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The spark for this episode comes from my just-for-fun reading life. I was reading (actually listening to the amazing Lauren Graham) One Italian Summer by Rebecca Serle. In Chapter 3, Serle describes the main character traveling for the first time on her own like this: "I am somewhere new where I have to be nimble, alert, present. It forces me into the moment in a way I hadn’t been in a year, maybe even ever.”
This connected with me because I want to be more present in the moments of my life. It also made me think about my experiences in the classroom when my students led discussions. This type of lesson "forces me into the moment.” When students run the show and can take the conversation in 100 directions that I have to be ready for, it requires me to be "nimble, alert, present." Why? I don’t think I’m alone. Many teachers—many humans—likely want to be more present in the day-to-day moments of our lives. Educators also have a ton of things to constantly be doing or thinking about doing, which takes us out of the moment. Certainly, there are many structural supports we need to put in place to improve teacher working conditions, including taking tasks off teachers’ plates. At the same time, I’d love to see leaders helping teachers to co-create the class conditions and design lessons for thoughtful student-led discussion. In my experience, this creates moments of professional satisfaction (seeing my students be brilliant without me stepping in is an absolute joy) and one of the more immersive types of experiences I’ve had as an educator (you know those ‘Oh wow, class is over?!’ moments). Leaders (Coaches, Department Chairs, PD Facilitators) Can… Step 1: Ask teachers to identify when they feel most present during class. Invite teachers to share, brainstorm, and plan how to create more feelings of being fully present with students. Offer any supports that may help (e.g., professional learning resources, opportunities to start meetings with a moment to reflect on moments of being present). Step 2: Offer Professional Development sessions on student-led discussion. Set teachers up for success by helping them plan out:
Step 3: Support teachers new to student-led discussions to try it out. Decrease the pressure. Trying new pedagogical strategies can be scary, especially strategies that require teachers to step back and respond to student ideas versus adhere to a structured information-sharing type of lesson plan. Co-create a list of evidence of success with your teachers. This way, you can emphasize the focus on student comments and actions instead of teacher actions. Step 4: Encourage visits to peer classrooms. Invite teachers who frequently have rich, student-led discussions to share what they do well. Ask if anyone would be interested in having teachers new to student discussions visit their class to see one in action. If yes, you can share a Google Doc/Sheet where teachers can add dates and times when they are having a class discussion. Offer coverages for visiting teachers as needed. Step 5: Facilitate ongoing reflection. Regularly invite teachers to share successes such as insightful student comments and practices or discussion questions that have generated high student engagement. Final Tip I’m inspired by Shane Safir and Jamila Dugan’s concept of a pedagogy of student voice, which they write about in their book, Street Data. In it, they encourage teachers to design lessons that have students talking 75% of the class time. Since publication, I’ve heard Shane Safir say the percentage maybe should have been even higher. I think this is a great goal to guide our aspirational teaching, coaching, and leading. To help you help teachers implement more student-led discussions in your school or district, I’m sharing my Circle Facilitation Guide with you for free. (This is my all-time favorite student-led discussion protocol!) And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 139 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. TRANSCRIPT I'm educational justice coach, Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling, and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings. If you're a principal, assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nering out about co-creator curriculum of students. I made this show for you. Here we go. I'm so excited about this episode where I was listening to an awesome audio book and I was like, this is the thing that I think synthesizes being a human and being an educator in education and also really helpful practical strategies for student discussion in the class, which is a strategy that I'm always talking about and an ambition that I think we all have is that we want students to lead conversations and lead what goes on in the classroom. 00:01:10 So here we go. Let's get into it. So the spark of this episode comes from my just for fun reading life. I was reading, actually listening to The Amazing Lauren Graham. I love Gilmore Girls One Italian Summer by Rebecca Star in chapter three Soul describes the main character traveling for the first time on her own. Like this quote, I am somewhere new where I have to be nimble alert present. It forces me into the moment in a way. I hadn't been in a year, maybe even ever end quote. Now, this connected with me because I want to be more present in the moments of my life. It also made me think about my experiences in the classroom when my students led discussion. So this type of lesson quote forces me into the moment in Cyril's words, when students were in the show and can take the conversation in 100 directions that I have to be ready for. It really requires me to be again in Cyril's words, nimble alert and present. So why turn this into a podcast of his own? So I don't think I'm alone. I think many teachers, many human beings in general, right? 00:02:14 Like we want to be more present in the day to day moments of our lives. Educators along with many people, right? Also have a ton of things to constantly be doing or thinking about doing, which takes us out of the moment we're always thinking about the next thing we're always worried about a fire that's definitely gonna gonna happen in the class or some student behavior or uh I'm being observed. And so I have to be worried about my evaluation and assessment from some other person, right? I think there's a lot of things that happen in teachers minds that take us out of the moment. But what a powerful situation to be in, to be present with people in the act of learning to be present when creativity hits or when insight develops and comes out or when we link the pieces together and get this new realization of the world or of a concept, right? That is brilliant. And for those of us who have been in the classroom and are now out of the classroom, I I want to include leaders who are still in school buildings that maybe not in classrooms all the time. Like for us, I think that is really tangible, really something that you can or probably have experienced in your educational career post being a classroom teacher. 00:03:28 Those are the things we missed, right? Those are the moments that we remember fondly that we want to still kind of be part of our day to day. If possible, we want to be in classrooms as much as we can because that's where so much of the joy is now. Certainly there's a lot going on in education, there's high turnover for a lot of really powerful reasons, right? It's not without reason that people are leaving the profession. And so there are many structural supports, we need to put in place to improve teacher working conditions, of course, including taking a lot of tasks off teachers plates. At the same time, I'd love to see leaders helping teachers to core the class conditions and design lessons for thoughtful student led discussion in my experience. Again, these are the moments of professional satisfaction that I experienced, seeing my students be brilliant without me stepping in or assisting them. Absolute joy, absolutely joyous and, and, and one of the most immersive types of experiences that I've had as an educator. Those you know, oh wow, classes over already moments. 00:04:30 Those are the moments. It's when the students were running the show, when the students were discussing and I was sitting back and just taking notes and listening to their insights and the unique ways that they drew connections across classes or linked to their experiences or pose kind of a new. What if the world looked like scenario that I had never considered before? So what do we do with all of this? Right? Leaders, this includes coaches, department chairs, PD facilitators, principals, all the things. Here's what I would encourage us to think about doing. One. Ask teachers to identify when they feel most present during class, brief, reflective activity, invite teachers to simply share brainstorm plan how to create more feelings of being fully present with students. You could also do this with colleagues. But I think for our purposes today, let's talk about when do they feel present in the classroom? So just invite that conversation, then offer any supports that might help. So if they've planned out like, well, here's where I feel more most present and I want to do more of this. Here's what I think I need offer as many of those supports as we can. So that might look like professional learning resources, opportunities to start meetings that you have with teachers with a brief moment of reflection on the moments of where were you present or when were you most present during this week? 00:05:45 Like which moments of your class did you really feel that moment of presence? And what were you doing? And how could we do more of that? Right? Just creating space for that reflection at the start of our meetings can be just AAA mental stopping point where we say no, we have a lot of tasks, we have a lot of things on the agenda for our meeting, but this is what's important and this is what we want more of. So we can at least take two minutes to go around and everyone share for 20 seconds. What were those moments of presence and how do we do more of them? And just also to connect human to human to see what the teacher across the hall believes or experiences as those moments of presence, maybe those could be moments of presence for us, but maybe it's also a connection for us to hear about another person's presence. The next thing we can do offer PD sessions on student led discussion. I think this is critically important. One of the things that I think sometimes we do and I certainly am um falling into this category myself, as I say, oh, we should do more of this. But without offering all of the supports about how to set it up, right? If we just say go do student discussion, it could crash and burn, it could be like, really not effective. 00:06:54 And then the teachers, like, why would I ever do that again? Of course, I wouldn't. Right. So there's so many things to consider and if we prepare well for it, it can go well, I think it's also really hard whenever we're trying anything new in education or otherwise to recognize where, ok, we just have to refine and try again and keep trying because it's worth it versus this is crap and I wanna stop doing it. Why would I do this again? Let's quit now instead of just like dragging my students through the kind of slog, I think this is one of those things where it is worth it, but we have to be able to do enough upfront so we can see where it's worth it. So thinking about what we plan out, then we have to help teachers plan out what to do in advance of the student discussion. For example, we need a compelling question. If you have a Socratic seminar, for example, and your que question is just like very bland or very teacher facing. It's not compelling students to jump out of their seat wanting to answer. Then we're not gonna probably have a very great discussion. We might have a discussion, but it's not gonna be monumental. 00:07:59 It's not gonna be full of excitement. It's not gonna be that moment of presence that we're really looking for. We also want to make sure that we core discussion agreements. The class culture has to be one where discussion can flourish and harm is going to be at least reduced or prevented to a great extent. We may not always be able to ensure that harm isn't going to happen, but we can core and have the conversation about those discussion agreements ahead of time and that's really critical. We don't just dive into a discussion without talking about how do we discuss in a way that is generative and honors the dignity of all students. I've had episodes about that in the past. Feel free to reference those for more on that. I also think we want to talk about how we respond to things that might happen in the discussion. Now, for this sometimes teachers are so fearful of what might happen that they don't even, that might be the number one reason they don't wanna have student led discussion, right? So let's proactively address it, things that could happen, harmful statements, students cause harm to one another, inaccurate statements that are positioned as facts. 00:09:03 So I think you just comes out and just says a thing like it's true and it's totally not right. Like what, how do we think through that um discussion agreements that are violated? Right? All of these things could happen. How do we address it as an educator? Like as a leader? I wanna make sure that all of my teachers are comfortable and confident in how to address each of those scenarios. So we wanna talk through them in advance of the actual discussion also. What can we do after? So some of those things that happen in the moment we want to address in the moment and some of them we want to address after. So part of it knowing what to do in the moment is what do I do in terms of speak right now in the middle of class when it happens? And what are the pieces that I'm like? Ok, I'm not gonna say anything. Now, my action in the moment is silence. I'm going to come back to this either at the end of the lesson or the next lesson. Also, if you were interested in this episode and really amplifying discussion strategies at your school. My favorite all time. One is Circle Protocol. I'm sharing my Circle facilitation guide with you for free and you can get it at Lindsay beth lions dot com slash blog slash 139, for example, um I want to address factual statements the next lesson. 00:10:14 So I might just make a note in my paper. We're gonna come back to that the next day. We're gonna do a whole class lesson on these five statements that are questionably factual. And we're gonna talk about source bias and we're gonna actually determine whether they're factual or not. And that's going to be a lesson versus a harmful statement if harm was caused in the moment, I'm gonna jump in probably that. Right. So it's going to depend and we wanna work with teachers to determine what's their comfort level. What questions do they have? Like, what do we need to work through? Um that the demands that we, we act and, and what can absolutely be more helpful if we plan for the next day? Ok. So what to do after might be also reflecting as a class. It might be that you share your feedback. Here's what I heard. Here are some amazing statements that I loved. Here's some insightful things, here's some discussion agreements that were followed really well. I really liked how this student invited this student to speak when he realized she hadn't spoken or whatever. It might also be, as I said to address inac inaccuracies and statements or repair harm as needed. Now, I also think we should be supporting teachers. So third thing we can do, support teachers new to student led discussions to try it out. 00:11:22 So that act of just trying that orientation of like we're gonna learn requires us to decrease the pressure. So trying new pedagogical strategies can absolutely be scary, especially those strategies like this one that require teachers to really step back and respond to student ideas versus I have the plan. I'm following the plan. Here's the structured information sharing type of lesson that's very common in teaching. I learned this in teacher school. I'm gonna put a transparency on the board kind of vibe and we're just gonna go through it when you have to respond to what students are doing way harder than to just follow your scripted lesson plan. So what do we do to make teachers feel more supported in this testing kind of phase? We co create a list of evidence and success with your teachers. For one, I think being able to name, here's what we're looking for. Here's what I wanna hear or see or you know, experience in your class. Here's what I think that's I'm trying to decrease my a list language. I think that's what I want to say right here is what I want to experience. Here's the evidence that we are seeking as we enter this classroom, right? 00:12:26 What does it look like? And this way, you can really emphasize in that co creation with the teacher of what the evidence looks like. We're actually focused on student actions instead of teacher actions So what are the students doing? Not, what is the teacher doing? That's what we're looking at. And that really decreases the pressure on the teacher. I think also and I, I almost think they should go without saying, but when we're trying something new, that's not when you observe for like something that goes in a teacher file, right? That's not a formal observation. This is just like coaching, right? So we're not encouraging a teacher to do this for their observation lesson. OK. Four thing we can do encourage visits to peer classrooms, invite teachers who frequently have really rich student led discussions to share what they do. Well, so what's the protocol you use? What is, you know, what do you do when X happens during a class discussion? Right? Let's learn from people who are doing it well with this. Maybe the same students that I have in my class or you know, students who are at least in the school building also ask if any of those teachers would be interested in having teachers who are new to student discussions, visit their class to see a discussion in action. 00:13:37 If they say us, I think it's really great to set up some supporting documentation. So for example, to share a simple Google doc or Google sheets where teachers can add here is the date and time I'm having a class discussion, feel free to visit. And then as a leader try to see if you could just step in and cover that class for the visiting teacher if that's needed, right? Or, or arrange a sub for the day, right? So if a teacher is having discussions all throughout one classic, bring in one sub to kind of rotate through and sub for the teachers who are going in different class periods or something, right? Like really make it a priority, this thing we could do. I think it's really important to facilitate ongoing reflection. So regularly invite teachers to share successes such as insightful student comments. I think those are the best, right? This is what the student said. And here is how they connected this current event with like three different classes and they made this el a history connection they brought in science or math or they actually connected to something they're doing in pe or they like just had this beautiful insight and we just want to share it, right? 00:14:43 Because we can get really jazzed about student ideas as educators, right? That that is something that's going to keep the momentum. Hi and to keep the momentum going, I also think things to share include like practices. So what are the protocols or you know, I I think a lot of people are challenged by Socratic seminar. So one of the things that in concert with many teachers over the years that that we did where I worked the last school I worked at kind of the network actually a network of schools kind of built together over time and refined what a student worksheet would look like. And so it became like, OK, page one of this three page student seminar packet was an entrance ticket. So we need the entrance ticket to be able to have a basic like you did the work enough to get into the discussion kind of thing. And then there was what are we doing during? OK. Well, we are gonna ask you to write down at least two statements that you heard and what you think about them, which you can do later, but you have to write at least two pieces of evidence down that your, that your peers shared. OK. Now, what do we do after we reflect on, did we learn anything factually any new ideas that came to us? 00:15:47 How did the discussion agreements go? Do we do? Well, there, do you want to do better next time? What do you want to do better? So the protocol itself um as well as the practices or resources involved like the worksheet also discussion questions. So I think it's really hard sometimes to come up with a really highly engaging discussion question often you'll see in my unit dreaming episodes a question that frames a whole unit, for example, might take half of the conversation because once we get that now we're rolling and everything kind of falls into place, but that's really important. So the more we can curate kind of really compelling examples like students really gravitated to this example, we can identify patterns in that. So is there something maybe a frame, a type of question or a sentence starter almost of the of the question that is really compelling across student groups? And let's try to use that as kind of our best practice moving forward. I am as a final tip here, inspired by Shane Ser and Jamila Dugan's concept of the pedagogy of student voice, which I've talked about before they wrote about this in their book Street Data, which I love in it. 00:16:53 They encourage teachers to design lessons that have students talking about 75% of the class time. And actually, since the publication of this book, I've heard Shane Seir say the percentage maybe should have been even higher. But I think this is a great goal to guide our aspirational teaching, coaching and leading. So as kind of a shared goal to orient us to this conversation of what do we want our school to look like? What do we want our classrooms to uh kind of feel like? Right, what's the experience we want people to have? How do we increase that presence for teachers? That joy of like, yeah, I feel professionally successful because my students are doing this because I help them to get to that point. And also my students are just brilliant and I get to soak it in and I get to be nimble. Right? I get to be responsive and I get to just be fully immersed in this moment of amazingness. Right. That is exciting. And so what does that look like? Well, maybe it looks like 75% student talk time or student engagement time as a student creation time in, in some regard where it doesn't have to be verbal talking. But I think that is the goal and I can't wait to hear how people are using this or doing this kind of thing. 00:17:59 Please share more tips with me. I would love to hear them. I cannot wait to be in some classrooms this year and really get back in there and start experiencing the brilliance of students myself. Super stoked. Here we go. If you like this episode, I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am about my coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane Sapir and Jamila Dugan, talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book street data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period. I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. If you're smiling to yourself as you listen right now, grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm. How I can help you make this big dream a reality. I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. Sign up for a nerdy no strings attached to brainstorm, call at Lindsay beth lions dot com slash contact. Until next time leaders think big act brave and be your best self. This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better Podcast Network better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there, explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode.
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In this podcast episode, we delve into the power of meaningful conversations in education, emphasizing the role of educators in fostering student voices, creating safe spaces for student expression, and setting monumental goals for academic growth. Kara presents tons of useful student-led discussion strategies, and of course, we tackle the challenges of teaching students to engage in discussions about issues of justice and equity.
