In the turbulent, chaotic, eventful times that are known as “End of Semester Report Writing”, on occasion, I have been thinking a lot about what I could do with additional resources. Not money (which would be excellent) or Sleep, but the simple idea of time. I have come to think of time as my most important resource. I have discovered (at least on a personal level) that time is resource I need the most, as it can provide solutions to all other resource shortfall; well at least the resource shortfall that are not consider insurmountable such as lack of air.

I have found, that given enough time, I can work around most problems I run into while teaching. The obvious ones are things like lack of sleep, work life balance, health, lack of patience and so on. All easily solved with time; typically, easily solved with sleep, but that is not the point. I have been more thinking along the lines of things like classroom resources – Money for materials and equipment; an ever-escalating work load; marking; classroom preparation. If I have the time, I typically find a work around to the challenge that I faced, or on rare occasions an actual workable solution.

Time has become a critical resource. I never seem to have enough. Far too often I must preform metaphorical triage on problems, applying band-aid solutions that are only short term; always promising that when I have time I will fix it properly; that close enough is good enough for now. While writing this I realized that we teachers often use future adjectives constantly; things will be done. I’ll get to it later. We’ll look at that next term. See me after………

We constantly are trapped in the now, which is full, so we push stuff in the future. Our time is spent before it even happens far too often. We are always looking for more and ever have enough.

This brings me full circle in my thinking; back to my original point. What could I do with more of this resource called “Time” (now with a capital T, since I’m going to treat it as a named object). To steal something, I remember from a piece of poetry or philosophy, source long forgotten in the cobwebs of my mind.

Time is infinite and finite; It is unlimited, but you can never have enough of it.

I have found that I am always time poor. I must prioritize and choose what comes first and what get my time. I always have more to do than I have time to do it in. I constantly decide what is important and what is not, not based on their true value of importance, but on how much time it will take to do, and how soon I need. This has resulted in ideas being shelved, projects being abandoned and things being left by the wayside. So what would I do with more Time?

First, I would sleep. Yes sleep. It is something that I have found as the semester ends I never have enough of. The candle gets burnt at both ends, with late nights and early starts the necessity of life. It would be wonderful to be able to get enough sleep and have time to do all the other things. Next, I would finish some of the things I have left unfinished; the projects that are good enough but not truly done. Those little things I am always working on, because they are interesting but externally a side project. For example, my research/exploration into VR as a classroom tool; the concept of gamification and applying it to the classroom; learning a new programming language; writing that app I want to make.  All those little side projects.

The final thing, would be spend more time with my family. Slow things down, and not cram in all the fun into brief hours, but actually have quantity and quality time instead of one or the other.

All in all, Time is something that seems to something I am wasting thinking about it. Which, all in all, not a bad thing. Best thing about time, is even wasting it can result in something.