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S1-08: The importance of risk-taking in the science classroom, a conversation with Valeria Rodriguez

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In this episode, our host Eric Cross sits down with Miami-based educator Valeria Rodriguez. Valeria shares her journey of serving in the Peace Corps, working a corporate job, and eventually finding her passion as a middle-school science teacher. Listen in as Valeria explains how sketchnoting, a form of note-taking that utilizes illustrations, encourages student choice and creativity in her classroom. Eric and Valeria also discuss the importance of risk-taking within the science classroom, and how their own mistakes can be crucial in modeling resilience for students. Lastly, Valeria shares experiences she had with several teachers who inspired her throughout her career. Explore more from Science Connections by visiting our main page.

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Valeria Rodriguez (00:00):

There’s so many things that drawing to me makes an essential connection to. It tells me no matter what, I can continue placing lines on my paper and creating the image I want. Some people will say they messed up the drawing. You know what? They gave it character.

Eric Cross (00:19):

Welcome to Science Connections. I’m your host, Eric Cross. My guest today is Valeria Rodriguez. Valeria is a science educator, instructional technologist, and illustrator, who is currently part of a steam team where she teaches third through fifth graders in Miami, Florida. Valeria has presented and led workshops at education conferences like NSTA, ISTI, and SXSWEdu. In this episode, we discuss how she uses real-world projects to make lessons more meaningful, and why teaching students how to sketchnote increases their conceptual understanding in science. I hope you enjoy this pun-filled conversation with Valeria Rodriguez.

New Speaker (00:58):

Now you’re in Miami and you have a biology background. We’re like kindred spirits. Like we do the same thing. I teach biology here in San Diego at a middle school called Albert Einstein Academy. So I’m in a seventh grade classroom teaching life science.

Valeria Rodriguez (01:11):

That’s so cool. That’s how I started.

Eric Cross (01:13):

Is it?

Valeria Rodriguez (01:13):

Mm-Hmm <affirmative> I started teaching middle school science for seven years, doing life science in my biology background.

Eric Cross (01:20):

How’d you get started? Like where did you kind of begin?

Valeria Rodriguez (01:22):

Well, I went to UF for undergrad as a runner, and I thought I was gonna go to the Olympics, but you know, running in college is hard. And you quickly like realize a path as a full-time athlete is really hard. And one of the days that I was having one of those, like “come Jesus moments” of what am I gonna do with my life, I walked by a sign that said life is calling. And I’m like, okay, <laugh>

Eric Cross (01:52):

You literally had a sign.

Valeria Rodriguez (01:53):

There was a sign. So I was like, I’m reading the sign. I’m following the arrows. And it was for the Peace Corps. And so I went to this meeting and everything that I’ve ever done student government, athletics school education, my backgroundmy family’s from Columbia–everything in that meeting came together and they’re like, we need all these skills. And I’m like, I have those. Those are my skills. And they’re like every Peace Corps volunteer teaches. And so I went in as an agriculture volunteer to Panama because of my major and my background in biology. And while I was in the Peace Corps doing the work, I was teaching at the local school. And I realized that the most sustainable way to create any change is through education. When I came back, I was like, well, what do you do if your first job in the world is in the Peace Corps? Like my background was, you know, managing a machete in a field and teaching second through eighth grade in one classroom, on a chalkboard, you know, in English and in Spanish, while teaching the teacher and the students. So I found that going into teaching allowed me to put some of those skills, that wide array of skills that I had collected until that moment, into practice. And it allowed me to do the arts, do the running, do the science, do the connecting with the community in one place here in the states.

Eric Cross (03:34):

I don’t know if I’m just romanticizing, but you were in Panama and you were doing this amazing teaching. I don’t know. Do you compare it to teaching now in the classroom? Is there anything that ever like makes you wish that you were kind of in that environment again? Or are you kind of, do you like the more kind of technology side of things?

Valeria Rodriguez (03:48):

I tell my students all the time that I miss it, because when I was in Panama, I was in Licencia. They looked at me like this, all knowing being. If they couldn’t come to class because the kids literally had to work, they would bring me their assignment, like run it to me and then run back to their parents. Like, “I had to turn it in, but I have to go to work.” And I’m like, oh my gosh. And like here, sometimes I feel like, you know, I have to negotiate and convince my students to want to give me their work. And maybe it’s because we take a lot of things for granted. I mean, I didn’t have running water in my community. Here, you know, we have everything. I miss how we appreciated — like, my parents would send suitcases of materials for me to hand out to my students, like color and stuff, notebooks, things like that — and the kids would like, hold that notebook, like pristine and here sometimes my students aren’t as careful with materials. And I’m like, why are you breaking the crayon box? <Laugh>

Eric Cross (04:54):

I’m thinking about that. Just even just bringing pens and crayons and how that’s valued. And then a culture that’s built around esteeming teachers, and you’re this essential member of the community — and you feel that. It’s palpable.

Valeria Rodriguez (05:08):

Yeah. And here, sometimes I ask students like, what do you wanna be when you grow up? And you get all sorts of answers, but in my community, it’s gonna sound funny, but they were like, we wanna be a teacher. Like, that means that we would know a lot of stuff and they would put their hair up in a bun, ‘cause I always have it in a bun, and they would write stuff when they were playing and they would act me out <laugh> and I’m like, do I, do I do that? <Laugh> I genuinely got a very rich experience in the time that I was there. And what I learned the most was how to try to not do as much, it’s like a lesson that I’m still trying to learn because like I’m here with the U.S. Mentality of go, go, go.

Valeria Rodriguez (05:58):

And they’re like, but we already did, you know, two things like now we stop. And I’m like, but, but why? And they’re like, you can do that tomorrow. And I’m like, but no, like we’re gonna run out of time. For me. It was a lot of struggle of like slow down. And as a teacher, I feel like I’m always like on the treadmill at a thousand speed. And sometimes I have to tell myself like slow down, be in this moment, like a parent texted me today that her daughter was walking with her dad and said, daddy, let’s talk about the layers of the soil. And I was like, I need to stop right now and acknowledge that this happened. She’s in third grade and she’s asking her dad, you know, she could ask him about anything, and she’s asking him about soil. That’s essential for everything. And we don’t even think about soil here. Like my community had tons of erosion and every year there were less and less crops being able to be produced. We’re not talking about that here. And yet, my student asked her dad here in Miami, <laugh> about soil. And that conversation happened because of our class.

Eric Cross (07:03):

And you allowed yourself to be present and experience and feel that that communication came to you.

Valeria Rodriguez (07:09):

Yeah. We put so much stuff out there and we don’t know where it lands. If it lands on dirt or soil, <laugh>

Eric Cross (07:16):

There you go. I like it. Yeah. Bringing it back. But you’re, I think you’re what you’re saying. Resonates with a lot of educators that’ll be listening to this is that there’s so much that you do. And there’s even times when we do get the feedback, there might be a letter or a card or something, but like, to your point, like we look to the next thing instead of stopping, being present and allowing yourself to absorb it. I think I need to put that up on my, like on my wall, like this, just be present. Now you came back and then you went into the classroom here and you started off teaching science.

Valeria Rodriguez (07:46):

I didn’t go straight into the classroom. I knew that I wanted to continue teaching. But I wasn’t back here in Miami. When I moved back, I moved to Austin. And I ended up getting married and there, I started teaching Spanish as a second language like corporate classes. And I was kind of like tiptoeing around, like, do you dive into education? ‘Cause The idea of a teacher here is very different than the teacher idea that I had while in the peace Corps. So he, a lot of people were like, you can do so many things. Why would you teach? And I was like insulted <laugh>. I was like, wait, what do you mean? Like even to this day, I’ve started a blog post, maybe 20 times with that statement because people all the time are like, you’re so talented. Why do you teach? And it drives me crazy because it makes me feel like they’re looking down on my choice <laugh> but I came to terms with it that it’s just like a societal thing. Cause of that quote, like those who can’t do teach. And I was like, let me let this go.

Eric Cross (09:01):

I find though that educators who come in as a second career, come in with a, a, a variety of skill sets that I, I think you can only get when you’re outside of academia. I mean, you can, you can develop them, you know, going kind of K12 education college and then into the classroom. But those soft skills, the business skills, a lot of those things you really develop. And it’s funny ‘cause your, your story almost sounds like some of the people that I know that work in big tech firms, they have this eclectic story and then now they’re, you know, working for Google or Facebook or something, but that actually was a as set to them because they are able to see the world through multiple perspectives. And I’m hearing kind of a distinguish between art of teaching and the science of teaching. Like you had the, maybe the art connecting ideas, these things, and then the science, like the quote unquote like formal teaching. Okay. That had to get built on later. Like am I hearing that right?

Valeria Rodriguez (09:55):

Yeah. The that’s what rocks I’m teaching the rock cycle right now. So I’m, I’m under a lot of heat and pressure <laugh>

Eric Cross (10:02):

We got the funds, we got the funds rolling. All right. All right. So bringing in the, so the, the art side or the science side we have, and then we just have this amazing illustrator. Now you mentioned your website and we’re gonna post it somewhere, but just so we have it here to, and you say, what is your website where all your majors and sketch notes can be found,

Valeria Rodriguez (10:21):

Www dot Valia, sketches.com.

Eric Cross (10:23):

Okay. So folks that are listening, if you wanna check out the art, there’s some awesome stuff on there, as well as Twitter and Instagram. And we’ll make sure we have it handles in the, the bio of the podcast and the notes. Your art’s amazing. I looked, I checked it. I saw inauguration. I saw astronauts. I saw all kinds of different things. How do you use that in the classroom

Valeria Rodriguez (10:45):

To draw connections? The ones? So what I do is I airplay my iPad onto the board. And sometimes as I’m talking, I’ll draw things, draw things I’m saying, or assignments I’ll sketch out different ideas, or maybe like the schedule I’ll have an icon of some sort that represents things. I use it for everything and anything, because just the way that I tell my students that science is everywhere. I, we don’t realize how programmed we are to use images to for, for information they’re in the street. Bathroom signs, we see the zoom little link, like the image, the icon of zoom. And we know that it’s a call the apps. You know, our phone doesn’t have the words for everything that we’re opening. We just have a list of images that represent information. So we’re programs for this. And all I’m doing is showing my students how we’re programmed for it because we’re so used to seeing images, to represent things that we’re taking it for granted again.