Kara Pranikoff is an educator in New York City. She has worked as a classroom teacher; reading interventionist; Instructional Coach; curriculum designer; and an adjunct instructor at Bank Street College of Education. As a consultant Kara partners with school to nurture independent thinking, voice and a sense of belonging for all members of the community. She supports educators in deepening their practice of inquiry-based teaching of social studies and writing. Kara’s book, Teaching Talk: A Practical Guide to Fostering Student Thinking and Conversation (Heinemann, 2017) shares ways to foster productive and independent student discussions in elementary and middle school classrooms. The Big Dream Kara’s dream for educators is to keep their eye on the big picture of education. We are raising humans! As educators, we walk alongside children on their journey of growth. Alignment to the 4 Stages: Mindset, Pedagogy, Assessment, and Content Educators who can adopt an abundance mindset and understand that nurturing student voices is a process are going to be highly effective. For pedagogy, we want to co-create an environment of understanding between teachers and students, set community agreements, and provide time for conversation and reflection. For assessment, we can create an artifact of student-led conversations and of course, have clear expectations for what teachers and students should ideally be doing in a student-led discussion. As far as content, discussion should revolve around topics relevant to students and their life experiences. Mindset Shifts Required We have the time and resources for what is truly important. We can remind ourselves (and our teachers) that nurturing student voices is a process that requires patience and deep listening. Action Steps Step 1: Be clear and explicit with your students about the fact that you are working to ensure their ideas are central is really important. Step 2: Set community agreements about what talking and listening (i.e., a good discussion) is going to look like and feel like in the community. Step 3: Invite students to share some ideas they want to talk about—maybe based on a text that you just read. Then, students can vote on what they want to talk about. Go with it! Step 4: After a discussion, provide dedicated time for reflection and student autonomy to problem-solve and explore how they experienced the discussion and what they might want to change moving forward. Step 5 (ongoing): Curate sparks! (e.g., images, topics, quotes, song lyrics that might generate student conversation) Challenges? Overcoming the fear of saying the wrong thing during difficult conversations and navigating conversations about justice and equity. Action steps for this challenge:
Teachers may also feel pressure to keep conversations on track and avoid tangents. Action steps for this challenge:
One Step to Get Started Find a friend or a coach to help navigate the process. This person can provide support and help with preparing responses to difficult conversations. Also, communicate with parents and caretakers from the get-go about the pedagogical approach and the importance of open conversations in the classroom. Stay Connected You can find Kara on her website: www.eyesopeneducation.com. To help you implement the ideas in this episode, Kara is sharing her Partner Talk Data Collection Resource with you for free. And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 138 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. Quotes:
TRANSCRIPT Kara Prank is an educator in New York City. She has worked as a classroom teacher, reading, interventionist instructional coach, curriculum designer, and an adjunct instructor at Bank Street College of Education as a consultant. Kara partners with schools to nurture independent thinking, voice and a sense of longing for all members of the community. She supports educators in debating their practice of inquiry based teaching of social studies and writing. Kara's book teaching, talk, a practical guide to fostering student thinking and conversation shares ways to foster productive and independent student discussions in elementary and middle school classrooms. I am so excited for this conversation. Let's get right to it. We are talking student led discussions. Today, I'm educational justice coach, Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling, and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings. If you're a principal assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nering out about co-creator curriculum of students. 00:01:09 I made this show for you. Here we go. Hi, Araniko. Welcome to the time for teacher shift podcast. Hi, Lindsay. I'm so delighted to be here to talk to you and to, I think alongside of you, I am so excited and we have so much in common that we do and we also have unique kind of ways that we bring ourselves and our experience to the coaching work that we do. So I am super excited to learn from you in this conversation and also see really exciting points of overlap. And for listeners, I think they'll connect with a lot that you are bringing to this conversation today. So with that, is there anything listeners should know as we're headed into this conversation? Oh, such a good question. Um One of the things that I feel very fortunate about is that in my time as an educator, I've been to able to explore lots of different avenues. And I feel really grateful for the opportunity to have done that um as an educator for, you know, 25 years now. Um I spent time a long time in the classroom. 00:02:14 I was a reading specialist for a long time. I was an instructional coach for a long time. I then went back into the classroom and I think that ARC has provided me uh the opportunity to really wrap my arms around what it looks like in a school community from a lot of different perspectives. So I'm very, very fortunate in that I also am the mom of two young adults. So my eldest child is 21 right now and my youngest is 18. And I feel like that journey of being a mother has provided me like an incredible amount of the depth and understanding both in how to communicate with kids. What are the largest things that you want to teach them? And also just the notion of walking alongside Children as they grow up like adjacent to their journey. But it's their journey. And I think that my role as a mother and my place as a mother has really deepened my own educational practice. Wow, that is such a beautiful idea to keep in mind. I think it actually flows really nicely into the next question that I wanna ask you, which is about freedom dreaming. 00:03:19 And I love Doctor Bettina loves quote around this dreams grounded in the critique of injustice. And so with that in mind, what is that big dream that you hold for the fields? I think my largest dream for educators is to really keep their eye on the big picture of education. So when I think about teaching, I think no matter what we're doing as educators in the school space, our largest goal is that we're raising humans, right? We're trying to, to inform, to create, to support Children whatever age they are and becoming their own best selves. And that's a life's work. Right. We're doing this as adults also. But I think in a school you've got to really keep your eye on that largest picture. Um, and not, not stray from it. So there are times when teachers might say they don't have time for that conversation after recess when kids are in conflict or they, they can't really make time for social studies because there's so many other things that happen. And I really want to encourage educators to stay true to themselves and stay true to what they think is most important in raising humans, right? 00:04:27 And in the incredible beauty that we have in growing alongside the humans that were, that were helping to raise, right? It goes both ways we become better as humans, whatever our age is, if we keep our eye on, on that largest goal. So I really think about that a lot. Yeah. Oh, that's so good. And I, I really appreciate so many of the things that you said one, the goal itself to the idea that we grow with Children. So a lot of times I think we get this martyr to mindset of like we have to expend all of our energy and all of ourselves and sacrifice, sacrifice for Children. Like no, it's it's best when we're both at our best when we're growing alongside. So that idea is so powerful particularly I think for new either teachers or people new to whatever role they're stepping into, whether that's a leader or coach, that is a huge concept that I, I want people to like latch on to as they listen. And then also I think the idea of not having the time is so often what we hear. 00:05:30 Right. And, and I think it seems to be sometimes and I don't know what you experience, but it seems kind of to erode at that educator by self or like staying true as you said to what's most important in raising humans because we feel like we sacrifice a bit of who we authentically are. And I just, I'd love to hear your thoughts around that idea of not having time. And I think this might even link to, you know, the next thing I usually ask about is like one of those like components that I talk about is like mindset. So like, you know, how, what's our mindset when it comes to this? But I think it also probably transcends into other things like pedagogy, the concept we teach, how we assess all that kind of thing. Um I just asked you like 40 questions in once but to, to get your thoughts. Let's see. Um So I, I think about a abundance mindset and time with teachers a lot. So we're, we're kind of programmed in school settings to think about what's gonna happen in this 45 minute period or what's gonna happen in this one day and when I coach teachers or sit with a team, I try to think big. 00:06:34 Like instead, can we think about where do you wanna be in three months with these kids? Where do we wanna be in six months at the beginning of the year? What are our largest goals? What do we want our Children to walk away with? And I wanna, and I wanna, again, think big. I want my students to really understand uh that their ideas matter that they have the capacity to bring their own voice to discussions. Well, if that's my biggest idea, then I can keep my eye on that idea and it can keep me true to what I'm doing in the day to day and in the, in the moments, I also want to, to help teachers be gracious with themselves. Right? A lot of the work that I do is around communication, around student voice and um student thinking which takes time and is a process and I want teachers to hold on to that process and appreciate that process for themselves as well. So if you're heading into a conversation and you're not sure what to say to a student or you've cut off a student and realize that you shouldn't. 00:07:37 It's OK be gracious. Go back and say, you know, I'm really sorry, I didn't mean to jump into that conversation. Can you continue with your idea or can you continue with your thought? Or if you realize that a student really had something that was pressing and you felt the urgency of moving along in the lesson cycle back, right? Adults appreciate that in our own communication and relationships. We're always appreciative if the next day a colleague or a partner comes back to us and says, you know what I've been thinking about this thing you said and I want to return to it, we can do the same thing with our students and we can encourage our students to do the same thing with each other, right? That's a life skill. And I think we have the capacity in our classroom to, to teach, to teach that we do have time for every conversation that's important to us. We, we have it, we have the capacity to do it. And I want to encourage teachers to trust their instincts and to really tune into what they think is important in that moment and allow themselves to just stop what's happening and, and address what needs to be addressed. 00:08:43 I think that's so important that, that we do have time like you were saying for, for what is important to us to me like often, what we do is we treat it like uh you know, uh we just keep adding to the to do list, right? Like so let's cram it in, let's fit it in, let's cover the content, right? Like these are concepts that we constantly hear, but instead it's like a prioritization. Like what is most important to you? You do that first and then you can get to the other stuff and that's a really different way of looking at it versus I have this finite amount of time and I still must do all of the things on the list which is literally impossible. So, and it never stops. Right. The, the fact of the matter is, is we have to understand the system that we're working in. The system that we're working in is never ever gonna say, OK, teachers, right? Pa pause. Everything really start thinking about the community that you're teaching in, really start listening to the stories that your kids wanna tell about their own lives and their own experiences really stop and think about ways to help kids listen to each other, to develop their own thoughts, to understand how to navigate conflict in a restorative way, teach us stop. 00:09:53 It's never gonna happen. So we can make it happen, right? We can help as coaches. If you're a teacher, you can um find AAA colleague who's in on it with you and be accountable to each other. I don't think this work can happen in isolation. Um But I think we can create the space. I, I know we can create the space. I love that and I, and I love also that you have said several times the word process. And so I think that's really interesting. I'd love to ask you about that. Like, I'm just imagining, you know, a new teacher, for example, or even the new instructional coach who's like, how do I help my teachers? Right. How would you even begin a conversation or the process? Right. With the teacher who's like, I know what I wanna do. I want the same goal. I have the same goal that maybe you just described. I just am not sure what the process looks like. How would you like, encourage them to either think through that or approach that? Right? Such a good question. Yeah, process is a huge word for me clearly. 00:10:59 Um And to your point about education tends to be about product, right? How, how are we, how are we doing on this assessment? What is the data? I actually think if we go back to how we all learn, we are excited about learning and we learn the most when we're in process. So where is it that I wanna go? I think a new teacher or a new coach or even an experienced teacher or coach that has a priority um can literally posts that priority somewhere, hold on to it and understand that the process is about um thinking about that priority across the day. So if I have a priority of ensuring that my students in my classroom develop their own ideas and raise their own voices then across content areas, that process looks like. What am I doing with? My voice. How am I checking my tendency to jump in? What can I do to not jump in? Can I not say anything? Can I be clear with my students and say one goal that I'm working on as a teacher is to center your voices? 00:12:05 So that's gonna look different in this classroom than it might in other classrooms. I'm gonna ask a question. I'm gonna be quiet and it might be uncomfortable for a minute, but we're gonna work through that discomfort together. I'm gonna just sit and take notes on what you say. Or I'm gonna ask you, what are you thinking? And that's gonna be the open ended question or I'm gonna just allow quiet to happen, I think are the process is about being clear for yourself, being clear for your students and understanding that the process, the real learning is messy. It's, it's mucky and we sometimes move away from it because it feels mucky and messy. But you're only learning if you're like in the mud of it, all, all of us are on our growth edge teachers and students. If we're in the mud, it's not supposed to be easy. It's supposed to be engaging. It's supposed to be interesting. You're supposed to walk away and keep thinking about it or come into school the next day and say, you know, we talked about this idea and I, at the dinner table, I shared that that's when, you know, the learning is happening and we're in process. 00:13:07 It's not in a container. No, none of us are so. And if you're beginning, I think that listening is crucial. All of us want to be seen and heard regardless of our age. So if you're a teacher, how are you going to help your students feel seen and heard? How are you gonna help them see and hear each other? How are you gonna help the parents in your community be seen and heard and know that they're, they're valued. If you're a coach, it's the same thing. You can't speed through that and it needs to be nurtured and cultivated all the time. Right? If you're a coach, a teacher might sit down, you want that teacher to share what's on their mind, you want to meet them where they are, it's not about your agenda, right? That, that's about the process and when you're coaching, you're in a teacher's process, right? So what can you do to support and nurture that teacher's process? I think listening is really incredibly crucial. Wow, that is so good. And, and I'm thinking too, I, I think you spoke to so many specific things, right? 00:14:12 That an instructional leader can do. I know in, in your practice because you do this all the time. It's like co teachers around this very thing. Are there specific either moves strategies, practices that you have found to be really effective in helping teachers move through this process? That you would suggest to anyone listening. Hm. Yeah, I think, like I said before, I think being clear and explicit with your students about the fact that you are working to ensure their ideas are central is really important. I think establishing community agreements about what talking and listening is going to look like and feel like in the community is crucial, establishing with your kids, what's a good discussion going to feel like we talk sometimes about the obvious points of a conversation, we're gonna look at the speaker, our hands aren't gonna be fidgeting what whatever it might be. Some of those things, most of those things I find not to be true. 00:15:15 There are plenty of us adults in the world who uh pace when they're thinking, right? So is there a space to provide pacing or standing in your classroom? Right? If a student's not looking at someone who's speaking but is doodling, that doesn't mean they're not listening, right? So I think it's about establishing what you're trying to build with your community and then talking through the things that bump. So a student might say to another, it feels like you're not listening to me because you're not looking at me. Well, that's a great point for a conversation that other student can say, you know, it's hard for me to look at you. It's easier for me if I take notes or fidget or whatever it might be. So, I think establishing the criteria. I also believe that students need to bump and then figure out what bumped and come up with how to try again. So oftentimes in a classroom, if you're starting to have a whole group conversation that's moderated from the Children, right? 00:16:17 Not from the teacher, you can imagine sitting in a whole circle so we can see each other. A student has, you know, several students maybe have, uh suggested. Here are some ideas from this text that we just read that I wanna talk about. The students have voted on what they wanna talk about. Even if you think it might not lead to a good conversation. You're the teacher and you're not gonna say that right? You're gonna let it fly, right? The first few conversations are gonna be done. We don't traditionally teach kids how to have their own conversation. We program them how to answer a question. Well, that doesn't help their own critical thinking that doesn't support them in the world. So you have to expect that it's gonna be ugly at the beginning and, and let it go for a minute and then stop and say so is this how we want a conversation to feel? Are are we going to be talking over each other? Right? Or we're not even gonna say that just like does this feel good? What doesn't feel good? How are we gonna make it better and lead from the students? Let them have a sense we underestimate. I think our kids of all ages and what their capacity is and it's important for them to know that they've got agency and the classroom can be their studio, right. 00:17:30 Their classroom can be a space where they can problem solve and try it out as a community and then it figure out what works as a community and individually as well. That was a lot. Then answer that question. Oh, my God. Beautifully. Yes. It's so good. Several things that I was just picking up on. I, I definitely appreciate that. We don't teach kids how to have conversations, particularly in an academic sense, right? Like we just, we totally train them to answer a question and there's typically a rights quote unquote answer. Right? And then it's worth searching for that and, and I love the idea of letting go, like letting them go. I was just reading the new um, Matthew K book with Jennifer or I think, um Yeah. And, and it's interesting, I can't remember the language they use, but they were like, sometimes you rein it back in and you, you, you know, control the conversation and keep it on the question that you had posed or that you had voted on with the students. And other times there are tangents that are worth going on and I can, I can think of so many with my high school students anyways. I know you work with a, with a younger group but they go on a tangent and I'm like, let's just see where this goes. 00:18:35 And some of the most insightful things that were said all year were a result of that tangent. Like it is. Absolutely. I want to say one other thing that I would suggest as you're having a conversation, I think it's incredibly important to hold, create an artifact of the conversation. It's really easy to let a conversation go and lose those nuggets, those tangents, those pieces that you want to come back to. So as a teacher, you can be jotting notes of exactly what said you can do it and a and a projection so that kids can see it. You can type, it doesn't need to be pretty. But I do think there's a real importance to holding on to an artifact of the conversation that helps both those nuggets that you want to come back to. Like, you know, Lindsay said this really interesting thing yesterday and we all seem to have a lot of thoughts about it. Let's look at it again, you know, with fresh eyes or after this next piece of text or at the end of this unit. Now, what do we think about what Lindsay said? And also if you're thinking about how a conversation flows and actually teaching the content of how to have a good conversation, that artifact can be helpful, right? 00:19:44 So sometimes we teach kids that you can't go off topic or that you can't repeat what somebody else has said. That's false. We do that all the time. One of the reasons we repeat what somebody else has said is because by putting it into our own words, we kind of hold on to it and then attach it to the thinking that we're, we're having in our, in our brains. It's not, it's not natural not to repeat what somebody else has said. It's how it flows. And so if you're actually looking at an artifact of a conversation with students, it can help give them a sense of the ways that they can enter and the ways that good conversations develop oftentimes in those tangents. If we don't interrupt them and they're not fruitful tangents, kids get back on track. They don't need us to say, you know, that has nothing to do with what your grandmother said or war has nothing to do with this conversation. Ki kids get it back on track. They don't need us and adults get off track too and then get back on track. Um I think a lot of times we hold students to this when we're starting open conversations, we all go to a false. 00:20:51 Um We, we desire something that's false. It's not the way our conversations go. So I think we need to be true to what's authentic in a, in a conversation and help them develop that. Yeah, that actually that leads me back to another thing. I want to touch on. I love this idea of like naming the challenges that teachers may experience or even honestly, administrators might experience when kind of coming into a class where maybe they're not in tune with what's being tried out. And, and maybe the teacher is nervous because there is this uh expectation of like silence, obedience, compliance, whatever the things are, right? And so I think one of the challenges I think for teachers that I've seen trying to start this work and being on of how to navigate that is redefining expectations, both for themselves and their students, but also for the broader school or the person coming in to observe them. And, and I think with, with what we do, what we both do, we talk a lot about justice and equity. And I think there are a lot of other challenges that given the nature of like what is happening in the world and that we, we know that students are attuned to what is happening in the world, how we navigate particular conversations I think are also, I don't know if they spark fear necessarily, but like maybe like a wariness or some sort of something with people who are doing this like, ok, well, what if a student takes it there or what if I want to have a conversation? 