Burnt Out But Still Showing Up

How teachers keep going when they’re running on empty

What happens when passion meets pure exhaustion

In this real and unfiltered episode of The Bellringer Podcast, Ms. Durden and Ms. James check in honestly on where they are this time of year, from loving the job to counting down to summer. If you’ve ever walked into your classroom tired, overwhelmed, and still expected to give your best, this conversation will hit home

The spring semester brings a unique kind of pressure. From testing demands and rising student behavior to the mental and emotional fatigue teachers carry daily, it can feel like a nonstop sprint to the finish line. In this episode, we break down what burnout actually looks like in real life, not just being tired, but feeling stretched, detached, and running on empty

We also get honest about self care, not the picture perfect version, but the kind that actually helps teachers get through the day. Setting boundaries, protecting your time, embracing simplicity, and letting go of the pressure to do it all

This episode is your reminder that you can love teaching and still feel exhausted. You are not alone, and you are not failing, you are human

Because even when we are burnt out, we are still showing up 🔔

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

I'm Miss James. And I'm Miss Durden. And welcome to the Bell Ringer. Class is officially in session. Hey y'all, and welcome back to the Bell Ringer Podcast. This is Miss Dernan and Miss James. So before we get started, we got a bit of bad news. Sad music. This will be our last episode before we take a very short hiatus. Because what? Word on the street is y'all want to see our faces. Y'all want to see this face and these two big front teeth. We got y'all. But we're just going to take time to, for one, just celebrate the fact that we have made it this far. This has been a couple of years since 2020. This has been, you know, a process or working in the making. And now we're here, Miss James. We're here to read five episodes in. So we just want to bask in that glory of just having five episodes in and then taking some time to regroup, taking some time to examine as teachers do, some self-evaluations, some peer evaluations, and just see how can the Bell Region podcast come back to you during our summer series even better. Because that is what teachers do, right? So this episode is entitled, and I feel like it's fitting because before we get tired of anything, especially with this podcast, we want to make sure that we are putting out the best us, okay, and why we started this podcast, putting out the best of us for the teachers, for the parents, and for the students. So this episode is titled Burnt Out But Still Showing Up. And Miss James, here's a question for you because I already know my answer. But on a scale from I love my job to count down to summer, where are you today? I'm sure I'm in the same place as you, girl. I am counting down to summer. Love my job. Absolutely. Let me say that I do love my job, but I am counting down to summer. I am I am so ready for the summer. She counted down the summer, yeah. We're gonna see what she's saying. So we'll we'll put that or I don't know, put a pen in it. We'll put a pen in it, we'll bring you some more news. But the news is coming. I don't know about it next week. You trying to do a bonus episode? Okay. So I'm count down to summer, but I'm also about I'm trying to get the summer because I'm just trying to see how you know my trips are gonna go. But we're in a point of the year where myself and Miss James, you know, have I finished state testing, she still has a little ways to go. Well, no, by the time this episode posts, she's done. But while we're recording, she's still in it, okay? So this will lead us into our first topic. And Miss James, tell us a little bit more about this testing pressure and the things that happened this semester that can get us burnt out. Yes, ma'am. Testing season is such a long season, it's a long season, and you know, 10 years in this year, I'm just not figuring out one thing that burns me out. Okay, so in my school, we don't we don't all test at the same time, right? And so I noticed the first couple weeks of testing, although we're not testing, we were on a testing schedule. And that did something, that did something to me. That did something to me. My schedule, not our not just me, but as far as my students, our schedule not flowing the same. Me not having my breaks at the schedule time that I'm you, it's like my body and my mind are used to those times. Right. And so I felt all out of whack. And I'm still out of whack because now we're now we're into what now we're testing too. And there is so much pressure when you teach an accountability grade, an accountability subject that is on the test, ELA and math. Um, if you're in fourth, I think what fourth and is it eighth. Sixth and eighth, yes, but even numbers, four, six, eight. For science, it can be over, it can be overwhelming. It can really be overwhelming, and there can be so much pressure. Uh, and this would be this would be um just a tip if we have any administrators that are listening, make sure that you're taking care of your teachers and not putting so much pressure on them. Because it's a lot to ask of some to expect so much out of one human who is over 20 plus children, right? And so, you know, we want to have achievement, we want to make certain scores, but girl, on Tuesday, if little Johnny comes in, if little Johnny comes in and he's not prepared, that parts on him. And so you have