Celeste Riley: Teaching with AI, learning with critical thinking

Oh, we had a teacher meeting this last mon Saturday, excuse me, u multilingual learners. And a teacher specifically said that, well, this student used it for, you know, they produce this beautiful, you know, paper la. And they’re like, this is these are the dangers.

I was like, okay, well, I’m going to push back because here’s the thing. First of all, my students are writing all the time in class. So, I know their voice.

I know their capabilities. I know their grammar. So, I have an open conversation.

And right now, we we complete projects on Canva. And there’s lots of AR opportunities on there. And I’m like, use it.

Now, when you use it and you check out the resources and what it, you know, click on what is it the background that it’s giving you. Is it giving you background? Let’s compare that to Google.

Oh, Google, you can keep going on with the pages, but when it comes to ChatGPT, it’s just giving you like a summary. Is that really robust? Is that really the research that we’re looking for?

Let’s be higher critical thinkers. And so I’m pushing the envelope, pushing them there with their thinking skills to consider what they’re reading and are just going to leave it there and what does your voice sound like? So sure, maybe I’ll take some information, but I’m going to go check that information to make sure to verify is it true?

Is it misinformation, disinformation, that type of thing? And so it’s really like learning to engage with information and not just take what’s in front of us and say that’s it. I think one of the most important conversations that we can be having at AID Studios, which is like actually just giving some time to educators to talk about their experience in the classroom and you know there’s so much talk about AI and education and you I think it’s important to actually have the teachers who are at the front lines of this kind of just sharing what this looks like or you know what your yeah your own experience.

I guess to kick us off, can you tell us your name and then sort of where you teach and maybe even just share a bit about the school where you teach and sort of like help us paint a picture of, you know, your classroom and then then we’ll dive in. My name is Celeste Riley. I am a fifth grade ESL dual language teacher, meaning I teach English and Spanish.

I teach at in Memphis, Tennessee at Treadwell Elementary International School. And our student population is about almost 60% Hispanic and then black students and a few a few others but those are mostly who we teach and serve. And our particular students u many a large population are Spanish speakers and so that would be their native language.

So we’re code talkers and what ages do you teach? Mhm. So fifth grade 10 11 that’s the preparing there for middle school and so you are one of the AI trailblazers.

Yes. Tell us about Yeah. Can you tell us about that experience like what first of all like what prompted you to apply?

And then I’d love to sort of hear you know just any anything about your experience that you want to open with and I’ll then I have more questions but Okay, great. Yeah. Here’s here’s the thing.

I don’t live in the district that I work in and that I serve in and I choose the district I serve in because of the students the access and opportunities. So when I saw this opportunity to join an AI cohort, I was like ah game on. It’s a gamecher to provide access and opportunities to our particular students.

And to be honest, I also love even using ed technology in the classroom, especially fifth grade. I’m like, you might this is your first time. We’re going to learn.

We’re going to learn together. We’re going to troubleshoot. And that’s fine.

That’s part of the process. And so and we’re going to iterate, figure out what we, you know, got right, got wrong, and move along until, we we continue to improve our process. So being able to see this opportunity, I know how much AI supports teacher work as far as not just lesson planning but differentiating and I also realized with time because of the way it’s continuing to progress at such an accelerated pace, I realized too that this is a game changer for our particular students in meeting their specific individualized needs and that doesn’t always happen with our particular population of students.

And so that’s why I was like I I have to join in. And I have to see what I can learn and what I can implement in the class and expose the students and they’re excited. They’re already using computers all the time.

So, hey, now we’re all doing it together in the classroom. When did you first kind of get your hands on AI? I mean, everybody has their story.

You know, it came out I guess end of 2022. Were you hearing about it and got curious or did you just like happen to get hands-on pretty early? That’s a good question.

When did it first first start? I’m a very curious person anyway. Anytime I hear something new, especially when it’s technology, I think I heard Chat 2T is probably the one of the first ones.

So, I’m trying to think which one came out first. It was that Gemini. It was Chad was first.

Yeah. Okay. Thank you for that.

And so I’ve been dabbling along with Chad GPT, Magic School AI, Claude. Trying to think of one of some of the other ones. I really like Copal.

