Teaching Middle School ELA

Episode 412: What We Would Have Done Differently This Year — And What We're Keeping for Next Year

• Caitlin Mitchell • Season 2 • Episode 412

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In today’s episode of the Teaching Middle School ELA podcast, Caitlin is joined by EB teachers Genevieve and Melinda for an honest conversation about what worked this school year, what they would change next year, and the small shifts that made a big difference in their classrooms. From classroom management and student independence to planning systems, positive reinforcement, conferences, AI tools, and organization strategies, this episode is packed with practical, teacher-tested ideas you can take into next school year. 

If you are already reflecting on ways to make next year smoother, more organized, and more engaging for both you and your students, this episode is for you. Follow us on Instagram at @ebacademics and share this episode with a co-teacher or teacher friend who might need to hear it too! 

Welcome To Teaching Middle School ELA

SPEAKER_01

Hi there, ELA teachers. Caitlin here, CEO and co-founder of EB Academics. I'm so excited you're choosing to tune into the Teaching Middle School ELA podcast. Our mission here is simple: to help middle school ELA teachers take back their time outside of the classroom by providing them with engaging lessons, planning frameworks, and genuine support so that they can become the best version of themselves, both inside and outside of the classroom. And we do this every single day inside the EB Teachers ELA portal. This is a special place we've developed uniquely for ELA teachers to access every single piece of our engaging, fun, and rigorous curriculum so that they have everything they need to batch plan their lessons using our EB Teacher digital planner that's built right into the app. Over the years, we've watched as thousands of teachers from around the world have found success in and out of the classroom after using EB Academics programs. And we're determined to help thousands more. If you're interested in learning more, simply click the link in the podcast description. And in the meantime, we look forward to serving you right here on the podcast every single week.

Why Year End Reflection Matters

SPEAKER_01

Well, hello teachers, and welcome back to another episode of the Teaching Middle School ELA podcast. Today it feels like the kind of perfect end of school year episode because we are talking all about reflecting on the year and specifically what we would do differently next year, what worked so well this year that we are absolutely keeping, and things along those lines. And I am just really excited because this episode is special. I'm not sharing because I was not in the classroom this year. So I asked two of our staff who are still teachers in the classroom and a part of our community team within our membership to be here with us today and share their experiences. So I want to welcome Melinda and Genevieve to the podcast. Welcome you guys. Hello.

SPEAKER_02

Bye, everyone.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you both so much for joining me. Um, I'm really excited that you guys took time out of your busy schedules as full-time teachers and working for EB and having families and all kinds of stuff to record this episode with me on a Saturday. Um, I want to start though, most of our listeners know you, Genevieve, but if you want to just do a quick little intro again, and then Melinda, if you can share a little bit about yourself too, before we dive into the episode. So, Genevieve, I'll have you go first.

SPEAKER_02

Hello, everyone. I'm happy to be back on the podcast. My name is Genevieve, and I teach sixth and seventh grade in Spain. I teach American kids, um, and I teach ELA, obviously, and creative writing. And I love using Eevee. And you love the EV workbooks too, don't you? Oh my gosh. So workbooks were a lifesaver this year.

SPEAKER_01

That is something I'm keeping for next year. I love it. Thanks, Genevieve. All right, Melinda, if you can tell our listeners a little bit about yourself now.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. And I just have to say, I am so honored to join the podcast today for the first time. Um yes, I am a fifth grade teacher in the great state of Texas. Um, but I've spent quite a few years in middle school grades as well. Um, and um, yeah, I'm just super excited to be joining the conversation today. And I will also be keeping those workbooks because we used them last year as well in our classes. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01

I love it. And one little um kind of fun side note about Melinda is that a lot of the audios that you might listen to in our materials are recorded by Melinda with her perfect like flight attendant voice.

SPEAKER_00

So that's who that is. That was a I thoroughly, I keep telling curriculum that I thoroughly enjoy getting to do it. It is such a it's a way for me to relax, oddly. It sounds so weird to say that, but it's nice to just close myself in a room. I'm never by myself, so it's my excuse to get to go do that.

