Episode 8

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Published on:

5th Oct 2025

Episode 8: “CI Burnout? Been There.”

Struggling with CI teacher burnout? Learn how to stay sustainable with Comprehensible Input strategies that actually work.

👉 Grab your free CI Survival Kit here: https://imim.us/survival

In this episode of Comprehend THIS!, Scott Benedict sits down with guests Tracey Collazos and David Rice to talk honestly about the not-so-magical side of teaching with CI: burnout. From the early mistakes that made it worse, to the boundaries and routines that keep them sane now, Andy and Pat share real-life strategies, encouragement, and a few laughs along the way. If you’ve ever felt the pressure to be “CI perfect” but secretly just wanted a nap, this conversation will remind you that you’re not alone — and that sustainability matters more than perfection.

#ComprehensibleInput, #worldlanguage, #languageacquisition, #CISurvivalKit, #Spanishteacher, #Frenchteacher, #worldlanguagepodcast, #teachingspanish, #teacherburnout, #CItips

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Transcript
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Good morning, everybody. How's everybody

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doing this morning? Welcome to the

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Comprehend This podcast this morning. I

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hope everybody's having a great Sunday. I

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am joined today by the

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excellent

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Tracy Cuyathos and David Rice is back

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with us this week and we

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are going to be talking about

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CI burnout been there done

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that I don't know about you

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But I certainly have and

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that's gonna be our topic today

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Let's go ahead and welcome our guests

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right after these short messages

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Ever feel like you're clinging to the

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edge of your teacher planner just hoping

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today's lesson magically appears

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Enter the CI survival kit a monthly

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membership made for teachers who love

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comprehensible input

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But also love not reinventing

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the wheel every Sunday night

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Each month you get fresh ready to use

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lessons time-saving tools and just enough

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structure to keep your

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teaching life together

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No stress. No guilt just monthly help

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from someone who gets it sign up at mm.us

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Survival and let the survival kit do the

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heavy lifting for once

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Welcome to comprehend this real talk for

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real language teachers. No drills

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No dry theory just honest stories

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practical ideas and a reminder. You're

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not alone in the CI

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trenches. Let's dive in

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And welcome welcome miss Tracy and mr.

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David. How are we doing this morning?

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We're doing great

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So happy to be here. Thanks. Awesome. I'm

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so glad to have both of you

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Right and early for at least me on the

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East Coast. I forgot

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Tracy. Where are you from?

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I'm in California. So you're the same as

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you're saying with me

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Yep, and then David is out there on the

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East side. So it's a little bit later.

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Yeah central. Yeah. Yeah

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It's 10 a.m. Here. So we're good 10. Yeah

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Yes, so

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It's hard to work out when you do the

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different time changes it works

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differently for you know

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We do it too late then it

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interferes with everybody else

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So it's not the we on the West Coast

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always suffer always suffer

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all that kind of stuff. So

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So today we're gonna be talking about CI

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burnout and I know Tracy you've got

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something special that you

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want to talk about especially

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So let's just go

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ahead and get started here

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When was your first CI burnout wake-up

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call like when did you first realize

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That CI can burn you out just like any

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other approach that you do and what did

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the burnout look like for you?

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Whoever would like to start?

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Did you want to start David?

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Hi Tracy

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Okay. Um, so let's see

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Uh

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It was probably the second year I was

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doing CI where so the first year

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I was training and I found

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that extremely exhausting

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Um, it just kind of trying to make it all

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work in my classroom trying to

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learn how to circle questions

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Trying to learn what each new fabulous

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tool that I was going to

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use in my classroom was

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and

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My second year I thought oh my gosh

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I don't know if I can give this much

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energy every single day every single

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period for the rest of my career

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What am I going to do? Um

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And so yeah, it looks like

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Yeah, so I thought uh, okay

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And what did it look like it looked like

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me coming home and

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wanting to lie on the flowers

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My husband happens to work at

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the same school where I work

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so, uh

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Sometimes he would jump in at the end of

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the day before he thought it was hard to

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go home because we leave separately

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And I would just be sitting in my chair

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kind of like slumped,

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you know like this staring

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And he's like are you okay? And i'm like,

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uh, just another day. We'll

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see. Yeah, i'll i'll be okay

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Give me a half an hour

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So

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Yeah, it looked like you know me looking

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totally exhausted like i've been run over

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by a math truck and um

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Then I needed a good half hour to just

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let my brain rest because I found that

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the mental acrobatics that are required

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For responding to students in real time

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the entire period are exhausting. Yeah

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Absolutely

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How about you david?

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So as as we talked about last week my

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story is I started uh

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Pprs and ci

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about

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2019 they're in the fourth

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quarter of our school year

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um

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And our district is a ci district, but I

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came from a textbook background

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So that wasn't unique experience because

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I had to learn fast how to teach ci

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with no prior ci training

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and so

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Yeah, um, so spring break came up right

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before some fourth quarter spring break

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came up and there was

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blaine ray's little green book

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um, and I decided to

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sit down and read it and

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to learn them as much as I could about di

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and tprs and all that and

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And that saved me because I was burning

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out quick. I was like, okay. I am

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overwhelmed. I don't know what to do

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um

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and then

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so

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That fourth quarter I thought my first

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um

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And I I enjoyed it. It was it was it was

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awesome. I enjoyed the interaction

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staying in the target language

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Uh the entire class period it was great

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Um

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Then we you know summer gets here. I go

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to training in chicago

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Come back. We have

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You know start the year off i'm doing and

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everything and it's great. It's great.

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It's great. I am coming home. I am tired

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Yes, i'm tired, but

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i've had it's a good time

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It's like, you know, I just left the dim

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time. I feel good. I feel energized

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um

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My moment of burnout pain because I am

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the type of person

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who put what I'm saying

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I have into what i'm doing.

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Um, i'm just so driven and

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So that year

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Covid hit

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And so we took a break and unfortunately

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covid hit and so we took

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a break in spring of of

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2000 yeah 2020

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And we came back and we

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had to go we were virtual

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We came back for the next school year. We

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were virtual and I was teaching

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Same stuff, but via online platforms and

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that was a unique experience. I'm

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learning to be to teach cci

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virtually

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Each stories and that was a challenge

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that was stressed. It was

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a new experience and then

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Then

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Blaine ray

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He contacted me and asked me to come

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teach with them teaching

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stories in the afternoons

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The adult learners or a group of learners

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and it was at that point that I had hit

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my limit and I was overwhelmed

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I was I was burning out on ci because

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there's only so much you can say the same

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story over and over again

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Asking the same questions

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and yeah, that was my moment

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Like I was like it's overwhelming

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It just matter

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Yeah

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Mine is a little bit different for

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um

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Different reasons my first experience

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with burnout was my first year of

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teaching and it wasn't ci

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I was the first semester. I was doing

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traditional and you know

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You have all those workbook exercises and

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the book exercises and I was bringing

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those stacks of

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things home and I was like

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I can't keep up

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They're having all this work to do and I

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have to grade it every time every kid and

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i'm like they're doing five or six

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Exercises a day in class and oh my gosh.

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I'm not going to keep this up. So I was

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glad when I found ci

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and

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I when I started ci it was only tprs.

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There was nothing else.

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We didn't have movie talk

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We didn't have picture talk. All we did

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was originally there were seven steps to

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tprs. That's what we did

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And so because it was so

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prescribed and what you did

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It wasn't so overwhelming for me and I

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taught levels one and two

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So I had enough variety that I wasn't

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doing the same thing

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over and over and over again

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So I did that at that school for four

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years and then I went to move to vegas

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um, and I did I was in

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vegas for seven years and

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We started which was I used the tprs

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curriculum that went with um

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Pasta la pasta, which was

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the predecessor to reale dades

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So I had those stories when I went to

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vegas we started we used blaine stories

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from look I can talk

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So I didn't get burned out because it was

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new stories new ideas

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And then we moved schools in vegas

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We had an opportunity to

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open me and my department chair

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Moved to a new school when they opened

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the brand new school

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We thought it'd be a nice thing to try it

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opening a new school

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And we didn't use blaine's rate

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curriculum. We used um

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Carol gobs curriculum quentimemas. So we

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use that one. So again

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after four years

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I'm now on a new

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curriculum. So it wasn't so um

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So much repetitive for me at that point

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and by this time we were starting to have

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Um movie talk was starting to come in and

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picture talk was starting to come in

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So we had some other alternatives to work

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with then just doing the same old thing

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Then I moved to look back to california

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and i'm teaching now middle school and

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i'm using my own curriculum

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Which already felt old to me because I

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wrote all the stories. So, you know, it's

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It's a little bit different when you

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write the stories and

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then you're doing them

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And that first year

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because we were just starting

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The language program that

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first year I went to that school

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Um, it was all level ones. So we had

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Eight there kids had seven periods and we

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taught six out of seven

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and I had six level ones

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That killed me

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No variety. I didn't know if I was coming

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or going did I already

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say this to this kid?

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Did I already ask this question?

