Dan Meyer (00:02):

Hey folks. Welcome back to the Math Teacher Lounge. I’m your co-host, Dan Meyer.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:07):

And I am Bethany Lockhart Johnson. And I’m your co-host, Dan! Hi!

Dan Meyer (00:12):

We’re co-hosts! Hey! Great to see you.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:13):

Dan, this is the last episode of Season 3. Three seasons!

Dan Meyer (00:19):

It’s gotta have a cliffhanger. What will the cliffhanger be? You know?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:22):

The cliffhanger is that we love having guests! It’s one of our most favorite things, because selfishly, we love to talk to all of these amazing folks who are doing this interesting research and thinking about amazing things. But for this last episode, it’s just you and I, Dan. Cliffhanger!

Dan Meyer (00:40):

Yeah. I like this. I like this. So the cliffhanger was last episode, and people are all like, “So who’s the last guest gonna be of the season before we roll out into summer?” And yes, as Bethany said, we love all the fascinating guests we’ve had on throughout these last few seasons. And we realized…who is more fascinating to each other than both of us? You know, let’s talk to each other about things, right? <Laughs> You get that! You get that! Or am I alone here in this? We had this idea about what we should talk about here, and that’s this: I am on Twitter a lot. I’m @DDMeyer on Twitter; throw me a follow; might follow back; who knows? I don’t tweet much. Bethany, what’s your handle on Twitter? Let ’em know.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:22):

I’m @LockhartEdu, and I was much more active pre-mamahood. But I’m still up in there. Go ahead.

Dan Meyer (01:30):

Yep. In there. Yeah, great. So I’ve been keeping track of the hottest conversations in math education Twitter, the conversations that the most people who kind of describe themselves as math teachers in their bios and whatnot have been replying to. We’ve got some little things working in the background, keeping track of this sort of thing. And so we are gonna bring you folks some of those extremely hot conversations, and even better than the questions—which we hope you’ll reply to and tag us in your replies—even more than those questions, we’ll bring you our answers—our answers!—to those questions. Can you believe that? We’ll fully settle these questions! Won’t we, Bethany? My gosh, won’t we?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:15):

Jeez Louise! No! Dan Meyer, the point is not our final word on it! The point is this episode, we’re furthering the conversation. We wanna hear from listeners about what do you think?

Dan Meyer (02:25):

Right. You’re right. You all need someone in your life like Bethany who will help you become the best version of yourself. So here’s the deal. We have several questions in a few different categories. We’re gonna bust through some quick ones, pretty quick. And, uh, there’s some meaty ones as well. Let’s get into it! The first questions come to you all, and us, courtesy of MTL guest Howie Hua, who has a renowned knack for just creating math memes, but also conversation starters that really capture the curiosity and answers of of a grateful nation. So Howie’s first question, which I’ll pose to Bethany, is, “What’s your favorite number?” Bethany? And why is it your favorite number?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (03:14):

Oh, I love it. OK. Well, the first thing that came to my mind is 12. ‘Cause It’s a highly divisible number. I mean, 2, 6, 3, 4—I love it. And it coincides with the day and month of my birth. Which, like, the double-digit…come on, 12, 12, 12, 12. I dunno, am I giving away, like, my bank security code <laugh> or anything by saying that?

Dan Meyer (03:41):

Yeah. What’s your favorite PIN?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (03:43):

Let me change my PIN. Yeah, it’s just such a happy, happy number. Well, 12 is, you know, 10 and 2. Two more. Anyway. Love it. What about you, Dan? What’s your favorite number and why?

Dan Meyer (03:55):

I’m into it. I’m into it. I think I would choose 16. Because it’s the first number for me when it was like, “Oh, you can keep on making numbers forever!” Where I’m like, OK, 2times 2 is 4. Great. That’s kind of an elemental expression in mathematics. Four times 2 is 8. OK. But then, 8 times 2 is 16, and it’s like, “Oh, you can just keep doubling that thing over and over and over again!” And I can recall feeling pretty excited that numbers are just like, out there for the finding. For the taking. Cool stuff.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:33):

I’m sorry. Wait, I have to interrupt. You went 2 times 4 is 8 and you didn’t go 4 times 4 is 16? You went 8 times 2 is 16? You wanted to keep the 2 the same?

Dan Meyer (04:49):

Yup. Yup. You can keep on doubling. You can keep on doubling numbers and it just keeps on going.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:53):

More evidence that our brain works very differently.

Dan Meyer (04:56):

We learn more about each other…let me keep this rolling with Howie questions. OK? Howie says, “If you could co-teach with one teacher from Twitter, who would you choose?”

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:06):

Oh, oh, it has to be a teacher?

Dan Meyer (05:11):

Or anybody, I guess. I mean, like, I know you love Oprah.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:15):

Can I co-teach with Oprah?

Dan Meyer (05:16):

Yup, yeah, so there we are. <Laugh> Yup. OK. Fair enough. We have to work Oprah into every single episode.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:23):

I’d just love to sit and like, we’d read together, we’d read to the students, and then we’d talk…I mean, obviously it’d be Oprah. But if we’re thinking more of like MTBoS, like math Twitter blogosphere-land, I suppose the person I would wanna co-teach with honestly would probably be Allison Hintz. One of our former guests as well. Her book, Mathematizing Children’s Literature, with Antony Smith, that book—I just love the idea of sitting and doing a read-aloud and then diving into some juicy math that’s inspired by what comes out of that read-aloud. So yes, that’s who I pick. Allison! Let’s co-teach!

Dan Meyer (06:00):

<Laugh> Shout-out to Allison.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:01):

What about you?

Dan Meyer (06:03):

I would choose MTL guest Idil Abdulkadir—because, and this relates to Allison and also Elham Kazemi—they talked about, in our episode about teacher time-outs. And I’m choosing someone who I think is—like I’ve never seen Idil teach, but I work with Idil at Desmos and think she’s fantastic. But what I really want in a co-teacher is someone that I can say, “Whoa, time out, do you see what’s going on here? This is really interesting. What should we do next about this?” And have a little strategy sesh in front of the kids and no one gets freaked out by that. And I think that that’d be a pile of fun. Idil seems like she’d be receptive to that kind of interaction, teacher to teacher. So that’s my vote right there.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:48):

Opportunity for you to grow your own practice, Dan.

Dan Meyer (06:52):

Yeah, yeah, exactly. 100%.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:56):

So Dan, I actually have a question for you from Howie. If we’re on the Howie tweet train, I have one from Howie too.

Dan Meyer (07:04):

Howie had some fire tweets, some fire tweets this current year. Yep.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:08):

Dan, I wanna know: Do you prefer doing math in pen or pencil?

Dan Meyer (07:16):

Ooh, yeah. Oh, I see that Howie says, “I don’t mean to start any drama, BUT,” and then asks the question–

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:23):

But!

