My 90 second video explains why I need 10 minutes of Lin-Manuel’s time.
If you’re the person who can help me make the connection, I’ll make sure you’re invited to the Zoom when it happens!
If you can make an introduction, send me an email at Lesley@mPoweredEducator.com and let’s make some magic happen!
THANK YOU!
Lesley
Story time, of course.
There was SO much information they needed to know on that very first day, but the most important lesson of all was that it will all be okay. The kids needed to hear that they are not alone and that I’m here to walk this walk with them.
This will be a hard road, and if they don’t get the chance to build relationships with one another while we are in a 100% virtual environment, it’ll be pretty hard to keep them engaged when they no longer get to play in ensembles with their friends in their band classes.
By the time they go to register for classes next year, they’ll be burned out and disconnected from the band kids unless we intentionally spend time building the kind of culture online that so organically occurs in our classrooms.
When kids listen to stories as children, most of their memories involve feeling peaceful and being interested in what’s happening. Story time is usually something children love … no matter how old they are.
So we connected on our first day of virtual high school band for the 2020 school year with good old story time.
As soon as my voice fell into the familiar beat of the rhyming patterns they’ve heard so many times before and they saw pictures of the very people they made memories and music with in past years, I could see their faces visibly relax as the stress dissipated and smiles began to appear.
The kids are as overwhelmed as we are and they said over and over again how grateful they were that we are taking the time to do this before jumping into content.
As you move through your school year, remember why you are pouring so much love and energy into an impossible job. It’s hard. It’s never enough. And people still complain.
Know that you are making difference in kids’ lives every single day. I am hearing stories about the conditions under which you are teaching and I am in awe.
Music teachers are incredibly resilient – but that can also be our downfall because we (and others) expect ourselves to just figure out how to do the impossible because we always seemed to solve unsolvable situations in the past.
I, too, am feeling the strain of trying to teach huge classes online without being able to see most of them while monitoring the chat room and breakout sessions and internet issues and screenshares and the list goes on and on. I have to plan out my classes with the same level of detail I did my first year…and this is my 33rd year!
I decided that there’s just too much stuff out there right now. Lots of great apps. Tons of great platforms. A million pre-designed lessons.
We’ll get to that later.
None of that matters until my kids and I connect and we create an online classroom truly worthy of being called a “band room”, that magical place where students thrive through music, relationships, and love.
“Connecting Through Music” is the theme my students selected for this year. We will use music to connect us as humans, but it’ll be in new and innovative ways. The delivery and some of the content changes. The fact that we are teaching little humans remains the same.
I wish you a year of growth and grace.
Lesley
All summer, in spite of your best efforts, you’ve been thinking about all the obstacles you and your students face this year. Many of them may even seem insurmountable. And yet I bet you’ve come up with a lot of creative solutions for meeting many of your students’ academic needs this year, because that’s what educators do.
There are a ton of the platforms and apps that are out there help us facilitate a lot of the challenges that could otherwise seem insurmountable.
But there’s really no effective app that addresses your students’ social and emotional needs. YOU are the one who does that. You are the one who has to know her students well enough to figure out what their needs are before you can begin to help them with the struggles they face.
Do you have a plan for quickly and effectively identifying the challenges that will make it difficult for your students to be successful, especially in a virtual, hybrid, or way-different-than-normal-in-person teaching situation? How are you going to get them to truly think about and articulate their obstacles so you can use that information to drive your instruction and help them be successful?
And what are you going to do once you understand their obstacles? Do you have proven ideas for navigating this kind of situation with so many students and families who are experiencing so many hardships while trying to manage school and jobs and life during a pandemic?
This is all I’ve thought about and it’s my mission to help students become the best version of themselves through the magic of music education. When the rest of their world seems to be falling apart, we music teachers can help them make sense of it. We can give them the tools they need to manage their emotions, express themselves, and learn so much more than just how to play a few songs. But first we must meet them where they are.
If you know this is true but just don’t know where to start, I invite you to watch this short training I did that gives an idea of what you could do in the beginning of the year to get to know your students so you can better serve them. Starting with this step will save you a LOT of time and effort down the line.
The training is free. I hope you find it helpful. Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you have any questions.
With you on this journey –
Lesley
Music education has been my whole life. I love my career. And now EVERYTHING about what I’ve done for over three decades is completely different.
How on earth do we serve our students and sustain our programs in the middle of a pandemic?
I’ve seen so much change during my years as a teacher. Technology and society have caused our kids to grow up faster than they were physiologically programmed to do, and the impact from all the stimuli on their ability to function in this world is huge.