00:22:12 Do I present it to them? Do I wait for them to bring it up? I think there are a lot of challenges just topically of what we discussed. Um, how have you helped teachers to navigate that? Or what advice might you give to some? He's helping teachers navigate it or a teacher themselves who is navigating those challenges? That such a smart and thoughtful question? Lindsay? I think you're right. I think there are a lot of teachers who want to do this work and want to touch on either, you know, current events or ideas that are on their students minds. They know that they're there and they're afraid they're afraid they're gonna say the wrong thing. One strong piece of advice I have is to find a friend. I don't think that the work of talking about any of the typically difficult conversations, it can be done alone and there's a range of difficult conversations, it can be difficult to have a conversation about why kids are being mean to other kids in recess. It can be difficult to have a conversation around um a student or understanding um disability or understanding uh gender diversity or understanding racism or why a comment hit on a stereotype or implicit bias that a student doesn't know. 00:23:26 Right. So when I say difficult conversations, it's a huge range, right? So I think you're right, the teachers are very afraid of saying the wrong thing. So you need a friend and you need that friend so that you can call them at the end of the day and say so this is how it went. I'm not sure about this. Can you uh can I talk out what I'm gonna say the next day or? Oh my gosh, this thing happened and I'm not sure how to address it. Can I prepare with you? Find a friend, find a coach, right? Also understand like I had said before, you don't have to have, how do I say this? There's a sense of urgency all the time in schools and in difficult conversations, you don't need to know exactly how to respond in that moment. But if you're feeling like there is some injustice that's happening in the world in your classroom. The first thing to do is just to say, here's how I'm feeling and here's why and I'm gonna respond in this way, right? Just say something, say something is the first step because you can always come back, you can come back to it. 00:24:36 I also believe that we say sometimes um that kids can lead the conversations, right? That don't bring something up that your kids aren't bringing into your classroom. I don't believe that I think kids are very tuned in, they hear their adults talking, they listen to the news, they're on whatever social media they're on, they know what's happening in the world. They're developing their own ideas, whether or not they're talking about them. So instead I would like our classrooms to be a place where there are no questions that are taboo that I'm going to bring up something that's on my mind because chances are you've heard about it and you've thought about it, teachers sometimes are afraid of what parents are going to say. I think that if you are in a clear communication with parents from the get go that this is my philosophical belief. Here's my pedagogy, here's what this is gonna look like. Then parents aren't surprised. Parents are surprised when there's not communication, right? Communication needs to be steady and consistent all year long. And parents I found because I've led a lot of parent workshops about how to have conversations with your kids about XY and Z. 00:25:46 Parents aren't sure either how to talk to their kids. So again, if we can all give ourselves grace and know that most of us did not grow up in school settings or in family settings where we were talking about gender diversity, racism, uh ability, disability, neuro divergence, you know how to really resolve the conflict that I had in the playground in a restorative way where I can still get along with this kid in my class. We probably weren't having those conversations. So, so let's be gracious with ourselves and support each other in jumping in. Let let, let's have them, let's bring them up. And what I found is that as soon as you let kids know that there's no topic that's taboo. As soon as you let kids know here's what's on my mind. Here, here's what I'm I'm hearing and feeling kids are ready to talk, right? And in terms of equity, we need to allow them to talk and share their thoughts in a range of ways, right? Kids might not be ready to talk right then and there in the whole circle. 00:26:49 So you wanna provide space for kids to talk in writing, you wanna make sure that kids are, know that you're available to have quieter conversations that it you've left a conversation and it feels finished in the whole group. But if some child is still thinking about it on Wednesday, that that child can come back to you and keep talking about it right? There is equity. Again, it's about what's most important. If what's most important is the communication and the notion that in this classroom, kids can share their ideas and their voice then that you need to afford for that all the time and really clearly communicate that hi listeners. It's Lindsay popping in to tell you about today's episode. Freebie Cara is sharing a partner talk data collection sheet. It is amazing and packed with resources for you. You can grab this at Lindsey Beth lions dot com slash blog slash 138. Back to the episode that resonates so much with me as a college student. Actually, I had a professor who showed we, we were watching like video clips and like discussing it and there was an interpretation of a scene that I I felt was like, really upsetting to me and like I wanted to write about it the next week I brought it back up even though it wasn't actually the clip that we were discussing or writing. 00:28:02 And I was told that was last week's discussion. There was like this, these bumpers on the conversation, even though it was truly like, something that bothered me. And that, like, I just think about, I never thought about it in that way in that context for students to be like, I need a place to return to this conversation. I mean, it could be for a reason because it was upsetting, but it could also be I just finally connected the dots on what the student said and what I read and you know, like people have these different processing experiences, right? And like they're gonna come to it when they come to it. Like we need to be there ready for them and not say that was Wednesday's class, period. No, thank you. Conversation is done to how we learn, right? We as adults, I'm always writing down quotes ideas from books. I'm reading from podcasts. I'm listening to from conversations I have because that information informs my current thinking and then I integrate it into my future thinking, right? So we that's what we want, that's authentic learning. So yeah, conversations should not have bumpers. 00:29:05 I'm really sorry that that happened. No. Yeah. Yeah. No, that, that thank you. And that I think really, really resonates with me. I mean, one of the things too, um, I consult with Panorama Education and they do surveys for students and one of their survey questions and in one of their topics about, I think engagement is like, how often do you talk about the classroom stuff you're learning about at home, like at work, even outside of the school. So I know you've brought that up a couple of times that is like such a beautiful indicator and such a quick question that we could ask students in like a quick Google form or something to try to gauge, is this resonating and and is it meaningful? And did that discussion help you synthesize things in your world? Right? I I think there's so much here and, and it makes me think too again about that kind of like redefining expectations for an administrator coming in to like, see something in action. I'm wondering what advice you would give like an evaluator. Whether that was, I think coaches that I think sometimes are seen as evaluators, even though that's not the role of a coach. Um but any person, whether it's a principal admin type who's coming in to, to do an evaluation and is witnessing kind of a student discussion lesson? 00:30:12 What are the things that you would want for the teachers that you coach, that admin coming in to look for and like celebrate great question. If we go back to the thinking. I would want the administrators to keep their eye on what's actually being discussed. Sometimes administrators come in and they wanna make sure that everybody in the circle is speaking. I also don't think that's how conversations go. I think everybody needs to have access to speak. I think it is ok that some kids might want to be quiet until later in the conversation. Right? We need to nurture our quieter students and also help our students who talk and process out loud all the time to understand that those quieter students have important things to say. Also, maybe not at the beginning, right? Or maybe not today, maybe tomorrow or maybe with notes or, right? So I, I think that notion that everybody is gonna speak is not true. I think we want to think about the quality of the thinking, our ideas connected is what is the teacher doing to encourage and stay in the conversation? 00:31:24 Is she smiling and nodding? Is she bending down to whisper into the ear of a student that uh might look confused? Or is she coaching into a student that might need a nudge in a conversation? Is she making sure that if something really incredible is said, she pauses the conversation, she says, I, I just want everyone to think for a second about what Lindsay just said, give yourself a minute, take a note, think about it, then go back. I don't need to repeat the brilliance. I can let the student have it. Right. Ho how am I facilitating a conversation? So it stays with the students and I don't bring it to a place where I think it needs to go. Right? I also would want an administrator to ask a teacher about their process. What are you trying to achieve in this process of developing student conversation? Where have your students grown? How are you supporting the students before the conversation and after the conversation, what does reflection look like? 00:32:33 And that's gonna be different, right? If you go back again to the I talk to them, uh call them frequent talkers and quiet listeners. The frequent talkers need something before a conversation that's different. You might circle up all your frequent talkers and let them get their ideas out and process before you get to the whole group, you might circle up your quiet listeners and also let them practice and talk and take notes so they know what it is that they wanna share. So they've had some practice, but they need different supports, different, different practice before our whole group conversation. I would also want an administrator to have a sense of what are the expectations that have been developed inside this classroom. Right? I want an administrator to clue into the community that they're in and um see what's happening for the community understanding that the goal is not that I share my thought, but that as a whole we all deepen our understanding. So what does that look like? Right. And again, that takes, that takes training and a resh shifting of what it is that we're looking like for an administrator to this process is slow, right? 00:33:40 This isn't, you're not establishing this in a week. We're, we're growing. And so if we're thinking again about process, I want an administrator to understand where a teacher might be in their process and for a teacher to be able to articulate that to an administrator, here's what I'm going for. Here's what I've tried. What, what do you see as new eyes? What, what advice might you have? Ask me why I've made a decision or a choice, right? Oh, I love this and, and I, I'm gonna move in a minute to our final closing questions. But before I do that, I wanna make sure because you were a wealth of information and knowledge and experience. Is there anything that we didn't get to talk about that you wanted to add in? Because we kind of went all over the place it go all over the place. Is there anything else that I want to add in? Yeah, I do want to add this in. So we're speaking and it's the summer, it's the beginning of August. And I think if you're interested in student conversation and centering student ideas, you can be on the lookout all of the time for things that spark your thoughts and your ideas. 00:34:49 So I think all of the time about having conversations, but teaching kids how to navigate conversations with an interesting piece of art with a quote with a short video clip that maybe isn't content related, it's related to the content of life. Right? And summer, the reason I bring that up is that I think that in the summer process, we as teachers are, are probably at more museums than we usually are. We're walking around, there might be an image, a piece of graffiti, some mural somewhere that might spark conversation. So I think that we can attune our own selves to what makes us wanna talk, chances are it will make our students want to talk and you can start to gather um ways uh images, topics, quotes that might spark conversation. I think I, I love that so much and I used to do that in like a Google doc for my own students. And now that I'm a coach, I have tried to make transparent that process. 00:35:52 So I have started posting on linkedin under the hashtag unit dreaming just like here once a week, here's like what this could look like and it's so expansive, it could be like here's like a thing that I was staring at that is on my dining room table or something or, you know, or it's like a piece of nature like, you know, that I'm experiencing, it could be a book that I'm reading that's a fiction and it's just sparking something. It could be a podcast I listen to or a news story like it is like, what you're talking about, car I think is so much more than like sometimes what we allow ourselves to think about as teachers. We're very, sometimes like, oh, academics, it has to be an academic test or something or an academic quote that it's like, no, it could be a song lyric. It should be a song lyric. You want your kids to come in and say I was thinking about this lyric. Can we talk about it? That's the dream. Because to go back to where we started, we're raising humans and we want to raise humans who are thinking all of the time they're observing, they're thinking they're curious. We have to model that and we have to make space for that in our classroom. I love the song, lyric, songs are the best. 00:36:56 I did like a media critique year where all of my curriculum was through the lens of media critique. And so students are bringing like music videos and things like that. It's just like that is where we get the good conversation. Absolutely. I start with what they're on about. You gotta get there. Yep. Absolutely. So we talked to about so many different things. I know that this is a hard question. But if there's one thing that you would have a listener maybe start with once they end the episode kind of like, ok, I'm gonna go do this thing. It's gonna like, really help me as you were saying, remember what is important, right about raising humans and what is important to, to be a do as an educator. Um What would that one thing be that you would recommend only one Lindsay? Really? Only one you can cheat and do more than one if you like, I'm gonna give two. I think the first thing I would want all educators to do is to give them, say themselves the space and time before the year starts and then some check ins during the year to write down. What are the three highest priorities I have. 00:38:02 What do I want my students to walk away? Thinking and feeling and knowing about our community when we're finished? Right? Maybe it's not three, maybe it's one or two. It's certainly not more than three. But I think that's not, I think you wanna give some space and time for that and literally, I would post them somewhere for yourself. And I would be honest about them with your students, with your colleagues, with your parents. Here's what I'm on about, this is where we are. This is what's most important to me. I think that's huge. I think the second thing I would want all educators to do is practice listening and attune their own selves to where they are in a conversation. What does it feel like to be quiet to give yourself a pause when you're listening to an adult or to a student. How does that feel to understand that you're walking alongside and learning alongside that person in a conversation? Whatever their age is, it's not, it's not about sharing your thoughts. It's about walking alongside and constructing together. 00:39:09 And that requires adults to be quiet, quieter than we generally are. That is so good. Thank you for both of those. Those are so amazing. And, and so two final questions for you, what is something that you have been learning about lately? And this could be related to the field of education, but it could also be totally random. Um I love, I, I'm a huge reader and I'm kind of always in the middle of, you know, seven books at once related to teaching, related to, you know, the world related to whatever it is. Um But summer I find my reading life shifts and I end up reading more like memoir essays, narratives. I have more like capacity to take that in and to reflect. So I would say I'm in the midst of two of those types of books right now and they're providing a lot of good reflection. The first is there's an amazing essayist Rebecca Solnit. I don't know if you're familiar with her, but several years ago, I read her book, a field guide to getting lost. 00:40:17 And recently I took it and it was very influential. It's just like a really beautiful kind of meditation on getting lost, like physically, you know, in space and mentally and the, the importance of that and how we kind of come through that process. Anyway, I found this book on my shelf as I was looking for something else and I handed it to my 18 year old who um is leaving and going on to his next journey soon. And he read it recently, which allowed me to reread it and kind of re explore it, which was this like, beautiful, a really beautiful moment in our relationship to get his thinking on a book that had been so influential. So I'm reading kind of the companion book to that uh by so that, which is much more straight memoir. Um And it's called The Far Away Nearby. And the other essay book that I'm deep in the middle of is um a republished book of essays by Alice Walker called, we are the ones we have been waiting for. And the essay I'm currently reading is about the importance of pause and she talks about how in our culture, we don't really appreciate transition, right? 00:41:25 We, we come to the end of something and we think great, we've gotta move on what is coming next. And she talks about the importance of actually pausing and giving ourselves the space of thinking about like, WW what is this transition? We're, we're ending up in where, where is it that we're going and that's important for all parts of our life. And so I'm, I'm really just like leaning into both Rebecca Solnit and Alice Walker. Wow, those are great and going on my to read recommendations. Um The last question I have for you is where can listeners learn more about you, connect with you if you want to also talk about what you and I have been working on as well. Like feel free. This is, this is a great faith. I think it's so connected to what we've been talking about. That would be something we can share with listeners as well. Ok, great. So the way that listeners can connect with me directly is I have a website called Eyes Open Education. And you can find me in some of my writing there. I'm also on linkedin and I'm on Instagram at KL Prank off. So I would love to be in touch. I am certainly somebody who loves a conversation. 00:42:30 So if something I've said, resonates, send me an email, find me. I would love to be in conversation with you, Lindsay. I'm really excited about this idea that we're germinating and, and growing together. Um And uh you know, you started by saying that we overlap in, in ways and I so enjoyed enjoy you as a, as a colleague and as, as a friend and the idea that we're germinating is a way to create a coaching relationship virtually. So we're envisioning a way that teachers either new to a practice or, you know, further along in their practice can reach out to us on a virtual platform. We're playing around with Slack right now. Ask a question about really anything that's happening in their classroom. It could be a question about a conversation. They weren't sure how to navigate it could be a question about language in a letter that's going home to parents. It could be a question about how to develop a unit of curriculum. 00:43:32 I've gotten to this point. It could be a question really about anything. There would be have the chance to ask that question directly to us and we will answer either with text or with video or provide a resource. But really, Lindsay, what I think you and I are are most on about one of our priorities is developing a way that teachers can support each other and that we all teachers really have the space to ask a question when it arises and get an answer. And what we know from our practice is that reflective teachers are thinking about their practice all the time, right? And there's not always a person to ask, it doesn't happen in that PD session, right? To your point, right? The discussion isn't bumper, right? So we wanna provide space an opportunity for teachers to ask their questions and get customizable coaching when they need it. What would you say? In addition, I was gonna say, oh my gosh, I didn't mean to put you on the spot there, but that was beautiful. Um And it's so fun listeners, you get to kind of the the creation process because who knows by the time this airs, if they be, if they look slightly different, right? 00:44:40 Or that. But right now we're, yeah, we're excited to pilot with a small group because we're just interested in what this could look like. I think we've reflected on those moments where we didn't have a person, right? And those moments when we did that were transformative, that were just a quick question, you know, oh, this happened in my class. Oh, I, I need a resource for this and just like one thing that maybe someone, it could have a coach, another teacher, a leader, anyone gave us in that quick moment might have meant not a lot to them. They're just kind of passing something along. And then to us, it was like my practice was at an inflection point and it totally transformed the rest of how I did things. And so I think we just want that for every educator and, and I mean, teachers, coaches and leaders, like anyone who needs that support, like we want to make sure that you get it. And we also recognize that time which we talked about earlier, right? It's so hard that like, I think we've both been coaches in the sense of part in person and me virtually for a lot of people like, like defined. 00:45:51 Here's the time that you need it scheduled on the calendar. And I personally have seen some teachers who come into that space and all they need is to just go take a walk or go grab lunch and, and the time that we've carved out, we have to try to make the most of it because that's the time we have. But I think in so many cases it's like, oh, no, it is that like subway ride home or it is like nine o'clock at night. And I just want to throw a message out there, maybe not expecting response right away, but within the next day, I'll get one and I could get it out of my head and into slack or whatever. Um, whenever it is helpful for me and not be pressured to use the five amount of time that I might have needed a break and not to get a coaching session. And those are my two sons right now. I think that's great. And I think what we're acknowledging is the learning process of teachers. Right. Our strongest. Well, no, let's rephrase that all teachers are in their learning process and if we can meet them at that moment and help at that moment, then they continue on with a gain, right? 00:46:54 They continue on having um, a better idea of how to proceed and that muscle in whatever area strengthens. Right. And if we can help that happen on a more regular basis. When a teacher, a leader, a coach needs it. It's gonna help them, help their students, help their teachers, help their, help their building. And so I think that that's what we want more than anything is that people feel like they're supported in their process when they need it. Absolutely. And I think one of the things we constantly are talking to administrators about people who control the PD funding is, right? Like, it's really hard to get a coach for every teacher, every coach, every leader themselves, right? And we are just trying to find a way that it's both impactful to individual educators and community at large. But also that is affordable. And I think that is like very aligned to all of the things that we prioritize as important. And we've had a lot of conversations about this, but I, I'm really excited to see where it goes and listeners if you have ideas or wanna hop in on the pilot that we're doing this fall, please just let us know. 00:47:57 Great. Absolutely. Lindsay, I'm excited to watch it grow too. Yeah. And Carl, thank you so much. This is a wonderful conversation. I'm sure listeners are getting a ton and maybe we'll have you back for another episode of the Future because I feel like this is just, this is just scratching the surface of so much Lindsay. Thank you so much. I've really enjoyed this conversation. With you and um I am just so happy to be able to be part of time for teacher. If you like this episode. I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am about my coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane, Sapir and Jamila Dugan. Talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book Street Data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period? I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. If you're smiling yourself as you listen right now, grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm. How I can help you make this big dream a reality. I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. Sign up for a nerdy, no strings attached to brainstorm. 00:49:01 Call at Lindsay beth lions dot com slash contact. Until next time leaders think big act brave and be your best self. This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better Podcast Network better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there, explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode
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In this podcast episode, Charles Williams dives into a comprehensive discussion on rethinking education. We explore the importance of equitable assessments in classrooms and critique the traditional approach to grading and feedback. Charles emphasizes the significance of providing feedback that doesn't contribute to the overall grade, promoting a safe learning environment free from the fear of failure.