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I couldn't remember if I asked this

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question to this class or

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last class or next class

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It was so I used to have to have as a

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job. I used to give kids i'm like, okay

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These are the things i'm supposed to be

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doing. Please check them off

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as I do them for each class

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So I had a little checklist because I

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couldn't keep it straight

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Because it was the same thing. It was

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just like, okay, just

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reset myself and rewind

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I felt like I should just record myself

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and just play the recording because it

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was so then I started feeling

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Very overwhelmed at that point and I

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started going if I tell one more story

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I am going to lose it because I was just

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you know, and I was always on

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always on because I

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hadn't thought away because

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Ci and tprs were on more than were not

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We don't give a lot of independent work

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because yeah, it's like giving a baby

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You know, oh two babies go

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ahead and talk to each other

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They can't yet they don't have that

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ability and that just causes frustration

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So you are on much more than a

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traditional teacher

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would be and it started

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hitting me

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and so

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my

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What and it's funny because

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it didn't even happen until

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Last year so my 23rd

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24th year of teaching

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The first time it dawned

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on me. I don't know why

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I now have we do our readings on

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thursday. We do two readings a week

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thursday's and friday's

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We do a class reading

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of a story that I wrote

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about the kids in my class and then

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They have a listening activity that they

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have to do afterwards on their own

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And then they have the reading activity

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comprehension questions that go with the

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reading that we just did

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As well, so the last 10 minutes of class

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I can sit down and go

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Because I don't

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believe in giving homework

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so

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Giving these activities in

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class in the last you know

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10 15 minutes of class for them to do

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they have to listen to a

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story that i've already recorded

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And it's on formative.com i'm telling you

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that is the godside everything. I do is

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on formative.com. You

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know their work their

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Um

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Warm-ups there their exit

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tickets. Everything is there

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So it makes life so much easier for me to

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go right through and do

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And then they can record things if I want

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like an exit ticket if

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I want them to record

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Um, you know

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Answer a question in spanish or tell me

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this in spanish, you know,

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they can do that all on there

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So I just love that app so

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much. But anyway, they um

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With it they can

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Work on their own so i've recorded and

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i've uploaded the recording

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so they can listen on their own

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With their headphones and then they can

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go ahead and answer the questions

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And then they can go do the reading again

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And it's the second time reading for them

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and i've glossed the words in this

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reading when I do it live

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I don't gloss the words i'm the glossary

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But i'll gloss some of the words that I

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don't expect them to know

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in the um

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In the stories i've

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told you before I am the

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Worst when it comes to staying in bounds

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because my stories can't stay in bounds.

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They don't know anything

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So I just gloss things that they don't

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need to that they need to know for the

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story and they can

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throw them away afterward

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But they were they're able to then work

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on that story and do the reading and do

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the comprehension questions

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And I have 20 questions for each activity

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and that takes them about 10 15 minutes

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Then they do the exit ticket and then the

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class is over and it works really well

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because I get that reset

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before

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The next class and I

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feel a little bit different

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And now that i'm not just asking a story

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every time because asking a story is very

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Stressful in a way because you're always

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having to come up with cute ideas and

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listen and it's a lot

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more work for the teacher

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But then when you do

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picture talk, it's the same thing

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It's still asking a story, but I have a

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picture to work with so

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it's a little bit easier

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It's scaffolded a little bit more and

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then a movie talk even more

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So I don't have to come up with the

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story. I don't have to make it funny

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I just have to tell the story that's

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already there. And so those things

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although it's the you know

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Filling the listening part of language

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where kids have to listen to language and

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interpret what's being said

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It's all three things

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fulfill that same task

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But they're slightly different

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On the perspective of the kids and on me

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So it's a little bit less of a workload

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if I need oh, I can't

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tell another story today

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I'm gonna go ahead and do a movie talk or

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I can't do another story today. I just

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can't it's just not in me

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Today. I don't have the energy

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I'm gonna do a story listening today

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Or i'll just throw a funny picture up or

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a meme and we can talk about that

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You know, the kids are always talking

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about whatever the meme of the week is

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and so those things are

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But i'm telling you I don't know why I

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didn't think of this one in middle

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school. We only had three minutes

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A passing period so it was like teach

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teach teach teach teach three minutes

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teach teach teach teach

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Three minutes teach teach teach teach

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teach three minutes and we were expected

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to be in the hallways in

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the three minutes greeting

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The kids they walked in the door

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So you didn't have a break until your

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prep or your lunch was

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the times you had your break

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You didn't have a p-break

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in time for all of that. So

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um

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Now that I have five minutes i'm like

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luxury five minutes between

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classes like a luxury for me

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But now I have that 10 15

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minutes at the end also to kind of

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regroup myself

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And and center myself so I don't get that

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so I highly recommend

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Doing some of that some activity because

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the only other

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downtime I had before this was

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The sustained silent

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reading that we did every day

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So, you know, that was my only time my

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piece, but i'm reading as well and

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walking around the

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clue. So I really wasn't

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off

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But now that I get that 10

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15 minutes at the end of class

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On thursdays and fridays only but it's

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off. It's my off time and I

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like that and it allows me to

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reset myself

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So let's talk about

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um

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Well, I thought so much up if anybody has

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any questions, I want

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to put that out there

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Please feel free to put them in the chat

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or if you have a problem or a burnout

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Thing that you want to know how to get

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around let us know as well.

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We're happy to answer that

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but let's talk about um

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Oh maria says can you say the program

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that you use? Absolutely.

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It's called formative.com

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Um

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There it is I love this

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There is a free version, but you're

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limited in the types of questions you can

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ask in the free version

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Um, I use the paid version and I think

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it's like it's 15 a month

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But if you buy it for the year, it's like

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120 or something like

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that. I buy it for the year

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Um, I because I use it so much and it

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comes out of my own pocket. My school

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does not pay for it for me

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Um, but what I love

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about it, there are so

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Many activities and the standards are

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already built in so whatever you teach

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you can search your

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standards IB standards

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They're there California standards.

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They're there national standards. They're

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there so I can attach my

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assignments to the standards

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So I can see what my kids are doing. It

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has true false multiple choice

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um video responses

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Audio responses I can ask

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questions like I can have

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I don't have time to have

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a dialogue with every kid

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But I can record questions and then they

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can record a response in a form of a

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dialogue as they go along

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Works really really well. I can do it as

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a video so they can see my

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face as i'm talking to them

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They can watch the video and I can say go

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And then they have to record a video. Oh

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Scott and they can go through and do all

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those kinds of questions

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I can do that. There's

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Re-sequencing where you can put a story

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and then they've got to re-sequence it

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So if we've read a story in class

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I can put it, you know,

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give like 10 statements

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It will scramble them and then they have

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to drag and drop them

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It has fill in the blank where they can

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drag and drop answers into

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the blanks that go in there

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Um short answer essay questions. You can

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create rubrics with this

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It is I use it for everything and I even

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We um, I got in the habit since covet

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like david talked about

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Um, we were required to do

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what's called a week at a glance

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So it was kind of just for

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the it was student facing

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So we had to create like a little graphic

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put what we're doing

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What the main activity is every day of

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the week and then what was

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due for every day of that week

Speaker:

And give that to the kids so they had

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some kind of idea what

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to expect for the week

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I never did that before I always put my

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agenda for the day on the board, but

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never for the whole week

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So now I have this week at a glance. I

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also post that on there so

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they can go ahead and see that

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And then I have them check off when

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they're done with it. They click that

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they're done with it

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Um, because they've done everything that

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week that was supposed to be

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done. So it really really works

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Well, it's what great for um when their

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apps and they can check kids can work on

Speaker:

these activities when they're absent

Speaker:

because they're digital

Speaker:

They can access the you know, the the

Speaker:

website at home and you

Speaker:

can turn it on or turn it off

Speaker:

So if I if it's a quiz i'm doing I lock

Speaker:

it so they can't access it

Speaker:

Until i'm ready to have them access it

Speaker:

and they can type in their accents french

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german and spanish accents are built in

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Automatically in there. So it just works

Speaker:

really really well. It's so versatile

Speaker:

And um, our school uses canvas in google

Speaker:

classroom and i've

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replaced both with formative

Speaker:

Just so they don't have

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they only have one place to go

Speaker:

They know everything is informative for

Speaker:

me and it really really

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works really really well

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So thank you for asking maria

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It's my go-to and it has saved my sanity

Speaker:

because if it's a true

Speaker:

and false or multiple choice

Speaker:

It will grade it automatically for me

Speaker:

And then I don't even have it grade the

Speaker:

warm-ups because the warm-ups for me

Speaker:

We go over them. So I don't need I just

Speaker:

grade them if they did it

Speaker:

So I don't even put answers in the

Speaker:

warm-up so it won't even grade it

Speaker:

We just go over it together because it's

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not necessary for it to grade it

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So I don't want to type in all the

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answers that say it takes up more time

Speaker:

And then the exit tickets are so nice

Speaker:

because I can have them

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Tell me three things you learned today in

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english or answer the following questions

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in spanish and they

Speaker:

can record their answers

Speaker:

It works so so well. I love it and it's

Speaker:

worth the 120 bucks that I pay a year

Speaker:

For for my sanity plus I can see what

Speaker:

they're answering the questions live

Speaker:

which is really good

Speaker:

And I forgot the other feature

Speaker:

They can ask you questions

Speaker:

privately right on the chat

Speaker:

They can click a chat on a question and

Speaker:

ask a question that comes on your screen

Speaker:

So you can answer it privately instead of

Speaker:

a kid going number four

Speaker:

I think it's this answer a but it might

Speaker:

be b and you're like you're giving away

Speaker:

the answers to the whole class

Speaker:

You know how that always happens

Speaker:

So they can ask the questions privately

Speaker:

and you can give feedback privately like

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at the end of an assignment

Speaker:

You can give feedback and it records the

Speaker:

feedback. So you don't once you type it

Speaker:

once you can just click it

Speaker:

For the second time and third time so

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don't have to keep writing, you know

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This needs to be written in spanish click

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and I don't have to keep

Speaker:

typing that over and over again

Speaker:

And they can see their feedback and their

Speaker:

private feedback and I can see as I said

Speaker:

They're answering the questions as they

Speaker:

go. I can see right away

Speaker:

And if there's a mistake that was always

Speaker:

a problem with regular quizzes when they

Speaker:

had a mistake on the on the key

Speaker:

And you already graded them now you had

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to go back and regrade all of

Speaker:

them and readjust the scores

Speaker:

You don't hear you fix that thing and it

Speaker:

regrades them all and

Speaker:

updates the grade right away

Speaker:

So it's really I can see right away that

Speaker:

like number four everybody got it wrong

Speaker:

So I go back to the question and I see

Speaker:

well, was it their

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problem or was it my problem?

