- The education system
functions and depends on unpaid overtime of teachers.
And so we can draw boundaries as best we can,
but there's this expectation that you're putting in
hours at home, you're lesson planning at home,
you're emailing and communicating
with families at home,
before and after school, and not getting paid for it.
[upbeat music]
- Welcome to another episode of aka Teacher.
This is Angie and I'm here with all three of my co-hosts.
Daniel, Shelton, Joanna, how are we doing?
- Pretty good.
- Yeah, we're doing, we're doing.
- I'm out here.
- We're here. [chuckling]
- Well, our listeners would probably enjoy knowing
how many technical difficulties that we've had.
It's bringing back flashbacks of online learning,
of having to be on Zoom.
Is my mic muted?
Is my camera working?
Everything like that. - Right.
- Definitely.
- Yeah, I think my tagline for 2020 or 2021
whatever it was, was, "Can you hear me now?"
[all laughing] - Yep.
- Or, "You're muted."
- Yep, exactly.
Yep.
Well, I think I'm gonna begin kind of talking about
this episode that we're gonna go on through today.
And one of the things we're gonna do is actually
we're gonna revisit the Pass the Mic from our last episode.
We had a great Pass the Mic, but I found myself,
I'm gonna read, well, you know what,
first I'm gonna read the Pass the Mic.
Then I wanna reflect personally on what we talked about
and then I wanna just get your guys' thoughts too.
So here is our Pass the Mic from last time.
This is from Rachel, from Rockford.
"I work with a lot of international students,
"and one day a student from Sierra Leone
"came back from gym class in tears.
"He wanted to play basketball,
"but the other kids wouldn't let him play.
"The other kids were Black and told my student
"that he couldn't play because he acted too white.
"My student was so frustrated.
"He pointed to his arm and he said,
"'We have the same color skin.
"'Why do they treat me like this?'
"But they don't let him play and he left furiously.
"As a white teacher, the moments of racism
"were really hard for me because I had to explain
"how this thing worked against my students
without them understanding it."
So when we were together last time,
I felt like we weren't able to devote enough time
to this bigger picture, which I mean honestly in itself
could probably be multiple episodes.
And I felt like maybe we quickly moved on
from the concept of race, and about the phrase even,
like, "You're acting too white,"
and focused more on international students.
But I found myself like, after the episode was done,
the next few days I'm thinking about it like,
I don't know if we did the right thing.
I don't know if we talked about the bigger picture here.
And our producers kind of offered us this opportunity,
not only to revisit the topic,
but maybe to bring Shelton and Daniel in on the conversation
and let us all to maybe digest this one
just for a little bit together.
What do you guys think?
- I can say, just hearing the story,
the first thing comes to my mind with,
I primarily work
with African-American kids in schools,
because they don't see people that look like them.
So one thing I've learned, like they're not,
so with the child from Sierra Leone, which is Africa,
I make a connection.
When I first start my groups,
I make a connection from Africa to here,
'cause everybody don't believe
that we're from Africa, that part.
But I just show 'em like, a lot of traditions
and the things we do, where we come from,
a lot of the foods we eat, the music we listen to,
how that correlates or aligns with Africa.
So because I do have a lot of international kids
and kids from Africa that are in the groups.
So I just, I like to build that connection, too.
And then I allow that child to teach our kids
about what they've been through, where they come from,
because then that shows a correlation of,
okay, we have similar experiences.
'Cause a lot of kids, they think about Africa
and they only get what they see on TV
or what they just assume.
So when they hear from somebody that came from Africa,
I think that paints a more realistic picture.
And they could, how do I say,
they could relate to each other a lot better,
if that makes sense.
- Yeah, it does.
Something that came to mind for me was the book
by Beverly Danielle Tatum,
Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?
And you know, you have a student who's in tears,
and they're hurt, and they're trying to figure out
why did this happen?
Why did this happen to me?
And so as a teacher, you want to comfort them,
you want to believe them and ease their hurt
and figure out what happened that they were excluded,
and that they were hurt like this,
and that this was done to them.
And that's kind of at the forefront.
When I hear the phrase, you know,
that someone was acting "too white" in this context,
regardless of their skin color, I'm thinking about that book.
And groups, circles, cohorts of students
of one particular race, in particular non-white groups,
that those spaces become a very protected space,
a very safe space against cultures,
a culture of whiteness and white supremacy
creeping in and encroaching on that space.
And potentially putting at stake their feelings of safety,
because they've gotten to know the way this system works,
and the way this system works for some and not others.
And these spaces, these affinity spaces,
these affinity groups can uphold identities,
can be a place where people can develop their identities,
can develop connections with each other, share stories,
have shared experiences from a common understanding.
And so I think there's something to be said about
not jumping to say like, "Oh, there was exclusion
"and we want inclusion.
So anything that's not inclusion must be wrong."
