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It can be tough to find a way toward joyfulness when you're overwhelmed, but you can reset and reignite your energy for teaching.

I love my job. I've been an educator for 18 years. I've been in teaching roles and administrative ones. This year, after searching for what would give me joy, I'm making the choice to return to the classroom. After some needed and continuing intensive mental health therapy, I examined my values. In personal discovery, I realized that I went to college to be an educator-not to chase titles. As educators, we can't control everything around us, and I struggled with that so much in my career. But this article is about what we can control.

As individuals, we can look within ourselves and focus on healing and restoring our own love and passion for our profession and our schools. I invite you to work individually and collectively to look deeply into your values and within your heart to locate the reason you became an educator. We can create ways to pour those feelings of resilience we fostered from within our hearts and into our classrooms.

Sorting Out Our Values

Yoga training has taught me the importance of settling in and breathing. I think this practice also applies to working in schools. We need the summer to recuperate, and the first few days before the students come back to class is a good opportunity to take time to settle in and focus on our breath. In our profession, between spring 2020 and spring 2022, we didn't get time to recuperate or to settle in. My own inability to heal from the trauma that I faced in the pandemic just made wounds bigger. A personal breaking point led me to seek support through therapy. This was something that I could control.

Asking for help isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of courage. As I started to accustom myself to the help, my deep past unhappiness surfaced. Weekly, I found myself considering a different profession and all sorts of businesses I wanted to start. My family and friends were exhausted listening to me. They were a great support system, but I was just moving so quickly from idea to idea that it was hard for them to support me when I was jumping from thought to thought.

My therapist came into the picture and advised me that before I made any sudden transitions, I needed to try to look deeply within my values. She had me complete a "values sort." I was skeptical at first.

She handed me three envelopes and the Personal Values Card Sort, a list of 100 values-duty, fun, integrity, love, and more-created by William R. Miller, Janet C'de Baca, Daniel B. Matthews, and Paula L. Wilbourne. The goal is to figure out which values are important to you. I invite you to try it at home in solitude and when you are content. People see self-care as having a massage, but in this case, I think it's really about giving yourself time to think about your values.

It's best to print the document and then cut out the value statements into rectangles, for easy sorting. On another page, create a table with three columns: "Most Important to Me," "Important to Me," and "Not Important to Me." The guide gives you an option of five columns, but I think three is more practical. I limited my "Most Important to Me" values to 10 rectangles, which pushed me to make some tough choices about what I really value.

Doing this alone ensures that you're making decisions about what's important to you and not anyone else. Once you complete this activity, you can have a conversation about what those values mean to you with a therapist or trusted friend.

Recentering Our Hearts

It's helpful to know how our values root us in our day-to-day activities. We really don't take the time in leadership retreats to follow up on the sorts we complete. We just check the box. It's important for this type of adult social and emotional learning professional development to be consistent and for all school staff. To do a "values tree," you can draw a tree or write an outline.

Write down the activities that your values are guiding you to at this point in your life (on the trunk or as headings). Next, write your goals (as branches) and finally outcomes you hope to see (as leaves and fruit). In my drawing, I wrote down my 10 "Most Important to Me" values. My bark had my most important activities. The clouds represented what I desired to carry on with in life. The sun, or self-love, helps growth. The branches I drew displayed my needs. The fruits on the tree were outcomes I hoped to see.

Restoring the Joy in Our Classrooms and Schools

1. Spend time now to work on a small project that excites you for the following school year. Moving back into the classroom and setting up my space is exciting for me to begin with. I can't wait to implement flexible seating again! I'm also creating a five-senses self-soothing station that kids can utilize for self-regulation in my classroom. It contains different bins that provide students with a variety of activities that appeal to the five senses in order to support self-regulation in the classroom.

2. At the beginning of the year, it's important to take your time to get to know students with activities that foster relationship building and cooperative learning skills in your classroom. Try not to jump into rules and syllabi right away. Find ways to have students help you create the physical classroom environment with their artwork and their ideas.