I’ve been leaning more towards that one, but I still use Chad GPT all the time. So and so teachers would say, "Oh, you could use it for, you know, creating many lessons. You can use it to differentiate your lessons for particular students where you need to scaffold or things of that nature, especially because we’re speaking, we’re teaching speakers of other languages, right?

And so I’m always looking for opportunities and ways to expand my reach in a way that I might not have considered or even in learning the prompts. Okay. So, how can I make my prompts better so that I can really be more of an expert in bringing out the the needs that I I’m trying to make sure, you know, is met in our classroom.

I mean, it makes sense because you’re a trailblazer that you’re an early adopter because I feel like for a lot of educators, they were they were kind of caught off guard. And so, for for folks, it was students using the tools and it whether it’s cheating or not, right? Like you know some teachers they just like saw that that essay and then it was like wait a second there’s no way this kid wrote that essay.

Is that I mean like fifth grade is interesting because it’s you know they’re old enough to certainly be using technology but do you feel like the kids are a few steps ahead or are they still early enough that you know they’re not necessarily you know prompt engineering themselves? Well let me backtrack and say this. I part of my masters I took several classes and that included IST standards and learning what it means to be a digital citizen and that’s what I bring with me in the classroom.

So I’m constantly for instance our students they have to create their own passwords. So I’m like we’re never using our name, we’re never using our address, nothing personal. So use your favorite character and maybe the year something you know obscure and something you can update.

And so I’m always thinking about being the first one to explain to them how to use it, what’s why to use it, and that type of thing. And then we just had this conversation. Oh, we had a teacher meeting this last mon Saturday, excuse me, u multilingual learners.

And a teacher specifically said that, well, this student used it for, you know, they produced this beautiful, you know, paper la. And I said, and they were like, this is these are the dangers. I was like, okay, well, I’m going to push back because here’s the thing.

First of all, my students are writing all the time in class. So, I know their voice. I know their capabilities.

I know their grammar. So, I have an open conversation. And right now, we we complete projects on Canva and there’s lots of AR opportunities on there.

And I’m like, use it. Now, when you use it and you check out the resources and what it you know, click on what is it the background that it’s giving you. Is it giving you background?

Let’s compare that to Google. Oh, Google, you can keep going on with the pages, but when it comes to ChatGPT, it’s just giving you like a summary. Is that really robust?

Is that really the research that we’re looking for? Let’s be hire critical thinkers. And so, I’m pushing the envelope, pushing them there with their thinking skills to consider what they’re reading.

And are we just going to leave it there? And what does your voice sound like? So, sure, maybe I’ll take some information, but I’m going to go check that information to make sure to verify is it meeting the is it is it true?

Is it misinformation, disinformation, that type of thing? And so, it’s really like learning to engage with information and not just take what’s in front of us and say that’s it. That’s really my whole goal with my fifth graders because they’re at the cusp of concrete and abstract.

And so, with that teacher, I was like, my teachers, my students use it and I have a conversation. I’m like, "So, I read this. Does it sound like you?" And the funny thing is this particular student last year, he looked at me, he’s like, "No, I I did use, you know, chatbt." I was like, "You know what?

That’s fine." I said, "Take some of that. Keep doing your research. I want to hear your voice." This student continued to learn and had become the expert in the the room with using technology.

Anytime we ran into a problem, hey, I can help. Of course, you can because you love it. So, let’s engage in that.

And I’m like calling him the edtech guru because I get to see his pathway and I’m super grateful that we had the opportunity to to wrangle through it, work through it, and empower him. It’s really interesting because I feel like there’s so much constrnation right now about, you know, these tools are just going to and I’ve even stated this worry that like these tools are going to get in the way of students productive struggle and you know, it’s going to undermine learning or at least like we’re worried about this. Is that example like an outlier or do you feel like that’s actually maybe relatively common in terms of like what you’ve seen as like students are using and getting hands- on with AI more.

Do you find that they’re actually more engaged? I do. I find that they’re very engaged because they are they this is their generation.

I mean, generation alpha connected to the umbilical cord. They grew up with a hand in a a computer in their hands all day long. So, they’re constantly already utilizing it.