Dan Meyer (07:24):

I think that Howie lives for drama. I think he knows he’s messy. He lives for drama. He knows what he’s doing this with this question here. He knows.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:32):

DRAAAAMAAAA!

Dan Meyer (07:32):

He knows what he’s doing. Yup. So I would just say it depends. Is that cheating? Like if I’m doing math to learn, or if we are learning in that process, then I want to use pen, actually. I wanna see the tracks of the thinking. And if we’re doing it for presentation, like if I’m presenting something, I wanna…I guess that’s an area where I’d be fine to not erase things. I don’t wanna prep it so it’s, you know…I guess you could use pen for presentation also. Just pen. Period. But I wanna see the tracks of the thinking if we’re doing some learning versus presentation. What about you?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (08:09):

Well, I heard the voice in my head telling one of my kindergartners, “No, you cannot do that in sparkly pen. You need to do it in pencil.” And I was like, “Wait, whose voice is that?” It was one of my math teachers telling me I couldn’t do it in pen! Why couldn’t this kid do it in pen? Sure! Do it in a sparkly pen! So I wanna say do it in pen. And since usually pen is what I have around…I mean, I do crosswords in pen, Dan.

Dan Meyer (08:36):

Wow, wow. With a piece of paper and math, you have lots of room to re-revise and cross off…but those little, little boxes on the crossword, that says a lot about your commitment to pen.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (08:46):

I got really good at making an A into an H or a P or whatever we need. So I would say, “Hey, if you’re in the room with your kiddos and you’re doing math, if somebody wants to do pen, let them do pen.” But I do know that I’ve seen teachers say you need to do pen so that I can see all of your thinking. So I think I hear what you’re saying. But do you think it should be like a classroom rule or something?

Dan Meyer (09:13):

Oh, no, no, no. I mean, I’m gonna ask you like, “How’d you get to this destination?” And I wanna know process somehow, and I think you’ll get tired of having to explain it verbally rather than just, like, showing. Just don’t erase stuff. Don’t scratch stuff off. Let’s let’s see how you’re getting there. That is what I’m into.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (09:30):

Thanks, Howie, for that trio of thought-provoking tweets, because I genuinely wanted to know what Dan thought and what our listeners think. I mean, Dan, I gotta say: Howie, you say you don’t wanna cause drama, but I gotta say I’m with Dan on that—

Dan Meyer (09:50):

Got the gift. Got the gift for drama. We’re still friends though. So I’m happy about that. Our next section, I got a few more questions queued up here and these ones relate to advice for educators, advice for yourself. Good advice, bad advice, that kind of thing. So let’s jump in. I would love to know—this one’s from Pernille Ripp—I’m very curious, Bethany, what is the worst teaching advice you have gotten in your life, ever?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (10:19):

<Laugh> Ooh. OK. Um, worst teaching advice was: “That’s OK, just move on anyway.” And that was in terms of pacing. It was like, students needed to do a deeper dive and the teacher who I was chatting with said, “No, no, it’s fine; it’s fine; just move on. Just move on to the next chapter.” That was probably the worst advice, because no, I don’t think that’s what I should have done at all! <Laugh>

Dan Meyer (10:48):

Right.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (10:48):

But I was a first-year teacher and I was trying to figure it out. And I learned that that was not good advice. And I understand the pressure of pacing. But it was totally antithetical to the type of listening to my students that I want to do in my craft. And this teacher meant well, but that was not good advice, teacher! <Laugh> What about you, Dan? What is the worst teaching advice?

Dan Meyer (11:13):

I dig that. That feels similar to one of the replies to Pernille here. Frances Klein says, “Never let them know you’ve made a mistake” being particularly bad advice. You know, just this like idea of like moving along, covering your tracks, not backtracking or admitting mistakes, those all feel kind of a piece. The worst advice I think I’ve ever received, and I wasn’t given this often, but it’s echoed by a lot of the commenters here on this tweet, which is “Don’t smile until X, Y, or Z,” where X, Y, and Z are like Christmas, October, December, January. Just the idea that you’ve gotta develop—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (11:54):

Wait, what?

Dan Meyer (11:55):

<Laugh> Did you never hear this from anybody? Don’t smile until Christmas? Perhaps this is more—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (11:59):

I’m a kindergarten teacher! Can you imagine? If I don’t smile the second they walk in? The tears?! The parents’ tears?! The kids’ tears?! If I’m just like, stoic?

Dan Meyer (12:07):

Yeah. Well.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:08):

So explain it to me.

Dan Meyer (12:10):

Well, the idea is, is that, you know, for older kids, they’re scoping you, they’re clocking you for weakness, they’re looking at you, they’re looking to take advantage. And so “don’t smile until Christmas” is like, hey, you can always relax. You can always relax your discipline, but you can’t UN-relax it if you start out, you know, Mr. Happy Pants Meyer. Which—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:33):

Smile perceived as weakness.

Dan Meyer (12:36):

Yeah. Very obviously poor advice. Eventually you come to realize that like having a rapport and a relationship that is trusting and warm and demanding, that has high expectations, that’s the best kind of classroom management. Not some kind of persona built around intimidation or stoicism, that kinda thing. So, terrible, terrible advice!

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:01):

I feel like I did have a few of those math classes. Yeah.

Dan Meyer (13:04):

Yeah, exactly. <Laugh> You loved them, right? They were like your favorite math classes. It was a blast, right?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:11):

<Laugh> So we have to ask the opposite. Thank you, Daniel Willingham, who said, “What’s the best advice you got?” But hold on, Dan, he didn’t just want the best advice. He wanted the best advice in three words.

Dan Meyer (13:26):

Oh yeah. He doesn’t, he doesn’t want a book or dissertation or even a blog post or even a tweet. He wants just three words.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:32):

I think maybe that might have been to me. <Laugh>

Dan Meyer (13:34):

This is someone who’s doesn’t have much time for this advice, wants it distilled down. I’m just obviously stalling here as I try to think about this. I don’t know, there’s just like so much nuance lost here. I would say, listen to students, listen to students. I can’t say more that, I guess. I guess I’m done. I can’t say more than that there. But you’re in a bad place if you’re not listening carefully to students. How about you?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (14:04):

1. Mine is “Ask…lots…questions.”

Dan Meyer (14:11):

Nice. ‘Cause I filled in the word! I filled in the word! I was able to kinda infer that. I did that. I got that.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (14:17):

Wait, wait, wait, wait! I could have said many! Wait, I could have said “Ask many questions.”

Dan Meyer (14:22):

Strong, strong.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (14:25):

So yeah. You know, no isolation, like don’t put yourself in a bubble. Ask, not just, not just your students, but the teachers! Ask a lot of questions. You don’t have to have it all figured out.

