Connect Canyons
Learning is about making connections, and we invite you to learn and connect with us. Connect Canyons is a show about what we teach in Canyons District, how we teach, and why. We get up close and personal with some of the people who make our schools great: students, teachers, principals, parents, and more. We meet national experts, too. And we spotlight the “connection makers” — personalities, programs and prospects — we find compelling and inspiring.
Connect Canyons
Ep 126 : Regroup, Refresh, Reconnect: How to Get Back in the Back to School Groove
Believe it or not, we're nearly halfway through the 2025-26 school year. Students are transitioning from playing games with their families over winter break to turning their alarms back on and getting back in the habit of classes and homework.
At the beginning of the year, we discussed how to get in that back to school groove. Now, on the latest episode of Connect Canyons, we’re hearing from two of our AVID experts about how now getting in a refresher on some of those methodologies would be helpful for teachers, students, and parents alike as we start out 2026.
“It’s important to review the basics with your students,” says Jenny Warner, Instructional Coach at Glacier Hills Elementary. “You almost have to pretend like you’re starting the year again, reviewing the routines and the rules with the students. One thing too, I think is really important, is to let the students have a voice in that. They have such powerful voices and listening to what they think is really important and maybe changing it and making it work for your whole classroom community.”
Welcome to Connect Canyons, a podcast sponsored by Canyon School District. This is a show about what we teach, how we teach, and why we get up close and personal with some of the people who make our schools great. Students, teachers, principals, parents, and more. We meet national experts too. Learning is about making connections. So connect with us.
SPEAKER_01:Believe it or not, we're nearly halfway through the 2025-26 school year. Students are transitioning from playing games with their families over winter break to turning their alarms back on and getting back in the habit of classes and homework. Welcome to Connect Canyons. I'm your host, Francis Cook. At the beginning of the year, we discussed how to get in that back-to-school group. So we thought now would be a good time to have a bit of a refresher course on some of those methodologies as we start out 2026. Joining me once again is Canyons avid specialist Jay Roddell, and we're welcoming Jenny Warner, Instructional Coach at Glacier Hills Elementary. Thank you both for being here.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_01:I'd like to start off with some shout-outs. Jenny, you were the inaugural Canyon School District Instructional Coach of the Year in 2024. For those who don't know, our of the year awards are, you know, a bit like the Emmys or the Oscars, where we love to celebrate and honor the hard work and dedication of the people who work here in our district. So congratulations on that and you know leading the charge for that Instructional Coach of the Year award.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you so much. It's an honor to represent all the hard work that the coaches do in our district.
SPEAKER_01:And Jay, you were recently a finalist in the first ever Avid Global Achievement Awards. So congratulations for that, and thank you both for your hard work and dedication for our street.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you very much. Thanks. Great to be here again.
SPEAKER_01:To say you both are experts in organization, getting kids passionate about learning, helping teachers, helping students, it's an understatement. So we really appreciate in advance the advice that you have. I'd like to start out with our teachers. You know, it's not just hard for students to set those alarms again and get back in the groove, right? And teachers have to get back up in front of the classroom, they have to be energetic, ready to go, setting that example. So what advice would you have for teachers to kind of get back in that groove after the break?
SPEAKER_03:I thought of myself when I was teaching. I taught for 18 years, and some of the things that I really thought about, after you have those two weeks off, you you kind of are like starting again and starting over and doing your reset. So one of the important things is like reviewing the basics with your students. You almost have to pretend like you're starting the year again and reviewing the routines and the rules with the students. And one thing too, I think is really important to have the students have voice in that. Like they can have an impact on how effective the routines are. And they have such powerful voices and listening to what they think is really important and maybe changing it and making it work for your whole classroom community. So I love like making it interactive. Like, what worked well the first half of the year? What are some things that your students want to change? And giving that student ownership is very powerful. And practicing those procedures, think beginning of the school year. So let's go back, let's practice, let's role-play this. They kind of lose that too after those two weeks. So making sure that you act out a messy lineup, right? And then, okay, so what do we need to do to improve to get this lineup back to where we were? And talking about how to do that in pairs, making it very interactive is really important. I think rebuilding that classroom community with building that relational capacity. One idea that I was reading about that I really loved is having students share like their holiday highlights and what they really loved, something about their break that they loved. Even if it was just the sleeping in part, because man, that's one of my favorites. Right. I love that. So even if it's just that, and keeping in mind that some students took a trip to Bahamas, some students may be struggling to get meals on their table. Sure. So, like really keeping that in your mind as well. Like maybe having them have one really great thing about their break and sharing that in their morning meeting can really help to build those relationships again with your students.