Charles Williams has served as an educator for nearly 20 years as a teacher, an assistant principal, and a principal for students in grades K-12. He also serves as an equity advocate with the Equity Offices of the City of Chicago and the Chicago Public Schools. In this episode we explore the power of equitable assessments, honest feedback, and challenging traditional grading systems. And we keep it “sugar free.” The Big Dream Open-mindedness (not having sugar-coated conversations) and understanding the purpose of grading and assessments and feedback. Specifically, grading is equitable and feedback is continuous, authentic, and meaningful. Alignment to the 4 Stages: Mindset, Pedagogy, Assessment, and Content Charles emphasizes the need for an open-mindedness in the teaching community, a shift away from averaging grades, and a focus on ungraded formative assessments. He offers this metaphor: “I think about sports. When I go out and I practice, there's no points for that. I'm not getting any stats right…For football, for example…That happens Friday night. You know, nothing else counts. The tackles I had during practice, the yardage that I ran, the touchdowns that I threw. None of that matters Monday through Thursday. Until Friday night, and those lights come on. Now it counts. So why do we struggle so much with it when it comes to academics? It's that same concept. When it's game time, now it counts.” The content, he believes, should be driven by the students' learning journey, not by an overall grade. Each student can have, in essence, their own IEP. He explains, “there's no one way…but I think it's stepping back and looking at: What do my students need and what is a practical way for me to develop or introduce that, to provide that? You know it's not the convenient thing, right, but it's also on the other end…not just saying..I'm gonna create a lesson for every single student. That's not feasible. But falling in that middle is what do they need and what can I actually provide? And in recognizing that, sometimes I gotta take my hands off and let them go, which, again, as I said earlier, I think is a scary thing for a lot of educators.” Mindset Shifts Required We can question the convenience of traditional grading systems, see beyond the transactional experience of grades, and help students embrace a learning journey that is not motivated by fear of failure. Action Steps What could it look like to start building the foundation for a shift to equitable grading in your school or district? Step 1: Start by reading Grading for Equity, a book that provides a comprehensive understanding of equitable grading systems. Charles says it’s crucial to read it in its entirety to grasp the complete concept and its implementation. Step 2: After gaining insight from the book, initiate conversations within your teaching community about these concepts. Understand the potential obstacles and discuss how to overcome them. Step 3: Test out these concepts in an elective class or subject. Learn from the implementation, make necessary adjustments, and then scale it up to core subjects. Challenges? Challenge: The non-zero policy. Response: ask: Is it actually equitable? Are we setting up students with unrealistic expectations? Charles explains, “You're receiving half credit for doing nothing…and…learning how to game that system, because that's essentially what we're teaching students: How do I game the system so I can do as little as possible and get a grade? Because, again, we're still in this transactional experience…Instead of focusing on that mindset shift of ‘Why am I in school?’ and shifting that over to the process of learning as opposed to that transactional experience.” Challenge: Stopping short of the depth of the concept (e.g., thinking equitable grading will help Black and Brown students at the expense of white students). Response: “That's not the whole concept…It's about understanding that sometimes students don't have resources or the supports at home that other students have…but again…If we're not averaging it, it doesn't matter, because all that homework should do is provide an opportunity to learn and to practice a skill.” One Step to Get Started Familiarize yourself with the concept of equitable grading systems. Reading Grading for Equity is a great way to start. As often as you can, step back and ask; “Why are we doing this? Does it make sense? Is is it what's best for students?” Stay Connected You can find Charles on his website and on Twitter @_cwconsulting. I also recommend his podcast, The Counter Narrative Podcast. To help you implement some of the ideas Charles shared, I’m sharing my Diagnosing Adaptive Challenges Mini Workbook with you for free. And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 137 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. Quotes:
TRANSCRIPT Today on the show, I get to talk with Charles Williams who has served as an educator for nearly 20 years as a teacher and assistant principal and a principal for students in grades K through 12. He also serves as an equity advocate with the equity offices of the city of Chicago and the Chicago public schools as a reflection of his dedication to doing this important work. Charles also hosts the counter narrative podcast which is Awesome and cohos an edgy show called inside the principal's office through his consulting company. He is a best selling author and a highly sought after workshop facilitator and keynote speaker. Let us get to my conversation with Charles Williams. I'm educational justice coach, Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings if you're a principal assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nering out about co-creator curriculum of students. 00:01:08 I made this show for you. Here we go. Charles Williams. Welcome to the Time for Teacher shift podcast. Hey Lindsay, how are you? Thank you for having me. Yeah. Thank you for being here. I am excited for our conversation today and I want to start with a question, what should people keep in mind as we jump into the conversation? Is there anything in particular they should be aware of or be thinking of? Um, so I will say this and, and I think it's just been something that I've been mentioning more and more, uh, is that I, I don't want to sugar coat things. Um, I'm gonna have a very honest conversation with you. Uh, it's, it's how I approach most of my topics and conversations now. Uh, in fact, I have been dabbling with the idea of going like this sugar free talk and it's just like, you know what, we're just gonna be honest and it's truthful and I, you know, we do that a lot in education, right? We tiptoe around trying to make sure that people it's agreeable and sometimes it doesn't have to be like this is just the reality of it. So, um, yeah, and during this conversation, I'm just gonna be as straightforward and honest and truthful as I possibly can, which might bother some people. 00:02:17 And, um, I would say that I'm open to having a conversation afterwards if you are, if you are open to that, I love sugar free. This is a beautiful idea, not in my snacks but in the conversation conversations. This is beautiful. And so I think this will be a great next question then to segue to which is I love talking about freedom dreaming. And Doctor Bettina love talks about this in a really beautiful way. She talks about dreams grounded in the critique of injustice which when we're talking about that, like we can't have the sugar, right? Like we cannot have sugar coat. So what is in that context, the big dream that you hold for curriculum instruction, kind of this leadership idea? So, you know, as I was thinking about this question, II, I was a little all over, right? Because there, there are a lot of areas where we, we could have this conversation. Uh but the one that struck me. So apparently the one that I'm meant to have a conversation around right now is around um equitable assessments. Um It, it's been a lot of the topics of conversation I've had as I've moved into a new building. In fact, my wife has gone back to school uh to, to continue her educational degrees and she's in an assessment class and I'm already like, I, I need to speak to your professor and she's like, babe, please don't like I'm trying to, I'm trying to pass do, do it afterwards. 00:03:34 Um So yeah, I think it's in that area of, of assessments, the role of assessments and feedback and grading and all of that. Oh, I love that. So when you think of what a dream situation of like, this is the, the team you get to work with and, and kind of help them build out the assessments that would be equitable and have this kind of system that is, has equity at the center of everything that you do with regard to assessments. What kind of things are we looking at or, or what kind of things are we like students experiencing or how, how does that feel for teachers? So, you know, I think one of the biggest things that I would look for in the team is just this idea of an open mindedness, right? Um And understanding the purpose of grading and assessments and feedback. I, I think, you know, when we were in school grading was something that was done, you know, kind of formulaic, right? Like every Monday we got our spelling words and on Friday, we took the test, right? Um And then a lot of times even the feedback, it was a, it was a letter grade or a percentage and nothing more which didn't help me learn or grow as a learner. 00:04:42 It was just like, ok, I mean, I was like, I got an a so ok, I guess I did ok. But if, you know, if, if I was to receive ac or ad or something like, I, I don't know what I did wrong. Um, and, and then even the, the, I guess within that process it's the, the time frames. I mean, how often did you turn something in, like a, like an essay or a paper? And, you know, you got, you got it back two weeks later, right? Like, what am I supposed to do with it now? Because we're, we're so deep into the next unit of study. So I think the role of assessment is critical and then from the student side, I think what would be helpful in that is that I, I'm really being assessed on what I know and not my journey, right? So I was one of those students who just got it right? I could read something and I memorized it, you would say it to me. I mean, like I, I held on to it long enough to regurgitate it because in reality, that's what we're doing for assessments, right? So they weren't even authentic assessments, which is a whole another piece to this. So I could just regurgitate it, right? Get my a and keep it moving. But what about those students who took some extra time? 00:05:46 Right. And so when we talk about like averaging grades now, you're punishing me because I didn't get it as quickly. But at the end of the unit, at the end of the course, whatever it may be at that point of that somewhat of assessment. I have the same exact, you know, base of knowledge, right. The same amount of knowledge as the person sitting next to me. But because it took me a while longer. Right. And so it takes that away. I mean, I don't know how many times I've had conversations with students where they're just like, well, what is this worth? How many points is this worth? Right. And so I don't see learning as a process, right? This idea of like I'm in it to actually learn, I'm in it to receive a grade. Is that transactional experience? So at the end of the school year, I mean, and then think about this when grades are in, right? And I'm at a high school and I used to be at an elementary but still same thing when those final grades are in 23 weeks before the end of the g uh the the year because you gotta figure out graduation and all of that, right? And the mind is well learning is done because I'm no longer working towards a grade. And that's one of those tho those unfortunate symptoms of our, our current grading process. 00:06:51 But if I was in it to learn and you know what I would still be, hey, where are we going with this learning journey? How I, I still didn't get to share with you what I've learned, right? It, it's that very extrinsic process. So I know that was a lot. But those are multiple pieces that kind of encompass this vision around what it should be. Yeah, I'm so glad that you, you gave it a lot because that, that all of those pieces are so relevant. Right? And I, I think about that idea of no averages. We used to try to like, calculate was, I don't remember the name of it but like the most of your grade, like it was like a weighted average, I guess, right? So like most of your grade is at the end. So like, because it was really hard for students to let go of the idea that I need to do something just for the learning versus for the grade. And so that was like a whole culture shift. Whereas like, ideally as teachers who want to come in and be like, OK, we're just gonna count that last grade. But then t the students as well as parents and caretakers have to let go of the idea that like, well what this, so then this thing we're doing first quarter doesn't actually, you know, count for anything. 00:07:53 It's like, no, no, it counts for the learning, right? Like, and so I, I love this idea of the big culture shift. That kind of goes with that idea of equitable assessment of. We are doing this because we're learning, we're doing this for the journey. I think about how school I was kind of that a student because I was able to pick up things pretty quickly. But I didn't, actually, that didn't serve me because when I got to a point where I didn't pick something up quickly, I kind of struggled with the learning process because I wasn't taught the learning process. We didn't value the learning. Right. So, there's, there's so much in what he said that resonates with me and, and I'm thinking too that it goes with the broader culture of cul uh like curriculum and instruction. And so I'm thinking of the components I usually talk about. So there's the mindset piece, right? Of like, of everyone, of students, of families of teachers, there's the pedagogy, like how do I interact with my students on a day to day basis? There's the assessment piece and then there's the, what are we literally learning about like, what's the content? And so I'm wondering like, how you see these pieces kind of connecting to assessment and equitable assessment and that whole kind of culture that, that you're kind of describing here? 00:09:03 Yeah. So, I mean, I I think going kind of through some of those right there is that mindset, right? Um It's the idea that you're, you're not given something for every little piece, right? Uh And, and you're right, I think you mentioned something about the, the, the learning struggle, which is absolutely necessary. It is a natural part of learning, but because we punish it, right? And I, I mean, think about that like we punish a natural part of the process that we're supposed to be doing. And so because we punish it how many students who go through that pretend like as if they're not, right. So either a I'm not going to tell you that I'm struggling and therefore I'm not going to actually understand it or I'm going to engage in other types of behaviors. So that way you don't see that I'm struggling and then you have a whole another set of issues, right? Because the students who are acting out or doing other things simply because they're struggling, but we're punishing the struggling process, right? And so it, it definitely is a mindset shift about what is learning supposed to be, what is that process? What are we looking at? Um, and, and really shifting that focus into the end. 00:10:05 And I know a lot of times as you mentioned, um, you know, grades are necessary, right? I can't, it's hard. So one of the things that I've recommended is this idea that you could still put grades in a grade book, but with a zero weight, right? And then it allows people to see, ok, well, how did I do? Like, I'm getting some type of that? Right. There's that feedback component, um which is necessary because, right, when we're thinking about this whole thing, like, it's not a matter of we're doing work, doing work, doing work, but you're never getting feedback until the end feedback is an absolutely necessary part of the process. Right. So in those formative assessments, you're providing that feedback, right? Maybe you are throwing it in a great book and, and that even becomes part of the conversation with, with the student and the parents. Let's say you get to the summit of assessment and a child does horribly, right? They, they haven't mastered anything where you could kind of go back and say, well, look right on all the formative assessments, all the practice runs up to this point. Your child hasn't done anything right. They haven't done or I've given them the feedback and they have it there, there, it tells that story, but that in itself isn't part of that overall grade, right? 00:11:10 Um, and it starts to, I mean, we have that mindset around other things, right. I think about sports when I go out and I practice, I, there's no points for that there. I, I'm not getting any stats, right? Like that, that's not contributing to that happens, right? For football, for example. Right. Since we're in the middle of football season right now, uh, that happens Friday night, you know, nothing else counts. The, the tackles I had during practice, the yardage that I ran the touchdowns that I threw. None of that matters. Monday through Thursday until Friday night and those lights come on now it counts. So why do we struggle so much with it when it comes to academics? Right. It's that same concept when it's game time now it counts. Um, so I, I think, you know, looking at even, I, I guess curriculum wise, one of the arguments and pushbacks that I've had was well, teachers don't know how to build assessments. Teachers don't know really how to create assessments that assess them in all of those things. And so I think on that journey, if we're looking at it kind of starting off and ideally, right, use the the the unit assessments that are being provided to you, use the things that are already created. 00:12:20 But as you get more comfortable, as you, as you become more adept at doing this, then you can create those real authentic assessments. Because at the end of this, again, it's not even just about that paper pencil assessment, right? God forbid, it's multiple choice assessments, right? It's how do I turn this into an a meaningful learning experience where you can demonstrate to me that you understand the content, right, that you can understand the concepts and that might look different from student to student. But I think there's a word for that we call it differentiation or something like that. Is it being facetious like that is where all of those things should happen? And is it a struggle? Is it a challenge? Is it, is it a load to carry for uh you know, an educator? Absolutely. But if it means that your students are actually going to learn the content, then isn't it worth it or are we? And this is where we come into that sugar free? Right? Or are we doing things that are, that are convenient for us at the expense of our students? Right. Yeah, I can, if we're doing this whole unit, I can say, OK, create right here. 00:13:22 Four or five or six different options or maybe you have something else, right? That is a lot for me to figure out these different rubrics that I have to create. But if it allows students to truly demonstrate their understanding, it's it, it's better for them or I can say, here's the automatic generated multiple choice, right? A few open ended responses. Everybody take this because it's easier for me. And now with, you know, A I or these programs, I don't even have to grade it. I'll let it grade it. Right. And boom, I'm moving into the next thing. Yeah, that's really easy and convenient. But is it what's best for our students? And I think that's that question that we always have to ask ourselves, is, is it what's best for our students? And in kind of thinking, right? I already know there, there, there's this push back. Well, you know, this, this process isn't what's right this and so if, if I can, right? And II, I know I'm kind of all over the place right now. I was having this conversation in my building where they adopted the zero, the zero grading policy, right? The nonzero grading and I get it. And I said, I, you know, we don't want students to be punished. I don't. But the problem is, is that when you, when you take pieces, right? 00:14:29 You, you never fully get there. And so one of my pushbacks right now is that well, if students don't do the work or they do minimal work, they're getting half the credit. But at the end of the day when we're still averaging right now, what you're doing is you're setting students up for failure, right? If you're going to go down that pathway, there's not, the zero doesn't even matter because it's just a piece of feedback and you're not averaging it. So zeros aren't necessarily this bad thing. Zeros are an issue when you're averaging grades, which hopefully you shouldn't be averaging grades. Right. So that, that's a non, you know, conversation. But I mean, I don't know, there, there's, there's a lot of pieces there. Yeah. And I, that's such a great point. I never could figure out exactly what my issue was with the replacing the zeros. I'm like, yeah, like we wanna make sure that they're not punished, but you're absolutely right. That, that's just such a, like a mindset shift that clicks into place for me where it's like the zeroes don't become a problem if we're ultimately not waiting those grades. Right. Like, that's the equity thing. Like when we have to fictionalize the number to represent something that is not accurate, we have a problem with the system we need to change. 00:15:37 Right. Right. Right. And we, and we keep trying to tweak the system, right, in order to, so it's like, instead of just like, can we just make sure that we, even if we have to replace it completely to fit our needs? Right. Like you're right. So no matter those small tweaks, if at the end, it's resulting in the same thing with, like you said, is gamifying, right? Oo, of what really occurred, it doesn't nobody any good. And I saw that this past year, so many students who were passing, right? Who under normal circumstances wouldn't have passed. My, my pushback was well, if I didn't do any of the work, right? When it came to that summative, there's no way I would be able to do well. And it's not even the mindset of a ha, you know, there's the, I got you, I'm gonna punish you there. It's not about punishment. It's about, I'm not prepared. I'm not ready to do well on the summative and vice versa. Right? I had students and this is just an example. I had students in a, a, um, it was a computer, it program and I had a student who was like, not going to class, not doing anything when he was in class. 00:16:44 I said, come on, do me a favor. Just sit down and do, do one of the modules, demonstrate to me that you can because I think once you get going, it'll be a lot easier. So this student, right? Because he wanted to prove to me how wrong I was, didn't just do a module, he went to the very, very end of the entire uh unit, took the certificate, which is that accumulation of everything knocked out the certificate. And then he looked at me and was like, now what? And I was like, well, right. But in that, in that process, right, it it then challenges us because all of those little things before are not necessary for that student. They are necessary for some students to gain the understanding and the knowledge that they need in order to pass that certificate. But for this student, he had already acquired that somewhere somehow I have no clue but he had that information. So in his, I'm not going to class, I'm gonna sit in here and do nothing wasn't necessarily in an act of uh I guess negligence or, or pushback disrespect, whatever it may be. 00:17:47 He was trying to communicate in his own way. This isn't necessary that's not relevant to me. And then it pushes us as educators to think about where can we go with it? I mean, think about how many times that we have maybe have hindered our students potential because we're trying to fit them into that framework. Whereas if we would have started off with an assessment or allowed that, like, oh, wait, you already know that, like, that could have saved me 67 weeks and we could just keep things moving. But again, is it convenient for me at the expense of our students? Yeah. And this, this to me speaks to kind of like that co creation process with students when we think about the curriculum or the pedagogy. Like, yes, some students already know things. So there is no point in teaching them again, right? Or, or even like even another thing I've seen is like, oh, let's value that the student has that, I mean, we should value that the student has that knowledge, but then we turn them into like peer tutors that do our jobs for us instead of pushing them. You know what I mean? Like they become to people like, oh, just teach your peer and it's like, no, why would they come to school for that? They need to be like, learning something that is relevant for them. 00:18:51 And so I, I just think about like, what that looks like in practice and I know we're going on a little deviation here. But I'm wondering like, what is that for you? What is that like, co creation look like or what is that like pedagogy and curriculum? Like, how do teachers make decisions? I guess I'm, I'm thinking in a way that's very personalized, right? And differentiated to your point so that we don't have students who are like, this is totally relevant to me and like, I'm just gonna disengage. So, you know, you're right. I mean, it starts to become very, it's, it's a load, right? When we talk about um like IEPs individualized, you know, learning plans for the students, it it, it almost becomes a process where each student has their own, right? Understanding like this, these are the skills that are needed. Where are you at on that continuum, right? Students who have already mastered it asking like, you know, how can we take them beyond that? Those who haven't mastered it? You know, what am I doing to get you to that point? But it it's creating those spaces of flexibility and um I guess uh autonomy even for the students, like I remember being in high school and there were some courses that I took that were called independent study because it was like Charles, you've already mastered everything that we have to teach you, right? 