And looking at it from the perspective of,
well, what were they protecting?
And I think there's something considerable,
even though there was harm done to another student,
there was something considerable that they were protecting
and standing up for, not only themselves, but their culture
and their race against this system of whiteness.
- And to piggyback off that, acting "too white,"
I forgot to mention that.
Like I always, a lot of my kids I deal with,
they will get certain other, Black kids that I deal with,
they'll talk about other Black kids and say,
"We don't wanna deal with them 'cause they act too white."
I'm like, "What does that mean?"
But they can't answer.
But so then that opens the opportunity for me
just to show the difference in who we are as humans.
But I do understand where they get this box,
this mindset of thinking from, music they listen to,
and how they feel, too.
Like Daniel said, like coming to a school every day
and you don't feel a sense of belonging,
that will make you protect yourself.
And anybody that's not like you,
like you don't want to deal with that.
So I do have a foundational understanding of that.
But with the "too white,"
that opens up opportunity to make them tell me what it is,
'cause I know it's not a thing.
But then it also gives me the opportunity to explain
the differences in who we are and why we are.
And usually they think talking.
I mean, they think acting white is, 'cause I talk proper,
I do good in school, I do things a certain way,
but then I'll turn around and ask 'em like,
"Well, how do you wanna do, like how do you wanna be,
"do you wanna be successful in school?
And what does that look like?"
And it fits right into the box of "acting white."
So then they're, "Oh," then they start to get it.
So a lot of these kids, in my experience,
they just don't have a sense of who they are
or why they are.
And then that takes my job under the surface a little bit
a lot of days.
- That concept of who they are and why they are,
and then that protection,
those are interesting to me because I wonder if,
as they are trying to figure out who they are,
so I'm thinking about like a standard high school-age kid
when I'm thinking about this, you know,
they're all trying to figure out who they are.
And with that unknown comes that scariness of like,
"Well, I don't know where I fit.
"I don't know where I want to be.
"And the comfort of seeing people who look like me,
"I'm gonna find myself in that space
and then I'm gonna protect it."
That's a really interesting concept,
the concept of like protecting the group
with which I find my identity.
That's, I really like that.
That resonates.
- I think about too, though, just that moment,
like how do you connect and provide comfort in that moment?
Because we know it's deep in a bigger issue.
And yet this is the kind of stuff,
this is why, I'm guessing,
Rachel from Rockford's writing in,
you know, to be like, this is just one
of hundreds of this type of moment in a day
of like, where there's a disconnection,
where there's a misunderstanding,
and how we've been kind of challenged
as a profession, recently especially,
about worrying about how to handle that.
And that's almost part of it is like, am I,
you know, the super over analysis of like,
did I say the right thing versus it is, I think,
instinctive in most of us to just offer the compassion,
you know what I mean?
And offer the connection.
So that's, I think about, we have this larger system,
and the status quo, and how it is,
and then there is just teaching is made up
of all of these tiny, these moments.
And we, again, as humans with emotions,
we can't predict what it means to whom,
you know what I mean?
And what thing really strikes deep versus doesn't.
And to me, it just makes me think about,
that's why Rachel was writing in, right?
And it's actually then why you wanted
to revisit it, Angie, right?
We carry these things.
But really it's about,
because we kind of really do always wanna get it right
with the connection and honoring someone's heart.
- Yeah, to piggyback off you, I always, again,
like to educate the kids, and teachers sometimes,
the word race, like we throw that around loosely,
but we don't understand like, even that word
was made up to divide us.
So when we think about race, I like to put it in perspective.
I ask the kids, "When you think about a race, what happens?"
They say, "Somebody wins and somebody loses."
So then I put them in the box and then I say,
"Well, this is a construct that we're living under,
"that we're living in to make you feel that way.
"But the truth is, you gotta dig inside
and understand where you get your validations from."
And I always ask about role models,
because a lot of kids don't have role models
or they got people on TV, which is fine,
but when you don't have that navigation in life,
especially as a person of color, you get lost real fast.
And then it turns into that,
"I'm protecting my space wherever I am and how I am."
And it translate into those behaviors sometimes.
When kids, they just don't have
that underlying foundation of concepts,
what they mean, and just how to encourage
and empower yourself.
- Yeah, Joanna, you said we carry these things,
and it's taking me back to my first year of teaching.
So 16 years ago,
and I was teaching high school ESL math in Madison.
And I'm eager, I'm going in,
I wanna do group work with my students.
Everything that I learned in my teacher education program.
And it was within the first couple of days of school,
and some of my students come in who are native Spanish speakers
and they see me, I think probably have seen my name
on a list of their teachers.
And I just remember this one student was so excited,
said, "Hey, Mr. Torres, all right!"
And just like, had this connection; we had never met,
this was our first interaction.
And he started speaking to me in fluent Spanish.
And me as, so I'm fourth generation Mexican American.