SPEAKER_01

I love it. Well, those of you who have listened to any of our recordings and our materials, Melinda is your girl. That's who it is that is recording those for you. Um, all

What We Would Change Next Year

SPEAKER_01

right. So I am so excited because May is basically like one long internal conversation of, okay, I'm never doing that again, right? As we look back on the year, it's like definitely that's a big hard pass. And also certain conversations around, wait, that actually worked really well. I want to make sure that I bring that into next year's curriculum. So we're actually gonna start with what we would do differently. And Melinda, I'm gonna start with you. What is something you already know that you want to do differently for next year?

Do More Tasking Less Asking

SPEAKER_00

Yes. So one big thing for me is going to be doing more tasking and less asking. I realized this year that sometimes I was over-explaining or over-checking for understanding verbally instead of having students actually do something with the learning. And the more I shifted toward active participation, whether it be through annotating, responding, discussing, sorting, or writing, the more engaged students became. So next year I want students doing more instead of me constantly asking, does that make sense every five minutes?

SPEAKER_01

Yes, I love that. And I think that's such a good distinction because so often our students can just say, Yeah, like I, yep, got it, thumbs up, you know, and they're not really processing anything that we're teaching them. So I think that there's nuance to the way in which we are checking for understanding beyond just verbally is huge. So I love that one, Melinda.

SPEAKER_00

Exactly. And when students are actively involved in their learning, that accountability naturally increases, which is really big for me.

SPEAKER_01

Totally. And like that's such a different accountability piece, right? Having to write something down or having to annotate or having to discuss with a partner or like any sort of doing this as opposed to like responding or reactiveness from our students totally increases that accountability and is huge. Um, I love that one, Melinda. Genevieve, what is yours?

Build Student Independence Before Help

SPEAKER_01

Yours is kind of similar along those same lines. Yes, very much.

SPEAKER_02

One thing I really, really want to work on next year is teaching students to find solutions on their own before immediately coming and asking me for help. I noticed this year that sometimes I became the first stop instead of the last stop. So next year I want to reinforce like rereading directions, checking their notes and resources, asking a classmate first, you know, the ask three before me. Um, and then, you know, to the to Melinda's point, just trying something first. Like Google Classroom is there. The amount of times I heard we're in Google Classroom. And I had to say, let's find it together, you know, like click around and look for some buttons. Um, because I want students building that confidence in themselves, right? I want them to know that they can help themselves instead of just assuming I'll solve every problem, problem for them immediately. And I think that not only helps them, but of course it helps me as well, because I'm not getting pulled in, you know, 50 million directions every minute. And then it helps them become more independent.

SPEAKER_01

For sure.

