Teaching Exhaustion Tips?

[FlyChicaga]

Fellow current and past instructors, I'm curious if anyone else has experienced "teaching exhaustion." On the days I teach, I get done and feel absolutely gassed from talking non-stop all day. I've worked 16-hour days in my full-time job, but I've never felt as wiped out as I do when I'm teaching. I put a lot of effort into my students, so I do a lot of detailed explanations of concepts and what not when we are in the simulator. Besides good sleep, nutrition, water, etc., all the normal stuff that helps, any other tips for helping develop better stamina for talking so much?

 

[Ian_J]

Honestly, after years of instruction, the one thing that I realized when it came to this topic as I just had to limit the number of students I handled each day. Nothing else I could do would give me more stamina for all the brain work and talking.In the military, I ended up just doing no more than two students per day.

 

[USMCmech]

Honestly, after years of instruction, the one thing that I realized when it came to this topic as I just had to limit the number of students I handled each day. Nothing else I could do would give me more stamina for all the brain work and talking. In the military, I ended up just doing no more than two students per day.

When I was a younger full time builder I would do 4 lessons in a day. After 4 I was completely whipped out. A few guys would do 5 and there is no way that 5th student got their money's worth.

Now I do a morning lesson and an afternoon lesson. That's it.

 

[derg]

it’s a lot like OE. After a day of performing OE, I generally ‘slam click’ and go for a nice long SILENT walk alone and generally dine alone because I need to recover.

Program some breaks, free of teaching, regularly so you can recharge your batteries.

 

[N826AW]

I have a different perspective on working hours/work ethic than most CFIs. Probably from all those years getting abused working retail hours. Because when weather/daylight allowed, I would schedule five 2 hour lessons a day. I found I'd need to block off my first morning slot if I did a night XC or night landing lesson late the evening before.

I largely ran on large Dunkin' iced coffee in the AM then lots of small snacks throughout the day. I made sure I had a plan for each student the night before. I also entered detailed notes in their course tracking so I could remember what we did.

 

[FlyChicaga]

I have no problem maintaining energy to teach, it's the physical energy to actually talk... my vocal cords get strained and I feel completely exhausted. I don't know how these windbag politicians just keep talking and talking all day...