3 Steps To Help You Switch Off From School
It’s 8.10pm on a Wednesday evening in the Summer term...
You’re home after what feels like the longest day ever: an early start, a morning of adapting (and readapting!) around last-minute changes, being called to cover the gaps in all sorts of places; all topped off with a difficult parent phone call where you were made to feel, once again, like you just weren’t doing quite enough!
But now, you’re home. Everyone’s fed and watered - even you! And so, you finally fall back onto the sofa breathing a deep, heavy sigh of relief…
Then it starts.
That little, niggling voice.
Just as soon as you thought you were done, it chirps up:
“Have you sent that email?”
“What did they mean by..?”
“You really should get another few reports done…”
Whether it’s negative rumination on something that happened in the day or a preoccupation on your to-do list, struggling to switch off is something we can all relate to! In fact, not only are 76% of school staff stressed but 66% of us find it hard to leave work at work and detach.
So, why is this such a problem?
As teachers, this is something we are actually more susceptible to compared to the average adult…
First of all, emotional labour is at the heart of our work. We spend all day absorbing and co-regulating the emotions of 25-35 young people - and we take on the emotions of parents, carers and colleagues, too. With the increasing need, and reducing resourcing, we’re seeing, this is only getting worse.
Also, in 2026 there’s seemingly no natural “finish line” to our work day. Ever since the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve seen a shift in expectations around availability of school staff. Many parents (and sometimes colleagues) expect us to be accessible almost all of the time. With laptops, remote working, email apps, it’s hard to create a real space between us and work.
Then there’s the role of smartphones and social media in our lives nowadays. What were once spaces to decompress, rest and connect, our homes have become places where we escape into 6 inch screens. This is one of the worst things we can do for overthinking, switching off - and stress in general!
Finally, we’re all going into work with our capacity cups already full. Family, finances, caring for others, looking after our health, keeping a home, and everything else we’re dealing, leaves us brimming before we’ve even stepped foot in the school building.
But it’s not just the external. There are real, deep-rooted reasons why this is such a challenge…
Like most things, it begins in the brain…
In a nutshell, your brain is running a threat assessment 24/7. This is because it’s wired for survival above all else and the signals it receives in school are often that of someone in danger!
At the centre of all of this is the amygdala: an almond-shaped cluster of neurons that acts like an alarm bell. When it spots a threat (a challenging conversation, a looming deadline or even an unread email), it fires a sort of “distress signal” to another part of your brain, the hypothalamus, which triggers the release of adrenaline and then cortisol into the bloodstream.
This is the famous "fight-or-flight" response we’ve all heard so much about!
But it doesn’t stop there my friend, oh no…
Your brain isn’t so great at telling the difference between real and perceived stressors or threats.
So whether you’re physically too hot, staring down the barrel of your to-do list or you have a parent shouting in your face on the playground (or you’re even just replaying these stressors in your mind) your brain doesn’t really know the difference.
If we mix this with something called the Default Mode Network, we get a recipe for rumination.
Our Default Mode Network (DMN) is something we desperately need. It helps us reflect, imagine, get creative, process experiences, empathise, plan for life - or even just remember the answer for that quiz question that stumped you two days ago!
We slip into it when we’re not overtly focused on an external task, like when we’re washing the dishes or going for a walk - and if you’re really stressed and can’t focus on anything, when you’re trying to do something relaxing like watch TV. The DMN technically has no natural "stop" switch; it will keep running the loop unless you give it something else to do.
When you’re emotionally exhausted and wiped yet wired, this often leads to struggling to switch off from school related thoughts. Crucially, this is all compounded by increased adrenaline and cortisol (our stress hormones), which over time increase the power of this response.
This is the neuroscience behind lying in bed at midnight and still thinking about what Jake in Year 4 said, or mentally rewriting the email you sent to a parent, or catastrophising about Thursday's parent meeting.
So, what can we do about it?
Let’s look at 3 steps you could use to help you manage this…
Step 1: Start “Switch Off Signal”
With teaching in 2026, your brain doesn’t really know when work has finished for the day; especially if you’re working til 10pm!
