TeachLab with Justin Reich: Recent Episodes
MIT Teaching Systems Lab
TeachLab is a podcast that investigates the art and craft of teaching. There are 3.5 million K-12 teachers in America, and we want to explore how they can become even better at what they do. Hosted by Justin Reich, MIT Professor and director of the MIT Teaching Systems Lab.
One of the best parts of doing research on education is talking with students. Not only do we learn a great deal about what is happenign in schools, it's often inspiring. Betsy Burris agrees. She is a retired teacher educator and a psychotherapist who hosts Teaching Through Emotions, a podcast that focuses on relationships within the learning core.
Betsy interviewed Jesse Dukes about the Homework Machine, our seven part series on AI and K12 education, with a particular focus on how students were navigating the often mixed messages they receive about generative AI.
Teachers are aware that AI is present in schools and learning environments, whether we like it or not. And many feel pressure, internally and externally, to learn and teach some form of "AI literacy". Justin has cautioned that it's too early for us to really understand what AI literacy is, and that just guessing at what might constitute AI literacy might do harm.
Teachers and schooleaders appreciate that warning, but many feel that we can't do nothing. It's essential for teachers to start getting some knowledge about how AI works, to start experimenting with AI powered practices, and think about implementing them into our instruction.
In our research, the most eloquent proponent that teachers should gain, and perhaps teach, some kind of AI literacy is Maureen Russo Rodriguez. Maureen is a Spanish and English teacher at St. Mark’s School in Massachussets. She is a cofounder (with Nate Green) of a network of educators called CoLab, which started in 2024 and now includes over nine hundred educators from over three hundred schools. We talk with her about her path to leading a process by which teachers design their own AI literacy professional development process, and Justin and Maureen try to pin down where they are in agreement, and disagreement.
This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes. You can learn more about Co-lab at https://www.educolab.org/.
We got support for our interview with Maureen from RAISE at MIT: Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education. Thanks to Eric Klopfer and Cynthia Brezeal. RAISE also sponsors a series of professional development opportunities around AI for teachers, in a similar spirit to Co-Lab called Day of AI. We had editorial help this week from Steven Jackson, Alexandra Salomon, Adam Brock, Sara Falls, and Steve Oulette.
Teach Lab is a production of the Teaching Systems lab at MIT Justin Reich Director
Over the last two years, teachers and schools have felt immense pressure to incorporate AI literacy into their curricula. In the fall of 2024, California became the first state to pass a law mandating AI literacy instruction in schools, and several others have since followed suit. In the summer of 2025, the Department of Education released the "AI Action Plan for Education," which stated in part: "The Action Plan encourages schools to teach AI literacy and supports the responsible integration of AI in classrooms. AI is seen as a key education tool to enhance individual student preparation for the real world and to bolster the United States as a leader in AI."
Most major AI companies have pledged significant capital to train teachers or educate students in AI literacy. Google alone has committed over 40 million dollars toward these initiatives, while OpenAI, Microsoft, and NVIDIA have all launched similar donation programs.
But do we actually know what "AI literacy" means? Sam Wineburg doesn't think so. Sam is a professor emeritus of education and history at Stanford and the co-founder of the Digital Inquiry Group. He previously led a landmark study for the Stanford History Education Group (SHEG) that exposed how standard school methods for teaching web literacy were failing K-12 students.
In part one of this two-part miniseries, Wineburg shares his observations on how educators have gotten "literacy" wrong in the past. He suggests there are more responsible ways to adapt to transformative new technologies than to hastily stand up literacy guidelines that may repeat old mistakes.
We’re pleased to share powerful reporting from our friends at the show Click Here, from Recorded Future News and PRX. They tell true stories about the people making and breaking our digital world. Over the past year, they’ve been documenting the digital – and cultural – erasure of Uyghurs in China.
As part of that series, they follow one man who set out to preserve his culture the old fashioned way: by opening kindergartens that celebrated the Uyghur language. And then, almost overnight, those doors were locked. And the school’s founder went from teacher… to enemy of the nation. Sean Powers reported the story and Dina Temple-Raston Dina, the host of the Click Here, brings it to us.
It’s not too late to take our listener survey about the Homework Machine series. We will enter you in a drawing to receive one of two $25 gift cards.
The timing of the arrival of AI has been bad for many schools and teachers. In the Fall of 2022, schools were just emerging from the extraordinary challenges brought by the pandemic. Teacher morale and turnover are at historic lows. Some school districts are on a good footing, and have the resources and stability to adapt, and even experiment with using AI to support learning, but many teachers tell us generative AI has just been one more thing they have to deal with, often without the support they would like.
At a moment when unprecedented sums are being invested in AI development — including many billions devoted to AI powered education technology — teachers wonder if our priorities are in the right place.
This episode was produced by Steven Jackson and Jesse Dukes. We had editing from Ruxandra Guidi and Alexandra Salomon. Reporting and research from Holly McDede and Andrew Meriwether. Reporting and research for the series from Chris Bagg, Andrew Parsons, Natasha Esteves, and Marnette Federis. Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson.
Production help from Yebu Ji. Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu. Administrative support from Jessica Rondon. Special thanks to Josh Sheldon and Eric Klopfer.
Original music for this series was created by Steven Jackson, Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes, as part of the music project Cue Shop. Thanks to Will Grueb, Andy Wilds, and the MIT Music Department for letting us use the MIT Harpsichord.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT. We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
Please take our Listener Survey for a chance to win a $25 gift card.
We keep saying that most ed tech is invited into schools, but generative AI crashed the party. But the truth in, some teachers have invited AI into schools. Some think it’s been great, and others see opportunities as well as challenges.
We visit four classrooms where students and teachers are using AI in ways they say are innovative, fulfilling, and effective: a student in Oregon who worked with her teacher to expand the scope of her assignments with AI; a Southern California instructor using AI to bypass busywork and focus on the creative aspects of filmmaking; a teacher in Illinois deploying AI to provide targeted feedback; and, finally, a former engineer whose students use AI coding tools to make circuitboards…play Rick Astley?
And we ask the question: What are the human teachers doing to create conditions in which AI can support learning?
This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes. We had editing from Alexandra Salomon and Ruxandra Guidi. Reporting and research from Chris Bagg, and Andrew Parsons. Additional reporting from Andrew Meriwether, Holly McDede, Natasha Esteves, and Marnette Federis. Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson.
Thanks to Jerry Shaw for digging up some of those Arduino Uno songs. The “Uptown Funk” was a simulation, created in our studios.
Production help from Yebu Ji. Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu. Administrative support from Jessica Rondon. Special thanks to Josh Sheldon and Eric Klopfer.
Original music for this series was created by Steven Jackson, Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes, as part of the music project Cue Shop. Thanks to Will Grueb, Andy Wilds, and the MIT Music Department for letting us use the MIT Harpsichord.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT.
We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
Education technology companies have been falling over themselves to provide AI powered tools for schools, and to convince schools to buy their product. The array of AI powered products is dizzying, and while some can likely be put to good use, it can be hard for school leaders to gauge which are worth adopting.
One school system in Iowa, Winterset Community School District has gone all in on generative AI, piloting at least three AI powered products and encouraging faculty and students to experiment with AI. They kindly let us visit for a week, and we dive in to see what they’re excited about, and what has been challenging.
This episode was produced by Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes. We had editing from Ruxandra Guidi and Alexandra Salomon. Reporting and research for the Homework Machine from Natasha Esteves, Holly McDede, Andrew Parsons, Marnette Federis, and Chris Bagg. Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson. Production help from Yebu Ji. Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu. Special thanks to Josh Sheldon and Eric Klopfer.
Administrative support from Jessica Rondon.
Thanks to Chad Sussex and everybody at Winterset who spoke to Andrew Meriwether. We’re happy to share that AI Express: Leading the Future of Learning — written by Chad Sussex and Sandy Groom-Meeks, who guided the AI journey for Winterset — is now available. This book offers school leaders and educators a practical roadmap for safely and effectively implementing AI in schools. Find the book here:
https://bit.ly/AIExpress_Amazon
Original music for this series was created by Steven Jackson, Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes, as part of the music project Cue Shop. Thanks to Will Grueb, Andy Wilds, and the MIT Music Department for letting us use the MIT Harpsichord.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT. We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
We’re halfway through “The Homework Machine” series, and as our production team works to finish the final episodes, we check in with Teaching Systems Lab director Justin Reich, who is returning to the classroom after a full year of sabbatical. Justin has been nervous, since some of the assignments he’s relied on in the past are not “AI-proof”. He tells us how he plans to adapt,
We want to share A Guide to AI in Schools: Perspectives for the Perplexed the guidebook authored by TSL, based on the interviews we conducted for “The Homework Machine”.
Justin is a fan of these protocols for evaluating student work:
We’re about halfway through The Homework Machine min-series, and we have more episodes coming. We're taking a break this week, which gives us the opportunity to share an episode of one of our favorite education podcasts with you.
Mindshift from KQED features in depth interviews and reports from classroom about education and educators. We particularly enjoy this episode about a shift to teach contemporary poets, alongside the classics.
Hanif Abduraqqib. Sarah Kay. Elizabeth Acevedo. Clint Smith. Do any of these names sound familiar? How about Amanda Gorman? All of these writers are part of America’s thriving contemporary poetry scene. But you won’t find them in many text books, because high school poetry units tend to focus on dead poets, like Robert Frost, Walt Whitman and Edgar Allen Poe. North Carolina teacher Melissa Smith is working to change that. For the last seven years, she’s been diversifying the canon in her classroom, and encouraging other teachers to do the same with the hashtag #teachlivingpoets. The shift has inspired teachers across the country to get creative with how they teach students things like tone, rhythm and structure in poetry. And it’s inspired students to connect with and see reflections of themselves in the poets they study.
We have more episodes of the Homework Machine coming in a little over a week. In the meantime, please take our listener survey. (We'll enter you in a drawing to win a $25 gift card).
https://forms.gle/KwPGTeVYZh2mo6gF7
Students tell us that they know learning in schools is important. But sometimes, turning to ChatGPT to get their work done feels like the best option. AI might help with what they perceive as busy work, or they might be confused about what counts as a legitimate use, and what counts as cheating.
And sometimes, students tell us, they know they’re crossing a line. When that happens, it’s usually because they’ve hit a wall in the learning process, and generative AI presents a quick and easy way through the blockage. For teachers, there is no single, off the shelf solution, that will ensure students make wise decisions, but understanding why students turn to AI can be a helpful starting point.
This episode was produced by Andrew Meriwether Jesse Dukes. We had editing from Ruxandra Guidi and Alexandra Salomon. Reporting and research from Natasha Esteves, Holly McDede, Andrew Parsons, Marnette Federis, and Chris Bagg. Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson. Production help from Yebu Ji. Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu. Special thanks to Josh Sheldon and Eric Klopfer. Administrative support from Jessica Rondon.
Featured guests include Miriam Reichenberg, Kaitleen Evangelista, as well as anonymous students. Thanks to InTandem for facilitating interviews.
Thanks to Greer Murphy and Jessa Kirk, at UC Santa Cruz's Academic Integrity Office. Check out Greer Murphy's co-authored survey of academic integrity policies.
Original music for this series was created by Steven Jackson, Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes, as part of the music project Cue Shop. Thanks to Will Grueb, Andy Wilds, and the MIT Music Department for letting us use the MIT Harpsichord.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT.
We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
Teachers have all sorts of opinions about AI. Some are optimistic, some are pessimistic. But the most common topic that came up in our interviews was cheating.
While students have always taken shortcuts to complete their work, ChatGPT and other generative AI have a historically unique power to quickly, convincingly and comprehensively do a students’ assignment. This is proving a powerful temptation to students.
So how do teachers help their students make good decisions? Teachers know that schools have historically struggled to manage discipline fairly but they also recognize that letting students get away with cheating isn’t doing them a favor. Teachers share how they’re navigating the Scylla and Charybdis of school discipline in the AI age.
Listen to a bleeped version of this episode (Coming soon!).
Transcript coming soon!
This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes with Yebu Ji.
Editing: Alexandra Salomon and Ruxandra Guidi
Reporting and research from Natasha Esteves, Andrew Meriwether, Holly McDede, Andrew Parsons, Marnette Federis, and Chris Bagg.
Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson.
Production assistance from Nathan Ray.
Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu.
Special thanks to Josh Sheldon, Camila Lee, Liz Hutner, and Eric Klopfer.
Administrative support from Jessica Rondon.
Thanks to the teachers who spoke to us including Joe O'Hara, Alec Jensen, Schuyler Hunt, Anna Rose Pandey, Ray Salazar, and Jessica Petit-Frere. And thanks to all the teachers and students who partipated in our research.
Thanks to Greer Murphy and Jessa Kirk, at UC Santa Cruz's Office of Academic Integrity. Check out Greer Murphy's co-authored survey of academic integrity policies.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT.
We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
The Homework Machine is a program of the MIT Teaching Systems Lab, Justin Reich, director.
ChatGPT is the most well known of the Large Language Models (LLMs) but what is an LLM? We go deep into how this remarkable new technology is built, and why their performance is inconsistent — or jagged — across similar tasks. We dive into the techniques AI engineers use to align these tools’ behavior with our values, and explain why they don’t always work, and sometimes we get hallucinations or biased output.
This episode was produced by Steven Jackson and Jesse Dukes
Editing: Alexandra Salomon and Ruxandra Guidi
Reporting and research from Holly McDede, Natasha Esteves, Andrew Parsons, Andrew Meriwether, Marnette Federis, and Chris Bagg.