I grew up speaking English, I learned Spanish in school.
Right, middle school high school.
And my Spanish at this point was not so great.
And it was too fast for me.
And I tried to keep up and I clearly stuttered,
and he could see.
It just kinda broke down this automatic connection
that he thought we had.
And he just, "Oh, no, you don't, no, never mind."
I think he said, "Never mind."
- No! [all laughing]
- And he didn't, you know, he didn't say,
"You know, oh, you're too white."
But it was a similar moment where it's something I felt,
you know, I have lighter skin
and I can kind of blend in with one circle or another,
I can pass as white.
And it hurt at the time.
And I thought, "Oh, we're gonna have this connection
"and, you know, I'm here to help you.
I'm this eager first year teacher."
And it's just stuck with me ever since that, you know,
those different aspects of our identity,
and what we bring to the table, and the assumptions we make,
whether they're positive or negative, they're there.
- Could I offer a reframe on that situation?
Because to me, number one, he attracted to you
because he felt like there was nobody else, so he was alone.
But then he assumed that you knew Spanish.
So he started, you know, talking to you in Spanish.
But then he was like, "No," at that moment, like that was,
I see that was a moment to put him on a pedestal
and be like, "Okay, can you teach me four words a week?"
Because we do have things in common,
but now he has opportunity to feel that sense of influence
where he's never felt it before.
And you are older than him.
So that's even a higher pedestal too.
Sometimes I see those as small windows of opportunity.
- That's a great point.
And I think something I became more comfortable with
later in my teaching of putting the students
in the role of a teacher, as you're saying.
- Thank you.
I just said this the other day, I'm like,
we should change the titles.
Teachers should be students,
because for the people that live off titles,
teachers should be students
and the students should be teacher.
Because now sometimes you get some teachers who,
"I got my degree, I don't need to know anymore.
I've learned this, I've lived, I'm 40, I did this."
No, it doesn't stop.
So I love that.
Yes, thank you for saying that.
- I actually feel, right now, that's why I'm,
I feel misunderstood as a teacher currently.
And I feel that is why.
Because I listen to my students,
and I use what they have been telling me over all the years
to create what I do,
but that is not understood or accepted
by the majority of my colleagues.
- Wow.
- Is what is not accepted then what your classroom looks like?
Or just like, you're like, "Hey, I'm talking to kids
and they're saying this," and people are like,
"Why are you talking to kids so much?"
- I think about what's in my classroom,
like how things are designed, right?
When you know, right, like a lot of my students
are let's say highly anxious.
So we don't use the traditional passing periods.
That's why, you know what I mean?
Because I'm listening and making the adjustment.
And it's what I call, I mean,
and there's actual thing out here, a "power with" system.
So what Shelton's talking about,
and especially youth are really into this.
They would thrive.
It's again, us looking at what is education
and what are we doing?
It's a "power over" system.
And "power with" is what it does need to be with our students.
Anyway, that's what came into my mind
when Shelton was talking about like,
we should be the students, they should be the teachers.
Right, it's like you observe, you listen,
and you use that to guide you.
So I agree, Shelton, and that's just the language
that I put to it of like, it's "power with."
But we really work in a system that's like, no,
these are the standards
and they're created by who even knows where, you know?
And that's the thing we have to do.
- Well, team, I just wanna say thank you
for giving us that opportunity to talk about this again.
And again, I wanna thank everybody that gives us grace
as we figure out how to unpack our learning
and to continually grow.
And I'm just really thankful for all of our perspectives
and I can't wait to continue to learn from you guys
because yeah, I know that I'm going to continue to reflect.
I'm gonna feel better leaving this episode
just because of our conversations today.
[upbeat music]
- So we wanna talk about the idea
or the concept of boundaries.
And when I think about boundaries,
I'm thinking about it as myself, as a professional,
but I'm also thinking about my personal life.
I'm also thinking about like, the community.
When you guys hear the word boundaries,
and you relate it to our work in education,
what does it make you think about?
- For me, I'm just recently learning
that I have to disappoint people.
Because I have a personality
where I want to help everything and everybody.
And so I've learned that I have, and no,
I don't want to, I'm asked a lot to help a lot of people.
So, and that's what I love to do,
but I have to set boundaries for myself,
because I'll end up helping something that's not on my...
I don't wanna say caseload, my caseload that day.
And then when I'm sitting to do what I need to do,
I'm just drained, energy is gone.
So I've learned, disappointing people protects my yes.
And if I want to have a healthy work life,
I have to learn to say no to people.
And a lot of people, because I'm Black,
they assume I have all the Black answers.
Not everybody, but a lot of people.
So I have to set that boundary of,
even when a teacher's dealing with a child that's Black,
they'll come to me and like, "Well, can you come do this,
help me with this child?"
And I'll ask 'em, "What have you tried?"
And that's my boundary.
