It’s no surprise then that your students are learning how to love themselves by watching how you love yourself.

In my first year of teaching, I shied away from self-love and self-care because I feared that it was selfish. 

I felt like self-care meant that you were cocky, narcissistic, and selfish. 

Little did I know, however, that by not prioritizing self-care my students suffered.

If this sounds like something you have experienced then you are not alone.

In an industry where we are expected to serve, it is easy for teachers to prioritize others over themselves. 

But today we are going to cover how incorporating self-care can benefit your students.

In this article we will discuss:

• What is teacher self-care?
• Why is teacher self-care important?
• How teacher self-care can benefit your students

So grab that cup of coffee and let’s get started!

What is Self-Care?

Before we talk about teacher self-care ideas for back to school, we need to get super clear on what self-care is. 

Self-Care is the action of preserving or improving one’s health. 

In other words, it is prioritizing your health first so that you can better preserve your energy and perform better as a teacher. 

It’s the ability to make habits that make sure all the different aspects of your health are taken care of. 

However, what many people don’t know is that there are four different kinds of self-care. These include physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual self-care.

I talk all about the different kinds of self-care in the article “The Ultimate Guide of Self-Care for Teachers.” So if you want to learn more, click here to read it now. 

Self-care is a healthy habit that helps you maintain an optimal state of health.

Now that we have discussed what self-care is, let’s talk about why it is important.

Why is Self-Care Important?

There are many reasons why teacher self-care is so important!

For instance, did you know that 45% of teachers claim to work more than 50 hours a week?

With that in mind, it’s no wonder that 4 in 10 teachers are leaving the profession in the first 5 years. 

Hence why self-care is so important!

To have a fulfilling life as a teacher, you need to prioritize your health first.

Otherwise, you will continue to feel exhausted, overwhelmed, and ready to quit the profession you so desperately love. 

Prioritizing your self-care will also help you:

• Keep burnout at bay.
• Stay energized throughout the day with clarity.
• Model to other teachers that prioritizing your self-care is okay and should be done.
• Help create a movement where teachers take back control of their lives in a way that helps better serve education.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. If you want to learn more click here to read more about the importance of self-care in my last article. 

How Teacher Self-Care Can Benefit Students

Now that you know what self-care is and why it is important let’s talk about how teacher self-care can benefit students. 

Show Up Energized

One of the ways teacher self-care can benefit students is that it allows you to show up to work energized and ready to go.

If you have ever neglected your self-care, you might recall feeling frazzled, burned out, and exhausted.

However, after maintaining your self-care habits, teachers feel energized and refreshed at the beginning of the day.

This is extremely important when it comes to teaching because students can sense when they feel overwhelmed.

Plus if you have ever had a “bad day” and that same day your students had a “bad day,” then you might note how students feed off of your emotions.

No matter how great you are at faking it, oftentimes students can sense when something is wrong.

Hence the importance of self-care and showing up each day energized and renewed. 

Trust me, this is a benefit for both you, and your students!

Be the Teacher You Knew You Could Be

At the end of my first year of teaching, it felt like I had blinked and the year was over.

That summer after some much-needed rest I reflected on my teaching the previous year. This is when I realized that I hadn’t been the teacher I always knew I could be because I was constantly overwhelmed.

With inconsistent boundaries and priorities, it’s no wonder that many teachers end the year defeated and just trying to survive.

By incorporating consistent and effective self-care, however, you are cutting down on the overwhelm and burnout.

This means you can show up each day enthused and be the authentic engaging teacher you always knew you could be. 

Students benefit when we show up as our authentic selves as opposed to a burned-out teacher on autopilot. 

This is why showing up as our authentic self is one of the ways students can benefit from teacher self-care.

Model Boundaries and Priorities for Students

Another way that teacher self-care benefits students is it is an opportunity for teachers to model healthy boundaries and priorities.

As we mentioned at the beginning of this article, students learn about themselves by watching how others interact with them.