Sound design and music supervision by Steven Jackson.
Production assistance from Yebu Ji and Nathan Ray.
Data analysis from Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu.
Special thanks to Josh Sheldon, Camila Lee, Liz Hutner, and Eric Klopfer.
Administrative support from Jessica Rondon.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT.
We had support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
The Homework Machine is a program of the MIT Teaching Systems Lab, Justin Reich, director.
In late November of 2022, ChatGPT was released to the public as a free research preview. Students quickly realized ChatGPT was pretty good at doing their homework for them. Schools scrambled to figure out what to do: Ban it? Embrace it? Teachers and students found themselves adapting to a new reality.
Buckle Up, Here it Comes kicks off “The Homework Machine” a mini series in the Teachlab podcast. Hosts Jesse Dukes and Justin Reich share stories of teachers and students reacting to the arrival of an exciting, alarming, and strange new technology.
Producer: Jesse Dukes
Editors: Ruxandra Guidi and Alexandra Salomon.
Reporting and research: Holly McDede, Natasha Esteves, Andrew Meriwether, and Chris Bagg.
Sound design and music supervision: Steven Jackson.
Data analysis: Manee Ngozi Nnamani and Manasa Kudumu.
Special thanks to Josh Sheldon, Camila Lee, Liz Hutner, and Eric Klopfer.
Administrative support from Jessica Rondon.
The research and reporting you heard in this episode was supported by the Spencer Foundation, the Kapor Foundation, the Jameel World Education Lab, the Social and Ethical Responsibility of Computing initiative at MIT, and the RAISE initiative, Responsible AI for Social Empowerment and Education also at MIT.
Additional support from Google’s Academic Research Awards program.
InTandem facilitated some of our student interviews.
Full episode transcript.
Generative AI is not like other education technologies, which schools often invite into the classroom. This one crashed the party. And then, it started re-arranging the furniture. We wanted to learn more, so in a little over a year, the Teaching Systems Lab has talked to over 90 teachers and 30 students about the impact of Generative AI.
Some are excited about AI's potential to transform education for the better.
Others are troubled by the temptations of a machine that can quickly and convincingly do many homework assignments.
And some think AI is just a shiny object – a distraction from the much larger problems facing education.
Over the next seven episodes, we'll try to answer the question: Is AI a game-changing tool, a threat to critical thinking, another ed tech fad? … or something else?
Media requests can go to jpd009@mit.edu.
School leaders, education researchers, and others often point to a study conducted by Stanford researchers that suggested the arrival of generative AI in K-12 school has not meaningfully increased the percentage of students who acknowledge some kind of academic dishonesty. Sometimes, school leaders or experts suggest it means there’s “nothing to see here” when it comes to tools like ChatGPT and worries about students bypassing learning. Researcher + Journalist Jesse Dukes joins Justin to dive into the specifics of that study, and compare it with anecdotes from interviews with students and teachers.
This episode was produced by Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes. We had additional reporting from Holly McDede and research help from Natasha Esteves and Manassa Kudumu. Thanks to the Spencer Foundation and the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing Initiative at MIT for funding our ongoing research into the arrival of generative AI in schools. And thanks to the Kapor Foundation for funding Jesse’s work in California with KALW public radio. Thanks to all of the teachers and administrators who have talked with us.
If you want to take our survey, or learn more about our research into Generative AI and K12 education, head over to tsl.mit.edu/ai and if you want to volunteer for the sister study, in California, visit Jesse’s Linktree.
Justin Reich and researcher and producer Jesse Dukes argue that AI in requires a new theoretical framework. Generative AI, unlike many teaching technologies, is an "arrival" technology, meaning it will be present in school environments regardless of what choices school leaders make about whether to adopt it. Their new preprintToward a New Theory of Arrival Technologies: The Case of ChatGPT and the Future of Education Technology after Adoption explores the idea of "arrival technologies"
But rather than summarize it, hey, why not let the arrival technology do it? So we turn to Google's new tool, Notebook LM for a "Deep Dive Conversation" to summarize the article.
Thanks to the Spencer Foundation and the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing initiative at MIT for funding our ongoing research into the arrival of generative AI in schools. Thanks to all of the teachers and administrators who have talked with us. This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes. We had research help from Chris Bagg, Manasa Kudumu, Natasha Esteves, and Andrew Meriwether. If you want to take our survey, or learn more about our research into Generative AI and K12 education, head over to tsl.mit.edu and if you want to volunteer for the sister study, in California, visit Jesse’s Linktree.
Jesse Dukes reports from a two day training one school district offered its teachers, all to help them adapt to the arrival of generative AI in schools. That training proved helpful to teachers, but it’s not clear how much professional development most American teachers are getting, and it appears many are getting little or none.
Episode produced by Jesse Dukes
Research by Chris Bagg, Andrew Meriwether, and Natashas Esteves.
Editorial support by Natasha Esteves.
Additional research from Manasa Kudumu.
Thanks for the school district that let us visit (you know who are!)
Thanks to all the teachers who talked with us for our ongoing research into the arrival of generative AI in school environments. Learn more at tsl.mit.edu/AI.
Jesse Dukes reports from a two day training one school district offered its teachers, all to help them adapt to the arrival of generative AI in schools. That training proved helpful to teachers, but it’s not clear how much professional development most American teachers are getting, and it appears many are getting little or none.
Teachlab is hosted by Justin Reich, and produced the Teaching Systems Lab at MIT. This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes. Editorial support from Natasha Esteves. Research help from Natasha Esteves, Chris Bagg, Andrew Meriwether, and Manasa Kudumu. You can contribute to our research and learn more at tsl.mit.edu/AI
Support from the Spencer Foundation and the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing initiative at MIT
Special thanks to the Byram Hills School District and especially their amazing team of building technology coordinators for inviting us to participate in their Cyber Camp professional development days. That team includes Kevin Guidotti, Peter Lichten, Al Lovelace, Dawn Selnes, and Michael McHale. Thanks to Deputy Superintendent Dr. Tim Kaltenecker and Superintendent Dr. Jen Lamia.
Thanks to all the Byram Hills teachers who spoke to us, including Letty Nardone, Kacy Muir, and many more!
We've just wrapped up a school year, so our team researching the arrival of generative AI in classrooms shares some fun and inspiring moments of teachers adapting to the new reality. We hear from teachers who role modeled the use of as a tool or resource for students, or to generate amusing and weird curricula.
This episode was produced by Andrew Meriwether and Jesse Dukes, and features research by Natasha Esteves, Chris Bagg, Andrew Meriwether, and Jesse Dukes. Original song "The AI is a Hummin'" written by Jesse Dukes with help from Bing CoPilot, and performed by Jesse Dukes.
To learn more about our ongoing research, take a survey, or volunteer to be interviewed, visit https://tsl.mit.edu/AI/.
The Arrival of AI powered tools like ChatGPT (now GPT4) in schools has generated concerns that students would use the tool to bypass cognition, or, “cheat” as we colloquially call it. And, it appears many students are doing just that. Early on in our research project about generative AI’s arrival in schools, it seems that English, ELL, and Social Studies at upper levels are particularly likely to encounter students using AI, without permission, to complete assignments. Justin talks to Jesse Dukes who shares a few examples of how teachers are managing this new challenge, and they discuss the wider implications for teaching, ethics, and student well being.
This episode was produced by Jesse Dukes. We had research help from Natasha Esteves, Andrew Meriwether, and Chris Bagg. Thanks to the Spencer Foundation for funding our research, and to all the teachers and administrators who agreed to speak with us.
Justin spoke at the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education in November of 2023. You can see his graphics and outline.tsl.mit.edu/AI/ has more generative AI related resources, including our SURVEY for educators, school leaders, students, and parents. Jesse Dukes is leading our current project about the experiences of teachers and students with generative AI this school year.
Today we share another great episode from our friends at Upper MiddleBrow. As students, parents, and teachers happily (or wrenchingly) returned to school, Upper MiddleBrow invited TeachLab host Justin Reich to talk about stories with teachers. They identify many examples of bad teachers and bad teaching in fiction, and while film and TV often present sympathetic teacher protagonists, they wonder if the Great American Teacher novel is yet to be written.
Resources and Links
Check out Upper MiddleBrow, a podcast where hosts Jesse Dukes and Chris Bagg discuss high-craft works of popular culture
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
See Upper MiddleBrow’s Teacher Protagonist’s graphic
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Civics 101 is a podcast refresher course on the basics of how the U.S. government works, born from the brain trust at New Hampshire Public Radio and hosted by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice. This is the second part in their series about the state of civic education in the US.
In this episode, TeachLab host Justin Reich joins the Civics 101 team to talk about how teachers choose what to teach, so-called "divisive concepts laws," and how we can approach disagreements without falling prey to "division actors."
This episode features:
- Justin Reich, Director at MIT Teaching Systems Lab and host of the TeachLab podcast
- Louise Dube, Executive Director of iCivics and member of the Implementation Consortium at Educating for American Democracy
- CherylAnne Amendola, Department Chair and teacher at Montclair Kimberly Academy and host of the podcast Teaching History Her Way
Resources and Links
Check out Civics 101: A Podcast, a production of New Hampshire Public Radio
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Click here to see a map of all the states that have passed legislation limiting what teachers can say regarding race, sex, gender, etc.
Click here to see the Interactive Roadmap by Educating for American Democracy.
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://sonix.ai/share/XBF9ue1HSi1uek4spV3fHohu
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Civics 101 is a podcast refresher course on the basics of how the U.S. government works, born from the brain trust at New Hampshire Public Radio and hosted by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice. Today is the first part in their series about the state of civic education in the US.
In this episode, the Civics 101 team gauges how we're doing civics-wise and then delve into the perpetually controversial history of history; have we ever agreed upon a narrative for our nation that we can teach students?
Walking us through the past, present, and future of social studies and civic education are Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University, and Adam Laats, Historian and Professor of Teaching, Learning and Educational Leadership at Binghamton University.
Resources and Links
Check out Civics 101: A Podcast, a production of New Hampshire Public Radio
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In our final episode in our Iterate series, we are joined by one of our favorite collaborators here at the Teaching Systems Lab: artist, creative professional and graphic recorder, Haley McDevitt. Haley is a master of listening, synthesizing, and creating visuals that support big ideas. And, Haley is the illustrator of our host Justin Reich’s new book, Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools.
Justin and Haley go behind the scenes to share the creative process for the book’s illustrations. We also hear about Haley’s own experiences with iteration and growth mindset in her creative life, and learn about the amazing resources that she created to support educators who read Iterate.
Resources and Links
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Take a look at our free downloadable materials for Iterate, designed by Haley McDevitt
Check out Haley McDevitt’s amazing graphic recording work
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our course Youth In Front, with illustrations by Haley McDevitt
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/iterate-haleymcdevitt/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
This week on TeachLab, we continue our series of conversations with innovative educators with Mel Cheng, a lifelong educator and learner. Mel is the Director of Engagement at What School Could Be, and before that worked as a classroom teacher, technology facilitator and coach, and administrator at Hawaiʻi’s first public charter school for 23 years. A maker enthusiast, Mel believes that intentionally designing environments in which learners are free to tinker builds stronger communities and richer connections.
We talk to Mel about her experiences with the Cycle of Experiment and Peer Learning, and the idea that people who can really change the teaching and the learning in schools are the classroom teachers.
“Intuitively we know that teachers are the driving force of change and administrators need to create the conditions for this to happen but rarely is that articulated, much less given a road map”
Mel Ching’s review of Iterate:The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Resources and Links
Visit the What School Could Be platform to find resources for educators and join the community.
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/iterate-melching/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
This month on TeachLab, we’re releasing a series of conversations with innovative educators to celebrate the release of our host Justin Reich’s new book, Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools.
This week we’re lucky to be joined by Ronni Moore, an educator who is passionate about re-envisioning what school can be. Ronni is the director of high schools for Crystal House Indianapolis, and was part of the founding team of Purdue Polytechnic High School North, a design thinking high school in Indianapolis, Indiana. We talk to Ronni about the power of relationships, achieving big change through small steps and leading throughout the pandemic.
Resources and Links
Learn more about the innovative schools from Ronni’s interview, Christel House Indianapolis & Purdue Polytechnic High School
Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/iterate-ronnimoore/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
This week, our host Justin Reich released his new book, Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools. To celebrate the launch and dig into the themes of the book, we’re releasing a series of conversations with innovative educators.
In this episode, we’re joined by Erik Burmeister, an award-winning teacher, principal, and superintendent who worked as a highly impactful educator in California for over 20 years before launching his strategic consulting firm, Solutionary Advisors. We talk with Erik about his experiences leading change using design and innovation principles.
Resources and Links
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Learn more about Erik Burmeister’s work at Solutionary Advisors
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/iterate-erikburmeister/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the eighth and final episode of our series on Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we talk with Katie Rinderle, a 10 year veteran educator from Cobb County, Georgia. Katie is the first teacher in Georgia to be terminated for violating the state's divisive concept laws. What did Katie do? She went to a school book fair, sponsored by her school, and bought the best selling picture book, My Shadow is Purple, which touches on gender identity. Her 5th grade students selected the book for a read aloud, and Katie read the book and invited her students to do a reflection poem. Then, a parent complained, and Katie was fired.
