About to give up? Read this

Maybe, you have felt this. You wake up in the morning, and then you know that you have to go to work, but even you know you have to get up, in someway, you don't feel doing it. Even worst, you feel hating your job.

It happens. I know you love teaching, but there are days that you hate your career. It is normal. But when this situation seems to be everyday, then you need to do something about it. Before you give up.

Try doing one or two of the following things in order to start your day in a better way.

• Maybe you are stressed. So try to relax, try hearing relaxing music everyday, even if it is 30 minutes, while you are resting.
• Give time to read a good book.
• Stop watching tv, or at least, don't watch too much. Disconnect yourself from the world.
• Do you like paiting? Try paiting, even if it is something simple, it will help you to have some fun time.
• Give time to think. Yes! to think. Think about you, about your family, about your life. Think about your future, because the more you think, the more you will see that your life is great.
• Start a new project. In your house, or in your school. Try doing something new. Even if it sounds exhausting, try a new responsibility. Who knows?, maybe you will like it. (if not, then just don't do it anymore)
• Try writing. It can be a tale, a short story, or maybe the last bestseller.
• Give a try to a new restaurant, or to a new dish.
• Visit new places. Plan your weekend to visit a new city.
• Buy new ingredients, or just new products. Products you have never tried before, or you wouldn't try.

The problem is not your work, it is your life. Try doing new things in your life and you will see that you will wake up happier and expecting new things for you to come.

Stressed classroom? Then relax

I have talked already about the importance of relaxing when you feel stress. A stressed teacher can just make it worst.

But what about your students?

I have found many times, that my students are really tired, and like bored, so I have to think in how to give energy. But I have found too, that other times, students are so energized, that I can't stop them. Both states are not good to have a calm and nice place to study and work.

If your students are a bit stressed or so much energized, then try to make them relax. Give a time in your class to relax.

It is just 5 or 10 minutes, but it will help a lot.

Play relaxing music, and tell them a story (the one I tried is this):

Relax your body, close your eyes and imagine that you are in a far place, alone. It is really a nice place, so relaxing, you can see a lake, and a big forest. You go there, and you watch the place, you see the sky and the clouds when they are passing by. Take your time to think about you, about your life, about your family. Breathe deep, stretch your body, relax. Then you will continue walking until you find a cottage, and in there your find and old man. He invites you to sit, he gives you gift, it is a little box. You keep it. You say thanks, and then you continue. Relax. Then when you are alone, you open the box, and inside you find a nice gift, that just you know what it is. It is something you need so much and you feel happy because you have it. Then you keep it with you forever. Then little by little you come back to the classroom....

Most of the students gets asleep. Let them. The idea is to relax. When they are back in the classroom. Talk about the gift, and share which were the gifts they saw in the boxes.

Try it, and you will see how nice is a relaxing moment in the classroom.

Time to relax

Everytime I feel tired, I just try to find a time to rest and relax. Most of the times, teachers are just so full of work that trying to find a way to relax, is really important, because it is part of our health. Give a break to yourself, you need it. If you feel tired, rest your body hearing relaxing music like this:

Source Youtube: ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d47zR5rXDsc )

Losing weight and teaching, what do they have in common?

The answer is really simple: Motivation.

I have found this interesting video made by Asif Fasih in his blog Be fit, Be happy! , related with fitness, and how to lose weight. But this video, which is called Tips on how to stay motivated, called my attention for other reason, and it was the fact that staying motivated to continue practising and exercising to lose weight is something  really hard to do, because most of the times, people tend to lose motivation, and as it is tiring, they just don't continue anymore.

His video mentions some tips to stay motivated, but I thought in which way it can be useful for me as a teacher. And to my surprise, it is very helpful.

Asif, who is a fitness consultant, mentions in his video what he calls SMART goals, which means:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Accountable
• Realistic
• Timely

Now, think how many times you wish your students to learn a lot, to know every content, to study and remember everything you have taught them.  This is really impossible. We need to have a realistic goal. What do we want from our students in terms of something that can be measurable and realistic? Sometimes we expect to have so many goals, so high. But what we have to do is considering Asif's words, and start planning for realistic goals.

Asif mentions as well, that in order to have a clear view of the progress we are getting, it is necessary to take photos. why? because it is a way that we see a monthly progress. As teachers we tend to evaluate, but we evaluate the progress of the students, but what about us? do we evaluate our monthly progress or goals?