For the first thirty-one-and-three-quarters years of my career, there was a lot that changed, but nothing like what happened when the 2020 pandemic hit the planet and, at the speed of light, uprooting everything we ever learned about teaching. Suddenly, in what was going to be my final quarter of teaching, I found myself, along with every other teacher in the U.S. and beyond, completely reinventing how I taught as the world came to a standstill and schools were shut down across the globe. I had to learn to teach high school band online!
The first few weeks of the abrupt transition from face-to-face teaching to the isolation of being quarantined and figuring out how to meet the emotional and educational needs of my students was daunting.
As we started working through what it would look like for us to continue our band classes without being together, I came to realize that the daily practices and protocols I established with my students (who often come to class with challenges like anxiety, depression, and difficulty focusing) as a way to help them focus and be present for class were even more important now.
The daily practice we did in one another’s presence every day – taking four minutes to do breathing and relaxation together – up-leveled our in-class experiences because of the way it synchronized all the students each day, which caused our rehearsal time to be at least three to four times more productive than in the past. I knew that since our routine had such a positive impact on our ability to bring sixty-plus teenagers together and get them focused when we were in person, it was critical that we continued to practice that same routine when we were isolated and experiencing heightened anxiety and trauma. The ritual of getting our bodies and brains to relax each day before we started class was more important now than ever.
Kids are constantly told to “sit still and be quiet,” yet they’re never really taught how to harness their energy and social reflexes so they can actually sit quietly and focus their attention. Guess what happens when you actually teach students how to physiologically reset their bodies and brains so all of the restless energy (side conversations, excessive physical movements, difficulty focusing, inability to pay attention or remember) gets out of their way and they are able to start with a clean slate? It’s truly remarkable. It’s how we are biologically programmed to function at our best, so why not work with nature and teach our students how to tap into this? Once you do, you will be blown away at the changes: the ease of teaching, the attentiveness of the students, the retention of content, and a million other positive changes that take place as a result of taking the time to teach students this critical skill.
Teaching kids to get into this learning state is no different than teaching them technique on an instrument. It’s muscle memory – that is all. By practicing scales slowly, you train their muscles to respond in specific ways. The more you repeat patterns, the easier it is for them to execute those patterns and the quicker their responses become.
The same goes for teaching kids to settle down. Once your students practice a relaxation routine on a consistent basis, their bodies learn to be still because the muscles learn how to relax. Their brains are no longer in hyper mode; instead, they respond to this practice by learning to let go of the drama and other stuff floating around in their heads and become cleared out for whatever content or concept you want to introduce.
You have an incredible opportunity to help your students not just be successful musicians but to be exceptional human beings. Music teachers change the world. We are arguably the most influential adults on the planet. We have kids in our classes year after year after year. We watch them grow up. We are the only adults they see that frequently, sometimes even more than their parents, see them. So, we have important work to do – and we need the stamina to do it.
That’s where this book comes in. If I learned about the power of teaching this skill before diving into content with my students, I could have been a healthier and more effective teacher from the start. Instead, I spent the first three decades of my career teaching the way I was taught, actively handling classroom management and correcting behaviors instead of giving my students the skills to self-regulate so I could focus on teaching. It took a lot more energy (both physically and mentally) to teach when I didn’t have a daily routine to get everyone relaxed and focused.
For most of my life, I didn’t know how to relax, and teaching was a hyperactivity for me. I did it well, but managing all the components of a huge music program required active work, both mentally and physically. Even teaching classes took a lot of energy. Corralling the energy of sixty kids an hour, day after day, and motivating them to meet my goals was exhausting. Once I learned the power of teaching students to relax and settle that energy down before starting to teach class, everything became so much easier for all of us.
I’m a much more effective teacher now. Instead of force-feeding kids everything I believe they should know and feel, I facilitate their abilities to tap into the music and hear the message it has for them. I learned how to help them go from states of stress – where learning is difficult, if not impossible – to a place where their brains and bodies are receptive and ready to learn, remember, and recall what they’re discovering. It sounds like a whole new way of teaching, but really, it’s not. It’s the way we were programmed to learn.
When we teach students how to get into a learning state, teaching and learning become so much easier, leading to less stress for you and your students.
This process can be used by children of all ages and across all socio-economic statuses, cultures, orientations, and marginalization, including over-achievers and AP/Honors kids. In fact, it’s often most effective for the kids you’d least expect.
