"What can I do to be better prepared for tomorrow? " / "How can I make that activity better?"
"I need to look at that assessment data so I can improve my instruction."
"I need to get those assignments checked so students know what to improve on..."
"I need to call little Susie's family as I haven't seen her in a week..."
"I need to update my families on that field trip coming up..."
The list goes on and on and seems to increase weekly as we struggle to sort and prioritize these thoughts and tasks. No matter the balance we hope to attain the thoughts about 'our children' edge into our attention. As we tackle items on this list the guilt creeps in, again. We look at our kids or spouse moving about our lives and we miss important conversations, events and milestones that are occurring when we try to do right by our innate duties to public education.
Do we have to choose our calling and passion over our families? Do we have to ignore the school tasks that tug at our mind and heart to fulfill the love we have for our families?
I do not think we have to choose one over the other but we do have to choose a couple of things. Collaboration and technology.
We cannot tackle this list alone nor should we. Education for many decades has been an isolated endeavor where each administrator or teacher felt like they needed to shut the door and 'get work done' during their plan period or scheduled meetings. We felt like we had to martyr ourselves to feel like we did all we could for our students.
In today's educational landscape this is not necessary and one must use technology and our peers to allow the village to raise and tend to our flock of students and allow time to be given back to our mental and family health.
Here are just a few ways to allow each of us to be at ease that we have 'covered' these thoughts as a collective group:
"What can I do to be better prepared for tomorrow? " / "How can I make that activity better?"
Utilize those shared lesson plans in your department/curriculum within the cloud (Google Drive/Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox etc.) and just tweak what you have collectively made! Also utilize the numerous websites that have free lessons to refer to like Discovery Education, Teachers.net, TeachingChannel.org, Scholastic.com, PBS.org, etc.
"I need to look at that assessment data so I can improve my instruction."
Push your department head, curriculum lead or administrator to dedicate some of your common meeting time to analyze data as a team. Also, encourage your school or ISD tech teams to pick an SIS, LMS, or grade-book system (great list HERE) that make easy work of data analyzation in quick clickable and color coded charts and graphs that link to standards and lessons.
"I need to get those assignments checked so students know what to improve on..."
There are many LMS systems, or other apps and programs that can help you make quick work of lower-level questions so you can spend your time wisely on higher order questions and projects. Flubaroo, Google Classroom, Canvas, Kahoot, Socrative Nearpod, PearDeck and many other products can give you checked assignments and feedback in real-time including what areas individuals and groups struggled in.
"I need to call little Susie's family as I haven't seen her in a week..."
Are you the only teacher Susie has all day/week? Doubtful. Make sure you reach out to her whole team of teachers/counselors/administrators to see who has had contact with the family. There is probably a list of "Susies" in your classes. Divide the list and communicate via a shared spreadsheet so each person can contact one Susie a week instead of numerous Susies a day. Also and app/website called remind.com will allow you to have two way texting conversations (many families communication choice) without giving out your personal number or even having the other party's!
"I need to update families on that upcoming field trip..."
You may have to comb your grade-book or LMS "help" feature but most have a communication or email tool (if not a phone or text mesage tool) that will allow group messaging. Again, Remind.com is an app that allows teachers to keep their own phone number hidden but will allow for messaging to large groups of families or students. Also, encouraging families to subscribe to your blog/website/classroom social media account can allow for seamless communication. Tools like Hootsuite.com or IFTTT.com allow you to efficiently post to multiple places with just one input. When in doubt check with your tech integration coach or IT department to see if you district has other means like Blackboard Connect.
Passionate educators cannot turn off their teaching and learning radar and internal monologue but they can make sure the needs of their students are met through collaboration and technology. The more that we as educators use these tools and collaborate with one other, the less we will struggle with the feeling of having to take it upon ourselves to single-handedly "fix" education in our daily spaces.