After the Bell: Teaching Tips With a Twist

Taking Tech Out Of The Classroom With Dylan Kane

• The Stunt Brothers • Season 2 • Episode 41

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In Episode 71 of After the Bell, the Stunt Brothers decide to think outside the box quite literally. Leaving the confines of the studio behind, our podcasters set up shop in Martin’s garden. Surrounded by fresh air, and blooming plants, they quickly notice that despite relying on technology to record the podcast, being outdoors makes them feel more relaxed, more focused, and perhaps a little more connected. This observation sets the stage perfectly for today’s virtual trip to Colorado to chat with Dylan Kane, a math teacher who made the bold decision to remove technology from his classroom. In an age where screens seem to be everywhere, Dylan’s experiment has led to some fascinating discoveries about student engagement, learning, attention, and classroom culture. Join Martin, Roy, and Dylan for an engaging and thought-provoking conversation about what happens when technology takes a back seat and why sometimes less technology can create more opportunities for meaningful learning.

Learn More at stuntbrothers.ca

key topics

  • Impact of screens on student attention and motivation
  • Dylan Kane's experience with reducing classroom technology
  • The role of social learning and community in education
  • AI's influence on learning habits and skills
  • cell phone bans in the classroom

keywords
education, classroom technology, screen time, student engagement, AI in education, teaching strategies, digital learning, classroom management, cell phones

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Speaker 1

Good afternoon, podcast listeners everywhere. Welcome to After the Bell, a Stunt Brothers production. I'm Martin Stuible.

Speaker 3

And I'm Roy Hunt, and we share your pain, having taught a combined 70 years. 70 years. I know. Wow. So get out your marking, organize your supplies, or just pour yourself a coffee. I think I need something stronger. That's okay. Okay. And listen, engage, and interact with After the Bell, a podcast for you, the hardworking, dedicated teacher who wants free lesson plans, free advice, and a free meal.

Speaker 1

Well, I always show up for a free meal.

STS With The Stunt Brothers

Speaker 1

Well, this isn't the box. This is not the recording studio.

Speaker 3

This is uh much more relaxing being in the box.

Speaker 1

Cheers, my friend. Episode 71 looks good on us. Yes. It's very chill. It's uh very chilled. Season two? Season two. Uh episode 41. That's correct. There we go. How about that? We're into June and we are live doing video because we have a guest later on that we'll tell you about the video episode as well. And we don't have the recording studio or the box as we call it. So we decided let's just go to my back garden. Yeah. And it kind of fits because a year ago, probably almost this very moment, we met with some.

Speaker 3

We met with Victor Elderton.

Speaker 1

Yeah, so you get you can hear the plane overhead, you can hear the stream going. This is live. This is not Uber technology.

unknown

Right?

Speaker 3

This is not AI. No, never. Because if this is what we're given for AI, then we worked on D aging and this is what we got.

Speaker 1

This is what we're really 105, but but you're right. A year ago we had Victory Alderton on, who is just a champion of all things outdoors, right? And we did it here in the back garden. It was a wonderful chat. And it's also timely because Victor is going to now defend his dissertation. He's just he's gonna be Dr. Alderton, and he's this month. It's very exciting. He's defending his dissertation, which I can't m believe the stress of that.

Speaker 3

What it is it like feats of strength?

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3

Got an arm wrestle. I got an arm wrestle. They pull they pull out the the the head of the dean of the university, and he's got arms like this. He said, Okay, take me on.

Speaker 1

Good luck. Good luck, Victor. We'll chair from the sidelines. I guess that's not what it means. Yeah. But technology, sometimes when you do get away from it, as we discuss with Victor, and as we're discussing, you know, we're clearly I still like technology and it has its place, but but there's a calm now that we're not in the studio. I guess partly because I'm in my back garden. Yeah. And that's my happy place.

Speaker 3

You feel the cool breeze. You can see the behind us, the the leaves moving on a tree. Yeah. There is a sense of sort of relaxation that comes from being outside. We're still in front of the technology as in front of the computer and we have the microphones here. But there is a a a sense of uh uh ease right now that comes from being here. Yeah. And I I guess it's it's almost looking at like right, if you were in uh intensely using technology and you're in an in that environment, but if you maybe I think we're kind of moving towards kind of the middle of it. We're using some technology, but we're not completely you know, we're not going back to the stone ages.

Speaker 1

Surrounded. You know, we have to do a podcast. Like, how would we do a podcast about technology? Would we be like the town crier in the square? Oh, I'd be good at that.

Speaker 3

Oh, I'd give a big yell. I have great projections. Yeah, hear you, hear ye. After the battle. And neighbors would be calling the police on us. You know, like those guys are screaming at each other in the backyard. Yeah, after the battle yellers again.

Speaker 1

That's when they say hang 'em, hang 'em. We're going back to the middle middle ages, it's that's who knows where we'd end up. That's like, oh, we've got a stockade down the street, we'll take care of you. But it's also it's this is perfect for today's episode because I read The Atlantic, okay, a really well established uh publication. Okay. I subscribe to The Atlantic and I'm flipping through reading The Atlantic, and there's this article about someone called Dylan Kane.

Speaker 2

Okay.

Speaker 1

Who's a math teacher in Colorado. You know, you think he taught grade seven math for many years? Totally was into the technology, had his Chromebooks, which a lot of schools kind of brought on, especially in COVID.

Speaker 3

Yeah.

Speaker 1

Right? And uh he recently decided to ditch all that to try try teaching without. He's certainly in no way anti-technology, and that will come out. But uh he decided to try, and he's getting a lot of uh discussion going on because of the success and the change in the behavior of the students he's noticed. So he's the guy. We're gonna go to Colorado.

unknown

Wow.

Speaker 1

We're gonna go I did Pacquiac. We're going to Leadville, Colorado, I believe. I'll confirm that with him when we talk to him, right? Okay. Which is even higher than Denver, which is the mile high city. Okay. Leadville is is 10,000 and something feet, so quite high up. So I don't know. Lead. Do you I think it's well let's ask him because I think it's lead, because it was a silver mining town. Oh, okay. That's when it was established by these two uh prospectors in the 1800s. Okay. And that was why they named it, I think, connected to lead, right? Even though it was silver. So I don't know. Let's let's find out when we get to that. So when we go we go to Leadville, Leadville, we go to this major mile high city in town and talk to Dylan Kane and just about like this this is why I like this organic part. Because we've heard people talk about it, we've had the thinkers talk about it, but to me it sounds like Dylan's putting this into action. Yeah.

