Educator Voices: Strategies and Best Practices for Teaching and Learning

This episode is Part II of a four-part series featuring educator voices from the 2022 AVID National Conference. Each episode features interviews with teachers and school leaders. In this episode, our educator guests share their favorite AVID teaching and learning strategies. Their insights are both inspirational and practical. One thing you will likely notice when listening to the guests featured in this episode is their undeniable love for their students. These educators want the very best for the children they serve, and the strategies they bring to their classrooms help them to empower their students for future success.

This episode is packed with strategies you can use in your classroom. In most cases, these strategies focus on building learning skills, so students can be successful in any future learning situation they encounter. Many of the practices center around the WICOR® strategies of writing, inquiry, collaboration, organization, and reading. Visit AVID Open Access to learn more.

Transcript

#210 — Educator Voices: Strategies and Best Practices for Teaching and Learning

TIME: 40:14
Owner: AVID Open Access

SUMMARY KEYWORDS
avid, students, strategies, teacher, school, teach, podcasting, work, inquiry, writing, kids, talk, opportunity, love, digital, learning, big, pbl, best practices, paper

SPEAKERS
Winston, Paul, Angela, Shelby, Heidi, , Carmena, Anita, Leeza, Steven, Nicole, Maya, Whitney, Mitzi, Christy 

Nicole Zaayer  0:00  

I often see students in classrooms doing Give One, Get One. And one of the reasons why I really love this strategy is because students are able to collaborate with their peers.

Georgette Sierra  0:09  

We're really pushing certain strategies to help with reading because that's our lowest deficit area. So we did writing in the margins and marking the text.

Christy Meier  0:19  

Favorite of all elementary children are the celebration cheers.

Winston Benjamin  0:22  

The topic for today's podcast is Educator Voices: Strategies and Best Practices for teaching and learning. Unpacking Education is brought to you by avid.org. AVID believes that every learner can develop student agency. To learn more about AVID, visit their website at avid.org.

Rena Clark  0:47  

Welcome to Unpacking Education, the podcast where we explore current issues and best practices in education. I'm Rena Clark.

Paul Beckermann  0:58  

I'm Paul Beckermann.

Winston Benjamin  1:00  

And I'm Winston Benjamin. We are educators.

Paul Beckermann  1:03  

And we're here to share insights and actionable strategies. 

Transition Music  1:08  

Education is our passport to the future.

Winston Benjamin  1:14  

Our quote from today comes from William Arthur Ward. He's a motivational writer. The quote says, "The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires. What do you think about that, Paul?

Paul Beckermann  1:37  

I think there's some truth to that. I think, you know, there's, there's a place for each of those things. But it's, it's kind of like we've talked about in past episodes. The more we can transfer to our students, the better. It's like that progression of compliance to engagement to empowerment that we heard from both George Kouros and John Spencer. It's that, that pendulum kind of we want it to go as far toward the kids as we can, even though at times, we have to pull it back. And I kind of see empowerment and inspiration is ideas that are really closely connected. Because if you're empowered, it's more, it's easier to be inspired. And if you're inspired, you're probably empowered in some way to do something with that. So these are the things that I think really impact our kids long after they leave our classrooms.

Winston Benjamin  2:26  

I agree with that, that that there is a sense of teaching, good quality teaching. The way that I think about it, since I've done, since my work really focuses on working with beginner educators and I watched them maturate into becoming more expert, I feel like this statement is kind of the process of becoming a teacher, right? In your first couple of years, you're just telling students. Your lessons are not focused on giving them opportunity for having voice, it's just here. And then you develop after a couple of years. You have more experience, you have more time, you think about a) I want students to do this, right. So you develop. But also thinking about like, sometimes teachers, you're in demonstration, you try to demonstrate a lot, you're just like there, and then there are times when you become an inspiration. So I don't, it's hard for me to say like, you have to be a great teacher to be an inspiration. I think some superior teachers end up becoming that inspiration because you just do the job. Right? So I sometimes think that people give this high level of expectation of what teaching should be, and it's really just, you're doing your work. You know what I mean? And if you do your work well.

Paul Beckermann  3:42  

And there's really, there's a lot of ways to inspire kids, right? I mean, it might not, the biggest inspirations might not be during class. It might be what happens in the hall between class. It might be in a club you coach or advise or something like that. A lot of times those are the times you have more, more of an opportunity to really connect with the kids and those kids that you connect with are the ones you're probably going to inspire the most

Winston Benjamin  4:03  

Absolutely. Right? To think it's the, it's the connections, the inside and outside of classroom that make you a great teacher. Right. A lot of times they will focus on just the classroom aspect, but I think it's important to do the inside and out.

