“It Has To Be Easier Than Last Year” – Teachers School The Rest Of Us

The Great Resignation has finally hit the schoolhouse. Teacher shortages, especially in math, science, and special education, have reached crisis levels. If you’ve opened a newspaper in the last few weeks, you’ve read the headlines. And whether or not reports of the shortage are greatly exaggerated, this much is clear: Teachers are reporting unsustainable levels of stress and are eyeing the exits at heretofore unseen levels. I turned to master teachers from around the country, rural, suburban, red state and blue, to get their advice and insight for the coming school year. Here are six gems that rose to the top:

1. Relax as much as possible before the school year starts. Since the school year has started for most of the country, remember that self-care doesn’t end when the school year starts. “You must put your own oxygen mask on first before you try and help anyone else. Self-care is not optional,” shared one teacher. If you’re finding it hard to make time for self-care, that’s not another thing to blame yourself for. It’s the structure of the school day and practices and expectations that make it hard for women, especially, to put their own needs before others. Share your experiences, band together, and advance practical changes, like more time for collaboration and professional development during the school day, that can make self-care after the school day possible.

2. Connect to grow. Find the teachers who excel in your building and learn all you can from them. Visit the classrooms of your peers so that you can see both things you want to emulate and things you want to avoid.

3. Meet your students where they’re at, rather than where you think they “should be.” Focus on the actual human beings in front of you, not the archetypes you might have been expecting. “Let go of expectations of where you think your students are supposed to be,” a teacher shared. Always good advice, this is even more essential since the pandemic, when children are entering the school year months or even years behind where they might otherwise have been, as drastic declines in NAEP scores show.

4. Know your students as individuals. Write notes to your students, welcoming them to your class. One teacher told us she sends postcards to all her incoming students welcoming them to her physics class. But even if the school year has started, it isn’t too late to let your students know that you know them individually, believe in them uniquely, and are committed to their success.

5. Be honest and show the path forward. School leaders: Teachers are exhausted from the pandemic and all that it wrought, and they’re worried about the effect of shortages on students and fellow teachers. Speak to their concerns honestly – don’t sugar-coat – and offer not just acknowledgement but a path forward. What changes are you making to address their needs? Can you invite teachers to co-create the conditions that will support their success with you? If you can nurture that kind of respect and sense of belonging for your teachers, they will be much better positioned to nurture it for their students. Which is essential, because the most important thing I heard was:

6. Create a safe place for your students. Students have a hard time learning if they don’t trust the adult they are learning from. One teacher reminisced about their favorite teacher growing up. You know what stood out about that high school math teacher? “She knew me as an individual person and supported me to grow into a more confident young adult. She believed in me when I was sometimes unsure of myself and my own abilities.” To riff off of Maya Angelou, people may forget what you teach, but they’ll never forget how you made them feel.

I hope, one of the teachers said, that students will say that they left my classroom knowing that “at least one adult cared about them and believed they could do it. It would also be nice if they also learned a little chemistry along the way.”