I have been teaching for 10 plus years, and well I guess the balance of it all would come into play after a couple of years right????. Hmmm…well it has… but… it hasn’t.
I started teaching in New York where I taught French, Spanish and even ISS for a year (if you are not familiar with ISS, it stands for In School Suspension. Yep that was an adventure in itself!). And until recently, I taught French in Georgia (taking some time off to be a Mommy 😊). Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE what I do! I enjoy the kids, the people I work with, and I truly love what I teach. However, the data, the planning, the grading, the meetings, the testing, etc. can become so overwhelming that I could easily forget sometimes that I was a teacher! I felt like I could work 24/7 and still have a ton to do and feel like my day was never finished.
So here’s where I am at…. Is it bad that I have decided to only work from 7:45 am until 4:30 pm? And what gets done gets done? I mean, if I didn’t limit myself to those hours I would be constantly working! I want to spend more time with my husband, family and friends.
Can I tell you that the moment I set myself to those hours, not only was I more productive during the day (and teachers you know how easily it is to get distracted by conversations with colleagues, students, etc.), but I didn’t feel guilty or bad about leaving my school stuff at school! This allowed me to be able to come home and be home. Granted, I know not all teachers can do this (especially not my first few years teaching. You need to get into a rhythm first), but if you can at least give it a shot you might just like it! I thought at first, I am NEVER going to be able to do this, but I did and you can too!!!
Here’s the thing, you can spend 5 minutes on a lesson or 60 minutes on a lesson and more than likely your students are going to spend the same amount of time and put forth the same amount of effort…no matter how long you planned and prepared. And let me tell you, when I would spend sooooo much time on a lesson and they didn’t care about it or it didn’t go the way I thought it would……OH BOY! Was I ever so upset!!!! Eventually, I did get over it, and that’s when I decided I needed to change. The irony of it all is that the lesson that I would put together on the fly or adapt in the middle of a lesson always worked out better and the students were more engaged! Go figure ??……
Here is the best part of this all, I could still be a GREAT teacher and plan great lessons without planning for hours each week. The key is to find some great teaching websites like TPT (my store coming soon!), talk to other teachers in your content area, and don’t reinvent the wheel! If it works use it!
I cannot say how happy I am that I have done this for myself and my family. It has allowed me to enjoy my evenings at home with my family, a night out with a friend, and my weekends to relax, catch up around my house or go do something fun.
I dare you to try! Set a certain time for you to go into school and set a time that you are to leave school and go from there. Take baby steps if you have to. Do it only on certain days and then build up to each day of the school week. You might just like it! (And thank me later! 😊 ).
Bonne chance!!!!
Merci,
Amanda