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Educator Well-Being

10 Simple Ways to Reduce Teacher Stress

Teach This Way! editorial · Last updated · 13 min read

Ten realistic habits that lower everyday teacher stress, with why each one helps, how to start, and where individual habits stop being enough.

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Teaching is rewarding, and it is also one of the more stressful jobs in the country. In a 2016 research brief for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Penn State researchers Mark Greenberg, Joshua Brown and Rachel Abenavoli reported that 46% of teachers experience high daily stress, and that high teacher stress is linked to poorer outcomes for students as well as teachers. RAND's 2024 State of the American Teacher survey found that teachers worked an average of 53 hours a week, about 15 of them outside contract time, compared with 44 hours for similar working adults, and named managing student behavior, low salary and administrative work outside of teaching as the top sources of stress.

Those numbers matter for one simple reason: much of teacher stress comes from working conditions, not from a lack of personal discipline. This article is written for K-12 classroom teachers, special educators, counselors and related service providers who want practical ways to make an ordinary school day lighter. The ten habits below are small on purpose. None of them will fix an unmanageable caseload or a class with no support, and we will say plainly where each one runs out. What they can do is give you back a few minutes, a little control and a clearer line between work and the rest of your life.

What Stress Actually Is (and Why Small Habits Still Matter)

The National Institute of Mental Health describes stress as a physical or mental response to an external cause, which usually eases once the situation is resolved. In schools the "situation" rarely resolves; it resets every morning. That is why recovery matters so much. Researchers Sabine Sonnentag and Charlotte Fritz reviewed the evidence on "psychological detachment," which they define as refraining from job-related activities and thoughts during nonwork time. Their 2015 review found that high workloads make detachment harder, and that low detachment is associated with higher strain and poorer well-being, including burnout.

The less obvious insight: stress reduction for teachers is mostly about two things, reducing the number of small demands that pile up during the day and protecting real recovery time afterward. Most of the habits below do one or the other. They work best when you pick two or three, not all ten.

During the School Day

1. Protect a two-minute reset between groups

Why it helps. Back-to-back classes or sessions leave no gap for your body to settle. NIMH lists relaxation exercises such as deep breathing among practical ways to cope with stress. A short reset will not erase a hard morning, but it can stop one difficult period from spilling into the next.

How to do it. Attach the reset to something that already happens: the moment the last student leaves, or while the next group lines up. Take a few slow breaths with a longer exhale, drink water, and look at something farther away than your screen. Some teachers keep a sticky note on the door frame that just says "reset."

Realistic limits. If you have no passing time at all, or you are supervising the hallway, the reset may shrink to a single breath while students settle. That still counts. If you never have even that, it is a scheduling issue worth raising with your team or administrator.

2. Batch your messages

Why it helps. Every notification pulls your attention away from students or planning, and it trains everyone around you to expect instant answers.

How to do it. Choose two or three set times a day to process email and messaging apps, for example before school, during planning and once at the end of the day. Turn off push notifications on your phone for work email. Keep a short list of saved replies for common questions (missing work, how to log in, meeting requests).

Realistic limits. Urgent safety issues and some special education timelines cannot wait for your batch window. Ask the office how truly urgent issues reach you (a call to the classroom, a message from an administrator), so you can safely stop checking for everything else.

3. Use routines to lower the daily load

Why it helps. When openings, transitions and closings run the same way every day, students need fewer reminders and you need to make fewer small choices on the fly. You may have heard this described as avoiding "decision fatigue"; the research behind that idea is debated, so it is more accurate to say routines reduce interruptions and repeated explanations, which is reason enough.

How to do it. Start with the one moment of the day that feels most chaotic. Script it in three or four steps, teach it, practice it, and post it. Our Classroom Checklists can help you set up routines without starting from a blank page.

Realistic limits. Routines take two to three weeks of consistent practice to stick, and they will wobble after breaks. Plan to reteach them in January and after spring break rather than treating a wobble as failure.