Speaker:

Was it a key error or was it they didn't

Speaker:

understand something in that question?

Speaker:

I can see it right

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away. The data is there

Speaker:

I can see the data on individual students

Speaker:

based on the standards and then also how

Speaker:

they perform on every assessment in there

Speaker:

So it's just great and if you know your

Speaker:

administrators like mine

Speaker:

require us to have data

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I get the data right here right away. I

Speaker:

can always tell them

Speaker:

exactly based on an

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assessment based on a class based on a

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Individual student. So sorry, it was a

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big I have no affiliation. I

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don't make any money with this

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um

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With this sponsored. Yeah, I'm not

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sponsored. Yeah, not sponsored at all

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But I love it so much that it is very

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worth it for me for um

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To use that so thank you for asking maria

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So let's go ahead and continue here

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Are any of you

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perfectionists

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and how if so

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How did that put pressure on

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you and make your burnout worse?

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I know david didn't use the word

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perfectionist, but he said driven

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He's very driven to do the best in there.

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So, uh, I can see

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exactly how um, you know

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That I think that's that's a problem with

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probably all of us to some extent

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Yeah, i'll take it. Um, I am i'm driven

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And i'm not gonna call myself a

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perfectionist, but yes, I am

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um

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that

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Every every like as I went my interview

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was uh with scott a couple weeks ago. Um

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I talked about like fourth quarter for

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me. What quarter of the school year is my

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experimentation quarter?

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it just it kind of

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helps me avoid burnout and

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um

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So i'll take things and

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experiment with them. So

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In and over the summer I

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continue it if it worked well

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Well if it worked out well

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And so i'll take the same story like and

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that part of the ci

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burnout is that same story

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You're telling it over and over again. If

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you've got if like this year I have

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I I don't know if i'm

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mistakenly asked my principal for it or

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Or for it, but I looked at her and I said

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please I only won't say I

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just want students to here

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So i've got six

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classes of about 35 students

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Uh, i'll space one and hell in the same

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story class after class after class

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um

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Which I kind of enjoy in a way because I

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don't I don't stress it says this year

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but I will take that

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story and I go home and I

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Edit it I make it available for myself to

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follow in the next coming year

Speaker:

So like that first story that I always

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teaches board george

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wants that coca-cola and

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That story

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Has gone through so

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many changes since 2019

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That it's

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I went and took the

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story and I put it in 10gpt

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God bless chat gpt and I asked can you

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give me some images for this story?

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um

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And chat gpt created images of george and

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their life life and it makes it much more

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enjoyable than the drawings

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No offense to the draw to the artists of

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the original george story. Um

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But the kids connect much

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more with the with that guy

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Uh the guy that they see on the screen

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now and that makes it

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more enjoyable for myself

Speaker:

um, and it saves that

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That burnout there. Um

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And then yeah, so yeah

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perfectionist is taking that story

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How can I make it better for my kids

Speaker:

anytime I tell the story? What could I do

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different? It's like, you know as

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teachers were always

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Reflecting on each class like as soon as

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first period is over

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i'm thinking about okay

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What did I do in first period that I can

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do differently in second?

Speaker:

And we all know that by the end of the

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day, whatever your

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last class is for the day

Speaker:

That lesson will be the absolute best

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lesson you have ever taught in your life

Speaker:

I mean, it's like you pray for your

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administrators to come into that last

Speaker:

class you do your observation

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Yeah, please come to the period I want

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you to see that class

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this will be a great lesson

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Yeah, because first period is always the

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guinea pigs first periods

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are always the guinea pigs. Oh

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bless their hearts, I mean

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That was really

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seriously bless their hearts

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Um, and it's and and also first period

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you know, it's that

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morning class we start class

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at 7 15 here and

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We've got to motivate those kids to wake

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them up to get them

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ready, but we're out by 2 30

Speaker:

so that's great, right, but uh,

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Yeah, we start early get out early. We're

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good, but it's motivating those kids and

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getting them energized and

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My kids always accuse me let me ask you

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constantly why are you so

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Hyper every day and I

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always am because if I don't

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I will burn out. I have to get stay

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motivated. I have to motivate myself to

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energy. I have to be energetic

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Absolutely

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Yeah, absolutely. My sister. I didn't

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learn. I didn't know this. I did it

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naturally. I didn't understand it

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my sister teaches elementary school

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And elementary school teachers are very

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conscious of what i'm about to talk about

Speaker:

and middle school and high school

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teachers. Not so much

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But they call it the ebb and flow

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Because they they have

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the kids all day long

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And so they have to always

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um

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Manage the energy in the room

Speaker:

so if the kids just came back from pe

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Then what they first the first activity

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they do when they come back from p is a

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calming activity when

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they sit down and relax

Speaker:

A little bit or if they just came back

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from time in the library

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where they were quiet and calm

Speaker:

They need some kind of an energizing

Speaker:

activity to get them

Speaker:

up and and moving again

Speaker:

So they're constantly playing with this

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ebb and flow and it's

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the same kind of thing

Speaker:

I never understood, you know, um

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My first period teachers talked about a

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sleepy first period i'm like

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I have never experienced that

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I have never

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experienced a sleepy first period

Speaker:

And I didn't understand why until my kid

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my sister said about

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this ebb and flow like

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That's it because I am loud and obnoxious

Speaker:

from the moment the bell rings so they

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don't have it. They can't be i'm like

Speaker:

When does the s class say first thing

Speaker:

they're like what the hell

Speaker:

is going on? I am you know on

Speaker:

150 from the beginning of

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class to the end of the day

Speaker:

And so that was that's how I controlled

Speaker:

it my I did that naturally by

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Being so energetic they had no other

Speaker:

choice but to be energetic back because

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it's just the way I did

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And luckily they changed I used to teach

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vegas. We started at 7 a.m

Speaker:

And we were out by 1 15

Speaker:

because of the heat situation, but

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California changed

Speaker:

the law a few years ago

Speaker:

That the high schools had to start later

Speaker:

The earliest high schools can start at 8

Speaker:

30. They can start between 8 30 and 10

Speaker:

To start the day for high school because

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it kind of goes in with the way their

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body rhythm works where they are not

Speaker:

They do not perform very well early in

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the morning and they move middle school

Speaker:

To where high school hours used to be so

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middle school can start

Speaker:

in that 7 to 8 30 period

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And high school is the 8 30 to 10. I

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think is the time that they can do

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So that the kids it kind of syncs up a

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little bit better with their

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The way their sleep habits work and the

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way that their bodies work along the way

Speaker:

But the kids take advantage of that

Speaker:

because then they sleep in longer and

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their grog year longer

Speaker:

because now that they know

Speaker:

I don't have to be up for 7 o'clock

Speaker:

class. I have to come in at 8 30

Speaker:

They change that but california made that

Speaker:

a loss that happened a couple years ago

Speaker:

where they swapped that out

Speaker:

Yeah, and actually, uh, I think I must

Speaker:

still have high school

Speaker:

brain because I still

Speaker:

Still struggle to wake

Speaker:

myself up in the morning

Speaker:

but uh, but I know exactly what you're

Speaker:

talking about in terms of

Speaker:

bringing the energy to your class so that

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your students are up

Speaker:

and ready and moving or

Speaker:

You know paying attention or listening or

Speaker:

doing whatever they um, you're asking

Speaker:

them to do for the day. Um, I was

Speaker:

Thinking as you were talking scott one of

Speaker:

the things that i've noticed about you

Speaker:

over the years and kind of following

Speaker:

The different iterations of an immersion

Speaker:

and things that you have done

Speaker:

Is how well you manage a routine?

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and

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I'm wondering if there are people out

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there like me who tend to flounder with

Speaker:

a set routine, um, I both have the uh

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I don't know. Should we say well you use

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driven david i'll use

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commitment to excellence

Speaker:

You know for trying not to be a

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perfectionist, right? Um, so I have I

Speaker:

have I have that as well and um,

Speaker:

So I do find that there are certain

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things that I need to put into a routine

Speaker:

in order for my students to achieve

Speaker:

And for me to be sane

Speaker:

But um, I am not as routine

Speaker:

oriented as I would like to be

Speaker:

And so whenever I see someone great

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routine that works for them,

Speaker:

you know, I just kind of like

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Like that's pretty amazing

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

But I tend to that ebb and flow that you

Speaker:

were talking about scott. So my first my

Speaker:

first teaching job was two hour blocks

Speaker:

And that was probably the best thing for

Speaker:

me because I got a really good idea of

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How much time you can work with students

Speaker:

when you have to stop when they need a

Speaker:

break when you have to stand them up

Speaker:

So of course like tpr tprs those kinds of

Speaker:

things early on were really helpful

Speaker:

You can stand them up move around you can

Speaker:

do actions. I had them

Speaker:

out on the football field

Speaker:

singing

Speaker:

like

Speaker:

I look like

Speaker:

The sound of music with the kids behind

Speaker:

me and like we're walking around and

Speaker:

singing because I didn't

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know at that point in time

Speaker:

What else can we do to get them moving to

Speaker:

keep their brains

Speaker:

flowing everything that?

