Stress isn鈥檛 new to teachers, but what they鈥檙e experiencing now makes their typical stress seem like a picnic. Driven by a pandemic to the front lines of an unprecedented rush to distance-learning, the nation鈥檚 teachers are scrambling to manage an armful of new challenges. And they鈥檙e exhausted.
That exhaustion emerges from a tangle of dynamics. Teachers are grappling with unfamiliar technologies. They have to retrofit鈥攐r reinvent鈥攖heir lessons and find new ways to do familiar things, like grading homework. They鈥檙e inundated with emails, texts, and calls from principals, parents, and students. They鈥檙e trying to 鈥渂e there鈥� for students and their families. And many are also juggling the needs of their own children or other loved ones while managing their own coronavirus fears.
Amy Pollington, a kindergarten teacher at Saint George School, a private K-8 in Seattle, didn鈥檛 mince words when she described her first week of distance-teaching.
鈥淏y the fourth day, I started to have a panic attack,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 hadn鈥檛 slept. I was feeling like the walls were coming in on me.鈥�
Sitting there in a living room chair, her $6 Amazon classroom-backdrop poster taped up behind her, Pollington had to shut down her laptop and her phone to regain her composure. She was trying so hard to 鈥済ive 150 percent, to be there every moment of the day and night鈥� for her families. But she had to stop. Just for a few minutes.
She isn鈥檛 alone. In interviews with Education Week, teachers described staying up until 2 or 3 a.m., answering emails, trouble-shooting technology or planning lessons. They can鈥檛 seem to shut it off. Papers are strewn across their living rooms, kitchens, and bedrooms. And on top of the stress and exhaustion, they鈥檙e grieving.
鈥淚鈥檓 sorry I鈥檓 crying, but just to be with them, their little faces, every day, in person, I miss that so much,鈥� said Angie Shaw, who teaches 1st grade at Longfellow Elementary in Scottsbluff, Neb.
She aches for the familiar routines and rituals of her brick-and-mortar school day and how she knew every loose tooth, every hurt feeling, in her students鈥� lives. Shaw holds a weekly evening circle time on Zoom, but she can鈥檛 get the kind of connection she鈥檚 used to with each student.
A New Level of Multitasking
One of Rana El Yousef鈥檚 recent days illustrates the complexities that teachers are now managing. El Yousef, a high school chemistry teacher in Glendora, Calif., multitasked during her morning dog-walk, using it as her twin 9-year-old sons鈥� 鈥渞ecess鈥� and as a quick tutorial in writing and fractions so they could get started on their teacher鈥檚 assignments.
Home again, she made the boys breakfast and got them logged onto their Chromebooks. Then El Yousef tackled a brimming inbox, scanning each email鈥檚 demands: There鈥檚 a science department Zoom meeting at 2 p.m., as well as her sons鈥� 3rd grade Zoom meeting. There鈥檚 another Zoom meeting at 3 p.m. for honors and Advanced Placement teachers.
It鈥檚 hours before she can get to her own students, and the emails were flooding in. El Yousef had posted YouTube videos with lessons and worksheets, and a do-at-home science experiment and a Google quiz. 69传媒 were asking: How do I answer this lab question? How do I submit my answers? Between emails, she graded her AP students鈥� practice quizzes and surveyed her students about their online access. And there鈥檚 the small matter of planning new lessons, too.
鈥淚鈥檝e been staring at a computer for eight solid hours, my eyes are strained, my shoulders are tense, and I have to keep reminding myself, all this is new, and we are all learning, and it will get easier, I hope,鈥� El Yousef said.
Teachers also feel caught between their students and families, who are overflowing with questions, and their principals who often can鈥檛 provide answers yet.
鈥淔amilies are asking, what is grading going to look like? What are they going to base promotion on? And we don鈥檛 know yet,鈥� said Theresa Bruce, who teaches 8th grade social studies at the KIPP-Harmony School in Baltimore. 鈥淲e鈥檙e used to being able to quickly get answers for our parents. But not being able to answer, it plagues your mind.鈥�
Haunted by the No-Shows
Bruce and her students are more comfortable than many with technology-based instruction, since their school is a blended-learning environment, with 1-to-1 computing. Even still, teaching from home is a massive and difficult change, she said. Among other things, she鈥檚 lost the cues that she can pick up only from seeing her students in person, she said.
