Stop Doing It
Teachers are very good at adding things.
A new tracker. A new form. A new spreadsheet. A new meeting to discuss the new system. They are less good at stopping.
Why are we still doing this?
Perhaps you transfer information from one system to another. Perhaps you create a differentiated worksheet when three questions on the board would do. Perhaps you produce reports that are carefully filed and never seen again.
Workload rarely arrives as one enormous pointless job. It grows through dozens of small, apparently reasonable ones.
What would happen if we stopped doing it?
Sometimes something important. Keep it. Sometimes absolutely nothing. That is worth noticing. Before making an unnecessary task quicker, ask whether it needs doing at all. Simplify it. Share it. Automate it. Do it less often. Or stop.
What would the Lazy Teacher do?
Probably not create a spreadsheet to monitor how well everyone is completing the other spreadsheet. The aim is not to avoid worthwhile work. It is to make sure worthwhile work survives.