Speaker:

Um, you know there like you said, there

Speaker:

was no movie talked at that point in time

Speaker:

I think this is your 26 maybe 27 for me

Speaker:

teaching. I don't know. It's

Speaker:

been a long time, right? So

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And just like you said, you know, that's

Speaker:

it's you know, you have different

Speaker:

iterations of

Speaker:

yourself as a teacher as well

Speaker:

and

Speaker:

I only came to ci about 10 years ago. So

Speaker:

I was having and my school actually still

Speaker:

Still uses the textbook quite a bit. And

Speaker:

so I don't have a ci like you david

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Me neither

Speaker:

Well, I mean it's the district so it's

Speaker:

and that's one of the reasons

Speaker:

I

Speaker:

That and it was more money

Speaker:

But uh to come up here to learn something

Speaker:

new and to embrace a

Speaker:

different way of doing things

Speaker:

And I think that's one

Speaker:

thing that goes a long ways

Speaker:

Towards avoiding burnout is is it's

Speaker:

change is doing something different and

Speaker:

that's part of my being driven

Speaker:

um is is is

Speaker:

I don't want to become

Speaker:

complacer because if I do I tend to

Speaker:

burn out and

Speaker:

But I have to be very

Speaker:

cautious about that in that if I go

Speaker:

If I if I go too fast

Speaker:

with my kids and it's like

Speaker:

in in one of Blaine Ray's uh

Speaker:

Feminards to use that word. Uh, one of

Speaker:

his classes he talked about getting too

Speaker:

much too fast too soon as a killer and

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

I was thinking about that and reflecting

Speaker:

awesome reflect on my lesson for next

Speaker:

week and start the second quarter and

Speaker:

I don't want to

Speaker:

Give my kids too much information that

Speaker:

they become frustrated

Speaker:

Because it's so much ci coming at them

Speaker:

why a ci is great and it's wonderful

Speaker:

But too much too much input

Speaker:

and they'll be overwhelmed

Speaker:

and

Speaker:

They'll get frustrated

Speaker:

And I will feel that i'm you know, i'm

Speaker:

not being effective

Speaker:

and i'll feel burned out

Speaker:

And and by not giving so much to them is

Speaker:

a little bit that I can control that

Speaker:

Control that ebb and flow and I know what

Speaker:

i'm putting out there and I can pull back

Speaker:

And push a little bit

Speaker:

further pull back, you know

Speaker:

And just that nice, you know

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

That nice flow right,

Speaker:

you know in and out. Yeah

Speaker:

And now a couple things as

Speaker:

you guys were talking that um

Speaker:

Brought some kinds to mind

Speaker:

I'll tell you just a couple things that's

Speaker:

still on the burnout thing because it

Speaker:

made me think of a couple things

Speaker:

I remember when we did readings

Speaker:

Those novels we didn't have very many we

Speaker:

had all the bling ray novels and that was

Speaker:

all that we had we

Speaker:

didn't have the variety

Speaker:

That we had now and for like the first

Speaker:

eight years of my career.

Speaker:

I taught pobriana every day

Speaker:

You know every level one

Speaker:

and especially, you know

Speaker:

I'm like if I I can't

Speaker:

even look at pobriana

Speaker:

The same way anymore. I know it by heart.

Speaker:

I can tell you that exactly, you know

Speaker:

going through I know

Speaker:

the whole story, you know

Speaker:

That would just drove me crazy after a

Speaker:

while. I couldn't and the original way we

Speaker:

were supposed to teach it

Speaker:

Which was the worst way no offense bling,

Speaker:

but this did not work.

Speaker:

We were supposed to teach

Speaker:

one

Speaker:

chapter

Speaker:

A week. So just on

Speaker:

fridays we would do it. Well and

Speaker:

Go as far as you could and so I was

Speaker:

teaching pobriana the whole

Speaker:

Year because it took the whole year to

Speaker:

get through it if you

Speaker:

did only once a week

Speaker:

um, and it was like oh my

Speaker:

I am so tired of pobriana

Speaker:

Can she become rich now and just move on

Speaker:

and move on to a new life? I was like

Speaker:

I just I drove me crazy

Speaker:

now. We have such a variety

Speaker:

So I have like three or four go to level

Speaker:

one and level two novels that I did. I'll

Speaker:

rotate them for my own sanity

Speaker:

out there

Speaker:

And then the other thing I

Speaker:

did who my kids had burnout

Speaker:

And I know why bling does this and why

Speaker:

everybody advocates for this,

Speaker:

but my kids didn't like it. So

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

The way when you work from a curriculum

Speaker:

usually the oral story

Speaker:

you do with your class

Speaker:

Is the same as the written story that you

Speaker:

have the kids read just more

Speaker:

words with it and more details

Speaker:

And my kids didn't understand that

Speaker:

It was actually something different

Speaker:

because reading is something different

Speaker:

than listening. They didn't understand

Speaker:

they're like we just

Speaker:

did this story yesterday

Speaker:

That's what they kept asking me. So when

Speaker:

I wrote my curriculum

Speaker:

I made sure that we had five different

Speaker:

stories because we had a

Speaker:

A story you did with actors you had the

Speaker:

reading then you had one with pictures

Speaker:

and then you had a reading

Speaker:

activity and a listening activity

Speaker:

Which again, I did those in

Speaker:

my curriculum way back in 2013

Speaker:

Never thought to actually give the

Speaker:

listening and the reading activity as

Speaker:

classwork never never never thought that

Speaker:

But I had five

Speaker:

different stories every time

Speaker:

To combat that for the kids and then it

Speaker:

also was different for me because

Speaker:

I'm like I did this story

Speaker:

when I only had level ones

Speaker:

I did this story already six times

Speaker:

yesterday and now i've got

Speaker:

to read it six more times

Speaker:

So I work really hard and all my reading

Speaker:

stories use the same vocabulary that

Speaker:

we're working on the

Speaker:

same grammatical structures

Speaker:

But then I write them about the kids in

Speaker:

my class. So that's my homework every

Speaker:

week is to come up with a new story

Speaker:

Based on that vocabulary with my kids. So

Speaker:

that helps me a little

Speaker:

bit with that burnout

Speaker:

But the perfectionism

Speaker:

And I know donna tatum johns

Speaker:

was one with me like this too

Speaker:

when we started tprs

Speaker:

And scripted we scripted everything

Speaker:

So I was like I

Speaker:

channeled my oprah wind free

Speaker:

and I made um

Speaker:

Cardstock half page and

Speaker:

I printed them at 16 font

Speaker:

so I would type up the first sentence

Speaker:

And then underneath that I would type up

Speaker:

10 questions. I could

Speaker:

ask about that sentence

Speaker:

And because it was so scripted I was

Speaker:

trying to be a perfectionist making sure

Speaker:

did I do my yes questions?

Speaker:

Did I do my no questions? I do my either

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or you know that pattern and make sure it

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wasn't a pattern and did I?

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Get my two for one. Did I ask did I

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reconfirm my no to get my

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yes and all that kind of stuff

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I made sure all those

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formulaic circling things were there

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But they couldn't change

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much. I had the variable name

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You could add the name the color of the

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hair but they were going to target no

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matter what because I

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wrote target in there

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And I wasn't it was I couldn't

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Change my script on the fly to now

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replace target with the piggy wiggly that

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they chose in the in the story

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So I was a very

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perfectionist and I know um

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Don and tatum johns did it with

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handwriting and she showed us her scripts

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It was like little booklets that she did

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I did it with typing it out because um

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I'm a slow handwriter

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And so I typed everything and then I

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could reuse it much easier because if I

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like copy got torn up or something

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I could just um, you know reprint it and

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be good and then I also um

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Would put them on the

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little rings little metal rings

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So I put a hole in them

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put a little metal ring

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So if I wouldn't have to worry about

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dropping them and then worried about what

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order the cards were supposed to be in

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So they were already in

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that that ring on there

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So it kept him thinking I always walked

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around with my little ring of cards for

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at least two years at least two years of

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Scripting because I just I

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couldn't think enough on my feet

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To ask all the questions

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and back when we started

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We didn't even ask questions when we

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first started we had to tell the story

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three different times

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in a row

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So um, and there was no

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circling or anything like that

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But when circling came about I scripted

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everything because I couldn't think on

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the fly and and then I even

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tried a little cheat sheet

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in the back of the room

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That's what I did

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She cheated in the back of the room where

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I would have a plus a negative

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An or and then a question mark. So the

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kids had no idea what I

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was looking at back there

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But I had that so I know oh I need to ask

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a positive question. Oh, I

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need to ask a negative question

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I need to ask an either or question. I

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need to ask a question word question to

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get that now it comes naturally

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But it didn't come naturally in the

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beginning. So I had to train myself

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and I made little um

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I don't know if I came up with this or

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someone else came with it

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I'm going to give someone else credit

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because I have no idea

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But I when I would script too because my

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scripting I always

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scripted in the same order

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But I would slide my thumb

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Up and down my card and whatever my thumb

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landed. That's the question I would ask

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that's how I kind of randomized

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The story a little bit so it helped with

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that and I would list different

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variables. So I was I am a perfectionist

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I've always been a perfectionist

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I'll notice a little error and I just

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made a hundred copies with this error and

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i'm like recycle bin

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Fix the error and go make

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the hundred copies again. So

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I

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Just did that with that class that um

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building foundations for

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success class. I had to make a

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a movie guide because we're watching a

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movie next week on um,

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on the movie concussion and so um

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The first part I forgot to put lines for

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them to write the

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answer to the first question

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So i'm like, okay

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Toss all those copies and then I

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reprinted it with the lines and then made

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a whole bunch of copies

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I am a perfectionist and I do I that's

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that's the wire where it

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really showed me a lot was in there

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printing everything out to make sure

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everything was just the

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way it was supposed to be

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So that I would not

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make a mistake nowadays

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Um, as I said, I can do it naturally I

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don't have to script everything but

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that's where that perfectionism came in

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and it was exhausting

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To write all of those questions every

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time we did not have chat gpt back then

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So we had to do it all of ourselves now

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Scripting would be extremely easy because

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I can put in my 10 sentences of my story

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and say now write me

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you know

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50

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Questions about this particular sentence.

