When it comes to video storytelling, the times have changed. Most students are already equipped with an Android device or an iPhone. The advanced cameras on phones can be a powerful tool to tell a story via video. At least when appropriately used. However, as an educator, you can still bring several tricks to the table to up your students' video filming game.  In Episode 184 of Class Dismissed, we spoke with former broadcaster Clement Townsend. Townsend works with youth to master storytelling with videos.  Townsend says they should learn to stay away from shooting vertical video for students just beginning to working with video. You know, a video that is shot with a phone upright. While that works for Instagram and TikTok, it's not the proper format for sharing videos on TV.  In our latest episode, Townsend offers layout tips for editing stories, and he tells his best advice for conducting an interview.  To hear our full interview with Townsend, listen to Episode 184 of Class Dismissed on your favorite podcasting app or iTunes.   All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

Highline Promise In 2012, Highline school Superintendent, Susan Enfield, made a promise to students. It's a promise that's now core to the Highline School District strategic plan. The "Highline Promise" states that each student is known by name, strength, and need.  Most educators come to the job with this spirit. With the intent of knowing each student in this way. But accomplishing this with thousands of students can be a challenge. Sometimes students fall between the cracks.  Enfield challenges Highline's educators' to seek out the students that don't have natural connections with teachers on campus.  Enfield says, "We've done an exercise where principals have taken photos of every single student and laid them out in the cafeteria for a staff meeting. And had staff members go and put a sticker next to a student that they knew really well."  The teachers then step back and see which of those photos don't have any stickers next to them.  "Those are the kids that we have to assign someone to," says Enfield. Power of one Enfield is a big believer in the power of one. "We want to make sure that every student can say that they have an adult at their school who they trust, who knows them, who cares about them, and whom they can go to if they need help or support."   She says that by identifying the gifts and the talents that each students brings, allows their teachers to build student confidence and resiliency. To learn more and hear how Highline school districts works to live up to the Highline Promise, listen to Episode 183 of Class Dismissed on your favorite podcasting app or iTunes. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

What is Inquiry-Based Learning? In Episode 181 we talk with Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL) expert Trevor MacKenzie. MacKenzie has authored two books on the topic. For MacKenzie, IBL is all about getting the students to have a more active roll in the class and exploring students questions and curiosities as entry points into the curriculum. “Sometimes that teacher is in the front of the room and leading the way so to speak,” says MacKenzie. “Sometimes that teacher is that guide along the ride. Someone who facilitating and supporting learnings.” Makenzie, who trains educators around the globe on how to implement IBL says they’re trying to do is give the classroom experience over to the students. He says students should be able to take ownership of what they’re learning. Where does an educator begin? Makenzie pushes for a gradual release of responsibility from the teacher to the student. “I always start my unit design with a big overarching ‘Un-Googleable’ question and I make that question front and center in my classroom,” says MacKenzie. He’s even built an info graphic where he models IBL like a swim coach teaching someone to swim. He even hangs the picture in the classroom for his students to see and he encourages teachers to download and print the picture for their own classrooms. MacKenzie is also really big on provocation. He shows students a lot of videos tied to their curriculum to spark interest and curiosity, but he’s ultimately determining wha questions his students have around the curriculum. Want to learn more? Mackenzie has authored two books on the topic. He says if you teach middle school or high school “Dive into Inquiry” is for you. If you teach younger students you may want to read “Inquiry Mindset.” To hear our full conversation about Inquiry-Based Learning with Trevor MacKenzie, listen to Episode 182 on your favorite podcasting app or iTunes. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

Over the past eight years Kahoot! has taken classrooms by storm. The learning software allows educators to create, share, and play learning games that drive effective engagement. The company debuted at SXSW in 2012, and in just five short years, they watched their platform grow to a billion players. By the start of 2021 they were up to a staggering 5 billion players. In Episode 181 of Class Dismissed, we caught up with Sean D'Arcy, VP of Kahoot! school and work, and ask him about how the Norway based company has been navigating COVID-19.  Coincidently, in early February of 2020, Kahoot! launched a new asynchronous gameplay called Kahoot! challenges. For many teachers, it was the right fit when educators were forced into remote learning.  "Teachers can basically assign a Kahoot to students to play on their own," says D'Arcy. The new tool was essential to their growth in the first part of COVID.  Bringing communities together D'Arcy says some of the best examples of people using Kahoot! during the COVID-19 pandemic come from the educators that use it to connect their communities. He highlights one educator in the Manitoba Province of Canada that streams his Kahoots! and turns them into substantial online digital events.  He says another educator in Indiana plays Kahoot with his community on Friday nights. "So he's just doing community-level games 1000 participants playing a game of Kahoot," says D'Arcy To hear our full discussion with D'Arcy, you can listen to Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