How can I utilize it and help me with my education, drive my education, right? So, project based learning. Right now we’re reviewing and and creating projects over different countries and I’m about to say okay so you just wrote about Afro Latinex you just wrote about the American Revolution now you’re going to compare it to revolutions in South America right because and we’re going to bring in their culture that that’s research and so we’re we’re engaging those higher critical thinking skills and again I know their student the students voices so we’re going to work with the with this in the classroom utilizing those tools But not just they’re bringing it to me.

Okay, so what do you think about this? And it’s a lot of it’s the engagement. It’s not just here, go do this, you’re done.

Oh, you completed it. Check. No, because I mean anybody can do that.

It’s more like we’re having a constant continuous conversation. They show me the work. I’m like, I’m not sure.

What do you think? Does this really sound like you or is this sounds like college level, you know, terminology? I never heard you use these words.

What do these words mean? You know, that type of thing. And it’s really the engagement I feel.

And and them feeling safe enough and brave enough to come to the teacher and say, "Okay, I did use it, but what do I do now or how do I how do I engage with it at a higher level so that I can continue learning?" Right? We were just doing a podcast. We were talking about advice to parents and there’s a a psychologist who one of the points she made is like you have to build trust with kids 100%.

If you really want to be able to engage them in this like you have to actually you know you can’t just approach this from this like assumption of bad intent. Oh yeah. And but then there would be folks who say well you know but some kids are just going to use it.

Maybe it’s not cheating but it’s a shortcut. And and and so you mentioned this idea like a you know like project based learning. You describe part of a project.

Can you just share a bit more for like teachers who are listening in and wondering like what does it actually look like because maybe just and I would just repeat back to what I heard is you know focusing not just on the output but on the process to get there. Yes. Yes.

But like but like sort of like tactically like how do you how do you sort of like test knowledge and make sure that there is learning happening? Sure. So learning through comes through iterations, right?

It’s like computer that computer language, right? Where we’re just constantly learning through different processes. With our projects, we use Canva as I mentioned before.

When they complete the Canva, they present it. So we’re fifth grade, we present it to fourth graders. And not only do we present, but I also tell them, you must be ready to answer any kind of question that they have.

And then you have to provide some extra information. So now only So now and I’m about to test them in this because when we stand in front of another group and we start reading and it doesn’t sound like us, how is that going to work, right? Because if I know what I put in my work, if I know what I put in each slide and it’s me, then I’m not going to it’s going to sound like me.

But if it doesn’t, that’s when we can have that conversation and it’s an open conversation. So maybe the teachers might ask a question. Another student.

So why how come they left their home country? A person who’s truly engaged in the research would be able to answer that where another student will be standing there going h I don’t know. And that nobody likes to feel like that, you know, where we’re like I mean it’s one thing to ask a a crazy question that we really can’t answer, but it’s another thing to ask a question with the research we should have conducted because they have a rubric.

They know what it is. And so really I’m going to walk through because we we just returned these in like literally on Tuesday. And I’ve even gave them some extra days.

So I’m going to engage with them first before they stand in front of the audience just to say so with a one-on-one consultation. And that takes time. That does take time.

It, you know, but at the same time I’m helping them to see is this you? Does this sound like you? How can you make this sound bit more like you?

What more how more can you make your project more robust? That type of thing. And from the beginning to the end.

You have a subject, you have a project per trimester, right? So, we basically would have four projects. By the fourth project, they’re rubbing and rolling.

Like they’re owning it. They’re excited to present. They’re excited about their work.

People who students who like are just pulling it out from the internet, copy and paste, and we talk about plagiarism all the time. They’re not as excited to present, right? So, I I feel like as long as we’re engaging in topics that they’re interested in, ads, we can do it.

And it’s it’s funny because what you just described there was like a college professor and he’s getting a lot of accolades because it’s like oh he like figured out how to you know reengineer the classroom and it was basically kind of like what you just architected yourself which is you have you you the students know that they’re going to be I don’t know if you call it getting put on the spot but they kind of like are feeling a little bit of that pressure and so yes you can’t just memorize you can spoil you can spend all the time memorizing the words but you’re better off actually it’s probably easier just to like learn the material. Absolutely. Yeah.

And it’s accountability. It’s accountability. It’s like because you know really especially for students like where is their voice?