00:20:05 So here's a space where you can explore and learn and grow and create, you know, a project to share it, right? Which was phenomenal because it was like, all right. So I went into that class and I just explored and it was wide open for me. I mean, there was some facilitation, of course, right? Some boundaries. Um but it, I mean, think about that, but again, there's a lot of, I guess maybe lack of control and that scares people because what is the, what is he gonna learn? What is he gonna do? What is he like? What it, but I, I think for the most part of students are saying, hey, I've mastered it if I'm here, like challenge me in a way, right? I think a lot of the behaviors that we see are challenge me or you're challenging me too much. So we can, we can cater that. I mean, putting students to say, hey, go study something while I work with this other group because I maybe as a teacher, even in this space, I don't have what you need right now. I mean, think about that, that is a scary thing for a teacher to say is that I can no longer guide you on that educational journey, at least within this unit of focus, right? 00:21:16 Because then it's like, well, I'm irrelevant, right? I maybe my job isn't needed anymore. Right? There's like whatever it may be, but it's ok to say that to say, ok, you continue on that journey and I'm gonna help guide these other students. I mean, there, there's no one way, right? There's no cookie cutter fix to any of these things. But I think it's stepping back and looking at what do my students need and what is a practical way for me to uh develop or, or introduce that um to, to, to provide that, you know, it's not the convenient thing, right? But it's also on the other end, it's not just saying, hey, you know what, I'm gonna create a, a lesson for every single student that's not, you know, that that's not feasible. But falling in the middle is what do they need and what can I actually provide? And in recognizing that sometimes I gotta take my hands off and let them go. Which again, as I said earlier I think is a scary thing for a lot of educators. Yeah. And it goes to the mindset shift again, I think of like we as educators are more supporting the process of learning and the journey of learning versus the content specifically. 00:22:20 I think we get very in our heads as teachers, especially high school teachers. That's my background and, and it's like, oh, we know our content and we have to like regurgitate that content to the student, you know, and it's like we don't actually need to be content experts. I don't think in any grade in any subject necessarily, we need to have a decent background, but we're not gonna know everything about every thing. And if we could just take that and be like, oh, all right, it's OK to be like, I don't know, but I know the process of learning and I know my pedagogy and I know how to equitably assess, right. I'm gonna help you along that journey and you can kind of go into within this I always think about like a content umbrella of like the unit we're teaching or whatever. And then you can like subspecialized in this like aspect of it that I don't actually know what on about. But you go run with that and then come back and you tell me the project and how you want to put it together and all this stuff and like that. What's beautiful about that is there's still those touch points with the teacher coaching along the way of like, ok, I got stuck. How do I get unstuck? Ok, you need like a five minute conference? Cool. Let's do that. And I think that just to me solidifies the importance of the teacher role. When you're saying, I, I've heard that so many times teachers feel irrelevant when students are going and running. 00:23:25 It's like, well, if I see myself as a coach, right? And we, we were talking about sports already, like, ii, I have a sports background as well. So I'm always thinking about like, well, coach isn't like on the field with them, right? Like they're coming back, they're like calling some plays and they're letting people run with that. And I think if we have that mindset, it's a lot easier to be like, oh, ok, so I'm letting go because I should be letting go. That's part of it. Absolutely. And, and I mean, think about the, the liberation of that, right? As a teacher, like, I think we, we hold so much and we carry so much, right? That was that English teacher forever, right? And you, you hold so much like I'm responsible but like you said, it's very liberating to say, oh OK, like now my job is a facilitator, right? And I, and I think a lot of times we do that really well in the admin level uh or some of us. So I did that with my staff. You know, we, we ran these series of meetings and sessions and they're like, well, thank you for doing this. And I was like, I didn't do anything. I created a space. We had these goals and objectives and then I facilitated your journey. I had no idea what this was going to look like. 00:24:28 In the end, we had ideas of where we, but I didn't know the route you're gonna take. I didn't know what you were going to produce, right? I facilitated the journey and then I think that's where, as you mentioned, as educators that we have to get to, right? These are the content. These are the skills that you need to do. Now. Let's go. Right. And how can I help you get there? Yeah, absolutely. I I'm wondering if there has been, I know you've kind of mentioned a few challenges along the way of like kind of like, right? Like in doing this work, is there any challenge that sticks out to you that you've either you're in the middle of and you're kind of working through or that you worked through and you would recommend for someone listening who's like, yeah, I wanna do this thing, but I'm facing this challenge or I am anticipating this challenge, like, how would I possibly work through it? So I imagine there's a lot of challenges that come up there are, there are, I mean, the, the nonzero was like, probably my biggest one. especially because it was like, well, it's equitable, right? And I think that's the other idea is that what is equitable rating mean? And I think people as a school, as a district, as, you know, we need to determine what that means because equity is a word that is thrown around a lot in education and it feels like, well, if I say it's equitable, then it means it's a good thing, you know, but, but is it equitable? 00:25:43 Right? Or are you hurting students? Are you setting them up with unrealistic expectations? And in this case, right, with the nonzero policy, that's what I felt and that's what I kept saying. Um And I know that there was some, you know, disagreements, um some, some lively conversations uh around that, but that is where I stood. I said, you know, this is an unrealistic expectation, but essentially, right, you're receiving half credit for doing nothing, right? And then, you know, learning how to gain that system because that's essentially what we're teaching students, how do I gain the system so I can do as little as possible and get a grade? Because again, we're still in this transactional experience, right? Instead of focusing on that mindset shift of why am I in school and, and shifting that over to the process of learning as opposed to that transactional experience. I think, you know, one of the other things is that and I'll just be honest, I, I was in a board meeting at my former company and somebody handed me uh an article and it was that classic, like, you know, you've read the stories where you're the only minority in the room and people kind of look at you. 00:26:49 Um, and it was this article called Race Based Greeting and they handed it to me and they're like, what do you think about this? And I was like, well, can I read it first? Um, and what it was referencing was equitable grading systems. But what they were arguing was that equitable grading systems would benefit black and brown students at the expense of white students. And I was like, well, first of all, like, they, they've got the concept completely wrong and, you know, we had this whole conversation around it that, you know, because it was talking in there around like, for example, policies around homework. Well, why do students, you know, from minority backgrounds? Like, you know, they don't need to do homework, but they're gonna get full credit for it. Well, that's, that's not the whole concept. Right. It's not just giving full credit for something that wasn't done. It's about understanding that sometimes students don't have resources or the supports at home that other students have. Right. So, yeah, but again, it goes back to that averaging, if we're not averaging it, it doesn't matter because all that homework should do is provide an opportunity to, to, to learn and to practice a skill. 00:27:58 That's all it should have done, right? And, and so again, for me, it was just coming back to and I think that big push is do we stop averaging grades? Can we start focusing on that, that somewhat of assessment? Right. Even if it, that's the first step, just focus on that somewhat of assessment, not even talking about standards based grading, right? That that's the next part of that like, but can we just focus on the end? What did you learn? Right. I don't know how many times you know, this idea around, you know, these equitable and I say it with quotes. I know you can't see me um you know, like the late policies then, right? Well, I could turn it in whenever. Well, what are you saying that? Right, because if I can turn it in past the assessment, is it really part of the learning journey or is it just the task that I'm doing to again receive credit? Thus, that transactional experience and then teachers are receiving a, a, um, a mountain of, of papers and assignments and things at the end of a grading period and they're trying to hurry and put it all in. But the whole point of those assessments were right, because they are formative assessments was feedback. 00:29:04 But I'm not giving you any feedback because it's the last day of the grading period. Like it's when we step back and we look at that, it's like somebody has to say this is not right. Right. And there's a very easy way to fix it. And I think that if we, if we slowed down a little bit and maybe took that step back and looked at these pieces and then looked at the real results of those pieces because it sounds great when you say it like a student shouldn't be pun punished for turning things in late. That sounds right. But let's look at what that means. Right. Students shouldn't receive zeros, it sounds fine. Right? Because I used to be that person. I used to be that proponents like no, no zeros, but let's step back and look at what it really means. And I think that we are so often in education so quick to grab on to the next newest thing. Like we don't pause and say what does it mean? Right. And is there something that could truly address this? But the thing that does address it means a lot of that convenience that we've talked about has to go out the window. Right? And so I, I could as I, I'm assuming that there are people like, no, I, I don't want to adopt this because of what it means for me. 00:30:09 Hi, it's Lindsay. Just popping in here to talk about today's episode, Freebie. So, in the spirit of leading change and in alignment with Charles's Sugar free conversation approach, I think this resource will complement this conversation nicely. It is my diagnosing adaptive challenges workbook today. It is one of my most popular resources and I want you to have it head to Lindsay beth lions dot com slash blog slash 137 to get yours back to the. So, yeah, absolutely. Definitely a culture shift and something to talk through with your, your staff if you're a listener thinking about doing this. But, but so worth it, right? Like as we've talked about this, ba basically like real listen to the episode, share with your staff, I think because there has been like, I think so many moments, Charles where you kind of like pulled back a curtain on this. I'm just like, right? Like this may look just like what you just said. This may make like initial like, oh OK, interesting. But when we pull it back and we say, hey, it just, there's no better way that I've seen so far than to do what you're describing, which is just do the summative and I think two things with that one is to have a summative that makes, that is co created with a student that makes a student interested in it. 00:31:14 Because I think some of the things that we try to do, it's like threaten almost like you will get a zero if you don't do this work as kind of like a coercive mechanism versus you're working toward this thing that you actually really wanna do. You co created what the summit is gonna be like, you're invested, you're just gonna do it because you're interested in the learning journey versus like this is a stupid assignment and I don't want to do it. Right. I've been there as a student and I'm just like, why, you know, and I think there's that transactional idea or that coercive idea of using grades in that way has just been so much a part of education and what we're trained to do in teacher school. And it's so problematic that there's a lot of unlearning I think to do before that. Um A and, and also the homework thing for me, like, I eventually stopped giving homework and I just was like, if I can't teach you it and this is an unpopular opinion. But I was like, if you, if I can't teach you it in my class time that I have you. Like, we're not that I'm, I'm failing you, right? Like I'm just like, this is the time we have together in addition to not being able to. 00:32:19 Right. I had a lot of students who worked, like, 30 hours a week or something, you know, like, they don't have time to do homework and I, and, and not only that, but, like, even the students who don't like, you're a kid, you should have time to play and just not have to always be working. So, like that 10 minutes you do have, go outdoors or something, right? Like be a human. Um, and I think there's, there's so much value in that piece. It's a little bit of another episode topic. But I'm thinking for a listener who's like, all right, this is a big change, but I, I am invested in the idea. Now, what do I do as like a first step, like a momentum builder perhaps? Or an introduction to my staff that maybe we're gonna entertain this. What would you say? A good first step would be? Hm. So I, I think there's a few different entry points. Um, you know, there, there's a book out there which I know, you know, there, there are people who like it, people who don't, but it's, it's called Grading For Equity. And in fact, it, one of the chapters in there and I think read it in its entirety. I will put it this way, read it in its entirety because it talks about a lot of these ideas and then it's like, well, here's where we should go with it. 00:33:22 But, you know, if you read it only partially or each chapter and you're like, oh, that's what it said, which is kind of what happened in my building. Like you didn't finish the idea, right? Like, finish the book, right. Have a conversation around it. Um, and then begin looking at what would this look like in our building? Um What, what are the obstacles that we're gonna have to overcome? Right. The mindset shifts or for students? For parents, for staff? Right. Having those conversations flushing out. Don't just like launch into this immediately, begin having those conversations understand the obstacles that you're going to have and then I would even maybe test it out. Right? Is a pilot program and maybe something that isn't so heavy, I guess I, I, and this is no offense to any of my, any of my teachers, but you have those classes that are like core classes that come with heavy credit, right? And then there's the other ones that are like, that's an extra credit, right? Like it's ok. Like what if we tested it out in those spaces where it was like, hey, you know, it, it didn't work, we gotta fix this, right. Um And it doesn't have that much damage. 00:34:26 I, I would also say is to and I wish I could think of one right now off the top of my head, there are, there are plenty of schools and districts doing this work. So what I'm talking about isn't like this weird thing that I dreamt about last night, like this is this work is happening. So instead of you trying to recreate the wheel and starting from scratch and trying to figure out like go visit those schools or have conversations with the individuals in those schools, talk about their journey, figure out what it was that they did and think again, how might this look in my own space? How might this look in my own building? Because it's not about just taking what's another school is doing and doing it right? Because it may not, may not necessarily work but figuring out those components, um a a and putting them in your, within your own school. I think it's just, I think the biggest part of this is that mindset shift it. I mean, we, we've been so long with this transactional experience and I will say even this, right? A lot of people are like, well, we're preparing students for college and I don't know about you Lindsay, but how many college courses like it wasn't a, it was a final, that was your grade but maybe I didn't go. 00:35:35 I had, I remember a class where what they did was they, there was a powerpoint which was shared online every class, they read the powerpoint, which I was like, I know how to read. I don't need you to read a powerpoint to me. So I stopped going to class and I would show up, I showed up for the midterm and ace the midterm because the midterm was about right. But that, that scares people because guess what, I then took control of my learning in that process and they're like, well, kids have to be in the building. They can't just skip out like it starts to open up these other conversations around, not just grading them but the format and functionality of school. And again, like our schools have been structured in a way for centuries because of like aggregor in societies. Like maybe it's time that we begin, right? I mean, there was this thing that happened not too long ago, this like pandemic that forced us to look at school in a different way. Like may, maybe there's some lessons that we could learn and adopt and it's not just a convenient place. There's that word again for students to come during the day while their parents are at work. 00:36:40 So that way they're being mo I mean, I'm just saying things right? But like is that what we're doing and trying to make it relevant? Right? Or making it seem like the things that we're doing are relevant because you gotta sit in this seat for X number of minutes and do these like maybe it's just time but that I think will begin going down that process because again, the more you go down this journey, the more you can step back and say, why are we doing this? Right. And does it make sense? And again, that question is, is it what's best for students? Yes. Oh, my gosh. It makes me think of like, the idea of like, you have to suffer because I suffered kind of thing. Like teachers, I feel like do that. Right. Like, oh, that was just the first year. It sucked. It was terrible. So, like, I'm not gonna give you any help. And like, I think also with us as students, it's like, ok students like, yeah, it sucks in a chair for six hours a day and like not move but like that's what school is. So we did it, you have to do it. And it's like if we shadowed a student as adults, that is a transformative experience to sit where a student is sitting and just do the things a student is doing for six whole hours like or whatever the school day is 6.5 hours. 00:37:44 Like people come out of that experience and are like, what are we doing? Like, why would we do this to students? They are not moving, they're not talking, they're like reprimanded for asking to go to the bathroom. Like, you know, all these things about the I love that you talk about the format and functionality of school. Like we are sometimes so distanced even though we're in it, we're teachers or we're in the school system we're still very distant from the student experience school and therefore we make these decisions or we say we had to do it. So you have to do it. And it's like not the best. It's not working. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Well, I just realized how long we've been talking. This has been wonderful. I have two final questions for you. One is for absolute fun. What is something you've been learning about lately? And it does not have to relate to our work. It could be literally anything. Um So I would love to say that I have a big personal life which my wife would like. She's listening right now. She's gonna be like, yeah, he doesn't. Um I, I'm sorry, hun. Um But I think the book that I'm reading right now and that I'm really focused, which I think is phenomenal is by Marcus Buckingham. It's called Love Plus Work. And he has this idea and they're called like figuring out your weird, right? 00:38:49 What is it that drives you fulfills you? And it's not just about work. Uh He talks about it in different aspects of your life but mostly work. Um And it's very interesting when we think about again, just how we approach work, the, the things that we do and why so many, I mean, burnout is a huge topic, right? But why is it so big because we are continuing to do things that don't always make sense. And so but we're just like, well, that, that's, that's how we're supposed to operate. So that's what I'm gonna do and then we step back and like, why is, why is it not working? Right. So, um, so it's, it's a great book. Um, and it, if you buy it, there are these modules and things. I haven't really dove into those yet. Um, but I'm in the last like section of the book and it just, it makes sense. In fact, I, I'm working right now. I'm like, all right, like, I think this could be right. I, I speak at conferences all over the place. Like I have this idea of that or I present this one about the Zen your, your zone of genius and it works so well with identifying and figuring out you're weird. 00:39:54 Like I'm starting to pull in some of those concepts because like, it just, it just makes sense, right? And again, it's that idea, like, as you're reading it, I'm slowing down and I'm like, oh, like, OK. Right. Those are some shifts I can make in my own life to make sure that I'm enjoying work. So a as one example, one of the ideas was, and I, and I just started doing this without understanding before I read his book was like, tweeting out a daily I get to right at work. Like, so we, we're so often and so quick to fuss with this. This happened today and this was horrible. And, but what did you get to do today? Not that you had to, but what did you get to do? And I remember I it was on a special Olympics trip. The kids were like, Miss Willms. Will you come with us? And I, and I went with them. Nobody forced me to go. It wasn't part of my job description. Right? There was no requirement but it was something that I got to do and it was such an enjoyable experience and it was one of those moments that right refuel you so that way you can do the things that you have to do. 00:40:56 So you know, that's a challenge right now for any of those of you listening, especially as you're going through the rest of the school year, just one tweet a day or Instagram or whatever social media you use, right? Myspace? If you still have it, what did you get to do? Right. And then you'll start, you'll realize that you start thinking about work differently and focusing on those things that you enjoy doing and those are your red threads, read the book. It'll make sense. I was like, we're launching into a whole another episode. I was like, really Becket, really Becket. I love it. I love it. And well, so I think people are gonna wanna see your, I get to and follow you and all the things. So where can listeners learn more about you or contact you on the internet. Yeah, so the, the easiest way is via Twitter. Uh So my, my handle there is at underscore CW consulting. Uh I used to fuss about the underscore because somebody has it without the underscore and they don't use it, but you know, I've made it what it is now with the underscore. Um So there is an Instagram account with that. Don't go there expecting much. 00:42:00 There's a Tik Tok account II, I just started claiming the handle in different places, not that I know what to do with all of them. So, Twitter is the best way. Um And you'll also find in that space, a link tree. Uh So you'll have access to all the other things, the podcast, uh the book, um speaking engagements. Uh So all of the other things that I do, you'll find that through that link tree account as well. Awesome. And I have to say the podcast is excellent listeners. You need to go listen to that. And I have now as of now seen Charles in action as a keynote and he is fantastic. So definitely check about it, Charles, thank you so much for being on the podcast. It was an absolute pleasure to talk to you. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it if you like this episode. I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am about my coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane sapper. And Jamila Dugan. Talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book Street Data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period. I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. 00:43:02 If you're smiling to yourself as you listen to right now, grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm, how I can help you make this big dream a reality. I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. Sign up for a nerdy no strings attached to brainstorm call at Lindsay, Beth lions dot com slash contact. Until next time leaders think big act brave and be your best self. This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better podcast network better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there, explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode.
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Lindsay and I explore the significant impact of connecting with students on a personal level, engaging in empowering conversations, and making education relevant to their lives. We also delve into the role mindset plays in creating a thriving educational environment. Join us as Lindsay Titus shares tips on how to incorporate this approach in our everyday interactions with young people, and discuss how to empower students (and ourselves) through self-reflection and action.
