Teaching is an all consuming profession. The school day certainly isn’t 9:00am to 3:00pm and school holidays are usually times of planning. At times it can seem like there is never an end to preparation, marking and emails. However, ultimately there is never an end point for teachers. There is no clear line in the sand at the end of the school day where you pack up and leave without further responsibilities or jobs on the to do list. Therefore, teachers have to work hard at developing a work life balance where they decide when the school day ends.
- Turn Email Off: Email is a never ending beast. If you’re incredibly efficient, you may have your inbox down to zero at the end of the school day. But it’s almost guaranteed that more emails will flood in over night. Therefore I recommend turning email off your phone (or at least turn off notifications). It is also effective to have your personal and work email in different apps or browsers so at home you can check your personal email without viewing your work email. If there is an urgent matter that must be attended to, your boss will call you. But otherwise there is no need to be responding to emails once you’ve left school for the day. Even as Deputy Head of Primary, I rarely responded to emails once I was at home. Granted, I left work quite late each evening. But I was able to have a clear school and home divide by not looking at emails once I walked out the school gate. For further ideas see my post How To Use Email Signatures To Create Quick Responses.
- Reassess Commitments: Teaching is much more than just the mandated curriculum, there are expectations for participation in extra curricular activities, professional development, staff committees and more. This is what makes education such a rich profession. But it can be easy to just add on extra responsibilities each year. Therefore, take time to assess your additional responsibilities. If you are asked to take on a new commitment consider what you should stop doing in order to give you the time. You can even ask your boss by saying ‘I’m happy to take on that new responsibility, in order to have time to do an excellent job what other commitment should I put aside?’
- Accept Compromise: Acknowledge that it is impossible to do complete every task to perfection. This is a very hard reality for most teachers. The Pareto principle known as the 80/20 rule states that 80% of effect comes from 20% of causes. Determine what is your vital 20% in order to focus your efforts. Then consider areas that are low impact where you can compromise. For example have a simple wall display that is only changed once a term. Use stamps rather than stickers when you are marking. Be innovative and creative where you can, but accept that not all lessons will be exemplary. Settle for a simple Mother’s Day card rather than a complicated craft. Use rubrics for marking rather than hand writing extensive comments. Plan units of work that run for 8 of the 10 weeks of the term to avoid over programming, knowing that there’s a good chance you will have days lost for events and excursions.
- Assess Efficiency: Do and honest assessment about your efficiency levels across the week. Number of hours worked does not necessarily correlate with effectiveness as a teacher. There are many of traps that teachers can easily fall into that decrease efficiency and therefore effectiveness. Do you get distracted when marking work in front of the TV, in a cafe or in your staff room? Instead, to go the library or an empty classroom where you can probably complete the marking in half the time. Do you spend hours searching for the perfect image, font, YouTube video or lesson idea on Pinterest? Set yourself a limit, for example looking at 5 videos on YouTube and picking the best from that limited selection. Do you procrastinate in the evening and then only start your work after you’ve had dinner and watched an episode of your favourite series? Rather stay at school for one more hour to get the urgent and important jobs done and then totally disconnect and relax when you get home. Are you constantly trying to multitask when working on a large task such as programming or writing reports? Turn off your email and social media notifications and block out time for focused work.
- Utilise Mornings, Unwind Evenings: I wouldn’t call myself a morning person, but as a teacher embracing mornings has been a game changer. Schools are incredibly peaceful from 7:00-8:00am. In that hour you can get a significant amount of planning and preparation done with minimal interruptions. Refine your morning routine so you’re out the door quickly and then use the additional time at school to set the tone for a successful day. When you leave school in the afternoon, be intentional about finding a way to unwind for the evening. I like listening to Hamish and Andy podcasts on my drive home because it helps me disconnect and puts a smile on my face. Exercise is also an excellent way to unwind, even if it’s a brisk 20 minute walk around the block when you arrive home.
- Embrace Holidays: Most teachers use school holidays to catch up on tasks not completed from the previous term and get ahead on planning for the term to come. I have found it most effective to compact this work into a couple of longer days where I either go in to school or sit at my desk at home. Once this work is complete then I put an out of office notification on my email and take a break. If possible, going away each holiday period is an excellent way to draw a clear divide in order to rest, recuperate and have fun.
Question for you: What systems and strategies do you use to achieve a work life balance?