How how often are they asked questions about world issues, things that are happening and that type of thing and when they find that empowerment like my voice counts what I think counts. Absolutely. So tell me what you what does this mean for today?

How can we connect from the the the because we study history a lot. I teach social studies in Spanish. How do we connect that to what’s happening today?

It is so engaging. I don’t have to worry about them just copying and pasting because they themselves see the beauty of what they’re learning and how they are growing from the beginning to the end of the year. In fact, I have teacher I have students that reach back to me and go, "Miss Ro, you’re the best teacher." Because they know I’ve helped them engage their higher critical thinking skills.

To me, that is the not the end goal, but that is the reach. Yeah. You mentioned critical thinking, which is something we’re obsessed with, but you also mentioned agency.

Yes. It feels like it’s quite powerful that you combined you’ve given students agency, but you’ve also you’re tapping into something that I think a lot of educators are struggling with, which is this this feeling that kids just aren’t in like there’s the sense that students don’t find what they’re learning relevant? Yes.

And like did that come naturally to you? Like just for for teachers who are struggling, you know, because kids are tough crowds these days and they have a lot of distractions. And it’s funny because we haven’t really talked about using AI, which I think is awesome cuz cuz I it sounds like AI is almost like it’s it’s sort of a background player.

It’s like you’re it it’s been helpful, but what you’re describing actually I think applies almost, you know, would be would have been relevant even before AI. But like what advice would you give teachers who are that are just like feeling like oh it’s really hard or like you know granted, you know, maybe they’re a math teacher or an English teacher where you’re just teaching something that just isn’t actually that fun. Look, I love English.

And here’s the funny thing. Last year when we were looking at figurative languages, I said, "Y’all, I love Shakespeare." And so we were jumping even though we’re fifth grade. We were just saying these idioms of we had a person come into our classroom that was talking about by being bilingual and he was asking the students what do you want to be and one of the students popped up.

I want to be an English teacher. I was like because they want to teach Shakespeare. You just never know what you’re going to say.

But let me circle back. The biggest thing with engagement is meet the students where they are. So I had my youngest she’s in middle school now.

When I first started teaching fifth grade, she was fifth grade. I was like give me all the inroads girl. I need to know the words.

So, every year, you know, terms change. Last year, it was always skittity toilet. So, I was like, I don’t want no skippity toilet with this work.

I want you to level up. Give me 10,000. You get 10,000 aura points for those words.

And so, use the words that they use. Now, I know some teachers feel uncomfortable like, "Oh, this is professional." I tell them, "Yes, it’s professional." But sometimes I’m like, "Hello, what’s happening here?" you know, or okay, like 67 is the big thing, you know, like find those little nuances that they’re like, what? What do they how do you know about that?

But those inroads make all the difference in making those connections with them. And so, like we I love watching like Stranger Things and Wednesdays and we talk about who’s watching that, who’s watched Squid Games, you know, little nuances because when you show them that you care about what’s happening in their life, man, everything else just opens up. They’re like flowers and then they’re ready to get super engaged.

Now, not everybody. Sure. Of course not.

And when it comes to especially teaching like English and teaching things that may not be culturally relevant or they’re like that happened 100 years ago, I always try to connect it to their life. Like we just read about World War II and co-t talkers, right? And the the the Navajo language and how that helped, you know, navigate that time frame.

And I was like, "You guys are co-t talkers. Did you know that?" And they were like, "What do you mean?" I was like, "Because you know two languages. Look, you can talk." And I started speaking in Spanish.

And I say if somebody monilingual just walked in the door, they would know what we’re saying. You’re a co-t talker. So like I’m constantly building the up the things that the strength that they have, right?

And and so just I I feel like every time I trap into one of those things, they’re into Messi, they’re into soccer. Okay, let’s talk about soccer. You know, all those things make all the difference with being able to like streamline the areas that they’re learning about.

I I just I’m like we’re repeating, you know, history repeats itself if we don’t know it. Like all these pieces there they’re they’re children and and people are naturally curious. They we really are.

So like continuing that curiosity games. Have you ever used AI to just help you come up with an idea of how to connect with students? I’ve used it more for like really to be honest is more with assessments for me.

But asking questions. Yeah. Oh, because with assessments, yeah.