Paul Beckermann  4:19  

For sure. 

Winston Benjamin  4:20  

Paul, sometimes I really, you know, appreciate, appreciate the way you think. So this is going to be a continuation of, and a second in our series of Educator Voices episodes. These episodes are based on recordings we gathered at the AVID National Conference, Convention in Florida last December. We collected these great insights from teachers, school leaders, who are just like you. Everyone at the conference was someone connected to the AVID program. So we talked, we asked them about their favorite AVID instructional strategies and best practices for teachers and learning. Here's what they had to say.

Rena Clark  5:01  

All right, so we're here at National Conference. If you would just let us know your name, where you're from, where you teach, what you do. 

Jenny Piel  5:08  

Okay, so my name is Jenny Piel. I'm from Greenville County in South Carolina, Lakeview Middle School. I'm an instructional coach there. We all know that AVID just takes the best of everything that, you know, is offered to educators in general for our kids, and builds on those, allows our students to grow in those areas, as well as our educators, and truly be and show success for all.

Mitzi Campbell  5:37  

Hi, my name is Mitzi Campbell. I am the principal of Kenneth D. Bailey Academy in Danville, Illinois. That is our school's alternative school. We service students ages, approximately 12 to 20. We start with basic strategies, just even just the organization piece. So a lot of our students come from homes that are kind of discombobulated. And it's funny, it's just amazing to see when they, when things are organized, when strategies are put in place and routines are put in place, they just feel comfortable, and they feel safe. And so it takes it to that next level. Any, any teenager, you know, struggles with focusing for long periods of time. So we're huge on brain breaks in our classroom. In fact, my alternative babies have gone to other schools and presented some of their favorite brain break activities. And it's just fun, because it's a quick way to get them engaged and reset themselves. 

Nicole Zaayer  6:17  

My name is Nicole Zaayer, and I'm the principal at Southwest Elementary School in Danville, Illinois. And one of my favorite AVID strategies is a strategy called Give One, Get One. And so I often see students in classrooms doing Give One, Get One. And one of the reasons why I really love this strategy is because students are able to collaborate with their peers. And so oftentimes, in elementary school kids are maybe a little bit timid, or they struggle, struggle academically. And maybe sometimes they don't understand the question that the teacher is asking in the lesson. And so Give One, Get One gives them an opportunity to collaborate with their peers to maybe feel a little bit more confident in what it is the teacher is wanting. And then they can feel more confident in their work.

Georgette Sierra  7:07  

I'm Georgette Sierra, and I'm the AVID district coach for Pulaski County Special School District. I want to talk about the AVID our favorite AVID strategy. So we're in year four of implementation. And we are really pushing certain strategies to help with reading because that's our lowest deficit area. So we did writing in the margins and marking the text. So we started with marking the text and now we're building on that in our districts by schoolwide, from K 12.

Winston Benjamin  7:38  

We are with... 

Steven Bockover  7:39  

Steven Bockover. So for me, one of my favorites is the AVID eBinder. I've been using the Google Slides template that was a pitched to me from former AVID teachers that I inherited the program at the school from Lauren Vitello Keisha Shirley, and then our district coordinator, Jody Peters. And what I really like is throwing our bell work in there. So we figured out a way of creating a master copy of the eBinder, a student copy, and then forcing the copy for the students to create their copy from. I can post the bell work in a slide, click update, it automatically prompts for all the kids to update. It gets us going with bell work very quickly in the day. And then the overall, the customization of the eBinder in general, where they get to express themselves throwing gifs and different images and things like that. It teaches them how to use Google Slides in a different way than just receiving information. And so I'm really excited for the ways that I was showing how to use the new eBinder templates this year to get students to organize things on their own and not just be input from the teachers, but they can express themselves as well.

Teresa Gooch  8:43  

My name is Teresa and I'm also from the middle of Missouri and I teach the AVID Elective to 10th through 12th graders. And one strategy that I use with my seniors just this week, but heard in my focused notes just this morning was this "Says, Means, Matters Framework, just getting kids to identify what's said in the text, put that into their own words, and then explain why it's important. And I thought about how I could utilize that in a better way in my content area class, which is health, in ways that I hadn't thought of before. So I've used it in AVID, but I am really excited about having my kids learn that strategy in a content class because I think they can really apply it.

Rena Clark  9:19  

Across all content areas. 

Teresa Gooch  9:21  

Sometimes you just forget how you can utilize it until you find another way.

Rena Clark  9:24  

Re-energize. Thank you so much.

