9 Tips for Overcoming Classroom Stage Fright

On a spring afternoon in the 1990s, I happened upon one of my professors in a campus restroom. The renowned metaphysical sci-fi author caught me eyeing his hands, which trembled as he lathered them with liquid soap. “I get the shakes before every class starts,” he explained. “Every class for 30 years.”

The Effects of Stage Fright on Teachers

I’ve encountered many K–12 instructors and preservice teachers since then who share my professor’s performance anxiety, a condition that causes them to mumble or forget critical concepts. Recent research on preservice teachers in China notes that teacher anxiety:

Negative coping mechanisms, like over- or under-eating and drug dependency, may also result.

Anxiety intensifies when administrators or university supervisors are present in the room. On top of being evaluated, you have to negotiate role ambiguity: Is your audience the students or the evaluators? At the very least, the experience is unpleasant; at its worst, it’s terrifying. I’ve been there.

What Causes Stage Fright?

Baked into our brains is the fight-or-flight response to perceived threats. When confronted by something scary, the body automatically shuts down nonessential functions, like digestion, and amps up blood flow, muscle tension, and perspiration to prime you to crush the danger or race to safety. Mary Fensholt, author of The Francis Effect: The Real Reason You Hate Public Speaking and How to Get Over It, believes that fear of public speaking is related to the ancient fear of being eaten. Thirty-five thousand years ago in sub-Saharan Africa, a couple dozen eyes staring your way meant that it was lunchtime for a pack of predators. Here’s a trick to reverse that bio-evolutionary reaction while teaching: Imagine the students are baby bunnies—your prey.

9 Tips for Overcoming Classroom Stage Fright

You already know that practicing presentations will relax you, as will arriving early to organize the setting and troubleshoot any technologies that will be used. Here are nine other tips you might not have tried:

Lastly, find inspiration in Eleanor Roosevelt’s words: “You can gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’... You must do the thing you cannot do.”