3. Find more ways to integrate student-centered, hands-on learning with design-thinking-based passion projects. I've always tried to find ways to work with kids to design projects that support a passion they have for themselves or the community.

4. Use music to make connections in your classroom. I always play a song of the week that was a transition from the hallway to classroom. It's usually a song that matches themes in our learning, but I do take requests from students as well.

5. Prioritize finding ways to bring in more kinesthetic learning. Gallery walks, moving jigsaw assignments, and academic games are great ways to get learners engaged.

What can we do to support ourselves in transferring that joy to our classrooms? Here's what I'm doing:

Joy is hard to find when you're nervous and moving nonstop. Slow down. Remember the phrase "It's OK" in order to give grace to your students and yourself. This isn't easy, but we can control the time and space we give our hearts.

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It can be tough to find a way toward joyfulness when you're overwhelmed, but you can reset and reignite your energy for teaching.

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Most educators acknowledge that a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching is ineffective, and a more student-centered approach is necessary for student success. Culturally responsive teaching incorporates and centers unique student experiences and identities, supporting educators to build learning partnerships that result in increased student engagement and ownership of learning.

But what exactly is culturally responsive teaching?

Based on Gloria Ladson-Billings' 1994 culturally relevant pedagogy framework, culturally responsive teaching refers to an approach to teaching and learning that facilitates the achievement of all students by recognizing that culture is a powerful force in shaping how we see ourselves and the world around us. In a culturally responsive classroom, reflective teaching and learning occur in a culturally supported, learner-centered context, whereby the strengths students bring to school are identified, nurtured, and utilized to promote student achievement. When students feel seen, heard, and understood, they are more likely to engage in the learning process and achieve success.

Zaretta Hammond, in her book Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain, defines Culturally Responsive Teaching as "an educator's ability to recognize students' cultural displays of learning and meaning making and respond positively and constructively with teaching moves that use cultural knowledge as a scaffold to connect what the students know to new concepts and content in order to promote effective information processing. All the while, the educator understands the importance of being in relationship and having a social-emotional connection to the student in order to create a safe space for learning."

Components of Culturally Responsive Teaching

In Beyond Flesh-Colored Crayons: The Four Components of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy , Hammond lists the four key components for culturally responsive pedagogy as follows:

1. Affirmation - I recognize and accept you as you are. I understand and nurture your multiple identities and none of these aspects of you are in conflict to me.

2. Validation - Validate students' experience of the world by acknowledging the socio-political context we live in. Teach the truth about power, politics, history, and context in developmentally appropriate ways, and use these issues as tools of instruction and discourse.

3. Cognition - Use students' culture as a reference point for helping them understand concepts. This is where learning theory, neuroscience and culturally responsive teaching all meet up.

4. Processing - Help students "hold on to it." Learn about the neuroscience of information processing to support students in internalizing content to the level of automaticity. Call and response, music, movement, and storytelling are all culturally relevant ways to create neural pathways.

What Culturally Responsive Teaching IS / IS NOT

Culturally responsive teaching is:

a bridge between home and school life,

affirming of students' history and culture, and

centering student voices and learning styles in all lessons and classroom experiences.

Culturally responsive teaching is not:

confusing race and culture as being the same thing,

only about motivating students of color,

relying on a single method to engage students within the lesson,

mastering the details of every culture, and

just adding Black (or other groups') history to the curriculum.

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Culturally Responsive Teaching - National Equity Project

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When we attend to healing, we expand our ability for ourselves, our organizations, and our movements to evolve and grow. Learn why healing is capacity building!

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The Ultimate Guide to Reflective Practice in Teaching

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Encouraging reflective practice in schools not only benefits individual teachers but the school as a whole. Find out how to get it started! Read more.

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Try AI Coach - Friends of Edthena - Edthena

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Want to try the AI Coach platform? Use your district email and get instant access. You will get 2 hours PD credit.

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The past few years have proven how important it is to center student voice in learning outcomes. From social justice movements to the pandemic, a historically inequitable and sometimes divisive social landscape created a shaky foundation for the modern student's day-to-day schooling.