Leeza Roper  9:27  

My name is Leeza Roper. I'm from Brooklyn, New York, and I teach in Syracuse, specifically Syracuse STEM at Blodgett. Go Lions. 

Paul Beckermann  9:36  

There you go. 

Leeza Roper  9:37  

I teach eighth grade ELA.

Paul Beckermann  9:40  

And you just attended a session on podcasting. Wondering what are your thoughts about using podcasting in your English classroom?

Leeza Roper  9:47  

I am going to create a PBL out of it, project-based learning because we're a PBL school, AVID and STEM school, so I think podcasting touches on all of those things.

Paul Beckermann  9:57  

That's amazing that you've got that combination. I love that. 

Leeza Roper  10:00  

Yes. And the next book that we're going to read is Mouse. And right now I have my kids creating an essay based on Monster by Walter D. Myers. So they got the writing skills based on this first section, this first semester of the school year. Now for the second semester, we're gonna go into more CTE, STEN, AVID, PBL, with this podcasting project that I'm implementing, and actually, Paul gave me a great idea to do the podcasting from the perspective of a character in our next book, which is Mouse. You know, touching on the Holocaust, and the kids getting some information about what has happened in history with that. I'm very happy to try that out and see how it goes.

Paul Beckermann  10:45  

From your excitement already, I can tell the kids are gonna be excited. So that's awesome.

Leeza Roper  10:49  

Thank you so much.

Maya Waters  10:50  

Well, hi, my name is Maya Waters. I'm a sixth grade teacher at Lincoln Middle School in Syracuse, and we're having a great time in Orlando.

Paul Beckermann  10:57  

Do you have a favorite strategy, like something that really works with kids?

Maya Waters  11:01  

Honestly, the AVID claps. They love that, like, they go so hard for the AVID claps, and they all want to do their own. So we, we do our own AVID clap, I don't know if you guys are aware of it. It's called Getting Sturdy. It's like a dance move that the kids do. And so instead of like doing like regular AVID claps, like they'll get sturdy for a second, like with all their kids, and they're just really into it. And it's just really nice to see them applauding their classmates and actually getting excited for them to present. 

Paul Beckermann  11:26  

That's cool. And for those people that are not familiar with a clap, when do you use it? Or why do you use it?

Maya Waters  11:32  

We use it when, if a student shares an answer that's really like, outstanding, we'll give them an AVID clap. If they ever present anything, even if it's something small, we'll give them an AVID clap, or some sort of celebration so that they feel appreciated. And yeah, if we see a student that if they have all the materials or if they're just really just being an outstanding student, like a role model for the class or the school, we'll give them a little cheer, and just acknowledge them for what they're doing. 

Paul Beckermann  11:55  

So class celebration.

Maya Waters  11:57  

All the time. All the time.

Paul Beckermann  11:58  

Awesome.

Christy Meier  12:00  

My name is Christy Meier, and I'm an academic coach at Stanley Switlik Elementary down in the Florida Keys. And favorite of all elementary children are the celebration cheers. And those are always a lot of fun, whether it's a huge group of students or just a small classroom. They really love that and enjoy getting into it.

Paul Beckermann  12:20  

What's a favorite, like a crowd favorite?

Christy Meier  12:22  

Oh, my goodness, the crowd favorite right now is the sky diver.

Paul Beckermann  12:26  

What is that?

Christy Meier  12:27  

The sky diver is where you pretend you're jumping out of an airplane. Your arms are outstretched, you're flailing, screaming, and then all of a sudden you stand up quietly, and you say "Ahhh."

Carmena Woods  12:43  

Carmena Woods from Atlanta, Georgia, Tri-Cities High School. Whoo, whoo. All right. I'm an administrative assistant. 

Paul Beckermann  12:51  

Okay. Perfect. 

Carmena Woods  12:53  

One strategy that I do like, What is the Gist? is one of the strategies that I learned from AVID and it's one that can be used across all curricula. And with that, that strategy gives the students an opportunity to think about what they've read, and be able to gather their thoughts and give a response to what they've read in whatever subject area it is.

Paul Beckermann  13:20  

So for somebody who has never heard of the Gist strategy, can you summarize, like, what is it? What does a student do?

Carmena Woods  13:27  

So it's kind of like a ticket out the door. But what happens is they go through the lesson. And then what is the gist of the lesson? What is the main part? What is the main point of the lesson? And they get an opportunity at the end to tell those main points, and the teacher engages with them, and gives them the feedback, immediate feedback, in reference to whether they are right or whether or not they're a little bit  off target. And it gives them an opportunity to get self-assessed right then, as well as the teacher giving an assessment of what the students know, and what the next level for teaching is.