'Cause then that makes them reflect on,
usually they'll say, "You know what?
I haven't even tried anything."
So instead of saying,
"Don't come to me with your Black questions,"
I've learned to ask that question back
to make them think about it.
So those are my boundaries that I have to set.
- The first thing that comes to mind for me
is the fact that the education system
functions and depends on unpaid overtime of teachers.
And so we can draw boundaries as best we can.
But there's this expectation that
you're putting in hours at home, you're lesson planning at home,
you're emailing and communicating
with families at home,
before and after school, and not getting paid for it.
Imagine other professions, right?
A lawyer putting in overtime, unpaid.
- Those are billable hours.
- Exactly, billable hours, time and a half.
It just, it doesn't happen.
And the system depends on it.
And I think, I remember that as a teacher,
you just assume that, oh, that's just the way it is
and you accept it.
- Oh, my gosh, yesterday I was talking
to a third year teacher from another district,
and it was, you know, then I'm like,
"So you told me that you coach."
And she's like, "Oh, yeah."
And then she listed off like 10, she's like,
"I coach volleyball, I do track, I'm the freshman--"
Like, she did list like 10 different things
that she was doing in addition to her teaching load.
And that's where you're, you know,
I hear in the expectation
or who asked her to do 10,000 things?
- Yes, yep, yep.
Yeah, I feel like there is a certain level of like,
where you have to draw the line.
And for me, the thing that seems really popular
in my school is new clubs.
It seems like there's a new club starting up every day.
And so now all of a sudden we have a knitting club.
That's really cool.
But that is an unpaid position by one of the greatest,
nicest teachers around, that she's like trying
to set aside time to meet with the kids about knitting,
and teach kids how to knit, and like all these things.
And she's awesome, so of course she's gonna say yes.
And then it's like, now we have board game club.
Oh, that sounds like a lot of fun.
But like, somebody has to unpaid be at school after school
to supervise board game club
and make sure there's board games.
And it seems like at some point I started doing
like what you did, Shelton, is making kids disappointed,
which hurts.
And be like, "No, I'm not gonna be
"the advisor of your science club,
"because also we have like, you know,
seven other science clubs."
But it'd be like, the kids just wanna be in a club
and you're like, "I don't even know,
"I think it'd be you and three people
in like, shoe tying club, in like, yo-yo club."
And so that's where I worry about teachers,
because we're letting down students, which hurts.
And letting down's probably the wrong phrase,
but like, I feel pressure to.
- Like, if there's this need,
if they're asking, why can't we build this into our day?
So again, the fact that it never changes,
that it's like, kids wanting to knit, super cool, great,
healthy; let's build it in.
Science clubs, you know, I've always been one to question,
you know, extracurriculars and in terms of the equity space
of like, who gets involved,
how are they able to get involved?
I don't know.
Makes me question like, how come we can't build that in?
But for you, are you saying then Angie,
that your boundaries too are around disappointing people?
Or what is it?
What do you think about for yourself?
What's up with you and your boundaries?
- Yeah, it's definitely saying no, and it's hard.
I joke a lot that I'm voluntold to be a part of committees,
or for me particularly,
sometimes it's on the fly presenting
or talking about something at a professional development.
So we're about to have a PD on Monday,
and it's Sunday night, and I get an email,
"Hey, can you talk for 15 minutes about X?"
Or the PD is happening, it's lunch,
and somebody comes up to me and says,
"Hey, we're not so sure if we like the next thing,
"can you talk about this thing
I know you do in your classroom?"
And I can go ad lib and talk about it,
but sometimes I'm like, "No.
"Why?
Why do I gotta be the one to like, save your butt right now?"
It like, jars at me.
And so no, I have terrible boundaries.
I should really be a student of this podcast.
[Shelton chuckling]
Because, like I said, all the time,
I get voluntold to be in this.
- I love that you're bringing up the phrase voluntold.
- Oh, my God.
- In case people haven't realized,
that's an educational term. - That is real.
That's real. - Yep.
- I think that's a big difference though, right?
Joanna, you're talking to that teacher
who's involved in all these clubs.
I imagine they volunteered for those, right?
But then there's these things we're voluntold to do.
I was also similarly talking to a teacher recently,
and he's involved with multiple innovation projects
at the school, multiple clubs after school.
And I checked in with him and just said, "How are you doing?
"Are you okay?
Like, is this too much?"
And he said, "No, I love it."
Those are actually the things that fill him up,
that make him excited to come to the job every day.
And it really resonated with me
because in my first five years of teaching,
I was thinking about the clubs that I was involved with.
I coached gymnastics, I was, you know,
advisor for the National Honor Society.
I co-directed a play at the school that I was at.
And those were the things that filled me up.
Now, I was young and I didn't have kids,
so I was able to give that time.
And then I was at another school,
which was a college preparatory charter school,
and we put in so many extra hours
to have extra tutoring for our students.
