Factors Contributing to Teacher Burnout During COVID-19

Abstract

As teachers returned to the classroom for the 2020–2021 school year, they faced new and challenging environments, instructional approaches, and roles as educators. The current study is one of the first empirical studies that identified factors contributing to teacher burnout due to COVID-19 (coronavirus disease) and instruction during fall 2020. Controlling for demographics, the results found significant predictors for teacher burnout-stress those being COVID-19 anxiety, current teaching anxiety, anxiety communicating with parents, and administrative support. The results are important for schools and researchers to consider when it comes to the impact of COVID-19 on teachers.

Returning to teaching during COVID‐19: An empirical study on elementary teachers' self‐efficacy

“…This was especially true for elementary teachers, who often incorporate hands‐on activities, individualized and small‐group scaffolding, and cooperative learning into lessons (Lutz et al, 2006; M. Pressley et al, 2007; Slavin, 2015). With COVID‐19 still impacting lives, researchers have only begun to study the effect of the COVID‐19 pandemic on teachers (Hoang et al, 2020; T. Pressley, 2021; Song et al, 2020; Vu et al, 2020), but this article is the first to analyze and explore the potential impact on elementary teachers' efficacy in the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic.…”

Protective Factors and Teachers’ Risk to Burnout during the Covid-19 Pandemic. Do Kolb’s Educator Roles Matter? - A Cluster Analysis

“…Teachers with less professional experience were more likely to belong to the 'High psychological resources, no burnout risk' profile, and members of the profile 'Moderate psychological resources, mild burnout risk' were more likely to be experienced teachers. This may seem to contradict previous studies [13] that related high levels of professional experience to a low risk of burnout; however, taking into account that the pandemic context created new stressors, such as tech-nostress and a lack of resources and administrative support [9,65], the situation seems to have changed. Consequently, these results may be in line with the latest studies that suggested that experienced and self-confident teachers in face-to-face teaching became suddenly deskilled when transitioning to online teaching, experiencing disempowerment, vulnerability and frustration in using remote technology [72,82,83].…”

“…In summary, the new demands on the current education system caused teachers to juggle three different types of teaching approaches: social distancing in classes, online teaching, and hybrid teaching. In this context, short-and long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on preschool and primary education have led to increased levels of burnout among teachers [9,11]. This study has shown that the teachers who are less protected against the burnout profile during the adverse context of the COVID-19 pandemic are those with moderate levels of well-being, self-control, and positive emotionality and who prefer the Expert and Coach educator roles.…”

“…In the general context of the impoverishment of the teaching occupation [1], the pandemic crisis negatively affected teachers' psychological resources with new stressors proximal to burnout, such as fear of COVID-19 [9,10], anxiety about teaching demands, parent communication and administrative support [10]. The lack of resources also affected teachers' accomplishments, demonstrating that the greater the perception of a resource deficit, the lower teachers perceive their accomplishments [11].…”

“…The literature also identifies professional experience as a major factor in preventing burnout. In this regard, despite the fact that previous studies have shown that teachers with more professional experience are less vulnerable to burnout [12,13,63], the pressure of moving the whole instructional process to a remote environment concomitant to learning in a very short time with the use of new technologies increased the levels of stress and anxiety [64][65][66] and generated exhaustion and burnout even in the case of experienced teachers [9,67]. Moreover, the few studies conducted in the pandemic context revealed that older teachers often demonstrated weak digital skills, highlighting the need for professional development in using digital technologies [68], while the younger teachers used a higher number of tools for teaching and learning, demonstrated better digital competence and had more confidence in using digital technology and openness to new technology [69].…”