Too many jobs to do? Maybe this “theory” can help

By Candace Bowen, MJE

Everyone has had one of those days. The to-do list barely fits on your iPhone calendar  anymore, and you’re thinking maybe you should expand to Monday.com.

You have work for each class, a part-time job, of course student media, and, honestly, do the dishes need to be washed and put away every night?

Whether you’re a journalism teacher/media adviser reading this or a high school student, I’ll bet you know what I mean. So…..you need to learn how to use The Theory of Rotational Neglect….

Sound interesting?

It’s a method I created out of desperation one semester when I was teaching six classes – six WRITING classes with almost nightly homework plus the student newspaper and its second cousin, an online news site with daily updates or breaking stories – plus a family, a house and two cats — and a dog who had been known to eat shoes left randomly around the house.

The Theory of Rotational Neglect….

It’s pretty self-explanatory. Almost everyone I know has a whole laundry list of required chores and expectations. (Laundry? I almost forgot that!!) So sometimes it really IS impossible to get everything done.

But if you ROTATE what you neglect – not always math homework or grading the weekly journals – you’ll probably be ok. And if you choose to temporarily skip one of those, you need to be sure you get it done as soon as possible. The journals won’t grade themselves. This theory has worked well for me – and for countless friends and former students (Yes, I almost always share it with my classes). I’ve also noted that some things – especially legal ones like income tax filings or renewing a driver’s license – can’t go on the “things I can rotate list.” If it does, the “rotator” has to be ready for some often expensive consequences.

Another word of warning for teachers – if you share this with your students, you have to be prepared when YOUR class is the one that was neglected – temporarily, of course. That’s only fair.