Budgeting Instructional Time

As most adults know, creating a budget is an important step to having financial stability. It can feel like a downer at times, but it is the responsible thing to do.

The reason we need a budget is pretty simple: planning. We want to have some ability to control and plan for our allotment over a period of time. Without a budget, we can run short of money at the end of the month and might struggle with saving up for bigger or important purchases.

Instructional time in a classroom is much like a paycheck. There is an amount allocated at the start, and we make decisions about how we spend that time as we go. Without a good plan, it is easy to make allocations that don’t represent our goals and aspirations.

Creating (and Adjusting!) Your Budget

As any good financial planner will tell you, budgets have to be monitored and adjusted as time goes on. A great plan is a great start, but when a tire blows out or a pipe breaks, the plan will have to be adjusted. The same is true in the classroom—we can’t create a long range or yearly budget of time at the start of the year and never look at it again. It has to be something that drives what we do and focuses our behavior.

This metaphor is pretty straightforward. Think of every hour of your school year as a dollar. Teachers might get five dollars per hour per day if they are lucky. Five dollars times eight hours over 180 school days is around $7,200 for a total school year. Now we start to do the budget: How much of that should be reading, how much should be social skills, and how much should be cooperative learning or technology integration? As we divide up the year and spend an hour here and there, we can see how valuable time really is in the classroom. Add in a few snow days and all of a sudden the budget is really tight!

There are two ideas that fit this metaphor for how we can help to ease a tight instructional budget. The first is adding more time (getting a raise) and the second is saving more time (cutting corners and expenses).

Adding Time

At times in our lives, we might feel like we need a raise. In the world of money, we might save up over time or get a second job (for example, something like writing blog articles for an amazing technology company!). How does this equate to doing the same thing in the classroom? Here are a few ways you can find more time:

• Homework: It can be a bad word in education, especially for younger students, but homework can have its place in the classroom for secondary students. It can be a great way for students to practice concepts that need more work (think math) outside of the classroom day. If this is a way to gain more valuable instructional time, make sure the homework is meaningful and valuable.
• Creatively extending the day: Times before or after school are good for helping to get kids what they need—this can work for both remediation or enrichment. Other times of the day, even lunch, can be used to help students who need to go over material a second time.
• Flipping the classroom: This requires some setup from the teacher, but it’s a great way to maximize instructional time. Teachers can create instructional videos about a concept that students can either use to pre-teach the lesson or go over a concept a second time if the student needs it.

Saving Time

If a teacher needs to save up time rather than getting a raise, there are options for that also. Here are a few ways to save time:

• Moving just a little quicker: Getting through some material more quickly may seem like a pipe dream, but it is possible. I often tell teachers that not all standards are created equally. Some standards matter much more than others, so for the standards that don’t matter as much, maybe less time is required. After teaching in a system for a few years, teachers can pick up on which topics students should know easily and which ones will require more time to cover.
• The “latte effect”: If this term is unfamiliar, the budget concept is pretty simple: The small cost of the latte each day adds up over time. By cutting out a coffee each day, people can save a great deal of money over time. What is the equivalent of a latte in the classroom? It could be a number of things, but teachers should consider transition times, passing periods, routines, and procedures. These little things add up over time and can help save time in the long run. 

The budgeting of time in the classroom can be an important process for every teacher to consider. Each minute of the instructional day is worth a lot, so teachers must spend them wisely!

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