a lot of that with teachers because you do want success, you do want your students to achieve, but you know, everyone has to buy into that, the students and the parents as well. Uh, I also see, in addition to that, at the same time, um I spoke about this on another episode when I mentioned like my students are acting like brothers and sisters, more so. So an increase in misbehaviors or them or them not getting along. And so all throughout the day, it's constantly um addressing situations, them you know, them bickering or going back and forth about stuff. That's constantly throughout the day. And then what um, for example, today, I felt like that happened during the school day, and then I made it to we had a 6:30 game. My cheerleaders were doing it too. They were getting on it, they were getting on each other's nerves, and they were, you know, bumping each other and you know, things that I have to address. And it's like it doesn't stop. And that can true, that can truly be overstimulating for me. I don't know, about for other people, and then a sense of growing tired, and so teacher fatigue, and then the students are tired too, because they are the ones, like in this season, they are the ones taking all of these tests, and that's a lot of I don't when I was in school, I remember, I remember celebrations of tests. That makes sense. I remember celebrations of tests. I don't think we were it's something different now, and students are more um, there's more pressure on them, honestly, where they're aware, they're aware of these tests that they're taking and that they have to have a certain score, um, with the literacy act in place, and students students realizing that if they're in red or if they're in, you know, in yellow and green, and we're making them more aware of data, and they have to know where they are, and that develops fatigue in them as well. Right. Um, and then after spring break, the breaks get a little bit. Yeah, you mentioned it. Yeah. Um after spring, we have that week of spring break, and then we roll into testing season, right? Which is such a which is a long, stretch, stretched out time. Whereas the off day, you start looking for you start looking for those off days. Oh, those breaks too, yeah. Yeah, those out of breaks. Yeah, because I've said them. Yeah. Those out of school breaks, they kind of get slim. And honestly, I think they get slim when we really need them. They get slim during that time. I was looking this month, honestly, I was looking for the late spring break day. But the late spring break day. I thought it was a teacher work day. I know, but that's I'm gonna take it. I'm gonna take it, but I would also really appreciate a day where I could be at home too during this month. During this month, it goes back to testing. Yeah, agreed. But another day during that time where we could be at home as well would work, it would work for me. It would work for me, and so just juggling all those things for testing, the close out of the year, teacher fatigue, student fatigue, all of it at the same time, it can be a lot, it can really be a lot. So, Ms. Durden, could you tell me um what you would like, what does burnout really look like to you? Okay, so during this time, you mentioned a lot of things. So the breaks are shorter, and planning periods change because you're typically a school that's on a modified testing schedule. Because by state law, you're supposed to get at least last time I checked or was told, 30-minute plan. I know it's 30-minute because I could have gone to the state on this past district, 30-minute planning period. So I said that because we get short patients and we are more irritable. And you made such a great point, and I'm just do a quick synopsis. So teachers come back from after Christmas break knowing that I got MLK Day, okay? So it's like, okay, MLK Day, something to look forward to. February, and what a lot of districts are doing, well, what our district's doing in other districts too, they are starting to give you like their Friday, and then Monday or like a two, because you get President's Day, so they're giving that Friday or that Tuesday before you're you have in that our district. We also have intercession, which is a week that is not required for um students, and it's not required for teachers, but teachers to come in and make extra money if they would like to. And March is spring break, April doesn't typically have any off times. And you're right, we do need it because what burnout looks like is you having a lot of things on your plate because you have testing, you have to you have to sit through so many testing trainings, like the trainings are it's like maybe 50 minutes, and you know, you have to read these oaths and sign these oaths, and you're being reminded that anything you do or will do could jeopardize your certification. Then you're thinking about all the things you did getting your certification, you're like, Oh my, it's just a very tense situation. Then while you're testing, and this happened, because now my school, thankfully, we test it as an entire school. Like, if you were to take science, the whole school took science. If you were to take math, now, of course, second and third graders move just because of the lyrics, the act and everything, they moved a little bit differently. So you have shorter breaks, you're irritable. The smallest things could get on your nerves, or sometimes, in my case, and I know my teammates, if they're listening, they probably think I'm crazy because sometimes I'm so zoned out, I don't even hear things. Like it's me picking up my