The Importance of Real Rest

It’s December, so I know that we are all grading, grading, grading right now. Because I am. But while COVID presents challenges it also presents opportunities: at this moment I’m delivering my final exam to my students across the country, while I’m in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, where I’m on my annual writing group retreat. You can see in this photo how cold it is!

But here’s the thing: I’m not grading the whole time that I’m here. I’m doing what I came to do: devote time to writing, thinking, praying, and resting. And I feel that it is more important than ever for me to do that. When I finish grading all the finals, I’m going to stop working on my teaching until January, and so should you. Here’s why: if you are constantly working on teaching, thinking about teaching, and prepping for teaching, then you never get the mental break necessary for you to be the best teacher you can be. It’s a diminishing returns kind of thing. You need to restore yourself and your energy for the challenging semester ahead.

So please enjoy a good long Christmas break with as little work—and as little guilt about that—as possible. Be present with your family. The work will be there on January 10th, too, and you’ll have plenty of time to get it together because you’ve done all this before. Trust yourself and your training.

I’m putting the finishing touches on my Spring 2021 retreat for teachers. My plan is to post it the Monday after Christmas, so stay tuned!

Queen Anne's Lace

It’s back….the month that shall not be named!

Well friends, the Queen Anne’s Lace is out and the month has arrived: fall classes are on the way! What are you doing to get ready for for the year ahead? Hopefully not a lot of syllabus work. What I mean is, what are you doing to get ready for it spiritually? I’m headed to

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YOU. MUST. REST.

Hello fellow educators! Sooooooo, I happen to know for a fact that some of you just turned in your fall semester grades. And that you feel guilty about it because you missed the deadline. And that you are exhausted to the core. And that you are already thinking about next semester. STOP. RIGHT. NOW. It

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Fall 2022 Retreat and MasterClass is up and ready to go!

Do you need a little extra encouragement to remember why you do this crazy job? Or just some tried and true methods for building classroom community or handling email? Then enroll today! Want a discount code? Please send me an email at christinabieberlake (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll give you 50% off if you

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