Show Notes
Teaching is hard (often draining) work, and educators’ instincts about what will bring relief are frequently wrong—just as they are for most people.
That’s because our minds deceive us, says cognitive scientist and Yale professor Laurie Santos, one of the world’s leading researchers on well-being and happiness. “One of the most annoying features of the mind is the fact that we all have these intuitions about the kinds of things we should be doing to feel better. But the research shows that many of those intuitions are just incorrect.”
In this episode of School of Practice, Dr. Santos joins host Kristin Leong to debunk some of the most popular and persistent myths about happiness—more money *mostly* doesn’t buy more happiness, for example, and a values mismatch at work may be more consequential for burnout than you think—and shares a set of evidence-based tools teachers can begin to apply right away to reclaim a sense of balance.
Related resources:
Learn more about this episode
The Research on Protecting Teacher Well-Being
Coursera: The Science of Well-Being
The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos
Yale’s Happiness Professor Says Anxiety Is Destroying Her Students
What a New Survey Says About Teachers’ Plans to Leave Their Jobs
The Burnout Challenge
No, You Don’t Always Have to Confront Your Feelings Right Away
Ross Gay on Finding Everyday Delights
Research: Exploring the Ripple Effect of ‘Always On’ Digital Work Culture in Secondary Education Settings (2021)
Research: Time Confetti and the Broken Promise of Leisure (2020)
Research: Buying Time Promotes Happiness (2017)
Research: Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself (2015)
Research: High Income Improves Evaluation of Life but Not Emotional Well-Being (2010)
Research: Toward a Durable Happiness (2008)
Research: Achieving Sustainable Gains in Happiness: Change Your Actions, not Your Circumstances (2006)
Research: Counting Blessings versus Burdens: An Experimental Investigation of Gratitude and Subjective Well-Being in Daily Life (2003)
More from School of Practice
It started with a student writing a joke on a sticky note: “I hope we have no tests this year.”
Have you ever had a lesson get derailed by a power struggle with a student? Or is there a student in your class who you got off on the wrong foot with, and you’re not sure of the best way to repair the relationship?
Did you know that drawing can be a learning superpower—even for students who claim they’re not good at it?
Everyone makes mistakes—including teachers.
Like a lot of other educators, Nicholas Ferroni is trying to find his way back to a time before technology was the default classroom mode. He thinks he was a better teacher back then—and kids acted more like kids.