Speaker 1: Hello there and welcome back to my channel. If you are new here, my name is Michelle Emerson and I love helping teachers with all things, technology, organization, and productivity. In this video, we are talking about routines, which simply put a routine is just a sequence of actions performed regularly. As teachers, we teach our students routines for everything, bathroom routine, lunch and recess routine, morning routine. Why don't I just do my routine without the juggling balls? The reason we teach routines is because they work. So today we're going to focus on routines we can develop as teachers that will help us be more efficient with our time and more productive. In case you are not already convinced, here are a few reasons you should be building routines. They're going to decrease the number of decisions you have to make, which in turn is going to decrease your mental fatigue. They're going to help you build momentum. They're going to help you stick to new habits through repetition, and they're going to decrease your need for willpower. I'm going to walk you through 10 routines every teacher needs. As we discuss each one, it is helpful to do a brain dump of all of the tasks you need to complete during that time, and then turn that brain dump into a checklist. Obviously you're not going to refer to the checklist every single time you do the routine, but it is helpful in times of stress or when you're trying to develop a new routine. Obviously you will need to decide where to store your checklist. You can keep it simple and just have it on paper or in your planner, but you also can go digital and keep it in the notes app or an app like Google keep, but it is helpful to have the items on the checklist in the order you will be completing them. Also keep in mind, once you actually start performing the routine, you may think of additional tasks that have to get added and you may need to adapt your routines over time as you enter into new seasons of your life. I can tell Michael's mood by which comedy routine he chooses to do. Also, if your routine is super, super long, keep in mind, you can always delegate tasks to others, especially your students. The first routine every teacher needs is a morning routine. This is going to go from the time you wake up to either the time you leave home or the time that your students actually enter. That is up to you. Your morning routine should include tasks that get your body ready. So maybe showering, brushing your teeth, eating breakfast, but it also needs to include tasks that get your mind ready. Things like reviewing your calendar, setting your intentions for the day, maybe reading a book or meditating. If you are extending your morning routine until the time that your students come into your classroom, you would want to include some of those administrative tasks like taking attendance, maybe submitting a lunch count or clocking in for the day. Your morning routine should also include tasks that move you toward your goals. This is super important to have early on in the day because it's going to set the tone. Let's say one of your goals is to leave school at the end of your contract hours. Maybe in the morning, you're going to create your power list your three top to do's to complete for the day. That way you stay focused. Or if you have a goal to be eating healthier or maybe drinking more water, your morning routine may include drinking a full glass of water. And last but not least, your morning routine should include tasks that make you happy. At least one, but feel free to include more than one. That might mean listening to podcasts or watching YouTube videos as you get ready, maybe reading your favorite book or drinking coffee. The second routine every teacher needs is an end of the day routine, which refers to the end of the school day. Obviously you have to include tasks that are part of your duty. So maybe taking students out to dismissal, clocking out at the end of the day and submitting any paperwork. Your end of the day routine should also include tasks that reset your space. Things like putting materials away, wiping off your boards, clearing your desk and turning off any technology. On a similar note, your end of the day routine should also include tasks that will prepare you for the next day. So things like changing the date on the board, changing the schedule. Maybe you're going to lay out all the materials you need to teach the next day. This is going to help you walk into your classroom the next day and feel a sense of relief because you are ready to go. And just like with your morning routine, your end of the day routine should include something that makes you happy. Again, this could be watching YouTube videos as you clean up or listening to podcasts. Maybe you keep a pair of slippers, and I say this because I did this, in your classroom that you can change into at the end of the day. Just include something that brings you joy. The third routine every teacher needs is a lesson planning routine. I know that lesson planning can look so different based on the subjects you teach, the grade you teach, or the expectations from your school or district. But I've broken it into four very broad categories, including planning, prepping digital materials, prepping physical materials, and organizing. Let's start with the first category, which is planning. This is where you're going to set dates for your lessons. You're going to create a scope and sequence. You're going to create maybe a to-do list of all the items you have to get done. Maybe you're going to go online to be able to find new ideas. It's really just creating that overarching kind of outline of your lessons. The next category is prepping your digital components. These are all of the tasks you can complete on a phone, tablet, or computer. Things like creating slides or creating worksheets, or even locating resources that have already been created, or pulling things from your curriculum if that's available online. The next category is prepping the physical materials. This would include tasks like making copies, printing and laminating materials, gathering manipulatives, preparing anchor charts, or gathering any physical materials that you or your students may need for the lesson. The final category is organizing. This is going to include tasks like adding websites to your bookmarks or adding files to the start section of your Google Drive so they're easy to access, putting copies into your days of the week drawers or however you organize your papers, or maybe creating a to-do list of things you have to do the day of for that lesson. Honestly, this will probably be one of your lengthiest routines. So my suggestions are to batch as much as possible. So rather than creating slides for one lesson at a time, try to create slides for an entire week of lessons. Same thing goes for making copies. Rather than making copies every single day, try to get a week or even two weeks done at one