laptop, taking it to lunch, and not doing nothing with it. Because I'm this is just a mental break for myself. This is literally, we we went over time today in recess, not even trying to. We're so mentally because this mental exhausted uh exhaustion can't plan, can't think. We literally sit in there, and I just don't happen to look at the time, I'm like, yeah, we've been out here like seven minutes longer, and we just look because we're so mentally prepared for a class to come down, and that's like our cue to go. We're checked out, but going off on students, that's part of it. Short patient, you know, you your patients at the beginning is like, okay, so we're not gonna. I and I'm to this point with some students, and I think I talked about this a couple episodes back. Some students still try to assist them. So the ones that's trying to system now, it's like say your prayer in the morning. Because if you try to do it by your mic, you can't hold your words back. Because sometimes those words, it now it's like, look, and then now I'm in the mo the mode, oh, testing over. Because think about it, you're in a room, you're skip that my students are used to having like an hour break in the morning, like getting their day started, and then at like 920, they got a break, and then they come back at 10:15. We wrap up, we're ready to switch classes. We're not oh, fifth grade, we're not switching classes. So I'm stuck with my homeroom. And so my homeroom is like, it's like being on vacation, but it's a it's an awful vacation. Um, also, burnout looks like, hey, I can tell you right now, I'm clocking in and they don't flights, you know, the kids not hanging from the ceiling in my classroom. I can tell you that. And then also, but I started doing this earlier. I really started doing this earlier as I progressed in this education journey, checking out. My mind right now was on this podcast. I literally had a moment before we got started say, Oh, I forgot to make a copy. Am I crying? Am I pulling up my computer to make a copy? I'm not. I may go ahead and pull some of my laptop printed so I could go ahead and make copies in the morning. But um, look, you're doing the bare minimum. Earth Day is coming up. It's they'll get a worksheet, they'll get a worksheet in a nice passage explaining what it's Earth Day, why we care for the earth. It's important for us to recycle. But that's what burnout looks like. And I do want to bring up the fact that because if you're not at this point not going above and beyond to do certain things and to have certain activities, um, it doesn't make you a bad teacher. Because now I'm at the point where, okay, you know, we did the welcome back stuff, we did the test prep, we did blitz, we did all this. We can breathe now because that was done is done. We cannot change it, it's being graded now, and we'll get it back later. But what we can do is, you know, still have some of that structure. Because I do want the biggest thing I will say is that even though you are tired, I hate to say it like this, but you need to do the bare minimum. Make sure your students are engaged and have something to do, even if it's not as strategic or as strenuous as you did in the beginning, you know. Have them still like have an activity. I say pick a topic now instead of a standard, pick a topic and use that topic to tie in. It'll when you choose a topic, it'll tie in a bunch of standards. And I would say do that. And but you don't, you know, it's the rah-rah is over because, like in my school, and what our mind is that we're planning for our big like field day, and we're also planning for the big promotion ceremony. So our mind is on that, and we're using school time to try to get some of those things done. So if you're not a bad teacher, you're just tired, and it's it's normal at this time. You're just tired, right? So since we're talking about tired, Miss James, what are some things we can do for self-care? I got you. I got you on the self-care. I need some self-care right now. Let me tell you what I did today. I went to lunch and I didn't bring, I didn't bring a lunch. I thought I only had my cup. And when I looked down, you know what else I had in my hand? What? My keys. My car keys. Okay. I didn't need my car keys. I never take my car keys to lunch. And so I was like, what made I was like, what made me take my car keys from my desk to the lunch room? I'm like, I guess it's time to go home. It's time to go home. I'm like, I'm so tired that I just grabbed my keys and my mind is already on going home. And then I didn't get home until about 8:30. So a long day. But girl, self-care is so important, and I am really big on self-care. We need it, we need it, and I think especially during like the spring semester, you have to be intentional. You have to be intentional when it comes to self-care. I have some things that I do at home and some things that I do at work or throughout the day. I noticed this week, I love music, so I'm always listening to music. Gospel and RB love it. I've been riding in silence. I've been riding in silence, especially in the afternoon. Um might have a conversation, you know, in the back. But other than that, but other than that, I ride in silence simply to because sometimes school can be overstimulating, and there's can't there's constant noise, there's constant movement all the time. And that silence is so healing for me. It is so, it is so healing. And leaving work at work, right? Leaving work at work. I think I said in a previous episode, I stopped bringing my bag home. I'll carry my iPad in case I have to, you