Speaker 3

I mean, there's a lot uh exactly. I I love it because there is a lot of talk. There's like, okay, technology, uh, we should limit technology. There there are governments that are uh trying to see if they can prevent kids uh from going on to certain social media platforms. Uh but they're talking about it, but this is someone who who is um not all talk, just action. Yeah. And I'd love to hear what um what kind of results uh he's had. And uh I imagine there there'll be a few uh comments from some teachers and parents that would be interesting to hear too.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and as they say, he's got boots on the ground, and so let's go. Let's go to Colorado. All right. Going on a field trip, field trip to Colorado to talk to Dylan Kane.

Speaker 2

Let's

Fieldtrip With Dylan Kane

Speaker 2

go.

Speaker 3

Today on After the Bell, we're joined by Dylan Kane, a Colorado teacher who is part of an international conversation about one of the biggest issues facing education today: technology in the classroom.

Speaker 1

Dylan Kane is a National Board certified high school math teacher in Leadville, Colorado. He often writes about the intersections of research and practice in math education. I have read many of his posts on Substack and they are excellent. Dylan's decision to dramatically reduce the use of screens in his classroom recently caught the attention of The Atlantic, where he was profiled for challenging the assumption that more technology automatically leads to better learning.

Speaker 3

At a time when schools are investing heavily in devices, apps, and digital platforms, Dylan has been asking a different question. What might students be losing when screens become the center of the learning experience? His observations about student attention, engagement, relationships, and what he calls the return to genuine classroom community have resonated with many, and he sure caught our attention too.

Speaker 1

So grab your coffee, put your phone on silent, at least for the next hour, and join us as we welcome teacher, writer, and international conversation starter, Dylan Kane. Dylan, welcome to After the Bell. Thanks for having me. Yeah, this is great.

Speaker 3

So we're gonna uh we're gonna start with the ABC one, two, three. I will do the ABC, Martin will do the one, two, three. Are you ready? And I know we always say there is no wrong answer, but when anyone says there is no wrong answer, people sort of start to uh sweat it out. Yeah, so don't worry. But don't worry about it. All right, A. Hiking in the Rocky Mountains or skiing in the Rocky Mountains? Ooh. Uh hiking. Okay. Hiking. Uh are you an avid hiker? Hiker and trail runner.

Speaker 1

Oh wow. And you're like Leadville, I believe, is right in the Rockies.

Speaker

Yeah, it's actually the highest altitude city in the United States. So I'm at about 10,000 feet or uh 3,000 meters for the metric folks.

Speaker 1

Because they always talk about Denver, right, being the mile high city, but uh you work you're you you top it, eh? Closer to closer to two miles high, yeah. Wow. Oh amazing.

Speaker 3

Wow. B a beautiful mind or goodwill hunting. Goodwill hunting. And C a Wi-Fi outage or a photocopy or jam? A Wi-Fi outage, easy.

Speaker

Why's that? Uh first of all, they happen pretty frequently where I work because it's it's up in the mountains, it's a small rural town. Um, so there's like I guess there's just like one line in, right, or something. And so probably like five times this year, and it just doesn't bother me being a paper and pencil guy. Um but yeah, photocopier, we we use lots of paper, and there's nothing worse than being kind of on the spot, right? Like you got to get those copies for next period.

Speaker 1

And there's ten and there's ten people in the line up behind you, right?

Speaker

Or or the toner is out, and whoever finished the toner didn't replace it.

Speaker 3

So often. They don't. So you you walk up to the photocopier and it's jammed before you even start. Yeah.

Speaker

I am I I'm I am a proud toner replacer, photocopier, unjammer. I at a previous school when the director of operations, the like person in charge of that stuff, was out for uh a vacation, I was the person who was the like second in command just for the copiers. Nothing else. Just if the copiers get jammed, you were the guy. Call Dylan. Dylan Dylan will deal with it, at least for this week.

Speaker 1

There was a special code over the PA system, right? Okay, one, two, three. Dylan, do you have a favorite teacher when you were a student, when you were in elementary or high school that stands out?

Speaker

Uh, you know, I I had a lot of great teachers. Um I think uh one who uh who I always remember is uh Miss Shepherd, was my senior year English teacher in uh an English literature class, and um was just great at getting kids thinking about stuff that they wanted to read and balancing reading some stuff together with it kind of uh encouraging us to find books that that we loved on our own. And um and that was really a turning point for me and my my personal enjoyment of reading. Yeah. Was there one book that stands out that she kind of got you on to? Um yeah, that's that's a good question. I I mean I I feel like it's a bit of a blur for me exactly which books I read, like because of her. Um I uh I I I do remember, you know, Toni Morrison's beloved is a really hard read. I didn't love reading it with her, but um I love the conversations we had about it. And I I just still remember some of the specific things she said around yeah, some of like the kind of plays on words um from that book.

Speaker 1

So wonderful. Okay, number two, I I got two mathematicians for you Archimedes or Pascal.

Speaker

Who I mean these are these is based on kind of shallow knowledge, not an expert here, but I my my memory is that Archimedes had these ingenious constructions um to prove different things. And um I just have a have a memory of loving some of those. Not that I could recreate them in this. No, no, no.

Speaker 1

Fantastic. No, great. And Dylan, if you had only one piece of music that you could listen to for the rest of your life, you couldn't listen to anything else, you don't have to play it over and over again. But let's say you're on a deserted island, you have this one piece, you play it when you want to. Is there one piece that stands out? Uh can I take a whole album? Yeah, sure. Sure. I'll give you an album. Taylor Swift's Red. Okay, great. Good. What is it about Red that stands out for you?

Speaker

Uh I mean, I'm I'm a big Taylor Swift fan, and I just think it's a good album top to bottom. It's kind of like her transition from country more towards pop. You get a bit of both sides, you get the songwriting, you get some of like the energy of her her more modern side. So yeah.

