Episode 703: Back to School with Tech: Align Strategy with Technology

Ashley Mengwasser:

Hi educators, it's you. Welcome to Classroom Conversations, the platform for Georgia's teachers. It's also me, your host, Ashley Mengwasser. Hi.

Today I'm pleased to present the finale of our three-part miniseries, Back to School with Tech presented by the dynamic content creation duo, the Georgia Department of Education and Georgia Public Broadcasting.

This special feature takes you onsite to last year's Georgia Educational Technology Conference, Georgia ETC. Where I spoke to teachers abundant with technology, ebullient in tech-powered teaching strategies that make a difference in student learning. There to help us understand and embrace the role of technology in education, were my final back to school with tech guests.

We recorded their interviews live at Georgia ETC where connections were full-tilt. What they share next will resonate with the work you're doing in your school right now. Let's meet them.

Third to the table now I have some proud members of the Chattahoochee-Flint RESA. It's Heidi GoodinSTEM-STEAM coordinator and Tonya Barrett, technology coordinator who also works with Georgia DOE as a Georgia Connect specialist. Welcome, Heidi and Tonya.

Heidi Goodin:

Well, thank you for having us.

Tonya Barrett:

Thank you for having us.

Heidi Goodin:

It's great to be here.

Ashley Mengwasser:

I wish people could feel palpably your energy in this room because it is electric. There are huge smiles. You guys have your ask me anything buttons on, so I will take liberties. Thank you for that.

I would like to first ask you about Georgia Movie Academy, which I know you are creators of. Take me through that.

Heidi Goodin:

We love Georgia Movie Academy. It is such a awesome experience for kids, for parents, for teachers. Anybody that gets involved in it.

And it's such a gateway to so many awesome professions. Not just acting, but also writing, directing, producing. Doing costuming, doing makeup, doing hair.

Tonya Barrett:

Lighting and sound.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, building sets. It's just amazing. Georgia has that huge industry of filmmaking right now. It's just another way to ignite those passions in those kids. And to just show them, when you come from Ellaville, Georgia, you can set the world on fire with your movie making abilities.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Be a filmmaker.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Absolutely, Heidi.

Tonya, how does it work operationally? How does somebody enroll in the Georgia Movie Academy?

Tonya Barrett:

So Georgia Movie Academy is a project-based learning competition that Chattahoochee-Flint RESA hosts. And it's for students in K through 12.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Excellent.

Tonya Barrett:

And so we actually host a regional competition, which is just for the 17 districts that we serve. But we also host a state competition, and that is for any school district across the state of Georgia.

We have some RESAs across the state that participate, but not all of them do. And if you are in one of those locations where RESA does not have a regional competition, then you are still available or welcome to compete in the state competition.

Like Heidi was saying, we are all about igniting that passion for future careers for students. And we go all out. It's a red carpet event for our regional awards ceremony. But for our state awards ceremony, we go even bigger. We get big-time speakers to come. In the past, we have had some amazing speakers such as Dr. Terrence Ferguson with the Critter Fixers.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Oh yes, I've heard of that.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes. So he came and spoke to the group of students.

Ashley Mengwasser:

From the industry.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes, he's a veterinarian, but the movie industry is involved in almost every career field.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Absolutely, that's true.

Heidi Goodin:

We also have had the Kendrick Brothers. So the Kendrick Brothers have come and they have done it. So they have been speakers with us. They've also had some of their actors come and do things with us.

Ashley Mengwasser:

So you are truly collaborating with the entertainment industry with Georgia Movie Academy?

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

That's incredible. Whether these students in Georgia's K12 schools work in the media like I do, their lives from this point forward will be incredibly media-laden. So you're giving them those tools now, which I think is very impressive.

We can't forget that we are at Georgia ETC. Which is the coolest place to be. I've had goosebumps pretty much all morning. I'm very curious what you have seen or heard about that people are enjoying so far here at the conference.

Heidi Goodin:

So once again, I have to say that the presenters, the keynote presenters have all been amazing. So people like Leslie Fisher, Tony Vincent, Brian Buffington. They just offer a plethora of ideas for the teachers, for the instructional technology coaches, for any leadership that might be here.