As teachers and education leaders struggle to create a dynamic and valuable educational experience for all students, the need for a student-centered approach is becoming more and more apparent. Although students are well-informed, innovative, and future-focused key stakeholders in their education, they rarely have an actual say in it.

While the concept of student voice is a growing movement in educational systems, not all schools and knowledge organizations know how to implement it-or why it's beneficial. In this post, we'll explain what student voice actually is, provide a few concrete examples of it at work, show some of its many benefits, and teach you seven ways to capture student voice in your organization successfully.

A definition of student voice should include reference to both the noun and the process involved. At its core, student voice is the expression and reflection of students' thoughts, ideas, opinions, and values that they share to drive change within a school community.
Student voice as an action or approach is the process of students sharing their values and perspectives with those in educational leadership positions-and those leaders actively listening and making decisions based on these shared ideas.

As research from Virginia Commonwealth University's Center of Transition explains: "Instead of a top down, teacher-directed approach to learning, [student voice ensures that] students play an active and equal role in planning, learning, and leading their classroom instruction as well as contributing to the development of school practices and policies. This significant philosophical shift requires all stakeholders to embrace the belief that there is something to learn from every individual regardless of age, culture, socioeconomic status, or other qualifying factors."

With student voice, students can contribute to the decision-making process and actively shape their own educational experience. Let's look at some great, real-world examples of student voice at work.

West Hawaii Complex Area student Kassie Tarpley saw an opportunity to use student voice for good in her school community. For her senior project, Kassie aimed to study the trending issue of bullying prevention from the student's point of view.

After speaking with Art Souza, superintendent of West Hawaii Complex Area, Kassie decided to use this opportunity to study all schools in the district rather than just her own. In order to conduct research at this scale, Kassie partnered with ThoughtExchange to crowdsource her data. She used ThoughtExchange's software to ask students across the district one question: "What instructions, if any, has your school provided on bullying prevention?"

By gathering candid and anonymous responses from students across the island, Kassie found quite a discrepancy between how school leaders and administrators thought they were handling the issue of bullying and how well-equipped students actually felt. As Kassie explains, "a lot of students won't go to teachers or principals to talk about bullying. But this was an opportunity to get their voice out to the administration."

By capturing student voice in a meaningful way, Kassie influenced Hawaii's state policy on bullying in schools. Here, we can see just how impactful student voice can be. What started with one student's idea grew to include the input of countless others across the region and influenced the student experience at a state-wide level-while closing the gap between students' needs and what administrators are providing.

Implementing and working with student voice helps accomplish a number of goals, both for students and educational leaders. Student voice promotes student engagement at every level and helps address equity in the classroom and in the wider community.

When it comes to a student's time in school, a successful student voice program will enhance the learning experience and drive a deeper sense of understanding between students and their teachers. Finally, student-led approaches help leaders gain support for beneficial programs and initiatives while improving overall student mental health. Let's take a closer look at some of these benefits of student voice.

A number of different factors can cause a lack of student engagement. From personal family issues at home to a disinterest in the subject matter, there are many possible reasons any particular student isn't fully engaged in the classroom.

Instead of teachers and educational leaders spending countless hours trying to figure out why their students aren't engaged and implementing initiatives that may or may not work, they could look to student voice. Just as businesses can increase engagement levels among employees when they share in the decision-making process, schools can use some of these same approaches to boost engagement amongst the student body.

By having constructive conversations and asking students to share their thoughts, opinions, and perspectives, educational leaders can quickly and effectively discover exactly how to keep their students engaged. When students have a voice and an opportunity to share their ideas, they naturally become invested in their own learning experiences. As Dr. Dana Mitra, an expert on student voice and engagement explains, "When students believe that they are valued for their perspectives and respected, they begin to develop a sense of ownership and attachment to the organization in which they are involved."

Rather than having a top-down approach where leaders tell students what to do and what to think, student voice empowers them to construct an education aligned with their values, interests, and greater goals.