Sometimes we'd be there 'til 7 o'clock,
8 o'clock at night.
Teachers would brag to each other
that they closed down the building that night.
And it was just this culture of do whatever it takes.
And I think sometimes we hear that too,
that you gotta do whatever it takes,
and we're convinced that staying hours unpaid after school
is what it takes.
And then I started having kids, and that really changed
where my boundary line was.
- Well, and Daniel, did you notice this?
So I was very similar to you, I feel like,
in those years when I was a brand-new teacher,
no children; Joanna, you can maybe comment on as well.
I had no kids.
So I was like, "I'm involved with so many things
"and I am unstoppable.
Yeah."
And then I had kids and I couldn't be involved.
That's just like, the facts.
I had to pick up at daycare at 4:30,
like, that just has to happen.
And I really felt bad about myself.
Like, now I'm not involved in anything.
Like, now I'm lame and then insecure about younger teachers
coming in, and not even insecure like, "Ooh,
they're better than me."
But like, "I used to be that good,
and I'm not that good anymore."
And it really took me, like my oldest is nine years old now
and I would say I've gotten comfortable
with that level of like,
"I just can't be involved in stuff.
"I got kids.
This is a season of my life."
And it's now, probably from the pandemic,
but I mean like, in the past four years,
did I finally have the confidence to be like,
"I can't be the advisor of all your clubs
"and on every single education committee.
I got kids I gotta go care for, and they're more important."
But it was hard.
Did you experience that, Joanna, at all with you?
- I have always been pretty, you know,
I just see how systems work from a young age,
and so I've always been really pretty protective
of my energy and my space.
And in a way I think about just growing up,
like when you grow up in chaos,
it can be a skill that you just, you learn.
And so it's helped me in adulthood.
I feel like I am very aware of like, where my levels are
versus you know, like what I need for me
versus what I can give to you.
And so I would say I wasn't so much
on the clubs and activities tip.
I have always given a ton to my union.
But similar to the guy that, Daniel, you were talking about,
it actually fills me up.
You know, or it feels like it's just a natural, like I said,
I'ma get off this thing
and I'll be talking to this girl who I help.
You know what I mean?
Like, it's kind of a natural part of my life.
However, I do, again, I just continue to be like,
"How come this can't all fit in?
"How come helping and offering assistance
"and guidance to my colleagues can't really
just be part of my work in a school district?"
"How come," like I said,
"these things that really do bring energy and joy,
"and are healthy for the students
"to do the clubs and the activities,
how come this can't be a part of what we're doing?"
But, so I don't know.
I really have never been...
No, you could probably hear,
I've been on other podcasts where I kind of brag about like,
"I ain't gonna sit on your committee.
If you ain't gonna pay me, no."
- Committees commit to do nothing.
[Shelton chuckling] - Right.
- Sometimes. - I do the work for real.
That's what I'll be like; "I do the work for real.
"I give it all to my students.
"And so you all got a choice.
"Do you want me to do it for them?
Or do you want me to sit here and go in circles with you?"
I'll always do it for my kids.
- See, I learned, I think that's why people
want us on the committees,
because they see us doing the work.
And when your name is on the committee,
it represents the whole committee.
- Yep.
Yeah, I feel that too sometimes that like,
it's like, "Oh, that's a name of a teacher I trust
"and they're on the committee.
Okay, I trust whatever the committee's about to say."
Or "Hey, you're a well-liked person by other teachers.
Can you present about this crummy topic?"
[chuckles]
- For a couple of us, having kids shifted our boundaries.
I'm curious if the pandemic has shifted anyone's boundaries,
if that made an impact?
- So I was gonna ask a kind of an opposite question.
Do you think the schools after the pandemic, like,
because they gotta catch up on all this academic,
like they just lost total boundaries of people
and what they're doing.
So a double-edge question, I think.
That's a good question. - Mm-hmm.
- And I think you both are, yes to both.
I think that the schools have totally,
schools, families, kids, they've totally lost boundaries.
I get an email at 8:00 PM on a Sunday.
At 8:00 AM on Monday I'm asked, "Did you see my email?"
by a kid.
It's like, "No?
The day's about to start."
And it's like, "Why?
"Why didn't you see my--
You didn't reply within 12 hours; why didn't you reply?"
And so I do think that there's a lot of blurriness there.
Like parents are like, "Oh, they're gonna be gone.
Can you just videotape every single class for them?"
No, I can't.
But then, to Daniel, your question,
I do think the pandemic really did continue
to build in my confidence of like, my kids need their mom.
They only have two parents and I'm one of 'em,
so I can't not be there for them.
So it has helped me with the pandemic, I think.
- I was thinking about what Shelton was saying earlier
about trauma, and you have students who have trauma.
And as a teacher, you're fielding that and you are,
it's secondary trauma. - Yes.