Speaker 1

I love her folklore album. Yeah, folklore is great. That was great. Yeah.

unknown

All right.

Speaker 1

Let's go. Let's get into it.

Speaker 3

You were the early believer in classroom technology. What caused you to embrace the adoption of technology?

Speaker

I mean, I I think a big part of it is just um as a teacher, I've always felt like I'm pretty unsatisfied with my success in the classroom. That I just have a lot of students who um often feel frustrated or feel like they um feel like they aren't learning, or I feel like even when I have some successes, student understanding isn't as like flexible as I would like it to be. And I I I think to me, a lot of the promise of technology was around um kind of uh helping to improve some of those outcomes, especially for students who really struggle with math, helping them visualize, helping them get better feedback. Um I mean, I I think early on the promises of technology were kind of everything. Like you like, you name it, you name a challenge in the classroom, and it could meet students where they are, it could give them instant feedback, it could give them more practice. It can customize it for their interests, like all these sorts of things. And so I think like my optimism was pretty broad when I first started using it.

Speaker 1

Was there a moment when you thought, no, this isn't working? Was there one that stands out or was it just a kind of it did a process slowly on on round?

Speaker

I mean, I I think it happened slowly, but I think a big part of it was just realizing that just because someone can do something with technology doesn't mean that they've learned something from it. Okay. Um so like I I I've always been a huge user of Desmos. Um and I I love love Desmos. I actually used a Desmos activity today in my class by projecting it up front and having students answer questions um like verbally or on on many whiteboards. And I was really excited about the promise early on, but realized that a lot of students were kind of like guessing and checking their way through some things and just not retaining what what you might think they would retain, given how cool and um how flashy some of the activities seem.

Speaker 3

So you went from hauling Chromebooks uh through the hallway to your classroom to unplugging them. Uh how did your colleagues and and administration and parents uh think about your what did they think about your decision?

Speaker

So I I would say the the biggest um biggest thing I would emphasize is that there hasn't been much of a reaction. Nice. I have yet to hear a comment from a parent. Okay. Um, you know, I I did parent teacher conferences in March and no one brought it up. And I have a lot of other stuff to talk about, right? About students. Um I'm not I'm not like soliciting their opinions. I just I you know I thought that was interesting. I would say um, you know, uh administrators didn't really notice at first, talked about it later, didn't seem like a big deal. Um the um our our tech guy was the first person to notice. He was like, Hey, I haven't heard from you in a few weeks. Are you doing okay? Like you because before I would always say be saying, hey, like this student is a Chromebook issue, that student is a Chromebook issue, and all of a sudden I went silent. Um and you know, colleagues, I I would say uh they've been supportive, but uh there's there's one who I think I've I've converted who is like very close to low tech now, but she was pretty low tech before. Um and I I think uh for the most part, I mean it it's it it's now just part of what I do, and um, I work in a school where people do a lot of different things. And yeah, that's that's that.

Speaker 1

And and was it January when you first started this? Yeah. Is it that recent? Yeah. Was there anything that very first month that you noticed right away? Or did it take a while to see a difference in student behavior and outcomes?

Speaker

Um, I mean, like the first thing I noticed was just that the technology can be such a pain, right? Like I spend so much time, you know, like the Wi-Fi's out, so I'm scrambling, or um like the login doesn't work for this one student, and now I'm like trying to problem solve this one student's issue, or you know, just things as simple as like I don't have a charger, or my you know, stuff like that. Like that stuff was just out the window. I think that was that was the first thing, and I like the simplest thing. But despite it being really simple, like that has really made a huge difference just in my ability to run class smoothly and focus on students and focus on learning.

Speaker 1

Yeah, when you talk about that, it always reminds me of any presentations you go to, and you know, everyone's comment often is technology's great until it doesn't work. Like, you know, someone's doing a PowerPoint or something, whatever it was, that whatever it has been at different stages of technology. The great presenters were just ones that could get up and speak and talk about it and be engaging, but when you base it on technology, it it's as good as your Wi-Fi, it's as good as your connection, it's as good as your laptop. Yeah.

Speaker 3

So you you've talked about how students pay more attention now. Um what does that attention look like in the classroom?

Speaker

I mean, I I I think the biggest thing is that um I think when when screens come into the classroom, they bring a lot of uh student habits with them. Like students have certain habits around the ways they interact with screens. And the biggest one is just that once they are paying attention to a screen, it is very hard to shift their attention to something else. It's not impossible, right? But there's this transaction cost every time. And we could sit here and have a really like in the in the weeds debate around like should you tilt the screens down, should you turn them around, should you shut it in entirely, right? And like I I've tried all those different things and we could like get into it there, but just taking them out of the classroom, it's not like students are suddenly paying perfect attention to every single thing I say. No, right, but there's one fewer thing I'm fighting against. And I I I do think, just subjectively speaking, I think students today have a different relationship with screens than students did 10, 15 years ago when I started using technology just because of the habits that they are bringing from outside of the classroom.

Speaker 1

And I think we are kind of programmed to look up at screens. Like I think if when I if I go to a restaurant or a bar that has TVs all around, I could be engaging in great conversation. I know I shouldn't look up at these, you know, this I don't care about basketball over here or football over there, but I start looking at it. And I think I've read it's almost an evolutionary thing. You know, you're you you're in Africa and there's that lion moving, you're gonna look up, you're gonna be aware of it. And somehow I think screens captivate us in that way.

Speaker

Yeah, well, yeah, because screens are always changing, right? That's like that's part of what they do as a piece of technology. Right. And so I think that's part of why, like, like you said, our like evolutionary bias towards paying attention to them. Right. But a lot of the time, what we want students to do is actually to pay attention to something that doesn't change, right? To like slow down and think about the meaning behind what's in front of them rather than trying to like get on to the next thing. Right.

Speaker 1

Attention has come up a lot in our podcast lately, and the idea of you know, you always hear heard people say, Well, kids these days their attention spans are only a minute long, so we've got to teach to that. Do you think attention can be taught? Do you think we can expand the length of time one can have attention, or is it something we just have we've changed because of screens? Is it hardwired now?