Valeria Rodriguez (12:03):

And sometimes my students will like, I’ll write something and I ask them, make your own visual vocabulary. So I give them the word of the definition for every unit, the younger ones, I give them the definition they have to plug in the word and an image, the older ones, I give them the word they have to plug in the definition and an image. But I don’t tell them what to draw because they need to create an image that will help them to remember the definition. Not me. I tell them, I wrote the list. I know the words, you’re the one that needs to think of something that’s going to help you to remember this. You need to draw a connection to this information. Like I use it and I mess up all the time. And I, I scratch things out because I feel that my students or the student that I’ve had in general are risk averse.

Valeria Rodriguez (12:57):

They don’t want to make mistakes. And drawing is one of those things that it taught me that it’s okay to make mistakes. Like people won’t buy commit to buying houses or they won’t commit to things because they’re gonna make a, I’m like, you can sell the house. You can move again. I mean, I’ve lived in a lot of cities. I’ve been married, divorce, gone out with people. It’s worked out it hasn’t you know, there’s, there’s so many things that drawing to me makes an essential connection to <affirmative> that it tells me no matter what I can continue placing lines on my paper and creating the image I want. And if a line doesn’t necessarily go in the direction, I want it to, I can continue shaping it so that the overall image is in the direction I want. And I can look past those line here and there that some people will say they messed up the drawing. You know what? They gave it character. I, I cycle and I have scars everywhere. They give me character and I keep writing. The overall image in my head is I’m a cyclist, not I’m banged up. <Laugh>

Eric Cross (14:14):

I feel like there’s so much to mind in what you just said. This was like a mini-Ted talk. And I couldn’t write fast enough because there were so many gems of the things that you said, but let me say something worse. And this is I’m gonna be surface with this because, and it’s your fault because you got me thinking in puns and you said, take it for granted. And I said, take it for granted because you’re talking about the rock cycle. So that’s what I heard way back. Anyways, you have your students creating what, but it’s low tech, which is really cool because a lot of times we think of creating content and it’s kind of high tech, but they’re creating something. And this is for us, like as biology folks, like you’re using kind of like this neuroscience that exists about students, creating an art to help them learn.

Eric Cross (14:55):

And this is something that I, I feel gets missed a lot in. When we talk about the quote unquote, the formal teacher training is the element of how creating an art can actually lead to improved learning in the classroom. It’s something you have to go to like a conference to kind of go and see or something, but it’s not as, it’s not as pervasive everywhere. And that thing about risk averse. I feel like I, you spoke to my own life. What I see ‘cause with my own seventh graders, I see the same fear or anxiety when I ask them to draw. As I do, when I ask them to give me a hypothesis about a phenomenon that I’m gonna teach and I say, it’s okay to be wrong, but I see them drift to the Chromebook and want to Google it. You know what you just said about just try it and you can always change and giving character, I feel like is just a great message for everybody to hear

Valeria Rodriguez (15:48):

Today. Students made fossil, right? ‘Cause They’re learning about rocks and we made using plaster, but then I put the green screen up and not only did they make it and they excavated them, but then we put it on the green screen. And they’re like all of a sudden at a dig site,

Eric Cross (16:04):

What I’m seeing right now for those of you who are listening is, is students who are on, is this on IMO?

Valeria Rodriguez (16:10):

This is on we video

Eric Cross (16:12):

Video and they’re holding up fossils that they made. But in the background, because there was a green screen, there’s an overlay of like a, a rock dig site. So the students legitimately look like they’re paleontologists or something somewhere.

Valeria Rodriguez (16:24):

Exactly. And so it’s, it’s not just creating lines, right? The sketching transfers to so much be because even the want, not wanting to make a mistake with their fossil. One of the kids today, when he took off the, the Plato, ‘cause we put the Plato at the base. Then we put in either a shell or some sort of artifact that they were going to fossilize. And then we put in the plaster when he took off the Plato, a piece broke off and everybody’s like, I can’t believe you broke your fossil. And I’m like, not the first. Okay. Do you know how many of these guys and girls have been out there? And all of a sudden they find a dinosaur bone and they’re walking and they fall. And this fossil that took billions of years is all of a sudden broken. I’m like this selfie, the original selfies, these animals died in commitment to their selfies.

Valeria Rodriguez (17:19):

And here you are dropping the bone. So they were all laughing, but it was to go away from the fact that, oh my God, you broke it. You made a mistake. You drew the wrong line. You asked the wrong question. Like no big deal. Keep digging, shout out to the teachers that try doing the projects that they have. They don’t feel completely comfortable with or you know, that they take risks doing. Because even though in theory, it’s like suggested and schools want that or communities want that when it comes down to it, people also expect us to do things at work. But part of our job is also taking risks. Like we did a tethered weather balloon launch the other day because we couldn’t get approval to release the weather balloon in the atmosphere since we’re near an airport. And it was too short of a time.

Valeria Rodriguez (18:14):

And I remember a parent said, oh, you’re not releasing the balloon. And I was like, well, this is a lot of work too. <Laugh> we, you know, we’re, we’re doing the tethered launch. This is a hard project. So the other day when I heard that comment, like I went back to my class and I was like, you know what? I took a risk to do this project. I could have played it safe with a handout of a weather balloon <laugh> or you know, a YouTube video. It’s it’s the, the fact that we’re continuing to push. And so I wanna like really thank the teachers that keep trying to do the hard things that aren’t like tried and tested because it’s scary. Yeah.

Eric Cross (18:57):

Yeah. There aren’t a lot of opportunities for them to have adults that they see in positions of authority or that they respect or admire model failure. And I don’t mean failure in the, like the negative pejorative sense, but like things just not working out and then seeing how you respond to it, ‘cause you’re modeling, taking a risk. But like with real stakes, it’s authentic. I had students swab the campus and we put it in auger dishes and Petri sealed it up and then let it grow room temperature, but we kept it you know, cool enough at 75 degrees. So it wouldn’t be able to survive any, anything pathogenic. And then students, you know, I took pictures of them and then showed them the results. So the students never interacted with it and some things grew and some things didn’t, it was mostly, you know, fungi and some bacteria, but I showed them like, how come mine didn’t grow? And I was like, well, you know, it could have been how we swabbed. It could have been some things don’t grow the temperature, we kept it at, but some of the experiments didn’t yield the cool results. And that was okay. But I front loaded the expectation so that if everything did go great, sweet, but managing expectation, I found really helps to mitigate the pressure.

Valeria Rodriguez (20:01):

Yeah. Well another project that we’ve participated in is growing beyond earth where we’re planting seeds that contribute to like a huge set of data for cultivars that are being considered for growth on the international space station. And my students are like, well, you know, we just have six little pots, like what is this? And I’m like, yeah, we have two little seeds in each of these pots. And we are one data set in like hundreds of data sets that they’re collecting. But we are contributing two research on the international space station. You don’t have to be the next bill gates or the next, you know, Steve jobs. Like everyone thinks they’re gonna be the next big thing. Like you can also be a seed. That’s part of a really big project and that is okay. Like everyone can’t be the next big thing

Eric Cross (20:48):

And the other. And the other thing, I think what Gladwell talks about this in outliers and there’s another book called bounce, but a lot of the people that we see is successful or famous, we don’t realize that their background and their exposure to things was one of the things that led them there, both jobs and gates had access, you know, gates had access at, at the university of Washington to like one of the first computers and then jobs at, at Hewlett Packard. The story go goes on and on, but we don’t see the lineage of some of these people and where they come from. We just see the end result. You just see LeBron James winning a championship or something. We just want the, the end result the, the glory, but not the sweat that it takes to get there. They don’t, we don’t really see that as much, which leads me to like the next thing I wanted to ask you is how do you, and I kind of saw it just now, but how do you engage your kids in the classroom?

Valeria Rodriguez (21:36):

Well, I think I’m funny. Some of them don’t do

Eric Cross (21:38):

They like the puns

Valeria Rodriguez (21:39):

<Laugh> some of them do. And some of them don’t get them. They get them later. And I see when they get it, I like to engage them by bringing in real people, real examples of things, real research when possible. Right. I can’t put them in a real dig site. So the green screen helps me do that. But one of my students yesterday, other day before was like, you have such cool friends because I’ll say, oh, one of my friends does blah, blah, blah. Or, or, oh, when we go to Kennedy space center, we’re gonna, you know, talk to one of my friends. Who’s doing research on, you know, chilies in space and they’re like, wow, your friends are so cool. And I took that moment to tell them, be mindful of the people that you collect as friends in your life, like make good choices, surround yourself with awesome people, people so that you can share ideas. Like you connect with friends who you inspire you to do more. I try to engage them by giving them examples of things that people around me are doing that connect to what we’re doing. Do

Eric Cross (22:43):

You, do you explicitly or intentionally teach soft skills or is it just something that you just kind of organically do natural or are you mindful about making sure that you’re doing that

Valeria Rodriguez (22:52):

A hundred percent? You have to be explicit about it with amplify? Actually, we, we did a poster for incorporating social, emotional skills and other soft skills into the classroom because sometimes we just like other things like writing and, and reading, you know, we silo all these things in education and the school counselor, can’t be the one to deal with everything. You know, you have to deal with things as they surface. And sometimes my kids ha are frustrated because I ask them to think I don’t have yes or no answers. I have, you know, we are gonna launch a high altitude weather balloon. We don’t know how high it’s gonna go. We don’t know what’s gonna happen. We don’t, we don’t know if we’re gonna find it when the <laugh>, when the balloon bursts and it lands in the ocean, are we gonna find it? Is the GPS tracker gonna work?