A Story About Learning The Hard Way

SPEAKER_01

You know what that just made me think of when you said that? When I studied abroad in Rome when I was a junior in college, we got there and like, granted, I had never been to Italy before. I had traveled to like London and I think a few other places with my parents when I was in seventh grade or something like that. But I'd never been to Italy, never been to Rome. Rome's like a pretty big city. I mean, it's not as big as Paris, but it's a big city and it's a foreign language, a foreign country. I'm 20 years old. And we get there and it's like the first night, and we're like, okay, we all want to go into town. So we go ask the teachers' assistants or like whatever the RAs that are the residents, the adults that are there with us, right? I use adults in quotation marks because they're like 23 and we're 20. Um, we're all supposed to be adults. And we're like, okay, like, so what bus do we take? Or like, how do we get into town? And they would look at us and be like, you have to figure it out. And I just remember being like, what do you mean we have to figure it out? I'm this is a foreign country. How are we supposed to figure out how to get to town? We don't even know what town is. Like, why won't you just tell us? And they refused to tell us how to get to town. And like, I know it was like a strategic thing that they, I'm sure, talked to the RAs about before all of these new foreign students came in. Um, and then the same thing goes for I had an art in Rome class on Wednesdays. And every Wednesday we met at like a new location in Rome. It was really cool. Like one of them was at St. Peter's Basilica, another one was at the forum in the Coliseum or whatever. But they never gave us any directions, just the name of the place that we were supposed to be. And this is back like, I gotta like set the scene. This is 20 years ago, right? So we don't have iPhones. We had razors. Do you remember razor phones? Right? Yep. And I had like the sliver phone. It was the first phone, I think, that had iTunes on it ever before iPhones were even around. And it was just like, we couldn't just like type it in to MapQuest or like whatever. No GPS, no, no internet there. Like we didn't even have access to like it was just, it was a totally different wild experience. And to what your guys' point about Melinda, I'm sorry, Genevieve, specifically yours, of helping our students become independent. And I think about this as a parent too. A lot of the times it's just so much easier to just tell them the answer or just do it now. But one of the things that my therapist has told me is what's easy now is hard later. And what's hard now is easy later. So, like as teachers, the hard thing is gonna be you you got to figure it out on your own. You and like they're gonna, there's gonna be pushback and frustration and debate and all this stuff. And it's like, and we are helping build that grit and resilience simply by saying, I already told you, or like in Google Classroom, I don't know, you figure it out, you know, and it's not mean, it's actually like really helpful for them for building their confidence. So that was a total side note story. But hopefully you guys will remember that as you listen to the podcast. You go back to the classroom next year and you're like, oh, Keelank wasn't given directions in Rome. I'm not gonna give you directions to this activity. I love it.

Shift Attention Toward Positive Behavior

SPEAKER_01

Okay, so another thing both of you mentioned that you wanted to talk about today was classroom culture and attention, like student attention, positive reinforcement, that type of stuff. So, Melinda, we'll start with you. What came up for you there when reflecting on that?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so I realized this year how much classroom energy shifts when I intentionally acknowledge positive behavior more than the negative behavior. And I think sometimes our students who are doing the right thing quietly all period can accidentally become invisible because all of our attention keeps going towards redirecting the disruptive behaviors. And I noticed that when I start narrating positive choices more consistently in my classroom, that it changed the tone of my classroom.

SPEAKER_02

I want to point out what you said, Melinda, when you said you started narrating positive choices more consistently. And I started doing the same thing. And it again, like you said, changed the tone of my room. I started calling out the students who were consistently doing the right thing. And I would notice immediately the tone would shift. And those students who were like maybe about to like mess around or have a side conversation, they their heads would whip over and they would be like, Oh, they that person is doing the right thing. I want to do the right thing. And it was totally a different classroom. So I agree. I want to be more intentional about where my attention goes. I don't want the loudest behavior getting the majority of my energy all the time. I want that effort, kindness, collaboration, preparedness, all of all of that. So and oh go ahead.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. I was gonna say oftentimes those those students who are exhibiting those disruptive behaviors they're seeking attention. So they when they hear other kids hear getting their names called, they want to hear their name called. So it's about leading them into doing what's gonna get their name called for a positive reason.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely 100%. Yes.