know, create something on Canva or do something like that. But I'll leave my whole bag. I leave, I leave my whole bag, and to me, that's so big for me because I spent so many years carrying that bag and trying to bring so many things home. You have to let it go, you have to let it go sometimes and leave the leave the work at work. Right. I promise you can get it done sometime at some point throughout the day. You can get it done. Right. And if you don't get it done the next day, you know, plan, we we also have to plan better. So that's good, you know, you have to plan. If you plan and you stay on top of um your things and what you have going on, then there won't be so much stress on you. Planning is self-care. I just want to tell people that it is, it is that that is self-care. And as I become a better planner, I'm also learning the importance of saying no. And that sometimes it's it's a sentence, and I think, girl, sometimes I do too much. Right. We on the podcast right now doing the most. Exactly. But that I do too, that I do too much, and sometimes it's a lot of doing things where I'm pouring out, right? I'm pouring out. So self-care is important because I'm identifying the times and spaces to pour into me. Pour into me. Um, as I continue to get more active in church and get closer to God, like I think like when I'm working, when I'm working and serving in those spaces, it's not dry, like it's not draining. Right. It's fulfilling. Yes, it's not, it's not draining, it's fulfilling. And I think we should be mindful and make sure we're walking in a space where we are doing things that are fulfilling us. And I think that's so good. Um, rest over productivity, it's okay to rest. Set it is it is okay to rest. You don't have to be everything to everyone, even in your in your classroom, you don't have to you can't solve every you can't solve every problem. You can't solve every issue if even though there are people who expect you to, you physically can't, and it's not mentally or emotionally healthy. Okay, but it's Not it's not healthy for you too, and so we have to do the realistic things and address our self-care needs in a realistic way and make it happen every day. And what ways are you pouring into yourself every day? And honestly, yeah, and I would say um really just keep going. It's okay. When you say no, don't feel guilty about it, keep going. Girl, I tell there are multiple times throughout the day I tell myself, do not get weary and well doing. Like I know that the work is like I know the work is good, you know, and we are as educators, we are pouring into the next generation and we are shaping their future. A lot comes with that. That's a big, that's a big task. We are the every every doctor has a every doctor has a favorite teacher, every basketball player, NBA, like whatever. Everyone has a favorite teacher, except for rappers. Rappers are the only people I hear talk, they talk about their teachers told them they want to be nothing. I'm like, what teacher told you that? Shame on her. But shame on them. But just truly taking care of yourself and know that don't get don't be persuaded by social media and think that self-care has to be this big um spot, in other words, yeah, elaborate, you gotta be doing something elaborate to take care of yourself. It doesn't have to be, it doesn't have to be elaborate, but make sure you're taking care of yourself, even in the little things. That's true. I was just gonna say, as we go into like the next topic, you know, since you know, you don't gotta report data anymore, since you don't have to do PLCs as frequently. I just want to say, since you're giving a lot of assignments on the iPad, or you're giving paper assignments that are like easy to do, yada yada, yada, you may not begin to observe as a good self-care would be to go to bed at like eight o'clock. That is great self-care. Like just try it, come home at the at the end of the day, get you a good little meal, you know, because when you talked about being on the go, and honestly, there are things, things still happening. I know my physical work day doesn't end to 5:30, 545. So I'm still, and it's not that's me doing a separate job, and then I have other things I have to do. Today was one of the first days where when I got off my job, I did not have to be anywhere by six o'clock, and I enjoy it. Actually, I'm mad at myself because I was supposed to go by seven brew and get a seven energy, but I didn't, and it's okay, it's okay, yeah. Yes, so here's some teacher truths, and I kind of like this because here it says spring equals survival mode, and I kind of was like, I don't want to say we on survival now, we're not on Temptation Island, and we're not, you know, like, but I get it, it's survival mode, the spring, and what I'm saying, it's something about when spring breaks come back. I think it's because, and we failed to mention this, it's getting hot. So, on top of these children, yes, I know how I'm saying this, these children are getting on each other's nerves, my nerves, the door nerves, my toenail nerves, they're also it's getting hot, and it's something about when it gets hot, something about they get irritated. I got irritated today being in a car. My phone is also getting hot. My little phone is also irritated. So, spring has become a survival mode because you go from spring, come back from spring break, because spring happens over spring break, come back from spring break, and then I think it's somebody looked this up somewhere and studied this. I think it's because we it's finally getting hot outside, but they don't get to