Katie's case has garnered national attention as a test of what public school teachers can and can't teach in the classroom. We’re joined in our conversation with Katie by her attorney, Michael Tafalski, from Southern Poverty Law Center.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Georgia Teacher Fired for Reading Children’s Book About Acceptance - SPLC Article
Katie Rindele’s Opinion piece on MSNBC
Southern Poverty Law Center’s latest Press Release on Katie’s Case
Learn more about My Shadow Is Purple and Author Scott Stuart
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/teacher-speech-e8/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the seventh episode of Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we dive back into our exploration of book bans and challenges throughout the United States. We sit down with Jen Varney and Barb Fecteau of the Massachusetts School Library Association, to hear about how the current climate is impacting the lives of school librarians, and their strategies for navigating these times. And, we talk to Sabrina Baêta, Program Consultant from the Freedom to Read Program at PEN America to better understand the current state of book bans, how they’re increasing throughout the United States, and what concerned citizens can do.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Learn more about PEN America’s important work on Book Bans
Find great resources from the Massachusetts School Library Association
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript Pending
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the sixth episode of Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we turn our attention to Guilford, Connecticut. Guilford is a small town with a big commitment to equity for their students, and serves as a microcosm for the debates surrounding schools in the US. Our host Justin Reich sits down with Amity Goss, Assistant Superintendent of Guilford Public Schools, to learn more about what’s happening in Guilford, how it impacts teachers, and the steps that the district is taking to support educators. And, Professor Meira Levinson, Founder of EdEthics, joins us to introduce educational ethics as a powerful tool and resource for having difficult conversations.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Learn more about EdEthics
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript Pending
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the fifth episode of our new series, Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we’re taking a look at book bans in schools. We head off to Florida, the epicenter of this conflict, to find out more about what books are being removed, how this affects students, teachers, and the community, and the actions that educators are taking in the face of these controversial transformations in school libraries and classrooms. Our host Justin Reich is joined by former teacher and educational researcher Natasha Esteves, and accompanied by an interview with Brevard County teacher and founder of Foundation 451, Adam Tritt.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Learn more about Foundation 451
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/teacher-speech-e5/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
This week, we’re giving the floor to our friends Jesse Dukes and Chris Bagg at UpperMiddleBrow to share one of their summer reading episodes. You’ll listen to teachers offer their summer reading recommendations for teens, and a great conversation about teaching literature. Heads Up: UpperMiddleBrow is a little salty, so there might be a curse word here or there. If you like what you hear, be sure to jump over to UpperMiddleBrow and subscribe to hear more episodes.
Upper Middlebrow Notes:
We’re joined by two veteran high school English teachers, each with a summer reading recommendation for a teenager. We talk about about how speculative fiction (including sci-fi, fantasy, horror, alt. history) engages teenagers in different ways, and why magic gets a bad rap among “literary” readers.
Book recommendations:
Never Let Me Go Kazuo Ishiguro
A Wizard of Earthsea Ursula K. LeGuin
As promised in the episode, we also have Lindsay’s self-syllabus for this summer of reading, both in image format and in a Notion template for your enjoyment!
Notion Template:
https://confirmed-gray-ae7.notion.site/d101bfaaec8f40848e8a6d3ae2faffd7?v=be5c29b11ad744a599e467cc39365ada&pvs=4
More Resources and Links
Check out the Upper Middlebrow Podcast for more episodes!
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Produced by Upper Middlebrow
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the fourth episode of our new series, Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we’re taking a look at autonomy. How much autonomy do K-12 teachers really have, how is teacher autonomy being reduced… and what’s being lost as a consequence? We share a profile of David Graf, a veteran educator from Woodland Park, Colorado. And, our host Justin Reich is joined by law professor Derek Black and education professor Sarah Kaka.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/teacher-speech-e4/transcript
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the third episode of our new series, Teacher Speech and the New Divide, we take a look at a few of the recent court cases that impact teacher’s freedom of speech, like Kennedy v. Bremerton and Kluge vs. Brownsberg.
Our host Justin Reich talks with Derek Black, Professor of Law at the University of South Carolina School of Law, Brock Boone, senior staff attorney at the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Sara O'Brien, researcher at Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools at www.iteratebook.com
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript Pending
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In the second episode of our new series, Teacher Speech and the New Divide, Justin takes a look at the history of teacher’s first amendment rights, with the help of experts Brock Boone, senior staff attorney at the Southern Poverty Law Center and Sara O'Brien, researcher at Harvard Graduate School of Education. And, we follow up with educator Dakota Morrison to hear about what happened next as he took on the history of gay rights in high school social studies class in Findlay, Ohio.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools at www.iteratebook.com
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript Pending
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Our host Justin Reich kicks off our new series, Teacher Speech and the New Divide. To get a sense of the current landscape of divisive content laws, we talk to Brock Boone, senior staff attorney at the Southern Poverty Law Center. Then, we’re joined by Sarah Kaka, Associate Professor and Writer/Researcher at Ohio Wesleyan University, who helps us understand how divisive laws are impacting teachers every day. And, Dakota Morrison shares his student teaching experience as a high school social studies teacher designing a civil rights unit in Ohio.
Special thanks to our friends at Learning for Justice, and the Justice in Schools team at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for their collaboration on this work.
Resources and Links
Take our course on supporting youth activism at www.youthinfront.org
Pre-Order Justin Reich’s new book Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools at www.iteratebook.com
Watch our documentary film We Have to Do Something Different
Transcript Pending
Credits
Host Justin Reich
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
TeachLab is doing a crossover episode with the book podcast Upper Middlebrow hosted by Jesse Dukes and Chris Bagg. Justin Reich was invited on as their guest and are graciously letting us repost the episode under TeachLab.
Upper Middlebrow Notes:
We hit pause on recapping, and talk the intersection of education and technology with a genuine educational technologist, Professor Justin Reich (and the man who introduced Dukes + Bagg). Justin considers Stephenson’s take on the ancient debate about whether education resembles “filling a pail” or “kindling a flame” and notes his preoccupation with the probabilistic nature of education tech.
Justin is an associate professor of digital media in the Comparative Media Studies/Writing department at MIT and the director of the Teaching Systems Lab. He is the author of Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can’t Transform Education, and the host of the TeachLab Podcast.
Resources and Links
Check out the Upper Middlebrow Podcast for more episodes!
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/upper-middlebrow/transcript
Produced by Upper Middlebrow
TeachLab edit by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
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Our host Justin Reich wraps up our series on Subtraction in Action with his reflections, along with highlights from conversations about the act of subtraction with education thought leaders from around the country.
“We're just not that good as human beings at thinking about subtractive solutions. We've thought about stuff that we could add, but have we really taken the time to think about things that we could subtract?”
We hear highlights from conversations with:
- Nat Vaughn, Principal of the Blake Middle School in Medfield, Massachusetts
- Tyler Thigpen, Co-Founder of The Forest School in Atlanta, Georgia & the Institute for Self Directed Learning
- Beth Rabbitt, CEO of the Learning Accelerator
- Nicole Allard, Executive Director of Educational Excellence and Innovation in the Vista Unified School District in California
Resources and Links
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Learn more about the untapped potential of subtraction in Leidy Klotz’s book Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/subtraction-wrapup/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In our latest episode of Subtraction in Action, our host Justin Reich is joined by Researcher and Professor Matt Kraft to discuss his latest paper “Instructional Time in U.S. Public Schools: Wide Variation, Causal Effects, and Lost Hours”. Subtraction in action is all about getting the stuff that we don't need out of schools so we can focus on the most important things, and Matt’s research offers some promising targets.
Matthew Kraft is an Associate Professor of Education and Economics at Brown University. His research and teaching interests include the economics of education, education policy analysis, and applied quantitative methods for causal inference. His primary work focuses on efforts to improve educator and organizational effectiveness in K–12 urban public schools. His scholarship has informed efforts to improve teacher hiring, professional development, evaluation, and working conditions; changed how scholars interpret effect sizes in education research; and shaped ongoing investments in school-based tutoring and mentoring programs in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Resources and Links
Read Matt Kraft’s latest paper: Instructional Time in U.S. Public Schools: Wide Variation, Causal Effects, and Lost Hours
You can learn more about Matt’s work at matthewakraft.com.
Follow Matt Kraft on Twitter
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/matt-kraft/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Justin sits down with the wonderful and prolific Larry Ferlazzo, an English and Social Studies teacher, author and education blogger. How might subtracting field trip permission slips help address chronic absenteeism? Tune in to find out.
Resources and Links
Visit Larry Ferlzzo’s Website https://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/
Follow Larry on Twitter @Larryferlazzo
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/larry-ferlazzo/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Teach Lab’s Subtraction in Action series continues as our host Justin Reich explores subtraction in curriculum. Justin reflects, “One of the things that happened during the pandemic is that educators had to reduce. There has just not been a way in the last few years to teach everything that we typically teach in a year, or at least if we choose to do that, we're choosing to leave students behind in a way that I think most teachers are unwilling to do. So educators have had to go back and re-look at their curriculum. They've had to go back and say, "What's the most important thing here? What are the most marginal things here?"
Justin is joined by educators around the country who share their experiences in cutting content and reducing standards. Our conversation includes:
- Beth Rabbitt, CEO of the Learning Accelerator
- Nicole Allard, Executive Director of Educational Excellence and Innovation in the Vista Unified School District in California
- Tyler Thigpen, Co-Founder of The Forest School in Atlanta, Georgia & the Institute for Self Directed Learning
Resources and Links
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/curriculum/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In today’s episode, host Justin Reich continues our series on Subtraction in Action in conversation with education leaders around the country. We reflect on the ways that administrators relate to subtraction, and hear stories from the field. Justin is joined by:
- Beth Rabbitt, CEO of the Learning Accelerator
- Nicole Allard, Executive Director of Educational Excellence and Innovation in the Vista Unified School District in California
- Tyler Thigpen, Co-Founder of The Forest School in Atlanta, Georgia & the Institute for Self Directed Learning
Resources and Links
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Explore our Covid 19 Reports and Resources
Get your copy of Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/admin/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In today’s episode, host Justin Reich continues our Subtraction in Action series with Nat Vaughn, Principal of the Blake Middle School in Medfield, Massachusetts. Together they discuss how Blake Middle School managed the pandemic by reflecting on the purpose of school, identifying what really matters for student’s education, and how to subtract the things we hold dear.
Resources and Links
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/nat-vaughn/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
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Host Justin Reich and Jal Mehta from the Harvard Graduate School of Education continue our Subtraction in Action series with Leidy Klotz, Professor of Engineering at the University of Virginia, and the author of Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less. Together they discuss Leidy’s book, his research and inspirations, as well as how these ideas can better serve education.
Resources and Links
Learn more about the untapped potential of subtraction in Leidy Klotz’s book Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/leidy-klotz/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
Our host Justin Reich is joined by Jal Mehta from the Harvard Graduate School of Education to kick off Subtraction in Action, our new series about the positive impact that subtraction can have on school communities. Justin and Jal have been talking to teachers, school leaders, and design experts from around the country about what we can take away from schools to free people up to focus on the essential. Justin and Jal share their ideas about subtraction, along with highlights from some conversations they’ve had throughout the series.
In this episode, Justin is joined by Jal Mehta, Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, co-author of In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School, and co-host of the Free Range Humans podcast.
We also hear highlights from conversations with:
- Leidy Klotz, Professor of Engineering at the University of Virginia, and the author of Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less.
- Beth Rabbitt, CEO of the Learning Accelerator
- Tyler Thigpen, Co-Founder of The Forest School in Atlanta, Georgia & the Institute for Self Directed Learning
- Nicole Allard, Executive Director of Educational Excellence and Innovation in the Vista Unified School District in California
- Nat Vaughn, Principal of the Blake Middle School in Medfield, Massachusetts
Resources and Links
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Subscribe to Jal’s podcast Free Range Humans
Learn more about the untapped potential of subtraction in Leidy Klotz’s book Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less
Watch our film We Have to Do Something Different
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/subtraction-in-action/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
In this episode of TeachLab, we present a selection from our host Justin Reich’s recent appearance on What School Could Be’s Game Changer Series. In the interview, Justin is joined by the filmmaker Aimee Corrigan and educator Angela Daniel, to discuss the making of the Teaching Systems Lab’s new documentary film We Have to Do Something Different.
The conversation is hosted by WSCB’s Susannah Johnson and Tony Wagner. Some highlights a discussion about the ways that teachers can use asset framing to build strong relationships with their students, the power of using rigorous and engaging curriculum to support diverse groups of students, and the importance of centering student and community context.
This fall, you can screen We Have to Do Something Different and get a peek into Angela’s classroom yourself. Attend a local screening or sign up to host your own. Learn more about screening opportunities and check out the screening guide at somethingdifferentfilm.com.
Resources and Links
Lean about our film We Have to Do Something Different
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/game-changers/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Follow TeachLab on Twitter and YouTube
Follow our host Justin Reich on Twitter
TeachLab is excited to introduce Subtraction in Action, a new series about the positive impact that subtraction can have on school communities. How do we make school simpler? How do we give teachers and students some room to breathe? Can we clear out the marginal to focus on the most important things?
For this new series of episodes, we’ve been talking to teachers, school leaders, and design experts from around the country about what we can take away from schools - to free up people to focus on the essential.
In this episode of TeachLab, our host Justin Reich goes behind the scenes of the Teaching Systems Lab’s new documentary film We Have to Do Something Different: Teachers on the Journey to Create More Equitable Schools. The 35-minute film provokes important conversations about the big challenges facing schools by taking a detailed look at the small steps teachers around the country are taking every day to help their students succeed. These dedicated teachers provide hope that, while the systemic inequities in our schools won’t disappear overnight, educators can make a positive impact, starting now.
