A New Year - Taking Back Your Time

I’m not a person who sets New Year’s resolutions, but I do like to reflect on the past year and come up with some things I’d like to implement into my life each year. In my life over the last few years, I’ve been working towards simplifying everything and moving towards a more minimalist approach to things.

Here are my tips for A New Year – Taking Back Your Time.

Get rid of the fluff. You don’t have to have the best bulletin boards that get changed out each month. Create a beautiful base, my personal choice is a wood grain background with a black and white polka dot border. It can easily be used all year long. Use clipboards or hang a couple of wires with clips attached to display the student’s work. It’s a super easy way to change up your board.
I do this next one at home as well as at work. Spend 3-5 minutes tidying up and putting things where they belong.
Sit down and actually take your lunch. You’ll be more productive the rest of the day if you take that much-needed break. Talk to colleagues about other things besides school.

Stay focused while at work and try not to stop and talk too much. It makes a huge difference in how much you can get done!
Scale back on the homework.
Choose one night a week to stay late and prep for the next week. For the rest of the week, leave right after school.
If it isn’t a vital piece of paper, toss/recycle it.
Use your parent volunteers! They are a huge asset to you in helping you get things done from cutting, copying, reading groups, etc. You can find more information about this in my Parent Volunteer Pack.

Lastly, do something for yourself. Personally, I make sure to get a monthly massage. It helps me tremendously. For you, it may be getting a pedicure or buying a new top. Find something you like and put it in your monthly schedule.

This is one of my favorite sayings and is so true.