Valeria Rodriguez (23:47):

Are we gonna lose all that money? I don’t know, but we have to do all the steps and find out. But with kids, they don’t have the skills yet. And I can’t wait for the counselor to come in and talk about handle the frustration that they’re feeling over. Not knowing the correct question to ask, because by the time they go meet with her, the moments pass, I have to stop and say, Hey, like check in with, with what you’re doing. It’s okay to be frustrated. You can’t take it out on a classmate. You can’t take it out on me.

Eric Cross (24:14):

So you were, you, you were intentional about teaching these skills to your students and you had the relationship. So it makes sense that you were the one to bring it across ‘cause you see them more than anybody does. You know, we’ve, we’ve, we’ve imagined. Teaching is for a long time. It’s been okay, you’re the science content expert. You’re the English expert, but so much as teaching evolves, there are these skills or like EQ emotional intelligence that you kind of have to have kind of coming in. Because like those moments, like no having the presence of mind to stop and why a young person through identifying how they feel, why, where it came from. Those aren’t always covered in those aren’t really covered in your methods classes when you’re in college, getting your, your degree or something. Now when you’re you’re sketch noting and for teachers who are, or one, could you just maybe give like a brief explanation of sketch, noting for somebody who may not be familiar with it, like how I was sketch any different than just drawing a picture randomly or something.

Valeria Rodriguez (25:10):

Okay. So you’re creating visual summaries. You’re using text and images combined in different ways to take notes. And before you know how we had like these shorthand things that the squiggly meant an indent and something else meant something else. And we had these lists of things when they would edit our papers, that represented things. It’s kind of like that for your brain. So you’re making a list of maybe icons or small sketches that represent things for you. So as you’re taking notes, you hear things. And when people talk now and they, they say, you know, I’m on the fence about this. Like I literally see a fence. And when they’re talking, I write the note, it’s almost like a T toe with pointy tops and I put a stick figure on top of it. And so later when I look at it, I think, oh, that’s right. My friend is on the fence about that decision

Eric Cross (26:08):

For a new teacher or even a, a, a experienced teacher. That’s interested in sketch noting, where, where would you recommend? They start like the structurize? Like, do you give creative freedom? Are they doing this paper and pencil vocabulary words? Are they up? Like, what are some just kind of maybe three basic things to kind of get started for someone who was just curious about it.

Valeria Rodriguez (26:29):

So it has to be simple because if it requires a lot of energy to go in, then you’re gonna be more hesitant to do it. For example, I wouldn’t start summarizing a video because it’s moving really fast or a live presentation is really hard. So with students, I would start with here’s a paragraph, make a visual summary of it, or here’s a vocabulary list, make an image to represent each word. Then you would move into, well, you know, here’s a unit summarize the three main topics in unit. Then you can move onto like a little YouTube video. That’s like 10 minutes a Ted talk, make a visual summary of the Ted talk because they can pause it.

Eric Cross (27:11):

Mm. Okay.

Valeria Rodriguez (27:13):

The hardest thing is live presentations, ‘cause in conversations you can say, oh, can you say that again? Sketch, noting. You start seeing how people organize or don’t their thoughts when they speak. Because when you start writing things down and all the information is about one thing and then like two blue ORPS about something else. You’re like, wow, that was really unbalanced. So then when you start teaching, you tell them what you’re gonna tell them, you tell them and then you tell them what you told them. So they can check that they put the notes in the right places and you tell them what you’re gonna tell. So they can prep the pathway that they’re gonna set up their notes and I have to be explicit. And I have to say like, I’m gonna talk about the rock cycle. So if I were you, I would put, you know, these four boxes. Oh, but there’s three types of rocks. See? I’m like, yeah, but magma. So let’s put it in the cycle, you know? And, and then I’m like, if I were you, I would put an arrow from here to here because this is how, you know, after erosion and then, you know, heat and pressure. But then it connects like this. So the arrows are gonna help me to remember the directions

Eric Cross (28:13):

As we wind down. There’s there’s one question I wanna ask you there, you are bringing together this science, the, the art, the social, emotional learning, the relationships with your students outside content, like there’s so many different things that you bring in the classroom that is clearly gonna make you a memorable educator for your kids. It just, it’s just, I’m just listening to your learning environment. And it’s so rich who is one teacher that really expired you. So

Valeria Rodriguez (28:38):

There’s a few people that stand out overall. I had very encouraging teachers. I had that one teacher that didn’t like my drawing <laugh> she also stands out <laugh>

Eric Cross (28:49):

We have those too.

Valeria Rodriguez (28:49):

Yeah. So I have colleagues that stand out to me that inspire me every day to like keep trying. And then I had a teacher in high school who I actually work with her daughter now at the school that I work at. And I didn’t even know her mom would make us write almost the whole class. And it was world history. And I remember hearing her say when she was talking about the Roman empire that it fell because it reached more than it can grab. So it kept extending too far out. And I heard that, like I think about, yes, I can keep reaching for things in education and reaching for things in my classroom. But I have to come back to like, what can I hold? I don’t wanna reach further than what I can hold. And yes, I have to believe in myself. And I tell my students to believe in themselves,

Eric Cross (29:38):

I’m in this, I’m in this sketch noting mindset. Because when you said what Ms. Brown shared with you, I thought of a hand reaching out, but then things kind of slipping through it. And I another hand with like a fist right next to it. So even in our conversation here last hour, I I’m thinking in pictures now. And so I’m like, if I can do it, they can do it. Like if you know, ‘cause I am just not the person who spends a lot of time committing to draw. Because a lot of times when I was that student who tried to draw and we get frustrated and look around and now I feel like this is, I wanna try this again. I wanna share this with my students and encourage them. This is gonna be a lot of fun. I look forward to continuing to see the sketch notes that you do. And maybe I’ll, I’ll show you one of mine. Like eventually I don’t know if you can see that there that’s my stick figures. Those of you who are listening right now, I drew, I was drawing stick figures and taking notes while Blair was dropping all of this, these like gems and wisdom in here. So

Valeria Rodriguez (30:31):

Maybe we can do a challenge that once people hear this podcast, they can tag us somehow in the sketch note that they create I’m in. So we see what they a take from it. Because that’s the other thing about sketch noting, you think you’re emphasizing something and all of a sudden people are walking away with something else that resonated to them. And you’re like, wow. And here I was thinking that this was what we were talking about. And this is what really jumped out at them.

Eric Cross (30:57):

Your kids are lucky that you’re in front of them, not just because of how you teach, but how you access all of these different parts of their creativity and their thinking and apply, integrate all of these soft skills and social, emotional skills and just life skills and your experience connecting them to the outside world. They, and like you said, and how we started, you know, where you started in Panama, the students realized what you represent and what you meant to them. And I feel like your students, when they get older, they may not realize it in the time, but as they get older and reflect back, they’ll be telling stories about you. So yeah. Thanks for making time and thanks for being here.

Valeria Rodriguez (31:34):

Well thank you too, ‘cause I know you’re in the classroom and making time to do other things outside the classroom. Isn’t always easy, but it’s what keeps us going in different ways.

Eric Cross (31:49):

Thanks so much for joining me in Valer today. We wanna hear more about you. If you have any great lessons or ways to keep student engagement high, please email us@stemamplifycom.wpengine.com. That’s TM five.com. Make sure to click, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and join our brand new Facebook group science connections, the community for some extra content.

Stay connected!

Join our community and get new episodes every other Tuesday!

We’ll also share new and exciting free resources for your classroom every month.

What Valeria Rodriguez says about science

“I use [sketchnoting] and I mess up all the time…because I feel that my students don’t want to make mistakes, and drawing is one of those things that taught me that it’s okay to make mistakes.”

– Valeria Rodriguez

Educator, Instructional technologist, and Graphic facilitator

Meet the guest

Valeria is an educator, instructional technologist, graphic facilitator, and dreamer. She currently works as a Science teacher as part of a STEAM Team in Miami, Florida teaching third through fifth graders as a free-lance graphic facilitator. She loves to connect with passionate educators she meets around the country. Valeria has presented and led workshops at educational conferences like SXSWEdu, ISTE, NSTA, NSTA STEM Forum, SHIFTinEDU, FAST, FCIS, and SEEC. When she is not teaching or sketching, Valeria can be found adventuring with her family around the world, training for triathlons, and creating opportunities to empower kids in all kinds of communities. 

You can check Valeria’s work on her website and follow her on Twitter & Instagram.

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About Science Connections

Welcome to Science Connections! Science is changing before our eyes, now more than ever. So…how do we help kids figure that out? We will bring on educators, scientists, and more to discuss the importance of high-quality science instruction. In this episode, hear from our host Eric Cross about his work engaging students as a K-8 science teacher. Listen here!

You might also like:

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Find Valeria!

Learn more about Valeria’s work and illustrations.

Two boys working on a laptop in a classroom, surrounded by other students and desks. They are smiling and writing on notebooks, appearing focused on the task.

Free poster!

Download a free poster to help students piece together their inner scientist.

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S4 – 03: LIVE from NCTM with Bethany and Dan

Hosts Bethany and Dan, both smiling, in a promotional image for the "Math Teacher Lounge" podcast, Season 4 Episode 3, titled "Live from NCTM!" with an

In this episode, co-hosts Bethany Lockhart Johnson and Dan Meyer are LIVE with more than one hundred Math Teacher Lounge listeners at the recent National Council of Teachers of Mathematics conference. Listen in as they answer the pressing question: Who is the best teacher in film or television?

Explore more from Math Teacher Lounge by visiting our main page. 

Download Transcript

Presenter (00:00):
Ladies and gentlemen, from Math Teacher Lounge, we have Bethany Lockhart Johnson and Dan Meyer! <cheering>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:08):
Doesn’t go well that the door was locked. Like, I could not get in! <Laugh>

Dan Meyer (00:12):
Yeah. Gotcha. All right. We’re gonna sit a little bit. Let’s see how that works—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:16):
Hi!

Dan Meyer (00:16):
Yeah. I think we’ll stand up? Or whaddaya think, sit…?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:19):
Should we stand? Hi.

Dan Meyer (00:22):
Hello. Great to see you folks. Yeah, I can hear you.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:25):
Can you hear me? That’s—I know YOU can me. Can you hear me OK? OK! We’re here. Hello. Thank you for like, lining up and coming out and being here. Thank you!