- You're helping them process it,
you're helping them work through it.
And with the pandemic,
everyone was experiencing their own trauma, their own grief,
their own sense of loss, whether they were losing friends,
family members around them,
or just a sense of loss of the way school was
and the routines of everything.
And so on top of your trauma,
you're also hearing the stories of the students
who are experiencing their own trauma.
And that level of secondary trauma,
I know during the pandemic, I was introduced to the phrase
compassion fatigue.
Separate from you know, compassion fulfillment,
where we're fulfilled when we act compassionately.
And as teachers, we care for others, we help others.
But when there's a certain level of trauma
that you're receiving and you're on the receiving end of it,
that secondary trauma,
and you can reach a level of compassion fatigue.
I just have nothing left to give.
[upbeat music]
- Okay, now we're gonna move on to our True Story segments
in which these stories, we will hear from an education,
something you've experienced.
It could be funny, uplifting,
just want to hear some stories about what's going on.
- I have a story.
This happened two days ago,
and it is the most embarrassing thing
I've ever experienced as an educator.
So boundaries, right?
So I have to bring home the...
We do a ton of dry erase work in our classroom.
It's a thing I love.
It's full of engagement.
Dry erase boards, hold up answers, work with a friend,
draw drawings, ask questions.
So the rags that we use to wash them get dirty,
gotta bring 'em home to wash 'em in my own house.
Because again, who else is gonna wash?
- No laundry service provided. - No laundry service.
- Wash your own stuff.
Buy your own stuff, wash your own stuff for the school.
So I washed them at home over the weekend,
and bring 'em back to class, and throw 'em all in a bin.
Doing whiteboard, a student calls me over
and she goes, "Um, who washes these?"
And as she opens, she kinda unfolds it,
there is my underwear connected to the rag.
It's like static clung on there.
So, awesome.
So for like four seconds, I tried to like, form a lie.
Like, I was like,
"We have a lady who washes the jersey...
They're mine, they're mine."
And I like, grab it and run away.
And it was very lucky because it was three very nice girls.
- Right; they weren't taking photos of them?
- That was my next question.
- So another story for another time
is I actually collect the kids' cell phones
before they enter the room every day.
- Way to go.
- To which I was like, thank goodness I do that.
They could have been Snapchatting it everywhere.
Luckily it wasn't like, three stereotypical boys
who like, tossed it around or put it on their heads
or ruined my day more.
And so as three super nice girls,
they all chuckled, because this is group work
and there's lots of dynamics going on.
My co-teacher didn't even know what was happening.
So, good.
So nobody else really figured it out.
And then I just kind of kept like, circling back on them
to make sure things were cool.
Like, circle back and be like,
"This is the worst day of my entire life."
You know, they'd laugh, laugh, laugh.
I had to take off my sweater 'cause I'm pitting out
'cause I'm so stressed out.
Circle back and like, "You are gonna tell everybody you know,
"I'm gonna tell everybody I know,
because this is literally terrible."
- Hilarious.
- So yeah, I've never, I can't, I don't know how to top it.
That was the craziest day.
[upbeat music]
- All right, let's move into our Look Back segment
where we do some reflecting
on our own personal teaching practices.
Remember, nobody's perfect.
So this can be things that you're working on.
It can also be things you're doing well.
Feel free to give a shout-out to yourself,
give yourself a pat on the back and share some wisdom here.
- Today I'm just gonna get a little personal.
I've been working on myself, believing in myself.
And I know I'm gifted at what I do,
but because I went through some personal things,
it is hard to believe and receive that.
So today I had a situation with a student,
that I walk into school and I seen the counselor talking,
the counselor and the psychologist talking to him.
And I hear the conversation,
and I just throw in a little input,
little insight from my experiences.
And after that conversation, the student's energy perked up,
perked up a lot.
And the psychologist and the counselor, they were like,
"Man, I wish we could just have you here all day, every day.
Matter of fact, you wanna go for principal?"
And she was joking, but when I explained
what I'm going through personally,
like that made me feel good because it made me feel
like I actually had an impact.
'Cause sometimes in my job,
'cause I move around from school to school,
I don't feel like I have an impact.
But just hearing that,
that just validated what I'm supposed to be doing.
So that's a small, little reflection.
- I think about, in my work, I'm constantly trying to,
well, I'm always kind of refining this idea
that I operate from of like,
how to make school completely supportive
of your human nervous system.
You might have picked up in the conversation.
I just see all the time,
like all the stressors that school adds.
And our expectations are, everything's designed
as though you're, you know,
productive, functional, and in this space.
And yet there's so much within the system
that actually sets off the nervous system.
And so I refine that work.
From the moment, that's how I'll talk about it,
where like my students experience a school experience
that is fully supportive
of their human nervous regulation system.
And so it makes me really think about
every aspect that we do.
And just recently was the end of a term.