Dan Meyer (14:34):

Into it. Very much into it.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (14:37):

Thanks. Daniel. Thanks, Pernille.

Dan Meyer (14:40):

Yeah. Daniel and Pernille, Both great questions there about advice, best and worst. Another fire tweet popped up earlier this year from Dr. Khristopher Childs, which was “Name one thing every educator should stop doing.”

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (14:57):

Oh, I don’t know. This kind of ties into my best advice about asking questions.

Dan Meyer (15:03):

Stop not asking questions?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (15:06):

<Laugh> Avoid the isolation. I really love this idea of when we can, popping into each others’ classrooms, co-teaching, building this collaborative nature. Elham Kazemi, in our interview, talked about this idea of, like you said, the teacher time-outs, learning from each other. So I feel like if we could stop isolating ourself…and I don’t mean at lunch—sometimes you need to not be in the teacher lounge at lunch. Like if you need a minute, take the minute! But in general, as a practice, how can we not be isolated and instead be learning with, and from, each other? How can we stop the isolation? That’s what I would hope every educator would stop doing. What about you, Dan?

Dan Meyer (15:54):

I think that educators should…this is gonna require a little bit of elaboration. I think educators should stop taking responsibility for things that are not in their zone of influence. I think that as a society we are asking teachers to do more and more, to become more and more of a central fixture holding together with chewing gum and twine all the various parts of a student’s life. From their health, their fitness, emotional health, that we feed students at school. It becomes very tempting, I think, there’s a lot of pressures to blame outcomes, disparate and unjust outcomes later on in life, on teachers. And teachers should just flatly refuse. And to yeah, understand what the job has been set up to do. What it’s good for. And do that with excellence and intent and a lot of effort. And then not take responsibility for the rest of it.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (16:53):

If I asked five different people about the definition of what a teacher should be doing, I would get five different answers. So I think it’s really interesting that you say that because yeah, many, many hats, which I think, yes, can lead to burnout. Can lead to all sorts of things. We’re asking schools to be all things to all, all people. Interesting. I’m gonna think about that more. I need to hear folks’ response on that, Dan.

Dan Meyer (17:18):

Mm-Hmm. I’m curious too. I mean, yeah, there are definitely things that are in teachers’ responsibility and some that are not. That’s a tough one.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (17:26):

OK, for help, name an example of each. And what’s something that you think every teacher should not and should be doing. ‘Cause I feel like my brain goes to some things like, you know, I had teachers who were saying, “Well, I don’t wanna have my kids have to have breakfast in my classroom in the morning. That shouldn’t be my responsibility to serve breakfast in the morning.” But I’m like, “But then your kids are eating and they’re gonna be able to learn and be more focused.” Should that be the teacher’s responsibility? I’m not saying it necessarily should, but I’m saying…I don’t know. It gets murky for me.

Dan Meyer (18:06):

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think that we should, as a country, have a really generous social welfare net so that everyone has food at home. Where a school is not the place where some students have to go to in order to receive nutrition and nourishment. That seems sad to me. And uncommon in developed nations. I think that teachers should watch out for, should be responsible for, the mathematical development of the students they teach, up to a point, they should be responsible for learning math and creating relationships in their classes. I don’t think that teachers should accept responsibility for larger kinds of outcomes, like the health of a democracy or international competition, who goes to the moon first. That kind of thing has historically been placed at the feet of teachers. And it’s tempting when you’re a teacher, I think, to take on that responsibility because it kind of develops your social importance. And I just say, we should say no to that. And get compensation, not in terms of social importance, but rather like in spendable dollars and monies.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:10):

I’m learning more about you, Dan. And you know, this is what I’ve gotten from that answer: If you’re gonna dream, dream big. Right?

Dan Meyer (19:17):

Is that what you got from that? I don’t know. I think I’m trying to dream realistically.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:23):

No, like if we’re gonna say, “Maybe teachers shouldn’t be responsible for serving breakfast in the morning,” well, because we want every child to have access to nutritious and filling food at home and time to eat it in the morning, right? It’s bigger than just, “I don’t want the teacher to have to do this.” So we’re dreaming big. We’re saying this should be the LEAST that students have access to, right?

Dan Meyer (19:53):

Yeah. Yeah. I’m here now. I’m with you. I like that dream. Where we take care of folks in their lives outside of schools. So schools don’t have to be the one linchpin for every kind of social outcome. Like currently a lot of them run through a school ’cause we don’t do a good job of setting up other ways to meet those needs. And we should.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (20:16):

And we’re also recording this in, what, two weeks, a week, after a tragedy where students and teachers were killed in the classroom. And I think both of us are taking some deep breaths and recognizing that there’s a lot of debate that is happening about what teacher’s role should be in preventing this in the future. And I don’t know if you’ve done drills in your classroom that are supposed to help mitigate disaster, but you know—collective deep breaths— <laugh> is where we’re at right now.

Dan Meyer (20:52):

Yep. The idea of “we should arm teachers” is another example of no, we should not do that. We should solve the tendency towards violence outside of the classroom so that teachers and students can teach and learn. That sounds awesome to me.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:06):

Collective deep breath. Whew. OK. So what else you got for me, Dan?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:33):

Ooh. So I feel like I’ve heard that in many teaching PDs. “I Do, you do, we do.” Actually I feel like I’ve seen like more “I do, we do, you do.” Like graduated release. I do it, then we’ll do it a little bit together, and then now you have permission to do it. And I feel like in directed draw, that’s a hundred percent true. Like I’m gonna show you this and then you draw it. And then you cut here and then you do it. If we’re trying to create this, like I’m teaching this new art technique. But in mathematics, I feel like that’s really not what I want my classroom to look like. I want to support my students and set them up for sense-making, and then I want them to try it out and I don’t want them to solve it the way it first comes to mind for me. I wanna see how they make sense of it and how they solve it. And then I want us to share it with each other so we can grow together. So I think time and place for “I do, you do, we do,” or “I do, we do, you do.” Or shoo-be-doo-be-doo-be. Yeah. You?

Dan Meyer (22:44):

I’ve got nothing. I have nothing to add. I thought that was just an excellent summary of a classroom I would love to be a part in, love to teach. I think it’s a certain tool in the toolbox that I think is overused. But it’s also a tool that can be useful in the case of certain kinds of operations. There are some operations that do benefit from “let me just show you how, like one way you might do this.” I don’t know. I’m like helping my kid whack a nail into a board and there’s a moment where it’s like, “Hey, actually, lemme just show you one way you can do this,” and do it, and then that’s helpful in some moments. But for so much of math, a lot of math does not relate to the operational kinds of fluency. And in those instances, it’s a little bit…it’s not a useful tool, I don’t think, for those kinds of skills and ideas.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (23:34):

I’m thinking of tool talks in my classroom. So in kindergarten, many of the tools that we use in math and just in class in general, are new to the students. And if I tell them, this is exactly how you should use this tool, then I feel like I’m taking a lot of the sense-making away from them. But if I introduce the tool, show them how to use the tool safely, show them this is not a safe way to use the tool, chewing on this is not safe. That’s not how we use this tool. This is how we take care of it, et cetera. But then support different modes of using the tool that are gonna help them use it to solve problems and make sense, I think…but I guess—Dan, have you heard “I do, you do, we do,” or is it “I do, we do, you do”?

