Who here is feeling burned out? Are you experiencing teacher burn out? Are you extremely exhausted and questioning whether you were meant to teach or not? I’m *Raising my hand* to all the above. Therefore, I thought I would write an encouragement letter to all of the amazing teachers in the world. So, here goes nothing…
Dear Wonderful Educator,
As teachers, we have one of the hardest jobs on the planet. No one really knows how hard our job is until they are in the profession or married to someone in it. And that was pre-covid.
Now, with a global pandemic, our job has become much more complicated. From trying to teach yourself a new learning management platform to learning how to make your entire class virtual on top of everything else we normally do – it’s just too much. Just from this, I can understand why you are feeling the way you do. This situation is not normal and you are not in this alone.
With teaching, I think that self-reflection is one of the most beneficial things we can do to improve our teaching, and I think it is a good thing to do since we have been through one complete school year with Coronavirus. Here are a few things that I have learned and that have helped me overcome burnout.
I am a perfectionist to the nth-degree and a people-pleaser to boot. My characteristics have led me to believe that I need to be “superwoman” to everyone in my life. I’m learning that, even though I strive for perfection, I will never be able to reach it. I have to let go of the idea of being the best at everything. No one expects you to be perfect or have the perfect classroom. Just make relationships with the students and everything will fall into place.
This leads me into my second point. On day one of this year, I had a discussion with my students about how I am just as human as they are, how I have a life outside of school, and that I completely understand how stressful having high expectations and school, in general, can be. I let them get to know me on a semi-personal level and,… can I tell you?, it has let me see a different side of my students. They care just as much about me as I care about them. Whoa!
Fill Your Cup First
Switching gears a bit – I’m learning that it is just as important to fill my cup as it is to fill the students. What I mean by that is that spending alone time or spending time with my family allows me to rejuvenate. Getting school off my mind helps me compartmentalize and focus on one thing at a time to devote my energy. There are a couple of other helpful things that can be done to help set boundaries:
- Set an automatic reply on your email for the weekend explaining that you will be spending time with family and that you will get back to the sender within 48 hours of returning to work.
- If you use Remind for messaging your students, there is an “office hour” feature that, when turned on, will let the students know that it is not office hours time.
Again, I am an overachiever, which means I put myself to the test. This past summer I changed my entire curriculum – and I mean changed – I started from scratch with two of the classes I teach. The plan was to redo a third class, but I didn’t have time. On top of that, I wanted to add standards-based learning. All the while, trying to complete what they call a Research Experience for Teachers (RET) program. I don’t do well with change and trying to change so much for this coming school year, burned me out! Completely out!!! Since then, I have learned that too much change at once is not a good thing. Make one change at a time – meaning one thing per school year. I still have 20+ years of teaching to go and that means plenty of time to change things around.
Do Your Best & Forget the Rest
Having said all of this, I want to let you in on a saying in my family: “Do your best”. As long as I did my absolute best, my parents were going to be proud of me and that made me feel so much better. However, I would like to add something to the quote (and you may have seen this in other places), “and don’t worry about the rest”. So, to my wonderful educators out there, “Do your best and don’t worry about the rest.”
You are absolutely amazing at your job! You are rocking it! We need more teachers in the world like you! Educator, you are making all the difference in the world to your students whether you see it or not. You can do this!
Sincerely,
Brandi
