A 30-Day Challenge for Teachers: Pick Your Own (Everyone's Welcome)

Every teacher I know has some sort of commute. Some are ten minutes through town. Some involve taking a train. Some involve driving through the great Northwoods of Wisconsin.

Starting Tuesday, October 20, I'm doing a 30-day challenge, and I'd like some company. You pick your own challenge. Teachers, this one's for you first; I built it around the kind of school days we actually have. But you don't have to be a teacher to join. If you have a morning, you can do it.

The only rule is size. Pick something small enough that a bad day can't knock it out.

Pick yours

Here are a few that would work: ten minutes of reading before bed. No school email after 6. Water before coffee. Lights out by 10. Five minutes of stretching after the last bell. Texting one friend you've lost touch with.

If you'd like more ideas, my Thirty-Day Challenges workbook has 42 small ones, along with a planning page to set your small version, a halfway check-in, and a certificate at the end. You don't need it to join. Some people just like having the 30 days on paper.

Mine: one song, six words, ten minutes

• Add one song to the shared Teacher Commuter Playlist. It has to be a song that makes you feel good on the drive into school. The one you turn up. The one that gets you singing at a stop sign.
• Write one six-word story about the day. School days can be about school. Weekends can be about anything.
• Take one 10-minute walk. Before school, after school, at lunch, around the block with the dog.

I wanted something for the mind, the body, and the spirit. The walk is the body piece, and it helps your head more than you'd expect: in a 2018 study, Edwards and Loprinzi had people take a single 10-minute brisk walk, and their fatigue scores dropped afterward. The six words are the mind piece. You can't fit the whole day in, so you have to decide which part mattered. Back in 2023, I did a 30-day six-word story challenge, one index card a day. Some of those cards were hopeful. Some were "Teacher versus Monday, today Monday wins." Both count. The song is the spirit piece. I can't back that one up with a study; I just know it works for me.

I'll add one song to the playlist every day. Whatever challenge you pick, you're welcome to add your own feel-good songs too. By Day 30 it'll be thirty mornings of good moods from teachers all over (and a few friends). Volume 1 is still on Spotify if you want a head start.

What 30 days can and can't do

Thirty days won't hand you a lifelong habit. Phillippa Lally's research at University College London found it took people about 66 days, on average, for a new daily behavior to feel automatic. Thirty days gets you a good way there, and her research had another finding I like even more: missing a single day didn't set people back. Being wildly inconsistent did. So if you miss a day, pick it back up the next one. Try not to miss twice.

How to join

Pick your challenge and say it out loud. Post it with #30DaySTRONG and tag m so I see it, or just reply to the newsletter and tell me. Join on any day. Day 1 is whenever you start.

Want to add a feel-good song? Use this link to the Teacher Commuter Playlist (Volume 2). It makes you a collaborator, so your songs go right in.

Everyone who finishes their 30 days gets a shout-out in the STRONG Teacher Newsletter in late November.

For your classroom

Six words works with students too. I started using six-word memoirs with my 8th grade homeroom in 2022 to build community. If you want to try it, start with Using Six Word Memoirs in the Classroom, then see how it went with my homeroom.

So what's your 30 days going to be?