Dan Meyer (24:22):

I’m with you. And I think that it got clarified post-tweet. But yeah, it typically is “I do, we do, you do,” the gradual release of responsibility it’s often called. And I, I have heard people do what you described, which is…what is it? It’s “You do, we do, I do”? Like an inversion of that? Like have people do a thing that I can do that’s not too, too abstract for them, and then like “We all do something together, and then I’ll offer a summary of what we learned,” is one way that goes. I like that tool as well.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (24:53):

I think particularly, at least I’ve seen in elementary classrooms, there’s sometimes this fear of letting students just try it out before I’ve really showed them, “but this is how it has to be.” And what I am most excited about is supporting students and creating a classroom environment where students don’t need my permission or need my direct “this is the only way to do it.” Instead, it’s like, yes, there’s lots of things we model. But there’s also like, “Hey, what do you think? How do you think this should be used?” And the joy of that exploration.

Dan Meyer (25:30):

Yeah. There’s a feeling of efficiency that comes from “I do, we do, you do,” for some kinds of math, but it’s undercut in my experience by what it cultivates in the students, which is “I’ve gotta wait until the teacher does before I can do anything.” So it pays off real diminishing returns over time. And it’s, just for me, an exhausting way to teach. Always being the bottleneck for new learning is a total drag.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (25:55):

Ooh, what a great way to describe it. You do not wanna be the bottleneck. You want to be…what’s the other thing? The facilitator? What’s the opposite of a bottleneck? The flowing river? The…The…Help me!

Dan Meyer (26:10):

Hit us up in the replies. I dunno. The opposite of a bottleneck. That’s what you wanna…you wanna not be the opposite? No, you want, yeah. We got this here. We’ll figure it out. We’ll get back to you. <Laugh> OK. Well, folks, those were a few of this year’s fire tweets. It’s been fantastic chatting with you—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (26:29):

Dan.

Dan Meyer (26:29):

—Bethany, About all those—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (26:32):

Dan. You know, my favorite thing to do is interrupting you, Dan. I have to interrupt you because we can’t end fire tweets, Dan, without including a tweet from you.

Dan Meyer (26:43):

Oh, that’s true. I do have my moments. Yeah, we should. We really should. <Laugh> Do you have one in mind?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (26:50):

No. Dan. Yes. I loved…you tweeted recently, “How many years have you been teaching?” Which, OK. “What Has been like the most influential? Like, what, OK, blah, blah, blah.” <blathering noises> You tweeted, “How many years have you been teaching? And at this point, what has most influenced how you teach?” And you gave some ideas: A methods course, PD sessions, curriculum, TV and movies, et cetera, et cetera. And I love that you put that out there because this episode is coming out as we’re wrapping up another school year. And it also got me thinking about summer and what teachers sometimes do during the summer, but what we might need to do this summer for self-care. But I’m really curious. I love that tweet. And I’m curious, Dan, what did folks say was the thing that had most influenced their teaching and what’s most influenced your teaching?

Dan Meyer (27:49):

Ooh, yeah. People’s responses to this one were really fantastic. I came into this, I was flying to the Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators conference. And I just found myself wondering, so, the pre-service year, the one year of, like, you’re learning how to teach, is how we did it in California. Like how much of that has still infused my practice? And in what ways? I don’t think I think about that stuff consciously, but I think that did like set me up with a lot of images that I would be unpacking for going on two decades now working in education. I think conversations with people, I think observing classes, I don’t think that like the one-day PDs, the one-day development days throughout the year, four times per year, I don’t think those stuck to me much. I think that this summer, I have learned so much, just an embarrassment of riches, from non-educational sources. From other disciplines. From storytelling, for instance. From how people have constructed movies I like. I am proud of the way…one of the aspects of my character that I’m proud of—it takes a lot to admit this, as I’m sure you understand, Bethany—but to integrate lots of wacky stuff and pick from it and use that to affect my practice and teaching has been really positive. So for this summer, I hope that people read a good beach book and just kinda let your teaching mind rest a little bit. And in doing so, create some openings for new ideas about education from other parts of the world. Kids! Having kids has been helpful. I don’t know! Just everything! It’s such a big job, education. Everything has so helpful. What about you? What’s an influence on your practice that might surprise me or other folks out there in MTL land?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (29:52):

Well, I don’t know about surprise. I mean, I definitely feel similarly, like methods courses absolutely impacted my teaching. But I feel like opportunities where I was able to observe other teachers and where I was able to have conversations with folks about their practice, that has deeply impacted me. And books I’ve read. I mean, honestly, I’ve learned so much from sharing with other teachers. Like, for example, maybe I’ll bring student work and we’ll talk about it. And we kind of create this conversation together about how we wanna come back to the students based on the work we see. Those type of moments where we’re collaborating and we’re bringing multiple perspectives to the table, that I think, has really often shifted me out of my first initial reaction or what I thought I was going to do in the classroom the next day. So that continues to surprise and delight me. And thinking about this summer, I think there’s a lot of creativity and joy that can come out of the marination process, when you’re just kind of sitting back and healing yourself, whether through sleep or sunshine or time with friends and family or whatever that looks like for you. I think there’s a lot of creativity that can come from that place of fertile, you know, wellness. I never think of that as wasted time. I think of that as getting the soil ready for all that’s gonna come in the fall. And that being said, I also think it could be a fun time to dip your toes into something that you are excited to read, that you might not have a chance to read during the school year that could be teaching-related. So it’s like very low pressure, like, “Oh, I’ve really wanted to read more by this author. I’ve wanted to read this article. I’ve wanted to dip into this topic.” And not with a pressure, but just with a curiosity. And, yeah, I think so often we as teachers love learning, and to give yourself space to learn in whatever that looks like can be a real gift.

Dan Meyer (32:09):

Yes. And if you need book recommendations, hit the MTL back catalog of episodes. Loads of folks that we interviewed have real good books out.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (32:16):

Yes!

Dan Meyer (32:16):

Think about it. Think about it.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (32:22):

One quick recommendation: Again, gotta plug Antony Smith and Allison Hintz’s book. I read Mathematizing Children’s Literature before we did the interview, but this summer I wanna read all the children’s books that they mention. I just wanna go to the library and read all those children’s books. I wanna read them to my son. I wanna read ’em to myself. So, you know, diving into some good YA, children’s books, just, like, TLC. Dan, thank you for such a rich season and a chance to have so many interesting conversations. It is genuinely a joy to learn with and from you.

