a set of test papers
• Create a quiz
• Create a review sheet
• Answer e-mail
• Create anticipatory sets for the entire week

In ten minutes you can:

• Call a parent
• Write a lesson plan
• Grade some essay questions
• Average grades
• Check homework papers

In five minutes you can:

• Create a dynamic closing exercise
• Write a positive note and send it home
• Use the hole punch on a set of papers
• Write a positive comment on at least five papers
• Review key points in a lesson

In three minutes you can:

• Record grades
• Drill your students with flashcards
• Put stickers on a set of papers
• Praise a class for good behavior
• Have students write an evaluation of the day’s lesson

In one minute you can:

• Erase the board
• Display a cartoon about the day’s lesson
• Have students tidy the room
• Select the student of the day or week
• Write an inspirational message on the board

Overcoming a Negative School Climate

In the movies, whenever there is a "tough" school, it's obvious. Lots of graffiti, big really mean looking kids, uncaring teachers, metal detectors, armed guards patrolling the hallways, and a pervasive sense of doom.

In reality, lots of schools can have a negative school climate without all of the cinematic trappings. Just low test scores and the struggle to help students overcome the obstacles to success can take a toll on any school. And that would be just the beginning.

In Discipline Survival Guide for the Secondary Teacher, I offered some small suggestions for those teachers who want to take a constructive stance toward the despair that permeates a building with a negative climate.

The most important thing to remember, though, is that any climate can be changed if enough people work together to make it happen. Start small, but start.

"Despite our best intentions of providing a positive, productive classroom environment for every student, when the schoolwide climate is negative, we struggle to teach and our students struggle to succeed. Contrary to what many people may believe, schools with a negative environment are not confined to the inner city or to impoverished rural areas. Any school can have a negative climate.

 Although there are many influences that can have a negative bearing on the climate of a school, there are some that are obvious: an unsafe location, a history of low academic success, a strong gang presence, a physical plant that is in need of cleaning and repair, a lack of effective procedures and policies, and a lack of administrative support for teachers, just to name a few.

 Unfortunately, schools with a negative climate are easy to identify. At these schools students tend to

• Focus on other activities instead of academics

• Report that they do not feel safe

• Experience little academic success

• Have poor attendance

• Experience problems with their peers as well as with their teachers

• See very little purpose for an education

• Flaunt school rules

• Report that their morale or school spirit is low

• Experience class disruptions due to violence and threats of violence

• Have a high percentage of discipline referrals

   If you teach in a school where the environment is not always constructive, there is a great deal that you can do to make a positive difference in the lives of your students. More than other teachers, the effectual educators in a school where the environment is not positive tend to direct their students toward the future. They help students establish goals and develop skills that will lead to a productive and happy life ahead.

 In order to manage this, though, your attitude should be one of realistic optimism. Teachers who are effective in schools with negative climates are not unmindful of the daily challenges that they and their students face. Instead, they acknowledge their problems and then find ways to solve or at least manage them so that students can be successful.

 Along with a sense of realistic optimism, successful teachers in a school where the climate is not positive tend to acknowledge the big picture of the school and not just focus on the problem areas. This perspective will allow you to acknowledge the problems you encounter at school and then move forward to help students find success.

 Finally, these teachers also tend to believe that change is possible and that they are the agents of that change. With this attitude firmly in place, teachers have been known to inspire entire classes to reach unprecedented and unanticipated success.

 With this attitude, you will have a much greater chance of successfully managing your daily challenges than if you spend your days bemoaning your school’s problems. In addition to these productive attitudes, there are several strategies that you can use to cope with the negative elements of your school’s climate.

• Start small. Keep your classroom clean and organized so that students have an orderly place for learning.

• Focus on the positive elements in your school and work to strengthen them. Become a band booster, football team fan, or sponsor of a student club.

• You should involve as many people as you can to make positive changes at your school. Enlist support and help from student organizations, community groups, the parents and families of your students, and your colleagues.

• Do what you can to strengthen your students’ literacy and math skills. In secondary schools, many of the problems that began when students were younger impede their ability to learn independently.