4. Keep a "done list"

Why it helps. Teaching work is never finished, so a to-do list can feel endless. A done list makes visible the progress that would otherwise disappear.

How to do it. At the end of the day, write three things you completed or handled well, including invisible work such as calming a student, calling a family or covering a colleague's duty. Keep it in the same notebook as your to-do list so you see both.

Realistic limits. A done list is a perspective tool, not a stress cure. If the to-do side is growing every week no matter what you do, that is information about workload, and it can help you show a supervisor concretely what your job involves.

5. Eat lunch away from your desk when you can

Why it helps. Lunch is often the only stretch of the day without students. Spending it answering email means your body never gets a break from work cues.

How to do it. Pick one or two days a week to eat somewhere else: the staff room, outside, or even a different chair facing away from your computer. If possible, eat with a colleague you like.

Realistic limits. Many educators have lunch duty, students who come in during lunch, or a 20-minute window. Protect what you can and do not feel guilty about the days you cannot. If you never get a duty-free lunch, check your contract or ask your union representative what it guarantees.

Outside the Classroom

6. Set a work cut-off time on most evenings

Why it helps. This is the habit most directly supported by recovery research. In a 2021 study of 58 office workers in Japan (not teachers, and without a control group), Tomohide Kubo and colleagues found that more frequent after-hours work email was associated with less psychological detachment, more rumination and more next-day fatigue. The study is small, but it fits the broader pattern Sonnentag and Fritz describe.

How to do it. Choose a realistic cut-off, such as 6:00 p.m. on weeknights, and let families and colleagues know when you reply (for example, "I respond to messages within one school day"). Our article on setting healthy professional boundaries has scripts you can adapt.

Realistic limits. Report-card weeks and IEP season may break the rule. Name those weeks in advance, and return to your cut-off afterward instead of letting the exception become permanent.

7. Plan in reusable blocks

Why it helps. Planning every lesson from scratch is one of the biggest sources of evening work. Reusing a lesson structure lets you spend your energy on content and students.

How to do it. Pick a small set of lesson formats (for example, mini-lesson, guided practice, independent practice, exit ticket) and build a template for each. Plan a unit at a time rather than a day at a time. Share templates with grade-level or department colleagues. The Teaching Ideas & Strategies library has structures you can borrow.

Realistic limits. New preps, new curricula and new grade levels take extra time no matter what. In those years, aim for "good enough and reusable" rather than perfect.

8. Find your people

Why it helps. Christina Maslach and Michael Leiter's widely cited burnout research identifies "community" (support, trust and the absence of unresolved conflict with coworkers) as one of six areas of work life linked to burnout risk. A colleague you can talk to honestly is a real buffer.

How to do it. You do not need a large group. One or two trusted colleagues, a mentor, or a role-alike group across schools (for example, other SLPs or counselors in your district) can be enough. Make it concrete: a standing Friday check-in, a shared planning period, a group text that is not only about work.

Realistic limits. Support groups can slide into constant complaining, which can leave everyone feeling worse. A useful pattern is "vent, then one next step." If your school's climate makes trust hard, look for connection outside the building.

9. Move your body

Why it helps. The CDC notes that physical activity can reduce short-term feelings of anxiety after a single session and helps people sleep better. You do not need a gym membership to get those benefits.

How to do it. A ten-minute walk after school, a stretch break during planning, or walking the long way to the copy room all count. Pairing movement with your commute home can double as a mental transition from work.

Realistic limits. If you are exhausted, a short walk is better than a planned workout you skip. If you have health conditions, check with your health care provider about what is right for you.

10. Notice the good moments, and protect your sleep

Why it helps. On hard days, the student breakthrough or the kind note from a family is easy to forget. Recording those moments gives you something to return to. Sleep matters for the same reason: everything else on this list is harder when you are tired, and the CDC recommends at least 7 hours a night for adults aged 18 to 60.

How to do it. Keep a folder (paper or digital) for kind messages and small wins. For sleep, the CDC suggests a consistent bedtime and wake time, turning off electronics about 30 minutes before bed, and avoiding caffeine later in the day. Grading in bed works against all of these.