Dan Meyer (00:35):
Means so much to me that you could be here for me, on my show, with Bethany Lockhart Johnson, my co-host. <Audience laughs>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:40):
The hour has just started.

Dan Meyer (00:42):
We’re just getting going. Yeah. If you folks have heard the podcast, you don’t know how much gets cut out. And it’s like, mostly me just having, you know, anxious nerves and saying something silly and then we cut it out and we can’t do that here today. So it should be real fun for all of us, I think. Yeah.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:55):
It’s not true. It’s mostly dancing. “Bethany, can you stop talking? Bethany?” Cause it’s mostly—

Dan Meyer (00:59):
“It’s my turn. It’s my turn! Bethany <laugh>! I haven’t been heard for a while.”

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:02):
Dan. We’re at an in-person conference.

Dan Meyer (01:05):
In-person BIG conference, I would say. I’d say a big conference. Yeah.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:08):
And have you been to the Amplify booth?

Dan Meyer (01:11):
I have! Have these people? There’s a claw machine with free socks.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:16):
Yeah. You’re saving me socks, right? That’s what you’re saying. <Laugh> I mean, it’s exciting. How has your conference been so far?

Dan Meyer (01:21):
So far it’s been a blast. I feel fed. I feel like the community’s been awesome. How are you feeling about it?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:29):
OK. Let’s talk about me for just a second.

Dan Meyer (01:31):
Yeah. Talk about you.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:31):
Last night, Dan, was the very first night that I was away from my toddler. <Audience: Aw!>

Dan Meyer (01:38):
Big commitment being here. Thank you.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:40):
I got super-emotional walking back to the hotel after dinner, and then I got in my room, <laugh> I put on pajamas, and I turned on music. I slept so good!

Dan Meyer (01:50):
Yeah. <Audience laughs> Give it up for no kids! <Audience laughs> Hey!

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (01:55):
I love him so much. But I slept all the way through the night. Oh, by the way, I ordered room service in the morning.

Dan Meyer (02:01):
On Amplify.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:01):
That bill’s coming. But it’s been a great conference and I’m so delighted to be here in person and to get to share energy…and hopefully that’s all we’re sharing today. Y’all got your tests, right? Yep. Sharing energy and community today. Because we know it’s been hard. Hardness. Hard.

Dan Meyer (02:25):
Yeah.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:26):
Years. Hard. And to be in person, I know conferences reinvigorate me and I go back into my educational spaces feeling revitalized with new connections and new ideas to try. So yeah, I’ve been excited to be here. And thank you all for being here.

Dan Meyer (02:40):
Yep. I don’t care if I get six different strains of Covid here. I’m just thrilled to be here. <Audience laughs> I don’t know if you’ve had the same feeling, though, Bethany, you folks…I’m a little bit confused to some degree about what we’re doing. I just wanna be really transparent. This is my sarcastic voice but I’m being sincere here. It kind of feels like we’re in a little bit of a time capsule. Like we all got in a time capsule in 2019 and, you know, you open it back up and it’s like, OK, so we’re still, you know, talking about X, Y, or Z protocol for establishing classroom routines or whatever. And I’m like, OK! Like, I loved that in 2019! But I do admit, I’m still trying to figure out a little bit like, what are we doing now? What’s our relationship to the world out there? Things are very different. I have had some great sessions that I’ve enjoyed. I’m also like, still waiting for a session to draw a little blood. Do you know what I mean? Like there’s been sessions…no? OK. You’ve been in these sessions where it’s like, “Oh, ow.” Like, and you look down and there’s and there’s blood there. It’s like, I thought I knew what we were up to. Like, I thought I knew what teaching was and how we relate to the world. I dunno, like in any Danny Martin session in 2019, “Take a Knee” was one, where I was like, “Oh, OK. Like, I’m not as hot as I think I am here. Like, I’m part of a system.” That kind of thing for me draws blood. And I haven’t been in one of those yet. Been some great sessions. I’m a little hopeful that today we draw a little blood and think about what we’re doing here, is my hope here, if that’s OK. So Bethany’s gonna moderate that impulse and she’ll be the fun one and I’ll be the blood-drawing one.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:05):
No, I don’t…that metaphor doesn’t speak to me personally. But what I will say is, I get what you’re saying about really wanting to be in that room where there’s like this synergy happening. No promises about that today other than—

Dan Meyer (04:18):
I promise. <Audience laughs> Go on.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:20):
Other than I get what you’re saying. I’ll find my own metaphor that does not involve bloodshed, but.

Dan Meyer (04:25):
Sure. There’s a lot of ways we we could go about this today. And the one that I’m excited about is, you know, we could like, you know, analyze some results from students, and talk about what went into that. Look at classroom video. Lots of possibilities. But here’s what we’re up to today. Hope you’re into it. Which is, we are here in the heart of the entertainment industry. You know, Tinseltown! Um, the Big Apple! Uh…

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:47):
No!

Dan Meyer (04:47):
Come on. What do you got here? Um…

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:51):
It was daytime at night. Like the lights were so bright.

Dan Meyer (04:54):
The City of Lights.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (04:55):
There was a movie premiere outside my hotel room, which I was not invited to, unfortunately. But so what are we doing today?

Dan Meyer (05:01):
So here’s what we’re doing. We are gonna settle, once and for all, a question you have not asked yourself yet, perhaps, but will want to know the answer to in a moment. Which is: Who is the best teacher in all of film or television? OK? We’re gonna do that. It’ll be fun. But I hope that in debating this a little bit with a special guest we’ll bring up in a moment, that we will start to uncover some truths about what makes good teaching. How that’s different from teaching as we see it in movies and tv. Why middle-class America wants teachers to look a certain way in movies and tv. What all that means. And it’ll be awesome. I think. I’m hopeful it’ll be awesome. So what we did here is we’ve invited eight people. Eight folks you people may have known. You’ve been in their sessions today, in this conference, perhaps. And asked them: Who’s your fave? Like, we might have our favorites, but we wanted to democratize it a bit. So asked some cool people who you folks like, who are very smart and thoughtful about teaching: Who’s your favorite teacher?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:58):
A few of whom are in this room. Thank you for your submission.

Dan Meyer (06:00):
Thank so much. Yeah. We’ll see what happens here. <laugh>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:03):
As they shrink down.

Dan Meyer (06:03):
Yeah. Might draw some blood that I don’t mean to right now. We’ll see. OK.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:06):
That metaphor, what IS that??

Dan Meyer (06:07):
Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I’m still going with it. <laugh> And you folks will be a huge part of this. THE part of this, really. So what will happen is I’ll share with you our first nominees. A few of us will make a case for our favorites, or least favorites, as the case may be sometimes. And then by applause, by acclamation, you folks will decide who wins and advances to the next round. Start with eight, move to four. You folks know math.You know where this goes. OK.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:34):
No, keep going. Keep going.

Dan Meyer (06:36):
Two, then one.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:36):
Yeah. Got it.

Dan Meyer (06:37):
Then a half of it. No?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:38):
He had to school me on the making of brackets. But we got it. Yeah.

Dan Meyer (06:41):
How brackets work.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:41):
But we got it. March Madness, what?

Dan Meyer (06:44):
Yeah, in order to do this right, we had to bring up—all the folks that you’ll see are also former Math Teacher Lounge guests, or like, just fan favorites. And we’re also bringing up a former Math Teacher Lounge guest to help us decide this and debate this in a respectful manner.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:59):
New dad.

Dan Meyer (07:00):
New dad.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:01):
You see where my brain’s still at? I miss him. <Laughs>

Dan Meyer (07:03):
Friend from San Diego. Really cool teacher.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:06):
Incredible teacher.

Dan Meyer (07:06):
Works at Desmos and Amplify. And I just want you to welcome up your friend and mine. Chris Nho!

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:11):
Chris Nho!

Dan Meyer (07:13):
Come up, Chris. Let’s go, buddy. We didn’t talk about it, but did you want to do the cornball stuff too?

Chris Nho (07:22):
Wow. Would I love to do—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:23):
And then the door could be locked! And then you have to wait and like, just—

Chris Nho (07:27):
Yeah, I’ll skip that part.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:28):
Hi. Welcome. You’re here. We’re here in person.

Chris Nho (07:30):
Very glad to be here. Thank you all for having me.

Dan Meyer (07:33):
Tell me who you are.

Chris Nho (07:34):
My name is Chris Nho. I live in San Diego. I’m a new dad. A three month old, just had. Yeah, she’s actually here at the conference with us in the hotel room. And I promise you she is not by herself. She is with…come on. I was like, “Hey, just gimme one hour. I’ll be right back. I have to do very important work.” But yeah, I think I got invited here because I have opinions and I’m willing to draw…some…blood.

Dan Meyer (08:02):
There we go! Two outta three! We’re good on the metaphor now.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (08:06):
We’re so glad you’re here. If you haven’t listened to the episode where Chris and Molly and some other public math folks share their ideas and ideas of how to take math out into the world, please listen, because we had a blast.

Dan Meyer (08:19):
Inspiring work. Really inspiring work. Very cool. Cool. OK. Right on. OK.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (08:23):
Let’s do this!

Dan Meyer (08:24):
Let’s get started here. Yeah! <Audience cheers> Yeah. And we might ask you who your favorite teacher is, who’s missing from our list of eight? We might have forgotten some people. Anyway. All right. So here’s our first two. Our first two are nominated by way of, let’s see, um, Mandy Jansen is a professor at the University of Delaware. Got some awesome talks here this week, a Shadow Con talk last night. She’ll be nominating one. And also, um, Lani Horn is a professor at Vanderbilt, also extremely cool, prolific author and speaker, just all-around great human and friend of teachers everywhere. And she’ll nominate another in this bracket, which is the Northeastern Comedy bracket, Northeastern comedy bracket.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (09:06):
It just worked out that way.

Dan Meyer (09:07):
Yeah. Here it is. Here is Tina Fey in Mean Girls.

