Tips to Keep Your Sanity (and Boost Effective Teaching)!
By Amy McDonald
It was a grey and gloomy February day in Thorne Bay, Alaska. I was sitting alone at my classroom desk, while the kids were at recess. I finally had a few minutes to think! My 24 students spanned grades 3 to 6 with a mix of needs, some intensive. I was exhausted, overwhelmed, scared, and wondering why on earth I ever wanted to be a teacher.
Many of us, especially teaching in rural schools, have experienced this kind of classroom. It feels like everything you once thought you knew has flown out the window. You work long days - including weekends - yet you still feel behind. Adding to the challenge, your administrator doesn’t seem to understand your classroom’s learning span or appreciate your teaching style. Homelife regularly falls into second-place priority.
On top of that are “other duties as assigned”: assessments, recess duty, parent meetings, IEP meetings, curriculum committees, professional development, the holiday program... The list is endless.
A dear friend teaching in the same school told me I needed to find a way to deal with the stress. She noticed that my spark had burnt out and helped me develop some stress-busting strategies. It wasn’t easy, but with her support, my love for teaching was reignited and I was able to get through the year and actually enjoy it!
Here are some things I learned that year that may help refresh your own well-being:
● Routine: My students and I craved routine. Together we devised a system to start every day, including some direct instruction, independent student work time, and student-led activities. This routine supported a calm start to our day and set the tone for the rest of the day.
● Morning Meetings: Routine meetings included a collaborative, agreed-upon mechanism for solving problems, answering questions, and making plans for class. This reduced the number of times I heard, “Ms. Amy…” in a day and gave students more opportunities to be involved in classroom management.
● Teacher Self-care: Build a life from which you don’t seek to escape. My biggest hurdle was allowing myself to prioritize my own needs. Nobody else gives us that permission. Try these:
Set a time to go home every day. Some nights I was still at school at 7:00 p.m., missing out on valuable family time and still never getting everything accomplished. Tell yourself “that’s enough for today,” and go home.
Practice mindfulness. Buzzing at 100 miles an hour, it’s easy to forget to enjoy each moment. Be okay with where things are, replace negative thoughts with positive ones, and be aware of how you are reacting to the world around you. Remember to breathe!
● Music: Use music as a facilitation tool. My students responded very positively to lyric-free music. When I was not giving direct instruction, music played a big part in the calming feeling of our classroom.
● Relationship-building: Intentionally create opportunities to develop relationships with your students. We seldom did anything fun, because we were always trying to complete everything in class. So, we started to include fun activities in our schedule, such as games during PE class, field trips to study science topics, etc. We also worked together to rearrange our classroom - from furniture placement to wall hangings to supply area accessibility. The classroom became more comfortable and efficient for all. These activities strengthened our connections to each other by having more fun and collaboratively making decisions.
● Gratitude: Every morning, the students and I would verbally express some sort of gratitude that we were feeling. This took a while to develop, but eventually it spread throughout our day and statements of gratitude became a normal occurrence.
● Follow Your Gut: I would often second-guess myself, because I was so overwhelmed that I didn’t think I could be right. Permit yourself to follow your instincts when it comes to students and teaching. You’ll be able to move forward and improve your teaching practice. You will also be able to accept when things go wrong. Be humble; there are times we make mistakes. We learn from them.
● Collaborate: If you do everything by yourself, you’ll only ever be as big as yourself. Reach out to others for support. One of the most significant supports I learned that year was to invite experts into my classroom. There was no way I could be an expert in every subject. Experts enabled me to learn from them along with my students and allowed me to better reinforce that knowledge.
● Find Your Crew: There are times when we just need to vent frustration. We need people who take it for just that, venting. We also need people who will put us back on track. My mom is that person for me. She is a remarkable listener and willing to tell me to “buck up” or “wow, Amy, that’s a lot, what can we do about it?”
● Take a Walk: The brain reset you get from taking a short walk is incredible. Our Alaska weather is often not conducive to walking outside, so the gym is a great alternative. Ten minutes at lunch made a big difference in my afternoon mindset.
● Avoid Gossip; Ask Questions: Especially in small schools and communities, relatively little is unknown about each other. Changing how I listened and responded to questions without offering answers was a game-changer. Learning to go to the source, ask good questions, clearly state my thoughts, and stay out of situations I didn’t need to be in made it easier to focus on the positive.
By the time spring arrived and greenery and sunshine began to appear, my classroom was a much more enjoyable place and I was a more enjoyable person to be around. Thanks to the support of my teacher friend, I was then able to support other new teachers as they came into our profession. By lowering stress and improving well-being, satisfaction and retention across our noble profession as educators will rise!
Amy has more than two decades of experience in K-12 education, including English Language Learning, classroom teaching, Lead Teacher, and School Counselor. She currently works as a Counselor and performs “other duties as needed” at Southeast Island School District in Alaska. She has a Bachelor’s in Linguistics, a K-8 Type B Teaching Certification, and a Master’s in K-12 School Counseling. She also leads workshops and events for Brightways Learning, a nonprofit education organization, to build resilience in both youth and educators.