August 1, 2009
About Seven to Three
A common first response after people know you are a teacher is, “Oh, it must be nice to work from seven to three.” Um, excuse me? At my school, some teachers are there from six to six! As my principal likes to say, “Teaching is not a seven to three job.” Sorry, but I beg to differ. Why do I have to live at school to get my job done? Don’t get me wrong-I love teaching! Why else would I work in a career that although I have a Master’s degree, I make slightly more than a janitor? I just don’t feel that I should have to be at school all day just to get my job done. I understand the concept of “taking work home”. But unfortunately, every teacher needs to come to these simple realizations. 1) You can not save the world. As much as you would like to, you can’t do everything. So do your best at what you can do. 2)Work smarter, not harder. That’s not a lazy attitude. Hello, have you ever heard of Google? You can google so many different teaching ideas and lesson plans, so you don’t have to be sitting around trying to come up with a creative, fun, engaging, lesson plan. 3) If you become a victim of “teacher burnout”, it’s partly your fault. Don’t get mad but it’s true. We have to take responsibility in our profession. Burnout should not be something that happens EVERY SINGLE SCHOOL YEAR, like some teaching rite of passage. Don’t let teaching and the politics that surrounds it burn you out. As a teacher, you have to make the most of your time, and no I don’t mean creating lesson plans during a staff meeting-unless you want to be called out by your principal. This blog will help you keep your teaching sanity and not have to live at school. Have a great year! Let’s get started!
PrePlanning Time!
Next week preplanning begins! What does that mean for me? It means meetings, meetings, oh and a few more meetings-with maybe, hopefully about twenty minutes to go in my class to do what I HAVE to do. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the importance of preplanning before school starts- but I have to plan myself! When do I get to create my lesson plans and back to school activities? Oh yea, AFTER preplanning!