Capturing and amplifying student voice is especially important for commonly marginalized groups. Students from racialized communities, lower-income communities, and those who are disabled have much more at stake both in and out of the classroom. While core aspects of the curriculum or in-classroom time may be working for some students, marginalized students may be having a completely different, usually more negative, experience-one that their teachers may not be aware of or understand.

By incorporating inclusive student voice initiatives, educators can work to encourage and improve equity throughout their institutions. As a report from American Progress finds, " efforts to incorporate student voice are stronger when they include intentional efforts to incorporate multiple student voices, especially those that have been historically marginalized."

Student voice enables educational leaders to uncover issues and areas of weakness in their organizations regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion. For example, when Dr. Jason Andrews and his team at Windsor Central School District wanted to work in alignment with their values and facilitate "conversations where everyone has an equal voice, and all voices are valued," they turned to ThoughtExchange.

After launching an Exchange and tapping into student voice, they discovered that students were interested in private unisex bathrooms for their school.

To learn more about student voice and equity in education, check out our virtual education series on the topic here.

While surveys might not provide the most in-depth data and information, they're a quick and simple way to start capturing student voice. Surveys allow students to share their views and perspectives in a straightforward way and can be adapted to fit a variety of needs.

For example, a teacher who notices that students aren't putting as much effort into their term projects as they had previously could build a survey with questions such as "What did you like about last term's project?", "How could I make this semester more interesting?", "Did you feel you had enough time to complete your project?", or "Do you prefer working in groups or by yourself on projects?" to find high-level reasons for their students' lack of engagement. With their students' answers, the teacher has a starting point for adapting their lessons and teaching approach to improve their students' learning experience.

A student council is an effective way for educational leaders and students to work together while promoting student voice.

With student governments or councils, " students can voice their opinions and take action on their ideas through council structures, procedures, interactions and involvements." Students can run campaigns based on their interests (from social justice issues within the school to the cafeteria menus) and then work with faculty and other district leaders to take action and make change.

While it is often the louder or more confident students that tend to run for student government positions, all students have the opportunity to vote for and work with those they believe are amplifying their perspectives and voices.

As Megan Ferren from American Progress explains, " Engaging in opportunities like student government not only benefits individual students by improving their leadership and communication skills, it also benefits school culture, facilities, and procedures." For example, Chicago's student voice committee, a student government initiative, conducted student surveys, held town halls, and interviewed both students and teachers to improve student-teacher relationships, identify solutions to issues facing many of their peers (such as hiring additional school counselors to relieve stress during the COVID-19 pandemic), and find ways to improve remote learning experiences.

Ferren recommends that schools not only grant their student council groups real and meaningful responsibilities but ensure that they " consider methods to increase participation in student government of students from traditionally underrepresented or marginalized groups-an effort that may include developing alternative selection methods to a traditional voting system or providing a stipend for elected positions."

To create a safe space where students can feel comfortable sharing their opinions and ideas, educational leaders can turn to technology and digital tools.

Tools like discussion management platforms allow for groups of students to share unbiased insights with teachers, educators, and their peers. Students can feel confident that their answers are being shared anonymously, without the worry of being singled out. By creating a trusting environment with digital tools, educators can gather student voice by hearing a diverse range of perspectives from a larger number of students. While other methods of gathering student voice may result in only hearing the loudest and most outgoing students, collective intelligence technology ensures the student voice represents all members of the student body fairly.

With a tool like ThoughtExchange, educators can ask their student body questions and receive dynamic, honest answers.

For example, Westerville City Schools used ThoughtExchange to capture student voice and discuss racial inequalities and social justice with their students. Here, student voice revealed that many students felt their concerns about racist incidents were going unaddressed. Additionally, they found that more student-on-student bullying and issues were occurring than the schools and districts were aware of. While students may not have been comfortable bringing up these issues face-to-face or in-person, ThoughtExchange's technology empowered them to anonymously share their concerns and worries without fear of repercussion or identification.

While in the past schools used parent-teacher conferences to discuss students and their status, student-led conferences (SLCs) allow students to play a significant part in crafting their own experiences at school.