Dan Meyer (33:00):

Likewise. And always hope to see you folks on Twitter now and then. Let us know what you’re up to this summer at MTLShow on Twitter or in our Facebook group, Math Teacher Lounge. We’ll be there tuning in now and then. It’s been a treat interacting with you folks over this last season. Take care and until the new season, so long.

Dan Meyer (00:04):
Hey folks, welcome to math teacher lounge. My name is Dan Meyer

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:07):
And I’m Bethany, Lockhart Johnson.

Dan Meyer (00:09):
And this is the teacher learning week. We’re thinking this week about how we grow as teachers. And to start with, I just wanted to ask Bethany, uh, first Bethany, how are you doing? And second <laugh>. Um, what is, what, what has been your like most favorite and least favorite, most effective least effective professional learning experience when you were a classroom teacher?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:30):
I think for me, most effective was definitely when I could use it right away. Right. Whatever we were talking about, whatever we were learning, like I got to go put it into practice. Sure. Uh, I, I remember we did something where we designed a lesson and then we went and taught it like one person taught it and the rest of the people watched. And then we kind of like got to workshop it, which that was like a one off the fact that we got to go out of our classroom and go observe somebody teaching. It was gold. It was gold. Um, so that was probably the most effective, because there was so much opportunity for reflection and least effective was something that felt like just completely unconnected to, you know, kind of either so theoretical that it wasn’t like touching on what we were navigating right there in the classroom. I don’t know. What about you? What can you think of times that, are you gonna say times you led a PD? Those were the most effective?

Dan Meyer (01:26):
Yeah. My favorite ones are my sessions, of course. But if I had to throw those out for a second, um, yeah, I, I like, I want, I want both, I want it all. I want the, um, the big ideas that take a long time to settle in that also have like small bits that can carve off and use relatively quickly to test my understanding of the ID is, yeah. I’ve had some, some PD where I’m like, this is very relevant to tomorrow. And I also don’t care. Like for instance, like how to use the CD, the, the, like the, the software, you know, on the, on my curriculum, for instance, it’s like, okay, yeah, this is just a little, little too practical. You know what I’m saying? I want some bigger ideas to chew on. Um, I would also say like, I love my favorite PD by a long was writing up thoughts about how the day went and putting that on the internet in a public place that we used to call a blog and where people would come along, cuz there was like 10 blogs and like, tell me like that’s no good.

Dan Meyer (02:16):
Like the thing that you like is not a thing you should like, here’s the thing you should like instead, or try instead, or just this weird community that sprung up, you know, when I was, uh, starting to teach relatively new teacher and uh, I feel like I grew a lot

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:28):
Go back to this idea blog. If people would call you, they’d call you on the phone. What, what

Dan Meyer (02:32):
Was they would fax me? They, it would be a fact. So

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:35):
Fax,

Dan Meyer (02:36):
I got it. Fax a comment. Yeah. Got it. So, uh, that’s, that’s Bethany and I, and we’re super excited to have people who have a bit broader of a perspective, a bit more of the land than what, what the two of us, um, think about with our own professional learning experiences.

Dan Meyer (02:52):
We’ve invited on an expert. We hope will help us understand alternate ways to do professional learning as teachers to grow as teachers besides, you know, all of us getting into the same room once every, every, uh, few months together, Elm Cosmi is a professor of mathematics education at the university of Washington, Elm studies, how strong professional communities develop in schools and how schools can be organized. So teachers learn from and what their students, this work is informed by equity oriented research on thinking, uh, on children’s mathematical thinking and classroom practice. She is co-author with Allison hints of intentional talk, which focuses on leading productive discussions in mathematics. And she edited coral counting and counting collections with Megan Frankie and Angela tau, which focuses on the importance of counting from preschool to fifth grade. Looking forward to a great chat with Elham, welcome Elham to the show.

Elham Kazemi (03:43):
Thanks for having me, my favorite topic ever to talk with you both about,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (03:47):
I think something that I just deeply, deeply respected admire is that I feel like you are constantly sharing about how you are learning. You’re continue to learn, continue to, to try out new ideas and you do a very good job of like highlighting things that you’ve learned, whether that’s sharing it through a tweet or sharing it amongst colleagues or peers. And I, I just really appreciate that because I feel like being in the mathematics community with you, I feel like I grow by, I just like paying attention to like, Hey, she’s a learner, she’s done all these amazing things and thinks in these amazing ways and has shifted my thinking in such amazing ways. But she’s saying, Hey, I I’m still learning. So yeah. Hi, thank you. Thank you for your, I don’t know. We’re just glad to have you here.

Elham Kazemi (04:41):
Thanks. I do feel like the perpetual student, like I’ve never left school and I wonder like one day maybe I will, when I grow older, when I grow up, will I ever leave school? Maybe not.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:52):
<laugh>

Dan Meyer (04:53):
Great. Let’s dig in. Yeah. So please tell us you partnered with a school for some professional learning that wasn’t the sort where you would go in and offer brilliant ideas and then leave. But rather it, it seemed like it was more of a job embedded sort, the sort of thing that might have a life of its own after, you know, after the, the grant ends or the program ends. Can you describe what it was you did and what the effect was?

Elham Kazemi (05:15):
I think I wanna first say that everything that I have done and experimented with as really the result of working with fabulous people, teachers, coaches, principals, other, um, colleagues and peers in the field who are constantly trying to work on what good teaching looks like and how you learn to do it. And mostly because we care about kids and we care about what students experience in the classroom. And we want kids to love school, to have school, be a place where they’re known, they’re loved, um, that they look forward to being in every day. And I think there’s that, um, the why that, that, um, per that makes you want to learn is really about the students and being, doing things in service of them. Because when, uh, as one of my colleagues said, when children thrive, teachers thrive. So what does it mean for us to thrive?

Elham Kazemi (06:06):
If we are focused on our kids’ experiences in schools, what we did at this, this particular school and a group of schools is kind of tap into a, all that curiosity and drive that teachers have to do a good job and to use their imaginations well, and to engage the actual ideas that children have in their classroom together, not separately, not like get a great idea and be inspired by it and then go figure it out by yourself, but be inspired by ideas and then try to figure them out together. Because, um, as you both know, very talented teachers, uh, who also have been inspired to change your classroom teaching. Once you figure something out or as you’re figuring it out, there’s all kinds of intricacies. Like I remember when I first learned about three act tasks, I thought what a brilliant idea, but it’s not so simple to try to enact the brilliance of it because you can simplify it too much or you can get stuck and not really know how do you move from one act to the next, or what’s the point of the third act?