One way to do this, is by having an agenda, and writing down every goal to measure our monthly progress.

Asif also says, that one way to avoid losing motivation is by asking ourselves why we are doing that. Why do we want to achieve that goal? Sometimes I lose the goal. I have to many things to do, in many aspects, that sometimes I forget the reason why I want to achieve those goals. And the answer is simple too, the reason is my students. So we must remember every time that we are getting tired, losing the battle, feeling down or just losing motivation, why is the real reason for us to teach and being a teacher? The answer will come easily.

At the end, Asif says that we need someone to help us in this progress of staying motivated. As teachers we need to have a network of supporting teachers to improve our performance, and to continue working hard to get our goals.

I leave the complete video of Asif Fasih.

Sources: Video youtube.com

( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdmGOvvJPRE )

Asif's Blog: http://strawhatasif.blogspot.com/

How do I get motivation to teach to difficult students?

One of the main problems we have as teachers, is when we teach to difficult students.

My experience has told me, that it is not a problem of the students. There are good and bad days. Some people say it is going to rain that is why students are hyper, I don't know.

But one thing is true, the perfect day doesn't exist.

If you are a teacher, can you imagine how amazing you are Yes, you teacher. You are really so great. because even you have one of the hardest jobs in the world, you get up everyday with energy, addressing to the school to teach.

You, teacher, are really great. You must be proud of yourself.

Most of the times, we receive critics from different people, we feel dissapointed and we just want to give up. But for some reason, we find the inner motivation to continue, because we know that what we are doing is one of the noblest and most honorable careers, and we know that what we are doing is not for us, it is for our students who will receive the benefit of our work.

I think there is just one way to get motivation to do our job. And the motivation is there, in the eyes of our students that are waiting to see what we are going to give to them in exchange of nothing. Because our work is based on the love.

Be positive, because everyday is different. Today was a bad day, but tomorrow, maybe it is a great day. Always go to every classroom being positive and do the best you can do for your students.

I want to share with you part of a series I watched long time ago. It is a japanese series called Gokusen. Maybe after watching a bit, you will undesrtand how do I get motivation to teach everyday.

Being a teacher, how can I avoid the stress?

How many times you have come home to realize that you have to continue working and then whe you finally go to bed, you realize you forgot to do something else, and what it is worth, you wake up in the morning already thinking you have to do more things. If it is so, then it means you are about to get a stress disease.

There is no magical solution for this, and it depends on every person to avoid this stressing situation.

I can tell, based on my experience, few hints that can help to avoid in falling into a stressing situation.

First of all, I plan. I plan all, and the more I plan, the better. You can say why? Because when you plan in advance, you take into account all the possible problems that you can face, and you already know what to do in those cases. Lesson plans are so important for a teacher, that I wouldn't see a teacher working without one.

Second, even if I have planned all in detail. I must have an open mind to adjust my plans. All teachers know that even if we know what to do, there are some inconvienents, and we must be prepare to overcome them. The point is that, if I already know this, I won't get stressed in the future, because I saw it coming already.

Third. I organize my time, so if friday or saturday is my free time, then IT IS my free time, and I don't give time to do my "homework". I do that at work, or on sunday, the day I have scheduled to do my job for the week.

Fourth. As a teacher, I know I don't have enough time at work to do all, and some of it, I must do it at home. That is why, what I have done is, killing myself at work, using all the time, even the few minutes I could rest, to do all possible work, so I don't need to take things home.

Fifth. I know it is so hard, but while I am at home, I try to forget my job. At home I try to watch tv, movies, reading, playing on my wii, and even I am bad at dancing and singing, I do it, because every time I do it, I laugh, I enjoy that time. I try to spend my time with my family, my girlfriend and forget that I have a job. Some teachers can criticize me when I say that I work to live, and I don't live to work, because even if I love teaching... my job is not all my life. I have more personal areas that I want to develop.

Sixth. I manage my stress by hearing music. It is incredibly how a slow and nice song can change your day. And when I feel down, I hear a happy song.

And last. One thing, that has helped me a lot to relax myself, is by just closing my eyes, and travelling to a pacific and lonely beach, and stay in there for some minutes, watching the sky, hearing the water, and just seeing how the waves are moving. That really helps me a lot.