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Give me some either ors

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Give me some yes

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ones. Give me some no ones

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Give me some question word ones

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Give me some inference ones and it will

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spit them out and I go great copy paste

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print and i'm good to go

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But not you know, we didn't have that

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back when I started way back in 2001

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I mean that was I mean I was doing the

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spinning wheel at the back of the

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classroom or whatever

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For my questioning as I

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was learning the process

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And making sure that I do the yes

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question that either or

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did I don't know and and

Speaker:

And it got to the point where one thing

Speaker:

and I brought this up to craig sheehy

Speaker:

uh

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a couple years ago that

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It got tiresome for me to constantly be

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asking questions of my students

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And and circling the question. Yeah, i'm

Speaker:

going to circle the class. I want to

Speaker:

circle the questions for the class

Speaker:

That's fine. And then triangle the

Speaker:

individual students. I'm gonna do that

Speaker:

But it got a little tiresome and so I was

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getting burned out like

Speaker:

and the kids were like, okay

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Yeah, this is the routine. This is what

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we're going to do and you

Speaker:

can tell they were like, yeah

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We know what we're gonna do today and

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probably it's gonna have us do this and then we're going to do this

Speaker:

And then we're gonna and then

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the bell's gonna ring and so

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Uh over the weekend I couldn't win and I

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I created questions that I

Speaker:

wanted them to ask each other

Speaker:

um

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and so

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As soon as you know, I got done

Speaker:

circling and trying to do you know the

Speaker:

the I do and the we do

Speaker:

And then that's okay

Speaker:

now I want y'all to do it

Speaker:

And so here's your question start asking

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the other questions based off what you

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know about the story

Speaker:

And that created a nice little

Speaker:

Breath of fresh air right there because

Speaker:

the kids were more involved. Yeah, and

Speaker:

which are eventually led them into

Speaker:

What blank I was describing the situation

Speaker:

now is them. Okay,

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and I would show a scene

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Tell me everything, you know about the

Speaker:

story now based off this picture

Speaker:

And and so now they're doing that and

Speaker:

it's like I get to relax

Speaker:

and I don't have to do as much

Speaker:

Which i'm enjoying that. So

Speaker:

that's say to me being burned out

Speaker:

and

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When i'll hear them saying something

Speaker:

about the story divided and i'll try them

Speaker:

in i'll add a little more

Speaker:

Detail to it or ask a question try to

Speaker:

push it along and it

Speaker:

makes it more entertaining

Speaker:

So i'm not burning out and they're not

Speaker:

they're not getting so used

Speaker:

to routine. It was neat that

Speaker:

this past friday the kids

Speaker:

it was it was

Speaker:

It was very spanglishy

Speaker:

because they're level one kids

Speaker:

Um, but they were arguing back and forth

Speaker:

about a detail of the story

Speaker:

uh

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It was in part because it's part spanish

Speaker:

And but it was neat to listen to them

Speaker:

arguing at that level

Speaker:

In and and trying to

Speaker:

get their point across

Speaker:

And I was enjoying the heck out of that

Speaker:

and I was making entertainment

Speaker:

So that was saving burnout is is hearing

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what my kids can do and so yeah

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Well, that's cool. You can tell they're

Speaker:

engaging with the material point too.

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That's amazing. Oh, yeah

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It's it's they will

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argue little details like

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um in every one of my stories i've taken

Speaker:

the stories and i've

Speaker:

Over the summer like that in details like

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you've got this boy bobby

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Uh, you know and then i'll give

Speaker:

descriptions of like

Speaker:

bobby the tall good-looking

Speaker:

and

Speaker:

Based off the picture that chad gpt is is

Speaker:

generated. Uh,

Speaker:

good-looking boy with long hair

Speaker:

And green eyes and i'll do those

Speaker:

descriptions in spanish in the story if

Speaker:

they're reading the story

Speaker:

Or if they're

Speaker:

listening to the story and um

Speaker:

And then i'll do their birthday on

Speaker:

bobby's 15 years old because his birthday

Speaker:

is this particular day

Speaker:

This month and this year and listen to

Speaker:

them argue about how old this kid was

Speaker:

Was he older than the other character?

Speaker:

uh in the story and

Speaker:

They're engaging with it and that

Speaker:

engagement hearing my students being gay

Speaker:

Is it's it's it keeps me from being

Speaker:

burned out. It's because i'm like, yes

Speaker:

They're getting it they can do stuff

Speaker:

It's it's i mean, it's fun hearing the

Speaker:

kids do that and that's

Speaker:

a motivator right there

Speaker:

absolutely

Speaker:

next um, let's talk about

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How do you keep it sustainable? What's

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one habit one routine?

Speaker:

that you use to

Speaker:

Keep it sustainable and how do you give

Speaker:

yourself permission to do enough?

Speaker:

Without burning out and i'm going to

Speaker:

start this one just because

Speaker:

tracy already mentioned something

Speaker:

That I do and I never realized how well I

Speaker:

did it until it was commented on in one

Speaker:

of my observations many years ago

Speaker:

the transitions

Speaker:

He goes i've never seen a teacher

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transition so effectively from one

Speaker:

activity to another

Speaker:

like you do and i'm like

Speaker:

I do I didn't even realize

Speaker:

Didn't even realize but I am very as

Speaker:

tracy already pointed

Speaker:

out i'm very routine

Speaker:

Oriented. Um, I have a structure. I

Speaker:

follow that structure, you know mondays

Speaker:

look the same tuesdays look the same

Speaker:

wednesdays look the same

Speaker:

And what that has done for me and for my

Speaker:

students is we know what to expect

Speaker:

Before I started the routines because the

Speaker:

routines didn't start coming

Speaker:

until probably

Speaker:

My seventh eighth ninth year of teaching

Speaker:

where I started to get

Speaker:

into a consistent routine

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

But i'll tell you that

Speaker:

I don't have to think

Speaker:

about what's coming next

Speaker:

Anymore, you know, what

Speaker:

was I supposed to do next?

Speaker:

I had that in my lesson plan

Speaker:

But I don't have my lesson plan right in

Speaker:

front of me type of a thing

Speaker:

And it started coming out because my you

Speaker:

know, we had to write

Speaker:

the agenda on the board

Speaker:

And then I found a way because i'm always

Speaker:

trying to find a way to

Speaker:

work smarter and not harder

Speaker:

And i'm like I write this agenda on the

Speaker:

board every day and i'm writing the same

Speaker:

words over and over again

Speaker:

Every day. Why am I doing that? I write

Speaker:

the date every day on

Speaker:

the board. I write them

Speaker:

It's the same dates year after year after

Speaker:

year. Why am I continuing to hand write

Speaker:

these? So I made little

Speaker:

Labels I printed them out in color. I

Speaker:

have labels for my days of the week

Speaker:

All the you know the

Speaker:

whole calendar up there

Speaker:

I put I laminated them put magnets on

Speaker:

them and I just stick

Speaker:

them up there. I have

Speaker:

my

Speaker:

Objectives I have them

Speaker:

laminated. I have them up there

Speaker:

I just got to put my objectives up there

Speaker:

instead of writing them every single time

Speaker:

because they just

Speaker:

repeat over and over again

Speaker:

And it's taking my

Speaker:

teacher power, you know

Speaker:

It only takes five to ten minutes to

Speaker:

write it up there

Speaker:

depending how many classes you have

Speaker:

But it's writing and I could be better

Speaker:

used that time and then

Speaker:

all my common activities

Speaker:

We do picture talk. We do a movie talk.

Speaker:

We do a story. We do

Speaker:

Inter uh

Speaker:

Conversations whatever we're doing

Speaker:

instead of writing it hand by hand. I

Speaker:

have these little labels that I have

Speaker:

I cut it them up. I laminated them cut

Speaker:

them out put little magnets on them and

Speaker:

so I can just do that

Speaker:

So I started it that way and realized

Speaker:

that i'm doing the same things all the

Speaker:

time in the same order

Speaker:

so when powerpoint came out and we

Speaker:

started teaching away from

Speaker:

The uh, what do you call the overhead

Speaker:

projectors and we moved

Speaker:

over to the powerpoint slides?