Simple Positive Messages To Families

SPEAKER_02

And that brings me to my second um thing that I want to start doing more of. I used to do this all the time on hand little handwritten notes. Um, and I would actually send these hand positive handwritten notes home to our parents. Um, but this year I just did not have the capacity. But I saw that it made such a difference for students and their families this year or sorry, in past years and and this year, you know, it just kind of went by the wayside. Um so next year I want to recommit to that in a different way that can make it more manageable for myself. One positive email home a week instead of like notes that I have to write out and then send. Um I started doing that a few weeks ago, you know, after reflecting on on, you know, this podcast, what we were going to talk about for this podcast episode. And I've already, you know, had a couple of parents email me back and say how much they appreciated it. And I've seen those students, you know, step up even more. Um, and so that's been really nice to focus my attention on the positive things as we head into the end of the school year.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it is so interesting. I even I remember doing that positive attention to student behavior of like when we would be in a transition. Okay, we have 30 seconds to do X, Y, and Z and blah, blah, blah. And then as you start to see the students who are doing what you ask, like, I see Melinda as doing a great job. Good job, Melinda. You're all set. I see Genevieve. And it's exactly what you just said, Genevieve, is all the students turn their head and are like, what is Genevieve doing? And then you guys become examples of like, if the student wasn't listening, what's on Melinda's desk? What am I supposed to have out? She's doing it right, et cetera. Um, it makes such a big difference. And also the not paying attention to negative behavior, to Melinda's point, like negative behavior is attention-seeking behavior, right? And so I think about my dog that I'm training, who I use the term training extremely loosely. It's not happening. I'm a bad owner. But he's seven months old. And like any negative behavior that I don't want him to do, I am being told by the trainer to literally ignore it. Because if I give him any attention for that negative behavior, it reinforces the negative behavior. Now, I'm not saying humans are exactly the same, but I am saying that there is very much something to be said about that in ensuring that the negative behaviors in our classrooms are not siphoning all of the energy and being energy vampires in our classrooms, but we're able to give that energy to the students who are exhibiting the behaviors that we want to see from them. So I love those reflections. Thank you guys so much for sharing those. Um,

Warnings Only Work With Follow Through

SPEAKER_01

Melinda, you also mentioned wanting to talk about warnings and consequences, which I think every teacher can relate to. So, what is something that you wanted to share of your reflection on that?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, absolutely. So I realized this year that every time I said, okay, one more warning, after already giving multiple warnings, whether it was, you know, in my head or directly to a student, I was just weakening my own expectations. So next year, I really want to be more consistent with my own follow-through on those consequences. Not any harsher, just more consistent because I really do think students thrive when our expectations are predictable.

SPEAKER_01

Yes, a hundred percent. And it's exhausting trying to negotiate and renegotiate your expectations all day long, all year long, things along those lines. And it's like if you give them an inch, they take a mile. Like that's so true. I think, especially for students in our classroom, kids need those black and white boundaries where there's no gray area, they know exactly what to expect, they know exactly what you know they're gonna get in trouble for or rewarded for, et cetera, and that you follow through. I remember my mom told me um as a parent, she's like, any threat that you make, you have to be able to follow through with. And if you don't follow through with it, your kids just gonna walk all over you. And it's it's the truth. And our students are the same. Um, thank you guys so much for sharing those. I love those ideas.

Parkinson’s Law And Pomodoro For Focus

SPEAKER_01

Let's talk about what we are keeping in terms of systems that actually worked. So, Melinda, what is first for you that you're absolutely keeping this year because it worked so well?

SPEAKER_00

Yes, definitely Parkinson's Law and the Pomodoro technique. I use both of these for myself and for my students this year, and it makes such a difference in your day. Um, so personally, for me, it helps keep my teacher to-do list from taking over my entire life, my entire day, and not being so consumed by it all the time. Um, it's like a way of giving my brain a certain space for it to stay temporarily and not, like I said, feel so consumed by it throughout the rest of the day. Um, and for students, giving them shorter focus periods of work time honestly increases their productivity so much. Um, so it's almost like when students know they have a specific amount of focus time, they tend to lock in more, which creates, you know, greater understanding, greater progress, perhaps a greater end product as well.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And for those of you who don't know, I'm so glad that you shared these, Melinda. These are great concepts. Parkinson's law is the concept that time expands or like what uh what we do expands to the amount of time that we allot ourselves to have it. So let me give you an example. If we have to record six podcast episodes, or I have to write six podcast episodes, and I'm like, okay, I only have two hours to do this, it's gonna take me two hours. If I tell myself I have six hours to do this, it's going to take me six hours. So, like how we complete the activity expands to the amount of time that we allow ourselves to have. And so when we're like, okay, I have to do X, Y, and Z, but I'm gonna do it in an hour. I'm only giving myself an hour to complete it. Nine times out of 10, we actually are able to complete it within that hour as opposed to like the week that we thought it was gonna take us. It's wild how much it works. Um, and then the Pomodoro technique is like a fascinating technique that a lot of writers used. I used it when we were writing our book. And essentially you set a timer for 20 minutes and you work for 20 minutes and then you take a five-minute break, and you work for 20 minutes and take a five-minute break, and you set a timer so you can see it kind of going as the time goes next to you on your clock. That's really helpful for grading papers too, is to set the pomodoro technique. So I love that you use those with your students too, Melinda, and you explain the concepts to them also.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. Um, I mean, I I not honestly, this past week we were even doing something. They were like, oh my gosh, you're because I use visual timers. Like I have the one on the whiteboard that they, you know, can follow if they need to. Um and I always tell them, especially like during transition times, I tell them, we have two minutes to do this. I need to see this in 60 seconds on your desk. Um, but that's kind of usually when I have that conversation. I don't necessarily use the names or the terms with them, but I explain, well, if I give you 45 minutes, you're probably gonna end up spending all of that time thinking about what you're gonna do in 45 minutes. But if I put a little bit of pressure on you, you're probably gonna get more done than you think you would get done. And even if they don't get all of it done, we usually all feel a lot better about what we did accomplish. But like you said, we do usually end up completing what you know we sought out to do.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I love that you use it with your students. I think that's that's brilliant. Um, there was one other thing that you wanted to say along these lines, I think.

