Japanese phrase for "the collapse of teachers"...
A silent resolution exists among educators. It's not about salaries or about cuts in funding. It's not even about increases in class size. It has more to do with an unspoken acceptance among teachers that in order to get the job done educators must surrender more and more of their lives to the cause.
The "cause" can take on epic proportions when teachers take personal ownership of the learning of our future generation. Can any sacrifice be too great?
I, like most of my colleagues, have struggled with a tendency to shut my life down for a large portion of the year while I attempt to make inroads in learning breakthroughs in my class. Fueled by enthusiasm, activist tendencies and a love of teaching I have willingly worked a 60 plus workweek. I have been aware that my job preoccupies most of my daily thoughts and often have an vague feeling of guilt when I leave school earlier than usual. Recently I have had a nagging sense that I am motivated by more than learning breakthroughs. Hints of burnout have sent me on a quest to discover why our occupation is so prone to workaholism.
"Teachers who experience burnout are less sympathetic towards students, less committed to and involved in their jobs, have a lower tolerance for classroom disruption, are less apt to prepare adequately for class, and are generally less productive." ~ Kenneth Leithwood Professor and Head, Center for Leadership Development OISE/UT
Realizing that teacher burnout is counterproductive to learning success in the classroom, I asked my colleagues on MiddleWeb Listserv to consider the following question:
"How many hours do you work in a week? If you work mega hours, why do you? If you have managed to carve out balance in your professional life, what specific steps did you take?"
Always willing to reflect, teachers from all areas of the continent shared their whirlwind schedules and insights. I will share some of those comments below and links to articles that may help educators shed some light on why we do what we do:
Recent MiddleWeb Teacher Comments.
Click on the resource links below for insights into changing paradigms in the teaching workplace.
A lot of people talk about their desire to be in balance. But what is balance? How do you know when you're "there"?
David Gergen speaks with sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild about the whirlwind workplace infringing on home life in her book "The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work".
Is
a Teachers' Work Never Done?
"Is Teacher' Work Never Done?: Time-Use and Subjective Outcomes" by William Michelson, from the department of Sociology, University of Toronto.
Total
Teacher WellnessIn Alberta, Canada, the use of Prozac by teachers went up 30% in 1998. The Japanese even have a special phrase for the classroom collapse of teachers: "Gakkyu Kokai"
School
Leadership in Times of Stress
School Leadership in Times of Stress by Kenneth Leithwood, Professor and Head, Centre for Leadership Development, OISE/UT
Catching
Up With Our Bodies: Reflections on Teacher Burnout
Lyrics
to "Just a Teacher" by Martin Collis (scroll
down to #6)
Web page created by Brenda A. Dyck
March, 14, 2001
Updated: September 17, 2009