Tina Fey in Mean Girls (09:12):
“OK. Everybody close your eyes. All right. I want you to raise your hand if you have ever had a girl say something bad about you behind your back. Open your eyes. Now close your eyes again. And this time I want you to raise your hand if you have ever said anything about a friend behind her back. Open up. It’s been some girl-on-girl crime here.”

Lani Horn (09:52):
I am nominating Sharon Norbury from Mean Girls as the best movie math teacher. She is an awesome teacher who is always there for her kids. She always sees the best in them. She shows that she can forgive even some pretty bad behavior, if she sees that kids are trying. She’s a strong feminist who makes sure that smart girls don’t dumb themselves down just to impress boys.

Tina Fey in Mean Girls (10:22):
“Katie, I know that having a boyfriend may seem like the most important thing in the world right now, but you don’t have to dumb yourself down to get guys to like you.”

Lani Horn (10:30):
She’s also super hard-working. She works three jobs. She’s always there for the kids. She plays piano in the talent show and takes them to Mathlete competitions. And she’s also socially aware. And when things go really badly among the girls, she does some pretty creative things to try to get them to be kinder to each other.

Dan Meyer (10:54):
OK. That’s one.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (10:55):
Helen Case.

Dan Meyer (10:57):
All right. Settle down. Settle down. Settle down. All right.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (10:59):
Piano too!

Dan Meyer (11:00):
Bethany’s already trying to bias people here. All right. Chill out. Hold on. So next one is Mandy Jansen with Jack Black from School of Rock. Uh-oh. Uh-oh.

Jack Black in School of Rock (11:09):
“What was your name?”

Kid in School of Rock (11:10):
“Katie.”

Jack Black in School of Rock (11:11):
“Katie. What was that thing you were playing today? The big thing.”

Kid in School of Rock (11:14):
“Cello.”

Jack Black in School of Rock (11:15):
“OK. This is a bass guitar and it’s the exact same thing, but instead of playing like this, you tip it on the side. Chellooooo! You’ve got a bass! <Laugh> Try it on.”

Mandy Jansen (11:25):
And I’m nominating for best teacher in a film Jack Black as Dewey Finn playing Mr. Ned Schneebly in the film School of Rock. So why this portrayal? First of all, playing a longterm sub. Those are so hard to find right now. <Audience laughs> Really hard. And then he teaches using class projects. That’s brilliant. Integrated learning. And then love this. He gives students roles and tasks that are differentiated and align to the specific strengths that each student has.

Kid 2 in School of Rock (12:05):
“I can also play clarinet, you know!”

Jack Black in School of Rock (12:06):
“I’ll find something for you when we get back from lunch. I’ll assign the rest of you killer positions.”

Mandy Jansen (12:13):
And the film culminates in a performance of a collaborative song that they all wrote and performed together. And the students experience that collaboration and teamwork and creating something beautiful is much more important than winning first place. And finally, one of the songs that the character sings in the film is “Math is a Wonderful Thing.” Can’t beat that.

Dan Meyer (12:40):
All right. That’s tough. That’s tough. So here’s the deal. What we have right now is just a quick minute—so Bethany, you ranked, we all ranked our own faves here outta the list of eight. And Bethany put Jack Black in School of Rock a bit higher than Tina Fey in Mean Girls.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:54):
Missed the piano part though.

Dan Meyer (12:55):
And Chris, vice versa here. So Bethany, would you start us off and just make a quick case here for Jack Black versus Tina Fey?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:01):
OK. So here’s what I’m thinking. There’s been rumor that maybe they’re putting less than credentialed people into classrooms to fill teaching gaps. I mean, just rumor. And so here’s this guy who is a rocker. He is not a substitute. He has no teaching training. And yet he goes in there and it turns out that he has the ability to see students’ potential and to recognize their unique abilities. And like Mandy said, he really tapped into, like, he saw them and said, “No, more is possible for you than what you think is possible.” And there’s like real sub anxiety. When you walk in, you can either be like, happy there’s a sub, but I was usually really nervous. Right? And he goes in and he makes that classroom into a home.

Dan Meyer (13:53):
Wow.

Chris Nho (13:54):
Wow.

Dan Meyer (13:56):
Chris, speak on it. Tina Fey needs you. Chris.

Chris Nho (13:59):
Tina Fey. Here we go. I’m gonna argue here that—when was that movie made?

Dan Meyer (14:03):
T is for terrific. I is for Interesting.

Chris Nho (14:06):
Decades ago. And I’m gonna argue that Tina Fey was very progressive for her time. OK, let’s talk about social emotional learning. Hello. <Audience laughs> Love that. Right? Stand up if, I mean, she’s getting people to talk about their emotions. And there’s a curriculum. But let’s just pause, because that’s not what’s really happening in the classroom right now. So social emotional learning, I think she’s, she’s got that a lot. And then number two, you know, if you remember the plot of Mean Girls a little bit, she gets her name written in that Burn Book. Like she sees what they say about her. Restorative justice. Let’s go. <Audience laughs>.

Dan Meyer (14:38):
Whom amongst us. Yes.

Chris Nho (14:40):
You write Mr. Nho in the Burn Book?? Well, your grade book is gonna look like a Burn Book! OK? <Audience laughs> Tina Fey, Tina Fey, she was like, “No, you know, know what? I’m actually gonna spend more time with you. You’re gonna become a mathlete.” And Lindsay Lohan discovers—she drops the most iconic line in all of math education. “The limit does not exist.” Thank you, Tina Fey, for that. For that gift.

Dan Meyer (15:04):
Bless. Bless you. Tina Fey. Wow.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (15:05):
Oh, man. Wow.

Dan Meyer (15:09):
Let’s see what the people say here. I do wanna just add one quick thing about—it’s interesting to me how often in these movies—just kind of go in a little bit, zoom out just a minute—how often it’s a teacher who has no training as a teacher. <Bethany laughs> I am kind of curious why it is. Like, those are the movies that get hot, that get made. Again, these are all kind of a mirror of the taste of the moviegoing public. You know what I’m saying? Like, these, these are not movies—I wanna believe they are made for me and for us as teachers. But they are not. There’s not enough of us to justify, you know, Jack Black’s, you know, M&M budget or whatever he’s got going on in his trailer or whatever. That needs to be for everybody in middle-class America. So what is it about middle-class America that wants to see teaching as something that anybody can do? Just like, you know, just, just run up there in your van and make it happen.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (15:54):
Magic magically manifests.

Dan Meyer (15:56):
Yeah. Manifest. Yeah. That’s just interesting to me. I just toss that out there as some red meat. Let’s see what the people say here. All right, OK, so you’re ready. Let’s get the bracket going here. The question is Tina Fey versus Jack Black. You had a moment here. Just whisper to someone real fast who you’re going for here real quick. What are you thinking here? <Crowd murmuring> All right. Crowd’s buzzing. Crowd’s buzzing. Would you folks…? All right. Bring it back. Go ahead and make some noise for Tina Fey. <Crowd cheers> OK. OK. Make some noise for Jack Black! <Crowd cheers> Judges say Tina Fey. Tina Fey moves on. All right. All right.

Chris Nho (16:44):
Stunned. I’m stunned. I’m speechless.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (16:46):
Tina Fey moves on. Wow.

Dan Meyer (16:48):
This has exceeded my expectations in terms of having some fun, but also getting deep, getting deep and real about teaching. I’m into this right here. Yeah. What’s up?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (16:54):
That’s the goal. That’s the goal. OK. You wanted blood? Oooh, this next matchup might just be where that blood comes forth! OK. Stretch. Warm up. Dan Meyer, who’s up next?

Dan Meyer (17:11):
We’ve got the animated/animatronic round here in the Southeast. And repping the two contestants here, who do we have? We have Allison Hintz, professor, author outta Washington, as one of the two nominators. And the other nominator is one of my heroes, though we’ll find out very wrong about this nomination, Jenna Laib, who’s in the crowd, and I’m trying not to make eye contact here. <Laugh> And here are the two nominations. A couple minutes each. And then we’ll chat about it. And one of us will probably die. But we’ll see how it goes.

Allison Hintz (17:50):
A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, MTL, we began learning from the Jedi Master of Teaching. With the Socratic and experiential approach. With unparalleled mindfulness, compassion, and humility. The best teacher in TV and film, Yoda is. <Audience laughs> Yoda lives the values we share as teachers and learners. He humbly comes alongside us as we construct new knowledge.

Yoda (18:29):
“You must unlearn what you have learned.”

Allison Hintz (18:32):
Yoda allows us to struggle and sees mistakes as critical to learning.

Yoda (18:39):
“The greatest teacher, failure is.”

Allison Hintz (18:43):
Yoda values curiosity and reminds us of the beauty and joy of teachers learning from children.

Yoda (18:52):
“Truly wonderful, the mind of a child is.”

Allison Hintz (18:59):
MTL! Join the Resistance! Let the force flow through you in declaring, the best teacher in TV and film, Yoda is.

Dan Meyer (19:18):
Give it up for Allison Hintz! All right! <Audience applauds>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:20):
Alison! And to have that on hand too, which Is kind of perfect.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:26):
Just to be clear, the helmet is not a part of a Zoom background.

Dan Meyer (19:29):
You may evaluate the quality of the nomination based on the costumes of the nominator. That is acceptable. That’s acceptable.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (19:35):
That is a REAL HELMET.

Dan Meyer (19:35):
All right. The next nominator here, this one is from Jenna Laib, math coach, all-around stellar human. Here we go. This is Ms. Frizzle.

Ms. Frizzle (19:42):
“Single file, class. Our rotten field trip has only just begun.”

Jenna Laib (19:47):
And I think that the best teacher from TV or movies is Ms .Valerie Frizzle from The Magic School Bus. First and foremost, Ms. Frizzle believes in her students. She encourages them to take an active role in their learning, and also to advocate for change in their local community. For example, there’s an episode where there is a logger who’s gonna cut down a rotting log that would benefit the local ecosystem. And the students figure out a way to convince him to leave the log so that all of the animals and the plant life can benefit. She orchestrates really challenging situations for these students, and she allows them the space to ask questions and engage in problem-solving and puzzle their way out of these really, really difficult scenarios. Ms. Frizzle has unmatched pedagogy. She’s bold, she’s innovative, and she’s a major proponent of experiential learning. So these students are heading straight into a storm to learn about weather systems. <Audience laughs> These students are heading into the human body to learn about digestion and disease. They literally get baked into a cake to learn about some chemistry and reactions.