Keep A Running Note For Next Year

SPEAKER_01

So have to structure in your classroom.

SPEAKER_00

Well, this so this is my running note for next year idea that um it's a non-negotiable that I will do every year now. Um so I just open up, I create a note in my iPhone, title it for the following next school year, and it's just like a running note of ideas that I know that I'm gonna I'm gonna want to implement next year or things that I'm gonna need to change. I don't make long, I don't create sentences. It's just like it's almost like a um a brain dump inside my uh inside of my notes. Um so anytime that I'm thinking, oh, I need to change this because we're actively in that moment and I'm realizing something that I haven't seen before, or something just came into my head about how something could work better, I immediately open my phone, add that little blurb into that note. Um it could be an idea or it could just be something that I need to remember to do for the next year. Um, just immediately put it in there because every time I tell myself, you know, I make a mental note of it and I'll remember it over summer or even in August when things are super chaotic. Um, I don't. And I feel like we're doing so much more for myself whenever I take the time in that moment to jot it down and let myself, you know, have the time to, you know, do what I need to do to implement that throughout the summer if I want, if I wanted to do it throughout the summer.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, super smart to put it in your notes immediately because you're right. You're like, oh yeah, I'll remember that later. You absolutely will not. No, not a chance. Genevieve, if you do something similar, yeah.

Planner Notes Plus The Pencil Routine

SPEAKER_02

Yes, absolutely, because you're right, I will not remember. Um so I use I use our EB digital planner. And what I because I would write down on a post-it or in our EV physical planner, I don't know why I didn't think of the notes app. I I don't know. But then I realized I can use the EV digital planner. I always have, you know, our portal up anyway, because I'm referencing a resource or I'm showing a video. Um so I created a class called next year, and throughout the school year, I just leave myself little notes like in the daily planning blocks. I just leave myself little notes. And so, like that for the first week of back to school next year, I've got like five million little notes of things that I want to remember. And then next school year, when I get to you know August and we're like sitting down and I'm really just like making sure I've got everything ready. I have all the all of those notes. Like this year, I was so tired of kids not having a pencil or like their pencil would break. And I put pencils out, they were gone within five minutes. And then I had to go get more and I was like, okay, we're done. So I said, if you need another pencil because it broke, just hold it up and I will come and trade you one. Like it is that easy. And I want to remember that for next year. So I wrote it down in my in the in the planner because I know I'm gonna forget about it in two months and it'll be there. And I'll think, oh, that was the best routine I've ever thought of ever in my life. It saves so much time and energy. And I won't remember it next year. So now I will because it's there. I love it.

SPEAKER_01

That is a great example. That's a great example of one of those random things that you're like, I cannot forget that this works.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01

Um, something else, Genevieve, that you wanted to talk about that I think is such a great idea is talk taking walk breaks.