Speaker

So so my read is that the like fundamental attention span I don't think has changed much. Um but I I would frame it around habits. I think students come into the classroom with a lot of habits from um from their lives and from the the different like attention profile of the stuff that they're experiencing in their lives. Um but we have the chance to help students build new habits. Yes, right. And so I think that requires some intentionality, right? We're kind of swimming upstream a little bit. I think it's harder to do that than it was before. But I I think on like a fundamental, like um uh you know, uh neuroscientific level, I don't think there's anything dramatic that has changed inside of our students' brains if we can kind of reset some of those habits and build our own routines and build kind of our our own culture around what attention looks like in our classrooms. Yeah.

Speaker 1

I I often talk about these Zen Tangles I used to do with my class, and they have to, it's just this art thing, really, you know, fine line drawers and focus. And they really have to concentrate and do the art. And when we first tried it, you know, get through five minutes, it was too much. Eventually they could go an hour and they were so focused and concentrating, and then I'd say, How do you feel? And they go, my brain, just it's we talk about what was going on in the brain, how calm they felt, right? And it's something we've lost, but I I think we can rediscover it, right? We can we could we could have new habits for sure.

Speaker 3

So did you initially uh talk to your students and say we're not gonna use technology in the classroom, or did you just go ahead and they d they found out? From the fact that there was no technology in the classroom. And w uh what were the students' responses by not using technology?

Speaker

Yeah, so I mean I um I I told students it was an experiment. I said I'm gonna try this for a month. I said at the end of the month I'm gonna give you a survey and ask you what you think. And then I'll I'll make a decision and I'll I'll tell you what we're gonna do going forward. Um the students really took it in stride. I I had a couple students who were like, yes, this is awesome. I didn't have anyone who was really negative about it at the beginning. Okay. Um I had a lot of students who were like, yeah, wow, like we use we use Chromebooks a lot. Like, you know, nice to have a break. Um and then we we dove in and uh and like you know, a few days later it was like it was all forgotten. It was just the new way we do things.

Speaker 2

Wow.

Speaker 1

And I like that when you go back to when you were using screens more often and computers, can you you've you've talked about the you know, it's like gravity, it's pulling them in to look at that screen. Was can you describe what it was like before when you were trying to teach a lesson? And they all looked engaged, but they really were not.

Speaker

Yeah, I mean I I think it looked like a couple different things. I think I really changed the way I teach with technology. Like when I was using it five, ten years ago, I would often stop students because I would notice something people were getting confused about, or that just like it's worth talking about as a class, and I would stop everyone and we would talk about it. And I was doing that less because it felt like there was more transaction cost in trying to pause the class, bring their attention towards like up front, towards a piece of student work, something else, um, and then to get everyone back um on the screens again. So it had kind of already um changed the way I I was doing that. But I I think some examples are you know, I would just see students staring at their screens, or if I asked them to close them, um, just like like trying to like lift them up. And I I often use Desmos activities and Desmos has a pause button, right? So like their screens would be paused, and they still they're like waiting to see if it's unpaused, right? And like to look back at it. And um, I I I think that that that's one that's one big example of of the gravity. The second is like I I've loved just not having Chromebooks on students' desks. Like I think just it's just one more thing that I think takes a little bit of space in their brains. Um and I I it it it feels like a kind of a subjective thing, right? It's just like my my judgment of like the stuff that like we're just always like fiddling with it, and I think it just it just pulls students in in a way that pulls their attention away from what I want them to be learning. Yeah.

Speaker 1

In the Atlantic article, you talk about uh Jared Cooney Horvath and how you had read the digital delusion, and it I've also read that book, and I've read Jonathan Hayes Anxious Generation, um, which it gets a lot of buzz. Now Horvath blames technology for the widely documented decline in student achievement. You said you actually disagree with Horvath a bit a bit in that, and you don't think it is the primary culprit behind declining test scores. What why?

Speaker

Um, I mean we can get uh into the weeds around like I basically think it it's a correlational result, and he he he plays with the numbers a bit, and I I think I can push back on on some of the specifics. But at a high level, um test scores have been declining across the entire developed world for the past 10 or 15 years. Um test scores have been declining for uh tests that countries give to working age adults, or like adults who have been out of schools for decades. Um and I I think it's reasonable to think about the role of technology in those declines, right? Like I think technology, social media, short-form video, like all these things that kind of um uh are are sources of cognitive automation that like just prevent us from having to think as hard about stuff, I think are are reasonable culprits for um for those declines. Horvath's specific thesis is that classroom technology, right? Like putting Chromebooks in front of kids in classrooms is is the cause there. And I just think you look at this happening at about the same time across different states and countries, across different ages. I I just don't think it's gonna be that neat and tidy of a like cause and effect. And one of the reasons that I often bring this up is I think we should set reasonable expectations. I I have become an advocate against classroom technology, not to cut it down to zero, right, but to significantly reduce the amount of screen time students have in schools. But I'm not saying that as the like miracle cure, right, for everything that's hard in schools. I I think it'll probably help a little bit, but um, you know, if if if you want to um if you want to create a great education for kids, there are so, so, so many things that matter. And I think technology is just one small piece of that puzzle. And so I think setting clear expectations, like I would not want someone to listen to things I say and cut technology out of their school and expect their test scores to skyrocket the next year. That's not gonna happen. It is just not in line with any of the evidence we have about schools and testing and education. So that's that's that's the big thing I emphasize.

Speaker 1

Dylan, I think that's really why it's because I mean I started teaching in 1990, and I could tell you the number of miracle cures that have come along, you know, in that years of teaching, right? And a good teacher just has to kind of look at it, okay, take a little bit from here, navigate it. Or you're gonna get whiplash if you constantly change with education. There's always that person that says, This is the one. Yeah. Well, it's a complex thing to understand how kids learn and what causes their decline, right? And I think there's many things going on right now. Yeah.

Speaker 3

Yeah. Yep. Did did you actually have any students who did learn better from using technology that uh that benefited from having screens in a classroom?

