5 benefits of having teacher boundaries
Boundaries are the red tape that you put around yourself to protect and promote your health and wellbeing. In teaching, they are essential. Without them, you can soon fall prey to an unsustainable cycle of overworking, over-giving and neglecting your own needs.
And the thing is, you may know this! You may know that you need boundaries in order to avoid teacher burnout. Yet, often the prospect of burnout is not enough to tempt teachers into actually prioritising their own wellbeing (I should know, I fell foul of this myself!)
So, to help persuade you that teacher boundaries are the best way to enjoy a sustainable and awesome career in teaching, here are 5 benefits to having teacher boundaries. (Make sure you read to the end, school leaders! There’s a bonus one just for you!)
1) Love your life inside and beyond the classroom
The first benefit of having boundaries is that it enables you to love teaching AND your life outside of school too.
This isn’t an either or situation. Perhaps you currently observe term time as work time and half term as your life time.
With boundaries, you can have a life AND teach!
How? By scheduling in you-time throughout the school term. This can be with the people who matter most to you, like friends and family, or even scheduling nights in with yourself, chilling and doing whatever brings you joy.
Increase your sense of accountability by telling people your plans so that you are more likely to follow through and avoid evenings and weekends with the school laptop and bag!
2) Variety is the spice of life
When you think, eat, sleep school, it can feel quite monotonous. Although every day of school may be different, you may begin to find yourself going scranny at the never ending merry-go-round of school work, life and drama.
When you create clear boundaries and allow time for yourself to come through, you begin to enjoy greater variety.
Perhaps you spend one evening at choir, another doing exercise. Suddenly, school isn’t the only thing going on in your world. It is one of several valuable aspects of your life.
This can reduce the feeling of monotony. School once again becomes a positive space of employment because it’s not where you spend all of your time and energy.
The added beauty of this is that you bring this variety and vitality back into school. Your anecdotes for the students help to bring their learning to life. They get to see a more human side to you although only what you are happy to share.
This isn’t the only way that students benefit though…
3) Student attainment increases
When you are healthy, well and enjoying teaching, your students benefit too. A study conducted by Leeds Beckett University found that children learned more when their teacher is happy and performing well.
To demonstrate this, let’s use the classic oxygen mask analogy. If you try to help someone with their oxygen mask before you’ve got yours on, you won’t be much use to them when you’ve passed out due to a lack of oxygen. That’s why the advice is that you put your mask on first and then help others.
It is the same with teaching. When you have a full cup, you can then pour effectively into other people’s cups. As a result of you being well and happy, your students will feel more comfortable and confident in your classroom and able to progress too. It’s a win-win situation.
4) You get to be a role model for others
When you yourself have healthy boundaries that empower you to enjoy your life outside the classroom and your life in school, you are acting as a role model for others in your community.
You are demonstrating that not only is it possible and safe to have boundaries but that it is also a positive expectation in your school.
This isn’t just for the senior and middle leaders in your school either. Everyone is a leader in school. So many students want to be a teacher when they grow up because that is the role model that they spend the most time with. Imagine the positive impact you can additionally have on your students if you also demonstrate what positive boundaries and prioritising wellbeing also looks like. This will be particularly essential for those students going into exams. They also need to know that there is more to life than their “job” or “performance”.
5) Boundaries = better health and wellbeing = more consistency in school
One of the least favourite things for a teacher to do is have a sick day and create cover. Not only is it annoying to be ill in bed and have to set cover before 7am (as an aside, isn’t there a kinder way to do this for our ill colleagues??), but also you then fret that the work might not get done. And when you do return to school, your classroom may be a state with resources strewn all over the place.
Instead, when you have clear boundaries, you are more likely to prioritise those habits that benefit your health and wellbeing such as, enough regular sleep, eating healthily and doing things that nourish and replenish you.
The result of this is that you are less likely to become rundown and ill and so you are able to be more consistently present in school.
The result? Your students continue to progress, your classroom remains in the tidy state you love and you are able to enjoy being in your place of work more.
And that isn’t all…
6) Schools benefit too!
When you have a culture in schools that promotes teacher boundaries and wellbeing, you create the following effects:
- You save money due to less supply teachers needed.
- You create greater staff loyalty and build a reputation as a positive workplace.
- This increases your number of applicants when you recruit, giving you the chance of higher quality applicants.
- Yet, because you have a loyal staff, you will reduce your costs of recruitment.
- You’ll retain a greater number of your experienced staff.
- With high quality, experienced and happy teachers, your student attainment will rise, furthering your reputation as a great school both for staff and students
When you come to think about it like this, teacher boundaries really are a no brainer.
Gemma Drinkall is an Educational Wellbeing Coach, helping middle leaders in education to create clear boundaries so that they can love teaching, and their lives, again.
Want to get in touch? Book a free, no obligation virtual coffee chat here: calendly.com/headsphere/bookacallwithgemma