Walk Breaks For Long Class Periods

SPEAKER_01

Talk to me about this.

SPEAKER_02

Yes, similar to Melinda's use of the Pomodoro technique, although I don't put the visual timer. I need to do that. I'm stealing that, Melinda, for next year for sure.

SPEAKER_01

Write it down in your planner right now.

SPEAKER_02

I need to as soon as we're done with the podcast episode. Um, so my classroom is like out, it's like in an outdoor, like we have the outdoors right outside of my classroom. We're not like inside, you know, a building, if that makes any sense. Yes. I'm sorry, it's almost it's almost summer break for me. Um and we have 85-minute classes. Most of my classes are 85-minute classes. And this year, the one of my afternoon classes, um the high school has lunch in the middle of our class and the bell rings for the high schoolers to go back to their classroom. So, because of that bell ringing, I thought that is a perfect um break time that we can have. It's it's like a it's an auditory reminder of a break that we can have. So as soon as we hear that bell, all the kids yell, high school. And because at first I was like, why is the bell ringing so early? And then they had to remind me it was the high school bell. And I said, Okay, we're gonna take a break. And I, we took this five-minute walk right outside in the quad. There's a little quad, and it was two laps, and it was perfect because it was like that natural break after 45 minutes of working, right? So even though we're not doing 20 minutes and five minutes, 20 minutes and then five minutes break, we get that 45 minutes of work and then we get to, they get to take a walk, they get to socialize a little bit, we get some fresh air. It's made all of us more focused, including myself. So definitely keeping that. And then I'm going to include the Pomodoro technique.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. I think any teacher who has longer class periods definitely just wrote that idea down if they're not doing it already. I did that when I had 90-minute class periods when I taught high school, and it was great. We would do like yoga breaks sometimes, and like I would teach a couple of yoga poses, or we would just go out in the sun and sit on the grass. I mean, because we again also, same thing with you. I had a classroom that just opened to the outside, which was so nice, but that was because we were in LA. It's different, I think, in California compared to some other states and countries. But yeah, I mean, like they need a break. Like, bro, to sit there for 85 or 90 minutes, I think is just an unreasonable expectation of our kids, especially in today's day and age where um attention spans are getting just lower and lower and lower. Um, so I love that idea. Thank you for sharing that. Teachers, write that down. That's a good one.

Planned Writing Conferences That Actually Help

SPEAKER_01

Um, Melinda, tell us about intentional conferencing. I loved this idea too that you came up with.

SPEAKER_00

Yes. So this year I became much more intentional, intentional about scheduling conferences with my students during the writing process. So instead of doing random check-ins with them, you know, waiting for them to come to me, um, students knew ahead of time when we would be meeting one-on-one together and what specific components of the framework or, you know, what piece they were focusing on at that specific time that we would be discussing at that conference. And of course, I would be using our rubric for that particular piece to guide that conversation in our conference. And it always made my feedback so much more focused. Students always came way more prepared to to me during our conference. And it of course helps me assess their understanding before the final draft instead of after it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So can you talk to me about a little bit of the logistics of that? Like, did you have a signup sheet that they signed up for? Like, how did you orchestrate that?

SPEAKER_00

Well, so this year I had a I have a pretty small class. Like, I think I at the beginning of the episode, I mentioned that I'm a fifth grade teacher right now. And so um, I I have a small class, I'm pretty much self-contained. Um, so I have a smaller class size that would allow me to kind of not do a signup sheet. Um, I can see myself, if I was back in one of my larger classrooms or larger class sizes with like seventh graders, middle school students, I would probably group them the way I would with kind of if I knew their levels, if I knew, you know, where more about where they were level-wise and how, you know, they're pacing, I would probably start grouping them and then tell this group, I'm gonna, I'm gonna plan on meeting you with you on this date, another on this date, or you know, being beginning of period or towards the end of the period. I might group them by by that way. Um, but this year, I I was able to kind of just let them naturally come to me whenever they needed me, as far as at a specific date. I would still tell the class, hey, I'm gonna plan on having a conversation with you on this component. I'm expecting to see these sentences of this body paragraph filled out, and we're gonna meet on this day of the week.