Elham Kazemi (07:12):
Do you just like reveal the answer and that’s it. And then you move on. Um, how do you even do design the tasks to begin with all of those things, raise questions and working on them together, uh, and carving up that space and time to work on them together is sorely missing in schools. And so that’s what we were able to do with the schools that I parted and it is find the time and then design the structures so that teachers could, um, <affirmative> think about their teaching together and then also be in the classroom together with kids. So the kids see that we are also learning to be responsive to them. That’s the point. So we have to work stuff out when kids are present, which is the part that usually trips a lot of people up.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:55):
Well, that to me is I think the part that shifted my teaching and continues to is this, it is a culture shift to tell your students, to invite your students into your learning, to tell them I’m, I’m learning too. It was an invitation to, to be vulnerable in a way that I think sometimes teachers are very afraid to be vulnerable. Uh, if they don’t know what the student response is gonna be, or they don’t know, they don’t wanna seem like they don’t know the answers or they don’t know how to figure out a problem. I think that’s a real shift in the, in the culture for, for compared to maybe what we, we experienced growing up.

Dan Meyer (08:33):
I hated not knowing the answer to a math problem. I admitting I, I was uncertain with the mathematics, but to admit that I am like a, a work in aggress as a teacher, feels like an extra admission, an extra layer of humility, which is, I don’t know, it’s a really special thing that you were up to with that school. I’d love to hear like about specific structures that you worked with to help make that transition feel, you know, more natural, more welcoming, more productive.

Elham Kazemi (08:58):
So, I mean, you probably have experienced common planning time, right? This is a thing that often happens for us teachers. I think that common planning time looks a lot sometimes like, uh, what are we gonna do on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday? Okay. What do we need? What are the materials we need? Who is gonna do that? Will you write this? And that’s what kind of common planning time, and then it’s over. And then you might see each other at lunch and say, well, how did that go? And you’ll talk a little bit about it, but common planning time and learning labs, which is sort of what the, what we call the, the PD that we designed means. Okay. So let’s take three act task. We, we write a little bit about it. We’ve seen a couple, but okay. What would it really mean to plan this particular one?

Elham Kazemi (09:42):
So common planning time is thinking like, how are we gonna launch that first act? What are we actually gonna say? What do we think the kids are gonna say? Why would we say it that way? What if they say something else? Um, and then, okay, so what does it actually sounds like to transition from act one, to act two? What might we say, what would happen with this particular task and actually getting into the details of how you imagine, like, what, what you would do when you were actually planning the specifics of a particular lesson, but leaving it loose enough that you’re not trying to make it perfect. And I think that’s the trick. So, so that you are not so invested, that goes in that particular way or that you fail. If it doesn’t go that way. Um, but that you have something you wanna learn together and trying out this three act task with a particular group of kids so that when you go into the classroom, first of all, you’ve all thought through the full R of the lesson.

Elham Kazemi (10:40):
And you’re curious enough about what’s gonna happen at particular points that you’ve left room for uncertainty and the taking of some risks. So then when you go together into a classroom and kids start to say things that you didn’t anticipate you or, or they start to do something that you’re so jazzed about, that you didn’t anticipate that you’re like, this is the thing we should pursue more. You give each other permission to do that. You’re like, whoa, wait, did you hear what so? And so said, I think we should follow that road and see where it takes us, or, huh. Okay, hold on. And that’s what we call teacher timeouts, where you actually confer briefly and you tell the kids, this is a super special day. We’ve tried to design something. We’re very curious how you are gonna react to it. So we’re gonna try it out. And along the way, we might pause to get your ideas or for us to make some decisions and steer the ship in a, in a new directions and see what happens. So we’re gonna be sitting closely to you among you. Um, and you get to be our teachers today while we teach. That’s how it’s framed.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (11:46):
Like, what were you seeing in professional development or in that wasn’t happening amongst teachers? Like where, where are the gaps? Because it feels like so much of your work. You’ve just looked in such nuanced ways at how teachers can continue to grow and be more reflective of their own teaching. And I’m just kind of curious where that came from or where you’re seeing the landscape.

Elham Kazemi (12:10):
Yeah, that’s a good question. Well, I, oh, everything I know about, children’s thinking to Megan Frankie and the beautiful body of work called CGI, but, um, one of the things that we noticed, there’s so many great CGI workshops, and even like all the seminars and conference presentations and amazing things that you can design to have engaging work time for teach in, in professional development, outside of their classroom, people get super jazzed, you know, they get, um, uh, they have meaningful experiences, but to contextualize that back into their classrooms with their own students is like where, where often I would see like, wait, the same group of teachers I just saw in my classroom or in either in math methods or in this PD seminar, or even myself, like noticing, like I have seen and thought about stuff a lot. But when I went to go do it with a particular group of kids, holy moly was that so hard. And I saw all kinds of new complexities that I didn’t anticipate. And if I were just left to my own devices, I might very easily say, whew, this seems a little too hard.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:21):
Right,

Elham Kazemi (13:22):
Right. And that’s the thing that I always hated. I was like, oh, if only we had, or you, or if you watched somebody do a demo lesson and you saw something that was like, kind of cool that you wish you had done afterwards. I often this happened in reflections. I wish we had, because we weren’t allowed to interrupt each other during teaching. Cuz somehow that would be rude or that would undermine the teacher’s authority. But that’s only the way we frame it. If we say actually we’re all capable people. So a question we ask ourselves during instruction doesn’t mean you don’t know what you’re doing. It means actually we’re thinking together then the interruptions aren’t about undermining authority. They’re about thinking together.

Dan Meyer (14:04):
There’s a performative aspect to a lot of teaching. Like the like teaching feels like a performance and you don’t, the movie’s playing or there’s a play that’s going on. It feels like inappropriate to interrupt that in any way. Cause the performance is going and I, I love what this that’s. I love what this idea does to kind of, to redefine teaching is not a performance, but this, this co-constructed thing. Or if it’s a performance, it’s a performance, the stars, all of us, like we’re all a part of the cast and always a it’s always the dress rehearsal.

Elham Kazemi (14:30):
<laugh> it is like the dress rehearsal. Although some of my brilliant colleagues with backgrounds in drama and theater, Sarah Kavanaugh and Holly GU and Elizabeth dure, they actually were at a meeting together. And they talked about how this like breaks the fourth wall, you know, mm-hmm, <affirmative> like, which is out of theater, um, where the performer speaks to the audience, you know, I know you’re there and I have something to say to you. Yep. And I was like, well, we should, why can’t we do that in teaching? So we actually wrote a little paper, um, that’s called breaking the fourth wall as a way. That’s so cool as a metaphor for understanding and reframing what these interruptions could meet. Cuz we often get people when we about this for academic audience who say like, aren’t you using the children and what are the children gonna do while you just pause? Are they supposed to freeze? And uh, you know, while you talk about them, but it’s not really that it’s like, Hey students, we’re here because of you. So shouldn’t, we try to involve you and are decision making. To some extent, it’s not like we don’t know what we’re doing, but we’re doing things because we wanna advance your learning.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (15:40):
I mean, I still remember the first time I did a teacher time out and it, it was, I, it was breaking the four, it was this like, okay, you’re gonna see what happens, kids like, look at my, my tap dances stopped. And you’re you mean like, you know, whoa, wait a second. And I think it is about how you frame it. Right? It’s a celebration of their thinking and you, you use the term ambitious teaching and it, to me that is such a joyful way to think about it.