So if I’m a particular standards, you know, we’re always standard driven and so I’m I’m working towards a standard and I feel like, okay, there’s a little bit of a misconception here. Help me break this down to make to explain it in a different way. And so it will bring something out.

I don’t find it is as rigorous to be quite honest and that may be because of the input, right? The more input it has, the better it can output. And so, it’ll produce something, but it won’t be as challenging a higher order for them as I want it to be.

So, I’ll even take it and tweak it myself. But as far as assessments, they might give me a little formative one. And so then I go, okay, this works.

Okay, that doesn’t work. How can I change this again? And I I’ll, you know, that’s kind of how I use it.

Right. This is important. You’re describing you’re not just using the AI, having it spit something out, and then that goes right to the students.

It’s like you’re taking that, you’re remixing it. Yes. Making it your own with your understanding of the kids and can you talk about just like for your peers?

So like the other teachers, are you an outlier? Like are other colleagues also doing some of this stuff or or are they still skeptical? I am an outlier.

I And again, I’m a naturally curious person. And I get so excited to know that there’s an that AI an entity that’s learning from itself, learning from other computers, learning from us. I I can’t even imagine the world.

And that’s actually one of the things that I utilize in my classroom. I show them the job. What jobs are happening today?

And what jobs can you do with AI or what jobs? That’s one of my last projects actually because I asked them what careers are you interested in, you know, getting involved in. How will AI change that job?

And so when I asked them how AI will change that job, they they start realizing, oh, AI can help, you know, streamline this job like the industrial revolution, right, is streamline things. AI might be able to help me, decimate information at a faster rate than I can myself. Or it might be, you know, there’s just different things.

So being able to engage in that type of thing those that curiosity. So I’m I’m like a Rubik’s cube. I’m like there’s many sides to me.

When I do present to our teachers there are teachers are like oh I don’t know that’s just too much. We recently just had a on ed technology and I’m like there’s so much that we could use. You don’t have to you have to you can work smarter not harder right?

That’s the purpose of AI. For instance there’s a one called reading coach where you can select the the passage for the student. The student re reads the passage and then it shows them the accuracy rate.

It captures their minutes and I tell them capture your data and then listen to the vocabulary words that you had a difficult you know time either pronouncing or or you don’t know what the word was. Go back and improve your reading rate. This is them driving their own education because I don’t have to sit with them.

I mean, I can and I do with the ones who really need the the most intense intervention, but some of our other students, they just need practice reading out loud. And so that AI is listening to them and I’m like, bam, bam, like what? So, some teachers push back though.

They’re like, oh, I don’t know. Ed Puzzle is another one. Recording yourself so that when students are taking the test, they can hear you and they can follow along as you’re reading the test to them.

There’s just so many opportunities and advantages. IXL, Nearpod. I use everything.

I’m like, "Hey, I want you to learn it. I’m learning it with you. It’s okay if we make mistakes.

I use flickers." And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. That’s fine. It’s part of it.

Like, that’s the beauty of learning is making the mistakes and going, "Huh, that worked. That didn’t work. What could I do better?" In fact, I even tell them, I’m like, "Did you troubleshoot?" They start telling me, "You know what?

I troubleshoot that men. I checked this the internet. I checked this.

I did this." you know, now they’re giving me like all the stuff that they’re taking where in the beginning of the school year they didn’t know. And I also tell them this, you are teaching your family. You’re the expert in the room because they don’t know.

They haven’t used it. We use Google Classroom. I did not use it last year and it made thing communication a little bit difficult with homework and projects and things of that nature.

But now I’m like you show them. All right, click the hamburger. Okay, now do we do what do we do?

Drop down box. Okay. So, this is where you you know upload your assignment and then here are the test grades.

I Damn, it’s ready to go. So, how long have you been in the the AI Trailblazer cohort? Well, last year was when I completed I completed it.

Oh, that’s right. That’s right. You completed last year.

Yeah, I just completed it like May. It was like the It was a year round. Yeah.

Academic year. Yeah. I mean, can you tell me about like some of the stuff you learned in the cohort and how that’s like influenced your own teaching practices?

Listening to other educators and what they were doing because we were able we were in spaces with, you know, from prek all the way to high school. And so I I love listening to other educators and seeing what they use, how they utilize it in their room and even if it’s kindergarten, just listening to some of their best practices inform my practices. That was very powerful.