Lindsay Titus has been in the field of education for 17 years and specializes in the study of behavior analysis. She is passionate about helping educators create a mindset that allows them to live a life of purpose and passion inside and outside of the school setting! In this episode, we talk about getting to be humans first, defining who we are, and the power of asking why…all in service of creating curricula and pedagogy that honors the humanity of students and makes class relevant to who they are right now. The Big Dream To create a thriving educational environment where students are treated as people first, and curriculum and instruction are connected to who students are now, not who we think they should be or will be or could be. Alignment to the 4 Stages: Mindset, Pedagogy, Assessment, and Content Mindset is the foundation for creating a thriving educational environment. Aligning our beliefs with our actions will better support students and foster meaningful connections in the classroom. “We often use the house analogy…I can bring in the greatest windows and doors and paint and things like that. So I can have really good assessments that are actually helping us move the needle forward…I can be teaching content that is relevant to now, but if I don't have the belief or the mindset that this is important…there's a disconnect, and so I truly believe that [mindset] has to be the foundation.” “That's really what I help educators do. It's like here's the situation we have. Let's unpack it and we're going to go deep…to figure out what's the barrier. And then, how do we…create new habits, new standards, new boundaries, new values, so that this now just becomes our new foundation?” Mindset Shifts Required Educators need to understand that they have the power to create change within themselves. Many say “if my leader changes, if my admin changes, if my school policy changes, if I change schools, if something else changes, then I'll change.” That’s what Lindsay Titus calls “the chase.” Chasing a dream or chasing a change isn’t the fix because we keep experiencing the same things. We are never doing anything new. We're building on from experience that we have, and that doesn't mean we have to keep doing what we've always done. Draw Your Ideal Self Triangle Step 1: Draw your ideal self triangle. On a perfect day, how will you show up? At one point of the triangle, write or draw what you look like. At another point, what you sound like. At the final point, what you feel like. Step 2: Then, on a day where you're not finding the joy, refer to this “anchor document.” Notice things like “my ideal self speaks gratitude, not complaints,” and try to find gratitude. Step 3: Repeat this ideal self triangle description/drawing every 4-6 months. Two Steps to Get Started Start with gratitude - Set aside three minutes each day to focus on things you are grateful for. Connect gratitude to something you see all the time, like mirrors. Every time you pass by a mirror, remind yourself of something you are grateful for. Ask: What is one thing I can do today? What is one step, one small, simple step I can take to build that momentum? Stay Connected You can find this week’s guest on her website, DefineYOUniversity.com. She’s also on Facebook and Instagram. To help you define your ideal self, deeply reflect, and practice gratitude, Lindsay is sharing her 7-Day Journal with you for free. And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 136 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. Quotes:
TRANSCRIPT Today, I have another Lindsay joining me on the show, Lindsay Titus has been in the field of education for 17 years and specializes in the study of behavior analysis. She has worked as a special education teacher, assistant principal and behavior specialist. She is passionate about helping educators create a mindset that allows them to live a life of purpose and passion inside and outside of the school setting. Let's get to our conversation with Lindsay Titus. I'm educational justice coach, Lindsay Lyons and here on the time for Teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings if you're a principal, assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nering out about co-creator curriculum of students. I made this show for you. Here we go. Lindsay Titus. Welcome to the time for teacher shift podcast. Oh, thanks so much for having me. 00:01:04 I'm excited to dive in today. Oh my gosh. I'm so excited. And so before we do, what should people keep in mind? Like, what should listeners know about you? I mean, I will have just read your bio at the front end of the episode. But like, is there anything else that we should kind of be thinking about when we start the conversation today? I think for me, the biggest thing that, that I really try and really just emulate every day as an educator is that we get to be humans first. Um We are so programmed and conditioned um through all the things in the, in the world to, you know, almost be, be what we do. Um Instead of bringing who we are, we want to be into all the things we do. And so I think a lot of what I share about that's really the core that, that, that's where it comes from is because for years, I didn't live with that hat on and I've made that shift and now it's wherever I am, it's not work related, it's not home related. It's literally anywhere that Lindsay shows up, I'm gonna show up as I as I authentically can be because that's the only thing that's really quote unquote worked. 00:02:07 Um So that's really my core and that's what I bring into, you know, kind of all conversations that I'm having. What a great way to ground the episode. I love this. I love this. So much so. Ok, so now the first question I usually ask where we're kind of like getting into, to some deeper things around, like deep that was pretty deep to start with deeper things around. Like what this looks like. What is the dream that you hold for, you know, curriculum instruction or educators? Because I know you do a lot of work with that idea of human person educators. So like, what is that freedom dream for you? Yeah. So I think when it comes to, you know, really curriculum and instruction and, and anything really even beyond, I, I think it really is remembering that the people we are teaching are people. Students are people first too, just like teachers, right? We are, we are out here shouting it from the rooftops. It feels like right now where we are in education that we are humans that we are people, you know, all these things. But I think we have to encourage ourselves to remind ourselves, students are people too. 00:03:11 They are humans first too. And so when it comes to curriculum instruction, it has to relate to who we're teaching. It has to connect with them on, on a, on a level that they can understand. You know, when we ask, why do you think we're learning this? Why do you think this is in our books or why do you think this is what you know, for me, New York State says this is what you should learn why. Right. And then, and invite a conversation. So it's not, we have to learn this because New York State says we have to. No, it's why do you think? And then what are we gonna do about it? If it doesn't connect to us, then let's take it another level, you know, deeper. And if it does amazing how are we going to use this to keep moving? So, for me, it's kind of two fold. It's one, it's remembering that whoever we're teaching, they are people, they are humans. But then secondarily, it's, it's gotta connect. It's gotta be purposeful and it's got to be connected to who they are now, not who we think they should be or will be or could be. I love that. And I think my background is in student leadership and people are always talking about student leadership as this future thing. 00:04:13 Once you graduate, it's like, no, no right now. Yeah. And we, you know, even so obviously I'm an educator, but I'm also a mom and I have lived that without knowing really, like, there's a term for it or, or all the things. But like that was my go to with my, my older daughter Keeley, who's now nine, you know, from the time really, she could talk. I was always like, here's why we do this. What do you think? What would you like to do? What would you like to add? And it could be something as simple as what do you want for dinner tonight? Right. Like, here's our plan. What else would you like? And it's just allowing her voice to be heard because absolutely, I believe who, who wholeheartedly that if we leave things for the future, they stay in the future. Right. One day someday stays one day someday. But until we start living it now, today we're not gonna see change. And so it really is about bringing it into this present moment so that we can, you know, make the change we want to see. I love that and I love that too as like the simultaneous educator and parent hat of like this happens right in our daily lives in our homes as well. 00:05:16 And like, where else can we bring that to life? So I love that tip just for, for parents listening as well or anyone who has a young person at home. Um So I OK, so thinking about all of this, I often talk about like a variety of kind of pillars that kind of play into bringing this to life. And so I think of things like mindset, which I know you coach a lot around. I think of things like the pedagogy and, and kind of even to what you're speaking of, of like literally how you interact with young people as you were just describing, I think of the assessment and, and the you were mentioning New York State and like I taught New York State for, for my teaching as well. And it was like, here are the things like you have to prep for the regions, you have to prep for like all these state tests, right? And so there's like that dynamic and like, how do we make that more human censored? And then there's also like, literally what you're, I mean, you've hit on all of these, I think the the relevance piece too with the content, it's like, it has to be relevant literally right now, not in some distant future. What do you think in terms of like, how you think about these playing out or how you would coach teachers to think about these? 00:06:20 Is there an order to them? Is there kind of like a prioritization? Is it like all things at once? Is there something that seems a little bit more important than others to you? So I think, you know, above and beyond all, I believe Mindset has to be your foundation and that's, you know, yes, I coach on Mindset. Um But I really do believe if you, you know, we often use like the house analogy, right? Like if I, I can bring in the greatest, you know, windows and doors and paint and things like that. So, you know, I can have really good um you know, assessments that are actually helping us move the needle forward, so to speak, I can be teaching content that is relevant to now. But if I don't have the belief or the mindset that this is important, but this is the way it really, that the world works. Right. If I don't have that core belief that this is it, then it's the energy. There, there's a, there's a disconnect and so I truly believe that that has to be the foundation. Um, and then I think the other things really can be more kind of individualized, personalized based on, you know, I even think it could be personal person. 00:07:26 I think it could be department to department. I think it'd be school district, right? Wherever your kind of mission and vision is focused because every school, every department, every district is a little bit different. But mindset has to be quote, right? That has to be the core, at least from my, from my beliefs. Because if my belief, my subconscious brain is telling me it's not important or it doesn't matter if it's not, it, then my actions will never align to it. And that's when we find ourselves doing things but feel that like, nag like, I don't know that this is what I should be doing or this doesn't feel right. This doesn't feel align. Well, it's because we have a disconnect between what our inner thoughts are telling us and what we are actually seeing in our reality. I think about that in terms of adaptive leadership, like a lot of the stuff that I do is adaptive leadership. And it's like, you know, we're always applying like a technical challenge to a pro or a technical solution to an adaptive problem thinking it's a technical challenge. We're like, oh, we'll just do a PD session and then this problem will go away and it doesn't. And I think you're absolutely right. It's because there's a disconnect between the underlying belief that we're usually a little afraid to address. And I think that is a really interesting, like a frame for a lot of the things that we struggle with in education and the reason we've been grappling with the same problems for so long. 00:08:38 And so I, I totally agree and, and I'm wondering, kind of as a follow up the, the mindset shift or maybe the core beliefs that you found that people do hold that are productive or that help kind of move the needle or, um, like things that you coach people on. What are, what are those kind of mindsets or beliefs that, that are positive? Yeah. So, I think it's really, it's really about creating this understanding of why we do the things we do and the actions we take today, the biggest kind of aha moment I had when I was personally going through this. But I, I also personally, you can't teach something you haven't gone through. And so, you know, I, everything I teach on everything I talk about is because I have lived it the last you know, however many years. And so when I think about mindset, it's ok. What is it or why do I do the things that I do? And they always connect to ultimately childhood and they always connect to a belief or an upbringing or something that we learn. You know, the, the easiest kind of noneducational example I I share is the money doesn't grow on trees, right. 00:09:42 So many of us myself and h grew up with that mindset of like, no, we have to save money doesn't grow on trees. It just doesn't come from anywhere. And so, but now as adults, we have that same mindset if we, if we don't shift it, right? I coach behavior primarily, right? So student behavior, adult behavior, why do we do the things we do a lot of it become? That's how we were taught behaviors that we find really irritating in our classrooms are probably the ones that irritated our parents. And then we were told don't do those things. And so those are ingrained in us, don't do those things, they're bad. And then subconsciously as educators, that's what we see, we see hitting, we assume bad and we act in a certain way now until I can undo that core belief, right? Not even undo I can rewrite it so that I can believe behavior truly is a form of communication. Behavior truly is meaningful in that moment. It's a solution to the problem. Well, then I can see it through a different light. And now as the educator, I can teach, support coach, a different directive. And so for me, that's really what I help educators do. 00:10:46 It's like here's the situation we have, let's unpack it and we're gonna go deep, right? We're gonna go to your point beyond the surface kind of initial pd layer, we're gonna go real deep to figure out what's the barrier and then how do we then create new habits, new standards, new boundaries, new values so that this now just becomes our f our new foundation. I love that. And you made me think of so many things too now as like AAA first time parent that I'm experiencing too in that realm of like, why do some things irritate us? And it is because it irritated our parents and it has been so much of an unlearning process to be like, is it really that bad that like, you know, something got a little messy or is it really, you know, because to your point of humans, we are humans first, right? Like this is a human child, we have a human connection. That connection is more important than a little bit of milk on the floor, right? Like, yes, it's so important and such a really good demonstration of like, I mean, that's a 1 to 1 kind of relationship or like a, you know, maybe 2 to 1 or, or whatever, but in a classroom. 00:11:49 It's the same thing, even though it's kind of a one to many like that is definitely, it, it's like the human part comes first. The behavior is the communication. Let's go deep and understand what's happening. And let's try to unlearn the things that often. I mean, a lot of my work is Justice Center. So it's like a lot of it is like white supremacy culture, right? That was says we should not wear hats or we should behave this way or we, right? And it's like, why? Yeah, I say it's, it's this one of the I would say in the English language, sometimes the smaller the words, the bigger the impact, right? And why, I mean three letters but holy moly like it's huge. And so, and I do that too with, with behaviors, you know, I'll get called into a classroom and we, we've got to change this kid behavior. OK? Why? Well, and I, and sometimes I get really good answers and sometimes I get like, you're in a headlight like because it has to change like, but why? But why? Right. And usually it takes 3 to 5 whys to actually get to, you know, the the core or the crux of like what is this actually impacting? And nine times out of 10, maybe that's maybe this but maybe like 67 times out of 10. 00:12:53 It's because it impacts the adult more than anybody else because we have not had the opportunity and this is not shaming or guilty trying to make anyone feel this is because this is how we were raised. We didn't learn this in teacher prep, we didn't learn this and there's no like adult course, like, figure all this out. But it's, that's why, right. It irritates us because of our past experience and until we can honor that and say, ok, it bothered me, then it doesn't have to bother me. Now, I can do different things. And that's amazing. And that's really cool and exciting. And that's what I'm gonna go find. Right. But if I'm living this, well, I have to do this because I should, and because of this, our energy is never gonna be what we want it to be. And that's what to me, in my opinion, what leads to burnout frustration and, and people just kind of saying this is never gonna work. Yes. And I think about that in terms of curriculum too, like I think about it behaviorally, but also in terms of curriculum, all of like the should, you should do this, this should matter. We are preparing for a task, right? All of the things that are like pressure and yeah, your energy just totally dissipates. And I think it's why a lot of people like leave the profession is because I got into this thing for joy and human connection and teaching in a joyful way and it's not happening. 00:14:03 And I don't want a part of it anymore. Yeah. So yeah, you know, at any time should, comes up in conversation, it's should be like that. Is that, is it just, and now it's funny, like as much as I share it, you know, out in social media land, I started sharing it like at school and people are like, what is that? I'm like, well, it's my made up word but it's purposeful like we are in should be right now. Like, I don't care. OK, so, yes, we, we're gonna teach this concept. Great. You don't need to love the concept, but you have to love the energy you get to bring to teach the concept. And that's what I always think. It's like the curriculum is the curriculum. We and I, I do, I think we have a long way still to go. I think we've made a lot of change but there's, it's momentum, right? It's not, once we get here, we're gonna be done. And I think that's something that I thought for a long time. Like, well, once we finally get here, we're good and then I learn. I'm like, no, I, no, I don't want good. I want great. I want phenomenal. I want amazing. And that's an ongoing process. Like if you're someone looking for, like, I'm here, I'm good. Like, no, like let yourself expand, let yourself get bigger than the curriculum, right? 00:15:08 Because you are bigger than it. But the energy you bring behind it. You don't have to 100% agree with it. You don't have to 100% understand it. There's some things that I'm like, I don't get. But let's be honest and real about that and let's teach how, then we learn how we make those connections for kids. So they see the purpose in what we're doing. That brings to mind an example of a couple teams that I've been coaching around curriculum and one of the teams just literally the moment they walked in the door, high energy, super loving their jobs. And they are the team. When I asked the first question of like, how does curriculum building make you feel? They were like, love it, do it all the time, constantly revising like the students change. So we have to change and this just like this dynamic thing and the group that was like, uh like walking in the door kind of like, I don't wanna be here. It immediately became clear that there was a connection between, I don't wanna be here because I don't like the idea of arising curriculum because I've been teaching this exact same curriculum for 5, 10, 15 years. And it's good. We are, we have arrived, right? There's no improving. And that mindset I think, and based on what you're saying, I think it's probably not just me that thinks this now they're like, there is a connection there to the joy that we bring and the way that we teach and the, whether we're happy in our profession and whether we stay in the profession in a happy way. 00:16:24 And that is fascinating to me that you just helped me make that connection. It really, I mean, it's taken me years to figure it out like it really is. And, and, you know, some people I often get like, they're like, is it really that simple? And I'm like, well, it is now our brains will make it way more complex because our brains want us to stay where we're at. Our brains do not want us to change. And so we don't, right, like our brains will hold us back. And so it takes ourselves having that inner work, that inner strength to say, I'm gonna do something a little bit different. I'm going to veer off the beaten path a little bit with this lesson and doesn't mean you have to go to like the next state or the next country. Like you can go across the street, right? You can go to the next town like you. And I think that's the other thing. We often live in this all or nothing universe. And so it's like when people hear curriculum change, it's like, well, there goes everything I've ever done, we're starting from scratch and I'm like, you're not like, and, and actually during the pandemic, that was something I really resonated with is like, we are never doing anything new we're building on from experience that we have like, stop giving away the credit of the life that you live because it got you here. 00:17:29 And that is an amazing thing. That doesn't mean we have to keep doing what we've always done. You know, I always, I'm, I'm so in tune lately with like the kind of the oxymorons and like the adult versus student world. I've shared a couple of them out on, on Instagram. But it's like for us it's like comparison is the thief of joy for adults yet. That's what we do in classrooms, right? We continue to compare our kids and I'm like, or no could be a complete sentence for me, but our kids can't say no. Like and so it's just like a moral world. That's the word, right that I'm living in and I'm just trying to like, get to a point of like, let's just all listen to each other. Let's just all be ok with change, right? We don't want to be where we're at yet. We're afraid to change. So we have to be willing to say that makes me uncomfortable, but I'm gonna keep moving forward anyway. Wow. That idea of adult student really hits home. That is so true. Wow. We totally think these things for us and not student when I do it here. Like I'll be talking to my daughter, I'll be saying something like, you know, that's, this is a great opportunity to practice gratitude. And I'm like, oh yeah, I should take my own advice. Like that's so great. 00:18:35 So I, I think people listening are probably thinking, yeah, like I wanna do more of this. I'm gonna have more joy. I want to be in human connection with students. I wanna like have these same concepts for myself as for my students and for my Children. What does that look like in terms of action? Like are there any anything anything that you've like coached around or you suggest people do to, to literally just help build that into reality for themselves? Yeah. So my, my favorite activity I think that anybody really can do. Um It's pretty simple. It all it requires really is a sheet of paper and a pencil is take a sheet of paper, draw a triangle on it and in the middle um if you're a drawer draw like your ideal self, like when you envision who you want to show up as at work, like and I'm thinking like the day where you've had like the best sleep, the best coffee. If you're a coffee drinker, like there no traffic, like you just have this like ideal day, like draw that out. I am not a drawer. So I write like kind of script out what that looks like and that's gonna fill the inside of your triangle and then order doesn't really matter. 00:19:37 But one of the peaks of the triangle is gonna be, what does this person look like? So physically, what are they wearing? What, you know, how, how long is their hair? What color are their nails? Everything you want to get really, really super specific. Um One of the peaks is sounds like. So when they're speaking, what are the words that are saying? Are there words full of gratitude or are they full of complaints? Right. What are, what is coming out when they speak and then feels like how do they feel during the day? And so by doing this exercise, this now becomes your rounding mechanism. So on a day where you're not finding the joy on a day that you are just like what is happening? My world is falling apart. You have this, I call them like anchor, um anchor statements or anchor um just documents, right? To really read ground you. And so you reread that and OK, right. That my ideal self speaks gratitude, not complaints. So what am I grateful for in this moment? What am I? What am I learning? Right. So for me, one of the sounds like is, is shares the lessons that she's learning through challenges. 00:20:44 And so now when I'm having a challenge, I don't see it as a challenge. I see it as what's the lesson? What am I ready to learn? What am I ready to expand? And so by having that, you now have almost like your own coach in your pocket. So to speak to really help you, you know, fully understand the emotion, right? And this is, you know, one activity to do, please don't think this is like all you do and then you're like saved like, but this is one way to bring it back to the present moment of what is something I can control right now. I might not be able to control all the policies, all the things that are happening, but I can control the language I use when I speak about it. And so for me, that's one of the easiest places to start because you have full control over whether you do it or not. I absolutely love this. And it also, I think just brings awareness sometimes to the fact that like, oh I am not this person that I, I ideally would like to be in this moment. And like you said, I do have control over that and how that manifests like, oh, so good. Yeah. And I do this activity at least once I would say every like 4 to 6 months. 00:21:47 So again, once you reach that ideal state because we're all about growth and expansion. So once I get to where I read it and I'm like, I am living this, you know, most of the time, right? Everybody has allowed a bad day, everybody has allowed a bad moment, you know it, that's fine. But if you get to where you're reading it and you're like, I am doing this well, now it's time to, to push yourself right now. We take it one step further. So you do it again with the now? Ok. What, what now is this person doing? And that's really how I've gone from, um, you know, I was a classroom teacher to now, you know, I'm a, I'm a behavior specialist in a district, but I'm also a speaker and an author and a podcast. So it's like, I've been able to add not all at once but over time because my ideal self continued to shift. How else am I gonna share my voice? How else am I gonna share my joy? How else am I gonna share my energy and what is that gonna look like? Someone can feel like I love that. I love that and I'm sure that people that you coach probably do this activity and have had a lot of success with it. Is there anything that like as you're coaching them, maybe they're like moving on from that step or maybe it's even around this idea that they have had, they've seen kind of like a challenge that transcends like individuals or like this is kind of a theme of like this is part of the challenge of this work and this is something that we frequently you have to overcome. 