It’s no surprise then that students will learn how to set boundaries and priorities by watching other adults and their priorities and boundaries.

As a teacher, we cannot control the home-life of our students.

Some students will have amazing parents who model exceptional boundaries and priorities.

While others may have families who struggle with setting consistent boundaries and priorities.

Either way, by modeling consistent boundaries and priorities, you are ensuring that your students have an adult in their life who advocates for healthy well-being.

This provides students with some tools they will need to prioritize for the rest of their lives.

Model Self-Love for Students

The next way how teacher self-care can benefit students is by modeling self-love to students. 

It’s no secret that self-care is an act of self-love.

You are prioritizing yourself, being in intune with your needs, and advocating for your boundaries.

That’s why it is so important to incorporate self-care in the classroom for your students to see.

When you are open with your students on how you love yourself in and out of the classroom, you are showing them that self-love is needed and accepted.

Students might then implement self-love in their daily lives by watching how they love themselves. 

Mindfulness

The final way that teacher self-care can benefit students is the idea of mindfulness.

When you are taking the time to love yourself and prioritize yourself, then you are cutting through the noise and preventing overwhelm.

When you are less overwhelmed you can show up mindfully.

Mindful as in the present and the moment.

Students need us to be mindful in the classroom so that we can listen to them. 

When we are mindful, we are opening a safe space in our hearts for our students.

A place where they will feel seen and heard.

And that is one of the best gifts a teacher can give to their students. 

Overview

Thank you so much for reading to the end!

As a review, in this post we discussed:

• What self-care is
• Why self-care is important
• How Teacher self-care can benefit students

I hope this post was the message you needed to hear and reminded you that self-care is not selfish. 

It is so beneficial to our students in so many ways. By incorporating self-care, you are influencing a future generation full of self-love.

Thank you so much for reading, and before you go I want to invite you to join our community.

Here at the Present Teacher, we strive to help educators who:

• Are tired of getting burned out
• Can’t be consistent with their self-care plan
• Don’t have the time for their self-care
• Have a hard time making boundaries and priorities during the school year
• Want to impact future generations by prioritizing their self-care by modeling it to our students

So if this sounds like you, then I want to invite you to get on the waitlist for our Self-Care Membership.

In this membership, you will join a community of educators that strive for consistency in their self-care habits while also holding each other accountable.

Click here if you are interested, and I can’t wait to see you there.

Happy Teaching!

The Present Teacher

So you incorporated self-care over the summer and got consistent with incorporating it into your summer schedule.

But now with back to school right around the corner, you can’t seem to find the time or be consistent with your self-care goals.

Hi, my name is Helena Hains and I am a Self-Care Coach. I help teachers create an authentic self-care plan that doesn’t take a lot of time.

I believe teachers need to prioritize their self-care before serving their students. 

Today we are going to discuss how teachers can be consistent with self-care during the back-to-school season. 

We are also going to cover:

• What being consistent with self-care during back to school looks like
• How to be consistent with self-care during back to school

So if this sounds like something you are interested in grab that cup of coffee and let’s get started!

What Being Consistent with Self-Care During Back to School Looks Like

Before we talk about how to be consistent with self-care during back-to-school, we need to figure out what this might look like.

Starting with what is consistency?

Consistency is taking small, incremental steps to make a certain action a habit.

In other words, it’s the little steps you do to make something easier.

For example, one way to be consistent with journaling every morning could be:

• Buying a journal
• Having it open every day for you to write in
• Setting an alarm on your phone

According to Healthline, it takes an average of 66 days to create a new habit. 

It can be easy to understand then why so many teachers struggle to make a self-care goal a habit.

Being consistent with self-care looks like doing the same thing for a while to the point where it becomes automatic.

For instance, a consistent physical self-care habit someone might have is to go walking every morning before work.

Now that we know what consistency is and how it relates to self-care, let’s talk about how you can become consistent with self-care this back-to-school season.

How to Be Consistent with Self-Care During Back to School

Being consistent with self-care during back-to-school can be one of the hardest things for teachers when it comes to self-care. 