We need a signal: a deliberate, repeatable routine that marks the boundary between "teacher mode" and "home mode".
For you, this might look like:
A 5-minute "brain dump" at the end of the school day: writing down tomorrow's three priorities and closing the book/laptop. This externalises the cognitive load, signalling to the brain that it can stop monitoring.
A deliberate physical transition: changing clothes, taking a specific route home, or putting the work bag in a designated spot and not touching it for a set period.
A “power down routine”: a last check of the emails, shutting the laptop down, quickly tidying your desk - even if that’s at 8pm, rather than 5pm. It’s a sign that the day is done.
Step 2: Regulate Before You Ruminate
When you arrive home already wired and wound up, strategies that need rational thinking (like journalling, talking it through or planning) are hard to do, your “thinking brain”, the prefrontal cortex, is still sort of offline.
The first step must be to physically downregulate the stress response and “fight or flight” system:
The physiological sigh: take one deep breath in, then sniff in a little more air at the top, then breathe out slowly. Research shows this double-inhale technique activates the parasympathetic nervous system (the "rest and digest" brake) faster than a standard deep breath
Extending the exhale: make your out-breath longer than your in-breath (e.g., 3 counts in, 6 counts out). The extended exhale activates the vagus nerve, which directly signals the brain that the threat has passed.
The vagus nerve runs from the brainstem all the way to the gut and is the main highway of the parasympathetic nervous system. Stimulating it, through slow breathing, humming, cold water on the face or neck, or gentle ear massage at the cymba concha (the fold of the outer ear) triggers a measurable slowing of heart rate and a drop in adrenaline.
Step 3: Switch From Pondering To Parking It
When we’re talking about rumination, we’re really talking about what’s known as “affective rumination”. It’s the most damaging type of non-detachment.
So your goal is to interrupt the "replay" loop and either convert the thought to something constructive, or consciously set it aside…
The "Why" to "How" shift: affective rumination tends to circle around "Why" questions “Why can't I do this? Why did that happen to me? Why won't things change?” These questions have no productive endpoint!
But problem-solving pondering shifts to "How" questions. “How can I approach this differently? How can I set this aside for now? How do I want to feel by the end of tomorrow?”
The "worry window”: bear with me here! Try scheduling a specific 15–20 minute window for thinking about work concerns. When rumination arises outside this window, the instruction to the brain is: "Not now. That's for Xpm." Research really does support that this "contains" rumination rather than suppressing it, which tends to backfire.
Challenge the thought, don't replay it. Ask: "Is this thought accurate? What's the evidence for and against? What would I tell a good friend who was having this thought?"
Aside from these 3 key steps, building these into your working day where you can, being aware of triggers and times where rumination occurs and protecting your sleep at all costs, are three ways to also further support your in switching off.
I’d like to leave you with a quote that really does sum up all of these strategies:
“You can’t solve a problem with the same level of thinking that created it.” - Paraphrased from Albert Einstein
The lesson here is that you cannot ruminate your way out of rumination, you can’t stress your way out of stress. We have to change the “level” you’re thinking on before we can change the overthinking.
I really hope this helps.
- Charlie
References
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Education Support (2025) Teacher Wellbeing Index 2025. London: Education Support. Available at: https://www.educationsupport.org.uk/resources/for-organisations/research/teacher-wellbeing-index/ (Accessed: 10 June 2026).
Mayo Clinic (2023) Chronic stress puts your health at risk. Available at: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/stress/art-20046037 (Accessed: 10 June 2026).
Querstret, D. and Cropley, M. (2012) 'Exploring the relationship between work-related rumination, sleep quality, and work-related fatigue', Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 17(3), pp.341–353. doi: 10.1037/a0028552.
Querstret, D., Cropley, M., Kruger, P. and Heron, R. (2016) 'Assessing the effect of a Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)-based workshop on work-related rumination, fatigue, and sleep', European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 25(1), pp.50–67. doi: 10.1080/1359432X.2014.1002326.
Sonnentag, S. (2012) 'Psychological detachment from work during leisure time: the benefits of mentally disengaging from work', Current Directions in Psychological Science, 21(2), pp.114–118. doi: 10.1177/0963721411434979.