HOW TO DEAL WITH A REALLY DIFFICULT CLASS

There are difficult classes and then there are really difficult classes. A difficult class is one where things don't always go as planned. Students may get a little loud. They don't do their homework consistently. Sometimes they are distracted and bored or off task. A difficult class won't cause you to toss and turn all night long. There is usually a reasonable fix--a tweak here or there solution

 

 

On the other hand, the really difficult class is exhausting, time-consuming, and stressful. It's the class where you are so busy trying to contain the chaos that you have difficulty just checking attendance. It's the one that makes you want to explore other careers. It's the one that you mentally replay over and over on the way home from school.  If you have one of these really difficult classes this year, you are not alone.

 

 You are also not without resources. You can deal successfully with this type of class. I should know. I have had enough really difficult classes in the course of my long career to develop some expertise in dealing with them. Here's what works for me:

 

 

• Own the problem. If you accept responsibility for what happens in your class, then you can start making efforts to improve the situation. Blaming students or anyone else only wastes time that could be spent creating productive solutions. Thinking of this as a solvable set of problems can move you forward.

 

• Identify the trouble-causing issues in the class. Is the noise level too loud? Is there a problem with students being off task? Is the start of class the problem? Transitions? The end of class? Not enough materials? No social skills? There is rarely just one reason for a class to be really difficult.

 

• Make it easy for students to behave well. Look hard at the procedures, policies, rules, and expectations that you have for this class. Do your students know exactly what is expected of them? When you are trying to manage a really difficult class, you must explicitly spell out the information that they need to know.

 

• Be ruthlessly consistent. If you say it, enforce it. Think through what you expect from your students, tell them what you want, and then mean what you say.

 

• Be patient. If you work steadily at chipping away at rude or unproductive behaviors, sooner or later things will change. Dealing with a really difficult class will take time.

 

• Attack the problem from as many sides as you can. Involve parents and administrators, reward good behavior, have negative consequences for bad behavior, allow for short attention spans...there is no one single approach that will solve the problems in a really difficult class.

 

• Work on the relationship you have with your students. Smile at your class. If you were videotaped while teaching, would your body language reveal positive or negative feelings about your students?

 

• Keep the expectations for your class high. Students live up to the expectations of the adults in their lives, so let them know that you expect a lot from them.

 

• From the first class meeting onward, establish that you control the class. Demonstrate that you will oversee the behavior in your classroom for the good of all students.

 

• Work on the noise level every day until your students learn to govern themselves. Teach students which volumes are acceptable and which are not. Establish signals to help students learn to control the noise.

• Stay on your feet and monitor. Students who know that you are watching over them will hesitate before misbehaving.

• It seems simplistic, but tell your students that you expect them to do their work well and that you will help them learn to do it. Be clear that you are on their side.

• Offer incentives other than grades. Students who have never received a good grade may not be motivated by grades. Offer small, frequent, rewards instead, such as stickers, computer time, or bookmarks.

• Praise good behavior as often as you can. Difficult students do not always know when they are behaving well. When you praise your class for good behavior, you are encouraging all of your students to repeat the behavior.

• Don’t allow students to argue with you. Be polite, but clear that you are the person responsible for the well-being of all students in the class.

 

• Acknowledge the rights of individuals in your class. Showing students that you are fair will ease many sensitive situations.

• Students who do not believe they can succeed have no reason to try. Teachers who achieve success with difficult classes turn the negative energy in a class into a positive force by persistently communicating their faith in their students’ ability to achieve.

What works for you?

Finding Meaning in What We Do

One of the hallmarks of a dedicated teacher is the almost unshakable belief that teachers can change the world. We want to believe that what we do is meaningful. That what do we does make a difference.

Some days, though, it’s easy to be so caught up in the papers to be graded, the assessments to be created, and the emails to be answered that we can lose sight of the meaningfulness of our work. And lately, the hateful tone of so many pundits who are not classroom teachers, but who are quick to tell us what we are doing wrong, wrong, wrong is discouraging and degrading. The result? Burnout.

Burnout is different from the insistent plea, “But I don’t want to go to school today!” that is the morning mantra for teachers everywhere. Burnout is a pervasive sense that there is not much point to what we do. Certainly, the negative aspects of our work outweigh the positives for teachers who are going through burnout.