SLCs provide a dedicated space for sharing and maximizing student voice. These events bring teachers, other faculty members, and parents together with students to hear from those who are most impacted by decisions made about their own learning experiences.

For example, Two-Rivers Public School in Washington, D.C. has had great success with SLCs. When their students enter 4th grade, they're included in the parent-teacher conference and given the opportunity to discuss their achievements and challenges in the last semester and help plan their own future. As 6th-grade student Payton shares, " Student-led conferences allow us to take ownership of our learning. Only we know how we are doing and where we are running. There isn't always going to be an adult there to help us."

While not a standalone activity, amplifying and nurturing student voice can only happen when students know how to take ownership of their ideas and confidently make decisions. This is made possible through applied learning activities that should begin as soon as the student starts school. As the State University of New York defines, " Applied learning refers to an educational approach whereby students learn by engaging in direct application of skills, theories, and models."

Applied learning activities are not a one-time thing. Instead, they're incorporated at every opportunity in the classroom. For example, if a teacher assigns a book report to their students, they may provide some general guidelines, a due date, and basic information required to complete the project. However, the students have the freedom and agency to choose the book they'll be reporting on or even the report format (ie. traditional written report, video, comic book-style, painting, diorama, etc.).

While not all students are natural-born public speakers, school-facilitated debates offer a safe space to develop their voice. As Cynthia Merse of Natural Pod explains, "Standing up before one's peers to deliver an argument can build a student's confidence in public speaking and encourage them to give voice to their ideas and opinions more often and in different contexts." Students will have the opportunity to argue (respectfully) about issues that matter most to them, and teachers will be able to hear their students' ideas and use this information to inform future decisions within the classroom.

For example, when teacher Dan Shackelford started teaching at a school where many students were experiencing poverty and other challenges, one of his first tasks was organizing a schoolwide debate to nurture student voice. He explains: "I let them choose the topics they wanted to discuss and listened as they talked about their fears, their realities, and their experiences as kids growing up in Detroit. Their preferred topics included public education, poetry, racism, and the importance of individual action over letting the government do it."

He saw his students come out of their shells through running regular debates, gain invaluable skills and knowledge for their futures, and build their confidence. As Shackelford concludes, "Each student had a unique voice and they were just waiting for someone to listen."

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7 Ways to Promote Student Voice in the Classroom | ThoughtExchange

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The past few years have proven how important it is to center student voice in learning outcomes. From social justice movements to the pandemic, a historically inequitable and sometimes divisive social landscape created a shaky foundation for the modern student's day-to-day schooling.

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Many educators feel an initial spark of inspiration and an undeniable pull toward the teaching profession as they're starting out in their career. They fall in love with the ideals of teaching and the ability to contribute to the world in a clear, meaningful way.

To have a passion for teaching early on is relatively easy. Early in an educator's career, the beauty of helping to shape young minds remains at the forefront. However, after years of hard work, administrative requirements (and hurdles), and trying to teach students who seem uninterested, maintaining that passion becomes more difficult. In fact, 55% of teachers report thinking about changing jobs.

For some, keeping the spark of passion alive can feel nearly impossible. But there are ways educators can either grow or maintain their passion for teaching, simply by shifting their focus and finding a community of fellow educators on which to lean.

Here are five ways to reignite your passion for teaching or even grow it anew.

1. Connect to your why

As an educator, when someone asks you why you started teaching, you can likely connect almost immediately to a specific memory or feeling. Perhaps you felt the urge to connect with your students and inspire the youth of today to become leaders and reach their full potential. Maybe teaching has been in your family for decades. Or maybe you even switched careers to go into teaching.

Whatever your why is, find a way to connect with what you love most about teaching. You can write it in a journal every day or meditate on this motivation each morning. You might even consider getting together on a call with other teachers and having a discussion about why you all began teaching in the first place.

Reconnecting with your why, or even connecting to your motivation for the first time ever, will anchor you in your love of teaching and help you focus on what matters most, rather than all the smaller difficult moments that come up during the day.