But I also want to talk about the teachers that are coming from the classroom. Bringing those great ideas that are working in their classroom. Bringing those hands-on activities and ideas. And sharing. Because that is what great education is all about. It's collaboration and connectivity.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Heck yes.

Heidi Goodin:

And that's what you can do here and you can take it back to your own school districts, your own schools, and just spread that joy of education.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Yes. It's series of education. That's what you are. And what did Mr. Vincent say to you earlier?

Heidi Goodin:

Tony, he knows that we work the conference. And so he came by and he was just like, "I know that you don't get to go to a lot of my sessions, but I'll make sure that you have all of this information."

Ashley Mengwasser:

That's incredible.

Heidi Goodin:

That's the kind of stuff, that even when we leave here, he's going to email me. Or he's going to tweet out something and he'll tag me in it. And I guess it is X out now, but anyway, it will come out to me. And so I just love that. I just love the camaraderie that we have.

We have people from all over the world here. So we have people from Wakelet, from Curipod who are from England, from Sweden.

Ashley Mengwasser:

No way.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, from Norway, from Sweden. I had a gentleman from Australia here today.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Amazing.

Heidi Goodin:

Yeah, so it's a worldwide community and that is an amazing thing too.

Ashley Mengwasser:

I'd like to meet him. I want to know how the koalas are doing. I'm very invested in the koalas.

But here's a phrase that I learned today, women, for the first time. PLN, professional learning network. So what you were saying, educators are here building their PLN, connecting with members of the conference that will probably come back next year. And they're getting to exchange this information.

What interactions have you had today with educators, Tonya?

Tonya Barrett:

Most of the interaction I've had has just been helping to direct the educators to the different sessions that they're looking for. But of course, the booth that I work is where they first come in. I'm just like, "Good morning rock stars. Let's have a great day. We're at the GaETC conference."

Ashley Mengwasser:

It feels like a pep rally.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes, it is. Just trying to motivate and just inspiring them to have a great day.

Ashley Mengwasser:

And they are.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Educational rock stars is such a good theme. It's such a good theme. And I know as the educators of the educators with the RESA that you guys are with, tell us a little bit about some of these tools that you think are worth noting right now. Especially anything that helps teachers with lesson planning or assessment. Anything you have to share?

Heidi Goodin:

So GaDOE actually unleashed last year, GaConnect's platform. And on that GaConnect's platform, you have things like SuitCASE, Inspire, Velocity. And it is such a fantastic way for teachers ... It's an all-in-one hub.

Ashley Mengwasser:

It's a one-stop shop.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes.

Tonya Barrett:

For everything that you need.

Heidi Goodin:

Exactly. And so you can go in there and you can get access to GPB. You can get access to ... As the STEM team coordinator, I focus on a lot of science initiatives, a lot of math.

And so I love that GPB has things for physics teachers, has things for chemistry, for environmental scientists. That you can take them on those virtual field trips. Those are all listed under those Inspire resources, under the science tools. But they're also accessible under any content area.

Tonya Barrett:

And grade level.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, most definitely. It doesn't matter grade level or content area, you're going to have access to that because it's all included. It's just an amazing piece.

And so I know AI is so prevalent right now. But what I love about Inspire and SuitCASE is you can take those activities and then plug them into your favorite AI bot, AI chatbot. And it just makes your life so much easier. My whole thing with educators is we need to work smarter, not harder.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Yes.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Heidi Goodin:

And when we work together and when we utilize those types of tools, it makes our life much more, I won't say easy, but just more pleasurable. Just more pleasurable. And you do get that joy and that excitement because you're going to have those exciting lessons.

Tonya Barrett:

And this is just a time when most educators are overwhelmed. They're just worn out. They have so much to do. And anything that can be offered to an educator to help save time. And GaConnects, that platform, is there to help teachers to save time. They don't have to create the lesson plan. They go into an Inspire and they can download a pre-made lesson plan.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Is that what Inspire is?

Tonya Barrett:

Yes, it has lesson plans.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Inspiring the curriculum?

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

I get it. Aha moment.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

What are Velocity and was it SuitCASE? What are those tools?

Heidi Goodin:

So SuitCASE is where all of the standards are located.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Okay.

Heidi Goodin:

So all of the standards, the Georgia Standards of Excellence are located in SuitCASE. And so you can go into SuitCASE, and you can copy. You can paste them into a chatbot if you want to. What I love is the tools that they have in SuitCASE, so they're so easy to transfer to other platforms and that's just easy for teachers.