One of the surest ways to combat the sense of despair that accompanies burnout is to reconsider what having a meaningful career looks like when you teach. What does it mean when we say we make a difference?

Teachers who stop kids from picking on each other, being rude, and making fun of classmates protect students who are powerless to defend themselves. We stop bullies from winning. We empower kids when we tell them to talk to an adult if they have a problem; and we empower them when we praise them for the right things. We empower them over and over when we use our adult power to stop bullies.

We make a difference when we show kids how to be lifelong learners. We make it okay to be curious. We take them to the library to check out books and show them how to read and write and think and work together. We make it cool to be a nerd in a tough world.

For all teachers, and especially those of us who teach the children of poverty, we find meaning in the way that we try to guide our students to a better life. Few veteran teachers have not known the despair that comes when we realize that even our most (seemingly) ordinary students can struggle with terrible home situations—an ill family member, an alcoholic parent, or a guardian who has been out of work for too long, just to name a few. For these kids, teachers are a touchstone of normalcy in a rotten world. We show our students how having an education can make a life far more comfortable and easy than a life of ignorance.

We offer comfort and guidance to those students whose lives are chaotic and dysfunctional for whatever reason. We can soothe the edges for those kids and guide them to cope, to make good choices, to succeed somewhere. We give them the encouragement that the rest of the world does not.

We show our students how to read, to write, to think, to have a life of the mind. Without us, many students would not possess any of these crucial skills. When we show students how to read and write, we give them safe passage in the big world.

Finally, perhaps the most important gift that we give students is the one that is most frequently reciprocated; we teach students to believe in themselves. Whenever you doubt that teaching is a meaningful profession, consider that you spend your days encouraging young people to take charge of their lives and to make gigantic leaps of faith—all dependent on the belief that we have instilled in them that the future is theirs for the taking.

Three Classroom Problems...Three Solutions

One thing is certain: to be a good teacher, you have to be able to solve porblems quickly and with confidence. While most of us are very good at solving serious problems such as covering  massive amounts of curriculum and convincing a roomful of students that we really do have their best interests at heart, sometimes it's the small problems that can be energy zappers. Perhaps the suggestions offered here can help!

Problem 1: Heavy Backpacks Blocking the Aisles

Your school does not have a policy concerning student backpacks. Your students carry around all of their school belongings in backpacks that sometimes seem to weigh more than they do, and their backpacks block the aisles in your class.

SUGGESTIONS

This is a problem with two parts that you must handle separately. First, deal with the weight of the backpacks. Then, tackle the issue of the obstructions and disruptions in your class.

Backpack Weight

• This situation certainly requires collaboration with other teachers. When you speak with colleagues, suggest that you stagger homework deadlines so that students can leave some of their belongings in their locker, in the classroom, or at home.

• Talk to your students to let them know how concerned you are about their health and their stress level. Ask for their suggestions on how to solve the problem.

• Consider involving parents in finding solutions.

• Find out why students feel the need to carry so much. Do they need more time to go to their locker? Do they need advice on how to manage their materials?

Obstructions and Disruptions in Your Class

• When students have backpacks in class, expect them to place their backpack under their desk or as close to them as possible in order to leave a safe aisle.

• Take a team approach to keeping backpacks stowed safely. If they are involved in creating the solution, students will be able to police themselves and each other. Working together on the problem will increase the chances of successful resolution.

• See if you can provide a safe place for students to keep their backpacks other than near their desks.

• Teach students that it is disruptive to constantly search for materials in their backpack during class. Encourage them to keep their belongings as organized as possible in order to reduce search time.

Problem 2: Lost Papers

 

Problem: You hand back a set of homework papers and notice that some of your students do not have their papers. You tell them that you never received their work. They, in turn, assure you that they did the work, turned it in on time, and you must have lost it.

SUGGESTIONS

• Be very organized about how you manage student papers. By appearing very organized, you will prevent many false accusations because students will not think that they can take advantage of your disorganization.

• Grade papers and hand them back as quickly as you can. The longer you delay in returning papers, the harder it is to keep track of them.

• If you use an in-basket for students to hand in their work as they finish it, be sure to move their papers to a labeled folder before the next class can add theirs to the stack.

