Have you ever felt that some days seem too long, some too fast, and some a combination of both? Your energy is dwindling, your patience is non-existent and sometimes you feel like you can’t do even one more day of the thing you love most – teaching. That is burnout. And teacher burnout is a real thing.
It could happen any time of year. And it clearly came into focus throughout this past year – 2020-2021 – when the pandemic hit, and we suddenly realized what matters most.
At the time of my writing this blog post, it’s almost the end of the school year, and we are slowly coming back to what was before the pandemic.
In this post, I am sharing 5 hacks that helped me overcome the perpetual tiredness – the proverbial teacher burnout – and allowed me to see my job, my students, and my colleagues in a completely different light. One that is energizing rather than draining.
Prevent teacher burnout tip#1: You have the power
Too often we complain about situations or people that, let’s be frank, we have no control over. There will always be a colleague or an administrator or a rule that rub you the wrong way. There will always be responsibilities that you loathe, no matter how much you love your job.
The only thing you can control is YOU. You have the power to choose your reactions and actions. You have the power to respond or not to. You have the power to choose to be compassionate or, if you cannot in that particular moment, take a step or two back and recenter yourself.
When you reframe the question to “what can I do in this situation?” instead of blaming someone else, everything shifts.
Take a step back and understand that it’s not you. You never know where people are coming from, what their personal life challenges are. We all look at life through the lens of our own beliefs, assumptions, and life situations.
Therefore, remembering that you are in charge of how you feel (and how you WANT to feel) is of utmost importance.
Here are some questions you can ask when you find yourself in a difficult situation
- What can I do in this situation?
- What is in my power to change?
- How can I help?
- How do I feel and what do I need to do pay attention to in order to make this feeling better?
Once I had the epiphany that so much more depends on me than what I had previously thought, my entire outlook to my life situations – both at work and in personal life – changed. And, to tell you the truth, I don’t want to go back to the old me:)
Prevent teacher burnout tip #2: Do ONE thing
In his book The One Thing, Gary Keller says: “Go small. Don’t focus on being busy; focus on being productive. Allow what matters most to drive your day”. (p.41)
We live in the age of overload of information. Both in our personal lives and at school our minds are so busy trying to get everything done and taught that no wonder we feel like we have nothing left, come evening.
In ESL world, this is multiplied by the fact that our students are most likely “behind” by the mainstream standards and there is this constant pressure to perform and to show results.
Stop right here. We need results, yes. We need to help our students move forward, yes.
But how? Doing what’s most important for our students is what matters most.
Pick ONE thing that allows both you and the students to move forward the most and watch your day pick itself up from the dust. Not multitasking. Not trying to cover ALL vocabulary, grammar, sentence structure,
Your one thing could be working on listening through content – dictating some sentences that will allow the
It could be summarizing the gist of a historical period they are studying in their social studies.
It could be writing a journal that will allow you to help them with expression.
The point is, less is more. And it works in teaching, too. One thing is certain, it will surely move you forward much more than jumping around from one thing to the next.
Prevent teacher burnout tip #3: Don’t worry, be happy
I know it sounds overly simplistic, but I want you to consider a couple of things.
What is worry?
It really is our projection of fear into the future. The fear might be coming from something that happened in your past and you are afraid that it will repeat itself.
But the truth is, the only thing we have is right now. We cannot change the past, nor do we really know what will happen in the future.
But when we realize that we have the present moment at our disposal, we can, in
If we have a student, who is not yet speaking English, worrying about it is not going to make him or
If we have a kid who is misbehaving, worrying about it is not going to change that.
What IS going to change is when you decide the actions you can take right now and the one thing you can do with the student every day until progress is made.
Remember, right now is your gift. The future is uncertain. Worry, albeit very human, is useless.
Prevent teacher burnout tip #4: Watch your language
Yes, I am telling you, the ESL teacher, to watch your language:)
Believe it or not, the words that come out of our mouths determine our reality.
Do you complain a lot about your life? Whether it’s the weather, a person, food, or anything else – the more you complain about it, the more of it you notice.
I know everyone and their mother is telling you to “think positive” and you may be tired of it. And I agree, thinking just positive is not realistic. After all, we are humans and it is perfectly all right to experience a whole range of emotions and thoughts. When we do that, we become clear of what it is we want and don’t want.
But there is something to be said about watching what you say and wording it in a more positive way (or as positive as possible in that moment). Bear with me for a moment here.
Repeating how tired we are, or how much we dislike our schedule or the weather is not going to make us less tired, change the schedule or improve the weather. We will just continue feeling drained and irritated.
Now what if we did one little tweak to what we say. What if we said nothing? The thoughts and grumbling mumbling complaints can live inside us but there is not need to let them out.
What if we said nothing AND tried to find something that is actually good? For example, it’s cold but we can really feel that spring is on its way. I had a great day and accomplished many things – that must be why I feel tired. And so on.
It is so much easier for us to notice things that are wrong because somehow we are conditioned to do that. But when we begin to notice that life is actually not that bad, we begin to feel better, become more energetic and creative and that translates into our work with our students.
Prevent teacher burnout tip #5: Take a mental health day
This piece of advice is nothing new. However, I have included it in this blog post mostly because even though we know we should take a day to ourselves, we tend to talk ourselves out of it.
There could be a multitude of reasons – from creating sub plans, to feeling the need to keep going because the students have a quiz coming up, to a meeting that had been scheduled months ago and you don’t want to change it.
But the main reason is guilt. Not enoughness. Desire to control.
If you have sick time or personal time built in, use it. If you don’t take a day when your body and soul are crying for it, you will get sick. And then you will really need to take at least one day off.
But what kind of recharging is it when you are physically unwell?
Remember, you are an amazing teacher. You have the power to take charge of how you feel and react. And you are always enough, no matter how big the avalanche of requirements, rules, and expectations of your job is.
How do you recharge? Share with us in the comments below!
P.S. I have also made a video for you, in case you prefer to watch rather than read:) If you find it valuable, I would be grateful if you followed my channel and shared this with your friends!
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