Speaker

Yeah, so I I can't point to any like obvious examples. I will say one thing that comes to mind is that I think technology is great for very motivated students. I think in 2026, we are living in a golden age of learning resources for anyone who is self-motivated. Anything you want to learn, there are resources online, there are courses, there's ways to practice and get feedback that didn't exist decades ago. And uh that's something I have I benefit I benefit from, right? Like I um just in the last like five years, I've become like a mediocre, self-taught chess player. And the resources online for teaching yourself chess are amazing and just far beyond what existed a couple decades ago. And so I think students who are very motivated to practice on their own, right? To like realize that they're confused about something and go home and just like bang their head against the the screen until they figure it out. Paper and pencil isn't a great resource for that, right? Like it's hard for me to print out something every single day for that student to go and you know go through that process. Um and there's so many awesome awesome things online. Now a student can totally do that, right? But if you're kind of like a tech forward teacher, if you're already using a lot of these online resources, they have a like a fluency, right, and a uh like uh ease with with those tools that they can just take this thing we're we're already using and spend more time on it, right? And so um I I it's hard for me to point to a a specific student I I teach who I'm like you would you would do better if I if I were using technology more, but I I do think that's a use case that teachers in schools should think about.

Speaker 3

Yeah, I I it it's interesting because I've always right when what when I was younger, I always went to the library, right? That's where all that information was, and so I would go through and I'd find the books that I wanted. And and oftentimes I would tell my students, you know, you have this computer, you have the the sum total of all the information available at your fingertips in the world, but you're you're watching cat videos. And but I I believe that's uh because it it's it it's it's for for entertainment, but but not necessarily productivity. And I think if you're motivated, like you say, you're a motivated individual, you can get a vast amount of information uh from using technology. And if not, then it's uh it's a pay an expense of paperweight and um uh another TV uh for you for someone.

Speaker

Yeah, and I I would say the majority of students fall in the the cat videos side of things. And I understand it, like learning, learning requires efforts. Totally, yeah. Like learning learning requires effort, right? That's just like basic, basic physics. It takes it takes energy and focus and time to learn stuff. And I think um the there is something that for some reason really motivates some people. If we could figure that out and put it in a bottle, like sign me up. Yes. Um we we have not figured that out. And in in in in the meantime, I think I I like my approach for the vast majority of students while also recognizing that I I I want to really keep doors open for students who are excited and want to bound ahead.

Speaker 1

I like the way you say learning requires an effort. Like learning is hard. Yes, it's really hard to master something. Yeah, and we've tried to make it sound like it's easy. You can learn a language like that, you know, whatever it is, you can play guitar like that. No, all those things are really hard. You've got to do it over and over again. It's gonna take practice, and sometimes it's gonna be frustrating. Yeah, and I think we need to revisit that sometimes. Now, you you also, when you went back, you revisited pen and paper, right? You got that back. Um what surprised you when you switched back to more pen and paper rather than completing assignments on the Chromebooks?

Speaker

Um, I mean, I so I think the biggest thing, and it connects to what we were just talking about with motivation, is that um there there's this idea with technology that we have like um a greater ability to respond to student thinking or to catch misconceptions right away, right? Because like we just get so much data from these technological tools. Um my experience was that data was often overwhelming. And it wasn't great for us to all be in the classroom and I'm staring at my screen, and the students are staring at their screens, and it becomes a little bit uh uh like like like why are we all here, right? Why are we all in the same room, right? Why not just like put us all in our own separate soundproof booth? Right. So with pencil and paper, while I have to put some effort in to like gather the information to walk around the room and say, all right, I want to look at everyone's number three and see what students said for number three, right? And like use that to figure out what to do next. I felt more in touch with um with student thinking, right? And was with just like the tenor of the class. Like, right, are we getting it or do we need to slow down? And I think me being in touch with that and just like spending more time walking around the room and looking at student thinking and like interacting with their work, um, I think that improved motivation and effort from students, right? Because that human connection, like me expressing, hey, I'm walking around because I care about you and I care about your thinking and I want to make sure you're learning. Um I think that really made a difference for student motivation. And that's totally possible with screens, but there's something that's just impersonal about them. Um and it's it's very easy for students to kind of hide behind a screen and to feel anonymous and to not get noticed and to be confused and a little ashamed and to just say I I don't want anyone to to see this right now. And uh that still happens with paper, but I think it happens less. Yeah.

Speaker 3

Countries have moved ahead on uh with bans on smartphones. Uh Australia was is the first one to come to mind. Um what do you think about that?

Speaker

Um, I mean I I'm for it. I think uh my school just went with a pretty strong smartphone ban this year. Okay, and I think it's it's been fantastic. I'm uh I I'm a huge fan. Um I also think similar to what I was saying earlier about technology, I don't want to pretend that it's uh it's gonna cure everything, right? There was just a recent study suggesting that it maybe didn't lead to learning gains, at least in the short term. And that's just one study on one specific methodology. Yeah, so I I don't want to put too much stock in that. Um here's an interesting anecdote. Um the the school I work at, I I I would guess um last school year, we had so I I work in a seventh through twelfth grade high school. Okay and I I'm in the seventh and eighth grade wing, right? So we're kind of in our own corner. We share teachers and classrooms and all this stuff. I I would estimate we had somewhere between like seven and ten fights last year. I think this year we've had one. And one reason is those fights are often started by students messing each messaging each other on their phones. And they're aggravated by students then spreading word that there's gonna be a fight on their phones, right? Or they use their phones to coordinate where to meet up, or they're filming it in the bathroom, or something like that. Right. And so I I I think there are academic benefits, but there are also just social and emotional benefits. It's so lovely to go into the cafeteria and the students are not all staring at their phones, right? They're talking to each other, they're doing stupid stuff, and that's what they should be doing. They shouldn't be doing it. Like I just I just love seeing it.

Speaker 1

How how does it work the uh the ban at your school? Do they have to put them in a pouch at the beginning of the day, or are they how how does it play out?

Speaker

So so we we actually do both for seventh and eighth grade, we do uh phone safes. So the students put their phone in a safe at the beginning of the day, they get it back at the end. If they are caught with a phone at any time in between, there are some pretty significant consequences involving parents having to come and pick up the phone. Yeah. Um we went with the pouches for ninth through twelfth grade. Um just because ninth through twelfth graders come and go a lot more, many of them take community college classes, they have free periods. Um that hasn't gone as well. I think they they say it's an improvement, but um the the height the the the teachers of the older grades are a little bit jealous of us um in terms of how how smoothly our system has gone.