鈥淲hen I鈥檓 with them, I can see what鈥檚 really going on with them,鈥� she said. 鈥淏ut digitally, they can hide it: their joy. Their depression. Anybody can put their game face on for an hour on Zoom.鈥�
Bruce is haunted by the ones who aren鈥檛 signing on for virtual sessions. In the past, she wouldn鈥檛 hesitate to call home if a child missed class. But now, with parents losing jobs, or maybe caring for ill relatives, Bruce isn鈥檛 sure if a call is too intrusive. She agonizes: 鈥淪hould I reach out? Is that too much?鈥�
Teachers report that simple things take much longer as they get used to working with online tools. Ayako Anderson, who teaches Japanese to high school students at three schools in the Boston suburbs, said that just noting an incorrect verb conjugation on a student鈥檚 paper recently required a laborious process of zooming in and out on her iPad, switching cursors and forming one word with a scratchy red scrawl.
In a brick-and-mortar world, she鈥檇 be able to make more extensive comments quickly, with a pen on paper. But she recognizes that adapting paper practices to computer can itself be inefficient. One of the schools where she teaches is 100 percent virtual, and its systems and processes are designed for online learning, so they work better, she said.
Teaching from home comes with another risk: too little physical activity. Teachers said they鈥檙e worn out from sitting still in front of a computer so much. 鈥淢y body aches from sitting for hours on end,鈥� said Shaw. Anderson said that since she doesn鈥檛 need to 鈥渨alk from classroom to classroom anymore, or walk to lunch,鈥� she finds herself sitting endlessly, working until the hours blur and it鈥檚 3 a.m.
Trying to Go From Zero to 60
Experts in online learning, and in grief and stress, say none of what teachers are experiencing is surprising. Susan Patrick, the CEO of the Aurora Institute, a nonprofit that supports districts with virtual learning, said it鈥檚 impossible to do full-scale distance-learning instantly.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a reason districts and schools take one to two years planning time,鈥� she said. 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 go from zero to 60 in 24 hours if you don鈥檛 have the processes and structures in place.鈥�
Michael Barbour, who focuses on virtual learning as an associate professor of education at Touro University California, said research shows that preparing lessons for distance-learning can be more time-consuming than for brick-and-mortar settings. Plans for live鈥攐r synchronous鈥攕essions can take up to three times as long, he said, and plans for asynchronous lessons can take as much as five to eight times longer.
Experts said teachers and those around them shouldn鈥檛 discount the emotional toll that the sudden shift to home teaching is taking on them.
鈥淏eing asked to suddenly do something you鈥檙e not skilled in, coping with the worry about coronavirus in their own lives, feeling they鈥檙e not doing enough for kids and parents, plus their fears about next fall, and how their students and families could really be suffering mentally and financially then, all of that piles up into an amazing amount of stress,鈥� said Kathleen Minke, the executive director of the National Association of School Psychologists.
Teachers鈥� experience of grief is going unacknowledged, too, as exhaustion and stress take a higher profile, experts said. That can produce a phenomenon known as 鈥渄isenfranchised grief鈥濃�攁 grief that鈥檚 tougher because it鈥檚 not acknowledged and accepted, said Kenneth Doka, a psychologist who specializes in grief.
鈥淚t could be hard for teachers to feel they can complain about the loss of not seeing their students, when they know people out there are dying,鈥� Doka said. 鈥淏ut that lack of recognition leads to [a] more complicated [form of] grief.鈥�
The combination of stress and grief can produce brain changes that make the already-stressful job of teaching even tougher, said Patricia A. Jennings, a professor of education at the University of Virginia and an expert in teacher stress. The sudden shift to the new demands of home teaching, laced with fears about coronavirus, blend into a kind of trauma that can shift the brain from higher-order thinking skills into survival mode.
鈥淲e might shut down a bit, space out, dissociate, or check out because we can鈥檛 cope very well,鈥� Jennings said. 鈥淲e might also get into a kind of hypervigilance, where we鈥檙e constantly checking emails or news developments, and it鈥檚 hard to concentrate.鈥�
Little by little, though, teachers are finding ways to adapt. Anderson, in Massachusetts, now sketches her daily schedule out in Google Calendar, to help her build clearer beginnings and endings into her work hours. With her district鈥檚 blessing, Pollington, in Seattle, now sends home lesson plans every other day, instead of daily.
In her first home-teaching days, Pollington woke up anxious and disorganized. Should she check email first or feed the dogs? She rushed to answer every email right away. Now, each morning she turns on her computer, feeds the dogs and makes coffee. Then she responds to students鈥� work on the video app Flipgrid. She gives herself 24 hours to respond to emails. She still forgets to eat lunch, but she鈥檚 working on that. She tries to stop working at 4 p.m. And she tries not to feel guilty about it.
Bruce encourages teachers to 鈥済ive themselves the grace they need鈥� to set realistic goals and take care of themselves. Try actually scheduling time in each day for something that brings you joy, she said.
鈥淟ike anything, the first year is tough, but over time, you learn and adapt,鈥� Bruce said. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e gonna regroup. You鈥檙e gonna recover.鈥�
