The Teacher Burnout Podcast

38 Strategies For Returning to School with Excitement
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Teacher Burnout Podcast, where we explore the challenges of burnout for teachers and share practical strategies to support teacher well being. I'm your host Barb Flowers. If you're a teacher looking for ways to prevent burnout or an educational leader searching for strategies to support your team, this podcast is for you.

Let's dive in. Hey everyone, welcome to the Teacher Burnout Podcast. Today we're going to be talking about returning to school with excitement. So by the time this podcast episode releases, some of you may already be back from break, but if you're feeling that post break struggle, Just know you're not alone. We all love the moments of freedom from routine and we get to indulge in the activities we are passionate about and things we want to do when we want to do them.

So a break, it's nice. It's, we get to reconnect with family, friends [00:01:00] and get things done that we have been putting off. So as we dive back into the school routine, let's channel that newfound energy and make the upcoming days not just manageable or a time we get through, but enjoyable. We don't want the next couple of months to be a countdown to spring break.

So if you don't have that newfound energy coming off of the break, that's okay too. I hope this episode helps you find that. In today's episode, we're going to be exploring practical strategies and tips to help you rekindle that excitement, to have that excitement, ensuring that you step into the classroom with renewed energy.

So we are going to start by talking about reconnecting to your purpose. Remember why you wanted to be a teacher in the first place. What do you love about your job? I always like to remind myself after coming off of a break that as much as I love that time off, I have a purpose in my job as an educator.

I get to go to school every day and have the opportunity to make a difference in students [00:02:00] lives. And having purpose is so important because as much fun as it is to be off work for a period of time, If I didn't go back to work, I would lose the sense of purpose. I would feel like, what am I doing with my life?

Because if you don't have that sense of purpose, you don't have a sense of fulfillment. So people need purpose in their life and that's it. You know, people are happier when they have that meaning and when they have that sense of purpose. So, really reconnecting to that purpose can help you look forward to going back to teaching and help you see the positives in teaching.

Another thing you need to do is set new goals and challenges for the new year. Use your purpose to create goals that excite you. So maybe you need a new challenge or a new teaching style to try. New teaching strategies. For us in an elementary, we've really been focusing on the science of reading. So I've seen how that has It's been stressful for teachers, but also reinvigorating as they try new strategies in the classroom and they're seeing strategies that work for their [00:03:00] students that they didn't know before and they're learning new research that they didn't know and how to apply things for their students.

So, really challenge yourself to try an innovative thing. Teaching strategy or incorporate a new technology in your classroom, but doing different things can get you excited again about being there and teaching. Also connect with colleagues. Take time to reconnect with your fellow teachers and staff members and share your experiences and insights from the break.

If you don't take time to eat in the lounge or visit with colleagues, during planning or during the school day, make that a goal for the new year. So I'm not talking about there are teachers I know who use their entire planning and lunch time to socialize. I was never like that because I wanted to use every ounce of time.

Time that I had in a productive way, but take time to spend time connecting with colleagues in some capacity. So even if you get a half hour lunch, maybe it's 15 minutes. You're sitting with colleagues and talking with [00:04:00] them. Maybe it's the whole lunch period, Or you use your planning to plan and you're checking in with them during lunch. However, you want to use that, but take some of that time you have throughout the day to connect with others. Because having colleagues that I talk to and can use as support is really important and it helps me feel excited to go back to work.

So if you don't have time to catch up with people during the workday, maybe make plans after school to do something fun. Go out for coffee, go out for a drink, but Get to know your colleagues, have that support system, and when you get back from a break, connect and be excited to see them. It's nice to have those colleagues.

People who work from home, talk about that's one thing they miss are the colleagues. So enjoy that you have that and you get to see people in person. Get student input as you come back from break.

Ask students in discussions about what they enjoyed about the first half of the year. What are they looking forward to for the rest of the school year? You know, ask them what they would like to see moving forward. And integrate their [00:05:00] feedback into lesson plans and create that sense of shared excitement for learning.

Students are more engaged when you get their feedback, so Get that student input and use that to help yourself and to help your students. And then take time after the break to reflect and learn. So take time to reflect on the previous half of the year of what worked well and areas for improvement. And I talked about this in my last podcast episode.

So if you did not listen to it, I encourage you to go back and listen because I gave areas to reflect on related to burnout so that it could be really helpful for you starting the year out fresh. And making sure that you aren't feeling burnt out as you come into the new school year. So use those reflections to refine your teaching strategies and making sure that you're growing and you're still enthusiastic about teaching.

And also, take time to express gratitude. So take a moment to express gratitude for the opportunity to teach and positively impact the students that you get to serve every day. Think [00:06:00] about what excites you or what motivates you in What do you love about teaching? And have a mindset of gratitude to shift your focus towards the rewarding aspects of the profession.

I always like to tell people to think of five things you're grateful for every morning, whether it's right as you get out of bed or as you're walking into school, but having things you're grateful for will have you be more positive overall. So remember that everything we do, it comes down to our mindset, because our thoughts create our emotions.

And our emotions create our actions. So having gratitude helps you have those positive thoughts, which are going to lead to pos, lead to positive emotions and positive actions around your teaching. So having gratitude, being excited to, uh. have the students that you have, even when it's hard, is so important.

So taking a gratitude journal can even be helpful, where you are journaling things you're grateful for, even if it's throughout the day, because sometimes it [00:07:00] might be hard to just sit and think of five things. And they could be small things, maybe it's you're grateful for the colleagues you work for, the students you have.

The resources that you have in your school. So what things are you grateful for? And really focus on that. So just remember, to help yourself be more excited to be back at school after the break, you need to reconnect to your purpose, set new goals and challenges, connect with your colleagues, get student input, reflect and learn and express gratitude.

So go to my Instagram at Barb Flowers Coaching for more tips. Also you can get a copy of my free teacher burnout assessment by clicking the link in the show notes or you can click the link in my bio on Instagram. If you want help finding your passion for teaching again, I would love the opportunity to help you and coach you and help you achieve your goals and love teaching again.

So reach out to me on Instagram or at barbflowerscoaching. com. Thanks for listening to the podcast. Stay tuned for the next episode of the Teacher Burnout Podcast.[00:08:00]