Elham Kazemi (16:06):
It is risky. And you would never say anything to shame any student, no. Or to shame your colleagues. Clearly it’s not a about that kind of discussion. Right. And they’re so brief. They’re like, it, it seconds. It’s not like you’re wasting time. You’re actually trying to understand what’s happening here. And I’ve just had so many instances where something goes on. Um, like we were doing a growing patterns task in a classroom and the student built the fourth term and they built stuff that did not follow the pattern. And I was so confused. I, I just didn’t understand like what was going on. And one of the kids said, well, if you, if you did follow the pattern, that’s not her words. But you know, she’s like, well, if we built it this way, that would be too obvious. Because if you just, if you saw that and you’re like, oh, that lesson failed.

Elham Kazemi (16:59):
Now we, our kids don’t understand what patterns are. We did it. Like, we gotta pause here and we gotta say, and we’re like, well, what do you mean? Can you say more about that? And basically what they said is that, um, well, first of all, they’re, they’re right. A pattern could change at any time, but it’s like, it would be more interesting if they, they knew how many cubes it would take for the fourth term that it would be nine, but they’re like, Hey, let’s rearrange that nine in some cool new ways. <laugh> cause that’s more interesting. It was like more interesting to them if, if they didn’t keep the pattern. So like, you kind of had to wrestle with that in the moment <affirmative> with them. And that’s how they can actually be partners with you in the teacher, timeout.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (17:40):
Right. That’s making it about them and their learning. It’s not about that. It’s not about your performance and like looking all shiny and, and I’ve got it all together and I know exactly how this lesson’s gonna go. It that’s so interesting.

Elham Kazemi (17:53):
And sometimes you pause and like some cuz somebody else who’s watching is noticing something about what the kids are doing. And while you’re, if you’re happen to be the person who’s upfront at the time leading, you’ve got so many things going on in your head that some times the person who’s just been sitting on the rug with the kids mm-hmm <affirmative> has noticed something. And they’re like, can I ask something right now? And that’s a great teacher timeout too. Mm. Because they’re interrupting you cuz they’re like, I think I, I wanna see what kids will say. If we ask this question next and those moments have been like amazing because someone has noticed something that another person hasn’t in the room and it’s been very helpful to illuminate how kids are processing something or what two ideas they could connect. That would be really powerful based on what we were hoping to learn that day or do with the kids that day.

Dan Meyer (18:47):
It’s like you have a bonus brain attached to you there in the room. Sounds really powerful. I wonder a couple about the student experience of this. I’m imagine if I was a student in the room and I heard the two teachers like kind of pause, take this time out and like talk about how interesting my thinking was like behind my back a little bit, like trying to strategize about something interesting. I had said, I just imagine I would, I would feel very good about like, that would be a very positive experience for me. Um, but I’m just curious, can you speak to how students reacted when they’re,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:16):
You mean, if you had been a student in the class and you saw two teachers conferring about your work?

Dan Meyer (19:21):
Yeah. Yeah. Like I, my classmates had of thing that was like, it, it kind of like was so novel that it stymied the teachers and then they like had to pause and like talk about what are we doing? Oh, I don’t know. I can imagine that’d be like know a fun feeling. Maybe I just tell more about me than about the kids, but

Elham Kazemi (19:35):
<laugh> it points to like, how would you go about starting to do this work? Right. Because one is you do, you do have to tell kids, Hey, I’m here with so and so and so, and so, and so, and so it might be just two of you. It might be five of you. It might be more and you know how we’ve been working on X thing in class? Well, today we wanted to try this new thing and, but we’re not sure how it’s gonna go and we need, we need your feedback. Right. So here’s something that might happen. We might pause you, you, I mean, you really do directly tell the kids to do that. And then we’re gonna ask you how it felt and we’re gonna share those feelings with one another. So you do that, you do a little exit card or you,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (20:19):
How, what felt the pause or how,

Elham Kazemi (20:22):
How, yeah. How did it feel that, how did this lesson go or how did a lesson, how did it feel when you heard, you know, ALM and Dan talk to each other, doing this lesson and they might say, Hey, it’s cool. It’s fun. Kids have definitely chimed in, in like, if we ask a question like, should we do this next or this, somebody will pipe in and say, do that, you know, do this thing. Instead. If, if you kind of pipe in to say, can I ask a question? They just turn to you and look at you and answer your question. Right. So, and we always thank them and we just like pump it up. Right? Like this is so cool because this is all about you. And usually when you say today, you’re gonna be our teachers, especially the little kids. They like get all giggly. Totally.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:02):
Right.

Elham Kazemi (21:04):
Love it.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:05):
You know, you, you were sharing about this really unique situation, which I wish it wasn’t as unique where you had the whole school involved, but how did that happen? And what if you don’t have the whole school involved? What if it’s just me in my grade level, who’s like, I kind of wanna try this, but what

Elham Kazemi (21:22):
<laugh>, I think you could start with your, a peer in your school or a colleague in your school. Yeah. I mean, it’s a little seed, right. And it’s a little seed and then you could make it grow. I also believe in starting small and growing, cuz you do have to invite people into a different way of thinking about what it means to learn together. So you need to experience it, um, in order to believe it.

Dan Meyer (21:49):
Yeah. It feels like we would not want to write off any student as like, oh, they just don’t wanna learn. I think a lot of, a lot of us just like don’t buy that, that there’s other reasons why people need that. A teacher shouldn’t like shouldn’t, that’s not true of students that they have been told they can’t learn or there’s various circumstances the same. I, I suppose the same as like should be true is true of teachers. Like no teacher doesn’t want to learn more about teaching is at least a helpful Axiom to use, to approach the work of teacher growth. And so maybe they, yeah, maybe I feel like I’m the only person in my school who wants to do this, but perhaps that’s not actually true. Perhaps it’s just a matter of creating an imagination or the right kind of enticement or I don’t know what, um, but to start small and grow from there makes a lot of sense.

Elham Kazemi (22:32):
I feel now, like it would be weird and a lot harder for me to invite someone to just come in and watch me teach and sit quietly in the back when I don’t know anything about what they’re thinking and wait until afterwards to get their opinion.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (22:46):
Oh yes.