In this episode, Justin explains the film’s origins in TSL’s online course Becoming a More Equitable Educator. He then shares key clips from the film that show the teaching practices that help teachers build relationships with their students and engage students in challenging but important conversations about representation and equity. The episode ends with Justin interviewing Neema Avashia, social studies teacher in Boston Public Schools and one of the stars of the film. They discuss the current challenges facing public schools and the need to bring joy back into the classroom.
This fall, you can screen We Have to Do Something Different and get a peek into Neema’s classroom yourself. Attend a local screening or sign up to host your own. Learn more about screening opportunities and check out the screening guide at somethingdifferentfilm.com.
Resources and Links
Lean about our film We Have to Do Something Different
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/WHTDSD/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, our host Justin Reich joins a panel of education leaders with Superintendent Dr. Baron Davis from Richland School District Two in Columbia, SC, Superintendent Dr. Rhoda Mhiripiri-Reed of Hopkins Public Schools in Minneapolis, MN, and Dr. Beth Rabbitt, CEO of The Learning Accelerator, hosted by the US Department of Education's Office of EdTech.
In the conversation, panelists share recent experiences in districts, schools and classrooms throughout the pandemic. In the face of challenges, new strategies and innovations have emerged. Panelists reflect on how educators can take these insights and move towards more equitable learning experiences for all students.
The conversation was moderated by Chris Rush, Sr. Advisor for Innovation & Director of Educational Technology, Office of the Secretary at U.S. Department of Education, and Kristina Ishmael, Deputy Director, U.S. Department of Education, as a part of the Office of Education Technology’s “Planning for Changing Scenarios: Navigating the Road Ahead”, a webinar and blog series to help districts and schools share challenges and strategies.
“It's really important for us to take some time and reflect on what we have learned in the past 20 months, recognizing the uniqueness of everyone's journeys… then also look ahead and strip away the things that we don't necessarily need, and continue with things that have worked for our learners.”
- Kristina Ishmael, Deputy Director, Office of Educational Technology, U.S. Department of Education
In this episode we hear about:
- The future of learning in the context of a post-pandemic world
- The importance of listening to the needs of teachers, students, and families
- Staying mission focused to make hard decisions
- Strategies for creating more meaningful learning experiences for students, and letting go of the things that aren’t contributing to that mission
- The importance of centering health and wellness
- Culturally responsive organizational values, culturally affirming curriculum, and culturally respectful instructional practices
- Stories of new learning models that unlocked brand new opportunities, including new technologies, learning spaces, community connections and partnerships.
- How the practice of including students, teachers, and families in a co-design process will be critical to creating the most meaningful, relevant, and beneficial experiences for students.
- Centering equity across discussions, decision-making, and codesign processes.
Resources and Links
Visit The Office of Ed Tech’s Webinar Replay — Planning for Changing Scenarios: Emerging Stronger Post-Pandemic to reflect more on this episode’s conversation
Don’t miss our online course Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Learn more about MIT Teaching Systems Lab’s Imagining September and The Teachers Have Something to Say Reports
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/emerging-stronger/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Host Justin Reich
YouTube
This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by research scientist Joshua Littenberg-Tobias PhD. and Elizabeth Borneman M.Sc. to discuss a recently published Teaching Systems Lab efficacy study around the online course Becoming a More Equitable Educator and how well participants engaged with simulations about equity. They discuss the findings within the paper and the implications for simulation-based research.
“There's very little research into what do people actually do in these simulations. To what extent are they actually applying their learning in simulation behavior?... people might say, ‘Oh, I believe this thing, or I'm really supportive of equity,’ but when actually presented with a scenario, how do they respond to that in real time?" - Joshua Littenberg-Tobias
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The Educator Mindsets
- The research and Topic Modeling
- Measuring changes in behavior over time
- Simulations for professional development
- Differences in teacher responses
Resources and Links
Check out Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Watch the full webinar Digital Clinical Simulations in Online Learning Environments to Promote Equity Mindsets: A Randomized Controlled Trial
Check out the TSL research paper Measuring Equity-Promoting Behaviors in Digital Teaching Simulations: A Topic Modeling Approach
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/equity-simulations/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by Dr. David Joyner, Executive Director of Online Education at the Georgia Tech College of Computing. Together they discuss the challenges and advantages of online learning, the hard shift to remote learning under COVID, and David’s new book The Distributed Classroom.
“The distributed classroom is really about asking the question, ‘Can we take one classroom experience and distribute it across students who can commit to different levels of attendance, different levels of in-person attendance, different levels of synchronous attendance, things like that, such that you get to have as much of the experience as possible within your individual constraints?’" - David Joyner
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The role of Executive Director of Online Education at the Georgia Tech College of Computing
- Distributed Classrooms
- The inherent advantage of learning CS online
- Minimum Necessary Compromise
- Assessing distributed classrooms
- The importance of teaching assistants
- COVID online learning and the Hosted Model
Resources and Links
Check out David Joyner’s book The Distributed Classroom
Check out David Joyner’s paper Components of Assessments and Grading At Scale
Learn more about Dr. David Joyner
Check out Justin Reich’s book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/david-joyner/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by a panel of teachers from across the country to bring their personal experiences of teaching during the pandemic and to discuss a recent report that was led by Natasha Esteves, a former teacher, and now a student at the Harvard graduate school of education called The Teachers Have Something to Say: Lessons Learned from U.S. PK-12 Teachers During the COVID-impacted 2020-21 School Year.
“I had one interviewee say, ‘Everybody wants to tell teachers what to do, but nobody knows what teaching is like, and nobody knows what teaching is like during a pandemic.’ It's a very odd place to be in when you have other people telling you what to do while they are working from home and asking you to return to the classroom, or while they are working from home and asking you to teach remotely without sufficient professional development and how to do so.” -Natasha Esteves
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The experience of interviewing teachers for the report
- Advocacy for teachers concerns
- The toll of widening inequities in pandemic learning
- Ever-changing school COVID policies
- Public support for schools and teachers
- Human interactions with students
Resources and Links
Check out the full live event Teachers Have Something to Say
Check out the report The Teachers Have Something to Say: Lessons Learned from U.S. PK-12 Teachers During the COVID-impacted 2020-21 School Year
Check out all of Teaching Systems Lab COVID-19 resources
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/teachers-say/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by Neema Avashia to discuss the recently released Teaching Systems Lab report Healing, Community, and Humanity: How Students and Teachers Want to Reinvent School Post-COVID. Together they reflect on what educators have seen in their classrooms since the pandemic, and how we can learn and grow from these experiences.
“I'm a pretty firm believer that the old normal didn't work already for too many young people. And that a lot of our young people, even if they're going through the paces of education or complying, that didn't mean that education was meeting their needs, or providing them with the educational experience that they deserve.” - Neema Avashia
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- How Neema adapted her class in the face of the pandemic
- The research and methodology from Healing, Community, and Humanity: How Students and Teachers Want to Reinvent School Post-COVID
- The pressures of “learning loss”
- What the students missed most about being in school
- How the pandemic served as a window into longstanding school inequities and how we are adapting school based on what we’ve learnedWWays that Neema is incorporating these new insights into her classroom teaching
- How Neema incorporates these new ideas into her classroom
Resources and Links
Check out the full webinar Healing, Community, and Humanity
Check out the report Healing, Community, and Humanity: How Students and Teachers Want to Reinvent School Post-COVID
Check out all of Teaching Systems Lab COVID-19 resources
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/healing-community-humanity/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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TeachLab returns! Our host Justin Reich is back in the studio and excited to bring you a new season of episodes, starting December, 9th, 2021. Stay tuned!
Justin Reich is joined by Joel Breakstone, director of the Stanford History Education Group (SHEG), and co-lead on Beyond the Bubble and Civic Online Reasoning projects. Together they discuss assessing online information, the research of SHEG, and the methods used by fact checkers to determine the validity of information.
“For one thing, when they did a search, they didn't immediately click on the first search result, which is what many of the Stanford students, and even some of the historians did. Instead, the fact-checkers engaged in what we refer to as click restraint. They paused, and they looked at the snippets about the search results. And they took a moment to check out the URLs, and then made a decision about where they should begin their search. Because that initial click often greatly influences the kind of search that you end up conducting.” - Joel Breakstone
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The challenges of evaluating online information
- The Stanford History Group research
- Cognitive Task Analysis
- The fact checker approach
- Lateral Reading, Click Restraint, and Strategic Ignoring
- New study published as a follow-up
- Digital literacy in education
- Wikipedia
Resources and Links
Learn more about Stanford’s Civic Online Reasoning!
Check out their most recent article: Student's Civic Online Reasoning: A National Portrait
Learn more about Beyond the Bubble!
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/joel-breakstone/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Mike Caulfield, a digital information literacy expert working at Washington State University who has worked with a wide variety of organizations on digital literacy initiatives to combat misinformation. Together they discuss critical thinking, issues with traditional forms of evaluating sources, and the SIFT method.
“SIFT. S-I-F-T. First is just “Stop”. If you find yourself emotional, if you find something that you've just got to share... Whatever is the trigger, the emotion, your excitement about sharing it, your rage, seeing something that just strikes you as a little bit odd... Whatever is the trigger, stop and ask yourself, do I really know what I'm looking at here? And you might… You might look at the source, and you might be like, oh yeah. I know this person. Most of the time, a lot of the time, you don't. A lot of the time, it just landed on your doorstep.”
- Mike Caulfield
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Mike’s introduction to this field - Critical consumption and CRAAP
- Students are “shockingly bad” at verifying sources
- The issues with CRAAP
- Evaluating online sources with SIFT
- Critical thinking
- CUNY Staten Island intervention
Resources and Links
Learn more about SIFT
Check out Mike Caulfield’s Sifting Through the Coronavirus Pandemic!
Check out Mike’s book Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers!
Check out Mike Caulfield's blog: Hapgood!
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/mike-caulfield/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Barry Fishman, professor of education and information at the University of Michigan where he studies the use of technology to support teacher learning, video games as models for learning environments, and the role of education leaders in fostering classroom-level reform involving technology. Together they discuss the 50th Anniversary edition of Wad-Ja-Get? The Grading Game in American Education with Barry Fishman’s new introduction, as well as grading systems during the pandemic, “Gameful Learning”, and issues with grading in general.
“Grades remove information from the system. Rather than me knowing what a learner has learned, I know that they have an A or a B or a C. What does that mean? It doesn't mean really anything at all, especially if it's a B or a C... And maybe you throw a curve in. That's even worse. Curves really remove information from the system, and they ration success. This is one of the worst problems with grading, I think, is that they were really designed for ranking and sorting. They were never designed to encourage learning.” - Barry Fishman
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- 50th Anniversary edition of Wad-Ja-Get?
- What are the problems with grading?
- Pandemic grading systems
- Student autonomy and dealing with ambiguity
- Common objections over Pass/Fail
- Alternative forms of evaluation
- Gameful Learning
Resources and Links
Learn more about Barry Fishman and his work!
Check out Wad-Ja-Get?: The Grading Game in American Education with a new introduction by Professor Barry Fishman!
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/barry-fishman/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by John Palfrey, president of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, former director of the Berkman Klein Center of Internet and Society, as well as an educator, author, and legal scholar. Together they discuss philanthropy in education, the work of the MacArthur Foundation, and the challenges of making large changes in institutions.
“And particularly when we look at a society where I think most of us, anyway, those of us on the left, broadly global left, would say, ‘We're not where we ought to be, right, from an equity perspective, from all sorts of dimensions we want to improve. And certainly the quality of K-12 education in the United States, that's not something we're that good at overall. Therefore, we need to disrupt it. We need to do it better. - John Palfrey
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- What role does philanthropy play in addressing inequality?
- Thinking about “who is being served?”
- The natural inclination to give locally
- Supporting individual leaders to influence the world
- Lever for Change organization
- Small financial help can facilitate larger financial help
- Palfrey’s new book The Connected Parent
- Parenting with technology
- Bringing equity into educational technology
Resources and Links
Check out The Connected Parent by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser!
Learn more about the MacArthur Foundation
Check the MacArthur Foundation’s demographic report!
Learn more about Lever for Change
Learn more about the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/john-palfrey/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley. Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich joins Jal Mehta and Neema Avashia for the live webinar panel How to Learn from the Pandemic: Name, Nourish, Connect, and Grow! Together they discuss their collective research and experiences from COVID remote learning, what positivity emerged, and what stakeholders want changed as students and teachers look to re-enter the classroom. Hosted by Elizabeth Foster.
“We actually used last year's Imagining September report that was put out, as the basis for redesigning our school schedule for rethinking curriculum. Really using what young people were saying and what educators around the country were saying, to say, ‘We're going to put our stake in doing what's right for young people and we're not going to let the fear of accountability, or the fear of standardized testing be the thing that drives’. We can't let compliance or obedience to external measures be the thing that makes us not do the right thing in this moment.” - Neema Avashia
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Introducing our panelists
- Jal on the common changes we saw throughout schools
- Neema on the “in-classroom” experience
- Justin on the Imagining September (August) activity
- What was most important during the pandemic is still the most important post-pandemic
Resources and Links
Watch the full webinar How to learn from the Pandemic: Name, Nourish, Connect and Grow
Learn more about the Imagining September Report!
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/learn-pandemic/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Matthew Kraft, associate professor of education and economics at Brown University to discuss the efficacy of tutoring, scaling tutoring for equity, and how COVID exposed the inequities of the status quo.
