It’s January which means you’re being inundated with information about how to build new habits, get healthier, practice self-care, increase efficiency, be more productive, and other aspirations. New year, new you, amiright?
With all of this in your ears (and in your eye balls), it’s easy to try to take it all on at once and make huge resolutions.
But the resolution that I would love for you to consider this year is this: do less.
As teachers, we often have so many things we want to improve in our classrooms. But taking them all on at once can leave you feeling overwhelmed and, eventually, like a failure for not accomplishing them all. Instead of trying to do everything, do fewer things better. Pick one thing and get really good at it. Once that’s become easy peasy, you can pick another one to add to it.
A couple of months ago I was meeting with a math department that was feeling overwhelmed with their algebra 2 curriculum. There were too many standards and too little time. They were trying to decide what could be cut and what had to stay.
I asked them, “What’s the most important goal for the year?”
They answered, “Well we have a lot of students who only take the first semester of Algebra 2 so we need to cover the most important material before they drop. But the AP Precalculus teachers say the students aren’t ready for the course so we need to make sure those students are prepared for an AP level course. Administrators have been saying we need to raise SAT scores. Oh, and kids still have a lot of learning loss from COVID.”
Woof. That’s a lot. And some of these ideas were even conflicting with each other.
I challenged the group to pick just one. They could work on the others in later years. It’s better to achieve one of these things than to achieve none.
Think about it this way, if you are trying to get healthy you could focus on exercising more, eating better, getting more sleep, getting better sleep, decreasing caffeine (no way!), and reducing stress. Now yes, it would be great if you did all those things. But more often than not, these goals are given up on because they are too difficult to do all at once. Instead, if you focused on just one of those things until it became a habit, you would be better off than if you had tried to do all of them and given up.
I challenge you to think about one improvement you can make to your teaching. Then make a plan for how you can work towards that goal. Think about actions, not about the outcomes. If you want kids talking more, maybe you set a goal to have students working collaboratively for at least 10 minutes a day, and gradually increase that over time. And acknowledge your successes, no matter how small!
Just because you’re not taking on all of your goals now doesn’t mean you won’t reach them someday. Improving the practice of your teaching is a lifelong journey. You’ll get there. Take your time. It’s not a race.