Speaker 1

What were the parents quite supportive along the way?

Speaker

Yeah, yeah, and I mean I I think our district did a good job. I think I we were frustrated because our district spent a year creating a committee and talking about the policy, and it it took forever, but it got a lot of buy-in, right? And so the teachers last year said, Hey, can we just do this? Can we just do the thing we know we're gonna do? And the answer was no, we have to go through the committee. And um, I think one benefit of that has been that the parents have been really bought in, and I I have not heard any complaints about it.

Speaker 1

You've talked about this with uh teaching, you get a better sense of where they're at, but it's also harder to teach that way, right? I think our whole life is kind of with whether it's parents giving kids who are five years old an iPad just to stay out of their hair, right? I think we've all found these different ways with screens to kind of make our life easier, but sometimes it needs to be harder. Yep. Um did did you find the teaching more rewarding though, once you got the screens out of the way?

Speaker

Yeah, definitely. And one reason I I've stuck with it is just that it's it's kind of like hold holding me accountable. Um I think a lot of the things that were easier about teaching were things that were less effort for me to prep, and then a little less effort in the classroom, and a little bit less learning. And and each of those differences is small, right? And so I think the reason I liked kind of going cold turkey is it helped me see what all of those small differences added up to. Right. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3

Did you find it more exhausting?

Speaker

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, and and I I also just think, you know, something I have felt um about teaching with technology is it is just so easy to say to students, all right, like we're gonna spend the last 10 minutes of class on our like, you know, math practice website, and say, here's the assignment. And one option is I circulate around the room and I like look at the data and I figure out who I need to check in with, right? And like try and support them. But it is just so easy to sit back and look at my screen, and all the students look at their screens and just feel like I I pushed the easy button for those 10 minutes. And it is totally possible to do that with a piece of paper, right? To hand out a piece of paper and say, great, you know, you students do it, I'm gonna sit over here. So I I I'm not saying this doesn't happen with paper and pencil, but I I found the pull of my screen and the pull of their screens is just so much stronger to make me kind of like a passive observer in the classroom for for chunks of time.

Speaker 1

In terms of just in terms of behavior in the class, did you find when you moved to pencil and paper you had to deal with more behavior issues? Whereas because screens were at least making them look like they were engaged, even though they weren't. Did you then have to kind of change your teaching that way?

Speaker

I I think a little bit. I think it wasn't huge. I would say definitely like the the class feels more energetic, right? There's more like energy and momentum for me to corral as a teacher. Yeah. And there's some different stuff, right? Like I I've I don't have to deal with students like doing some of the things they can do with a computer that are way worse than what they can do with a piece of paper, right? In terms of like messaging each other or some things like that that we've run into as a school.

Speaker 1

Yeah, for sure.

Speaker

Um so I it's nice not to deal with those, but I would say like on an everyday basis, yeah, like I there the the the energy leads to some more kind of lower level stuff, but stuff that bothers every teacher that I have to respond to, yeah.

Speaker 1

And that energy can be a good thing, right? For sure. Yeah, you want that. Yeah, I mean it's you want a class filled with energy, right? I would say there's do you want a bunch of zombies or do you want higher variability? Higher variability for sure. Yes.

Speaker 3

Yeah. So if you could go back to the very beginning, right? Uh how would you introduce technology differently? Or would you?

Speaker

Yeah, I don't know. Um it's it i it it's hard because like I think a lot of the technology I I used has shaped me as a teacher. I think a lot of the different dynamic online resources have really helped broaden my horizons in terms of what math can be and the types of problems we can ask students. You know, I um I still love Desmos activities. I think they have so many interesting ways to get students thinking hard about connections and um the different ways that we can visualize math and the ways we can represent mathematical ideas. Now I just do them by projecting an activity up front, and I have students answer on on many whiteboards or discuss with a turn and talk. Um and I'm not sure I would have started doing that right if if I hadn't had the experience of using them in the like student-facing uh version first. So I don't know. I I I think I've I've benefited a lot from from technology, and I I I think a lot of that learning has kind of shaped the teacher I am now. Just for our listeners, could you explain what decimal's activities are? Yeah, I'm not yeah. Um so I mean it's um uh a company that's that's been around for uh over ten years that makes um dynamic math activities. So um the idea is to kind of show students what that math looks like in action. So an example we use today is we were doing some uh some problems about inequalities, where the answer might be like X is less than four. And the way the Desmos activity for this works that we were looking at today, it's called Shira the sheep. And Shira is a sheep who wants to eat grass. And so x is less than four. Imagine you plop Shira down on the number four, and since it's less than Shira goes to the um, you know, towards the negative direction, right? Or towards zero, and then and so Shira gets to eat all that grass, right? And so the question is like how can we optimize how much grass Shira eats? And okay, she gets to eat more if there's x is less than six, right? And you can imagine different configurations of grass and water we don't want Shira to fall into, um, and then we start to solve different types of inequalities, um, where it might be five X is less than 15. And it's um it's a way of kind of visualizing what that solution set looks like. And so the way I used it is I did a little quick little activity to show students Shira the sheep, and you know, we like did it like two or three different problems that we project and we can see what happens and we can see the results of that calculation. And then um we went from there to something separate with paper and pencil on how we graph inequalities, right? You take a number line, you shade in all the numbers less than four, right? To kind of use that um physical representation to give students an anchor into like what we mean when we when we shade those things in.

Speaker 1

Good. Thank you. Now it's it's kind of funny times right now because you know, on one hand, a lot of people are having this conversation about you know getting kids off cell phones, technology, but we're also entering the AI world. It's like we're going in two direct what's what you know, which way are we gonna go? Do you have concerns about AI? Do you think we're we're suddenly, you know, we say, Oh, look at what cell phones did to us, and suddenly here comes AI and we're all jumping on that bandwagon now. You but what is your view of our future and what maybe we should do to be just a little careful with this?