time. Also collaborate with team teachers or teachers from other schools nearby as much as possible to help take some of the load off of your plate. Obviously this routine is not meant to be done every single day. It's more so a routine that you would complete every week or maybe every other week, depending on how much you have to plan. So you can take the number of tasks and divide it into the number of planning periods you have within that timeframe. The fourth routine every teacher needs is a grading routine. Now this is going to look different for everyone, just like your lesson planning routine, but it should include tasks like actually marking the assignments. Maybe you're adding comments, you're embellishing with stickers, you're entering grades into the grade book, you're preparing redo assignments, you're keeping track of missing assignments. You are contacting families about grades that have improved or maybe grades that are declining and you're returning any papers to students. The fifth routine every teacher needs is a paper flow routine. I know everything there is to know about paper. This is all about managing the paper monster and not letting your papers get out of hand, which tends to happen pretty often because there are so many. So this is going to allow you to process your papers in a timely manner so they do not pile up, especially if they're in drawers and they're not very visible. But some of these tasks might fit into some of your other routines like your morning routine or your end of the day routine. I will say that the routine should mirror your paper organizational system. So here are a few examples. Maybe you have a bin where students put any papers that have to get turned into you or have to get turned into the office. And as part of your morning routine, you're going to process all of those papers. You might have drawers where you keep all of your copies for the upcoming week and that could be part of your lesson planning routine during that organizational component. Within this routine, you may have tasks that have to be completed daily, other tasks that have to be completed weekly, and still some tasks that maybe you only complete once a month. For example, you would need to process any papers that have to get turned into the office on a daily basis. Maybe you're only organizing your copies on a weekly basis and maybe you're filing papers on a monthly basis. The sixth routine every teacher needs is an after work routine, also known as an evening routine. This after work routine is going to help you establish that boundary between work life and personal life. It almost signals to your brain that you can stop working and move on to your time at home. Obviously you're going to include any necessary life tasks. So things like eating dinner, brushing your teeth, taking your vitamins, maybe you take your dog for a walk. But just like with your morning routine, you also want to include tasks that are moving you toward your goals. This could include going to the gym or maybe you're taking a grad school class. Your after work routine should also include tasks that will prepare you for the next day. Things like packing your lunch the night before, picking out your clothes, packing up your bag so that it's ready to grab in the morning. Any of those little things you can do ahead of time to make your life easier in the morning. And you already know what's coming. Your after work routine should also include tasks that make you happy. This could include maybe dessert after dinner or watching your favorite TV show or a movie, playing games with your family, reading your favorite book in bed, whatever those little tasks are that bring you joy. The seventh routine every teacher needs is a weekend routine. Obviously it's okay to have more flexibility on the weekend. I'm not saying you have to plan the entire weekend out, but you will find there are certain tasks that you do every single weekend, especially to prepare you for the week ahead. This could include things like going grocery shopping or doing your laundry. That way it's done and out of the way. Maybe instead of creating an entire weekend routine, you could just have a Sunday routine and this would be filled with those tasks that you can do that will help ease your anxiety going into the week. You know, getting rid of your Sunday scaries, if you will. This might include tasks for work. Maybe you enjoy lesson planning on Sundays. That way you're not rushed throughout the week. It doesn't matter so long as you find the flow of those events that work for you. The eighth routine every teacher needs is a weekly tasks routine. This routine is going to include all of the tasks that you complete on a weekly basis. It's pretty self-explanatory. This might include sending an email to parents every week, or maybe you're setting out new books to be able to read with your students, or maybe you have a quote of the week and you have to change it once a week. These are all of those tasks that you have to do in order to set yourself up for the next week, but they're not necessarily part of your traditional lesson planning. With this routine, you might get the tasks done throughout the week or you might wait until Friday and get them all done. Then I always call this my Friday routine and it was part of what I would do during my planning time on Fridays in order to get ready for the week ahead. The ninth routine every teacher needs is a monthly tasks routine. Again, these are tasks that you complete every month, but you could adapt this to be every marking period or every term or every semester. This might include restocking student supplies or creating a new seating chart or changing your bulletin boards. All of those tasks that you don't do every week, but you do have to make sure you don't forget. The 10th and final routine every teacher needs is an organizing slash cleaning routine. As I previously mentioned, this might be a routine that you complete all at once. Maybe you have one day that you dedicate to cleaning and organizing your classroom, but it may also be something that you're able to check off all of the items by the end of the month and you can kind of do it at your own pace. This might include tasks like cleaning off your bins or wiping down student desks or wiping down your own bins. It might also include tasks like cleaning out student desks or cleaning out student lockers. Not that you have to do it, but you set aside time for students to do it. That is it. Those are the 10 routines I believe every teacher needs. It's not about creating more for you to do. It's about you being able to analyze what you get done during what chunks of time so that you can be more productive. If you enjoyed this video, please give it a thumbs up, hit the subscribe button and notification bell. So you do not miss any future videos as always. Thank you for watching. I love you so much. Don't forget to put your positive pants on and I will catch you.