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

I had a routine that I made and so I

Speaker:

followed it because I would make a

Speaker:

template so I wouldn't have

Speaker:

to recreate all the slides

Speaker:

Every week. I would just use my template

Speaker:

and make the appropriate

Speaker:

changes that I had to make

Speaker:

And so I never had to worry about what

Speaker:

i'm going to teach next because the next

Speaker:

slide would tell me what we're doing next

Speaker:

I forgot we were doing a brain break

Speaker:

right now and which

Speaker:

brain break we were doing

Speaker:

Didn't have to worry about it because

Speaker:

whoop click brain break tells me which

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one we're doing right off

Speaker:

Sometimes it would be a

Speaker:

student choice and we do the wheel

Speaker:

I like I never thought about doing the

Speaker:

wheel for questions, davin, but that was

Speaker:

a good idea good

Speaker:

suggestion using the wheel

Speaker:

uh, the spinning the wheel for the

Speaker:

questions and just a

Speaker:

little shout out to um

Speaker:

Now i'm gonna forget her name

Speaker:

dr

Speaker:

I can't think of her first

Speaker:

name off the top of my head

Speaker:

Waltz, I just can't think of her first

Speaker:

name and I have terry.

Speaker:

Sorry. Dr terry waltz

Speaker:

Um, she's an amazing mandarin instructor

Speaker:

um, but she came up with circle up cards

Speaker:

And so it was a deck of cards that you

Speaker:

would use and you shuffle them up and it

Speaker:

would tell you what to do next

Speaker:

Add a character

Speaker:

Or ask a positive question

Speaker:

Ask a two-fer question, you know, you

Speaker:

didn't have to think about what you were

Speaker:

doing. You just had to pull out the card

Speaker:

It was random. That was a really um a

Speaker:

really ingenious way of doing that but

Speaker:

Those transitions I

Speaker:

never planned a transition

Speaker:

I just expected my

Speaker:

kids to move along with me

Speaker:

We moved to slide we moved to the next

Speaker:

activity and they had to move with me or

Speaker:

they were getting left behind

Speaker:

And I guess that was good transitioning

Speaker:

because I guess other people have

Speaker:

problems with the

Speaker:

transitioning and i've never had

Speaker:

Problems with the transitioning. I just

Speaker:

expect my kids to get up. Let's go. We

Speaker:

are now moving from you know, um,

Speaker:

You know, we just did our morpheme

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

We just did the morpheme and then we uh,

Speaker:

we're now doing a song

Speaker:

Let's everybody stand up. We're getting

Speaker:

to sing our song and go right along the

Speaker:

way and it worked

Speaker:

really really well for me

Speaker:

I did see another teacher. Um

Speaker:

Years ago in the beginning of my career

Speaker:

and I can't do it. Um,

Speaker:

it's to the happy day song

Speaker:

One o'clock two o'clock three o'clock

Speaker:

rock, but it's counting so they would

Speaker:

count in spanish to that rhythm

Speaker:

As they were transitioning from one

Speaker:

activity to another so they had to get

Speaker:

something out of their

Speaker:

backpack the whole class was singing

Speaker:

I can't do it in spanish. I can't get the

Speaker:

rhythm right when I'm counting but uno

Speaker:

I don't know. I can't do the rhythm, but

Speaker:

they were singing the song

Speaker:

in spanish in the um, you know

Speaker:

Using numbers as their transitioning

Speaker:

time. So it kept them

Speaker:

from talking to each other

Speaker:

As they did that i've never had to do

Speaker:

that because my expectations just get

Speaker:

going get going get going

Speaker:

And as I said, I can't get the tune right

Speaker:

You know, I know the tune and I know the

Speaker:

words in english, but I

Speaker:

can't get the counting to work

Speaker:

Right. I need to hear it again to get the

Speaker:

counting to work right to

Speaker:

get that rhythm in there

Speaker:

So that's kind of what I do to keep it

Speaker:

sustainable. I have the routine and I

Speaker:

have routines, which is another thing

Speaker:

I think it's harry wong

Speaker:

They gave me this book when I first

Speaker:

started teaching in high school and i'm

Speaker:

reading the book and I see the pictures

Speaker:

And they're all elementary school kids.

Speaker:

They go. Um, did you

Speaker:

realize I taught high school?

Speaker:

This isn't going to help me. So I didn't

Speaker:

do it for the first eight nine years

Speaker:

And then I realized without

Speaker:

actual classroom routines

Speaker:

of things to do for kids

Speaker:

My classroom management wasn't

Speaker:

as good as it could have been

Speaker:

And so I read the book and go oh I can

Speaker:

see how this can apply to older kids, too

Speaker:

They don't have to be as goofy as

Speaker:

everybody hold hands and line up at the

Speaker:

door because we're going to the library

Speaker:

Shoulder to the door, you know doesn't

Speaker:

have to be like that

Speaker:

But my routines that I have in my

Speaker:

classroom my expectations right away and

Speaker:

having a routine a

Speaker:

procedure for everything

Speaker:

Really helps with classroom

Speaker:

management. So those are my two

Speaker:

Sustainable things that

Speaker:

keep it sustainable for me

Speaker:

Having a lesson routine that I do which

Speaker:

makes my especially my anxious kids

Speaker:

comfortable. They know what to expect

Speaker:

They'll moan on wednesdays because they

Speaker:

know that's quick right day. They'll moan

Speaker:

because they go. Oh, it's wednesday

Speaker:

I forgot it's wednesday, but they know

Speaker:

what's coming and they know that's there

Speaker:

So it gives them a little plan a little

Speaker:

routine and then they

Speaker:

always know what to do

Speaker:

If I have to step out of class

Speaker:

They know what to do

Speaker:

They're supposed to go get a book from

Speaker:

the back of the room and start reading if

Speaker:

I have to step out of class

Speaker:

For a minute while like a teacher asks to

Speaker:

talk to me or something like that

Speaker:

They know what to do and it

Speaker:

just helps with everything

Speaker:

Before we continue this little um

Speaker:

question. David you're on

Speaker:

because maria has asked

Speaker:

David take more about the wheel, please

Speaker:

Oh wait, we're losing are you okay. Okay,

Speaker:

you're back. Okay. He lost him

Speaker:

I'm back. Yeah, right. Um, so there's um

Speaker:

What I do the way I do the wheel is at

Speaker:

first it was on paper and

Speaker:

Over the years that

Speaker:

paper has gone somewhere

Speaker:

Um, but there's a

Speaker:

website. It's uh called slippery

Speaker:

F-l-i-t-t-i-t-y

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

And slippery net is a random name picker

Speaker:

and you can just do lots of things over

Speaker:

there that you can use

Speaker:

And you can type in the question types. I

Speaker:

just want to use it. You can type it

Speaker:

um

Speaker:

And so what you do is you use that and

Speaker:

and just i'll put it on my

Speaker:

So i've got my PowerPoint going on

Speaker:

On the prometia board and on the flippity

Speaker:

wheel i've got kid either at my desk

Speaker:

Getting the wheel or i'm by my wheel or

Speaker:

i'm by the screen and i'm

Speaker:

tapping it and it's automatically

Speaker:

Please get a question for me to ask based

Speaker:

off what's on the screen and what's going

Speaker:

on. It's just a random questioning

Speaker:

Um, you can use that with student names

Speaker:

so you can um

Speaker:

And we call them students

Speaker:

which administrators love

Speaker:

You to do so you keep them guessing who's

Speaker:

going to be called on

Speaker:

so they're not you know

Speaker:

Like would anybody like to answer this

Speaker:

question? I would never do that

Speaker:

So there's that it's

Speaker:

called slippery. Yeah, uh

Speaker:

And scott. Thank you.

Speaker:

You can click the link in

Speaker:

in

Speaker:

the chat

Speaker:

Go explore that you can use that to

Speaker:

create questions if you want to ask

Speaker:

question types or

Speaker:

whatever and randomly pull it up

Speaker:

It's it's great for

Speaker:

that and I didn't know this

Speaker:

I'm sure it did. Um that I didn't know

Speaker:

that site existed. I used

Speaker:

what does it spin the wheel?

Speaker:

I think it's spin the wheel. I use

Speaker:

there's another one that I use

Speaker:

What is it called

Speaker:

Oh, um wheel of names

Speaker:

I've done I put different things in

Speaker:

there. There's different ones i've used

Speaker:

but I didn't know flippity existed

Speaker:

That's a whole different one and guys i'm

Speaker:

looking at the website

Speaker:

I'll link it in the show notes later

Speaker:

Um, but it's got a lot of different

Speaker:

activities on it. Not just

Speaker:

Um, you know a not wheel spinner

Speaker:

So yeah, there's

Speaker:

there's tons of things to use

Speaker:

Um, but I love it

Speaker:

So yes, that is that is a great resource

Speaker:

And again, i'll put the link in the show

Speaker:

notes for those who are listening on the

Speaker:

podcast and not watching

Speaker:

So I will put that there so you can link

Speaker:

to you can check it out

Speaker:

And i'll put some other ones on there

Speaker:

that I use because

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there's a couple that I do use

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I do use wheel of names.