“If we are to not think about changing how schooling works, it is in effect a default acceptance of that current world. So what I'm saying is given the empirical evidence, given the just willingness of parents to pay a whole bunch of money for tutoring, I think it's likely that it can be effective. There's no guarantees. It has to be done well. It won't work great at first, and you're going to have to improve. There's a whole bunch of landmines, as there always are. But with a sustained commitment to continuous improvement and problem solving, there's, I think, potential here, as much as there is for any other things that we do in school. So, lets have that be part of the school day so that it's equitably accessible for all kids, particularly those kids who most need it. ” - Matthew Kraft
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Lack of social emotional learning for young students
- What role does tutoring play in supporting students and teachers?
- The difficulty of scaling
- The costs of tutoring
- Integrating tutoring into the regular school day
- What do we continue post-pandemic?
- Adding time to the school day
- Stigmas around receiving tutoring
Resources and Links
Check out A Blueprint for Scaling Tutoring Across Public Schools by Matthew Kraft
Check out the Boston Globe article: For schoolchildren struggling to read, COVID-19 has been a wrecking ball
Check out Justin Reich’s book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/matthew-kraft/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Matthew Mugo Fields, the general manager of supplemental and intervention solutions at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, a learning technologies company. Together they discuss Matthews career, the direction and values at HMH, and the responsibilities of designing and implementing effective educational technology.
“...it can never be about the technology alone. It has to be about sort of more comprehensive instructional systems that leveraged technology, and that technology can play a key role, but if you're going to be serious about... instructional technology at scale, you've got to be as thoughtful about implementation and how you're going to support teachers and using it, how you're going to coach them, et cetera, as you are about what algorithms you are going to optimize.” - Matthew Mugo Fields
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Updates on education in their lives
- Matthew’s edtech story - “Tracked to the bottom” / Tutoring
- Beginning of Redbird Advanced Learning
- Work with Dr. Patrick Suppes
- The importance of building relationships in education
- Matthews work at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
- “Unfinished learning”
- Designing for users
Resources and Links
Learn more about Matthew Mugo Fields
Check out the HMH podcast Shaping the Future
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/matthew-mugo-fields/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s tenth and final Failure to Disrupt Book Club we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guest Kevin Gannon, professor and director of the Teaching and Learning Center at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa. Together they discuss the final chapter of Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can’t Transform Education.
“My institution is where you have students who are living in their cars, students who can't get basic needs, students who are working three jobs and need some technical solution to help them manage this workload. But they're not in those conversations about the tools that we have available to us, to adopt. I don't know what the solution to that is. But I don't think Ivy League graduates designing these products that look like the app students use, so they're more comfortable with it- I don't think that's the answer.” -Kevin Gannon
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Kevin’s edtech stories - Gopher/Pearson
- Takeaways from the final chapter and the whole book
- Edtech amnesia
- Theories of Change
- “Disruption”
- Responsibilities of schools vs. society
- “Clunky” Student Information Systems
- Lack of student voice in edtech decision making
- Next book recommendations
Resources and Links
Check out Kevin Gannon’s book Radical Hope
Check out Audrey Watters' book Teaching Machines: The History of Personalized Learning
Check out Sustainable. Resilient. Free.: The Future of Public Higher Education by John Warner
Check out Schools That Learn): A Fifth Discipline Fieldbook for Educators, Parents, and Everyone Who Cares About Education co authored by Peter Senge
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub10/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s ninth Failure to Disrupt Book Club we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guest Candace Thille, director of Learning Science at Amazon and former researcher and faculty member at Stanford University and at Carnegie Mellon. Together they discuss Chapter 8, The Toxic Power of Data and Experiment.
“It wasn't just that they didn't know how to use the educational technology. It was their belief about their role as a learner and their belief about her role as an instructor. And so just like you talked about many times in your book, the technology can't do it. The human interactions are what really drive how the technology gets used.” -Candace Thille
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Candace’s positive edtech story - Human interaction with edtech implementation
- Candace’s negative edtech story - Failure of interface design
- Privacy/surveillance/autonomy concerns in edtech
- Open Learning Initiative statistics course
- Comprehensive Assessment of Outcomes in a first Statistics course (CAOS)
- Systematically evaluating the variations between teachers
- Defining “experiments”
- Ethical data collection
- Data ≠ useful insight
- Democratizing education research
Resources and Links
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub9/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s eighth Failure to Disrupt Book Club we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guest Courtney Bell, a former research scientist at the Education Testing Services and now director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER), UW–Madison School of Education. Together they discuss the book’s third edtech dilemma, the Trap of Routine Assessment.
“The assessment practice of observing Justin teach or Justin teaching in an assessment situation is not the same, by definition from Justin's real world teaching… My assertion is, that's always true in every assessment. If that's the case, then we think to ourself where can technology fit into this thing?”
- Courtney Bell
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Courtney’s edtech story - PalmPilot and Mursion
- Complex performance assessment
- History of assessment technology - TUTOR and PLATO
- Real-world teaching vs. The observer effect
- Capturing teacher decision making
- Lack of social understanding in technology assessment
- Peer-assessment technology
- Meaningful feedback
- Stealth Assessment
Resources and Links
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub8/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s seventh Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guest Antero Garcia. He's a faculty member at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a former teacher in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Together they discuss the book’s second edtech dilemma, the Ed Tech Matthew Effect.
“Let's start with the community as the designer, and what it means to then imagine what schools and the tools that schools are going to need to build from there. That, to me, seems like the starting place of the conversation. I tend to get grumpier as I think about other kinds of tools because I think they all are generally bad. All of the surveillance stuff is... Not only do I not trust the tool, but I don't trust the motive or the intentions of the companies that are making and selling these tools or of the designers...”
- Antero Garcia
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Antero Garcia’s edtech story - SMART board
- Antero’s work
- Issues and shortcomings of edtech
- The “Digital Divide”
- Dangers of proctoring software
- Aligning business values with that of public schools
- Community design
- WiFi over wellbeing
- Lack of imagination in education
Resources and Links
Check out Antero’s book, Good Reception: Teens, Teachers, and Mobile Media in a Los Angeles High School
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub7/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s sixth Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guest Dan Meyer, the chief academic officer at Desmos. Together they discuss the work of Desmos and the section of Justin’s book on the “Curse of the Familiar.”
“From our perspective, for us, we are not trying to subvert the school day. We're not trying to get learning outside of the four walls of the classroom. We're not trying to upend schooling and turn everyone into home schoolers. I'm not judging those necessarily, but I'm just saying, we know what we're not trying to do, and we're actually really eager to use the four walls, we understand that there are things that are possible when a bunch of people are together in a room that is impossible during asynchronous experiences. There's this sometimes collective effervescence, it's why we used to go to movie theaters, or why sports are interesting to watch in person, versus on TV. It's that bubbly champagne like feeling when you're all together. So we know what we're trying to change and not trying to change.”
- Dan Meyer
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Dan Meyer’s edtech story and teaching experience
- Success of Quizlet
- Curse of the Familiar
- Combat vs. Co-opt schooling
- Desmos’ approach
- Community in edtech
- Creating a low, welcoming floor
- The business of edtech
- Assessment in online learning
Resources and Links
Check out Dan Meyer’s blog!
Learn more about Desmos!
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub6/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s fifth Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode, we look back at Justin’s live conversation with regular Audrey Watters and special guests Scot Osterweil, a game designer and creative director for the MIT Education Arcade, and the esteemed games researcher Constance Steinkuehler. They discuss the history of learning games, their current work, and Failure To Disrupt’s Chapter 4: Testing the Learning at Scale Genres: Learning Games.
“I've been studying kids in games for a long time. And oftentimes, when you try to tackle issues of how to treat other people online, how to deal with conflict, how to manage your screen time and also stay physically fit, it's very hard to create interventions around games, that kids just don't spit right back out. They just don't take because there are often layers added on top. They're not authentic to the space. In my efforts, and I'm sure people have done better than me, but in my efforts, it always seems to be colonizing and the kids will ignore me, and it comes off as, mom is wagging a finger saying you need to get up off that screen and go stretch.”
- Constance Steinkuehler
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Scot and Constance’s background and edtech stories
- Skinnerian learning and behaviorism
- Categories of learning games
- “Transfer” in education
- The social and community aspect of games
- Examples of effective game implementations
- Connection through esports
- Learning social skills through games
- The industry of learning games
Resources and Links
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Join our self-paced online edX course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub5/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s fourth Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode, we look back at Justin’s live conversation with Natalie Rusk and Mitch Resnick from MIT’s Lifelong Kindergarten Lab and who are the developers of the Computer Clubhouse program and the Scratch programming language. They discuss the founding of these programs as well as Failure To Disrupt’s Chapter 3: Peer-Guided Learning at Scale: Networked Learning Environments.
“I think sometimes there really is this misperception about this type of creative learning approach... it's growing out of, as you say in the chapter, John Dewey's ideas for the progressive education movement. And sometimes people characterize that as if-- just stand back and kids will do wonderful things on their own. And of course, if you stand back, some kids will do wonderful things on their own. But I think we're very aware that you need a whole variety of supports as Natalie was talking about. So I think sometimes people get the wrong impression about what's going to be needed. And then people might get disillusioned or feel that doesn't live up to the promise if they do just stand back and say, ‘Let it work on its own.’” - Mitch Resnick
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Natalie and Mitch’s background and edtech stories
- Beginning of Computer Clubhouse
- How Scratch grew out of Computer Clubhouse
- Providing support and community to informal learning experiences
Resources and Links
Check out the Computer Clubhouse network!
Check out Scratch!
Learn more about the Lifelong Kindergarten Lab!
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub4/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Susanna Pollack, president and director of Games for Change and Kate Selkirk-Litman, founding teacher and curriculum specialist at Quest to Learn, to discuss games in education and the STEM Your Game Challenge, a contest for game developers to reframe game design with the lean of serving STEM education.
“The community that we want to tap through this challenge is the commercial entertainment game developer. The game developer who might not have thought about the use of their games in educational contexts, but think that there might be something unique about their game, that if paired with a curriculum developer, curriculum advisor, or an educator like Kate, could actually find those threads and those connections to align with STEM education…” - Susanna Pollack
Note: The deadline for submissions has since been extended to January 6, 2021.
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- NYC school closures
- Games for Change mission in light of COVID
- STEM Your Game Challenge
- Bridging games and education
- Past examples of successful game implementations
Resources and Links
Learn more about the STEM Your Game Challenge!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/games-for-change/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Barbara Means, author and executive director of learning science research at Digital Promise to discuss her research with digital learning before and during COVID.
“There were quite a few universities that for equity reasons told their instructors, ‘Don't do any synchronous instruction in the spring, just put everything online and let students do it asynchronously, that is on their own time whenever they wanted.’ We found that when there were no synchronous sessions, which could have been either with the professor or it could have been online office hours, or it could have been working with a teaching assistant in a section. But if there were no synchronous sessions, the students were less happy with their course and their learning. So they really wanted that connection with a real person just like many of us do. You call up customer service. And it's so frustrating even if after the fifth click you can get to what you want. You just want to say, ‘I want a real person to talk to me and tell me they're sorry.’” - Barbara Means
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Barbara Means’ edtech story
- In-class vs remote learning research
- Three helpful practices
- The importance of a personal relationship in teaching
- Balancing synchronous and asynchronous learning
- Self-regulated learning
- Implementation models
Resources and Links
Check out Barbara Means’ book, Learning Online: What Research Tells Us About Whether, When and How
Learn more about Digital Promise
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/barbara-means/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s third Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode, Justin Reich reflects on a live conversation with special guests Cristina and Neil Heffernan. They discuss Failure To Disrupt’s Chapter 2: Algorithm-Guided Learning at Scale: Adaptive Tutors, and discuss the success of their tool ASSISTments.
“According to SRI, they thought the reason why it was successful...They were like, "This fit in with what teachers were used to doing." They're used to actually assigning homework, and classwork. They could see before the kids walked in the door, which problems were hard. And so they could do something a little differently. In fact, what they did find is actually teachers didn't go over every item the way they used to. And of course they didn't because all the kids got feedback, but they still went over the stuff that was hard. And particularly in the places where there was common wrong answers because all those kids should be told, "Hey, you weren't all alone." Meaning, actually, you and half of the rest of you all screwed up this problem in the same way. And I think there's a social-emotional component of actually doing that as opposed to just sitting in class and realizing, ‘I got everything wrong’ and not knowing everyone else, or a large number of other kids are in the same boat.”
- Neil Heffernan, Professor/Researcher/Program Director
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The Heffernan’s edtech love story
- Personalized learning vs. forming communities
- The rhetoric behind algorithm-guided edtech
- The core of ASSISTments
- Non-disruptive edtech
- Providing teachers with student feedback data
- Virtual Professional Learning Community
- The surge of online learning with COVID
Resources and Links
Check out ASSISTments!
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub3/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined by S. Craig Watkins, professor at the University of Texas at Austin and a respected voice on digital media and youth culture. Together they discuss the affordances and limitations of technology in education and the digital divide created as technology becomes a staple in the classroom.
“What struck me is even as I came into the project aware of these ideas around the digital divide and the tech rich and the tech poor, the haves and the have-nots, when we subscribe to that view with no other considerations and in a very one-dimensional way, we end up imposing a kind of deficit narrative on those who we see as occupying the wrong side of the divide. That is to say we only see them, right, through lack. Lack of access to technology, lack of educational opportunities, lack of interest, lack of motivation, lack of this kind of capital, that kind of capital.”