Just like a carpenter needs the proper tools and high-quality wood and a plan if he is going to create a craftsman-style piece of furniture, teachers need tools to do their jobs well, too. One of the most powerful tools a teacher has is being able to guide their students into a readiness-to-learn state before delivering content. This one simple step has more impact on every aspect of student growth than any other pedagogical tool I encountered in the more than 30,000 classes I taught over the course of my career.
This book is my way of sharing what I learned so other band directors can do the important work of teaching in a way that is easier and more effective for them and their students. I want to support them in their efforts to be positive role models and mentors for their students. I want to work with teachers who realize that our roles include shaping kids into responsible and respectful human beings through the magic of music education. It takes a lot of stamina to do this year after year, and I am here to share strategies that support dedicated music teachers who are called to change kids’ lives for the better.
Under the best of circumstances, teaching is stressful and exhausting.
After our 2020 health crisis, it’s going to be even more so, and unless you have a plan in place for how you’ll help students cope with the strange new world in which we live, it’ll be overwhelming and daunting for you and your students.
If you have a routine that already works, then now is the time to reevaluate it and see what you might need to tweak in order to meet the new needs of your students. Most of them will be affected by everything that happened as a result of the pandemic, so teaching-as-usual will be anything but usual. You know your students and community best, so you can use this book as a guide to help you assess and possibly redesign what you do in light of our new normal.
If you don’t have a routine you use to help your students overcome the distractions of life so they can focus in your class, then I’m especially glad you picked up this book! Now’s your chance to practice some new skills that will help you and your students get the most out of your classes in spite of the added stress, anxiety, depression, and more they’ll be dealing with.
This book outlines the process I designed and implemented in my classroom and is set up to help you create a plan to successfully teach music to students who will be forever changed after this worldwide shift in education and life as we once knew it.
My work with my students always comes from a place of love. As I came to what was going to be the end of a long and fulfilling career in music education in June of 2020, I found myself being called to stay in my classroom and community a little while longer. I see the writing on the wall and know there will be massive shifts in everything we do as educators now, so I made the commitment to remain with my students and walk beside them on this journey. Providing them with the stability of our routines together during a time of upheaval and uncertainty is essential not just for them but for me, too. Now more than ever, they need to continue to practice what we were doing every day in class – relaxing amidst the chaos.
Because my students and I learned to make our classroom a place where we decompress together every day, I know I will have the stamina to be present with them as we adapt to our new ways of doing things. Even though we will all have more reasons to be distracted with each passing day and the rapid changes taking place to education and we will undoubtedly experience plenty of stressful situations, we will forge ahead with our daily routine that allows us to settle into an hour of magical music-making together, where we can put our worries and distractions on the back burner and use music as a tool to help us cope, heal, and express ourselves.
This book is the culmination of my life’s work and shares the most powerful wisdom I gained from my decades of experience as a busy band-directing mom who managed to build a successful band program in spite of a million obstacles. My wish for you is that you will find it to be instrumental in helping you be that badass band director you were born to be so you can be there for your students for a long time to come.
Check out a FREE SNEAK PEEK of Love the Job, Lose the Stress: Successful Social and Emotional Learning in the Modern Music Classroom now!
Now that bookstores are opening, I’m thrilled to have my book available in print nationwide!
THANK YOU to all of you who have already read the book, sent me notes about the changes you’ve made in your own life as the result of what you’ve learned, and helped make this a #1 International Bestseller in multiple categories!! 😍💪
Teachers have always dealt with stress, that is nothing new.
Over the past several months, I have spoken to hundreds of educators.
The anxiety they are experiencing with not knowing what to expect in the coming months and year are showing up as insomnia, worry, fear, and depression as we see all of the obstacles we are facing magnified as the level of stressors we are experiencing seems to be skyrocketing.
There are a lot of things we cannot control.
But what if you could take a little more control of a few things and therefore at least reduce your stress and all the negative impacts it has on your health? Wouldn’t NOW be the time to start so you have the stamina you need for whatever the upcoming year brings?
Good news, just in time for a new school year (whether that’s in-person, virtually, or in a hybrid situation), my book and is available in print!
My signature mPower Method helps you identify and then make changes in the areas of your life that are no longer serving you so you can be the best possible version of yourself. Thousands of people have used this book to jumpstart their personal wellness journey. Are you next?
Join me in celebrating the bookstore launch THIS FRIDAY. There will be lots of great giveaways from the publisher, so register today to get the scoop on all the good stuff.