Speaker

So I would say I have very strong opinions about AI. And the first two things that come to mind, number one, AI is most powerful right now for people who have a lot of knowledge in a domain. A knowledgeable, skilled teacher might be able to use AI to come up with additional examples, right? Or to find ways to amplify what they already know how to do. Someone who has no idea how to teach will end up getting generic, uh generic advice that they struggle to understand and struggle to implement well, and it won't help them become a better teacher. Right. And so that's a teaching example, but I think that that's true across different domains. So our job is to help students develop expertise before they use AI. Yes, because they become dependent on it. And that's something I'm observing. You know, I I don't I don't use Chromebooks in in classrooms uh very often now. I I've used them twice in since January. And um but but I I still see students in homeroom right working on assignments for other classes and I talk to them about their work in other classes. And one thing I feel alarmed by is I'm seeing a lot of students become dependent on AI as soon as something becomes hard. They've developed this habit where as soon as they don't know something, they want AI to do it for them. And I think that habit it has the potential to cripple students. Yeah. If if that becomes the way they look at the world, they they're not gonna develop that expertise, right? Where they become someone who is amplified by AI, they they become dependent on it. And I think the future uh in in my best estimation is uh a place where humans still need expertise, and we have more and more powerful tools to amplify expertise. And our our job as as teachers is to help students see that they need to use their own brain, right? And to show show them what their brains can do and to not allow them to get in the habit of uh of outsourcing their thinking to AI at the first sign of difficulty.

unknown

Yeah.

Speaker 1

Dylan, that really mirrors what we had. We had a guest on, his name was Andrew Cantarudi, and he really talks about the cognitive offloading that happens when schools allow students to use AI to do their thinking. Learning is hard, as we've said. It's messy. You know, it's you could get a class that would brainstorm story ideas, and they might be just, you know, superheroes and things that aren't really that creative. So you get AI to do it for you, and it suddenly they look amazing, but the thinking was not done. It's not their ideas. They don't have that skill level level yet, right? Totally. And that's the danger.

Speaker

And and and I agree with you, and and I would really emphasize like it's not just about the lost learning from that activity. For me, it's about the habits I'm seeing students build, where they then, in a different class where they aren't allowed to use AI, are more likely to give up and are more likely to just throw in a towel when things get hard because of that experience of being able to outsource their thinking when things get hard.

Speaker 3

You use the term collective uh effervescence, right? So why is social learning so important to math?

Speaker

Yep. Um, I mean, I think social learning is important to everything, right? So um here's here's an example I like to use. I um I am slowly over time working on my Spanish skills. I have a lot of students and families who speak Spanish as their first language, and I'm trying to get better at at uh at speaking Spanish. And um I really struggle to motivate myself a lot of the time, right? And here's something I I would benefit from. Like, what if like once a week there was a meetup where people who were all trying to learn Spanish all got together, and I had that accountability, right? There's other humans there who were like, hey, where's Dylan? Is Dylan coming this week? Um, that would really help me be more consistent in my Spanish learning. Right? And you go down that road and you're like, okay, what if we all got together at the same time? What if we like found someone and we all chipped in and this person had some expertise, right? And they could like help to guide us in our journeys, and all of a sudden we've invented classrooms and teachers, right? And like I um and it wouldn't be perfect, but that social accountability of someone else doing the same thing I'm doing, I think can help to um motivate people and get people in into routines, right? Where like every day we show up to this room at 10:34 a.m. and we all do math together, and this weird guy makes some jokes and tells us that you know, here's this thing that we should we should try to learn, right? And so I I mean I think there's just this basic wiring of humans where we want to do things together. And I think schools are imperfect places, like what I described is not uh like uh a fairy tale for everyone, but it is uh like in in the words of Winston Churchill, it it's the worst way of education ever invented, except for all the others.

Speaker 1

I love it.

Speaker

Um and so I I I think when screens are in the room, often the premise of screens is trying to quote unquote personalize learning, right, where everyone's doing something slightly different. And I think that breaks down those social bonds, right? When when I say, hey, we're gonna learn something together about inequalities, and I'm gonna give you a piece of paper with eight inequality questions, and we're all gonna try those questions on our own, and then we're gonna talk about them, and we're gonna say, hey, here are some common places we're seeing people get stuck, right? And then we're gonna try and figure out and work through that stuff together. Like it it it sounds basic and boring, and it it's not perfect, but I think it's one of the best tools we have to get students learning in in this like public education system that we're working under.

Speaker 1

And I think community is so important, and we've lost that. And schools are like one of the last places where you can still have community. Yeah, I mean you you could be at home and order everything, get food delivered, never see anybody, go to the store, use the checkout machine, not talk to the cashier. So community is quickly disappearing. So schools is the one place where we have to learn how to how to work together. Yeah. And if we take that away and they're suddenly in front of screens, then that's it.

Speaker 4

Yeah.

Speaker

I, you know, I um I was was talking with with some colleagues recently about how um for some reason where I live, it's pretty common for students to enroll in online school and to try out online school. By common I mean it's not like everyone, right? But like we'll we'll see a handful of students a year, right? And I was talking with colleagues because we we were kind of comparing notes around some students who we talked to, and over and over again we hear this story of a student who goes and tries online school, right? Because they're frustrated and they they feel like school isn't moving fast enough for them or or or whatever. And over and over again they come back and like, oh, I was bored. Yeah, I I I'd rather be able to see my friends in the hall between classes. And it like it sounds so so simple, but like that that community makes such a difference, right? And like like we we have all these amazing educational tools. I have no doubt that you can teach yourself the content that we want students to learn in public education online, but I uh a lot of students aren't choosing it, right? Yeah, and I mean and that that option's available, right? If if that's what you need, great. The the option is available to you, but we are seeing students choose community.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah. That's good. Yeah. Where do you see us in five years and way technology is going as it are we get it? It's because there's it's hard to tell, isn't it, really, right now? Because I think there's a lot of debate back and forth. Yeah. I don't know. Where do you hope to see us? Where do you hope to see us?