-S. Craig Watkins
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- S. Craig Watkins’ edtech story: Using technology in the educational setting
- The digital divide
- Early adopters of mobile technology
- How classes and curriculum can stifle the creativity the technology introduces
- How the pandemic changes and doesn’t change edtech
Resources and Links
Check out Young People’s Transitions into Creative Work: Navigating Challenges and Opportunities
Check out The Digital Edge: How Black and Latino Youth Navigate Digital Inequality by S. Craig Watkins
Check out Don't Knock the Hustle: Young Creatives, Tech Ingenuity, and the Making of a New Innovation Economy
Check out Justin Reich’s new book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can’t Transform Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/s-craig-watkins/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined in a live webinar by members of the Youth in Front team. They answer questions and share reflections and resources that we believe can help educators process this moment themselves and with their students.
“So I've been doing a 10 minute election update every day...but again, really thinking about dosage and trying to just think about what is the right amount to not sort of overwhelm you or drown you in this, but also to make sure you feel like you have space to engage. And if it takes more than 10 minutes, then we take more than 10 minutes. But trying to just plan in doses, as opposed to entire lessons about the election or the electoral college, which is how I would have taught it in person. In person, there would have been a whole voting unit and we would have gone through every element of it. I didn't feel like that was the right move in this context, and so I didn't. So I've done these sort of 10 minute doses.” - Neema Avashia
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Introductions
- How post-election has looked in K-12 school community
- How COVID affects election education
- The multiple views of student activists
- Civic education opportunities with high student awareness
- Teacher transparency on personal political views
- Grounding conversations in specific texts
- Teaching Challenging Issues in Uncertain Times: Strategies for Online and Hybrid Teaching online course
Our Guests
Neema Avashia from Boston Public Schools
Kevin Dua from the Cambridge Public Schools
Joshua S Littenberg-Tobias from the MIT Teaching Systems Lab
Sara O'Brien from Youth In Front
Resources and Links
Watch the full webinar
Check out Conversations Across Differences with Meira Levinson
Check out Teaching Challenging Issues in Uncertain Times: Strategies for Online and Hybrid Teaching
Check out Youth in Front: Understanding and Supporting Student-led Activism
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/youthinfront/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s second Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode, Justin Reich is joined again by friend and colleague Audrey Watters to reflect on their conversation with special guests George Siemens and Elizabeth Losh. They discuss Failure To Disrupt’s Chapter 1: Instructor-Guided Learning at Scale and Massive Open Online Courses, looking at “three big bets of MOOCs,” and exploring why MOOCs failed to achieve their most ambitious goals.
“I don't know if I've ever seen an ed tech thing where we can spend eight years talking about, "What is it?" We've been trying to define, "What are MOOCs? Are MOOCs this, are they that? They're not this, they're not that." I find it fascinating why we're finding so much difficulty really nailing down what MOOCs are and what role they play.”
- George Siemens, Writer/Professor/Researcher
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Elizabeth Losh’s EdTech story
- The global impact of MOOCs
- Online and remote learning during COVID
- FemTechNet as an example of creative innovation
- Productive discourse in online forums
- The complicated relationship between Universities and MOOCs
George Siemens is a writer, theorist, speaker, and researcher on learning, networks, technology, analytics and visualization, openness, organizational effectiveness, and complexity in digital environments. He is a Professor and the Executive Director of the Learning Innovation and Networked Knowledge Research Lab at University of Texas, Arlington and co-director for the Center for Change and Complexity in Learning at the University of South Australia.
Elizabeth Losh is a theorist and scholar, and the Gale and Steve Kohlhagen Professor of English and American Studies at the College of William and Mary. She specializes in Rhetoric; Digital Publishing; Feminism & Technology; Digital Humanities; and Electronic Literature.
Resources and Links
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book, Failure To Disrupt!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub2/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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For TeachLab’s first Failure to Disrupt Book Club episode, Justin Reich is joined by friend and colleague Audrey Watters for her insight on Justin’s new book as a well respected writer on educational technology.
They reflect on and play clips from the first live webinar Book Club from September 21st, where they were joined by special guest Chris Gilliard, Professor of English at Macomb Community College, to get his unique privacy and surveillance perspective on the book’s introductory chapter and edtech in the age of remote learning.
“I mean, one for one, the pandemic highlighted that it's a place where kids go because their parents have to go to work. It's a place where kids get fed. It's all these things. As an educator, I don't want to overstate this. I believe strongly in education, but it is a place where people, in some ways, it holds people until they're adults. I'm trying to state that in the least offensive way possible. I mean “watch” in all the different ways you might think about it. Watch as in oversee. Watch as in take care of. Watch as in monitor.” -Chris Gilliard
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Initial reflections on the webinar
- Privacy and surveillance in schools
- Mistaking surveillance for care
- Criticisms of “Learning at Scale”
- The incentives of technology companies
- Moving forward with edtech during pandemic times
Resources and Links
Watch the full Book Club webinar here!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/bookclub1/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by Mitchell Stevens, a sociologist of education at Stanford University to discuss the history and current relationship between online learning and higher education, and how COVID has altered that relationship.
“I do think this provides a moment of true uncertainty about the future, because essentially every college and university overnight had to reconceive what quality instruction would look and feel like at their institutions. It creates an openness to forward change that I honestly believe we cannot fully predict. It will depend, for example, on how American students and those who pay tuition feel about the value proposition of what they've experienced and the extent to which the utilities and advantages that they experience online are sufficiently satisfying, that they're willing to continue a conversation about online or hybrid delivery. I do believe this is the context in which how students and their families respond to these new environments will be definitive in how the fate of the sector unfolds.” - Mitchell Stevens
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- What is higher education?
- How online learning fits in with higher education
- The historical relationship
- How the pandemic changed the attitude towards online learning
- Why isn’t higher education turning towards expensive, already produced online courses?
- No mandate and no incentive to measure learning
- The influx of K-12 homeschooling
- Educational businesses, how they stand between home and school.
Resources and Links
Learn more about Mitchell Stevens and check out his Twitter!
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/mitchell-stevens/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich is joined by editor and EdSurge podcast host Jeff Young to discuss the current state of higher education and the technology issues of opening schools during the pandemic. They also look at Jeff’s new project, the Pandemic Campus Diaries, a series on the EdSurge Podcast that aims to document this unique moment in a lively and lasting way, and shine a light on the nuanced effects the pandemic has on students whose learning has been disrupted.
“...we were trying to get a sense of, ‘what is the experience?’ And so we have kind of drafted a cohort of professors and students at these six campuses of various types around the country, different geographies, different types of campuses and trying to get-- we don't know what's going to happen. None of us do.” - Jeff Young
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- Pandemic Campus Diaries project
- Types of adaptations for remote learning
- Technology on delicate and disruptive systems
- The cost of COVID policies on the campus experience
- Working together to create solutions
- The variety of experiences between professors
Resources and Links
Check out EdSurge and the Campus Pandemic Diaries
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/jeff-young/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Michael Pershan, a New York City math teacher, returns to TeachLab to share his experiences in the face of COVID-19. Back by audience request, Michael reflects on the challenges faced during the spring, and shares his strategies for the fall.
“...It's hard to know what kids are actually learning and doing. So I'm trying to be flexible. My plan for the spring was eventually keep things engaging, keep kids coming back. That's my fundamental goal. Try to teach as much as I can. And that's what I'm going to try to do in the fall also.” - Michael Pershan
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- What we learned in the spring
- Technology needs and solutions for remote learning
- Engaging and motivating kids virtually
- Remote learning for elementary students
- Using variety and reinforcement
- ResearchED conference
Resources and Links
Check out Michael Pershan on Twitter
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
For more teacher reflections from COVID-19, check out What's Lost, What's Left, What's Next: Lessons Learned from the Lived Experiences of Teachers during the 2020 Novel Coronavirus Pandemic
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/michael-pershan-revisited/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Host Justin Reich is joined by Kevin Dua, 2017 Massachusetts History Teacher of the Year, a two-time Massachusetts Teachers Association Human & Civil Rights awardee, and a current member of the Ideation UpLift Legacy Cohort for K-12 Black Male Educators. Kevin is a History and Psychology Teacher at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Justin and Kevin discuss anti-racism, unlearning, and strategies to increase equity in education in the age of Covid. Kevin also shares his experience as an advisor to the award winning Black Student Union in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
“Oftentimes educators talk about wanting to integrate current events. Right now, the current events, if it's not COVID-19, it's systemic racism. It's white supremacy. If those words, if those key terms aren't being said aloud, regardless of if it's a social studies classroom or a math classroom, that should be a red flag.” - Kevin Dua
In this episode we’ll talk about:
- The Black Lives Matter Movement and its impact on teaching
- Disrupting Systems / Unlearning
- Current state of educators in COVID
- COVID exposing inequities
- Cambridge Rindge and Latin’s Black Student Union
- Advice to teachers
Resources and Links
Follow Kevin Dua on Twitter
Check out Kevin’s resources on Anti-Racism.
Read an interview with Kevin Dua in the Daily Times Chronicle
Check out Justin Reich’s new book!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/kevin-dua/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined in a live webinar by colleagues Jal Mehta from the Harvard Graduate School Of Education, and Neema Avashia, a Civics teacher in the Boston Public Schools to discuss the Imagining September report; a joint research project to identify values and priorities for reopening schools.
“We have to get smarter about how we structure ourselves in ways that actually are in service of kids learning.” - Neema Avashia
- Managing uncertainty
- What worked this spring and what did not work
- Ideas brought by students
- Imagining September
- What do you value most from school?
- How could you start to imagine some of the things you value most from school appearing in a new hybrid remote format.
- What can you leave behind?
- Getting smarter about school structure
- Connecting with all kids
- Being a teacher and a citizen in today’s climate
- Being safe AND feeling safe in schools
- Audience Questions
Resources and Links
Check out Imagining September: Principles and Design Elements for Ambitious Schools During COVID-19
Check out Imagining September: Online Design Charrettes for Fall 2020 Planning with Students and Stakeholders
Check out Jal Mehta’s Book In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School
Full webinar link coming soon!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/imagining-september/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Rich Milner, Professor of Education in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University joins Justin Reich to talk about his personal teaching history, and share stories of education research in schools. He presents his five mindsets of becoming a more equitable educator, and discusses the common reluctance to bring race into the classroom.
“ if you're going to do work that is emancipatory, if you're going to engage work that is transformative, if you're going to engage work that meets the needs of every young person with whom you work. Then you've got to consider race. “
- Rich’s Teaching History
- Deficit Mindset
- Colorblindness
- Myth of Meritocracy
- Context Neutral Mindsets
- Understanding Cultural Conflicts
About Our Guest: Dr. Rich Milner
Rich Milner is the Cornelius Vanderbilt Endowed Chair of Education and Professor of Education in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. Professor Milner began his career at Vanderbilt University where he was appointed Lois Autrey Betts Associate Professor of Education and Associate Professor of Education in the Departments of Teaching and Learning and, by courtesy, Associate Professor of Leadership, Policy and Organizations as well as founding director of the graduate program, Learning, Diversity and Urban Studies at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. At Vanderbilt, in 2008, he became the first Black person to earn promotion and tenure in the entire College of Education’s history. His research, teaching and policy interests concern urban education, teacher education, African American literature, and the social context of education. In particular, Professor Milner’s research examines practices and policies that support teacher effectiveness in urban schools.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners:
Read Rich Milner’s new book: “Start Where You Are, But Don’t Stay There: Understanding Diversity, Opportunity Gaps, and Teaching in Today’s Classrooms (Second Edition).
Check out our course: Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices on MIT’s Open Learning Library
Explore our Reading and Resources for Equity Teaching Practices
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/rich-milner-reboot/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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This week on TeachLab, Justin is joined by Lillian Hsu, the founding principal of Latitude High School in Oakland, California, and Angela Daniel, instructional coach and design thinking project strategist at PSI High in Seminole County, Florida. They reflect on their transition to distance learning in the age of COVID, what values they brought with them, and how this experience will inform the upcoming fall semester.
“So much of the ninth grade program at our school is around visiting different community partners and getting to visit lots of different work places to investigate the anthropology of different careers, so how we can still translate that to the online space is something that really matters to us.” - Lillian Hsu
- Priorities and values going into emergency remote learning
- What worked and for who?
- Changes in staff models and student support
- Lessons that will be brought into the Fall
- How the community can support learning
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Watch “Voices from the Field: Centering Context” featuring Lillian Hsu
Watch “Voices from the Field: Asset Framing in Practice” featuring Angela Daniel
Check out the full course “Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices now on the MIT Open Learning Library
Check out the full course “Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices on edX
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/lillianhsu-angeladaniel/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, Justin is joined by Paul Reville, founding director of the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Redesign Lab, and former Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. They discuss the future of education during and post-pandemic, the shift of involvement for parents in their child's education, and the need for communities to shift in order to support it.
“...it goes beyond just having higher expectations for families, and extended families. It goes to having higher expectations for our communities as a whole.”
- Education Redesign Lab
- Post-pandemic education
- The risk of categorizing and ostracizing students with less resources at home
- Building relationships with students and families and getting feedback
- Supporting parents at the center
- Breaking community boundaries and connecting with other districts
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Check out “Broader, Bolder, Betterr: How Schools and Communities Help Students Overcome the Disadvantages of Poverty” by Elaine Weiss and Paul Reville
Learn more about The Education Redesign Lab
Check out “In Search of Deeper Learning: The Quest to Remake the American High School” by Jal Mehta and Sarah Fine
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/paul-reville/transcript
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, we’re republishing our first episode with the brilliant Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, to bring her lessons of equity and race back into light during these challenging times of the COVID pandemic. Now with a new segment called “Dear Teacher”, a message from Dr. Tatum directly to teachers around the world.