With you on this journey-
Lesley
With all the things you have to do to prepare to teach next year, you may not have the time, energy, or desire to read a book to help yourself get healthy while you’re also figuring out how to do things in education without a playbook or the training you need. It might seem like too much work.
But what if you don’t invest in your own personal well-being? How in the heck are you supposed to be there to support struggling students, colleagues, your own family, and yourself when you’re dealing with all kinds of stressors and so many things you can’t control?
GREAT NEWS: All the strategies I wrote about in my books are now available in an online course where I guide you through the nuggets you need to manage the never-ending stressors that come with teaching and parenting. This course cuts to the chase with real and practical solutions you implement to get you the results you need so you can weather this storm.
I’ve had thousands of people use the methods I teach in my books to help them conquer the chronic stress and exhaustion that comes with teaching, and now that information is more needed than ever.
Now that summer is here and there’s a limited amount of time for you to spend on getting your own stamina built up so you can be successful next year in spite of all the challenges we’re facing, I’ve reimagined my curriculum (my books) and put them in a format that can better serve busy stressed-out teachers during these unusual times. You can work at your own pace, easily completing the activities in a matter of a few weeks and then you’ll benefit from the changes you make from now on!
I know first-hand what happens to our minds and bodies when we are exposed to constant stress and impossible expectations. It sucks. It doesn’t have to be that way. I’d like to show you how you can build your resilience and not just make it through some unprecedented times, but how to do it without burning out.
Click the button below to find out how you can get this course at 90% off the regular tuition. As a special offer, I am introducing this online program at this rate as a way for a very limited time in order to make it accessible to every educator who recognizes the need to keep ourselves mentally and physically fit for the jobs we were born to do.
The course, which you’ll have access to for life, is available for $250 this week. As a FREE BONUS, I will include a 30-minute one-on-one strategy session to help you get the most out of this course for you if you download the class in the next seven days.
After you sign up, I will send you everything you need to get started on your road to better health now.
Why would I offer this program at a fraction of the regular tuition? I’ve been an educator for over 30 years. My parents and grandparents were teachers. My three children have all taught. I have a vested interest in the health and well-being of educators. Our future depends on us being able to do our jobs. This is my contribution to helping make it a sustainable profession.
We’ve got some serious work to do to be ready for whatever comes next.
With you on this bumpy ride –
Lesley
You’ve spent the last three months learning all kinds of new ways to deliver instruction and teach in a distance learning environment, despite never having experienced this as a learner or having been trained how to deliver all your content in new ways – and you made these changes overnight.
While you somehow got through the most surreal educational (and life) experience, you may be looking back at what you’ve learned and now have more questions than answers as we move forward.
Now that school has ended for this year and you’ve had a moment to take a breath, you may be wondering, “What in the hell am I going to do next year?”
How am I going to teach? Will I even have a job? How do I deliver content and realistically meet all the guidelines and expectations without spending 10 hours a day this summer rewriting my curriculum and planning for multiple types of teaching platforms and situations? How can I balance my family and professional lives when I don’t even know how classes will be structured? I’ve never been trained for distance teaching, and I’m not sure how to adapt my performance-based classes… there’s so much to worry about!
As educators, we tend to be organized with plans for every contingency that could come up. But in a pandemic and during a time when there’s so much anxiety about what school will look like in the fall, the time we normally take during the summer to relax and recharge can easily be hijacked by stress and fear of how to teach and support your own family in a sustainable way.
Are you going to spend all summer worrying about next year or would you rather spend it making sure you’re ready to face whatever comes at you without the stress, anxiety, and exhaustion taking over?
It’s possible to use the next few weeks as a time to rebuild your own toolbox with skills you can use to keep yourself in the best mental and physical space possible so you have the stamina to do this important work.
Don’t waste all summer trying to figure out where to start. Jump to the front of the line by figuring out how to recharge by identifying your own current mental and physical health status so you can determine what you can do to take care of your own needs so you can support your students, family, and yourself in the upcoming year.
Where do you even start when it comes to figuring out what is creating the most stress for you so you can begin to figure out how to address it?
I’ve designed an assessment to help you do just that!
Check out Moffat’s Mojo Meter for Educators. This quiz will help you identify the very things that are keeping you from being able to truly relax and recharge this summer.
I hope you find the few minutes you invest in taking this assessment to be helpful in identifying what you need to do for yourself in order to support everyone else through this journey.
Peace-
Lesley
The challenge of not knowing what to prepare for when school starts in the fall is stressful. Stress contributes to all kinds of health problems, both physically and mentally. I know this from first-hand experience.