In Episode 180 of the Class Dismissed Podcast, we caught up with Minnesota principal and author Jessica Cabeen. Cabeen, who is the author of "Lead with Grace: Leaning into the Soft Skills of Leadership," shared tips on handling professional confrontations. Cabeen says one of the biggest mistakes school leaders can make is to "lead with their title." Not sure if that's you? Cabeen says that you may be leading with your title if you're in your office more than you're in the halls. Or if you're multi-tasking when someone is having a conversation with you. Cabeen tips on having those challenging conversations include Don't worry about being hated Keep it professional, and don't take things personally Focus on what you can control Empathize To hear our full discussion with Cabeen, you can listen to Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

It's no secret that the stress of being an educator can take a toll on any teacher's mental health. But High School Humanities teacher, Henry Seton, is on a mission to let his fellow educators know the importance of talking openly about it.  "It is OK to talk about the other ways you cope—your CrossFit and spin classes, your yoga and meditation sessions, even how hard you hit the caffeine or alcohol," says Seton. "But mentioning a therapy session is usually seen as a sign of weakness, an awkward overshare, keeping it too real." Seton believes we need to normalize discussions about mental health in the education workspace. In two recent Educational Leadership articles, Seton kept it very real. He shared his own experience of how a personal tragedy sent him into a depression, and he also wrote about challenges he faced after moving from Boston to Ohio and was forced to navigate a new school district.  Seton is a superstar teacher. When teaching near Boston, he would have people from across the city come and observe his class and his students preformed exemplary on state tests. But "behind the scenes," Seton admits that he was barely making it and dealing with burnout. In Episode 179 of Class Dismissed, Seton tells us how at one point in his career, he almost entered into what he describes as  a "doom loop," a negative and vicious cycle. He even consider quitting. But he shares how he broke free of his doom loop and he gives us tips on how school leaders can identify and break the negative cycle within their team.   To hear our full discussion, listen to Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

Softening the blow for new teachers In Episode 178 of Class Dismissed we talk with Chase Mielke about ways new teachers can keep their flame for educating ignited. After a decade of reflection Mielke compiled a list of what he calls his five “Passion Stokers” for educators. Find a positive tribe Curate the good, don’t hoard the bad Forgive Own your present and future Craft your calling Mielke, who has been teaching for over a decade in Michigan is quick to acknowledge that many teachers will fight burnout at some point and he believes much of that burnout will come from something other than students. “The main cause I think stems from a lot of conflicts and perceptions that a are adult-driven rather than student-driven,” says Milke. Mielke says a lack of autonomy or respect, colleague conflict, and struggles connecting with parents are leading causes of teacher burnout. Practice what you preach Mielke, who authored “The Burnout Cure: Learning to Love Teaching Again”, says there was a time in his life that he considered quitting teaching himself. He had been teaching for 8 years but he says he felt so bogged down by extra stuff. Ironically, he was teaching a positive psychology class and he decided to double down on what he was teaching. In a way, he was counseling himself when he was writing “The Burnout Cure.” “It was like, what were that things that have help me? What were the things that I’ve talked about a lot. And how do I put those in language that any teacher could use to help them reestablish their love.” Much of Mielke’s notoriety in the education community stems from a blog and video he produced back in 2014. The high school teacher and instructional coach found himself unable to sleep one night and wrote: “What students really need to hear.” The post has been read around 4 million times and the corresponding video (below) has been watched almost a million times. To hear Mielke talk in-depth about each of his five “passion stokers”, listen to Episode 178 of the Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021

The best of 2020! In Episode 177 of Class Dismissed we reflect on the best things that 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic thrust upon the education ecosystem. For example, 2020 helped normalize connectivity, renewed a focus on family, and has school districts examining the efficiency and effectiveness of their school calendar. During this episode, we also reflected on some of our favorite interviews of the year. Can schools help overcome the disadvantage of poverty? How one educator tackled three natural disasters Why it’s crucial to make an “emotional deposit” with students Harvard Professor: Here’s how to bring empathy and SEL into your classroom Listen to Episode 177 of the Class Dismissed Podcast on your favorite podcast app or iTunes. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2021.