Children in The Magic School Bus (20:54):
“What’s happening?” <Audience laughs> “Why is it suddenly getting so hot?” “Maybe it’s because the floor is on fire!” <Audience laughs>

Jenna Laib (21:02):
This pedagogy is all led by her outstanding catchphrase, which is:

Ms. Frizzle (21:06):
“Take chances; make mistakes; get messy!”

Jenna Laib (21:14):
From her pedagogy to the classroom community that she creates, Ms. Frizzle is an inspiration, and that is why I think that she is the best teacher from TV or film. <Audience applauds>

Dan Meyer (21:25):
Right on! Give it up for Jenna. Give it up for Jenna. All right. I’m gonna take first pass at this. Chris knows my argument already, so I’m gonna take this here. I see some of you are feeling how I’m feeling on this one. OK, so I don’t have tons to say in favor of Yoda. I think it was all true what Allison said. I think the costume was banging. It was awesome. So there’s all that, but I have more to say against Ms. Frizzle than for Yoda.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:48):
No, no, no. Wait a second!

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:49):
Let’s let it happen. Bethany, I’ve come prepared.

Dan Meyer (21:54):
I may have made a misstep here, I realize.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (21:56):
I’ve come prepared.

Dan Meyer (21:56):
So I think Jenna is all correct. I think those clips spoke for themselves. I think that what they add up to, to me, is not “great teacher,” but more “someone who should be locked up.” <Audience laughs> Or at the very minimum, “someone who should be kept away from children.” <Audience laughs> Do not let that woman around children. I mean, check it out. Look, I don’t wanna throw down credentials. I’ve been to grad school, though. I know how this works. When your brain is stressed, you get these—all the cortisol happens. Your working memory shrinks up. You cannot learn when you’re stressed. And those kids, like whatever lesson Ms. Frizzle is teaching by sending them into an oven, I repeat, an oven <audience laughs>, like, they’re not gonna learn anything ’cause their brains are freaking out with stress and fear. OK?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (22:41):
“What’s happening??”

Dan Meyer (22:43):
“What’s happening? Am I on fire? Well…I’m learning lots, though! Sure is magical!” <Audience laughs> It’s like, “No. Get that woman out of a classroom.” That’s my opening and closing argument. Right? There’s all it is.

Chris Nho (23:01):
All right. All right. All right.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (23:02):
Chris knows.

Chris Nho (23:03):
I’ve got, I’ve got lots to say. First off, I think Dan was in charge of the editing of those video clips. So let’s let that be—you know, let the record stand. <Audience laughs>

Dan Meyer (23:11):
Where’s the lie though? Where’s the lie?

Chris Nho (23:14):
And, you know, second, I think, um—this is the guy up here saying, “I wanna see blood.” You know? And then he has a teacher who literally takes the students into a blood cell and, and you get a little scared! You get a little worried for the students, you know? So I just don’t get it, Dan. This or that. OK? I think Ms. Frizzle—so I actually went to a project-based learning school. I taught at a project-based learning school. And the best thing about it is like, your learning, it doesn’t just stay in this box of math lesson or writing lesson, history lesson. And I think with Ms. Frizzle, like you can’t help but learn things because you are getting baked in a cake. <Audience laughs> Yeah, it is a little scary. And I imagine there’s cortisol and things happening, but guess what? Probably the next episode, they go into their own brains and explore what’s happening. That kind of thing. You know?

Dan Meyer (24:07):
The kids that survived, just be clear. <Audience laughs>

Chris Nho (24:10):
Yeah. OK. Would I want Nora, my three-month-old, to be babysat by Ms. Frizzle? Maybe not. <Audience laughs> But what I have to say about Yoda is Yoda maybe wins the best tutor award. Give it up for Yoda’s Best Tutor Award.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (24:24):
Oh, yeah…

Chris Nho (24:25):
That ratio’s looking really nice. I could teach the heck outta Luke Skywalker. OK? But 20 little Luke Skywalkers running around. I’m not sure. OK?

Dan Meyer (24:34):
Luke did survive the training, though. <Audience laughs> So that’s awfully nice to say about it. All right, Great words from Chris here. I’m still not convinced. We’ll see how you’re convinced here. Would you whisper to someone where you’re leaning here? Frizzle or Yoda? <Audience buzzing>

Chris Nho (24:47):
I tried. I tried.

Dan Meyer (24:53):
All right. That’s enough of that. Let’s hear it folks. Give it up for Yoda. <Audience cheers> Give it up. Give it up. You. Give. It. Up.

Chris Nho (25:05):
Hey, next. Next.

Dan Meyer (25:06):
All right. All right, all right. <Mutters> Give it up for Ms. Frizzle. <Audience cheers louder> I dunno, it’s pretty close. Call a tie. Maybe Yoda? Yoda by nose? <Audience laughs> All right. All right. Let’s…let me see who’s it. Let’s get the people advancing here. I’ll keep on moving here.

Chris Nho (25:26):
As you’re doing that. Um, Dan ranked Ms. Frizzle last in his personal ranking. And I ranked Ms. Frizzle very high, so we knew this one would be spicy,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (25:36):
<laugh> Spicy it was. Are you having a good time so far? <Audience cheers> So while we love seeing these images and we love seeing these video clips, at the core, what are these things about how teachers are portrayed? And how accurate is that to our real lives? I mean, besides the cake part, right? That my chemistry class did often feel like I was on fire. I was so stressed in it. Um, we’re ready?

Dan Meyer (26:05):
Yep. Great. We’re ready, we’re up here. So the next two nominees are coming to you folks from Tracy Zager, who is the editor of my book, forthcoming in 2027 at the earliest and 2032 at the latest. And also your very own Zak Champagne from Florida, here in the room. Hey, Zak. Zak, let’s see who the nominations are. I’m gonna skip past that, didn’t work out so well for me. Here it is. This is Marshall Kane from the TV show Community.

Michael K. Williams in Community (26:32):
“You two complete your case to the class and let them decide your grades.”

Joel McHale in Community (26:37):
“Professor, thank you.”

Michael K. Williams in Community (26:40):
“It’s not a favor, Mr. Winger. Man’s gotta have a code.”

Joel McHale in Community (26:44):
“Awesome.”

Zak Champagne (26:46):
This is a pitch for an underdog. This teacher didn’t stand on desks or encourage his students to follow their musical passions. In fact, this teacher was seen only in a few episodes of my favorite TV show of all time, Community, Community has set at Greendale Community College in Colorado. And in season three, we get to meet Dr. Marshall Kane, a biology professor whose story is an inspiration to anyone who just takes the time to look and listen. Dr. Marshall Kane slowly earned his PhD while in prison, serving a sentence of 25 to life. In his classroom, he inspires students to love biology, question why LEGO has become so complicated, and randomly pairs his students for group projects to ensure no one feels left out. His greatest performance comes when a group of students believe their yam project was intentionally sabotaged. Dr. Kane took this as an opportunity for some trans-disciplinary real-world learning. So yes, at community college, he felt that a middle-school mock trial was the best way to determine who killed the yam. So let’s all pick the underdog and vote for Dr. Marshall Kane. After all, man’s gotta have a code. <Audience goes “oh!” and applauds>

Dan Meyer (27:53):
Thank you, Zak.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (27:54):
I have a code.

Dan Meyer (27:56):
Next up is Tracy Zager, nominating an unusual nomination, not a single person, but an ensemble performance. A bunch of people from a movie called Searching for Bobby Fisher. Here we go.

Rapid-fire movie dialogue (28:11):
“What’s that?” “Schleimann attack.” “Schleimann attack? Where’d you learn that from, a book?” “No, my teacher taught me.” “Aw, your teacher. Well, forget it. Play like you used to, from the gut. Get your pawns rolling on the queen’s side.”

Tracy Zager (28:26):
Hey, Math Teacher Lounge. This is Tracy Zager. I’m excited to share my nominee for the best movie teacher. But I have to admit that when I first got the email, I thought, oh, who am I gonna nominate? Because most movies about teachers are highly problematic. They usually have like a saviorism thing, usually white saviors. And I just felt like I couldn’t suggest any of those. So rather than nominate a movie about a single teacher, I wanted to nominate a movie that taught me something about teaching. And that movie is a deep cut. It’s Searching for Bobby Fischer. It’s a movie about a chess prodigy. And what I love about it is that all of the different adults in the movie are in teacher roles in some way. And the student, Josh, the chess player, is a fully realized character, not an empty pail, who pulls from the strengths of each one of those adults while also dealing with their flaws and humanity. And there’s just beautiful synergy in the way he gets the best out of everybody, but also has to overcome some of the barriers that they put in front of him. So I feel like it’s a much more authentic and humbling, but also inspiring, movie about the power of teaching. So if you haven’t ever seen it, check it out. And I can’t wait to see who the other nominees are. Thanks so much.

Dan Meyer (29:53):
Right on. Thank you, Tracy. Wherever you are. <Applause> We’ll move a little quicker here. I’m curious, Bethany, you put Marshall Kane pretty high. I put Bobby Fischer pretty high. What do you have to say about Marshall Kane for us here?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (30:04):
Well, I just wanna say two things. One is that, like Zak said, he has this code of conduct that he brings in. And he stays true to it no matter what happens. If you saw him in in Community, you know that he held himself up to such high esteem, but not just himself, his students as well. And he took accountability when he felt he had done wrong, even though, well, that’s controversy. But first—oh, the other thing, rest in peace, Michael K. Williams. Oh my gosh. The actor who plays Marshall K. And the thing that I wanna say most of all about it is that he brings his whole self to the classroom. He was in prison for decades. He brings his whole self and says, “This is who I was. This is who I am today. And this is how we can work together as a community.”