Are you prepared for whatever comes your way or are you already envisioning the 14-hour work days that involve Plans A, B, C, D and more? Will you have the energy for your own family while teaching in person and/or remotely while also monitoring students’ health and safety?
How will you keep yourself mentally and physically fit so that you can handle all of your responsibilities at school and at home without collapsing?
If you aren’t sure if you’re prepared for the challenges of having a healthy work/life balance come September, check out my Music Teacher Mojo Meter. This quick self assessment lets you get a snapshot of your readiness for teaching during a pandemic.
By asking yourself these questions, you can easily identify where your strengths have been and what your biggest obstacles will be moving forward. You can’t fix what you can’t identify.
Summer is the perfect time to invest in YOU – and this summer is the most important summer to put habits in place that will support you in the upcoming school year. We’ve got important work to do – and we must have the stamina to be able to do it!
I hope my Music Teacher Mojo Meter is a helpful tool in helping you figure out what you can do to support yourself through this stressful time.
With you on this journey –
Lesley
It’s my 32nd year of teaching, so this shouldn’t have been a big deal. I’ve been through dozens of these and had no reason to believe this would be any different other than the fact that it was taking place online due to the pandemic.
Mr. Peters and I met on Zoom, and after exchanging pleasantries, he screen-shared my evaluation form.
There on page six he had a running narrative of what was going on in the classroom:
As he scrolled through a couple more pages of that narrative, I saw in front of me what an ordinary day used to be like in the band room at our school. Oh, the things I took for granted.
I was reminded of the sense of accomplishment we’d feel when we’d woodshed a passage and finally master it. Or the wave of emotion that would sweep over all of us when we’d executed a passage with exceptional passion. Or the simple thrill of watching that third clarinet player finally get over the break without alarming the rest of the band with horrible squeaking.
All of the seemingly ordinary things we did every single day at school seem so much more significant now that we have been away from our kids for a couple of months. I long for the days when we could high-five ’em as they walked in our classrooms and then settle them in for 55 minutes of music and memory-making.
As I read the narrative of what happened in my classroom during wind ensemble on that ordinary day in November, tears poured from my eyes as it finally sunk in just how precious that time together had been. Those days in our classrooms did so much more than just teach kids how to play songs. Through the process of developing as musicians, I watched them grow up. I watched them overcome personal struggles and challenges. I grew to love them not just as music students, but as humans. We’d become a family and suddenly the pain of being ripped from my band family was really raw and all I could do was cry.
I am sad for so many things that we’ve lost as a school, community, nation, and world. I worry about the future of everything from education to survival and more. And I wonder how I can continue to be a band director and serve my students in a post-pandemic world.
I don’t have all the answers, but I know it’s up to me to do a few things:
If you are a music teacher who is looking for strategies to support the long-term survival of your music program and sustainable ways for you to balance work and family lives while you do this important work, then I invite you to do a self-assessment that can help you identify your readiness for what lies ahead. It will help you ask yourself the questions you need to face as you plan for what’s next.
We have important work to do, and I, for one, plan to be ready to serve my students in spite of the obstacles that will arise as we get closer to September. Budget cuts, loss of performance and trip opportunities, and the fear of the unknown can be crippling – but our kids are counting on us to be brave, step up, and be there for them.
Take five minutes and check-in with yourself using this self-assessment. The peace of mind that comes when you get the clarity you need to take the next step can make the difference between stepping into the next few months in fear or with purpose. I choose purpose!
Are you a “Type-A, super-organized, ultra-planner” who is used to being in control kind of teacher and now feels like a fish out of water as you undo all of your spring events, plan new activities for distance learning, and try to figure out what next year might look like for you and your program?
This is a pretty unnerving place to be, especially for those of us who like to plan in advance and be prepared. How can we possibly do that for our programs when we have no idea what next year might look like? How can we offer music classes to students and grow our ensembles when being socially distant might mean limited in-person classes and activities next year?
Now that the initial shock and disbelief that our in-person school year ended in March has worn off, many of us are beginning to wonder how we are possibly going to be able to do our jobs when school finally does resume. There are so many unknowns about what education will look like that it can be paralyzing, frightening, and extremely overwhelming to think about. And when we consider the impact all this can potentially have on our music programs, well, it can be downright discouraging.
I remember the same kind of feeling after 9/11.
