Kevin Lister’s Teach Like You Imagined It: Finding the right balance shares a wealth of tools, ideas and encouragement to help teachers manage the conflicting pressures of teaching and become the educators they imagined.

Teaching is an incredible profession, but it also comes with a potentially toxic workload. You do not have to put up with burn-out, however – and one way to avoid it is to return to how you imagined teaching to be in the first place.

Before you became a teacher, you pictured yourself as a teacher; in your imagination you almost certainly saw yourself as happy, efficient and able to manage your work–life balance effectively. Yet chances are that the reality of teaching is a little different, and it is this disconnect that can give rise to stress, anxiety and frustration.

But what if you could use simple strategies to get a handle on your schedule and take control of your workload?

Covering lesson planning, behaviour management, the streamlining of marking and getting the best out of CPD, Kevin Lister has drawn on his background in engineering to fill this book with trusted techniques and savvy suggestions to help you maximise your productivity and teach like you imagined it.

Each chapter examines a different aspect of the day-to-day reality of teaching and suggests alternative, practical ways to look at or approach common tasks. Throughout the book Kevin touches on topics such as time management, prioritisation, educational research, leadership, psychology and other diverse concepts that his personal experiences and education have led him to explore. After each area of discussion there are prompts for action, where Kevin asks you to reflect on your working habits, question your practices and decide what you will do in response.

Suitable for both new and experienced teachers looking to boost their day-to-day efficiency and find the right balance.