Paul Beckermann  14:03  

That's awesome. So they get to kind of practice remembering and recalling that information, the teacher gets to see if they get it. Sounds like a win-win.

Carmena Woods  14:11  

Yeah, it is. 

Anita Allen  14:12  

Hi, my name is Anita Allen. I am a second grade teacher at Thacker Elementary in Kissimmee, Florida.

Paul Beckermann  14:19  

Awesome. Well, you're not so far from home, then? 

Anita Allen  14:21  

No, I'm not. 30 minutes away. One of my favorite AVID strategies is I like to use a Hands Up, Stand Up, Pair Up. I use this activity or this strategy with the students because they have a chance to get around, collaborate with other students. And I use it a lot of times with reviewing content in math or in reading. Actually, I did it a couple of days ago. Actually, if I want the students to think about a certain topic, like a brainstorm for a topic, like talk about what the Constitution means to me, they will have a chance where I will say okay, I present the question to them. What does the Constitution mean to me? And then I would say, okay, boys and girls, stand up, hands up, pair up. And then they have a chance to walk around the room and then they find someone within 30 seconds. And then after they get with that partner didn't have a chance to talk with them about the question.

Paul Beckermann  15:16  

So it gets them moving, gets them thinking, gets them talking. 

Anita Allen  15:19  

Yes. 

Paul Beckermann  15:20  

Yeah. Some people might say second grade, you said? 

Anita Allen  15:22  

Yes. 

Paul Beckermann  15:23  

The second graders can't do that kind of thing. What would you say to those folks?

Anita Allen  15:27  

That everything's possible with AVID. I mean, the strategies I use with second grade are wonderful. And second graders love it.

Rena Clark  15:34  

All right. So we're here National Conference, day two. Could you go ahead and just introduce yourself? Tell us where you're from?

Heidi Ebel  15:40  

Absolutely. My name is Heidi Ebel. And I'm from Mesa, Arizona. I teach...

Rena Clark  15:45  

Awesome. So actually, we've run into some other friends from Mesa, heard good things. So we're glad... 

Heidi Ebel  15:50  

It's so great district. 

Rena Clark  15:50  

...glad you're here. So just as far as being part of the conference, and I think we heard you're newer to AVID. So what are some of your takeaways, things you're taking back for your students.

Heidi Ebel  16:02  

So I'm learning so much here at the conference. But one strategy that I see really help my ninth graders is the focused notes. And really, the key, the key piece there is going back and interacting with the notes and showing kids the benefit to that and then seeing at the end of a semester, where we teach, and they are actually getting to learn that strategy in my class, take it to their core classes, and watch their grades increase, and they're getting pretty excited. That's exciting for me. The ball's rolling.

Rena Clark  16:38  

If you can tell us a little bit more about focused notes. I know traditionally, we talked about Cornell Notes. Now we talk a lot about focused notes. And there's kind of choice in like how kids can take notes. I can talk about, curious how your students interact with those notes. Have you seen...

Heidi Ebel  16:53  

Yes. Specifically what I, because they're ninth graders really learning to, you know, go a little deeper with their content. we circle unfamiliar words, underline key themes, and add color to really individualize it for them. And just teaching them to go back in because we know that that's where they really get the bang for the buck. 

Rena Clark  17:16  

So it's not just one and done. 

Heidi Ebel  17:18  

Not one and done. Yeah, coming back strong with the note-taking strategies. Look out.

Rena Clark  17:25  

Okay. Well, look out.

Winston Benjamin  17:30  

I used it in my grad school program--that highlighting and writing and circling back around, I absolutely wouldn't have completed the grad school without it, so...

Rena Clark  17:37  

That's the college connection. 

Heidi Ebel  17:37  

That's the testimony. We all benefit from that. 

Rena Clark  17:41  

All right. Well, thank you so much, Heidi.

Paul Beckermann  17:44  

Could you introduce yourself, tell us your name, where you're from, what you do?

Shelby Wright  17:47  

Hi, I'm Shelby.  I am from Maryland, and I teach seventh grade RELA and social studies.

Paul Beckermann  17:47  

I overheard you say something about an accountability talk. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Shelby Wright  17:57  

Sure. We have warmups every morning where the students write their own discussion. And we began practicing with the accountability talk strategies. We selected about five for the class, where we identify whether we agree with the statement because/we disagree with the statement because--a way that the students could improve. So this allows the students to be able to read another response, and provide their own opinion for it as well. But they're also practicing how they can share their ideas respectfully, and to assist their peers to better them and also better their own writing by their reading.

