Poor Time Management: Going through the Motions

Stephen R. Covey, in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, unveiled the time management matrix.

Quadrant 1 time management includes items that are urgent and important. Quadrant 3 includes items that are urgent but not important. Quadrant 4 includes items that are neither urgent nor important. Quadrant 2 includes items that are important but not urgent. According to Covey, poor time management occurs when individuals spend most of their time in Quadrant 2.

Teachers who never learn how to improve time management give up and turn to Quadrant 4.

For a more detailed description of the time management matrix as it applies to teachers and other professions, follow the link.

Few teachers begin in Quadrant 4. They end up there after too many days in Quadrant 1 and too many evenings in Quadrant 3. They are the burnouts. Some fake work out of embarrassment. No longer slaves to urgent demands, they sometimes transition to Quadrant 2. This is rare. They soon discover they can get paid the same amount for doing nothing.

Quadrant 4 teachers can be found in the parking lot as the buses leave for the day. They make frequent appearances on the teacher’s forum, eager to lampoon their colleagues. They always seem to know some big secret about investing, business, the Internet, or the Dominican Republic that will allow them to retire at 45. They never do.

Many teachers don't realize they're in Quadrant 4. Here are some signs:

• You have video game websites bookmarked on your work computer
• You seem to have more free time during the school year than you do during the summer
• You haven't graded a paper since 1993
• You haven't written a lesson plan since 1992
• You only know half your students' names by mid-January
• You're dating your student aide
• Your gradebook is missing an entire class
• Students ditch biology and show up in your class
• Your teaching license expired last Tuesday
• You know more subs than Jared
• You almost got hit by a bus walking to your car after school
• You almost got hit by a bus walking to your room this morning
• You have Netflix delivered to your classroom
• Although your students can't read, they have every Disney movie memorized
• You're reading this when you should be preparing students for proficiency exams
• You're writing this when you should be preparing students for proficiency exams.
• Your idea of technology in the classroom is online poker and and a DVD player.

Those looking to get out of Quadrant 4 and regain their self respect need only to look at Quadrant 2. Here's how one teacher made the transition.