Realistic limits. A gratitude folder is not a substitute for dealing with real problems, and it should never be used to talk yourself out of concerns that need attention.

How to Put This Into Practice

  1. Pick your biggest drain. Is it email, evening planning, a chaotic transition, or never getting a break? Choose the one that costs you the most.
  2. Match one or two habits to it. Email drain: habits 2 and 6. Evening planning: habit 7. Chaotic day: habits 1 and 3.
  3. Make it small and specific. "I will check email at 7:30, 11:45 and 3:30" works better than "I will check email less."
  4. Try it for two weeks. New habits feel awkward at first. Judge them after two weeks, not two days.
  5. Review and adjust. Keep what helped, drop what did not, and add one more habit only when the first ones feel automatic.

A Realistic Example

This is a composite, hypothetical example. A fourth-grade teacher we will call Ms. R. was answering family messages until 10 p.m. and planning every math lesson from scratch. She chose two habits. First, she set a 6:00 p.m. cut-off, added a line to her email signature ("I reply to messages within one school day"), and told her principal how families could reach the office for urgent issues. Second, she and her grade-level partner built one shared math lesson template and split planning by week. After a month she still had late nights during report cards, but most evenings were work-free, and she noticed she was less irritable in the first hour of school. Nothing about her class size or her schedule had changed. What changed was how much of the job followed her home.

What to Do When It Doesn't Work

  • "I tried batching email and fell behind." Add one more check-in time, or set up saved replies for the questions that come up most. Batching should reduce interruptions, not create a backlog.
  • "Families or colleagues push back on my cut-off." Restate your response window calmly and point them to the urgent-issue route. Ask your administrator to back the expectation publicly if it is a school-wide issue.
  • "My workload is simply too large." Then habits are not the main answer. Bring specifics to a supervisor: how many minutes per week go to each duty, what could be shared, paused or dropped. Union representatives can also help clarify what is contractually required.
  • "Nothing helps and I feel worse each week." That is a sign to talk with a health professional or your school's employee assistance program (EAP). Our article on understanding teacher burnout explains warning signs to watch for.

Adapting These Habits to Your Role

  • Elementary teachers: You may have almost no breaks. Focus on routines (habit 3) and shared planning (habit 7), which save the most time across a self-contained day.
  • Middle and high school teachers: Passing periods make habit 1 easier. Large student loads make batching and saved replies (habit 2) especially valuable.
  • Special educators: Paperwork and legal timelines are a major stressor. Block recurring time for IEP work on your calendar, and ask your team to treat it like a meeting that cannot be double-booked.
  • Counselors, school psychologists, SLPs and OTs: Your schedule may change every day, and crises can arrive without warning. Habits 4, 6 and 8 travel well even when the rest of the day is unpredictable.
  • School leaders: You set the conditions. Avoid sending staff email at night, protect duty-free lunch and planning time, and model a reasonable response window. Leadership choices often do more for teacher stress than any individual habit.

Try This Tomorrow

  • Turn off push notifications for work email on your phone.
  • Write a three-item done list before you leave the building.
  • Choose one evening this week with no schoolwork at all, and tell someone so you are more likely to keep it.

Quick Takeaways

  • Teacher stress is common and largely driven by working conditions; small habits help, but they are not the whole answer.
  • The habits with the most support are the ones that protect recovery time: cut-offs, sleep and movement.
  • Start with one or two habits that target your biggest drain, and judge them after two weeks.
  • When the load itself is too heavy, bring specifics to a supervisor and seek support rather than trying harder alone.

Reflection Questions

  • Which part of your day costs you the most energy, and which habit above addresses it most directly?
  • What is one task you could share, simplify or stop doing this month?
  • Who is one colleague you could check in with regularly?

This article is general information, not medical or mental-health advice. If stress feels overwhelming or lasts for weeks, talk with a health professional or your employee assistance program. If you are in crisis or thinking about harming yourself, call or text 988 (the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) in the U.S.

Sources & Further Reading

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