Each year public schools spend millions of dollars on copyright-protected textbooks. Districts do this even though we now live in a digitally dominated world full of open-sourced books. But there's an alternative. The movement of using Open Educational Resources (OER) has been growing over the past five years.  In 2017 Class Dismissed interviewed Cable Green, the director of Open Education with Creative Commons. Green made a compelling argument for OER, but we wanted to learn more. For instance, what is it like to be on the front lines of a school-wide OER roll out?  How much more work does it take? Are Open Education Resources better than traditional textbooks? Have there been advantages to using OER during the COVID-19 pandemic? In Episode 176, we caught up with Dan McDowell, the director of learning and innovation of the Grossmont Union High school district in San Diego County, Califonia. McDowell and his colleagues have been gradually transferring their curriculum to OER over the past five years. The journey to an OER district McDowell will admit that transitioning to OER has been challenging, but there are also many benefits. "It takes a lot of time and work to develop these resources," McDowell says.  The Grossmont Union High Schoo District pays teachers extra to help gather and vet the OER materials and then develop the instructional materials around them. They set up committees and which in turn discover what's out there.  McDowell references a great website called CK12 that has opened licensed textbooks on it. He says they then modify and add supplemental resources like videos and additional readings to those existing resources.  McDowell says all of their science course are now using this OER format, so they no longer provide textbooks for their main science classes. They're also making good progress on Social Science and ninth and tenth grade English. "This isn't like a change everything sort of thing," says McDowell. "It's a see where it fits and see where we get the most bang for our buck."  In our full conversation with Dan McDowell, you'll learn...  What OER looks like for the student.  If OER is a useful resource during virtual learning.  If McDowell has any regrets about making the transition. Why buy-in from the teachers is critical. You can also see all of the Grossmont Union High Schoo District OER projects on their website.  In Episode 176 of Class Dismissed we talk in-depth with Whiting about how to help students become media literate by identifying native advertising, influencers, and media bias. To learn more listen to Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2020

How educators can navigate media literacy in a politically charged environment? Let’s face it. We've been living in a politically divided country. On Twitter, President Donald Trump listed the New York Times, NBC, ABC, CBS, and CNN as the “enemy of the people,” and he’s on record saying that 80% of media is fake news. So what responsibility do teachers have to reconcile these comments with students? And how do educators wade into the political turmoil without getting complaints from politically charged parents? Tackle fake news without being political “Lots of educators are afraid of having that talk,” says Jaquelyn Whiting. “And I understand why they’re afraid of having that talk.” “I BEGIN EVERY CONVERSATION ABOUT MEDIA LITERACY BY SAYING, WHILE WE ARE IN THE ROOM TOGETHER, WE ARE NOT GOING TO USE THE TERM ‘FAKE NEWS’,” Whiting is the co-author of News Literacy: The Keys to Combating Fake News. She’s also a library media specialist at Wilton High School in Connecticut. Whiting has made it her mission to inform students and in some cases colleagues on how to identify media bias “I begin every conversation about media literacy by saying, while we are in the room together, we are not going to use the term ‘fake news’,”  Whiting says she’ll feel successful as an educator if she can remove the term from the students’ vocabulary. “When that term is invoked. It tends to be invoked with the intention of shutting down dialogue.” Whiting asks her students to think about three things when evaluating news. Information – What’s happening Misinformation – When someone tries to convey to you what’s happening and they make an unintentional mistake. You know the mistake was unintentional when they come back and write a retraction or clarification to correct the error. Disinformation – When someone tries to convey incorrect information to you for their own personal gain. Whiting says dividing news into these three categories allows her and her students to have a quality conversation about how we understand the world. “We can start to differently about the choices that journalists are making when they choose to print or not print something,’ says Whiting. Whiting says that the political climate is what it is and we have to learn to operate in it productively. In Episode 175 of Class Dismissed we talk in-depth with Whiting about how to help students become media literate by identifying native advertising, influencers, and media bias. To learn more listen to Class Dismissed Podcast on iTunes or your favorite podcasting app. Other Show Notes Will teachers get priority for COVID 19 vaccines? New York City Will Reopen Elementary Schools and Reduce Hybrid Learning All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017-2020