5 common teacher fears and how to overcome them

5 common teacher fears

1. Common teacher fears #1: Losing control of the class

Often teachers, in particular beginning teachers, avoid trying new things, like allowing students to work in groups, for fear of not being able to get students’ attention back afterwards. There is a fear that allowing students more freedom or choice in the classroom requires you to loose a sense of control.

This does not have to be the case. 

You can overcome this fear in the following ways:

• Have well established classroom routines
• Practice with students using the technique you want to use to get students’ attention back without raising your voice if possible
• E.g. Counting down 3 – 2- 1
• Use a timer on the board
• Raise a flag
• Have clear consequences for not following classroom rules / routines or bad behaviour during activities

2. Common teacher fears #2: Losing respect of your students

This can go hand-in-hand with the first point. If you don’t have control of your classroom it can also feel like you have lost the respect of your students. Other common ways to lose student respect include allowing students to talk to you in a disrespectful way and not doing anything about it, and not having confidence when teaching the content.

You can overcome this fear in the following ways:

• Have and follow through on consequences for students who talk to you (and other students) in a disrespectful way. 
• Spend time learning the content and gaining confidence that you know what you are teaching
• For science teachers: practice experiments before running them with your entire class where possible
• Show compassion and patience with students
• Spend time building relationships with your students in the playground and during class time by showing a genuine interest in their lives

common teacher fears

3. Common teacher fears #3: Not doing enough for your students

As teachers we really do care about our students. If you are also quite an empathetic person this can be felt 10 fold. With this, it can often fear that we are not doing enough for our students and feel teacher guilt that we are letting them down at certain points.

This may be due to not having enough time to plan a great lesson, seeing students achieve poor results on a test, or due to various welfare struggles you are aware of. These things can weigh on our hearts and, from experience, can lead to teacher burnout. 

You can overcome this teacher fear in the following ways:

• Ensure you are meeting the requirements of the curriculum
• Provide as much information and direction as possible for assessment tasks
• Allow students to ask you clarifying questions for classwork and tasks
• Have a few resources on hand to direct students for welfare issues. This may be within the school, such as a school counsellor or year advisor, or outside the school, such as beyond blue or local youth services.

It is also helpful to remember:

• You are not a counselling service and there are places you can direct students to with people who are trained in those sorts of areas
• You are not solely responsible for student achievement – there are a whole range of factors involved that are out of your control.
• You are also responsible for your own wellbeing, and your family and friendships. You need to reserve energy for these too.

4. Common teacher fears #4: Not knowing enough 

Often students expect teachers to know everything about anything related to their subject area. While this is obviously not possible, it does put pressure on us to feel like we can answer all our students’ questions.

You can overcome this teacher fear in the following ways:

• Spend time learning the content and refreshing your memory of content you haven’t taught in a while. This is as important as actually designing the lesson.
• Create videos. Sometimes if I am teaching a really complex idea in chemistry, I create my own video of it for my students so that I can plan my delivery in a clear and concise way, and I don’t get tongue tied. It also means I can revisit my own video for the next time I have to teach it. 
• Have a statement to use when you don’t know the answer. To avoid you stuttering or being put on the spot and giving out incorrect information, being prepared with a statement that will give you time to find the answer is the way to go. Some examples may be:
•  “Oh that is a really interesting question! I’m not confident I know the answer to that one so let me do some research and get back to you”. 
• “That is a great question to ask. How about you and your partner spend 10 minutes now seeing if you can find the answer to your question and share it with the class”.
• “That question is not in my area of expertise, however, Mrs ________ loves that topic so let me ask her and get back to you”.

common teacher fear

5. Common teacher fears #5: Dealing with parents

Dealing with parents can be scary, and rightly so! They are advocating for the people they love most in their lives. In staff rooms, parents can cop a lot of flak for being overzealous or unrealistic. On one hand I ask you to give them some slack – remember that they are just trying to be a good parent and look after their child’s wellbeing and academic future. On the other hand I support your fear in this area – you are dealing with some passionate mumma bears. 

Having dealt with a number of parents and parent-types over my many years teaching, I have found that there are some really helpful things you can do to ease the tension, not just for you but also for the parents’ of your students. 

You can overcome this teacher fear in the following ways:

• Break the ice early. Start the year by sending out a ‘meet the teacher’ page that introduces yourself, provides expectations for the class and how to contact you if the need arises. This will help parent’s feel comfortable to approach you and also ensures your first correspondence with parents is a positive one that you are in control of.
• Get on top of issues early before they end up out of control. If you have a concern then it is a good idea to make contact with parents early on – before it becomes a huge issue. 
• Keep communication as open and honest with the student and the parent.
• Plan what you are going to say and potentially have a practice with a colleague if you are nervous about it.
• Remember that often parent’s just want to feel heard. Have some phrases handy like 
• ‘I understand why you feel like that’. 
• ‘Yes I can see why you think / feel that way’.
• ‘I understand your concern regarding that’. 
• ‘What are your thoughts on how we can move forward here?’ 
• ‘Do you have any ideas for how we can help your student in the classroom?’

common teacher fears

Conclusion

 These teacher fears are not stupid. They are 100% warranted and you fear them because they definitely do happen from time to time. 

For all of the above, it can be helpful to talk to more experienced teachers or your teacher mentor about strategies and how they might go about dealing with a particular situation. While you might not have the experience to draw on yet, people around you will and their advice and support will be valuable to you.

As always, please do reach out if you have any questions or comment below with your own fears you would like me to address. 

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common teacher fears

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