SPEAKER_01:It kind of provides that opportunity for them to reconnect with their classmates too, right? Because they may not be excited to set their alarm, but they're probably excited to see, you know, their friends in the class that they didn't get to see over the break and they want to chit-chat. And that can be hard to regain that control, but that kind of provides that constructive outlet for that.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Seeing kids smiling faces today, I think that's really huge. Like they are excited to be back with their class or community with their friends and seeing their teachers again, even though I'm sure it was hard getting up this morning. I can see that that's really important to them.
SPEAKER_01:So I also read teachers can give them a prompt along the lines you were saying, talking about their holidays and sharing kind of their favorite moments. But also looking back at what they did during those first couple months of the school year. What are they proud of that they worked on before the break? And then what are their hopes for the rest of the year? And you know, kind of setting those goals. Right.
SPEAKER_02:One of the things I'll piggyback on what Jenver said, who did an outstanding job with that, by the way, is that you're you as a teacher are constantly reflecting and trying to improve your craft and making sure all students are learning. And sometimes we just take that on ourselves for our students. Oh, this is what we're gonna do and how that's gonna work. But a lot of times we need to hear just like what Jennifer said and actually push it back on the students a little bit. I always did before I left for break, the students would have a survey, and I had probably maybe 10 questions associated with it, but what did they like? What did what should I get rid of? Should I stop telling my corny jokes and my dad jokes? Never what do you like about the classroom? Did you like the group activities? What would you like to see happen in the coming months? And understanding when we come back, we have to reset all of those things that we worked on for the first four months of school because that two weeks has a huge impact on the students. It's like going back, oh yeah, we gotta do this again and we gotta do this again, we gotta practice this, we gotta practice this because we're in the home stretch of the school year. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:What worked for you and what didn't.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly. So the students need to say that too, not just the teacher reflecting on it.
SPEAKER_01:So that's a great pivot into how we can help students and how parents can help their students in getting back into you know being awake and learning in the classroom. So let's pivot to those students. I know Jenny, you were talking about getting it in that classroom lineup. That alone can be hard for our younger students to get back into those routines. So, what are some steps that students and parents can take to not only get them into that routine, but also inspire them a little bit?
SPEAKER_03:I think easing back into the routines is really important at home as well as at school. Giving them simple responsibilities like getting their backpack ready, those types of things are really important for the parents to help support their students and being organized and prepared to go back. Also, I think talking about it with their students, what were your favorite things about the school year or what are you excited about as we begin? Thinking about goals with students too is really crucial. I think what is your goal for the end of the year? Like maybe you want to read five books, or maybe you want to raise your hand more before you're speaking. Like having parents involved in that too. What are their students' goals and and also celebrating those things that went really well so that you can continue to build on that, I think is really important.
SPEAKER_01:And again, I think that opens that connection between a parent and their child, you know, asking them not only how their day went, but what can they do to help them succeed in the classroom?
SPEAKER_02:One thing that I'll add to that too is I always realize with the students is they kind of focus on the past a little bit because they can't see very far in front of them. Sure. And I always said, guys, you're writing a book of your school year every month. And especially when we had this break, guys, it doesn't matter what happened in the last four months. You're going to write a whole new chapter. You can make it whatever you want. And the way you do that is us set goals up, like Jennifer sets, but also fostering those goals with the parents as well. This is what you said you want to do. Let's just work on a little bit each night and see where we can go. And not only from a month now, but maybe even this week or next week, those short-term goals start to add up as long as you're setting a new set of standards for yourself or a new set of goals.
SPEAKER_01:I'd like to talk about goals a little bit more because, like you said, that's so important for especially our younger students who aren't looking into, you know, maybe college or, you know, they're looking at recess and lunch, right? But then we also have students who are looking ahead to their futures and what they want to do after they graduate. How do you go about helping students set not only goals but attainable goals? And is it the short, do you focus on short term? Do you go long-term? Is it a mix? How do you set those goals?
SPEAKER_03:That is a great question. And I really liked how you pointed out that students really are looking at, and Jay talked about this too. You're looking at what's coming. Just not super far in the future, but maybe what's recess is coming. I think it's really powerful for them to be able to set short-term goals and also to have that long view of where do I want to be at the end of the school year? One of the advantages, and I think one of the wonderful things about Glacier Hills is we are an avid school and we have binders. Every student at our school has binders, and we do goal setting in those binders. For example, we do reading minute goal setting for them to achieve, we have them track their fact fluency. We have them track our program that we work with for literacy is Lexia. So we have them track that weekly. So they have the short-term goals, but they also have like, I want to be reading 65 words per minute by the end of the school year. So they have those long-term goals as well. And we, their teachers are able to work with them. And also we have the benefit. Jay's been awesome with providing us with avid tutors that come in weekly with these students and look at their goals and they go over those short-term goals and also make that connection is how is this leading to you being able to read 65 words per minute? How is this leading up to that end goal for the end of the year for you? So I think that that's really an advantage for our students, and they are able to see that goal setting leads to the long-term goal achievement. So I think that's one of the things that I'm really proud of at our school is that we have that in place and we're also able to share those goals with parents as well.
