Christmas Chores

Well, I don’t know about you, but I typically don’t find myself getting a lot of R&R over the Christmas holidays! Yesterday I cooked for (and washed up after…) 15 people, we dragged the garden table in from the patio so we could all have some elbow space for dinner and had to totally rearrange the furniture to fit everyone in comfortably. Truth be told, these are the kind of ‘chores’ I absolutely love about Christmas time. Yes, it’s hard work peeling potatoes and rolling stuffing balls for 15 people with big appetites but when you sit down for dinner surrounded by your family, it’s just wonderful and totally worth it. If not incredibly loud!

Work? Not Worth Getting Worried About.

As lovely as friends and family can be around this time of year, it really is important to find some time for yourself. It’s always been my opinion (I’m sure many teachers will disagree with me…), that science teachers are among the most hardworking of secondary school teachers. In science, we plan and deliver theory lessons as usual, but on top of that, we need to be on the ball in order to plan and order provisions for practical lessons. We risk-assess our practicals and we have to mark for the usual SPaG on top of scientific terminology… all the while maintaining a record of practical skills achieved. So it’s highly unlikely that you left school for the Christmas holidays empty-handed and without a to-do list, but make sure you build into that list some time for you, your family and loved ones.

Try to limit the number of books you take home for marking and the amount of time sent planning/working. You might plan to work just one hour each day. If you know that you can mark 6 books in an hour, don’t take more books home than you can physically mark. If you are planning lessons, set yourself a start and end time and then actually stop after your set time. Plan in other (non-work!) activities and fit your work around those – not the other way around!

Take some time to recover and revitalise. You absolutely deserve it!

And on that note, I am going to leave you with some well-being resources to explore and give you some ideas to relax, de-stress and clear your mind of work.

Have a lovely break and a wonderful New Year everyone!

Check out our helpful resources below: 

Top Tips for a Good Night’s Sleep

Secondary School Teacher ‘Brain-Dumping’ Top Tips

Mindfulness Colouring Christmas Decorations

These resources are free at the moment but you do need a Twinkl account to access them, you can sign up below if you haven’t already.

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