Then when we created our projects with our particular group, so you know, elementary worked together and middle school worked together and high school worked together. And then when we implemented the program or the lesson, my student said to me, Miss R, that was the funnest lesson we’ve ever had. I was like, of course, because it was, we had to slow down and realize the steps that we give to AI and what that really looks like.

And so at first we’re so automated with our moves and what we do that we don’t realize that for coding or when it comes to prompts we have to be very specific very explicit in order to get the output that we want. And so once we re re again iterated that iterated that in the classroom they didn’t want to stop. They were like can we do it again?

Let’s do another one. And so again, that’s sort of really it leaned towards that project based because it gave them an opportunity to see it from the coders’s point of view and also from the AI like AI is going to give you what you put in. So if I say stand up, it’s only going to stand up.

If you’re trying to tell it to walk, it’s not going to do anything, right? So those type of things. So it was really engaging.

They really enjoyed it and I really enjoyed that and I enjoyed seeing the videos of the other lessons that the other teachers provided. So holistically, it was really aligned to the standards and what I wanted to do and that type of thing. And so I’m actually going to reintroduce that again this year and then level it up with a different AI lesson with our with our this new group of students.

Can you walk us through the lesson itself? Yeah, so I like I love that AI actually had slides ready, you know, that we can utilize if we wanted to. They actually had some printouts that we could use and then then we can decide and they even had a little video.

So one of them was just was sequencing. It was providing prompts to the AI and then the other one the other person acted like the AI, right? So for instance, if I was supposed to give it it was supposed to give me a handshake.

Well, first I have to tell AI to walk left and right and then left and right, you know, put out your hand. Which hand do I just put out my hand or my arm? You know, it was so specific and we think that’s so ridiculous, but it’s not because then once they were done giving the commands, they started doing moves.

I said, "Wait a minute, but you didn’t tell it to do that move." And they’re I was like, you know, like a high five. They were like, "High five." I said, "But did you tell it to high five?" So, I’m like, So, I was standing next to them modeling what their actual prompts were versus what they thought their prompts were. And I was like, "Okay, let’s go back to the drawing board, talk to your partner, see what you can change to make it very clear and very specific." And that just helped them slow down.

And then we wrote about it in our sequencing, what we learned, what we now know and, what we could do better next time and that type of thing. So, there’s like an older version of that activity, which is, making instructions to like to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Oh, yes.

And but I like that this one is it’s interactive and it actually gets like multiple people cuz the peanut butter and jelly sandwich one is maybe harder to do with a classroom like at scale. I need to add biz. I totally forgot.

So I went online because I I like I love media. I found a Juni B. Jones No, it was Amelia Bedilia.

Excuse me. Amelia Bedilia because that was a perfect hook because Amelia Bedilia misunderstood the instructions even though they were told she was told to, you know, u powder the baby or something like that. And so she’s getting weird things and do, you know, and and they’re laughing and I’m like, but this is what happens if we are not clear and explicit with our instructions.

It was a short video. We were all laughing at the end, you know, dress the chicken. And so she’s cutting out, you know, clothing to make a dress for the chicken.

So again, we’re engaged. We’re laughing. We now understand what it means.

And then we went into the lesson and then we came out on the other end. Okay. So are you giving, you know, the banana to the chicken or the baby?

Like one of the things was giving the bananas and chick the baby, but she did peely. So anyway, it was fun. It’s so funny.

You mentioned Ameilia Bedilia. I’m like, "Oh my god, I literally read Ameilia Bedilia." And yeah, the ones you’re referencing is where like she delivers the chicken and it’s in a box wearing like literally suspenders and Exactly. Yeah.

And but that was a perfect connection to what it means to, you know, to code AI, if you will, or to to give it the clear and explicit prompts. And they were so excited. Like I’m I cannot wait to see what happens in is happening today and now.

But like what our students are going to do as adults in the career choices that they have that are that work alongside AI mind-blowing. It’s a whole new world. It’s a paradigm shift.