SPEAKER_02:And two things, piggybacking off of what Jenny said is number one, I have great tutors and they work really hard with the kids all the way from kindergarten to seniors. And they do a fantastic job. The other thing is when we talk about these student goals, in the avid world, it's our student agency. And the five avid schools do focus an awful lot of their attention on this student agency, and how do we get kids to think beyond just the recess, or how do we get them to think beyond the lunch? And this is important for my future. And these goals, and again, what what Jennifer says, there's I think there should be more short-term goals than the long-term goals. So the short-term will get you to the long-term goals, I believe. Our teachers, our avid teachers at my five schools do a fantastic job of setting those short-term goals up for the students so that they're getting some success all the way through it. And those long-term goals will certainly come true if we can get those short-term goals focused with those students.
SPEAKER_03:And I just wanted to add on to that too. Some of the power of that is the students are tracking their own goals. They're like graphing their own goals sometimes daily with those short-term goals. And at the end of the week, they're able to reflect, see like it's their progress, which is so motivating to them. And like Jay said, they can be able to, once they are hitting those short-term goals, they can see how this is gonna build to that end-of-the-year goal. And not only that, but in their lives, like we continually set goals. Us as adults, we just set goals, I'm sure, probably for New Year's, right? So we do that, and I think that they can see that that leads to success and that they have the power to be the creator of their own successes. So that's really beneficial.
SPEAKER_01:I think that's a beautiful way to look at it. You know, you mentioned New Year's resolutions, right? And as adults, a lot of us have been setting those for years, but a lot of the time it's something I'm gonna run a triathlon. Well, can you run a mile? Because, you know, if you can't achieve those shorter goals, like you said, you're not gonna be able to get to that long-term goal. And it like it sets you up for success and it makes it so that goals are something that you believe are attainable and not something completely out of reach. So it's really cool to see you showing them both that short-term and long-term successes. At the beginning of the year, I feel like a lot of teachers take extra time to kind of go over the tips and tricks of how to succeed as you're learning and how to, you know, succeed in the classroom as a student, as a peer, even sometimes as a mentor. But I'm curious, some of those tips are probably then not really discussed again as the year goes on because we've already done that, right? That's that's learning 101, we're halfway through the year. What are some of those you know, basic things that maybe we should bring back as we're facing that second half of the year?
SPEAKER_02:Well, just like with what Jenny said, I we have to do a reboot. Um I mean, the first couple days back from the break, it should be a total reboot. Yes, the content is important, yes, you need to get to it, but there's so much more to teaching than just the content. And not just the discipline associated with it. But Jennifer also mentioned the relational capacity piece. We got to get back to knowing our kids. We were off for two weeks, the students were off for two weeks, they need to go back. They may not always know who their partners are, and we need to build that relational capacity back again with them over the next couple, three weeks and continue that throughout the school year. That's one of the things I think the avid schools focus on an awful lot because we do so much collaboration in the classroom, and the kids are moving towards getting a better relational capacity mindset with all of their classmates, as well as the teacher, the administrator, the tutors, you know, the custodians, all of those things are rebooted, I believe, come January 5th. Just like getting up in the morning was rough today to do that. My wife's also a teacher, and it's like, oh boy, here we go again. And my daughter's in college, she was moping around last night, the Sunday scaries and all that. But the reality is we enjoy being here because it's social. I think sometimes the teachers forget that, that we're here because it's social, we want to teach the content, but that socialization and understanding the relational capacity piece is really important.
SPEAKER_03:And I agree totally with Jay. It's okay, teachers, for you to take some time to re re go over those things again, to re-establish those partnerships, the routines, what they look like, what they sound like. Because the time you spend rebuilding that will pay off in the long run. It's gonna save you time in the long run. So I think that's okay. I think some teachers want to jump right back in and like everybody's gonna be ready to go. Here we go. Like everybody's gonna remember everything, and then you're like, oh my gosh, they can't remember how to find out what it's happening.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly. Okay, we left off at the American Revolution. Now we're moving on. Let's go. And it doesn't work that way. It's like they need to, I need a report. In fact, I was in a meeting this morning. What did we discuss two weeks ago? Right. And these are adults.