Once again, it's all about helping the teachers save time so that they can put forth more energy with their students, with their kids. And then Velocity, I'm going to let Tonya tell you about Velocity, because Velocity has a whole layer of just excitement with it.

Ashley Mengwasser:

It sounds fast. See what I did there?

Tonya Barrett:

Yes. Velocity, yes.

So Velocity is the piece within GaConnects that is for students. And so you can actually create ... There are already Velocity activities within the platform that you can push out as assignments with your students. And it's just assignments to help them recall information.

Maybe that if you're studying about your community. If you're in second grade and you're studying about community or whatever, there are different activities that you can push out to your students. It's just very engaging for the students to get them involved with the lesson, to just help them review the lesson. It is an amazing platform.

Heidi Goodin:

So some of those Velocity activities also bring about a gaming component.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Heidi Goodin:

Kids today love that. Their minds are ever working.

Tonya Barrett:

And they're so quick.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, they are so fast.

Tonya Barrett:

And they're better at technology than we are.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, most definitely. But it does bring about that gaming aspect to them also. And that's engaging to kids. And so that's what we need to do. We need to promote that engagement for kids. And we've got to meet them where they are and take them even higher.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Absolutely, Heidi, sound off.

Let's end with this. If you could share one educational technology tool you've got your eyes on or you think it's pretty interesting, I'd love to share that with our audience of educators.

Tonya Barrett:

Okay, so I'll start. One that we typically highlight is a platform called Magic School AI. And it is amazing. It's free for educators. And there's just a plethora of different things that you can do within that platform. Teachers can go in and construct professional emails to their principal. They can go in and construct comments for report cards.

Ashley Mengwasser:

That is magic.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Report cards. Wow.

Tonya Barrett:

You can even go into GaConnects SuitCASE, pull out a standard for a lesson that you're working on. You can go and plug that into Magic School AI and it will create a lesson plan and activities for the teacher within the classroom.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Just like magic. Mic drop. Mic drop, Tonya.

Heidi Goodin:

Yes, exactly. And it's like seconds, within seconds. I have to say that, and Tonya knows this about me, because I am a Wakelet ambassador. I can talk about lots of different platforms, but I have to stay with Wakelet, because Wakelet is a place where you can house all of your instructional tools for your toolbox. And they're there in a click.

And so I'm in my 32nd year of education.

Ashley Mengwasser:

No, you're not.

Heidi Goodin:

Yeah.

And so I'm that girl that had 50 tabs open, getting to different things. And now, I just drop it into my Wakelet. And so I have a place for everything to be. And it's organized and it's awesome.

And so I have to say, Wakelet is my go-to. It's where I house everything. It's the best little curation station and I have everything. I can put any type of file in it. Any type of web address in it. I can always have access to it. And so it's just-

Tonya Barrett:

Images, URLs, websites.

Heidi Goodin:

... Yes, and it comes up with immersive reader technology. And so anybody that has any type of language barrier or reading disability can go into it. Click that button under Wakelet and it's going to pop up. So it's just user-friendly. It's for kids of all ages and stages and language, and it's just a great platform.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Heidi Goodin and Tonya Barrett from Chattahoochee-Flint RESA, thank you for bringing us these incredibly inspired tech tools today. We appreciate you sharing on Classroom Convos.

Heidi Goodin:

Thank you so much.

Tonya Barrett:

Thank you for having us.

Heidi Goodin:

Thank you for having us.

Tonya Barrett:

Thank you so much.

Heidi Goodin:

Keep being awesome.

Tonya Barrett:

Yes.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Joining me now is Andrea Powell, third and fourth grade math teacher at State Bridge Crossing Elementary.

Welcome to the show, Andrea.

Andrea Powell:

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

Ashley Mengwasser:

You, m’lady, are cool. Would you describe your outfit today?

Andrea Powell:

Thank you. I have a little checkerboard moment. A little, I teach shirt on. I have my pigtails in with my-

Ashley Mengwasser:

With checkerboard bows.

Andrea Powell:

... checkerboard bows, which I'm known for by the way.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Checkerboard bows or just bows?

Andrea Powell:

Just bows.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Just bows.