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There's another one I use too

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Um for uh, we play twister in class and

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so it's got a twister one

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But you can take out the twister stuff

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and put other stuff in there, too

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But I just never thought of using it to

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ask questions. I think that's really a

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A really fun way to do that, especially

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with the kids in there

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And I know that um, la maestro loca

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absolutely positively hates

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asking kids

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To vote on an answer like it if you're

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coming co-creating a

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story she can't stand that so

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What she used to do was

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she bought one of those

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Uh, what do you call

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it the whiteboard dice?

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So each side of the dice is a

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white is a whiteboard surface

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And then she would write the different

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possibilities that kids suggested

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On each one and then she would just roll

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the dice so that there was no decision

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making needed to be made

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But a low-cost cheap way to do this would

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be a spinner wheel is

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another way to do that

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So if the kids give you like six

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suggestions for where they want to go

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You can quickly type in those suggestions

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put them in there spin the wheel and then

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that's where we're gonna go

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That we don't have any fights. You don't

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have any she's like

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there's no democracy in my class

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We are not voting on this

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We are just gonna go with what the the

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wheel tells us or what the dice tells us

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so it's kind of a fun

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A fun thing. So, um, that's because I

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just remember her always saying that she

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goes I bought this dice

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And this is the best thing i've ever

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done. So she loved that aspect of it

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So since you're already up david, tell us

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about your sustainable what you do to

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keep it sustainable so you don't burn out

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So, um, I try my best

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to incorporate variety

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As much as possibly

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someday we'll be doing a story

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It'll be either an

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oral story or they come in

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Guess what y'all are reading today and

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i'll give them a i'll give them a section

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of the story that we're doing

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I want y'all to read this and see what

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y'all can interpret or

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It'll be another day. They come in. It's

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a technology day and i'll take there's

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two websites that I use with my kids

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One of them is uh sentence builders.com

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and the other is text activities

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um

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We're on both is whatever

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structure we're working on

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I've created that on sentence builders so

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they can practice

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creating sentences using

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You know using that structure. Um

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and then on text

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activities I can take and

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Put sections of the story in there and

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have them reconstruct the

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story based off a parallel tech

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So those are some

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different things that I use to

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Keep it sustainable to you know, keep it

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going and change it up, but it's still

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accomplishing the mission of getting the

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kids to you know acquire the language and

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so yeah and also like

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This coming quarter what we're going to

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do is i'm going to do free

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uh free voluntary reading

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or ssr

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It's not a sustained reading. Um

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I'm i'm trying to figure out which day of

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the week I want to do it either

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It's going to be a friday or

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it's going to be a wednesday

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but i've got

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Pretty much

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We were talking about, you know all the

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different book sellers

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I've and I lean heavily towards cpr as

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opposed. That's that's where I got my

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training. That's what I know right now

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uh, and so i've got their whole library

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at the back of my classroom and

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It's on the it's on the wall at the back

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and the kids can see it

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Next week when we roll in the second

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quarter probably wednesday

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i'm going to look at them

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I want y'all to pick out other covers.

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Y'all. I've already been looking at them

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and I want you to pick a book to read

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and

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I'm not asking you, you know to

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To read it in depth to do a book report

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or whatever over it.

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Um, just you know, just

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Have fun reading it and

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I've got the way i've got the books laid

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out is i've got it from novice

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Novice me at all way to advance low

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And so much else I look right now

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I will stay down here at this end of the

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end of the dry race board

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before I would not go over here

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If you want to go over here go for it

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But you know

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If you get over there you say oh, I don't

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like this. You can go back over here.

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It's fine. It's fine. Um, but yeah

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Did that make sense? Yeah, absolutely

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Absolutely. What about you tracy?

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Um keeping it sustainable definitely the

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fbr the free volunteers assigned, uh

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sustain silent reading

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Um, we tend to work that into a book chat

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usually about once a semester. I give

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students in my level one sentence frames

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and

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They pick which ones they want to talk

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about just in a small group

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They just grab their book and kind of you

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know, this this is what my book's about

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I liked this character because and they

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usually give a recommendation. I

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recommend or I recommend and why?

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And that gives students, you know kind of

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an idea of what they

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might want to read next

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Um, so I I love fbr

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It's one of my favorite things to do with

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students and it definitely gives me that

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Anywhere from five to ten minutes at the

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beginning of the class

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depending on you know

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Where they're at in their ability to read

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for a sustained period of time. Um

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I tend to when i'm when i'm tired

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Um, I tend to go to if it's french and I

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do the petit journard francophone

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Um, which is cecilene and I

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also use el mundo dos manos

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For current event type of reading i'll

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have them do read around

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Um in a group and and develop true false

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questions for each other

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Um either in target language or in

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english that usually

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doesn't really matter

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um

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That's one of the things I do when I need

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a data myself where I can just kind of

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walk around and monitor and help

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Um, I definitely use story builders. I

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think that's martina bathes

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Um, I love those I like students to be

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able it sounds like it's a bit like a

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sentence builder, but in story form

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Um, so they're creating their own sort of

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choose your own adventure stories

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That also gives me a day where I can just

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kind of sit back and I know that they are

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uh reading and

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understanding and writing at

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the same time

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um

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The other day I did what's in my backpack

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I was like, I can't do another story

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So I took my backpack

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into class where you know

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Our text was at this point in time. All

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of my colleagues are doing supplies and

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classroom supplies and

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Ci teacher I work those things in

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throughout the year. So I

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don't really worry about it

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So I was like, okay, i'll bring in my

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backpack i'm gonna put a

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bunch of weird stuff in it

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And i'm gonna ask them to tell me I think

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this is in your backpack

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So we I did a sentence frame, you know be

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it's okay. I or jeffons kia and um

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Different people, you know, hey, I think

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there's a flank in your backpack and

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we've already done stories about

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kangaroos and crocodiles

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and all those kinds of things

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So I put a kangaroo in a croc. Oh, no,

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actually I put a crocodile

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But no kangaroo and so when the crocodile

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came out somebody else said oh, I think

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there's a kangaroo in the backpack

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And I said, oh

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You know, uh, yeah, you're okay. Let me

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look let me look so i've got my head all

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the way in the backpack

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Right and I get back out and i'm like

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Oh

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That's exactly what I

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was thinking the crocodile

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It's not there anymore

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And the whole class was like, oh no

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So, um, you know again, it was it was

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fun. Um, you know, one of

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them wanted me to take out pencil

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So I took out a pencil, but

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I didn't have a calculator

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So instead I took out a princess crown

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that I had and stuck that on I was like

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I don't have a calculator, but I do have

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a princess crown

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check that out. Right? Um

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I put a slinky in there. There was much

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rich weird stuff, but um, it was fun

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I enjoyed it. It was very low prep

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I just put a bunch of stuff in there and

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then afterwards we put everything out on

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a table and I asked them to draw their

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own backpack

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And put you know things that were already

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in their backpack and then a couple of

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things they would like

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to have in their backpack

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That maybe weren't in there today

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Um, so with that was that

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was our day and uh, it was fun

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Well that would not work in my class what

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you put in your

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backpack because all my kids

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They have none of their stuff they're

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supposed to have but they have

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Takis and hot cheetos and then I do

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little small bags.

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They have the giant bags

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I'm like, what the heck are you doing?

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Like you've got a full family sized party

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sized bag of hot cheetos in

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your bag. He goes I get hungry

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I'm like, but where's your where's your

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your chromebook? Oh, I left that at home.

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There's no room in my backpack for that

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I'm like

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I did put cheetos in the backpack because

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they haven't we just I

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introduced the word comida

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So I figured okay cheetos can be the

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comida and then I asked them

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is is comida mala comida buena

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It was very cute, um, yeah, so we had a

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good time with that. Yeah,

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that's funny because they um

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Because yeah, they only like the hot hot

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spicy spicy stuff lately

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The hot the hot spicy

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talkies and the hot cheetos

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It's got to be hot and spicy hot and

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spicy and then my kids told me about

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something last year as they go

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We need to make a chip salad. I'm like,

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what's a chip salad?

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She goes you need to be in a giant bowl

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profe and then we put all

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of our chips in the bowl

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They all get mixed up

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and then the

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I'm not autistic

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But I have a lot of autistic, um

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Qualities and one of mine is we don't mix

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that kind of stuff together

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Like as a kid I couldn't eat pretzels and

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then eat chips afterwards or vice versa

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Because the flavors were just too

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different and my mouth was not prepared

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for that. So having that

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All the different textures all the

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different things in there would drive me

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crazy. There's no way

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I when I eat food at

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like I eat burgers and fries

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I eat the fries first because they go bad

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first and then I eat

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the burger. I don't go

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Fry burger bite fry burger bite like some

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people no, no fries are done. Then it's

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time to eat the burgers

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You know, I do I don't do that. I can't

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mix that kind of stuff. I'm weird that

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way just the way that I am

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but um, yeah that that

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Chip salad they were talking about was

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like so creepy to me. I'm

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like, oh no, I couldn't do that

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Couldn't do that at all

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Well, we are to our time so let's just

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end with one last thing

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What's one pep talk kind of thing that

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you can give to our listeners?

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um

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That help them get through and get past

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that burnout. Give them

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one thing that you can

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recommend or pep talk some

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kind of motivational thing

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Uh

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Do you have anything david go for it?

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Okay, so uh, I was thinking about it. So

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and this is on the

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theme that I was you know

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I'm the perfectionist of the driven guy

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Uh ci isn't about being perfect. It's

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about being present the stories of

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laughter the connections, right?