SPEAKER_01

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_00

Um, but if I had a larger class size, I would probably need to, you know, increase the number of days on when those meetings would happen.

SPEAKER_01

Gotcha. So you're saying like you had intentionally scheduled conferences into your plans almost when you were batch planning. Yes, gotcha. That makes perfect sense. So it's not like something that I'm in the process, I'm teaching and I'm like, oh my gosh, I've got to put conferences in here now. My students need my help. It's like you planned for it a month ago.

SPEAKER_00

Correct, correct. So it's almost like I had to meet with them before I would even plan on grading their paper. Like I would have to know that I've had this many conferences with them because this number of conferences was planned based on this conference being this component, this conference being this component. So almost like I knew their entire paper before I sat down to grade it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, brilliant. I love that. Great idea. Add it into your batch planning. Thanks, Melinda. Um, okay, let's talk about tools and organization now. So,

AI Seating Charts And Standards Skill Tracking

SPEAKER_01

Genevieve, you had mentioned using AI and the digital planner in some really practical ways this year. Can you share that with our listeners?

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. These systems saved me so much mental energy this year. One thing that I'm absolutely keeping is using AI to help create seating charts and student groupings. Um, I love that idea. Every time I sit down to create a seating chart, I have to mentally think who can I put where, who needs to avoid who. So what I did after the second time I did that, you know, because it takes like at least 30 minutes, if not an hour, to go, you know, go through that. Where have they not sat before, et cetera, et cetera. After the second time of doing that, I um typed in all of my students' names and I labeled that chat, you know, whatever class I was uh doing at the time, and I said, uh, these are my two previous seating charts. I need a third seating chart, I need these students to not be together, these students can't be near each other, I need this student in the front, I need three these three students in the back, you know, for if they're on 504s or IEPs for preferential seating. And it spit it out in like 30 seconds. And then I, when I needed another one, you know, six weeks later or however many weeks later, um, I said, okay, using the three previous seating charts, I need these things that are different. And it gave me another one. And it was just so much less mental energy on my part. It was amazing.

SPEAKER_01

That is genius. I love that. Can I add one other thing that just came to mind? Because I used to, with my students, have them on an index card write where in the room they would like to sit, right? Because like I personally like to sit off to the right and to the side in the front. Like for whatever reason, that's my spot. So, where in the classroom do you want to sit? Who do you not want to sit next to? And who do you want to sit next to? And like really taking into account like who's a distraction, who's not a distraction, who's your friend, who you know is gonna be a good seat buddy, whatever. And I used to have them put that on an index card and I would take those into consideration as I would make my seating chart. But what you could do is you could create a Google form where they input all of that information in a Google form. You download the CSV file, upload it to Chat GPT in addition to what you just said, and say, please take my student seating preferences into account when you're creating the seating chart, but don't make it the primary, make it the secondary, right? The primary are my inputs that I'm giving to you as a teacher, and the student preferences are the secondary aspect of it. Because then you're giving students like some agency over their seating, but you don't have to read any of it. I mean, you always want to check Chat GBT's work, but like that's genius. I love that idea because then it remembers and it's like, okay, make me another one with these adjustments. Genius.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I didn't have to remember. I mean, of course I get to know my students and I know like, you know, all of that stuff, but I didn't have to remember from every single seating chart where they sat before from like, you know, October. And I used to do that with the student choice, really, only where they wanted to sit in the classroom. And I and I would have them fill out a Google form even. And I can't believe I didn't think about downloading it and uploading it as a CSU file. So I am going to include that for next year. So thank you for that.