Andrea Powell:

I'm a bow girl.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Hashtag just bows.

Andrea Powell:

And I also have on my-

Ashley Mengwasser:

My favorite part.

Andrea Powell:

…math earrings. Absolutely.

Ashley Mengwasser:

I have to describe these for our audience. They are dangles that include all of the mathematics signs. I see plus, minus, multiply, and divide. Where does one acquire a set of those?

Andrea Powell:

You can get them from Amazon.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Perfect.

Andrea Powell:

And then I also have on my Nike Dunks to top it all off.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Because when you leave here, you're just going to go take these slam dunk ideas and hoop it up. Right?

Andrea Powell:

Absolutely.

Ashley Mengwasser:

How is what you've captured today going to change your classroom instruction? Anything standing out?

Andrea Powell:

Today, my teacher bestie and I actually got to present a session all about personalized anchor charts. And I think just the vibe in the session, having all of those teachers share the ways that they use anchor charts in their classroom, was awesome. I had got lots of ideas from them.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Describe anchor charts.

Andrea Powell:

So anchor charts are, if you come into my classroom, the walls are filled with our learning. I always start the year with completely blank walls. And as we're learning our different math lessons, I add as we go. So by the end of the year you look around in our classroom and you can see our full third and fourth grade year on the walls.

Ashley Mengwasser:

That's wonderful. I bet that feels a little bit like a marathon snapshot because the students can look back and see how far they've come on the journey in your classroom.

Andrea Powell:

Absolutely. And we know at the end of the year there's the big tests. And we can use our walls to help us prepare for those and it's great.

Ashley Mengwasser:

What tech tools are you currently utilizing as a third and fourth grade math teacher?

Andrea Powell:

Okay. So in my classroom, we are a one-to-one district, so each of my students have a laptop. I'm big on hands-on learning in my classroom, so the students are doing math with stuff. So we have manipulatives out.

I love to use that aren't naturally thought of as a math manipulative, but we can really use anything to do math. But as far as tech tools, we do utilize the computer to play different tech games like Blooket, or Gimkit in our classroom is a favorite. I also have my students design presentations and posters on Canva and things like that as well.

Ashley Mengwasser:

You are going to talk to us a bit now about Assessment Bank. I believe it is. Tell me about that.

Andrea Powell:

Yes, so I wanted to talk about the Georgia DOE Mathematics Assessment Item Bank. This is a bank of questions that are available for kindergarten through 12th grade math teachers in the state of Georgia.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Totally free.

Andrea Powell:

Yes, absolutely free. I was a part of a team that created the third grade Assessment Item Bank. So it's something I'm very passionate about and I want all the teachers in Georgia to use these questions because they're great.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Yeah. What is a sample question we might find in the Assessment Bank?

Andrea Powell:

So if you access your grade levels Assessment Item Bank, you will notice that there are 60 different items that can be used in many ways throughout your classroom.

So think about for homework, for classwork, for something that could be used as an assessment. It could be something like a ticket out the door just to really see if your students understand the standards in which you're teaching.

Like I said, there's 60 different questions, various DOK levels, you DOK 1, you know those easy recall questions, all the way up to things that could be used over the span of a couple of days. Those DOK 4-level items.

So students or teachers should really be checking these out so that they can utilize them to prepare their students for the milestones and things.

Ashley Mengwasser:

Thank you for making that pitch, Andrea Powell. I would assess this interview as an A+. Thank you ma'am.

Andrea Powell:

Thank you.

Ashley Mengwasser:

You are totally electric and may you go forth and multiply these bright ideas.

Andrea Powell:

Oh, I love that.

Ashley Mengwasser:

For their incredible takeaways and motivating enthusiasm, a huge round of applause for my teacher-napped, Georgia ETC guests. These fine interviewees allowed us to quite literally route them into a back room and allowed me to grill them on the spot. No preparation. They're legends.

And the technology they've embraced is moving mountains for learning. We hope your takeaways have been just as monumental. It's a new school year and you're a great teacher. May the toolkit shared here make this year one for the record books.

If you love our podcast like I do, more good news. Next we're launching Season 7, 10 new episodes on the topic of personalized learning. Follow our series and stay close because it's about to get good.

I'm Ashley and I'll meet you in Season 7. Goodbye for now.