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It's it's that it's what we want our

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students to remember

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When we give ourselves the same grace you

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give our learners the work becomes

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sustainable again is is you know

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We're going to make mistakes. We're going

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to have those we'll get

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the letting of recycling then

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But this embrace it and

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this enjoy the whole process

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And not too much too fast as soon as a

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killer and you know,

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don't overwhelm yourself

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I love what you just said i'm putting it

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in here. Ci is not being perfect. It's

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about being present. That is

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Absolutely

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a gem that is

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Absolutely. I love that. That is great.

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Thank you. I'm gonna steal that because

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it really that really does

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Emphasize what we do.

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It's about being present

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It's not about sticking to that script

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because you need to teach the kids in

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front of you and the

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kids you have in front

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Of you in first period are not the same

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kids that are in front of you in second

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period. No, it's not

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Absolutely. I love that. You need to be

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present in that moment

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You can't have laminated lesson plans

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that you just go ahead and

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do. I mean I have my templates

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And but I have my space isn't that are

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left blank in my templates where I write

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the story for the week

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That is for my kids

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So I 90 of my lesson

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plan is done every week

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But the other extra part is where I add

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that little spice there to my actual kids

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So absolutely you need to be present

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there. You need to be able to recognize

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Your kids to strengths or weaknesses

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their likes their

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dislikes and so that you can

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Jump on those and use those to your

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teaching advantage. So that is excellent

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advice. David. Thank you so much

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Um, I would also

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That was awesome. I love the idea of

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grace too because I feel

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like our students need it

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We need it right and so

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that ci allows you to be human

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with students and um, just like scott was

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saying it allows you to

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respond to student needs

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So I feel like it allows you to speed up

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or slow down according to student needs

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Um where you're not you know, you do have

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that. I love you. I'm using

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again. You do have that grace too

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to um to work with this

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Um, I actually am I

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think a little less planned?

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Because of that I do roll with it if we

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don't get quite as far as

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I would like to in my plan

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Well, we still did something that was

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meaningful and um and fostered connection

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and that is the most

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important thing to me

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Paula says thank you

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for the wonderful session

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Um, you're so welcome pala and she also

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put in there that

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makes sense. So absolutely

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Um, and I just had the idea was what I

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was going to say and I just lost it

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Tell you it's covid

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brain. I still have that

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lasting effects of covid, um

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But oh, yeah, this is what I was going to

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say. Here's my piece of advice

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Your lesson plan is

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for your administrators

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So it's there for them

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But if I don't get

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A if I don't get to

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what's on my lesson plan

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my only goal every day

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And it's the same goal

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every single day no matter what

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is

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to use the language as much as possible

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And to make it comprehensible or or as

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dr. Terry waltz would say

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Comprehended because just because you

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think it's comprehensible if it's not

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Comprehended by the students then it

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wasn't very comprehensible

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So I love that about her.

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How she put that in there

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um, but

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So if a kid asks me he's

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trying to get me off track, right?

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Like it's homecoming coming up homecoming

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is coming up at the end of the month

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It's coming up in the announcements

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tickets are for sale. So the kids are

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asking me about my homecoming

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How was it what I who'd I

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go with and stuff like that?

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Well, your instinct is then to just go

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ahead and tell that story in english

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but instead

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You know the kid thinking he's going to

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derail the class because he sees all the

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stuff we're supposed to do

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And I instead tell the story in spanish

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And I circle it. I ask my

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questions about it and I make it

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Comprehended and i'm

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drawing pictures on the board

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Then they go at the end of the class and

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go we didn't get anything done

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We were supposed to do and they think

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they were a win and i'm like

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That was a win for my class because we

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spoke let spanish the

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whole period it was understood

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That was the win even though I didn't

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touch my lesson plan

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So think about it that way that your only

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goal is just to use as much of the

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language whatever language

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you teach to your students

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Use as much of it as possible make it

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enjoyable for both you and

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your students and make it

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Comprehended by your students and you

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will have had a successful day. And if

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you need a break then take one

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Take a break there's lots of different

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ways sustain silent reading ones

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We've given and i'll i've gotten some of

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the websites that they've that both tracy

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and david have mentioned

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I'll be putting them in the show notes.

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You've got some other

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ideas for activities in there

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You've got formative.com. You can make

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some activities in there. You can do

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Quizlets or cahoots or any of those kinds

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of things give yourself

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permission. Take a break

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Um, we're getting ready for midterms

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midterms or this thursday and friday. And

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so what did my kids do?

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I needed a break on friday. I needed a

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half an hour. I had already vocab review

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practice in there already set there

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But what I did was what I always do so I

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said, okay, I already have some um, uh,

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gim kits already made

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So i'm gonna go ahead on that vocabulary

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because we're just finishing unit two

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So I just put that up there. They played

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three 10 minute games

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Of gim kit three

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different games of gim kit

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Um with the same vocabulary to get the

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practice. So it gave me 30 minutes of

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Down silent reading is another great one

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Come up with a reading or listening

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activity that the kids can actually do

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On their own all of those things if you

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need to take a break take a break

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Mental health is a

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real thing and we need to

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Play into that a little bit kids get

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tired. We get tired if the

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kids aren't feeling it switch

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Around if they're really active then do

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some kind of quiet activity

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if they're really, you know

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Low energy do some kind of an active

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activity to get them going and tracy

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talked about taking

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your kids singing outside

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I used to do um tpr parades

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So we would go outside and walk over the

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school and i'd be calling out the words

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and they have to do the actions as we

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Paraded around the school

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So cool. I love it

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And so, you know, it was just so fun or I

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we would do our song of

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the week that we were doing

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I bring a little portable

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radio with us a little speaker

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And the kids were singing it as we walked

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around the halls of the school singing it

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through there the kids were so

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Embarrassed I made sure we always went

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through the front office

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Because there was so embarrassed like hey

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i'm singing and being it just as goofy as

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you and i've got to

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work with these people so

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If I can do it, you can do it. So just

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give yourself a break have your mental um

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down days just like you need

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Um because we absolutely need that we

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can't do we can't always

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be on 180 days of the year

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It is way too much and other teachers do it, too

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So don't think that you are you're you're

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being lazy or you're you know, that kind

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of thing give some kids something

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Structured to do nothing, you know, just

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frivolous not just to fill time

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But give them something that has a good

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purpose in there, but that

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they can work on independently

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The only thing I don't recommend doing is

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giving workbook or textbook exercises

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Because those usually are too artificial

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and there's very little learning that

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comes from those particular activities

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So find some other stuff that actually

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talk to the standards

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and you will be golden

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Maria says thanks. Great job guys. You're

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so welcome. Maria. Anybody have any final

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words before we end up?

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No, okay

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Stick with it because it's worth it

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Absolutely

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So that's the wrap on today's episode of

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comprehend this huge.

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Thanks for hanging out with us

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You could have been waiting

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But let's be honest

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This was way more fun

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And of course a big thank you to tracy

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and david for keeping

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it real about ci burnout

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And hopefully you're walking away

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reminded that nope you're

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not broken ci can wear you down

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And yes, there are ways to keep it

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sustainable without losing your sanity

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Don't forget to hit subscribe drop us a

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review and share this episode with any

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colleague who's currently crying

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Into their stack of ungraded quizzes

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You can catch us live on youtube every

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sunday morning or replay it later on your

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favorite podcast app

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Ditch the drills trust the process and

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i'll see you next time on comprehend this

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About the Podcast

Comprehend THIS!
Real talk for real language teachers—because comprehension isn't optional.
Welcome to Comprehend THIS!, the podcast for language teachers who are tired of the same old textbook chatter and want the real talk instead.

Every episode is like pulling up a chair in the copy room or leaning on the hallway wall at your favorite conference — except it’s not awkward, the coffee’s better (yours, not mine), and nobody’s grading you.

Host Scott Benedict sits down with 1–2 guests — teachers, trainers, authors, CI rebels — to swap stories about what actually works in a comprehension-based classroom.

We talk the good, the weird, the messy middle — first wins, facepalms, reading that actually sticks, grammar without drills, surviving department side-eyes, grading for real proficiency (without losing your mind), and everything in between.

It’s casual. It’s honest. It’s LIVE — so you get all the “did they just say that?” moments, unfiltered.

Pull up your favorite mug. Laugh, nod along, steal an idea or two for Monday, and remember: you’re not the only one doing it different — and doing it better.

Watch LIVE: Sunday mornings at 8am Pacific / 11am Eastern, on YouTube at youtube.com/@immediateimmersion — or listen soon after on your favorite podcast app.

Comprehend THIS! — Real talk for real teachers. Ditch the drills. Trust the process. Stay human.

About your host

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Scott Benedict

Scott Benedict has been teaching Spanish since 2001—which means he’s survived more textbook adoptions, curriculum rewrites, and “revolutionary” teaching fads than he cares to count. He runs Immediate Immersion and hosts the Comprehend THIS! Podcast, where he tells the truth about teaching with comprehensible input: the good, the bad, and the “did that student just say tengo queso again?”

After two decades in the classroom, Scott knows what actually works (spoiler: not conjugation charts) and isn’t afraid to say it out loud. On the podcast, he dives into CI strategies, teacher survival hacks, and the occasional story that will make you question your career choices—but in a good way.

When he’s not recording or coaching teachers, you’ll find him traveling, taking photos, or wandering yet another zoo because apparently, one giraffe enclosure is never enough.

Comprehend THIS! is equal parts professional growth and comic relief—because let’s be honest, if we don’t laugh about teaching, we’ll cry.