I often catch myself thinking that if I just make it through this day or until that break, then I’ll get a chance to catch my breath. Despite my hopes, the next week is almost always full of its own new challenges and problems that I could not or did not anticipate. The following is a list of five truths and their corresponding disciplines that help me teach well when I realize that next week isn’t going to slow down.
Truth #1: “If you give a pig a pancake, she’ll want some syrup to go with it.” – Laura Numeroff
Discipline #1: Learn to set appropriate boundaries and expectations. Suppose a teacher lets the class go outside one particularly beautiful fall day. It is a truth universally acknowledged that the class will then ask to go outside every day for the rest of the month. Whenever the teacher does something, she creates a natural expectation that she will do the same thing again. This applies to the classroom, to non-teaching duties, and to extracurriculars. Therefore the teacher must properly communicate her own expectations, her degree of commitment, and her ability to continue to do anything she does. If you can commit to giving extra help at lunch one day a week, say so explicitly. Otherwise a single offer to meet at lunch can turn into an offer to meet at every lunch, which can lead to burnout. It is natural, and at times even beneficial, that people expect more of you the more you give them. But it is vital that you articulate to yourself and to others what you can and cannot actually do with your time and effort.
Truth #2: “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man actually in the area, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error.” – Teddy Roosevelt
Discipline #2: Learn to fail well. Especially when a teacher is tired, criticism can cut deep. A teacher may take criticism in one of three ways: it can crush them, numb them, or teach them. The crushed teacher takes criticism personally and begins to obsessively worry over his own shortcomings. This leads to over-exertion, burn out, and in the worst cases, the teacher quitting his job. The numbed teacher takes an equally destructive but opposite response. He has convinced himself that all criticism is complaining and that nobody else could help him run his classroom better. The proper response is to balance confidence with humility. Seek out advice from mentor teachers or administrators when you know you’ve made a mistake and ask for specific, actionable feedback when criticized. This allows your failures to become learning experiences. It may also help to make a list of strengths and weaknesses. Reread your strengths on the days you are feeling crushed to remind yourself that you bring unique value to your school through things you do well. Reread your weaknesses on the days you are feeling invincible to remind yourself that you have several ways to improve your teaching. You will fail as a teacher, and you must learn to embrace failure as the mark of one who really tries to succeed.
Truth #3: “It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.” – J.R.R. Tolkien
Discipline #3: Learn to love your field. Nobody can solve all the problems of the world, and neither can they solve all the problems of a school. Instead, each member of the school is given their own little field to tend. Do not ask yourself how to make the school better. Ask yourself how to make your classroom, your faculty, or your office space better. For example, our dean of boys noticed that our high school morale had begun to dip: homework, tests, and extracurriculars had piled up to nearly a breaking point. Rather than try to address all the issues at hand, he took his waffle iron and created Waffle Wednesdays, where one lucky student in each grade gets a free waffle in third period. That did not solve every problem, but it did make students feel noticed and excited for Wednesdays and morale improved. He tended his own field–student well-being–with creativity and love. When everyone does this, the school inevitably becomes a better, quirkier place as a whole. Perhaps this means bringing in scones while you read a favorite poem to class, or hand-writing one note home to that student who needs a little extra support through a rough patch. The accumulation of these small acts of focused care by individuals on their particular little corners the school do far more for its well-being than any school-wide initiative can accomplish on its own.
Truth #4: “For to enjoy a thing is to rest with satisfaction in it for its own sake. To use, on the other hand, is to employ whatever means are at one’s disposal to obtain what one desires, if it is a proper object of desire; for an unlawful use ought rather to be called an abuse.” – St. Augustine
Discipline #4: Learn to enjoy what you do, as far as possible, for its own sake. Working for the weekend is a surefire way to burn out fast. I am guilty of covering one after school activity so that “I’m off the hook” for the rest of the quarter and of grading everything on a Friday so that “I don’t have to think about work” until Monday. Working ahead can certainly be a good, productive use of your time, but it can also make aspects of the job seem transactional. This quid pro quo approach to the job reflects a utilitarian vision of work. Every task soon becomes a means to a never-realized end, and all real enjoyment is lost. If you must grade, take pleasure in the success your students have and the challenge you have in helping the student who struggled. If you must have a difficult conversation with a parent, take pride in the fact that you care enough about their child to talk with them honestly about uncomfortable things like lying or cheating. If you must stay late to finish lesson plans for a brand new class, order takeout with a colleague and make the sort of memories where misery turns to merriment. The next thing can never satisfy your needs and desires–only the present can bring satisfaction. If you choose to enjoy the tasks and the people with you at the present moment, you can avoid the burnout of a utilitarian life.
Truth #5: “Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy! He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.” – Psalm 126:5-6
Discipline #5: When you are drowning, learn to reach out. We seem to have two options when we reach our breaking point: become self-reliant and reject help or become dependent on the help of others. The first leads to isolation and failure–nobody has ever become a good teacher by going it alone. The second, though, assumes (often wrongly) that someone else has a surplus of energy and time to help you. But there is a third option. When you have no more energy to do ‘your job,’ offer to help someone else do theirs. When you long for someone to smile at you and ask you how you are really feeling, walk across the hall and ask your colleague how he is doing. Do not wait for someone to offer to cover your study hall–go tell your colleague you are taking hers for the day. This will set off a chain reaction, and somebody new will want to share the gift of a listening ear or an hour off, and you will reap the good that you sowed. Earlier this year, I stress-baked a load of cookies to bring for our staff. A couple days later I had no time to stop for dinner between work and my own graduate school classes when the music teacher sent me a text saying homemade spaghetti was waiting for me in the fridge because she wanted to thank me for always bringing in baked goods. If you do not have the energy to do all the things you think you have to do to be a great teacher, remember that even the best teachers are there simply to plant seeds in our students’ hearts and minds that we hope will bear good fruit in time.
