Being a teacher means I have a lot more structured time off (specific weeks where I’m not teaching) that most professionals. It also means that the days I’m working are structured very specifically – there is absolutely no flexibility in my work day. I am supposed to be there from 8:15am to 3:15pm, but I absolutely have to be there from 8:30am to 3:05pm or another adult needs to cover for me. It’s one of the more stressful aspects of my job.
It also means that I’m acutely aware of how I spend my time for a large block of the day. Sure there are some hours that can be wasted or used unwisely. If I linger under the covers (where it’s oh so warm) for too long, I may leave the house so late that I hit more traffic going to work and arrive even later than the mere 15 minutes I wasted under the covers. That means I get less done before I start teaching at 8:35am. My prep period shares a passing period with our 30 minute lunch which means I get 80 full minutes of prep time in the middle of the day. (I do intermittent fasting and don’t eat until 3 or 4pm so I don’t spend my lunch time on lunch.) I generally use that time wisely, but sometimes I squander it.
The biggest wild card in my days, is the chunk from 3:00 to 7pm. I always commute during this chunk, but when that commute happens, and whether or not errands are run on the drive home, varies. Some days I have meetings at work. Some days I have to race back to the city to get my son to martial arts. Sometimes I’m going to martial arts myself. Sometimes I’m trying to run before it gets dark and cold. Sometimes I wait out the high school release time traffic in my classroom doing more prep work. This massive portion of each day is really the most important variable. This is when I can make deliberate choices about what I want my life to look like.
I had a nice little schedule going before the winter break, but we’re about to change it up considerably so my son can attend a class with a high belt session at the end. So now is as good a week as any to track my time to see how my afternoons actually look with this new schedule. LV is hosting a time tracking challenge right now, so her daily posts will help remind me to fill out my own spreadsheet (I never got around to formally signing up, so I won’t be receiving the email reminders). I hope I keep tracking my time through the end of the month so I have an ever better idea of where the hours are going.
Because sometimes I’m really not so sure. Today I had no problem determining how I had spent my time when I was driving myself home or ferrying my son and his friend to and from the dojo. But once I got home it was a lot harder. What exactly did I do from 7 to 7:30pm? Was I on the blue couch the whole time just looking at my phone? Hitting my 90 minutes (!!) combined time limit on my reading apps suggests I did. And I’m only slightly more sure of how I spent the half hours before and after that. I definitely ate dinner, and did some dishes before. I definitely listened to a Spanish audiobook with my daughter at some point afterward. But that time really is nebulous, and that might be why sometimes I feel like I’m not using my time wisely. Or like I don’t have enough of it.
I meant to write about what I want my afternoons and evenings to look like today, but my daughter and I ended up listening to the audiobook for longer than expected and I was too tired to tackle such a long post that late. Maybe tomorrow…
In the meantime, here is today’s time tracking. I guess I’ll upload a jpeg of each day to help hold myself accountable.
I find time tracking SO DIFFICULT to actually do. To remember to keep noting down what I am doing. How do you do it? I am impressed.