I was just starting my 14th year of teaching. As a parent, I was scared about what this tragic event meant for my own kids’ future. My girls were 4, 8, and 12 at the time, and in order for my husband to remain employed, he had to transfer to a different work location, making his commute three or more hours per day. I found myself with very long days that started with zero period jazz band classes and ended with evening activities, trying to balance the extra parenting responsibilities I had while my husband was commuting. As a teacher in the changing landscape of education after that event and the stressors that came with it, I really struggled to keep it all together.
Fast-forward 19 years. Ready or not, as a result of this pandemic, we are at another major changing point in education. Having experienced teaching and parenting after a major event that impacted life as we had known it before, I am prepared to share what I learned through my personal story so other teachers can skip a lot of the growing pains and be the teachers, parents, and partners they want to be and come out stronger on the other side.
Educators are natural leaders. Being a leader at a time like this requires vision, passion, and stamina. Being a leader during distance learning while juggling your own family, limited access to resources, and sketchy internet can be incredibly challenging. But as music teachers, we are not intimidated by challenges. In fact, we often thrive in situations that seem impossible to mere mortals.
If you are a music teacher with a vision of helping your students be the best version of themselves through the magic of music education and you want to be a leader who does that in spite of the circumstances, then I want to invite you to check out my new book.
In my latest book, I share all kinds of strategies and resources that will help you do this important work efficiently, with greater ease, and with less of a drain on your energy. Having taught more than 30,000 classes in my career while raising a family of my own, I’ve walked the walk and am delighted to be able to pass on what I’ve learned.
The book will be published next month, but YOU can get a FREE advanced copy of the ebook NOW and get started on tapping into strategies for your long-term stamina as a music teacher!
If you read it and find it helpful, I’d love to know. In fact, if you send me any feedback before May 4, I can include it in the eBook that will be published next month on Amazon! I would be really grateful for any reviews because that will help me get it into more people’s hands, and that was the whole reason for writing it in the first place. 🙂
I’m really grateful to Dr. Tim for his enthusiastic support. I put a sneak peek of his foreword below so you can see for yourself if this information will be helpful for you.
In-person teaching will one day resume. It will look different than what we’ve known it to be. We can either wait and see what happens, or we can be the leaders and visionaries who use our platforms as music educators to shape the future of music education.
Our students are counting on us, so let’s do this!
by Dr. Tim Lautzenheiser
Lesley Moffat’s newest book, Love the Job, Lose the Stress, redefines the term “self-help.” Her first best seller, I Love My Job, but It’s Killing Me, awakened us to a new landscape of personal and professional sanity. This latest-greatest contribution offers a tried-and-true blueprint for vocational success while embracing the critical importance of fueling one’s mental, emotional and physical health. Spot on! Bull’s eye!
What is uniquely wonderful about Lesley’s writing is based on her own teaching journey. Her wisdom reflects reality rather than hypothesis. She has “been to the well,” she “walks her talk,” and she does it with a sense of understanding unknown in common hours. Rather than simply focusing on the obvious, she delves into the why, what, and how of the given situations:
A bit of history: By all standards, Lesley Moffat was at the top of her teaching (band directing) career. She developed a program-of-excellence recognized (and envied) by her colleagues. The numbers grew, the quality soared, and the awards continued to spotlight this one-of-a-kind culture-of-artistic-excellence being driven by her ongoing desire to serve the students, the school, and the community. However, all of this manifested at the expense of Lesley’s health and well-being. To attain these high, self-appointed educational standards, she was short-changing the most important part of her program: Lesley Moffat. Let us be reminded of this cornerstone truth: “You can’t lead others until you lead yourself.” Fortunately, she recognized her plight and executed a massive course-correction. Now, we are the benefactors of her self-explored research via her trademark writing talents.
This manuscript is an endless treasure chest of immeasurable value. From the self-reflection templates to proven time-management skills, each page reveals yet another golden nugget you can integrate into your own daily agenda. This is not a book you read and then put on the shelf; rather it is a file cabinet of priceless data certain to bolster the health, happiness and good fortune of every (music) educator.
We’ve all heard the familiar teacher outcry, “I’m tired. I’m frustrated. My health is suffering. I live in stress. I don’t have a life. I don’t know what to do. I want to give-up. I’m just plain burnt out!” It truly is “a sad state of affairs” when one experiences this kind of desperation. Might I suggest that reading Love the Job, Lose the Stress offers-up a powerful prescription availing us to a personal/professional avenue arriving at one’s desired contentment and fulfillment.
Lesley, thank you! We know the master teachers are also keystone role models. That being said, you are an exemplar for all of us!