Elham Kazemi (22:47):
I would be much more willing to co-plan with someone so that we were both on the same page about what we were trying to do and then when you’re in the classroom with me. So that’s the other thing that’s important cuz I don’t think you can just be in the classroom together and I, you know, interrupt each other’s teachers, if you haven’t planned together, cuz you do have to have some common understanding of what are we trying to do here? Oh the

Dan Meyer (23:10):
Intent here.

Elham Kazemi (23:11):
Yeah. So I would definitely say don’t just show up in each other’s classroom and start interrupting each other. <laugh> if you don’t know what the heck is going on. Yeah.

Dan Meyer (23:21):
Yeah. I, I know that’s directed at one person on this call in particular. I hear that.

Elham Kazemi (23:25):
I know who we’re talking about, but you know, I would be way more intimidating for me if I was trying to do a three act task and Dan just came to watch me do it <laugh> and he hadn’t planned with me. He didn’t know why I selected that task. I had no opportunity to talk to him. Then it would be, Hey Dan, would you just like do this with me? Let’s think through this. Why would you do this then? What, what have you normally done? Oh, okay. Why have you done that? Right. And then to like, okay, let’s try it together. Um, and then, and then along the way, if I have questions, you’re there with me. So sometimes there is someone more experience like if right. And sometimes you’re both just like, I just don’t have that much experience with this. I’m learning this for the first time.

Elham Kazemi (24:04):
Right. And the beauty of the math ed community, whether it’s on Twitter or is that we’re kind of pretty accessible to each other. Right. So if I read something and I have a question about it, you bet I’m gonna reach out to the author <laugh> and say, I’ve been thinking about your work and this is what’s been coming up for us. Can you? So like, it definitely happened with hands down conversations. We tried it in the learning lab and we just couldn’t figure out like that. How do you intercede, like into the hands down conversation cuz the kids are supposed to have a conversation. So we had to like give Kaia and her co-author a few specific examples so they could help our thinking so that we could try it again. Right. And make it better. And I think that is, is what it means to be learning in community is that you use the resources more broadly.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (24:52):
That’s a beautiful reminder too. And it also helps me feel a little better about all the messages I’ve sent you. Like what does this mean? Can you help me with this?

Elham Kazemi (24:59):
<laugh> I mean, that just makes you feel alive. <laugh> I think

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (25:06):
So. I think P part of the beauty of you talking about starting small is that it does give those of us who maybe aren’t seeing that those opportunities for collaboration reflected in our school culture, it gives us kind of some hope for like, wait, don’t just like, think you can’t start. I, how do you, how do you see, how do you see it growing? Or, or do you think like if you could magically <laugh> like wave your wand and, and create some shifts around, around, uh, the culture where folks are feeling isolated or maybe don’t feel like they have the needs to do this work. What could that look like?

Elham Kazemi (25:51):
Yeah. What could that look like? So time, like we need some imagination around the use of time in schools and I have seen some really amazing opportunities where teachers get to co-teach, which means that they really have to co-plan when, um, there’s a break in a regular school session and there’s like an intercession or like a, like an elective that, um, that doesn’t, I haven’t seen it happen a lot in public schools, but I have seen it happen a lot in independent schools where they’ll have like, stop, stop the presses. It’s like a drop everything and read, but it’s like a drop everything and do an R arts week. And then all the kids in the school get shuffled. So they into multiage groupings and the teachers get to plan something special for like the week. But you could start with like a day, which would at least get you to plan something together and try to teach together and be just in each other’s spaces. And I think that might be kind of an interesting way to start where you have to like mess with the schedule somehow. Cuz the schedule is the beast in schools

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (26:59):
Is kind of the first step. Like we are going to create a shared activity, a shared instructional goal, a shared like where do I start?

Elham Kazemi (27:09):
What, where do you start? I mean, there’s so many good books. We all read, start with something that grabs your imagination. That you’re like, if I got to do this in my class, I’d be so jazzed. And I think my kids would love it. Why would they love it? You know, whatever it is. There’s so many good ideas that people are instantly blogging about publishing, um, slow reveal graphs. I love those two. I have like all these things. I was like, I would love to try these out, but I, I gotta do them with somebody cuz I need a sounding board about like how, what does it mean to do it well? And what does it mean to just do it at the surface level and do it a, you know, in a kind of a crappy way. And we don’t wanna do a crappy job. We wanna do a good job, but you have to start, you have to start sometimes in an awkward, crappy way. Like, you know, and get past that stage. Cause often we try a bunch of stuff, eh, and then we drop it. But like you gotta work on it to make it really

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (27:58):
Good. And if you’ve already tried it and it didn’t go so well it’s, this could be an invitation, like, you know, it doesn’t mean give up on the idea. It means like, Hey let, let’s let’s collaborate. Let’s you know, come into my class. Let’s co plan this.

Elham Kazemi (28:10):
So I would challenge people to think about the schedule. <laugh> try to do something just a little bit different. You know, like when we do learning labs, people are like, well, how do you do that? And there’s no money for it. Actually. We just use our money in a slightly different way to make or that everybody four people get a sub, which I know right now, sub shortages is crazy, crazy, but then combine your classes or do something different. Yeah. You know, um, involve people differently somehow in your, in your school environment to get that time,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (28:43):
Really see this as a priority. This is a, this is there’s is intense value in this time to collaborate. Yeah.

Elham Kazemi (28:51):
Yeah. There’s so many side benefits for, I think for kids and teachers when you’re able to do this.

Dan Meyer (28:58):
Yeah. You’ve heard of folks. Uh, usually our, our math teacher challenge, our lounge challenge has been, uh, pedagogical in nature or a new CU. And uh, this is a different kind of one. This is, uh, go, go be a Rabel Razr go Rouse rabble at your, uh, front office and figure out the right way to get some funding or some time or shuffle a master schedule in such a way that you have collaboration, time to plan to co-teach to interrupt one another and uh, let us know how it goes. We are super excited and super interested in all of that. Thank you, uh, Elham for being with us here today and sharing all of your wisdom about how teachers grow.

Elham Kazemi (29:36):
Thanks for reminding me. You too loved

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (29:38):
It. We’re never done learning. We’re never done learning. Nope.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (29:44):
Aha. Thank you so much for joining us in the lounge. I think all of us have sat through effective and ineffective professional learning sessions and just helping us to envision of how this can truly help PD can truly transform our classrooms. It is it’s exciting. It’s exciting. And I think we’ve all learned a lot from our conversation. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And don’t forget, you can connect with us in the lounge on Facebook at math teacher lounge or on Twitter at MTL show. Let’s keep this conversation going. Keep it going. Thanks so much for joining us. Thanks

Speaker 4 (30:20):
Everybody. <silence>.