SPEAKER_01:That was so last year. I don't remember.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly. You know, and I think that reboot and how do we actually engage in that conversation again needs to be rebooted and to be refocused at the beginning of the year.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely. We do that with our school-wide PBIS. What does it look like in the hallways? What does it look like in the library? We have videos that our students engage in with their teachers. They don't just view it, they stop and talk about it with their partners and they talk about what it looks like to walk to your STEM brain booster, just those basic things. And again, it's almost like you're starting the year again. This though, reboot will go a little bit smoother, a little bit quicker. Kids will get refreshed and say, Oh, yes, I remember. However, it's important to spend that time because if you just try to hit the ground running and go into the next thing that you left off on, it's not going to go well. So it's really important to give yourself grace, set some extra time for you to re-establish those routines and expectations with your students.
SPEAKER_02:Keep it in mind, the kids are tired too right now. You know, it's it's like they're trying to figure out this whole new thing again as well. So keep that in the back of your mind as well if you're a teacher.
SPEAKER_01:And I think, as you mentioned with relationships, that's such an important part of success in the classroom on both sides, right? Our teachers aren't just out there doing one blanket lesson that one size fits all. They're tailoring as much as they can to each student's needs and abilities so that each student can learn and then grow together as a classroom.
SPEAKER_02:Our avid schools do a great job.
SPEAKER_01:They do. We have some great avid programs.
SPEAKER_02:They do a great job of that differentiated instruction for students. Yeah. Sorry, I didn't throw that in there.
SPEAKER_01:No, you gotta shout out for your people. And we do have some great avid programs, and I think these are some wonderful tips that students who may not be in an avid program can, you know, their parents can learn from them, teachers can learn from them, students, everybody can take something from this. You know, I honestly I stopped setting New Year's goals because I was only setting unattainable goals. And instead, I walked it back. Okay, what am I gonna do this month? Okay, I want to read more, I want to walk more, I wanna and making it attainable, and then again creating those relationships to the point where you know what each of your students need. As we wrap things up, I'd love for you to just share any overall advice that you have for teachers, for students. For parents, as all of us are working to get back into those routines and really back to the grind.
SPEAKER_03:I think take some time to celebrate and not over plan. I guess speaking to the parent perspective, like getting back into the routine with your children is tricky. It's it's hard. It takes some time. And I know that families get so busy with students do a lot of extracurricular activities, those types of things. I would say in the first couple weeks, if you can, just keep it as chill as possible. Don't plan too many things, but also plan time to celebrate. Let your student pick their favorite dinner so that they can have that opportunity to like celebrate and have family time as well. But I think just keeping things very chill and calm as you as you go back into the school year. And for teachers, I would say the same: like keep it chill, keep it calm, celebrate with your students, celebrate getting to know them again and plan opportunities for your students to have opportunities to talk and speak with each other, to get reconnected. Um and and just reestablish those routines, expectations with your students, and that's gonna pay off in dividends as the year goes on. You're gonna go slow to go something fast.
SPEAKER_02:So Jenny's elementary focused person. I'm more of a secondary focused person. And so the semester ends for our secondary schools in two weeks. And a lot of I think a lot of times we forget that oh, we've had two weeks off and now we gotta make this big push to our finals and all that. One thing I would suggest for teachers and for parents and for the students is start preparing for that now because that's coming up next week. I would always try to work some review in there a little bit each day so that when the finals, when I gave my finals or give the final test for the semester, it wasn't like, oh, I was trying to trick them or anything. I wanted a review. I wanted them to know the content. And so instead of me trying to add more content than I should, I'd go back and review that so that they're prepared for their finals at the end of this semester.
SPEAKER_01:I think that's great. You know, I think that we could come up with our own three R's, right? Regroup, reconnect, and refresh. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:That's excellent, actually. The three Rs of routine.
SPEAKER_01:Perfect. We're gonna call them up right. TM avid, TM. Well, thank you both for being here. I think we've covered so many topics that can just be helpful to everyone, whether it's students getting back in the classroom, teachers getting back in their routine, and helping those students to grow to really just adults trying to remember how to adult, right? As we get back into our routine as we start off a new year. Well, thank you both for being here. Thank you for the advice, and I hope the rest of the year is a success for all of you.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you. Thanks for having us. Thanks for having us here.
SPEAKER_01:And thank you for listening. If there's a topic you'd like to hear discussed on the podcast, send us an email to communications at canyonsdistrict.org.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks for listening to this episode of Connect Canyons. Connect with us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram at Canyons District or on our website, canyonsdistrict.org.
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