Next week, we’ll be back with a new episode in our COVID-19 series, talking with Paul Reville, founding director of the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Redesign Lab, and former Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Episode 1 Summary: Our host Justin Reich has a powerful conversation with renowned author, psychologist and educator Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum. Dr. Tatum shares some of the stories that inspired her bestselling book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations about Race and offers tips for addressing the ongoing challenges of racial issues in classrooms and schools.
- Dr. Tatum encourages teachers to take the first step in tackling racism by talking about it, because “if we can’t talk about it, we can’t fix it”.
- Dr. Tatum says that all of us can take a leadership role in making institutions more sensitive towards inclusivity by using her ABCs of leadership
- Affirming Identity
- Building Community
- Cultivating Leadership
- Dr. Tatum tells us that there is value in sitting together with those of a shared identity, and it’s not necessarily a problem “So I often say, let's worry less about who's sitting where during the break times, and think about what's happening inside the classroom. Are there opportunities inside the classroom to help kids navigate those differences?”
- She shares stories of how ignoring identity and engaging in color blindness is not helpful. “One father said it really bothered him when teachers said they treated all the kids the same. His response to that was always, 'The same as what?'"
Note to the audience
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Additional Resources
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race – Read Dr. Tatum’s book updated and reissued in 2017.
ROPES – This blog post describes a protocol for collaboratively creating shared rules and expectations for the classroom. It could also be used to kick off challenging conversations with educators.
“White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard to Talk to White People About Racism” – Dr. Tatum recommended teachers read Dr. Robin DiAngelo; this article provides pointers based on her book.
Is My Skin Brown Because I Drank Chocolate Milk? – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum’s presentation at TEDxStanford about how people talk (or don’t) about race and how to approach the conversation with young children.
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/dr-tatum-reboot/transcript
Produced by Jesse Dukes and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Aimee Corrigan
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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This week, TeachLab is republishing the latest episode of MIT OpenCourseWare’s Chalk Radio “Teaching Remotely During Covid-19 with Prof. Justin Reich”, hosted by Sarah Hansen. Below is the episode summary from Chalk Radio.
“Join us as we talk with Justin Reich, assistant professor in comparative media studies at MIT. Professor Reich runs the Teaching Systems Lab, which was founded with the mission of designing, implementing, and researching the future of teacher learning. With the emergence of the current coronavirus pandemic, Prof. Reich has been turning his attention to helping teachers and education policy makers figure out how to transition rapidly to remote learning. In this special episode of Chalk Radio, Prof. Reich discusses the need for teachers to use a balance between asynchronous materials and synchronous check-ins, the challenge of making home learning equitable for students, and the value of existing open educational resources (like the materials on OCW!) for teachers who are suddenly forced to teach their classes remotely. “It’s totally normal to struggle during a pandemic,” Reich says, but he reassures teachers and parents that effective education at home may look different from effective in-school education—we simply need to recognize and cultivate the kinds of learning that can happen best under these extraordinary circumstances."
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Chalk Radio Podcast website
MIT OpenCourseWare
The OCW Educator Portal
The Teaching Systems Lab
Professor Reich’s faculty page
Interview with Prof. Reich on WBUR’s “On Point”
Resources, tools, and support for teaching remotely at MIT
Support remote learning by donating to OCW
Support OCW by sharing your story
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/chalk-radio/transcript
Join our course on edX!
Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Recorded and produced by MIT OCW
TeachLab version produced and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, Justin is joined by Jessica Minahan, a behavior analyst, special educator, author, and school consultant. They discuss how COVID-19 is affecting students with anxiety, how it manifests through behavior, and some simple strategies that teachers can use during remote learning to help students feel a bit more in control during these challenging times.
“...there are a couple of things to keep in mind as you're planning curriculum and planning different things is we're going to see a spike up in fears around sickness and death, particularly those two themes. So for example, if you're going to read a book where the mom dies, we want to be extra thoughtful about that right now. We want to make sure that we think that through and that's something administrators and teachers can be doing together.”
- How students have been responding to recent changes
- Behaviors of showing anxiety
- Establishing adequate check-ins for students to communicate their feelings
- Handling behavior and stress in remote learning
- Cheat sheet of responses for handling student panic in the absence of support staff
- Helping students develop a sense of control over their own lives
- Youth cultural change around germs and disease post-quarantine
- Being thoughtful about discussing the pandemic
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Read Jessica’s Educational Leadership: Special Report “Maintaining Connections, Reducing Anxiety While School Is Closed”
Learn more about Jessica Minahan’s work
Find Jessica’s book “The Behavioral Code” on Amazon
Learn more about emWave biofeedback
Learn more about the mote voice commenting for Google Docs
Check out Do Something!
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/jessica-minahan/transcript
Join our course on edX!
Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced and edited Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, Justin Reich joins Blake Middle School of Medfield, MA for their Monday morning check-in to discuss the many challenges of distance learning, and the specific challenges of middle schools, who have uniquely diverse age-groups to address. Principal Nat Vaughn guides the discussion and provides questions for Justin to shed light on with his experience and research.
“when I was a brand new teacher, my department head used to say.... every time you assign an essay, you're assigning 75 different essays. The experience that your students have writing this is just going to be so different for each student. And that was in normal non-crisis pandemic times, I feel like that advice is magnified a thousand times now.”
- Teaching Systems Lab’s COVID-19 State Guidance Report
- Recognizing a diversity in individual experiences
- How virtual schools function
- The challenges of the middle school age group
- The need to remain flexible and understanding of each other
- Remaining critical and parting from state guidance
- Celebrating the learning that does happen
- Reach out to those most vulnerable or struggling
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Learn more about the TSL “Remote Learning Guidance from State Education Agencies During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A First Look” Report
Read the LA Times article “Inside teachers’ never-ending crisis shifts: ‘You just keep going all day and all night’”
Learn more about author Tressie McMillan Cottom
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/middle-schools/transcript
Join our course on edX!
Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced and edited by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, Justin Reich is joined by Daniel Wendel, Research Manager and Software Developer of the MIT Scheller Teacher Education Program / Education Arcade. They discuss the importance and caveats of modeling, their use in the classrooms, and Daniel’s most recent collaboration project “Modeling the Spread of a Virus”, an interactive model designed to be used by teachers and parents for a conceptual understanding of how a virus spreads in a community, and how the individual can affect the collective. Learn more at www.virusmodel.org
“...one of the things with emergent models is that if you don’t understand the rules behind it, you might just think we just put those emergent things into the model. Being able to see in the back of the house, you can see those rules were never programmed into this model, it just kind of happened as a result of the other rules we did program into the model.”
- How computational models differ from other models
- Relation between Starlogo and Logo
- Using complex system models in classrooms
- Back-end of Starlogo / Block-based programming
- Modeling the Spread of a Virus project
- How the virus model can be used in education
- How the model is different from reality
- Learning how to use Starlogo Nova
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Visit Modeling the Spread of a Virus
Learn more about the STEP/Ed Arcade
Learn more about Starlogo Nova
Learn more about Teachers with GUTS
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/virus-model/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced, edited and mixed by Garrett Beazley
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This week on TeachLab, Justin Reich presents findings from a report on remote learning guidance from state education agencies (see tsl.mit.edu/covid19). He discussed relevant background research, points of consensus among state guidance, and the most important question for schools right now: what is the purpose of schooling during a pandemic? Harvard University professor Marty West, a member of the Massachusetts Board of Education, joins as discussant to provide a state policy perspective. The conversation was recorded during a live webinar, the video and slide deck can be found below.
Note to the audience:
The Teaching Systems Lab and the TeachLab team would like to thank all of our audience for their patronage as we attempt to shift our production and content in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We think it is of the utmost importance to continue distributing as much content as we can, and as widely as we can, to assist those who are in need of information in these difficult times. We are working to improve the quality of our content with these new constraints and get back to a more regular scheduling. Thank you for your patience.
Resources and Links
Check out additional COVID -19 information from Teaching Systems Lab
Watch the Full Webinar on YouTube
Download the slide deck
Check out our earlier episode with NYC teacher Michael Pershan
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/covid-report/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced and edited by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded by Justin Reich
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich hosts a virtual session with MIT’s Jameel World Education Lab’s (JWEL) to offer practical guidance and strategies for online learning during the coronavirus pandemic. The live audience includes educators from all around the world, and Justin answers their questions and offers his advice on listening to students and faculty, designing learning for challenging times, and prioritizing the needs of marginalized students.
“...really think about how you can partner with students and faculty. Coronavirus feels like something that's being done to us. It would be great if our response to the Coronavirus feels something that we do together.”
- Partner with Students and Faculty
- Identify and Support Disadvantaged Students
- Consider Emphasizing Asynchronous over Synchronous Learning
- Strategically Reduce Learning Goals
- Help Students Form Study Groups
- Prioritize Time for Individual Connections
- Plan for Remediation
Special thanks to Julia Reynolds-Cuélla, Susan Young and the whole team at the Abdul Latif Jameel World Education for the invitation, and for recording the conversation.
Resources and Links
Check out the full live event and powerpoint
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/age-of-covid/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Justin Reich joins NPR’s On Point with Meghna Chakrabarti to discuss the challenges higher education is facing in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, and some strategies for navigating them.
They discuss the need to engage the student who are most struggling, respond to pre-recorded testimonials, and provide advice for faculty for enduring these difficult times.
Meghna and Justin are accompanied by Christina Morales, a senior at the University of Florida, who describes her experience transitioning to online course work, and Amardeep Kahlon, dean of distance learning and computer science professor at Austin Community College in Texas, to discuss the administrative perspective of the rapid change.
Special thanks to Meghna, Grace Totter and the whole team at NPR’s OnPoint for producing this episode and letting us share the conversation with you.
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/pivot-online/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Recorded and produced by the incredible team at NPR’s OnPoint
TeachLab segments produced by Aimee Corrigan
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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At TeachLab we continue our efforts to support teachers during the coronavirus pandemic. In this episode, Justin Reich joins Laura Tavares from Facing History and Ourselves, a professional development organization empowering teachers & students to think critically about history & to understand the impact of their choices. We discussed building community, supporting students, and caring for each other in the transition to distance learning.
During the webinar, Justin and Laura discuss:
- Sustaining values and equitable practices in challenging circumstances
- Research about the risks for struggling and vulnerable learners in a transition to online learning
- Actively reaching out to support learners in low tech ways through phone, messaging, and email
- Research on typical virtual school practices, including their emphasis on self-paced, asynchronous learning and how much they depend upon parental support
- Supporting student motivation through partnership, choice, autonomy, and agency
- Using school resources in a crisis not just to address immediate needs, but to plan for supporting students in catching back up in summer, fall, and beyond
Resources and Links
Watch the full conversation with Justin and Laura at Facing History
Learn more about Padlet
Read Invitation to Brave Space by Micky ScottBey Jones
Learn more about FlipGrid
Learn more about Project Zero
Check out FHAO’s Resource Library
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/facing-history/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan
Recorded by Justin Reich and FHAO
Edited by Aimee Corrigan
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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To support teachers in the midst of the recent COVID-19 pandemic, TeachLab is switching our focus to highlight tools and strategies for effective teaching during this time. Today we talk with Michael Pershan. He is a New York City math teacher at one of the first schools in the country to shut down in the face of COVID-19. At his school, the goal was to transition fully to synchronous distance learning. Michael joins Justin Reich to discuss what we know about online and distance learning, and what's feasible for a math teacher to do.
- Michael’s experience and challenges in the midst of Coronavirus
- How to create a base for kids to keep learning
- Issues of synchronous online learning
- Alternative methods of distance learning
- Looking at the needs of different age groups and those who need extra support
- Equity issues around access and technology
- Strategy and planning in the midst of emergencies
About Our Guest: Michael Pershan
Michael Pershan is an elementary, middle and high school teacher in NYC. Learn more about Micheal on Twitter @mpershan You can read about Michael’s professional history here and check out some of his writing here.
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/michael-pershan/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Recorded by Justin Reich and Michael Pershan
Edited by Aimee Corrigan
Mixed by Garrett Beazley
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Dr. Meira Levinson is a normative political philosopher, writer, and Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Meira joins Justin Reich to discuss an emerging field of educational ethics, what that means in the classroom, and just how nontrivial that can be in practice. “So as you start sort of peeling back the onion of the data, you think... I don't know if it's even possible to compare this charter with this district in terms of quality. And on the other hand, in some ways, we need to, right?”