go outside, they gotta do testing first, and then by the time testing is over, uh, it's the end of April, and then we have the Maybuzz and May everything, and it's the the close out of the year and all the programs and everything like that. So, spring is survival mode, so it's who this is rough. I I can only imagine if you're if you've been pregnant, so Miss James, I know you have, and it's like labor pains. The closer you get to the time to deliver, it's like it gets worse. But trust me, the delivery is coming, May is coming, or that day them kids just stop coming. All right, so some things that are also true is that every lesson doesn't have to be amazing, y'all. Who are you trying to impress? What what TikTok, what Instagram reel are you trying to do? Every like I taught my students how to do a claim, evidence, and reasoning. That's something they would need next year. Bow, that's it. We did a virtual lab also on fresh water. They did a virtual lab on how much water does their family use. It sounds nice, it looked nice to the naked eye, but it was just assign it, go on by yourself, and it did a self-grade as well. Self-grades are important. So if you doing, I mean, if you want to go out elaborate and you want to carry home papers, you do. But as for me and my purse and my book bag, we don't carry papers outside. I lied and did it last week, and I don't know why I brought 54 papers home. Because guess what they got graded at at my desk on Monday morning with my AP walking in. I'm like, what you want? You see, I'm grading. I just got back. So, and it's okay to simplify, it's okay. You can draw things out, and I think honestly, because I teach science and social studies, and I kind of spend a portion of my year supporting math. I think because I don't have an accountability subject, I already started teaching like this. It took me a while to realize when I first started teaching just only science and social studies, like let the material breathe. You can introduce something. And once you introduce it, like that's when I taught CER, that took four days, and some of them probably still weren't done. I did a I did a week of just introducing it and giving and letting them work with an example and just taking time to use an example. Now they're going to apply it when they use when they do it with their virtual lab. That is fine. Let the material breathe, let it simple as best. Take you that one worksheet. It can have the worksheet, it can have 10 problems on it. If you're a math teacher, I just do this off the top of my head. Get everybody, you got 20 students, put them in groups of two. Everybody work on that word problem. Oh, better yet. 10 problems. You could put 10 anchor charts around the board or around the room, put the problem there, let them do a gallery walk, solve the problem, go to the next one. Can you solve it a different way, or do you agree? See how you just that lesson will take you like 45 minutes to do. Simple. Better yet, history, science. You do this with any subject. If you have a worksheet with different problems, cut up the word, the problems, whatever they are, or the passage, or whatever, the questions to that passage. Let them read the passage at their seat. But cut up the the um the work they have to do, and you can make it like a scavenger hunt. You could make it like trash ball and ball it up, throw it around the room, open it up. I have this, and this was this answer. I agree, and it wasn't this, so you know, simple as best. See how that was stuff I just really just came up with on the top of my head, and also just rest. I mentioned that kind of earlier, but one thing I've I've been doing since testing, because I had to remind myself I'm not the one testing. Turn on Virgin River on Netflix. I'm sorry, that's a show I'm watching right now, and it's just the bees. It's so good, and I just love it. I give me some popcorn, Brandon's popcorn from Dollar Tree. Because rested teachers, we talked about what burnout looks like, you being short-tempered. Y'all ain't about to ruffle my skins. One thing I'm gonna do, I'm gonna stay black, not red. Also, just know you can still love teaching and feel exhausted. Like, I love what I do, I have no plans on quitting my job. The last time I quit my job, or mentally I quit my job and I was waiting to turn my resignation was 2020 and COVID happened, so I couldn't quit my job because I got to keep a job by being at home. But you're still you can be an amazing teacher and be exhausted. And honestly, if you're exhausted now, if you're a teacher, you're not exhausted. I'm looking at you kind of side eye because what you've been doing. Well, we exhausted, I feel it all in my eyes, even right now. Okay, so those are some teacher truths to, you know, you know, you burnt out, but that's it's a true reality that we as teachers do we do face. Absolutely. And so to all the teachers out there, please remember to give your give yourself grace. Give yourself grace. You are not perfect, you don't have to be perfect, and also remember that you're not alone. We hope that us uh having this conversation with you just reminds you that there are other teachers who feel like you. And just know we may be burnt out, but we're still showing up. So, to all of our teachers, listeners, stay the course. A couple more months left. We got it. And in closing, we thank you for listening in to us for five episodes. We appreciate it, and we will see you soon. And in closing, I'm Miss James. And I'm Miss Durden. Thank you for listening to the bell ringer. Class is officially in session. Don't be late.