21 August 2026
For many teachers, the final week of the summer holiday brings a mixture of excitement and apprehension. Results day has passed, new ideas are ready to be implemented, and a fresh academic year is waiting just around the corner. Yet even experienced teachers often feel a sense of nervousness as September approaches.
That feeling can be surprising. After all, if you have taught for years, led departments or mentored trainee teachers, surely you should feel completely confident by now. The reality is very different. Many teachers still wonder whether they have forgotten their rhythm in the classroom or whether their carefully planned lessons will work as intended.
Rather than seeing those nerves as a weakness, it may be more helpful to view them as evidence that you care. Teachers who want to do well are naturally concerned about getting the year off to a strong start. The goal is not to eliminate those feelings completely. Instead, it is to put systems in place that reduce avoidable stress and create a sense of control.
Start with the year, not the lessons
Many teachers spend part of the summer preparing resources and refining lesson materials. While lesson planning is important, it is often the practical demands of the school year that create the greatest pressure.
A useful starting point is to review the school calendar and identify the events that will matter to you. Parents’ evenings, assessment windows, data collection deadlines, mock examinations and school trips all have the potential to create workload spikes later in the term. One question can help guide your preparation: what will cause me stress in six weeks if I ignore it now?
Adding important dates to your diary at the beginning of the year provides a much clearer picture of what lies ahead. Teachers who stay on top of workload rarely possess a secret productivity trick. More often, they simply know what is coming before it arrives.
Think of it as laying railway tracks before the train starts moving. Once term begins, events come quickly and relentlessly. Planning ahead makes it much easier to stay in control.
Create one system and trust it
Organisation looks different for every teacher. Some prefer a paper planner. Others rely on digital calendars and spreadsheets. The specific tool matters less than having a system that you use consistently.
Maintaining your own personal planning system rather than relying entirely on multiple school platforms can reduce confusion and save time. Many experienced teachers keep their timetable, class lists, assessment records and key reminders in one place.
Colour coding can be particularly effective. Assigning colours to classes and using those same colours throughout your timetable, planner and mark book makes it easier to identify classes quickly and avoids mistaking one class for another in the same year group.
The same principle applies to student information. Having one personal mark book that contains all the information you use regularly creates a single point of reference. Instead of searching through several different systems, everything you need is immediately available.
The best organisational systems are often the simplest. If a system becomes complicated or time-consuming to maintain, it quickly becomes another problem rather than a solution. Craig and Dave both favour a spreadsheet, with one colour-coded worksheet for each class. Entering student names by hand can help you learn them more quickly at the start of the year. It is also worth adding any relevant student data but remember that pupils can surprise you. Use data to support your planning, not to create a self-fulfilling prophecy about what a student can or cannot achieve.
Protect planning time from administration
Few things disappear faster than a free period. A teacher might sit down intending to plan lessons, only to spend the entire time answering emails. One message becomes three. Three become ten. By the end of the period, no preparation has been completed.
Planning time works best when it is treated as protected time rather than spare time. Lesson preparation, curriculum planning and assessment tasks should take priority over administrative distractions whenever possible.
That does not mean ignoring emails altogether. It simply means handling them deliberately. Many experienced teachers find it more effective to process emails at specific points during the day rather than checking them constantly.
Teaching is already a profession driven by deadlines. Allowing every incoming message to dictate how you spend your time only adds to the pressure.
Establish routines from day one
The opening weeks of term often determine how much effort will be needed for behaviour management later in the year.
Clear routines provide structure for both teachers and students. Entry routines, seating plans, equipment checks, homework procedures and lesson endings all benefit from consistency.
Students rarely remember expectations simply because they were explained once. They need reminders, repetition and reinforcement. If a routine feels slow or awkward at first, resist the temptation to abandon it. Consistency is what makes routines effective.
This is especially important for ECTs. It can be tempting to focus on creative activities and exciting lesson ideas, but routines provide the foundation that allows those activities to succeed.
Students generally respond well when expectations are predictable. They know where the boundaries are, understand what is expected of them and can focus more effectively on learning.
Let consistency beat creativity
Teachers are naturally creative people. Summer often provides time to rethink schemes of learning, redesign lessons and experiment with new approaches. While that creativity is valuable, the first few weeks of term are not always the best time to prioritise it.
A highly consistent classroom is usually more effective in September than a highly creative one. Students benefit from familiar structures and predictable expectations. Once those habits become established, creative activities often have a greater impact because they take place within a well-managed environment.
This does not mean lessons should be dull. It simply means that consistency should come first. A powerful principle for the start of the academic year is this: consistency beats creativity in the opening weeks.
Mark strategically, not endlessly
Workload discussions often return to marking, and with good reason. Marking can quickly become one of the biggest sources of stress for teachers.
The temptation is to treat every piece of work as equally important. Unfortunately, that approach often leads to growing backlogs and increasing pressure.
Strategic marking is far more sustainable. Focus detailed marking on work that genuinely requires it. Use verbal and whole-class feedback whenever they can achieve the same outcome more efficiently.
Students need feedback. They need recognition when they produce strong work. They need guidance when they make mistakes. However, that does not always require lengthy written comments.
The most effective feedback is often immediate and personal. A short conversation during a lesson can have far more impact than a paragraph written in an exercise book days later.
The goal is not to mark more. The goal is to help students improve while maintaining a manageable workload.
Remember that everyone feels it
Perhaps the most reassuring lesson from experienced teachers is that nervousness never completely disappears.
Teachers at every stage of their career can feel uncertain before a new academic year begins. ECTs worry about teaching independently for the first time. Experienced teachers wonder whether they still have what it takes. Department leaders think about results, staffing and curriculum changes.
Those feelings are normal.
The difference is that experienced teachers learn to channel their nervous energy into preparation. They build systems, organise their workload and establish routines before students arrive.
The Scout motto offers a simple reminder that remains as relevant to teaching as ever: Be prepared.
You survived last year. With the right preparation, there is every reason to believe you will thrive this year too.
Want to know more? Watch our latest video on ‘At the chalk face’ where we both talk about our individual experience as teachers and returning to school after the summer break.
Looking for resources to help make the new academic year easier? Explore our Craig’n’Dave Resource Centre for ready-to-use Computer Science teaching resources, or use Smart Revise to support effective revision and reduce workload.