00:23:00 Is there anything you'd want to share around? Like what's challenging? And then how do we move through that? Yeah, I think the biggest thing that comes up more frequently than not is this understanding that we truly do have the power to create change around us. I think so often we are conditioned in that. Well, if my leader changes, if my admin changes, if my school policy change, if I change schools, if something else changes, then I'll change. And I learned that that's just what I call the chase, right? That's us chasing a dream or chasing a change. That really is never gonna happen. Because until we believe it wholeheartedly within ourselves, we're gonna keep finding different experiences of the same thing. And so in educators that I coach when we finally kind of crack through this thing. So they're like, I moved grade levels and it was great. But then, you know, this challenge hit and I felt burnt out again. I'm like, right, because we didn't actually get to the crux yet of what that challenge meant to you and how you perceived it. And so once we do that, then the breakthroughs happen, not only in the classroom, but also at home, the family during, you know, their leisure time and they're really starting to see that their life is created by them, that it is not work first and then I try and fit in everything else. 00:24:16 It is no. Who are you at your core? And then all the other things will find their peace, but you get to stay in control and once we learn how to do that, then even the challenging days, I just had an educator reach out the other day. And she's like, it was one of my most challenging days as an educator. And I still left work with a smile on my face because I knew I did my best. I knew I'm learning the lesson and I knew that whatever happened that day did not define me that who I show up as after that, right? The resilience, the empowerment, all those pieces. That's who I am and she was able to continue on her day. Whereas in the past that would have knocked her, you know, out, so to speak for at least a day, if not more. So those are the moments that like, make my heart super happy because everybody has that ability within them. We just have to believe it and then take the align action to make it happen. I love that so much because I also resonate with that challenge. Like I often think of, I mean, even just in like my own like, oh, it would be so great when, you know, we could like fence off the yard and then that way it'll just be easier to let the dog out or something. You know what it's like, waiting for that day, waiting for that thing. 00:25:20 It's like, no, no, I can have the joint now. Like, what else can change like? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And it's it really is like we can have long term goals, like, absolutely. But don't forget about the short term, the medium term, the in the middle, right? And then more importantly, what can you do today? Right. And so if there's something you desire in the future, that's amazing. But if it stays in the future, it stays in the future. And this is whether you're talking about wanting to get in shape or, you know, we want change in the classroom through curriculum. Like it doesn't matter if we say one day it stays one day. And so instead we can start to think what is one thing I can do today, right? What is one step? One small, simple step I can take to build that momentum. Because what do we know about momentum? Once it starts watch out, it's gonna keep going. And that is a, that is a power that is something we all have inside. And if I think if we can get more people to, to band together on that, then then truly watch out because we really are unstoppable at that point. 00:26:24 That's amazing. And, and I, I think about the work that you do with your journaling and, and all of the different things that you have for people to be able to use and, and go to that. Do you mind talking us through a little bit? Like what for listeners, you're gonna get access to a seven day uh journaling like documents, right? And so Lindsay is sharing that with you guys so you can use it and try it out and I'll, I'll just like throw it back to you to, to see if you want to talk us through that. Yeah. So I think again, so much of what we're talking about here today starts in our thoughts, right? And if we don't have a way to ground our thoughts, then our thoughts win, right? And you are not our, we are not our thoughts. And I thought, I thought we were for a long time. Like I grew up thinking like, well, this is just the way I am, right? I have these negative thoughts about myself. I grew up very like low confidence, low self esteem um thinking, you know, I'm, I'm just a pessimist, that's just who I am. And it wasn't until I got into adulthood, but I was like, no, I'm not right, like working with a coach myself and really going all in on this mindset where I was like, no, I'm not like, but I needed a way to channel those thoughts. 00:27:28 And so like I said, for me, I am a writer and so journaling was the way, but I, I couldn't figure it out with just open journaling, right? Just kind of blank sheet of paper. Some days I can. But most days I'm like, I don't know what to write and I would get stuck on like I don't know, it's right. So I'm just not going to write. And so I created um the defining journal that is, it's kind of a combination of all the journaling practices that really resonate well with me and I've had similar success with other um educators, although it is not written solely for educators. So anybody really that's looking to help define who they are, um can absolutely use it. And so it starts out, each day starts out with a little motivational inspirational poem, message, just something to really get your mind thinking. Um There are lists for both celebrations of the day. I fully believe in celebrating everything. And I always say, I don't care if you put on there, you brush your teeth like I don't care what you celebrate, but you celebrate five, at least five things and then gratitude. Same thing does it matter if it's big things, little things, the more we are grateful for, the less we take for granted. 00:28:30 And then on the opposing page, it is all about reflection on either whatever your thoughts are saying to you or how you resonate to the poem. And so what connections did you make? What wonders do you have? What feelings are you feeling? And then words to define your day? Because I realize like we don't allow ourselves just to wonder and get curious and question things. And I think the more we do that in our daily lives, the more we're gonna feel natural doing it in the classroom and we're not gonna be so off put. Then if students right, it is a normal part of human nature to question things that are happening, doesn't mean we did anything wrong. But if we don't start that practice with ourselves, we won't accept it as, as like, ok to do in the classroom either. And so I created this um to really help people either through a morning or an evening routine. I know some teachers that use it on their lunch break as like a midday, like pick me up here we go. Um And it's just, it's, it's, you know, my pride and pride in, you know, my little baby that um um I just, I love sharing out in the world because I think it is such a, again, a simple way to really help people get their bots focused back on themselves. 00:29:38 I love that. I'm going to download it and use it because it sounds wonderful. And so as people have been like listening to this episode for a while now and, and thinking about all the things that they might want to do, where is one thing where they could start in a place where, you know, they are building that momentum that you talked about and, and really living in alignment with like who they want to be that ideal self in that triangle. So I think if you are someone like you like I don't know where to start. My number was always start with gratitude. Start with three minutes. That three minutes changed my life. I started gratitude practice um with three minutes. So I would set my alarm clock every morning for three minutes earlier than I had been waking up. And I just sat in bed and I just spewed off the most random of random things that I was grateful for. And that then turned into again, it's all about building momentum and everybody has three minutes, like even the, the, the busiest person, even though I don't love the word busy, but like the person that's doing it all has three minutes. Um You know, even there was nights, you know, I have a one year old as well and there was many nights I still do it because she's still not sleeping through the night. 00:30:47 Um, where as I'm holding her, as I'm rocking her, I am just spewing out gratitude because my, otherwise my mind is gonna go. Why do I have to do this? I'm gonna be exhausted tomorrow. This is so frustrating, even though that's not what I truly believe, that's what I feel in the moment. And so instead, it's, I'm so grateful I get to be here for her. I'm so grateful I get to hold her. I'm so grateful she's telling me what she needs right now and that just makes everything change. And so when you start to do that in the morning, you're gonna then do it in the afternoon. You're gonna, then do it in the evening. Um The second way to kind of build on that is connect gratitude to something you see all the time. I do it with mirrors. So any time you pass a mirror, it's like a p you have to say something that you are grateful for and you can say it internally, it's fine. Otherwise people might look at you, but that's ok too. But think about it. There's mirrors everywhere, right? They're in our car, they're in our buildings, they're in our homes, um Anywhere you go. And so every time you pass by now you're practicing gratitude just as a daily habit. Um And I think that is the simplest way for me that I found to just do that. And then on those really tough days, that's just what I did with like I just, I just increase the gratitude and, and fall back in love with the life I'm living. 00:31:56 Even if it's frustrating me at that moment, it's Lindsay Lances popping in here to tell you about today's episode. Freebie. So Lindsay Titus has written a ton of cool journal kind of things with awesome prompts and she is sharing with you a seven day journal freebie that you can access on our blog post, go to Lindsay Beth lances dot com slash blog slash 136 to get yours. Now, back to the episode I love that idea of the cues. I totally gonna use that. And I think I, I talk about sometimes, like, I think it's James Clear, talk about habit stacking or something and it reminds me of that. Right? Like, what do you link with something else? So good. All right. This question is just purely for fun. I just love learning what other people are learning about. But what is something that you have been learning about lately and it can relate to our conversation or be totally different? So I am all about. It's funny, I do not read fiction books. I just can, I not even, I can't, I just don't enjoy them. Um Like I once did and so I'm constantly trying to pull in. So right now, I am totally fascinated with the mind. I mean, that probably doesn't surprise anyone that's listening to this episode, but I've been really focused, a kind of hyper focus on human design and really learning about how we are all so unique but interconnected at the same time. 00:33:06 And so based on like time of birth and where you're born and all that. And I don't even, that's about the surface as I am right now. It's all about like the moons and the star, you know, all the things, but it gives you kind of this like formula for, you know, somewhere that you've been and I know there's people that are like, nope, don't believe it there's people that are like, yes, this is all I believe. And I'm kind of in the middle, right? Like, I'm kind of like reading it. Like, I believe this, I don't, but it's just fascinating to me that I'm like, this is just cool. Right. And I love, again, kind of learning things that I'm like, oh, maybe that's why I do what I do. I love that. I love fun stuff like that. And then finally, listeners are going to get and be able to download in the show notes in the blog post, um your template or your sorry, not template uh journal for seven days. Also just wanna flag here that Lindsay also has the full journal that you can buy if you're like, yeah, I want more than seven days of this. Um So we'll link to all of that stuff as well in the blog post. But where can people connect with you and get in touch and continue the conversation? Yeah, absolutely. So um define university is my website and so and university is with uh you, so you um but pretty active on most social media sites, I would say Facebook and Instagram primarily. 00:34:17 Um because those are the ones who let me write the super long captions. So just a fair warning to anybody I like to write stories with, with my posts. Um But that is where I show up most frequently. But then again, everything else links back to the website. Awesome Lizzie. Thank you so much for joining us today. Uh Thank you so much. It has been so much fun if you like this episode. I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am about my coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane, Sapir and Jamila Dugan. Talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book Street Data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period. I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. If you're smiling to yourself as you listen right now, grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm. How I can help you make this big dream a reality. I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. Sign up for a nerdy no strings attached to brainstorm. Call at Lindsay beth lions dot com slash contact. Until next time leaders think big act brave and be your best self. 00:35:24 This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better podcast network better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there, explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode.
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In this episode, Nadia A. Bennett talks about the pressing need for anti-racist school environments, her dream for curricula that equips students to grapple with social issues head on, and a concrete example of a school in which the leader said racism was too hard to solve. (She insightfully shares how she responded in that last situation.) We go deep into the journey of leading anti-racist work including the challenges along the way and practical strategies for what your anti-racist leadership can look like.
Nadia Bennett is the founder of When Brown Girls Lead™, an education consulting firm that leads the way for schools to become anti-racist learning environments through culturally-relevant leadership development and mentorship. For more than 15 years, Nadia served in education, as teacher, principal and executive director of K-12 schools. In this episode we go deep into the journey towards leading anti-racist work including the challenges along the way and practical strategies for what your anti-racist leadership can look like. The Big Dream Nadia says, "The curriculum that is used in schools would lead students to this truth that the mind is a weapon and reading is one of the best ways to sharpen that weapon." She envisions a curriculum that equips students to grapple head-on with social issues like poverty and racism. Alignment to the 4 Stages: Mindset, Pedagogy, Assessment, and Content Mindset is really important. Nadia says, "We have to embrace unlearning, the lies that we have been told," she emphasizes, adding that anti-racist schools begin with anti-racist adults. “Shift, unlearn, learn the truth, make a decision to move forward in a space of anti-racism, equity, equality,” she says. Mindset Shifts Required Nadia stressed the need for adults to take responsibility for creating anti-racist school environments. "The adults have to do the work because the adults are making the decisions, setting the policies, and creating the systems and structures," Nadia explained. Action Steps In our conversation, Nadia outlined three key steps to confronting racism in schools: Step 1: Look at the data. According to Nadia, the data can reveal disparities in education that often slip beneath the radar. "One of the best things you can do is show them the data.” Step 2: Assess why the disparities exist. "We need to assess why there are so few Black and Brown children in AP and honors," Nadia states, urging educators to take a hard look at the adult actions leading to these student outcomes. Step 3: Adults must take responsibility. Nadia stressed that adults have to have the courage to do this and commit to making changes. Challenges? Nadia described a concrete example of a white administrator saying the racism showing up in his school data was too hard to solve. She explained why this happens, “Let's be honest, it's not going to directly impact him or his children because he identifies as a white male. So he's fine. He can go home at night, he doesn't have to worry about his child being killed, unarmed, just because they're getting gas at a gas station or whatever the scenario is this year. He doesn't have to worry about his child being funneled into the school-to-prison pipeline. He doesn't have to worry about his child being passed along when they should be supported more academically or his child walking into a classroom and people have little expectations for him. That's not his concern. So he gets to lean back.” This is not okay. Nadia says “that's why I often use the word anti-racist…[Kendi says] it's not enough to not be racist, one must be anti-racist. And anti-racism looks like taking actions against racist policies, taking action against racist ideas and expressions, et cetera. So that same man will look at me and say, ‘Well, I don't mistreat black people intentionally, I don't use the N word, I don't do ABC, so that means that I'm not racist.’ No, sir. No sir, that's not enough, and it's really not enough because of the work that you do and what the children you owe these children because you decide to take this job. You wanted to do this work, so you owe them. You give them the education that they deserve.” Later in the episode, Nadia reflects on this moment, sharing, “ I have been learning that this work, even for myself, is to also be done over the long haul. And I have to be patient with individuals that are just starting to engage with the work or have not engaged with the work…Now I can lean back and say ‘You know what? He's just not there. He's just not there yet.’ And what can I do? Maybe through this assistant principal…support him in managing up. So I'm learning to have grace and and in my support of schools and understand that every school leader is in a different place.” One Step to Get Started To start making a difference, Nadia believes that educators should first commit to understanding the problem. "If you are educating children, you have to understand that everybody comes into a space with their own biases and it is your responsibility to not have those biases play out when you're working with young people who are put in front of you to be educated," she said. Stay Connected You can find Nadia on her website, LinkedIn, and Instagram. To help you implement some of the ideas Nadia shared, I’m sharing my Root Cause Analysis Worksheet (which now includes my Data Analysis Worksheet too) with you for free. And, if you’re looking for more details on the ideas in this blog post, listen to episode 135 of the Time for Teachership podcast. If you’re unable to listen or you prefer to read the full episode, you can find the transcript below. Quotes:
TRANSCRIPT I am so excited for you to hear this conversation today with Nadia Bennett, who is the founder of Wen Brown Girls lead an education consulting firm that leads the way for schools to become anti racist learning environments through culturally relevant leadership development and mentorship. For more than 15 years, Nadia served in education as teacher principal and executive director of K 12 schools. During that time, El A test scores doubled student attendance increased and teacher retention rates spiked after years of successfully turning schools around yielding notable results and creating anti racist school environments. Nadia now leads her team at when Brown Girls lead to make sure all students receive the equitable education they deserve. Get excited for this conversation with Nadia Bennett. Here we go. I'm educational justice coach Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings. 00:01:05 If you're a principal assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nerd out about co creating curriculum with students. I made this show for you. Here we go. Nadia. Welcome to the time for teacher shift podcast. Oh, thank you. Thank you for having me. I am really excited for our conversation today and I just wanted to know if there's anything that you want listeners to know as we kick off the conversation that they should kind of keep in mind as we're chatting today. That's a great question. I would say I would like listeners to know that I am a school turnaround strategist. Uh I work with K to 12 school to develop leaders foster a culture of inclusion, equitable, equitable, achieve achievement, excuse me, and create anti-racism, school environments. Um I do this through professional development, anti-racism training. And the core is I believe that when more Black and Brown educators are given the opportunity to lead students and school communities evolve and we're able to influence the next generation in the, the best way possible. 00:02:11 Oh, that's amazing. And I think actually segues perfectly into my next question, which is about freedom dreaming, right? And like, what, what is that dream? I, I love Doctor Bettina, love how she talks about dreams grounded in the critique of injustice specifically. I think that's such a cool foundation for what, what our dreams are. And so I'm wondering what that big dream is for you in, in schools that dream for me is that the curriculum that is used in schools would lead students to this truth that the mind is a weapon and reading is one of the best ways to sharpen that weapon. And that weapon needs to be sharpened for battles, right? Battles against racism against poverty and all other forms of oppression. If curriculum could somehow help young people leave with that truth and that understanding of their identity and align with that. I think that would be the best curriculum that there is to offer all Children. I love that. And II, I love the emphasis on all Children right too, because I think sometimes people are like, oh, this is just curriculum for certain students or you know, black, a brown student, it's like, no, no, this benefits every student, right? 00:03:23 When we center black and brown leaders, when we center curriculum, that helps people sharpen their minds and combat racism like that helps every person. So I appreciate that grounding. Exactly. And it helps every person in the way of it fosters in a future world of true equity and equality. Right? In that, if we consider that up until probably the last 5 to 10 years, all curriculum has been written from the lens of the white American, right? History is told through the lens of the White American. So black and brown Children have been educated and socialized in an environment where the White American is lifted up and their history is told and it's understood et cetera, which perpetuates white supremacy and black inferiority if we had a curriculum that show the true history of everyone, right? And they saw that the history of black people doesn't start with slavery and it doesn't start with the civil rights movement. 00:04:27 But understand that we have such a rich history as well. Again, it creates and we be beginning to socialize individuals for equity and equality that one's not greater than the other. But we have an understanding that we all have a deep, rich and important history beautifully that thank you so much for elaborating on that. I think there's so many components to doing that well, like there's, there's so many pieces, right? And so I, I usually think of the four like mindset. So like the mindset of teachers, also the mindset of like maybe families or, or students or there's a lot of mindsets. So, right? And then there's also the pedagogy, like how do we interact and, and teach students as well as like structures like assessment, but also the content we teach, like you're talking specifically about history, content and the example you just shared. So I think there's so many of those pieces that people sometimes are juggling or figuring out like how to fit that together. So I'm wondering what advice you would give or what you've kind of seen around. Like what's important? Is there like an order there like specific things to consider. 00:05:30 With some of these, you touched on a really important one mindset. Um So we have to embrace unlearning the lies that we have been told. As I mentioned earlier, this idea of white superiority and black inferiority, we have been socialized, taught, educated, um reinforced through media, et cetera. We see that all the time. It is literally in our subconscious minds, right? And I'm speaking when I say we, I mean, anyone that's born and raised in America, right? You see this is what we are taught, right? So we have to understand that in order for us to reach that next stage, we as the adults have to go through a process of unlearning and that unlearning requires true self reflection, understanding of self, right? It requires individuals. Uh I always say like taking up their mantel and saying, I'm gonna start with me, I'm gonna read the books. I'm gonna listen to the podcast. I'm gonna have the difficult conversations to understand how I have been mis taught and how I need to change things. 00:06:34 And that's for everyone but everybody has to. If you are educating Children, you have to understand that everybody comes into a space with their own biases and it is your responsibility to not have those biases play out when you're working with young people who are put in front of you to be educated and you are like bleeding all over them because you haven't done your work shift, unlearned, learn the truth, make a decision to move forward in a space of anti-racism, equity, equality, et cetera, diversity, inclusion. All the, all the words, right? Make that decision and then do the work. But it, it really does start with an individual mindset. I always say that anti racist schools begin with anti racist adults. The adults have to do the work because of the, excuse me, the adults are making the decisions that the, the adults are setting the policies and creating the systems and structures. If they do their work, then it all that will then shift the systems, it will shift the policies and the shift the decision making. 00:07:42 That is brilliant and it makes me think about like a student voice. Also, my, my background is in student voice and co creating policy with students. And so it actually makes me think of like part of their work is like, how do we like, engage in partnership with students as well? Like, of course, the leaders have to do their work first and then part of that is like, ok, well, now don't think, you know it all and then make sessions and kind of go forward. Right. Right. Exactly. I agree. I agree. You should definitely talk to the students and understand what their perspective is, how they feel about being in your building. Do they feel that they're experiencing, you know, microaggressions? Do they feel that there is some, you know, kind of because, you know, people can feel negative energy and I don't think that we trust Children enough, right? They may not know, they may not have as much life experience um as us, but they still, we're all born with intuition. We're all born with a several, a certain level of insight and we should trust them enough to understand and want to be invested in what their experience is and enough leaders and teachers, school adults that work in schools, it's really everybody don't, they don't put enough time and effort behind understanding student voice and understanding student experience. 