So in high school, that's time to reflect, portfolios, tests,
all that kind of stuff.
And so the portfolio that we just created and did
was really reflective of this sequence that the students use
of regulating, connecting, centering,
exploring, and reflecting.
And I'm just feeling really good
about the feedback that I got from that,
because I'm very always intentional to set up
an internal question and an external question.
So again, on the outside, this is what you might see,
but internally, this is what I'm feeling.
And one of the things in particular was,
by the end of the day, I was asking the students to evaluate,
like, in the closing circle,
"Do I feel like, centered or scattered?"
You know, "Do I feel connected or separate?"
And I just, anyway, I was feeling good that I'm like, yes,
I like when I come up with good assessment pieces.
Like, I'm really good at the standard piece
and you know, I don't know.
So I don't even know if that made sense,
but I felt really good about this standard piece.
- Where can you find these?
Where can we find these centered, these self questions?
I like some of those.
- Oh, well, they're all on my Google Drive.
- Well, we're gonna need that Google Drive
linked to this episode, please.
- Hey, well, and I really am.
I offer that to y'all and aka listeners,
like, that is what I, I just know it works.
This whole like, putting the internal side to everything,
and offering that to students, and that connection.
So yeah, I'm feeling really good about my recent portfolio,
and the feedback that I got,
and how the kids can even just talk about it themselves.
So feeling good and aligning that nervous system regulation.
- Do you find that...
So we were talking earlier about like
when kids are starting to build up for holidays,
build up for kind of these bigger events,
that there seems to be a lot of like maybe...
All of a sudden, the inequities are showing themselves.
Do you see like a difference in sometimes
how the kids write about themselves as the year goes on?
Do they get, like throughout the year
do all of a sudden you see some magic in how they reflect?
Are they hesitant in the beginning?
- Oh, I think some of the, part of the thing that I do
that I honestly do feel is amazing,
no, it don't take all year.
It's pretty immediate.
It's how you frame things to children.
When you frame it as like, "This is just your nervous system.
Your nervous system works quite well," instead of,
"Well, you don't have as much as other people or you..."
like, I don't talk like that.
That's judgment. - Thank you.
- That's bias. - Yes.
- It is just life.
Here is life, here's how it works.
We go through emotions all through the day.
Let's build some awareness around it.
And seriously, the way you position that,
my experience has been,
and I've been doing alt ed for 26 years,
it's how you position it.
And the kids really do understand.
It gives them a language, it's pretty immediate.
And so that's actually something really beautiful
I get to see is kids just do feel better.
And then when you feel better, you can do better.
So, yeah, I think no, it don't take all year.
That's, I think we said in one of these other episodes
where I'm like, I'm not one of these people who's like,
"If I could save one life," I'm like, "No,"
or "If I can change one kid's impact," it's like,
hello, that's a low bar.
So no, I'm not waiting all year.
- I got 150 kids to worry about.
- Right, I ain't waiting all year.
This is happening pretty immediately.
However, how they judge their growth is out there.
You know, it's individual how they judge it.
But no, I think it's a concept, again,
it's our most innate human stuff.
They get it.
- I don't know if it was stress over the election or what,
but I started meditating for the first time in my life
and set a smart goal, realized I needed a smart goal,
and downloaded an app and I said,
"I'm just gonna do five minutes a day.
I don't need very much, 'cause I wanna try to build a habit."
And I did a seven series, I'm gonna start with one week,
I'm gonna do five minutes a day.
And I got through the week
and I've been doing it every day since.
It's something I've never done.
- I love it. - And building new habits.
And I realize too, I think something to work on
with smart goals is knowing the difference
between where to set a smart goal
and where to keep something as a vision.
And as we talk about the holidays
and the new year coming up,
I realize when I set a New Year's resolution,
I set those as a vision.
I want to be healthier this year, right?
I want to include more art in my life.
And then it may or may not happen
because it stays at that kind of pie in the sky level idea.
And I don't break it down into a smart goal, right?
What am I gonna do in January?
What am I gonna do the first week of January?
So it's just something I've been working on
for my own mental health right now.
And maybe something I'll try to actually follow through
on New Year's resolutions coming up.
- I just wanna add, congrats on the meditation, truly.
- Yes, yes.
- I've been meditating daily for seven years.
And because of that, yeah.
However, what I was gonna say,
through my meditation practice, let's say,
I've moved from smart goals to intentions.
Smart goals now make me be like, ugh, timebound, ugh,
report out, no.
Anyway, so you may progress, or I hear
you talked about a vision; I call more an intention.
You know, like, here's what I'm really hoping for,
this is what I intend for it to happen.
But no, I hope it really brings peace and joy.
It's great for your nervous system.
- I love it.
[upbeat music]
All right, moving right along
and transitioning to the Pass the Mic session.
We'd like to know who's here with us.