- Educational Ethics in practice
- System vs. Teacher level / Teacher Demoralization
- Scenarios of ethical dilemmas for teachers
- Massachusetts Charter School expansion
- Ethics of Technology and Data in Education
- justiceinschools.org / Bringing their work into practice
- Discovering differences in values
About Our Guest: Dr. Meira Levinson
Dr. Meira Levinson is a normative political philosopher, writer, and Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She writes about civic education, multiculturalism, youth empowerment, and educational ethics. In doing so, she draws upon scholarship from multiple disciplines as well as her eight years of experience teaching in the Atlanta and Boston Public Schools. Her most recent books include the co-edited Making Civics Count (Harvard Education Press, 2012) and No Citizen Left Behind (Harvard University Press, 2012). In 2013, No Citizen Left Behind was awarded the Michael Harrington Award from the American Political Science Association, the Exemplary Research in Social Studies Award from the National Council for the Social Studies, and a Critics Choice Award from the American Educational Studies Association. It also won the 2014 North American Society for Social Philosophy Book Award. Levinson fosters civic education scholarship at Harvard as co-convener of HGSE's Civic and Moral Education Initiative.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
Read Meira Levinson’s No Citizen Left Behind along with several other publications
available on Amazon
Learn more about Meira Levinson’s work the Harvard Graduate School of Education
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/meira-levinson/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Rich Milner, Educator, Scholar and Author of the book “Start Where You Are, But Don’t Stay There: Understanding Diversity, Opportunity Gaps, and Teaching in Today’s Classrooms", joins Justin Reich in a powerful conversation on how to help educators work for equity for all students. Rich encourages teachers, "If you're going to engage work that is transformative, if you're going to engage work that meets the needs of every young person with whom you work, then you've got to consider race".
- Rich’s Teaching History
- Opportunity Gaps and Opportunity Centered Teaching
- Deficit Mindset
- Colorblindness
- Myth of Meritocracy
- Context Neutral Mindsets
- Understanding Cultural Conflicts
About Our Guest: Dr. Rich Milner
Rich Milner is the Cornelius Vanderbilt Endowed Chair of Education and Professor of Education in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. Professor Milner began his career at Vanderbilt University where he was appointed Lois Autrey Betts Associate Professor of Education and Associate Professor of Education in the Departments of Teaching and Learning and, by courtesy, Associate Professor of Leadership, Policy and Organizations as well as founding director of the graduate program, Learning, Diversity and Urban Studies at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. At Vanderbilt, in 2008, he became the first Black person to earn promotion and tenure in the entire College of Education’s history. His research, teaching and policy interests concern urban education, teacher education, African American literature, and the social context of education. In particular, Professor Milner’s research examines practices and policies that support teacher effectiveness in urban schools.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
Read Rich Milner’s book, recently released in an updated second edition. “Start Where You Are, But Don’t Stay There: Understanding Diversity, Opportunity Gaps, and Teaching in Today’s Classrooms" (Second Edition). Available by Harvard Education Press, on Amazon and at your local bookseller.
Learn more about Rich Milner’s work at Peabody College at Vanderbilt University.
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/rich-milner/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Neema Avashia, a Civics teacher in the Boston Public Schools, joins Justin Reich to discuss the power of bringing real-world challenges into the classroom. We hear how Neema and her students rallied the community to challenge the closing of their school, McCormack Middle in Dorchester, and won. Neema speaks to the importance of empowering students to express themselves, and shares some of her best classroom moves.
- Neema’s Personal and Teaching Background
- Bringing complex issues into the classroom
- Using student choice as entry points
- “Jeremiah Option”
- Identity in the classroom
- Addressing conflicts in difficult civic conversations
- Restorative Practices
- Threat to Close the the McCormack Middle School
- Using civics to address the real problem
- Students expressing their motivation and talents
- Balancing activism and curriculum
- Connecting with students and the community
About Our Guest: Neema Avashia
Neema Avashia has been a Civics teacher in the Boston Public Schools, since 2003, and was recognized as city wide Educator of the Year in 2013. A graduate from Carnegie Mellon in 2001, Avashia has written and performed for The Moth Story Slam, and has become a powerful voice on WBUR’s Cognoscenti, where she has published work about the urgent issues of our time, including, “My Parents May Be Acceptable Immigrants, But None of Us Is Safe” which looks at a violent crime against an immigrant in the midwest, and “Newton North High School: Talking To Students When A Symbol Of Racial Hatred Is Unfurled Close To Home” She has also published work in The Aerogram, and in Eat, Darling, Eat. When not working on essays about inequity in education and racism, Avashia writes about the complexity of growing up Indian in West Virginia.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
https://www.neemaavashia.com/my-writing - Check out Neema’s published writing
https://www.dotnews.com/2019/mccormack-leadership-academy-would-merge-under-bps-plan - The latest news on the McCormack Middle School
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/neema-avashia/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Dr. Liz Self, Assistant Professor of the Practice at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College of Education and Human Development joins Justin Reich on TeachLab. They discuss Liz’s early teaching experiences, racial equity in the classroom, and Liz’s current work where she uses clinical simulations to help teachers practice for challenging situations in teaching.
- Liz’s early teaching experiences
- Simulations for pre-service teachers
- Recognizing the actual problem
- Large reflection process
- Variety of simulation scenarios
- How students of different backgrounds react to these scenarios
- What’s the next step?
About Our Guest: Liz Self
Dr. Liz Self is Assistant Professor of the Practice at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College of Education and Human Development. Her current research focuses on designing and using clinical simulations, to prepare preservice teachers for culturally responsive teaching. These instructional tools help teachers recognize their assumptions, biases, and prejudices within the context of systems of oppression.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
https://my.vanderbilt.edu/elizabethself/about-me/ - Learn more about Liz Self’s work
https://www.amazon.com/Pushout-Criminalization-Black-Girls-Schools/dp/1620970945 - Check out Monique Morris’ book mentioned in the episode
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/liz-self/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded by Garrett Beazley
Mixed by Corey Schreppel
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone joins Justin Reich to discuss fighting intergenerational poverty for inner-city children, the approach Harlem Children’s Zone is taking, and how you have to address the entire context of the child, not just their academics.
- Baby College in Harlem
- Harlem Education Pipeline
- Equity mindset in Harlem
- Balancing academics with life services
- Job Description/Teaching
- Creating a Learning Environment in Harlem
About Our Guest: Geoffrey Canada
Having worked with the Harlem Children’s Zone® for more than 30 years, Geoffrey Canada is renowned around the world for his pioneering work helping children and families in Harlem, and as a thought leader and passionate advocate for education reform.
From 1990 to 2014, Mr. Canada served as the President and Chief Executive Officer for the Harlem Children’s Zone, which The New York Times called “one of the most ambitious social-policy experiments of our time.” In 2011, Mr. Canada was named to the TIME 100 list of most influential people in the world and, in March 2014, was named one of Fortune’s 50 greatest leaders in the world. As of July 1, 2014, Mr. Canada stepped down as CEO, handing the reins to COO Anne Williams-Isom. He continues to serve as President of the HCZ and Promise Academy Boards, and a board member of the XQ Institute.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
https://hcz.org/ - Learn more about the Harlem Children’s Zone
https://xqsuperschool.org/- Learn more about the XQ Institute
https://youtu.be/vY2l2xfDBcE - Geoffrey Canada on TED
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/geoffrey-canada/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Daymian Meija
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Milly Arbaje-Thomas joins Justin Reich to discuss the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO), a voluntary school integration program in Boston, Massachusetts. They’ll focus on METCO’s mission, its underlying values, and Milly’s personal experience with the program as a former METCO parent and as its current CEO.
- Milly’s personal experience with METCO
- METCO’s current work
- Restorative Justice
- Teacher Diversity
About Our Guest: Milly Arbaje-Thomas
Milly Arbaje-Thomas is the CEO of METCO, which is a voluntary school integration program here in Boston. Prior, Milly managed neighborhood antipoverty programs at Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD) for 15 years. As Deputy Director of ABCD Field Operations she provided leadership to 14 neighborhood sites and is credited with transforming those sites into integrated, full-service case management organizations serving the low-income community.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
https://metcoinc.org/ - Learn more about METCO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I65Ru4ZM9c - WGBH segment on METCO funding
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/02/18/metco-students-outperforming-those-bps-charter-schools/W4jpFqnOSFxbdvsJu30jXN/story.html - Recent article about METCO performance
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/milly-arbaje-thomas/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Dr. Ilana Horn joins Justin Reich to discuss finding the strengths in every student, listening more closely to student thinking, and finding ways to shift curriculum from “school math” to the kind of math that’s both more engaging to students and closer to what real mathematicians do. Dr. Horn offers a slew of concrete strategies for teachers and teacher educators, from roster audits, to “becoming invisible” to mediated field experiences.
- Making math interesting for kids
- Addressing context variables in math
- Asset Framing your students
- Mathematics vs. “School Math” values
- Working with in-service teachers
About Our Guest: Dr. Ilana Horn
Ilana Seidel Horn is Professor of Mathematics Education at Vanderbilt University's Peabody College, where her research and teaching center on ways to make authentic mathematics accessible to students, particularly those who have historically been disenfranchised by our educational system. She is the author of Motivated: Designing Math Classrooms Where Students Want to Join In and Strength in Numbers: Collaborative Learning in Secondary Mathematics.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
Motivated: Designing Math Classrooms Where Students Want to Join In - Read Dr. Ilana Horn’s Book
http://ilanahorn.com/#bio - Learn more about Dr. Horn’s work
An Asset-Orientation is Everything - Watch Dr. Ilana Horn’s lecture
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/ilana-horn/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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José Luis Vilson joins Justin Reich to discuss how to connect with your students, what it means to be a teacher of color, and the mission of EduColor, a movement and organization that Vilson co-founded to elevate the voices of public school advocates of color on educational equity and justice.
- José tells us about how he connects with students early in the school year
- Teacher advocacy work as a person of color
- How to scaffold questions with your students with three tiers
- Guiding step by step
- Surfacing opinions and observations
- Encouraging students to discover the underlying question
- Navigating how to co-teach
- Teaching in an unfamiliar environment
- Mission of EduColor
About Our Guest: Jose Vilson
José Luis Vilson is a full-time math teacher, writer, speaker, and activist in New York City, NY. He is the author of This Is Not A Test: A New Narrative on Race, Class, and Education. He has spoken about education, math, and race for a number of organizations and publications, including the New York Times, The Guardian, TED, El Diario / La Prensa and The Atlantic. He's a National Board Certified teacher, a Math for America Master Teacher, and the executive director of EduColor, an organization dedicated to race and social justice issues in education.
Additional Resources for Teachers and other Listeners
This is Not a Test: A New Narrative on Race, Class, and Education - Read Jose Vilson’s book published in 2014
https://thejosevilson.com/ - Learn more about Vilson’s work
https://www.educolor.org/ - Learn more about EDUCOLOR
No conversation about education without teacher voice | TED-Ed - Check out José Vilson’s presentation for TED-Ed
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/jose-luis-vilson/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Aimee Corrigan and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Kate Ellis
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Daymian Meija
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In TeachLab’s first episode, our host Justin Reich has a powerful conversation with renowned author, psychologist and educator Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum. Dr. Tatum shares some of the stories that inspired her bestselling book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations about Race and offers tips for addressing the ongoing challenges of racial issues in classrooms and schools.
- Dr. Tatum encourages teachers to take the first step in tackling racism by talking about it, because “if we can’t talk about it, we can’t fix it”.
- Dr. Tatum says that all of us can take a leadership role in making institutions more sensitive towards inclusivity by using her ABCs of leadership
- Affirming Identity
- Building Community
- Cultivating Leadership
- Dr. Tatum tells us that there is value in sitting together with those of a shared identity, and it’s not necessarily a problem “So I often say, let's worry less about who's sitting where during the break times, and think about what's happening inside the classroom. Are there opportunities inside the classroom to help kids navigate those differences?”
- She shares stories of how ignoring identity and engaging in color blindness is not helpful. “One father said it really bothered him when teachers said they treated all the kids the same. His response to that was always, 'The same as what?'"
About Our Guest: Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum
Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, president emerita of Spelman College, is a developmental psychologist, administrator and educator who has conducted research and written several books on the topic of racism, including the recently published 20th anniversary edition of her bestselling book, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations about Race. A thought-leader in higher education, she was the 2013 recipient of the Carnegie Academic Leadership Award and the 2014 recipient of the American Psychological Association Award for Outstanding Lifetime Contributions to Psychology. Dr. Tatum holds a B.A. degree in psychology from Wesleyan University, a M.A. and Ph.D. in clinical psychology from University of Michigan, and a M.A. in Religious Studies from Hartford Seminary.
About Our Host: Justin Reich
Justin Reich is an educational researcher passionate about the future of learning in a networked world. He is an Assistant Professor in the Comparative Media Studies/Writing department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the director of the MIT Teaching Systems Lab, where Justin and his team design, implement, and research the future of teacher learning. Justin’s writings have appeared in Science, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Educational Researcher, the Washington Post, Inside Higher Ed, the Christian Science Monitor, Education Week, and other publications. Justin's favorite hobbies are spending time outside hiking, climbing, and boating with his wife and two school-aged daughters. He has a new book on education technology forthcoming this fall from Harvard University Press.
Additional Resources
Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race – Read Dr. Tatum’s book updated and reissued in 2017.
ROPES – This blog post describes a protocol for collaboratively creating shared rules and expectations for the classroom. It could also be used to kick off challenging conversations with educators.
“White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard to Talk to White People About Racism” – Dr. Tatum recommended teachers read Dr. Robin DiAngelo; this article provides pointers based on her book.
Is My Skin Brown Because I Drank Chocolate Milk? – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum’s presentation at TEDxStanford about how people talk (or don’t) about race and how to approach the conversation with young children.
Transcript
https://teachlabpodcast.simplecast.com/episodes/dr-beverly-daniel-tatum/transcript
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Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices
Produced by Jesse Dukes and Garrett Beazley
Edited by Aimee Corrigan
Recorded and Mixed by Garrett Beazley
Filmed by Denez McAdoo
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Introducing TeachLab with Justin Reich, a new podcast where we investigate the art and craft of teaching. Coming to you in January. Subscribe now!