Following on from my first posts at the end of July, here are some more tips for ECTs starting in September:
11. Join Twitter
Twitter is an incredible resource for ideas, discussions and advice. Nearly every subject has an online Twitter community or associated hashtag. For example, for MFL look up #mfltwitterati or for English look up #TeamEnglish and there is a wealth of support available. You will hear about and come across people having famed ‘Twitter spats’ but ignore that. The vast majority of the “EduTwitter” community is incredibly positive and some of the best lesson ideas I’ve had during my NQT year have come from threads I have seen on Twitter.
12. Keep up a hobby outside of teaching
You will undoubtedly find yourself working long hours during your NQT year (and teaching in general!) but it’s really important to remember that we work to live, not the other way around. Don’t sacrifice your hobbies. I have a commitment on Saturday afternoons that only actually began on a regular weekly basis during the summer before my NQT year. At the time I wondered how wise it was, but it was great to have something to do each week that wasn’t work, and it held me to ensuring that Saturday was always a work-free day. Which leads me to…
13. Have at least one day each weekend with no work
It’s really important to take time to rest each week. We work hard during the week so we deserve our weekends! Make sure there is one day at the weekend where you do absolutely no work – for me, it’s Saturday but I also try to minimise my work on a Sunday. At least once a month, aim to have a weekend where you don’t work at all. As I prepare for my NQT+1, one of my targets is to minimise my weekend work by increasing my productivity during the week based on an excellent book I have recently read (separate post to follow).
14. Have a cut-off point
Working into the night will leave you exhausted and you will not be a better teacher for it. Setting a time beyond which anything not done will have to wait until tomorrow allows you to more easily maintain a work-life balance. When this is might depend on your individual circumstances, and it might take a bit of working out.
15. When it comes to work-life balance and routines, find what works for you
If you ask teachers how they manage their work-life balance, you will get a different answer from everyone. Some arrive just before the bell and leave not long afterwards because of childcare commitments, but will work at home in the evening instead. Some like to arrive early and leave early. Some will always be the last to leave in the afternoon. Some will work a long day in school, arriving early and leaving late, but then not work at home. Some work long days in the week for completely free weekends. Some are happy to work a day at the weekend to free up evenings during the week. It’s best, I think, to play around with a few of the above to see what works best for you as an individual, and bear in mind that this might not be the same as during your training year.
During my training year, I had about an 18-20 minute drive to and from school each day (down to just 2 minutes for my second placement!) which meant I was in no particular hurry of a morning to beat traffic, and could leave whenever in the afternoon. I generally arrived around 8am on average and left around 5-5:30pm with work to do in the evening which I had plenty of energy for.
For my NQT year, I had to change my routine because planning to arrive at my school at 8am would mean sitting in a queue for 15-20 minutes which I could avoid entirely by arriving earlier. So I trialled a variety of different times but settled on arriving between 7-7:15am although sometimes I was a little later. I still left at around 5:30pm but generally without work to do in the evening, as I found that my 45-minute drive home was also a mental switching from work to home which I found difficult to switch back from. I was also more tired given that I had been awake much earlier than during my training year. If I took much work home to do in the evening, it would often come back the next morning untouched which can be demotivating. In the end I found that if I needed to do some extra work at home, before school was a more effective time to get this done as it meant I arrived at school with a feeling of productivity. It meant getting up ludicrously early, but worked better for me than working in the evening after a long day when all my brain wanted was to switch off.
So my message here would be: play around, see what works best for you. However, don’t burn the candle at both ends as a teacher’s to-do list will never be done and the work will expand to fill all the time you give to it. You might make the odd mistake prioritising but you will quickly learn what can wait and what can’t. I am single and childless, which makes my life a much easier juggling act than it is for many (if not most) teachers. What works for me won’t necessarily work for the next person and vice versa. I still have a few tweaks I want to make to my routine next year to improve my work-life balance, so don’t be put off if you don’t strike the balance right first time. Tweak your routine and make it work for you.
That’s all for now, but one final post will follow to round off this series of NQT tips ahead of September.
Hashmançais 