Especially during back-to-school season.

You’re busy planning, decorating, prepping, welcoming students, communicating with parents, etc. It’s no wonder that teachers throw self-care out the window during back-to-school.

But that doesn’t have to be the case. Here are 5 strategies to be consistent with self-care this back-to-school season.

Measurable Goals

The first way to be consistent with self-care during back to school is to get super clear on your goals.

Much like writing objectives at the end of the lesson, you need to write yourself measurable goals that help align you to your outcome.

Inspired by Michael Hyatt’s book “Your Best Year Ever,” you want to make these goals measurable.

For instance, creating the goal “to drink more water” is not measurable and there is no clear way to figure out if you reached that goal.

You could drink more water for one day or week, but would that mean you reached your goal?

Instead, try creating the goal:

“I will drink 12 cups of water every day by 8 pm consistently for 365 days before December 31st.”

This goal is measurable, tells you how often, how much and when you wish to reach that goal.

By creating clear, measurable goals you can be more consistent with them because you are clear on the actions needed to reach those goals. 

Write it Down

Another way to be consistent with self-care this school year is to write your self-care goals down.

An article by CNBC stated that “Participants who wrote down their goals achieved those desires at a significantly higher level than those who didn’t. She found that you become 42% more likely to achieve your goals and dreams, simply by writing them down daily.”

Hence why writing things down is so important.

So if you want to be more consistent with self-care during back school write down your goals. 

Alarms

It can be easy for teachers to neglect their self-care when they are overwhelmed with work.

Oftentimes teachers may find themselves working long past contract hours into the night. 

That’s why one way you can ensure that you are consistent with your self-care goals is to set an alarm on your phone. 

For example, every day after school I have an alarm that goes off that reminds me to read. 

This reminds me that I should stop working and start reading my book. 

When you give yourself visual reminders, you are ensuring that you won’t forget to do something. 

This is also a great reminder to leave work every day or to start prioritizing your family if that is one of your goals. 

Gamification

Another way to be consistent with self-care during back-to-school is to make a game out of it. 

Gamification is the action of applying typical actions of game playing to something.

Also mentioned in “Your Best Year Ever” you can use a tracker to track the progress of how often you reached your goal.

For instance, I can put an X on a box after every day that I drank 12 cups of water. 

The longer I am consistent with this the longer my streak will be. Hence the less likely I will want to break it.

Much like the tracking used by Fit Bit’s or Apple Watches, gamification is a great way to track your progress and be consistent. 

Accountability

The final way to be consistent with self-care during back-to-school is to find some form of accountability.

One example of this would be if you wanted to leave work every day by 4 pm.

Find a teacher friend that has the same goal and keep each other accountable.

That way you can remind them to leave on time and vise versa. 

Habits are easier to be consistent with together that’s why accountability is a great way to be consistent with self-care during back to school.

Overview

You made it through all the ways to be consistent with self-care during back to school. 

As a recap, in this article we talked about:

• What being consistent with self-care during back to school looks like
• How to be consistent with self-care during back to school

If you want to learn more about how to be consistent with your self-care goals join the Teacher Self-Care Membership!

This membership is perfect for you if:

• You are a teacher who feels exhausted, emotionally drained, or experiencing burnout.
• You want to prioritize your self-care.
• You want to set goals, priorities, or boundaries in the workplace.

If this sounds like something you are interested in joining the waitlist to get notified when the doors open by clicking here.

Happy Teaching!

The Present Teacher

So it’s that overwhelming time of year that many teachers know as… Back to School.

It’s that time of year where teachers come back from summer break and start decorating, organizing, planning, and eventually welcoming their new students for the year.

In the midst of all that chaos it can be hard to remember about incorporating self-care.

So that’s why today we are going to tackle some teacher self-care ideas for back to school.

In this post we are going to cover:

• What is self-care?
• Why is self-care important?
• 9 teacher self-care ideas for back to school

So grab that coffee and let’s get started!