It's definitely important to be mindful of what's in and outside of our control Susan. Burying your head in the sand works well for some people some of the time, but eventually it's good to come up for air.
alot of students are under alot of stress just to get to school that stress is felt by the instructor
students often come unprepared relying on class mates to help them out, causing strees for them selves and the class
equipment does not work
equipment does not get maintained
equipment does not get returned
class schedules are not clear
students do not know who in administration to go to with questions
stessors in the classroom:
faulty equipment
getting broken equipment replaced
getting broken equipment repaired
lack of equipment
below par product to work with
Sounds like several of your classroom stressors relate to equipment and resources Kevin. That can be tough.
Hi Dr. Read,
I am the General Manager of two restaurants and I currently work about 55 to 60 hours per week. I also teach twice a week for an hour each time. In addition, I set aside the necessary time to grade my students work and answer their emails. Finally, I am the father of two teenage boys and a beautiful wife of 19 years. My stressors are numerous but I love all three major facets of my life. Because my wife is a teacher herself, I think that she really understands the stress that I'm sometimes under. She encourages me to do relaxing things like fish with the boys or take in a ballgame. Sunday mornings are for the two of us. We escape to our favorite breakfast spot and catch up with each other. The food isn't even that good, but the company is the best. I always look forward to my vacations and at times, try to identify when I'm really stressed out. So far it's working and I feel that I'm lucky to be blessed with what I have.
Regards,
Peter
The major stress with my courses that I have experienced has been the fact that I have rewritten the course over a year ago and each session I still have to make the same changes over and over again. Our school uses an outside source to maintain our online campus and sometimes we don't have but a couple days before class starts to make changes. As soon as I gain access, I submit my changes and it takes days to get them changes if they get done at all.
If they don't get done, then I spend the entire course explaining that the course syllabus had an error and I need to make a correction. That makes me and the school look bad. This has been going on for a year now. I really don't like having to depend on other people to get things done.
Wow Peter, It sounds like you accomplish a lot in life but manage things very well. I too find that I really enjoy the things I spend the most time doing. Time just seems to fly by and even when work gets hard, stress effects me less because I'm enjoying things.
I find that most of my stress does come from rush hour commuting stress and the stress of not physically having enough equipment to meet my students' needs. In addition, it is often hard to remain calm when required to deal with other employees handling or mishandling of shared space and product. These are items I have been working hard to overcome through multiple strategies.
I think as instructors we all struggle with the inconsistency of the rules and that put you in a tough position between you and the students. They look at you like the bad person instead of the one that’s there to help and that brings a lot of stress into the classroom.
Recently they have begun doing major road construction in my town. Often it feels like if I don't get moving in the traffic I will be late. I am unable to leave any earlier due to childcare needs. Once at work our office is shared with 5 instructors. Trying to read and prepare can be challenging when fellow instructors are on the phone or having discussions regarding other issues. The lack of quality time to prepare can lead to stress prior to class.
This is true Alex. Instructors often have to remind students of our role in the educational process. We are truly there to help facilitate their success - though sometimes that's hard to see.
It sounds like you face a lot of resource constraints Earl. Equipment, shared space and product are often in short supply - especially these days.
The major cause of stress in my career is a direct result of attempting to be an administrator and an educator simultaneously. If I were fortunate enough to have either one job at a time or another things would be much easier. So I've had to develop a system whereby during the day I assign priorities to being that of an administrator and then during a different time of the day I assign my tasks to that of being an educator. Unfortunately throughout the day the rules will become mixed and I often will have to take what I call a timeout where I re-organize my thought processes and priorities for that particular day and quite possibly even reorganize my schedule for the week.
One area that can cause stress is the disruptive student who pushes the envelope to its limit. Luckily those students are rare! I really am not a stressed idividual, great family, circle of friends and co-workers. I do take 10 credits at University for my undergraduate degree (only 10 more to go!)but I find that actually helps relievemy stress.
Wow Ty, it must be stressful to be an instructor and a student too! It's great to hear that you have so much going right in your life in the way of family and friend support. I'm sure that helps tremendously.
From a confrontational student. Lack of excercise, lack of sleep, unfamiliar technology.
Most recently, the transition from our old curriculum to the new one has been one of the largest areas of stress for me. It can be compared to the stress I felt when I was just beginning my teaching career: feeling underprepared even when everything is as dialed in as it possibly can be, and feeling inadequate in my delivery of the new material. Fortunately, I have a great support system of fellow instructors, who always offer to help in any way they can.
I have a very "self emposed" demanding homelife that sometimes causes stress. I am going to sit down and write a list of priorites to help relieve some of the stress.
That sounds like a good plan Ron. And yes, sometimes we take on too much and stress ourselves out. It's important to reevaluate every now and then.
That sounds very stressful Dorothy. One of the benefits of teaching for several years is the ability to settle into a curriculum and automate things. It could take a few semesters before you feel settled again.