Paul Beckermann  18:33  

And how do the students respond to this? 

Shelby Wright  18:36  

At the beginning, we started with just a few strategies. So we will begin with the "I Agree or I Disagree, because." And then from there, we built on to those and added into them. And now they're to the point where they can select which one they want to use, because we have, they have about 20 responses, 20 peers that they can respond to. So it gives them an opportunity to use the different accountability talk strategies. And we started out with the writing, and now we're getting into where when we respond, we automatically use those strategies. And especially in the RELA setting, it really helped with writing the complete sentences because it was the sentence starters and the sentence frames. So overall, it helped with their speaking and their writing.

Rena Clark  19:17  

Can just tell us your name, where you're from? 

Whitney Prowell  19:19  

Tell you that?  

Rena Clark  19:20  

Yeah, we want to know who you are. 

Whitney Prowell  19:21  

My name is Whitney Prowell. I'm from Columbia, South Carolina. And I represent Richland School District Two. I love so many AVID strategies. They're all just best practices, but my favorite is the Fishbowl. I really like using the Fishbowl strategy because it gets everyone engaged. It allows for some critical thinking. It allows for collaboration, especially when there's a pilot and a co-pilot and they swap out or they have opportunities to speak to each other. Um, you can dig really deeply into different concepts when you're using the Fishbowl. I like to use Fishbowl in my professional development with teachers and staff. I also like to see them use it with students or I use it with students. So when there's an opportunity to have different perspectives, or dig deep into text, I think the Fishbowl strategy can be used in so many different ways. It is my absolute favorite.

Winston Benjamin  20:14  

Oh, I heard you heard some good things out of that, baby. I know, you heard some good things out of that. But you know... 

Paul Beckermann  20:22  

I feel a little inspired by some of that. 

Right? It's just this like the things that you all are saying are more valuable than what we say most times. I'm not gonna give you all the time, but I'm gonna give you most times.

I love hearing from teachers, for sure. If I could, I'd be I'd be pulling this stuff in every day. 

Winston Benjamin  20:39  

Every day, right. But we've got a second collection of quotes related to best practices. So this we've had our our respondents focus in on the AVID WICOR Framework. Guests. 

Paul Beckermann  20:54  

What, what's WICOR? What's WICOR? 

Winston Benjamin  20:56  

See, that's the day, one day if you're early in the game, and you don't know like, I didn't know, you know, sometimes you miss the things but WICOR for those who don't know, WICOR stands for writing, inquiry, collaboration, organization, and reading. It's a really fundamental strategy that injects these strategies into all of the content areas as a way to give students fundamental skills to help them build on other areas. So let's listen to some of our educators we met and hear what they have to say about WICOR and how they utilize it in their, in theIr, with their work with their students.

Paul Beckermann  21:33  

All right, well, thanks for stopping in with us today. Could you tell our listeners a little bit about who you are, where you teach, where you're from?

Angela Leonard  21:39  

Hi, my name is Angela Leonard, and I'm from Lafayette, Colorado, in the Boulder Valley School District, and my school is Anjevine Middle School. We're the Bobcats. Go Bobcats!

Paul Beckermann  21:51  

Would you like to share an insight from the conference with us? 

Angela Leonard  21:54  

Sure, I just came from a conference about organization. And the whole WICOR thing is awesome. But I always talk to students about the "O" being the longest letter and WICOR, in terms of what's in the O versus the I, C, and W and R. And sorry, I didn't do that in order. But I just came from a fantastic conference or session, pre-session about eBinders. And it is revolutionary because we are kind of going back and forth with paper and interactive notebooks and how to, how to incorporate more digital. And I think we have some really good materials and great takeaways. And I just texted my boss who you saw in the background, that I have some actual things that we can use right now as soon as we get back to school, so I'm thrilled.

Paul Beckermann  22:49  

What's the benefit of using a digital version instead of a paper version?

Angela Leonard  22:55  

Well, there's just more options. And one of the things about paper is it's hard to keep track of. And that's one of the things that we all struggle with. And one of the neat things I saw with the eBinder idea is you know, we're still going to have paper, but digital can actually capture the paper and put it in the digital binder. So you can have both and I love that. So for those paper people, you can still do paper. But for the digital people, there is a connection there. And hopefully we'll be able to continue connecting. And that's the big piece with WICOR I think, is connecting ideas and kids.

Paul Beckermann  23:33  

Awesome instead of "or," you can have "and." 

Angela Leonard  23:35  

Yes, exactly, exactly. "We can" instead of WICOR. 