00:08:55 Yes, I could not agree more. That is exactly it. I, I think also with this, if someone is listening and like, oh, well, you know, this is, this feels like a big shift for me or this is like, um you know, I have some teachers or some adults or, you know, some even some family members or whoever that are not into this dream or they're, they're not doing the individual work, right? Like what mindset shifts are required to have people kind of like, move together towards this dream and do the inner work that's required that you're describing when. So I'll speak to what mindset shifts are required or what actions because it there's, yeah, so you spoke a lot about the, the mindset. I know already, I'm, I'm wondering, I guess what, what you've seen to be effective when there's kind of like a challenge in place or there's some sort of resistance to like, ok, as a leader, I'm saying, we're gonna go do this, we're gonna do this together as adults. We're gonna, this is the work. 00:09:56 Um, is there something that is kind of like, clicked in people's minds when they can think about something a little bit differently? Um And then of course, I'm, I'm totally excited about the active steps too. Um With this thing is this answers your question and it's actually one of the first actionable things that people can do and that thing would be know the data. So if you are working in an environment where you have individuals that are having a difficult time embracing the fact that you have a problem of racism and you're trying to move towards an anti-racism environment. One of the best things you can do is show them the data. What data am I speaking to? Well, are your black Children suspended at a higher rate than your white Children? And if they are, which nationally, that is fact nationally, then we need to look at the reasons that young people are suspended, right? Are they suspended for things such as what can be perceived as disrespect? Right? And if you're perceiving disrespect, is there an opportunity to understand culture? 00:11:07 Is there an opportunity for an adult to reflect? Now, I wanna make myself very clear, I'm not talking about like outright disrespectful things such as a child using profanity towards an adult. Like that's not, I I am not saying in any way that expectations should be lowered for black Children. But what I have found in my work and even when I was a principal and executive director is that it's very rare that it would be like an outright disrespect. It would be something that someone is perceiving as disrespect and they're perceiving it that way because again, they came into this environment with their own biases. And so they're assuming that when this black child says something or does something that that's disrespect versus versus a white child doing the exact same thing, right? And not being taken that way, I'll put it to you, but I'll tell you a quick story about a school that I was working with recently and their black Children were suspended seven times more than their white Children seven times. 00:12:11 And their leaders knew that there was a higher level of suspension, but they had not looked at the data to know that it was actually seven times more. So when I pulled that data and I supported them in looking at that data. Two of the leaders immediately said, I cannot believe this, that I can name several, this was middle school, I can name several white, middle school age girls right now that have the worst attitudes, right? It was, and it was kind of like a uh a lighthearted kind of thing like they like they, she, she has the absolute worst attitude, understanding at that time, I like of hormones are changing. Middle school. That's tough. We all get that. How, but how are they not being written up yet? The Children that are being written, it was mind boggling to them. And so it was a great point of reflection and an opportunity to pivot for those leaders where you can see very clearly that you, you are interacting with these Children every day. I'm not and you can see very clearly that we have a problem, right? 00:13:15 And so I I all of that to answer the first part of that question around if you have individuals that will not accept the truth, start with the data, right? And I want to go beyond behavioral data as well because often we hear statistics and things about black Children that equate to to data, which I mean, excuse me, that equate that are in relation to, to behavior, pardon me? Um And I want to kind of take us outside of that box because sometimes we can get stuck there and we forget that black Children need an academically rigorous environment. So I want to take it to the academics. I've also been in environments where uh there are a much larger percentage of white and Asian students in A P classes and honors classes than there are black Children. Now, one could say, oh, well, a P honors is based on test scores is based on grades. What a lot of people don't know is also based on teacher recommendation. I I was a high school principal and I've worked in a lot of high schools and I've seen it myself. 00:14:18 It teacher recommendation is typically be. And let me tell you why teacher recommendation is typically taken into consideration because you can have a child that's incredibly bright naturally, but they can also be kind of lazy, right? And teachers know that. So teachers will say, oh well, yes, it shall get straight A and they score high on this exam. However, I have to push them constantly to do the work. They don't have the drive, the motivation. I don't think they will be successful in the A P class. So that's why teacher recommendation is important for, for leaders to be able to understand those um qualitative things about young people. So when you think about the fact that teacher recommendation is considered and yet every year after year, your A P honors class are packed with white and Asian students, could it be that some biases play though? Is someone even taking into consideration that they're black Children that are just as brilliant but not given the opportunity because we come into the classroom with the belief that black and brown Children cannot excel academically like they're white and Asian peers. 00:15:25 So that's why the data is so important. It's the very first action. It's a mind, it, it helps with the mindset. But then it's also the very first action that I take with schools when I'm in schools because I need to know what I'm working with. But more importantly, you need to know what you're working with and you need to know the truth about what's happening in your school district or, or your individual school. That is brilliant. That is, I just love this idea of like just look just looking at the data like what is going on like, yes and, and, and then from there you have like, I think you have a three letter acronym, I believe. So like that was kind of, I think part of the first one. Do you want to walk us through? Like what's after knowing the data or looking at that the data? Well, it's not an acronym. However, I like that I did, I'm gonna try to come up with one after this time. So, but that's, that's the first step. Um The next step is if there are disparities, which there often are assessing why the uh disparities exist, right? 00:16:29 So going back to my early examples in that, what are the adult actions that are leading to these student outcomes? As I said before, anti racist school environments begin with anti racist adults. So we need to assess why there are so few black and brown Children in A P and honors. We need to assess why black Children are being suspended at higher rates and understanding because you wanna make sure you're solving the right problem. Right. And there could be a million on surface reasons why. And this is why having an outside person is so important in these situations. Because a school leader, a teacher or someone who's dedicated to education, dedicated to Children can come up with a million reasons as to why that data looks the way that it does and it can all be on surface and it can all be valid and true. But if we really drill down, we know that's not really the foundational issue that we're experiencing here, which then leads me to my third point which is adults have to take responsibility, period. 00:17:35 You know, uh we all have biases. It's like it is impossible to not have them and we have to take responsibility for the fact that we have them and the young people that are put before us do not deserve to experience them when they come in front of us every day. If the adults can't take responsibility for the fact that there is a problem, we have data that says there's a problem we've discussed why this problem exists. Now, we have to have the courage to name this and work towards changing it. So naming that, let's think about this from a leader perspective that might look like a leader, principal, assistant, principal superintendent, whichever standing in front of the individuals, they lead and saying everyone, we have a problem and depending upon where the person is in their leadership, how long they've been at the school, it may be, we have a problem and I take responsibility for that problem. Right. And they want to take responsibility for the problem. 00:18:37 Not because they did every write up or because they were involved in every, you know, selection of who goes to A P honors. But because it is your responsibility as a leader to keep an eye on the data, it is your responsibility as a way to look at the hard stuff. And if this has been happening and you were not aware, then it would, it does benefit you and the staff for you to say I take responsibility for not being aware of this earlier. And I'm also taking responsibility for making sure that it changes. Yes, I I there's so much about this that I love. So I, I love this idea of taking responsibility. And what it reminds me of is I love the framework of um like adaptive leadership and there's a quote from some adaptive leader scholars that are talking about the underlying thing, like the root usually is like a value belief or loyalty that underlies it. And I've always been trying to share that quote and try to ground the root cause analysis or whatever in that. It's like we're not, it's like surface level unless we get to that point, like we have as adults, this underlying kind of like belief or loyalty to something that needs to be unearthed and unlearned. 00:19:49 And I just feel like that adults take responsibility. That is perfect. Right? II, I love the way you just said that and I would, I wanted to share another story as to why I always reinforce this. I worked with the school again recently. It was a school, it was a short term um support of the school to go in and evaluate their, their policies around anti-racism and give them some feedback, et cetera. There were several leaders in the debrief meeting and the assistant principal um who identified that as a white male, understood that it was a problem, took responsibility for the problem and said, I understand that we have to change this. I just don't know how OK, his supervisor, the school principal whom also identified as a white male leaned back in his chair and said, I know that it's a problem. It's just too hard to tackle. I exhibited a lot of self control in that moment. 00:20:52 Um And I addressed it as it needed to be addressed. And what needed to be communicated to this person is that you are a principal of a high school. Your job is hard. You're like you come to work every single day to do hard things. We just had a conversation about your classrooms not having rigorous enough instruction and you were all for that conversation. That's hard as well. But when it comes to creating an environment where black and brown Children, black and brown staff members feel comfortable even coming into this building and setting them up for success in this building. And in the future, you lean back and you just get to say it's too hard, then, then you're not taking responsibility, right? You're taking the easy way out and that one decision uh because I, I just always try to communicate to school leaders how powerful they really are because I think that sometimes we can forget how powerful we are. That one small decision of the principal making a choice to not tackle this work will impact thousands of Children, thousands of Children that are waking up every morning, simply coming to school to get a fair and appropriate public education free and appropriate public education and somebody an adult made a decision that the work that they really needed was just too hard and that he wasn't gonna do it. 00:22:20 Yeah, I, oh my gosh, I cannot even believe that like what that would have taken restraint wise to not, not I'm even restraining myself now, but there's definitely some words I want to say to him. But yeah. Right. And I think what people often think of is I usually, it's usually a distinguisher. People are like, oh, it's a we want to be safe. We were safe, like safe versus comfort is like a huge thing. I also think hard versus comfort is the difference there, right? Like you just want to be comfortable, sir, like and, and you want to be comfortable because it doesn't directly impact him. Let's be honest, it's not gonna directly impact him or his Children. Hey, it's Lindsay here to tell you about today's episode free B so Nadia and I talk a lot about root cause analysis and strategic planning and getting into those deep conversations. So I'm sharing with you my root cause analysis worksheet, which includes my data analysis worksheet as well in today's show notes. So go to the blog Lindsey by client dot com slash blog slash 135 to grab it. Now, back to this amazing conversation with Nadia because he identifies as a white male. 00:23:22 So he's fine. He can go home at night. He doesn't have to worry about his child being being killed unarmed just because they're getting, you know, they're getting gas at a gas station or like whatever the scenario is this year, right? He doesn't have to worry about his child being funneled into the school to prison pipeline. He doesn't have you have to worry about his child being passed along when they should be supported more academically or people or his child walking into a classroom and people having low expectations for him. That's not his concern. So he gets to lean back. And so that's why I think, no, not not a thing, but that's why I often use the word uh anti-racism because I'm not sure those who are not familiar with Ky's book, he says in there, it's not enough to not be racist. One must be anti-racism and anti-racism looks like taking actions against racist policies, taking action against racist ideas and expressions, et cetera. So that same man will look at me and say, well, I don't mistreat black people intentionally. 00:24:27 I don't use the N word, I don't do A B and C. So that means that I'm not racist. No sir. No sir. That's not enough and it's really not enough because of the work that you do and what the Children, you owe these Children because you decide to take this job, you wanted to do this work, so you owe them, you, you give them the education that they deserve. But I, I'll stop now. I'm sorry, I'll stop now. No, I think this is a just perfect perfect demonstration, right? Of like what this literally looks like when we're in the meetings. Like sometimes I think it's hard to pull back the curtain on like what does it look like in those meetings when these decisions or conversations are being had amongst the because only a few people get to actually be a part of those conversations. And this happens so often like so often, like you said, that's what the conversation is and that's what the manifestation or like the uh result of that decision or that comment is harming thousands of Children. Like and it's this behind closed doors meeting. You know, I just, I think I thank you for bringing it up. You're welcome. 00:25:30 You're welcome. I'm also wondering and I don't know if this is too, I don't wanna, I don't wanna like do too many like case studies of this but I'm wondering of like, OK, cool. So I'm wondering if there is another example you could share of like, let's say if you were saying, you know why the disparities exist, you could, you could say like AAA range of reason of reasons. But I think thinking about the adult piece or the adults taking responsibility. I'm wondering if there is like something early on where in a conversation you've had with, with a school or a district or something where they've said, oh, this is the reason, but it's really one of those surface reasons that you talked about and, and later on realizing or maybe you realizing from your coach lens, like there's actually something that's much deeper there that that was missed on the initial pass through. Could you give us an example of what the surface versus the real might be? Sure. Let me think about that for a moment. Yeah, I'm so sorry to put you on. No, it's totally fine. It's totally fine. I was the, the first thing that comes to mind is uh I worked with a district. That was a, how can I say it, it was a public charter. 00:26:37 However, it was a very small charter and it, it was difficult to get into due to the fact that they can only take so many young people, you know, um in the school year and it was a, a highly sought after uh charter. Now, the credit that I would give these leaders is that what the leader there? She did an exceptional job of creating the very diverse environment when she got there, she said no, like initially, it was a, a very, it was white and Asian majority and she wanted to create diversity. And so she intentionally brought in more black and brown Children, which I think is incredible. And so as we were talking through the, the behavior numbers because black Children were being suspended at a higher rate, I heard the leaders keep saying something to the effect of, oh, well, this young person came from a public school and they're getting used to the culture here because they didn't this, this particular school did a positive behavior support. 00:27:42 And so, well, oftentimes it takes them a while to get used to the way that we discipline here because we have positive behavior. So that's why we have to do A B and C and, and I thought to myself immediately, is it that they're getting used to it or is it that you're assuming that because they're coming from public school, then they're black that they're gonna come here and misbehave. Right? And so the reason I said earlier is that all of the reasons could be valid. Now, do young people have to get used to a different culture? Of course, we're humans. When we get into a different environment, we have to adapt et cetera. However, if no one's there to ask why and push them to a deeper understanding of really, there's a mindset believes a belief here, as you said. So poignantly earlier, there's a belief here and that belief is playing out and how you are accepting these young people and how you are educating them and you're leaving it at this surface level of. Well, they just got here who you can't tell me that every uh black student that comes from public school is misbehaving like you can't. 00:28:46 It's not, the odds are very slim. And so we have to look at what do the adults believe about the child before the child even comes into the building. So that's uh an, an example of that. And yeah, so that's an example of that. Yeah. What a great example. Thank you for sharing that. I think you're very welcome. That's another example. That's like a very common surface reason that people would share, right? This happens a lot. I think people could probably listening, relate to that example. Yes. And, and that's why I I I'm glad that that you feel that way because like I said, I've worked this, listen, I'm not new to education. I've been a teacher, I was a teacher, I've been an assistant principal, a principal and executive director and I was a turnaround leader. So I understand all of the reasons and the context, et cetera, et cetera. But we have to know that we live in a world that automatically views black Children from a deficit mindset. The deficits of that child are going to be discussed and on paper and in people's minds before the child even enters the classroom. 00:29:52 To the point that when a black child comes into a classroom and they are academically strong, right? When they can surpass their peers, we're shocked. Why are we shocked? Those are other little signs that we should be looking for, right? Because if you have the same expectation for the black child that you have with the white child, are you shocked when a white child does well, academically? Probably not because what you expect them to do well academically and you don't expect that of the black child and that's where those things begin to play out. Thank you for, for saying that that is absolutely absolutely resonating with me. I I wanted to say before we go into a couple closing questions, is there anything else that you, I wanted to ask, I guess is what I meant. I wanted to ask, is there anything else that you wanted to share? With us before we kind of moved to to our wrap up questions. Yes. So one of the in to those three things that I mentioned earlier, the data, why and taking responsibility, the last thing I would say is commit for the long haul. 00:31:02 So we have to also understand that it didn't this uh racist, these racist social structures that we all live in every single day were not built yesterday. The belief of the inferiority of a black person was not etched into our minds. Yesterday, we were born into this, right? We have grandparents and great grandparents that because of when they were born, they believe these things and they passed it down our textbooks, pass it down, et cetera. It's going to take time, right? And so when I say commit for the long haul, it's wise to settle in, settle into the discomfort and create a 12345 year plan to say this is how over time we're going to shift mindsets, we're going to shift policy. So shifting mindsets could be identifying, let's say this is random, identify, let's say an eight part anti-racism series for professional development that everybody that comes into your school environment as a teacher, leader, et cetera, everybody gets that training. 00:32:18 So they understand when they come here. Oh, I know where I'm working, right? They're serious about that work, right? And so, but even building something like that even that takes time, so settle in and commit for the long haul because these systems weren't created overnight and they're not gonna be changed overnight. I love the idea of doing like an A RPD for everyone who comes in. That's brilliant. That is so good. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. And I, I am just so excited to see like, I'm sure that people are gonna be like reaching out to you after this to be like, can you help me with that? I love to, I would love to. That is awesome. And so what, while we're thinking about all of the things that we have talked about today, we've talked about a lot of, a lot of different things that people might do. And I love this idea of settling in for the long haul. The kind of the short term like getting started or like momentum builder. What's like the first thing that someone could do when they stop listening to the episode, what would you say that would be like, what's the, the very first thing I, I would say there's an individual thing and then there's a group thing, the individual thing is to start your own work, find the book, find the podcast, be honest with yourself, journal about it, reflect on where you are as an individual, on your understanding of race, period. 00:33:40 Because if you're going to be leading this charge, it's gonna trickle down from you. So the first thing is you wanna do your own work. And at the same time, if you're the leader of a school or even the teacher of the school, start looking at your data so that the data examples that I gave you earlier were really for leaders. But teachers can look at their data too and say, hey, like are my black Children failing at a high, failing my class at a higher rate? Um you know, they can, they have data, they can review too. So individually start your work as a group for the larger impact. Start looking at your data reflecting on your data and looking at what you can do differently beginning the very next day. Excellent, excellent suggestions. And this, this question is just purely for fun. I feel like everyone who comes on is just constantly obsessed with learning and growing and doing their own thing. So anything you've been learning about lately and this does not have to relate to the work that you do, but it it can if you want. Um That's a, that's a great question. I'm gonna be very transparent. I have been learning that this work even for myself is to also be done over the long haul. 00:34:56 And I have to be patient with individuals that are just starting to engage with the work or have not engaged with the work. And I'm learning that because I truly have been fortunate as a school leader, both principal, as well as executive director and it may be the places where I worked. It may just be because of who I am. I don't know where I always worked alongside or supervise individuals that didn't shun away from this work always. And they were always in uh various places along their learning. Some people said the wrong things sometimes et cetera. But they understood that there were things that they didn't know and they were invested in learning and some people were way far ahead. Right? And they had already done their work and could help me in helping others. I recognize now that I'm in a consulting role and I'm working with schools nationally that that was actually I was really fortunate to have that. And I got a little bit spoiled. And so now that I'm working with schools nationally, I'm like, oh man, like there are schools that have not even really started this work and it requires me to exhibit grace, um understanding patience, et cetera. 00:36:08 Like with the example that I gave you earlier with the principal that leaned back. If he had met Nadia five years ago, my, my response would have been very different. I'm not always proud of those responses, but trust me, my response would have been very different. But now I can lean back and say, you know what, he's just not there, he's just not there yet. And what can I do maybe through this assistant principle, right. That is there and maybe support him in managing up. So I'm learning to have grace and, and um in my support of schools and, and understand that every school needs, this is in a different place that's really profound. I'm gonna, I'm gonna try to take that on too because that is hard work that you're doing and so important to, to be able to make sure that the work does get done right, to be able to stay in it Like, yeah, thank you for sharing that and, and I'm sure as I said, people are gonna want to reach out to you and, and work with you. So where can people I'll find you online? Absolutely. So uh they can sign up. 00:37:11 Well, they can find me at Nadia Bennett backslash podcast where they can sign up for resources, either school leader, resources or resources about anti-racism. And then they'll also get all my contact information when they sign up there. And I also can be found on Instagram at when Brown Girls Lead and on linkedin, I am Nadia a Bennett. Yeah, perfect. Thank you so much Nadia. This has been an absolute joy talking to you. I appreciate you coming on. Thank you for having me. If you like this episode. I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am at a coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane, Saer and Jamila Dugan, talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book Street Data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period? I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. You're smiling to yourself as you listen right now. Grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm. How I can help you make this big dream of reality. I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Z Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. 00:38:20 Sign up for a nerdy no strings attached to brainstorm. Call it Lindsay clients dot com slash contact. Until next time leaders think big act brave and be your best self. This podcast is a proud member of the Teach Better Podcast Network, better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there, explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode.
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AuthorLindsay Lyons (she/her) is an educational justice coach who works with teachers and school leaders to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice, design curricula grounded in student voice, and build capacity for shared leadership. Lindsay taught in NYC public schools, holds a PhD in Leadership and Change, and is the founder of the educational blog and podcast, Time for Teachership. Archives
August 2024
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