Dan Meyer (30:58):
That’s big. I love your comments about code of conduct too. It makes me wish that Ms. Frizzle had a code of conduct also.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (31:05):
I knew that was coming back!

Chris Nho (31:06):
Two slides ago, Dan. That was two slides ago.

Dan Meyer (31:08):
Can’t let it go. So yeah, I love what you said there. I have no strong beef here either way. Bobby Fischer’s a movie I have loved dearly and can’t be objective about it. I love that the kid in that movie, more than any other movie here, the kid teaches the adults so much through his innocence and how he challenges them and how they’re treating him. Dig all that so much. Will not, will not begrudge anyone any vote either way here. I do begrudge many of you your vote in previous rounds. <Audience laughs> So let’s just, let’s hear. We’re not gonna ask you folks at all to chitchat. We’re gonna move on this one. So would you folks make some noise here for Marshall Kane in Community? OK. OK. And would you make some noise here for Bobby Fischer, the kid in Bobby Fischer, the ensemble? <Audience cheers, applauds>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (31:56):
Marshall Kane.

Dan Meyer (31:57):
Marshall Kane takes it. All right. Good job, Marshall Kane! All right. Zak’s feeling good. Moving on to the final four here, Zak, right on. OK. Our last—the Northwest Division here is also the large urban district division here. We have a couple different teachers in sets of large urban schools. They’re nominated, they’re advanced by a couple people here. One is past president of NCTM, Robert Berry. And another is Fawn Nguyen, Southern California phenom. Great teacher and friend of lots of us. Um, let’s see who they nominated here. First from Robert Berry, let’s see, who is it here? Janine Teagues from Abbott Elementary.

Abbott Elementary dialogue (32:37):
“Hey, you know what? I’m probably probably gonna be Kenny’s second-grade teacher. Why don’t you just let him get a head start with me today?” “That’d be great.” “Yeah? OK. Hey, Kenny, would you like to be in my group today?” “Not really.” “That’s the spirit.”

Robert Berry (32:54):
My nomination is gonna be Quinta Brunson, the Emmy Award-winning Quinta Brunson from Abbott Elementary. Janine Teagues is the character. She exemplifies care not only from an affect way, but she also exemplifies care in the things that she does for her students. While the scenes in the show are entertaining, they do represent the challenges that teachers experience when they’re trying to meet the needs of her students. So she goes, goes all out for her students and finding resources. She accesses other people to get resources for her students. But the care shows up in the way that she is mindful of their needs. And so, for me, when I think about teachers and teaching, sometimes we can talk about pedagogy, but sometimes we also can talk about those kind of intangibles that makes a teacher a great teacher. It is apparent from her students that she cares about them, she supports them, and she goes all out 100% for her students. Janine Teagues, Quinta Brunson is, I think, is my choice of the best teacher on television because of the realism and the representation that she brings to this character of what teaching is about. <Applause>

Dan Meyer (34:28):
Right on. Right on. OK. OK. Next up, we’ve got, Fawn Nguyen is nominating Erin Gruwell from Freedom Writers. Here we go.

Hilary Swank in Freedom Writers movie (34:39):
“Look, you can either sit in your seats reading those workbooks or you can play a game. Either way, you’re in here till the bell rings. OK? This is called the Line Game. I’m gonna ask you a question. If that question applies to you, you step onto the line and then step back away for the next question. Easy, right? The first question. How many of you have the new Snoop Dog album? <kids move around> OK, back away. Next question. How many of you have seen Boys in the Hood?”

Fawn Nguyen (35:26):
We all learn about Miss G and her 150 students in the movie Freedom Writers starring Hilary Swank. All great teachers share a common set of traits. They care deeply about their students, have high expectations of them, and always believing wholeheartedly that they will succeed. Great teachers go above and beyond, not because they extraordinary—as Anne Gruwell would always refer to herself as an ordinary teacher—but because extraordinary things happen to people when we believe in them, give them hope, help them write their own story with a different ending. So what stood out for me with Miss G is the scope of her reach, the ever-expanding sphere of her humanity. The red tape she had placed on the classroom floor for the line game shows just how much we all have in common despite our differences. Her students didn’t just learn from her; they learned from one another. If you’d like to be part of this expanding sphere to give voice and hope, please check out Freedom Writers Foundation dot org.

Dan Meyer (36:38):
OK. This right here is a tough one for us. Thank you, Fawn. We collectively ranked—that’s our number one seed and number eight seed, which I hasten to say does not have to do with Erin Gruwell, a person, but the portrayal and the movie. So we don’t have like a whole lot of…there’s not a lot of defense we have to offer here of our eighth seed. And I heard like a kind of a little bit of a murmur over the crowd on Erin Gruwell. So I’m more interested than having a defense back and forth. I’d be curious what you, Bethany, think about what, like, what both movies have to say about like, what teaching is, especially teaching urban schools with black and brown kids and lower-class kids, for instance. They both have, I think, very different things to say about them. Do you have thoughts about that?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (37:19):
Well, it’s interesting because there is some overlap in the sense that the arguments that both Fawn and Robert Berry put out, they both care deeply about their students, right? We’re not gonna argue that. They care deeply. And something that I would say about Miss Teagues is there’s something about the way that she sees not only her classroom, her students, but she sees all of the students in the school as her students. And her idea of resource generation is really helping the teachers to generate resources from their community themselves, and to also realize that the students see themselves reflected in the teachers. And I think that—you know, again, this is not about the real person—but the movie portrayal, and we often see kind of this, for Freedom Writers, we often see this like, Great Last Hope whisked in and her personal sacrifices are what makes these students, these brown and black students’ transformation possible. Because of her sacrifices. Including her marriage. Including, you know, three jobs. And it’s just portrayed in a way that I think really celebrates her sacrifices rather than what the students have already brought—they already come into the room bringing so much as they are, already, without her intervention.

Dan Meyer (38:38):
I love the portrayal of the teacher as part of a community of teachers. Versus in so many of these movies, it’s the teacher as the only person who gets it, you know, oftentimes coming from outside of the world of teaching and everyone’s against them and wants ’em just to fall in line and do the thing we always do, and they’re the outlier. But in Abbott Elementary, it’s like we all rise and we fall together. And teachers are investing in each other’s success, especially with Gregory the longterm sub. We’re all rooting for his, you know, his flourishing. I love that. And yeah. That’s bigtime.

Chris Nho (39:09):
Yeah, I think one interesting thing is that Freedom Writers, when it came out, I think it was like a commercial success.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (39:17):
Oh, big time. Yeah. It was.

Chris Nho (39:18):
It probably influenced a lot of people to try teaching out. So I do wonder what it says about us, right? Like that we want teaching to fit this narrative, and we wanna be those people who could go into a classroom and <puts on “cool voice”> “Y’all listen to Snoop Dog?” and just have that question HIT. <laughter> And you know, I’ve taught in a large urban school district, and I’ve been that person and I’ve seen other people try and be that person. And I think stepping away from it a little bit, just—it’s a reflection of what people want out of teaching and what they think better education looks like.

Dan Meyer (39:57):
Yeah, yeah. This idea that, so I’m a middle-class person, let’s say, and like, there’s this idea, like, “I know what I would do if I was going into circumstances of impoverishment.” Like I have—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (40:06):
“All they really need is…”

Dan Meyer (40:07):
…for me to give ’em some real talk and tell ’em, you know, pull their pants up or whatever, listen to Snoop Dog, that kind of thing. And that will be the key. And that’s not how it is in, you know, in Jack Black in School of Rock or Tina Fey school, which are, you know, coded as largely like upper-class or largely white schools. And in those movies, it’s interesting, like how it’s about students discovering themselves, oftentimes. And the central figures are often students. And the students need to reject an oppressive parent figure or something and find themselves. But no, in Freedom Writers, it’s like, “You need to become more like the middle-class teachers who are coming in here to give you this wisdom.” It’s just interesting. I do find it—a pet peeve of mine is when movies portray teachers as only successful if you endure, for instance, the failure of your marriage, or even in Stand and Deliver, for instance, like Jaime Escalante, they depict him having a heart attack. And, like, the job oughta be…easier. <Audience laughs>

Chris Nho (41:04):
Truth.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (41:05):
That’s the barometer for how much….

Dan Meyer (41:09):
Like, no heart attacks and no divorces related to the job, that kind of thing. I do love how in Abbott—one last thing and we’ll vote and Abbott will win <audience laughs>—is like how, like there, there is a lot of degradation in Abbott, but it’s not a divorce or a heart attack—it’s the petty indignities of asking a student, “Do you wanna hang with me?” And a student says, “Nah, not really.” And that just spoke to me like how it’s not cinematic, but teaching, successful teaching, is like a collection of developing an immunity to students saying, “You’re not hot.” <Laugh> You know? And so I love that. I do wish that there was more depiction of students in Abbott Elementary. It’s a lot of adult stuff. Whatever. Give it up for Abbott, if you would, please. Let’s just get this done here. All right. That’s plenty. That’s plenty. Not gonna ask folks about Freedom Writers. OK, let’s move on to— all right, let’s hear it for Freedom Writers! Yeah. OK, cool. We go, yep.

Chris Nho (42:05):
Plot twist!

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:07):
OK, let’s see our final four. Cut and paste. Real time. Real time.

Audience member (42:12):
Where’s Dolores Umbridge?

Dan Meyer (42:14):
Oh….

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:16):
Hey, did you hear that? He said, “Where’s Dolores Umbridge?”

Dan Meyer (42:20):
All right. OK.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:20):
See, we missed so many. We could…

Dan Meyer (42:21):
So coming up here, we’ve got in the Eastern Conference, Tina Fey and Ms. Frizzle. Y’all know how I feel about that one. Let’s just get this one done. OK, let’s give it up for Tina Fey. Let’s hear it. <Audience cheers> OK. All right. Yes! Let’s give it up for menace to children everywhere, the terror, the Ms. Frizzle. <Audience cheers> One more time for Tina Fey. Let’s hear it. <Audience cheers> One more time for Ms. Frizzle. Let’s hear it. <Audience cheers>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:59):
Yeah. OK.