• If you are unable to check a set of papers within a day or two, at least check to make sure all students have turned in work. This will preclude any surprises for students who are expecting to receive graded papers.

• Do not be absolute in denying your guilt. Instead, try to solve the problem by first asking students with missing papers to check their own notebooks or lockers to see if they could have taken them from the room accidentally. If the papers do not turn up, then offer the students more time to redo the work and turn it in.

Problem 3: Students Without Supplies or Materials

 

Problem: Some of your students have problems keeping up with their materials. They come to class without pencils, pens, papers, or books. You find yourself growing increasingly frustrated as you wait for students to borrow the necessary tools to do their work, wasting valuable instructional time.

SUGGESTIONS

Off-task behavior and discipline problems are just two of the things that can go wrong when students come to class unprepared. Keeping extra supplies on hand will help you avoid many problems. You should implement a system that works for you and your students—one where students can settle quickly to work without fuss. You can do this without having to spend a fortune of your own.

Try to have extra textbooks on hand to lend to students if they forget theirs. When you lend a book to a student, make sure the student writes his or her name on the board or another safe place so you have a record of where the books are. You could also assign a responsible student to be in charge of issuing and collecting borrowed texts. Other teachers have found that expecting students to provide collateral is also effective.

If missing pens or pencils are a problem, set up a system where students can borrow from a shared bank of supplies. Here’s how:

Step 1: Select one or two students to be in charge of the supplies bank.

Step 2: Ask every student to donate a new pen or pencil.

Step 3: Mark the pens and pencils with a number.

Step 4: When students need to borrow a pen or pencil, the students who are

in charge of the bank can record the number and the name of the student who borrowed it.

Step 5: The students who distribute the supplies are also the ones who should remind the borrowers to return them at the end of class.



Save Time and Save Your Sanity

Scenario: You are constantly rushing at school only to find yourself falling farther and farther behind. Every teacher you know seems to feel the same way. The hectic pace is really taking its toll.


Your goal: To free yourself from the stress of the constant rush of a typical school day

Quick Tips: You can save time with some of these strategies.

• Create assignments for student viewing when you preview films or Internet sites.

• Never lose your classroom keys because you keep them in the same location each day.

• Have an up-to-date set of emergency plans ready—just in case.

• Keep your school email folders organized.

• Use a daily “To Do” list you keep on your desk in a bright, easy-to-see folder.

• Teach class routines for activities such as handing in papers, sharpening pencils, or disposing of trash.

• Set up equipment early just in case there are problems.

• Give clear directions to your students so you do not have to repeat them.

• Maintain order in your classroom so you do not have to spend time dealing with behavior problems.

• Learn how to use school equipment efficiently.

• Use a checklist or rubric to grade papers quickly.

• Teachers students how to tidy their work area and pack their materials.

• Don’t arrive too early or too late to meetings or duty assignments.

• Keep receipt books and the other materials you need to collect money on hand.

Still feeling rushed?

In fifteen minutes you can:

• Grade the objective portion of a set of test papers.

• Create a quiz.

• Create a review sheet.

• Answer e-mail.

• Create motivational activities for the entire week.

• Post homework assignments to your class Web page.

• Find at least one helpful Web site to enrich your students’ learning.

• Create a crossword puzzle for fun and reviewing.

In ten minutes you can:

• Call a parent or guardian.

• Write a lesson plan.

• Grade some essay questions.

• Average grades.

• Check homework papers.

• Create a quick diagnostic measure to check prior knowledge.

• Create a model or example for students to use as they work.

In five minutes you can:

• Create a dynamic closing exercise.

• Write a positive note and send it home.

• Make notes on your “To Do” list for the next school day.

• Write a quick reflection about what went well and what you need to tweak in a lesson.

• Use the hole punch on a set of papers so students can stay organized.

• Write a positive comment on at least five papers.

• Review key points in a lesson.

In three minutes you can:

• Record grades.

• Drill your students with flashcards.

• Put stickers on a set of papers.

• Display student work.

• Praise a class for good behavior.

• Have students write an evaluation of the day’s lesson.

• Show a motivational slide show.

In one minute you can:

• Erase the board.

• Display a cartoon about the day’s lesson.

• Have students tidy the room.

• Select the student of the day or week.

• Write an inspirational message on the board.