Speaker

Yeah. I will say, like, I don't feel like I have been very successful at changing people's minds. Just in in in my networks, in my school. Um I uh the the school board asked me to come and talk to them after the Atlantic article. They were very nice, they're very receptive, right? But I've seen no sign that we're making any substantive changes as as a district. Um I I think one thing that is a really strong pull towards technology right now is uh is the the the testing and accountability regime, right? Like all of our tests are online, um, and that's true. I I think across all of the US and maybe across much of the world. Yeah. Um I think that means that schools are still gonna have to invest in a lot of technology. And I think it's gonna be hard to justify saying, hey, we can't use this stuff if we're spending all this money buying it and keeping it around. Um so my my guess is that we're gonna see it it decrease. My guess is that we're gonna see um curriculum adoptions are gonna lean towards paper and pencil first curricula, right? Like I think that's one shift that I I think is our is already underway from from what I'm hearing anecdotally, right? And that's not that adopting paper and pencil means you can't use technology, right? But at least saying we're not gonna make teachers use technology with some of these technology first curricula. I I think that's that's one trend that I think is pretty likely to continue. My guess is that we we see an equilibrium with a little bit less technology, a little more skepticism, a little more paper and pencil, and probably still a lot of variation, school to school, teach teacher to teacher, room to room. So yeah.

Speaker 1

Well, Dylan, don't give up on your ability to change people's minds, right? I think keep doing what you're doing and writing. Yeah. And you is it mainly yeah, is it mainly Substack where you write some articles on? Where where else can people find you? If they I mean if they they're gonna listen to this podcast, they want to hear more from Dylan for the Substack.

Speaker

51213. 51213 is um is the name of my favorite triangle and also the name of my substack. Oh and uh you can uh come read along there, and that's I I I don't do much besides the Substack, so yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1

Yeah. What do you a lot of people like Substack a little more? They feel feel it's a little more in-depth than other social media. Are you finding that? Like at least it's long form.

Speaker

Yeah, you know, I so I I've been blogging since I think 2013. And I was on WordPress for a long time. And back then there was a very strong teacher community on Twitter, right? And so most teachers would find blogs on Twitter and talk about them on Twitter. And that community uh still exists in some form, but it's not nearly as strong. And sharing links on Twitter is not nearly as powerful as it used to be. And so I changed to Substack just because it was the way to kind of keep some semblance of community, right? Keep people commenting and telling me when I'm when I'm wrong. Um and I I think it's a perfectly nice place. I I I I really miss the teacher internet of 2014-2015, that era. Um, and so I I I won't say Substack is perfect. It is it is the best tool I've found, and it's been a nice place for for me to find some folks to just talk about teaching with.

Speaker 1

Well, thank you. Thank you, Dylan. We really appreciate this conversation, and uh, we we really enjoyed having you on After the Bell.

Speaker

Thanks for having me. So much fun to talk to you guys.

Wrap Up With Roy and Martin

Speaker 1

Well, there you go. Visit to Colorado and Dylan Kane.

Speaker 3

Yeah, the elevation didn't bother me at all. No, I'm not too dizzy at all.

Speaker 1

I was impressed with him. Yes, I really was. He just had a calm intelligence about him. Like, you know, I say that sincerely, like I just enjoyed his take on things, his balanced view.

Speaker 3

Yep, and he just says like uh this is what I did. Um, these are uh the things that I that I've seen, and you know, and then uh our listeners and our our viewers can uh do with it what they want.

Speaker 4

Yeah, right?

Speaker 3

And I think that's the way it should be. It says it's the difficulty with technology, there's always I think there's always that fear of missing out, right? If we don't get our students into technology, then they're gonna be behind. Remember how long ago was it that, oh, everyone has to do coding. We have to code because all the jobs in the future will be coding. Where did those jobs go?

Speaker 1

Yeah, I know AI is doing, right? And and obviously the time it took then to spend on coding actually took away from building community in the class or reading skills or real math skills. That's the problem. It the day doesn't get longer, so it takes away from something. We need to re-establish what schools should be about, I think. And I think that's his purpose and focus.

Speaker 3

And and I I love that you know we we have talked to more than one person uh and and and talking about that maybe we need to to kind of take a look at at how we're using technology and move it back uh back a bit. Uh Andrew Cantaruni, we talked about that and how to use uh attention as commodity in the classroom and building and then the whole idea of creating an analog class where we're uh getting students to be uh more involved in the sensory experience of school. And I remember reading a long time ago that if you want to make something more meaningful for your students, right, involve as many senses as possible.

Speaker 4

Yeah.

Speaker 3

Right? And uh and that big tactile sense. I think that is so important. And we I know we've gone gone very far away from the tactile part because uh there are a lot of students who who have difficulty just just writing and printing. And so, right, uh I think it's great that some people are putting a pause. Yes. Uh they're not they're not anti-technology, but they're trying to put down let's find that balance.

Speaker 1

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and uh I think you hit the nail on the head in terms of saying the analog classroom. And you know, obviously it doesn't mean going back to slate boards in the 1890s. No chalk, right? But uh couldn't even find chalk, yeah. Yeah, but we want to hear from listeners. Like, do you what are some of your thoughts about that? How would you envision a classroom that has less technology in? Because uh the Stunt brothers, Roy and I are we're we're planning to put together a book called The Analog Classroom. Not sure of the final title for it, but I really think the time has come to help people kind of get back to that hands-on outdoors, play-based world that is not just saying, well, the easy way is just to put a kid in front of a screen. Yep. Right? So let us know what would work, you know, like real maps on the walls, and there's all kinds of things that we have away from. Yeah. And that's why this it's been perfect this episode. Yeah right? Here is the analog podcast out in nature, out in the garden.

Speaker 3

It's uh that fine balance of the the appropriate use of technology, and then the rest of the outdoors.

Speaker 1

We are practicing Dylan Kane's words right here, right? So thanks, listeners. Check us out on Facebook and our Facebook page after the bell. Check us out on our podcast, go to stuntbrothers.ca and stay healthy, stay happy, stay fit, and we'll talk to you again on After the Bell. Bye. This podcast is organic, taking shape with each episode, building resiliency for teachers everywhere.

Speaker 2

That sounds great.

Speaker 1

And our website is stuntbrothers.ca.

Speaker 2

That's stuntbrothers at ca.

Speaker 1

We will chat again after the bell.

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The Stunt Brothers

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