Avoid Burn-Out

Goal: Avoid Burn-Out of The 30 Goals Challenge for Educators.

“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, “I will try again tomorrow.”~ Mary Anne Radmacher

This year’s theme is, “This is MY Moment.” Each goal will focus on getting educators to believe their plans of action now will lead to positive changes and transformation in their teaching and learning environments.

My Take on the Goal

Each year as a teacher I struggle with burn-out. The number one thing that helps me is SUPPORT, support from friends, family, and my PLN. Part of the reason The 30 Goals is more collaborative this year is because I have found that when you ask your friends to join a movement and give them the freedom to help you out, the movement moves. We can’t successfully or effectively complete our mission as educators without support. Vicky Loras, an amazing friend actually posted about Goal 2 first and this kicked things up for me as well as the feedback and activity from our Facebook community. It’s great to know that the community of educators we have built will be there when things get busy or life events get in the way.
Another important way I avoid burn-out is through taking time for myself everyday. I pause. I tend to be a workaholic and a type A person so being stressed is something I struggle with daily. Therefore, I have created 2 to do lists- my actual one and a personal to do list. Sometimes as teachers we allow our to do list to take up our personal to do list. Everyday I try to chuck something from the to do list and instead focus on the personal to do list. This action signifies to me that I am making steps toward giving myself “me” time. I also schedule Google calendar alerts that remind me to take time for myself.
New to The 30 Goals Challenge? Each year, teachers worldwide aim to accomplish 1 to 30 goals that transform their teaching. Join the movement by accomplishing any goal from any of the cycles then letting us know through a blog reflection or status update on our Facebook community or on Twitter, @30GoalsEdu . At our official site,  30Goals.com, find all the goals, participant reflections, badges, and get your copy of The 30 Goals for Teachers: Small Steps to Transform Your Classroom workbook. Click here to discover all the 2015 goals!
For more ideas about this goal, check out the video I did in 2011.

Goal

Short-term-Take at least one hour for yourself where you don’t dwell on your role as an educator but instead give your time to relax and have some fun. Tyson Seburn, who will be another educator we will Hang-Out with posted a graph of how he spent his time for this goal. Check out Tyson’s post and graph

Long-term– Begin to schedule weekly even daily times where you leave your work as an educator behind and aim for balance. We can’t save them all. We have to try to find away to let go. How can we best do this?
Education Leader Goal– As a leader, think about events and programs that you can schedule to help your teachers avoid burn-out. At one job, they gave awards for miles walked around the school and other healthy activities. At another job they had an intramural sports team. What ways can you make your meetings more participatory? In what ways can you ensure your teachers feel their ideas and concerns are being heard and acted upon at each meeting?
Net Teacher Goal– As a new teacher, start planning now how each day you will avoid burn-out.

More Posts Related to This Goal

Challenge:

Take an hour for yourself each day for a week. Add ideas of ways you avoid burn-out by contributing to our Pinterest Board on avoiding burn-out!
Follow Shelly Sanchez’s board Ways to Avoid Burn-Out as a Teacher on Pinterest.

If you enjoyed these ideas, get your copy of The 30 Goals for Teachers or my $5.99 ebook, Learning to Go, which has digital/mobile activities for any device and editable/printable handouts and rubrics. 

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