SPEAKER_01

Write that down. Write it down in your planner. Okay, what else?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, and then just using it for student groupings. Um, same thing. But I'm also obsessed with checking the skill analysis feature inside the EV digital planner. Like every time I log into the portal at school, I go to my lesson plans and I click the skill analysis button. I'm like, what do I still need to teach? You know, like of course I've batch planned, things come up, some units get cut, and then I have to figure out, you know, where am I gonna put, you know, um, I don't know, point of view for informational texts. And I can see that that's the standard that I still need to cover before the end of the school year. So I've got two weeks, two weeks left, and I am going to get it done with our skills-based passages. But that skill analysis feature like has saved my life this year. So I'm definitely still going to obsessively uh obsessively check it next year.

SPEAKER_01

I love that. And so for those of you who don't know what Genevieve's talking about, inside of our portal, which is our membership for middle school ELA teachers, we have a digital planner. And one of the features of the digital planner is that anytime you put a lesson or a unit in, it pulls in the standards or the skills, and you can also input your own stuff and choose your standards and skills. And basically what the planner does is it tracks which skills you have not covered in your planning. And so one of the things that we hear from teachers all the time is like, there's not enough time to cover all of the skills. There's not enough time to cover all the standards. Well, what happens is when we look at what we're actually covering, we are covering so much of the same standards so often. And the skills analysis tool inside of the EB Digital Planner shows us that. It's like, bro, you've covered themes six times. Like, let's maybe take out one of those theme lessons and incorporate point of view in informational text, right? To Genevieve's point. And so a lot of the times it's not uh like students aren't getting this the standard and understanding the standard issue. It's a we are not planning properly to teach all of the standards issue. And I think that puts a lot of agency back into our hands as teachers. So if you're an EB teacher and you're not using the skills analysis feature inside of the EB digital planner, it is a game changer. That might be something that you add to your notes to change and do for next year. Um, all right. Well, I

Small Tweaks Beat Big Overhauls

SPEAKER_01

love this conversation because none of these things are like giant overhauls of our systems, our processes, our classrooms, or anything like that. They're just like small little adjustments. And like Genevieve, your pencil situation. Like the tiniest little thing that I don't want to forget that I do. Or like Melinda, the Pomodoro method, like to just keep doing that with our students or to put in your plans that this is a conference day for this particular thing that I'm addressing with my students writing. And I think that's really important for teachers to hear, especially this time of year, is you do not need to become like an entirely different teacher or have an entirely different approach next school year. Sometimes the biggest improvements come from tightening one routine or from simplifying one little system or being more consistent with just one expectation that you have of your students. Um,

What To Do Before Summer Starts

SPEAKER_01

so before we wrap up though, what is one thing that each of you would encourage teachers to do before summer starts? So this is like we're in the home stretch here. I know some teachers have like a couple days left. Melinda, you go first.

SPEAKER_00

Definitely write things down now. Don't trust yourself to remember all of your brilliant end-of-the-year realizations in August.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that ain't happening. You will go on summer vacation mode and it all goes right out of your brain. Genevieve, what's yours?

SPEAKER_02

I 100% agree with Melinda, absolutely. Um, and I would just say, teachers, give yourself credit for what did work. I think we are really good at focusing on what needs fixing as teachers, but there are probably things that you did this year that genuinely made your classroom better, and those deserve attention too. So don't forget about those.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I love that. Thank you guys both so much for being here and for sharing about your experiences in your classroom.

Share Your Keep And Change

SPEAKER_01

And to everyone listening, we would love to hear from you. If you're an EB teacher, go post in the EB teacher community what is one thing you would do differently next year, and what is one thing that you are definitely keeping. And maybe Melinda, these might be some of our Sunday conversations.

SPEAKER_00

That's actually in the plans, yes.

SPEAKER_01

I love it. You're on it. Melinda's 10 steps ahead of me all of the time. And if you are not an EV teacher, come let us over know over on Instagram. Genevieve reads a lot of those messages on behalf of the team. Um, so we would love to hear what you are doing and what you are keeping, what you're changing, all that stuff. So thank you both so much for joining me today. It was lovely to have you guys here. And we will see you guys next week on the podcast. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

SPEAKER_00

Bye.