And here in this segment we like to take questions
from early career pre-service teachers
and we'd like to hear their stories.
And this week, we have a story from Maya from Oshkosh,
and her, it's more of a quote, so yeah,
just gimme some feedback.
Her quote is, "As someone who looks
"the same age as students I will teach,
"how do you navigate authority and getting the respect
from older teachers who think you're unexperienced?"
- Well, I remember what I did when I was first teaching.
I lied to the kids and I told them that I'd been teaching.
Like, I was like, I ain't a fool,
I ain't gonna tell them I'm new.
Hello? - I love it.
- So I remember telling the kids that.
Like I was like, "This ain't my first year.
I'm new here, but I've been teaching for three years."
- Let's go.
- So I remember saying that to the kids
and so they didn't think I was a brand-new teacher.
So that was clever perhaps.
And then among adults, I don't remember,
I actually started teaching at the school that I went to.
So I didn't have, they knew who I was
and I felt like they all kind of shepherded around me
because I was their student and they wanted to help me.
So I can't relate to that part.
- I remember being a first year teacher, first few years,
and being young and looking young,
and you just can't hide it.
And it would be how I dressed, you know,
button-up shirt and a tie every day.
And you know, if it was casual, it was just the button-up shirt.
And I felt like that was,
it was kind of that self-imposed dress code
that would give me that authority.
And that was something, you know,
I thought was important that that authority
was necessary to gaining respect.
And I think that's something I, over the years,
reflected on.
And it's a question, you know,
is authority necessary for earning respect?
- For me, it's looking for colleagues who seem
like they're going to be supportive of a young teacher.
And so for me, I've taught in three different schools.
So I've had three different experiences
where I'm like, the new kid on the block.
And all three times, I just get really active
in looking around at staff and looking for staff
who feel welcoming, who seem like they will
wrap their arm around me and show me
a little bit of this building's ropes,
and who are the helping teachers,
who are the people maybe who are less enthusiastic
about helping, looking for mentors, kind of.
And so I try to really like, search those staff meetings,
and look around, and look for teachers who seem welcoming.
And that would be my biggest advice
for a teacher who's coming into the profession young.
And if they find themselves at a school where, you know,
people are shutting their door,
where people are saying, "Well, you're sharing my room,
but this is my room so your students can't touch my stuff,"
'cause I've been there. [Shelton chuckling]
Then I start just looking around for who seems positive,
who seems like a teacher who's willing
to take me under their wing.
And then also, doesn't have to be a teacher.
At my current school, one of my biggest mentors
is a guidance counselor.
And she'd hate that I said guidance counselor.
Counselor. [Shelton chuckling]
She's one of my biggest mentors and she's not even a teacher.
But I know that I can go to her and that she will help me
think about problem solving, and that she's got my back.
And I found her my first year at Middleton.
And so yeah, my advice would be
is to look for some helpers and colleagues.
- I love it.
- And I'd also say, just enjoy it.
It doesn't last that long.
And so kind of enjoy it, because it can be fun in a sense,
of the whole like, "I get you, I'm in this with you.
I was right where you were."
- Yeah, I'm thinking of some advice I heard
years after I was a first year teacher.
I wish I had heard it earlier.
And it's in a commencement speech,
I believe it's for Pitzer College,
and I'm forgetting the name of the speaker.
But the speaker says to the college graduates
that sometimes you're gonna go out into the field,
into whatever career you're gonna have,
and you are gonna be the youngest person in the room,
and there's gonna be all of these veteran people around you,
older people around you,
and they're gonna know better than you.
And you need to know when to listen,
basically be quiet and listen,
because you're wrong and they're right.
But you're also gonna run into times
where you're the youngest person in the room
and you are the one who is right.
And you need to speak up and stand your ground,
and challenge the ideas of others.
And he said the hardest part is gaining the wisdom
to know the difference between those situations.
And no matter how old I get,
it's true that when you're in the room,
knowing the difference between those two and feeling it out,
whether you're a similar age to your students, or friends,
colleagues, whoever's in the room,
that's really hard to know the difference.
- That is beautiful. - That's great.
- Well, I just wanna thank everybody,
and this has been a nice night.
I'm gonna walk away from this with a smile on my face
and some positive reflections.
And we just wanna thank our listeners for being with us,
for spending their time with us as we kind of reflect,
stumble, question, and grow together.
We'd also like to hear from you.
So if you are a pre-service teacher,
if you are a new teacher,
if you're a seasoned veteran with your own advice,
or just somebody with a question,
please feel free to reach out to us.
You can record a voice memo, type it up,
or send it, and send it rather, to education@pbswisconsin.org.
Make sure you put "aka Teacher" in the subject line.
And head on over to our aka Teacher podcast website,
which is at
pbswisconsineducation.org/ akateacher
to find helpful resources related to all of our episodes
that we've recorded so far.
[upbeat music]