You know, adults are like freaking out about oh my god, what are the what’s going to happen to jobs? And I didn’t worry about talking to kids about it because we don’t necessarily have the answers. I love that you’re just bringing them in and challenging them to think about what would these jobs in the future look like, which feels like the perfect way to get them to a like be aware that like jobs are changing, but then give them agency, which is I think often missing even like conversations with adults where you know they’re hearing all the doomsayers talk about, you know, AI disruption and we’re not also posing the question of like, well, what can you do?

Yeah. So, just to close, there’s, you know, a lot of the folks that we talk to are building leaders, district leaders, and they’re always trying to they’re agonizing over like, well, how do we support more teachers embracing you not just not not necessarily just the AI tools, but but some of the practices that you’ve talked about like project based learning, you know, making learning relevant, integrating the standards. I mean like what advice do you have to to those education leaders that are ultimately trying to like empower folks like you and and maybe address some of your colleagues who are you know a little bit less ahead of the curve.

Definitely some PD training makes a big difference. So and in in in small in small chunks, right? Because if I give you everything I’m I can’t it’s too much.

I don’t know what you’re talking about and I’m just going to check out. So start with one thing. So for instance our school we with our PD we had five rooms every the teacher who excels in teaching that particular thing or utilizes it in their classroom like I love using near pod they taught 15 minutes 15 minute chunks and then the teachers can write ask questions answer questions whatever it may be but it was a a small chunk of time having your utilize the teachers in your building that are already excited and utilizing these these different opportunities right that’s really what they are because my enthusiasm will rub off even more than just an admin enthusiasm, right?

And then they don’t feel like, oh, I got to do this. It’s more like, oh, this is how they’re doing it. And as soon as we had this PD, we had two or three.

Show me how to do that. I’m going to use it tomorrow because it’s actionable. And that’s a big part of it, too.

So, I have to one, utilize the people in front of you. Two, is it something I can take away and utilize tomorrow? If it’s something that it’s going to take a long time to utilize or to implement, I’m going to walk away from it.

But also make it normal that it’s okay for it not to work well the first time, right? And that’s part of the process like and then I would even say go back a month later. So how what worked?

What didn’t work? How can we what else can we implement for those who it worked for? Great.

Try the second one now. And then those who didn’t work, let me see how can I support you because sometimes teachers, especially when it comes to technology, it’s going so fast that if I’m not learning about it as it’s going on, I’m going to be very lost. And so, feeling uncomfortable with being uncomfortable, it’s fine.

Like, that’s okay. You’re building the plane as you as you’re flying it. That’s okay, too.

Our students are doing it. We’re doing it. Let’s just do it together.

And so doing it as as a school, I think if you could introduce one maybe once a month. I don’t know if that’s overwhelming. Maybe maybe every six weeks if some teachers have push back, but having a real good PD on it makes it all the difference.

Even some like recording. Hey, you you had the PD, but I still I don’t remember all the steps. Can you like send me a video so I could do it on my own time asynchronously?

Big. Because I know I’m a visual learner. I’m like, "Okay, she said click here.

Let me click here. Now I’m supposed to go over here. Okay, that just helps my brain when I’m implementing it in the moment and then share the wins.

Hey, I used this for three, you know, in three three months. I use this and I saw an increase in this kind of engagement. And then we hear each other because I’m listening to you.

What? That worked in math. Maybe that’ll work in ELA, you know, and vice versa.

Th this all speaks so loudly and it’s something that we’ve it’s been our intuition. It’s really powerful to hear it actually coming to light. This idea of you can’t just mandate this top down creating a safe sandbox for experimenting and you know celebrating failure as a learning opportunity stuff that we would I think want for our kids but educators also feel like they need to know everything and that that’s that’s impossible in this in this moment it’s Celeste right Celestee yes thank you for that Spanish name I know that we’re we’re at time I wish I could I wish we could chat for another hour but but yeah, sounds like you have a busy day.

Yeah. Thank you so much for for jumping on. This has been this has been really cool actually hearing it.

It’s like the most fun conversation I’ve had in a while. And I can see why your kids are your enthusiasm is rubbing off on me. I can imagine your kids totally like feeding off of it as well.

No, they they really are the light of the world and I’m just I’m grateful that I get to sit in this space and we get to explore the world together. H it’s so the world is so curious. It’s beautiful.

So we learn together. So thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it.