Imani Thaniel  23:42  

Imani Daniel.

Winston Benjamin  23:42  

And you are with the, what school district were you in? 

Imani Thaniel  23:46  

Alexandria City Public Schools, Virginia. 

Winston Benjamin  23:50  

VA all day. Stand up.

Imani Thaniel  23:55  

Any session that I choose is really about what I can bring back to my students, how I can continue to build relationships with them, how I can continue to WICOR-ize my learning, if you will, but make it so it's blended. So I'm using technology. So I'm using face-to-face. So I'm using paper and pencil so that we're able to, the strategies that I've built here, I can teach to other teachers so that they can use them outside of AVID. So that's really what it's for. That's really what AVID is for. That's really what the curriculum is for. It's to have students and teachers use them outside of AVID so that they can utilize them for the future.

Winston Benjamin  24:30  

I liked that you said WICOR-ize. I've never heard that verbiage. I'm stealing it, putting hodgepodge in it. 

Please do.

Mary Grupe  24:38  

My name is Mary and I'm from the middle of Missouri. I'm a high school principal and we're looking to implement a purposeful, instructional framework and to use WICOR to embed that in our conversation right now. It's sparked from the advisory potential, the new curriculum. And we're thinking and talking about how that new curriculum and giving advisory with our ninth graders going up can move us towards being more AVID-wide, building-wide.

Shannon Harsh  25:02  

My name is Shannon Harsh. I'm from Phoenix, Arizona. I work at an all-AVID high school called Wilson College Prep. I'm a biology teacher, the AVID coordinator, and I teach junior AVID this year, as well.

Paul Beckermann  25:15  

And I understand inquiry is a big part of, it's part of the WICOR Framework. So how does inquiry look in in your school and maybe in your science classroom?

Shannon Harsh  25:24  

In my science classroom, it's more about not knowing the answer all the time. So I use essential questions in everything, either as an essential question for a lab, an essential question for activity, an essential question for, for the unit, for the notes, for the day, for whatever. And it's all about trying to figure out the answer to that essential question. 

Paul Beckermann  25:43  

And that's hard for some kids, right? 

Shannon Harsh  25:45  

Very hard, very hard. They, they're like, but they just want to Google it, they really do. But, you know, it's it's not that's not what we're doing.

Paul Beckermann  25:53  

And those are life skills that are going to support that student in anything that they do. 

Shannon Harsh  25:57  

Yep.

Cameron Inouye-Ng  25:58  

My name is Cameron Inouye-Ng. I am a fifth grade teacher at Makalapa Elementary School in Honolulu, Hawaii. I also loop with my kids. So I teach fourth grade. And then I teach fifth grade, and then I go back down with them. So some things before coming here, I'm just like, oh, like, yeah, I didn't realize that was like an AVID strategy. Oh, that was an AVID strategy? Like I've been doing it already. One of the biggest things is for me is the organization. So I've been holding my kids really accountable this year through planners, desk checks, binder checks, just so that they can have it all ready. And that way, there's like no miscommunication between me, the students, the students' parents, and everybody else that we can have everything set for them.

Winston Benjamin  26:39  

Ooh-wee. See. 

Paul Beckermann  26:41  

You know what I was thinking, Winston?

Winston Benjamin  26:42  

What were you thinking, Paul? 

Paul Beckermann  26:42  

WICOR. You kind of just gotta: Winston WICOR. WICOR-ize Winston.

Winston Benjamin  26:50  

If you WICOR, you will win. Ah, I'm sorry, Paul. I'm trying. 

Paul Beckermann  26:55  

Winston. Winston Benjamin. 

Winston Benjamin  26:58  

Rena, yo, I'm sorry. You can't leave us together alone for too long. That's why we have Rena as the balance. But you know, sometimes it just works. It's the us. But I just want to ask: Paul, what stood out to you out of these conversations and these quotes from our, our family?

Paul Beckermann  27:16  

Yeah, I was really struck by how a lot of these AVID strategies and the WICOR really focuses on the skills of how to learn, which I think amplifies everything that we do in the school, because, okay, I can memorize facts. But that's not really learning how to learn. These are skill-based things that we're transferring to the students like organization. Somebody said, the "O" is the longest letter in WICOR. Well, because it's it's such a big part of being successful, not only academically, but really in a career or anything if you have to be organized. I know John Bergman was with us talking about mastery learning. He said, you can't just wing mastery learning. You have to be organized. You have to have kind of a plan. And I love that AVID gives strategies like writing in the margins, marking the text, whether you're paper or digital, these things can work because what you're doing is you're you're processing the content that's in front of you. I think those are powerful things that stood out to me.