2. Recall your own favorite teachers and mentors

Another great way to recall your passion for teaching is to think about your own past teachers and mentors. You may have even asked yourself this as you've wondered how to be a better teacher during hard moments: What did they do to inspire you that you want to embody as an educator yourself?

Make a list of their qualities, of the little things they did to make learning special, and of the ways they showed up as educators. Then you can go through the list and choose a few different qualities you would also like to embody as an educator in your own way.

Sometimes having gratitude for teachers that changed your life can remind you that teachers do have a magical power to help their students grow. You might even remember that you didn't quite show your gratitude then, but you remember these mentors and educators to this day.

3. Celebrate small victories

Educating others is no easy task, and teaching is not for the faint of heart. Some days you might feel like nothing you're doing is working or that your students aren't grasping the information. Some days feel like they get lost under the mountain of grading and paperwork you have to do. Perhaps you feel overwhelmed by the new structure of teaching right now.

Whatever might be bringing you down, remember that you can still celebrate the small victories. Take note of each time a student really grasps new information. Recall moments when students thanked you for your work or gave you a note to tell you how much they appreciate you.

Celebrate moments when you finally finish grading a tall stack of papers or coming up with a creative new set of learning plans. Give yourself these victories, because they do add up after a while. Focusing on the wins rather than all of the challenges will keep you inspired to keep pushing forward to the next day.

4. Maintain a support network

If you're an educator, you likely already know how important it is to maintain a strong community of fellow educators who help support each other through the ebbs and flows.

Even if you don't already feel close to your colleagues at school or in your local community, you can find ways to connect with other educators through networks like the NSHSS educators community or another global network of educators.

These groups of fellow educators allow you to bounce ideas off of other teachers who care deeply about their work, commiserate with fellow teachers about tough moments, and relate with the people who understand what you go through each day.

5. Take time for self-care

As an educator, you likely spend a great deal of time worrying about others and have very little time to devote to yourself. However, taking the time for self-care is of the utmost importance. You cannot show up with full energy for your students if you don't cultivate that energy in your downtime.

Indulge in your favorite hobbies. Go on walks, listen to music. Get more sleep. Eat a good meal. Take time to just relax and enjoy life outside of teaching.

By being an educator, you already show that you care about the future of your students and of the world. But you don't need to worry about your job all day. Your students will thank you for taking this time to yourself, because you will inevitably have more energy to devote to teaching when you take care of your own needs, too.

You are an educator, and as such, you are vital to the future of society. The world is grateful for the work you do, so take time to thank yourself as well.

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5 Ways Educators Can Grow and Sustain a Passion for Teaching | National Society of High School Scholars

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To have a passion for teaching early on is relatively easy. Early in an educator's career, the beauty of helping to shape young minds remains at the forefront.

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Diverse Learning Strategies

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Allowing students to stay after class or come in during impact hour to finish work/tests.

Doing some of the homework with them after the lesson to give the students concrete examples to take home and make sure everyone is understanding the content.

If a student has their phone on them, the teacher takes them and plugs them into a giant charging block that he has on his white board so it’s not strictly a punishment but also helpful.

Make it a goal to open class with a warm open:

a.      What’s going on in life?

b.     How are extracurricular activities going

Giving out information on school initiatives and events

Make it a goal to wrap class at least 3 minutes early to give students time to collect themselves and their things, prepare for the next class, socialize, fill up water bottles, etc.

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Visual Arts Why Art Is So Important Infographic in Colorful Illustrative Style 2

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What Are Habits of Mind? - The Institute for Habits of Mind

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For Teachers Ever find yourself doubting whether you are creative? Many people assume that creativity is a rare commodity that someone is either born with or not and that it is reserved for the elite among us: artists, writers, and composers, or the likes of Miles Davis, Steve Jobs, or Frida Kahlo.

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To help build relationships with the parents!

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To help build relationships with the parents!

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One app to bring your whole classroom together | ClassDojo

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New for back to school: messages families actually read, classroom tools that save time, and new middle and high school features. All free, in the app you already know and love.