Winston Benjamin  28:15  

See, I'm going to piggyback off of you in that idea of mastery learning is the idea of there's an essential question. And Shannon pointed, talked about that and pointed that out about the value of the inquiry, right? Like the fact that it's based on students not knowing and willing to find out the answer, right? There's a lot of times the way schools are structured, and in the spaces students feel like they're set up to "you got to know the right one or or you're not doing well." Or this is this is the process. You only have to go through the singular process. But I think with the AVID WICOR idea, it's like, listen, I'm gonna think. I want to know this one particular question. How do I go and find research? How do I develop information to justify the way I view this particular thing? Right? So, I think like you said, it gives students a sense in the strongest practice of how to engage. Also, after getting a PhD, I am mad I didn't know the WICOR system. i literally came up with a question that I needed to answer. I had to figure out how to organize, right? I needed to inquire and build a system based on all types of what is the tech say about this particular value? Or this particular issue? How, where do I find my niche? Right? Then I had to collaborate with my advisory team. I had to collaborate with my participants when finding questions with setting up time for interviews. Then I had to figure out, literally, reading, and organizing all of this stuff in order to produce information. So, I think the WICOR not only is for in class and in school now. Like me, I could have used it a few years ago. But I just wanted to throw that part in.

Paul Beckermann  30:05  

Yeah. And you know, now that you're talking about that, you kind of wedged my mind a little bit and nudged it into another direction. They said that "O" was the longest letter. I think "I" might be the most impactful letter, because that takes us back to that quote we had at the beginning of inspiration. If you're inspired, you're gonna go out and seek answers. You're going to really engage in that inquiry piece. And that's where the student-centered aspect really happens.

Winston Benjamin  30:31  

Absolutely. Right? Because you're willing to dig into like, I love hip hop. I know so many obscure facts about it. Why? Because I read about it. I tried it. it inspires me to be better. I'm sure you do with other writing or music, right? So it's just remembering that that's an important part of it—your drive for information.

Paul Beckermann  30:55  

And we have tools that allow us the inquiry skills that we never were able to have before. I mean, we can go find answers. It used to be when you applied for a college, the biggest factor was how big the library is. That's why Harvard and Princeton and all these did so well, and were so prestigious, because they had these massive libraries. That's where all the information was. But now the information is everywhere. And it's sort of a little bit of a great equalizer in a sense, because now everybody has access to this content that once was just reserved for the elite kind of, and that's where inquiry is so important.

Winston Benjamin  31:32  

Even pushing it to that, even to your point is that Encyclopedia Britannica that opened the door and then continuing to open the door in different ways to provide information, but the way you judge, organize, value, think about it. That part, I think it also is an important piece of WICOR. It just, it's not just go get information. It's like what does that information mean? Why is it valuable information, which is also a thing that where you talk about writing in the margins, how that like really helps the thinking.

Paul Beckermann  32:06  

Right. And thinking in the margins. To that phrase... 

Winston Benjamin  32:13  

Yeah, but we got to push them outside the box, though. I'm sorry, I'm a little bit ridiculous.

Paul Beckermann  32:20  

And the internet is a really big encyclopedia.

Winston Benjamin  32:23  

It is like, the biggest, right? That's why people say, oh, kids, they don't they don't they don't they don't memorize things. How can you memorize the internet? Right? It's like how to you utilize the internet? How do you utilize, so I think that's an important part that we talked about.

Paul Beckermann  32:42  

And the internet is a tool. 

inston Benjamin  32:45  

And we are going to jump into the toolkit! What's it's in your toolkit? 

Transition Music  32:53  

Check it out, check it out, check it out. Check it out. What's in the toolkit? What is in the toolkit? So, what's in the toolkit? Check it out. 

Winston Benjamin  33:03  

What are you putting in your pocket to say, I'm going to use this? Paul, what are you thinking?

Paul Beckermann  33:08  

Well, I thought it was kind of cool that WICOR became WIC-and at one point. So it was the paper and the digital. I know this becomes like this big argument. And I'm not sure that that's really the argument we need to be having. I don't think the the medium is the biggest deal. It's what we do with that. It's how we process that. I do think that digital does give us some really cool advantages. Like if you do an eBinder rather than a paper binder, you can embed video, you can embed links, you could record yourself speaking audio notes into that. And for students that are not good writers or readers, that can be a really big scaffold to greater, you know, educational success, too. So I'm kind of a proponent of the digital but it's not WIC-"or." Well, it is. But it's WIC-"and," which I really kind of like that.

Winston Benjamin  34:01  

I like that. I'm gonna go with the traditional, the WICOR, but I appreciate what you're saying in terms of like, adding video because then that can be, that can really drive student inquiry. They can build out how to engage in deal with other students. But I really appreciate the WICOR strategy as just a foundational skill set that can be applied not to just today, but through your/our students' lives, right? So in order for a student to go through grad school, go through college, go and do a job, like there's always learning opportunities on a job, even if you're a janitor, or even if you work in construction. There's always a learning opportunity. So how do we support our students to make best use of those learning opportunities? It's really something that I think WICOR is help, would, could potentially help.

Paul Beckermann  34:55  

For sure. And I should mention too, if people are looking for digital versions of eBinders, probably the two easiest ways to make them or like with Google Slides or PowerPoint. You can do it that way because there's no learning for the tool or make a website because then you can embed things in there, too. But you have to kind of figure out the sharing permissions and things like that. So this is when the toolkit section, I'll drop some actual tools there.

Winston Benjamin  35:19  

And Google pages is another one that you can use to create websites.

Paul Beckermann  35:23  

Awesome. All right, well, let's jump into our one thing, Winston. 

Transition Music  35:27  

It's time for that one thing. One thing. One thing. Time for that one thing. It's that one thing.

Winston Benjamin  35:40  

I am going to say intentionality. Use things and think about the choices that you make because that will impact your students' ability to do work. Everyone that we've listened to talked about the purposes of building relationship with students, not just in relationships with students. It's the "Why are you doing that?" Because then they'll do more. right? People talked about the, for example, the best practices, the reason why they use those best practices is that they yield value in return. So I think it's important to engage with what's there. And be purposeful in why you're using it, and how it's going to impact your particular set of students. And just think deeply about who they are.

Paul Beckermann  36:36  

Yeah, I love that intentionality piece. That's key. I was struck by something that at Leeza Roper said. She was talking about the fact that her school is a combination PBL, AVID, and STEM school. That's a lot going on. But I, the more I think about that, the more I think those things just fit together so nicely. You know, if you're doing PBL, what better way to do that, than to inject the STEM into it--the science, tech, engineering, and math. And then those AVID strategies will give you the WICOR skills and those other things to help you navigate some of that. They're structured, but they're less structured, in a sense, they're more student-centered. So the students need more skills to guide themselves through that, and that actually piggybacked off something Shannon Harsh said, she talked so much about the power of inquiry. And you know what? Students don't always have to be given the answer right away. Let's let them find that answer. I think that's a big part of PBL and AVID as well, because I do think that "I" is a big letter in WICOR.

Winston Benjamin  37:44  

Absolutely. And thank you all for listening. It's really valuable for us to get the voices of teachers, admin, who are utilizing AVID as a way of supporting their students. I'm gonna give you a little analogy since that, I like this, I like talking about schools and I always tell teachers be like elephants' parents. Mother elephants, they're all families. Like be like a mother elephant, y'all. Think about it. When you think and you think about that baby elephant, they're playful, they run around, they do things, they get into a mess, they are inquiry, they are trying to figure out the world. They're playful, jumping around. And the reason why they have the ability to do that is that they have a strong community that supports them, that gives them the freedom, to jump into the muck, to be playful, to learn. So as you're doing all of these strategies, and giving students the opportunity to then be like that baby elephant and inquire and use the skills they are learning from you to become sufficient, remember, build those relationships. Why are you letting them run around? How do you help them learn and be better? How do you help them hold accountability? All that goes into the life of raising an elephant. So if you're out there, be like an elephant parent. Allow your kids to find inquiry, use these best strategies, and be intentional in how you are growing these children. Thank you so much for listening.

Paul Beckermann  39:22  

Know what, Winston? An elephant never forgets.

Winston Benjamin  39:26  

See. That's why you got to remember your babies.

Paul Beckermann  39:32  

Pack up your trunk and go.

Winston Benjamin  39:34  

Right? Get it to work. Get to work. Thank you so much for listening.

Rena Clark  39:42  

Thanks for listening to Unpacking Education.

Winston Benjamin  39:45  

We invite you to visit us at AvidOpenAccess.org, where you can discover resources to support student agency, equity, and academic tenacity to create a classroom for future-ready learners.

Paul Beckermann  40:00  

We'll be back here next Wednesday for a fresh episode of Unpacking Education.

Rena Clark  40:04  

And remember, go forth and be awesome. 

Winston Benjamin  40:08  

Thank you for all you do.

Paul Beckermann  40:09  

You make a difference.