Dan Meyer (43:00):
It took ’em one round, but they made the right call in the end. <Laugh>

Chris Nho (43:04):
All it took was 10 minutes of constant Ms. Frizzle-bashing. <Laugh>

Dan Meyer (43:09):
Persevering and problem-solving, that’s my game. Yes. All right. So, do either of you want to influence the audience one way or the other?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (43:16):
That’s not how I play, Dan.

Dan Meyer (43:18):
Oh, OK. Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. You’re good. On Abbott versus Marshall Kane, should we just let ’em have it? All right. All right. Give it up For Abbott Elementary. Not bad. And for Marshall Kane. OK. OK. I hear Zak and five other people. All right, cool. <laugh> Right on. All right. We got our, we got our finals,

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (43:45):
We did it. We made it to two. And we know: We left out a lot of people. Right? And honestly, I kind of wish we could poll like everyone. I mean, think you put it on Twitter, right? Like, who would you pick? But I would say we had a pretty solid eight there. I’m excited to see who… Look at the little crown he put, you guys. Come on.

Dan Meyer (44:05):
I worked hard for you. For you. <Laugh> Yeah. I liked that it was a good bunch that had a lot of different kinds of qualities…and lack of qualities in some cases. And it allowed us that—I shouldn’t knock her while she’s down, and she IS down, it’s true. <Laugh> And I appreciate the conversation we’ve had, what they have revealed overall about teaching and what the world wants teaching to be versus what it actually is or actually should be. I appreciate that. So let’s settle this here. Give it up, if you would, for Abbott Elementary. <Audience cheers> And give it up for Tina Fey in Mean Girls. <Audience cheers>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (44:49):
Wow.

Dan Meyer (44:51):
That was close. I almost give that to Tina Fey.

Audience member (44:55):
Yeah, we do!

Dan Meyer (44:55):
I don’t know. That was a bracket-buster for me right there. Yeah. I lost money in the office pool off that right there. Maybe let’s just find out one more time here. One more time.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (45:03):
Last time.

Dan Meyer (45:03):
Time to summon up all your conviction on one or the other here. No half-measures right now. All right.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (45:07):
Emmy Award-winning Quinta Brunson.

Dan Meyer (45:09):
Yeah, you saw Robert Berry on that, right? He was like, “Oh, I got one more card to play. Emmy Award-winning.” That’s admissible. That’s admissible. We’ll take that. All right. So…give it up for Abbott Elementary, one last time. <Audience cheers> OK. All right. All right. And give it up for Tina Fey in Mean Girls. <Audience cheers>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (45:30):
Drumroll, please!

Chris Nho (45:33):
Best teacher is….

Dan Meyer (45:34):
Tina Fey in Mean Girls! Yeah. Not a bad pick.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (45:39):
I love it. And I think, too, I think we’re gonna have a little bit of a more reflective lens than we thought we did when we see depictions of teachers in film and television. And, you know, hopefully we’ll see some new tropes come in, right?

Dan Meyer (45:55):
Yep. Yeah. Every dollar we spend on movies with lousy teachers is just encouraging these people to make more lousy teacher movies, you know? Awesome. Thank you for being here for a live taping—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (46:06):
Thank you for being here.

Dan Meyer (46:06):
—of our podcast, Math Teacher Lounge, in a hot room. Appreciate that. Yeah, it’s been fun for us to have you here. Um, super-important, super-important final remark: Bethany loves Oprah and Oprah occasionally, in the show—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (46:18):
Is she coming?! Is she here?!

Dan Meyer (46:19):
Not here! Not here! Calm down. Calm down. Um, but we do have in Oprah fashion, not something—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (46:24):
Oh. Oh, OK. Oh, that’s, that’s OK. Sorry. I got, had really excited for a second. As if the Amplify playing cards, The Amplify t-shirts being chucked at you at high speed—I did try to get a t-shirt cannon, and that was quickly ruled out <laugh>. They didn’t know about my rocket arm, right?

Dan Meyer (46:46):
Yeah, you got a cannon. <Laugh>

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (46:47):
Yeah. Oh, that’s a compliment. Oh, is that a compliment? Thank you, Dan. Thank you. Look under your seat because we have five winners. We wanna thank you for being here in person. We wanna thank the folks who are listening. We wanna thank Amplify. Oh my God. Somebody just pulled off the chair tag. You get to take that chair home with you.

Dan Meyer (47:08):
Does anybody have a prize?

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:10):
OK, stand up if you…stand up if you…Yes! Stand up if you have one!

Dan Meyer (47:16):
Free set of classroom dry-erase boards, right here. Congratulations.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:22):
And for you who pulled off the chair tag, I don’t know. We gotta we gotta find something for you.

Dan Meyer (47:27):
Put that in your backpack.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:30):
Thank you again for being here. Thank you. Amplify. Thank you, Desmos. Thank you. Dan Meyer.

Dan Meyer (47:36):
Thank you folks. Chris, thank you buddy.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:38):
Chris! Chris Nho, everybody!

Dan Meyer (47:40):
We will be, we will be at—Bethany and I will be at the booth, if you wanna chit-chat and hang out, sign some stuff. Whatever. You wanna have Bethany sign you, she’ll do that. Um, come on down to the Amplify booth and we’ll—

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:50):
We’ll talk to you more about Ms. Frizzle.

Dan Meyer (47:52):
Fun and prizes. I will share with my real thoughts about Ms. Frizzle down there. I’d love to see you. Thanks for being here, folks.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson (47:57):
Thanks for listening. Bye.

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What Dan Meyer says about math teaching

“Teaching, more than other professions, is a generational profession. The kinds of joyful experiences we offer—or don’t offer—now affect the experiences students that haven’t even been born yet will have years later.”

– Dan Meyer

Meet the guests

Dan Meyer

Dan Meyer taught high school math to students who didn’t like high school math. He has advocated for better math instruction on CNN, Good Morning America, Everyday With Rachel Ray, and TED.com. He earned his doctorate from Stanford University in math education and is currently the Dean of Research at Desmos, where he explores the future of math, technology, and learning. Dan has worked with teachers internationally and in all 50 United States and was named one of Tech & Learning’s 30 Leaders of the Future.

Bethany Lockhart Johnson

Bethany Lockhart Johnson is an elementary school educator and author. Prior to serving as a multiple-subject teacher, she taught theater and dance and now loves incorporating movement and creative play into her classroom. Bethany is committed to helping students find joy in discovering their identities as mathematicians. In addition to her role as a full-time classroom teacher, Bethany is a Student Achievement Partners California Core Advocate and is active in national and local mathematics organizations. Bethany is a member of the Illustrative Mathematics Elementary Curriculum Steering Committee and serves as a consultant, creating materials to support families during distance learning.

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About Math Teacher Lounge: The podcast

Math Teacher Lounge is a biweekly podcast created specifically for K–12 math educators. In each episode co-hosts Bethany Lockhart Johnson (@lockhartedu) and Dan Meyer (@ddmeyer) chat with guests, taking a deep dive into the math and educational topics you care about.

Join the Math Teacher Lounge Facebook group to continue the conversation, view exclusive content, interact with fellow educators, participate in giveaways, and more!

You might also like:

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Free professional development cours…

Three on-demand professional learning courses for math teachers.  Earn your cert…

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Mathigon: the mathematical playgrou…

Math games and manipulatives for online and remote learning.

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Desmos Classroom Grades 3–12

Join Desmos Classroom to gain access to free classroom lessons, lesson-building…

Complete K–5 math assessment system

Expect more from your assessments with mCLASS® Math Texas, a brand-new digital benchmarking and progress-monitoring assessment system.

mCLASS Math Texas represents the next generation in math assessment. It provides educators not only with reliable measures of student achievement, but also with an asset-based approach that analyzes student responses to reveal underlying mathematical thinking. The Student Thinking Report provides actionable insights, so teachers can confidently plan both whole-class instruction and targeted intervention.

About mCLASS Math Texas

mCLASS Texas offers reliable progress-monitoring and digital benchmarking assessments that evaluate student performance against grade-level expectations and growth throughout the year. The digital program seamlessly integrates with intervention and core instruction, providing rich, actionable, data-driven recommendations for where and how to support learning. The program empowers you to leverage your students’ strengths with features like:

  • Reliable measures of student achievement and asset-based reporting that analyze student responses to reveal underlying mathematical thinking.
  • A powerful digital benchmarking and progress monitoring assessment system.
  • Actionable recommendations aligned across skills and core instruction with instructional resources.

Access deeper insights into students’ understanding.

mCLASS Math Texas provides insights not only into what students know about grade-level math, but also into how they think. By leaning on students’ individual strengths and strategies, teachers can confidently differentiate instruction and plan future intervention.

The asset-based approach of mCLASS Math Texas digital benchmarking and progress monitoring gives teachers peace of mind that students are making meaningful progress in their math development. The system recognizes that all students have their own ways of thinking. Their individual strengths, experiences, understanding, and strategies—or assets, as we collectively refer to them— inform the robust data that powers mCLASS Math Texas.

Dos mujeres están sentadas en un escritorio, mirando papeles y sonriendo. Una señala una página mientras la otra está sentada con un bolígrafo en la mano. En el fondo se ven útiles de oficina y tablones de anuncios.
Table comparing traditional assessments, which focus on deficits and isolated data, with mCLASS Math’s asset-based benchmark assessments that emphasize strengths and support progress monitoring through richer, responsive feedback.

mCLASS Math Texas Benchmark Assessments

  • Are administered digitally to the whole class three times a year (BOY, MOY, EOY) for growth measure.
  • Allow teachers to see student work in real time throughout assessments.
  • Include diagnostic capabilities to further target Tier 2 & Tier 3 intervention areas.
  • Identify the specific areas of strengths and development to inform differentiation.
  • Provide support and flags for potential risk of dyscalculia.

mCLASS Math Texas Progress Monitoring

  • Helps teachers monitor a student’s math performance with a
    15-minute assessment between mCLASS Benchmark assessments.
  • Informs teachers if tiered interventions require adjustment to improve student learning.

Validated by research

We’re thrilled to announce that mCLASS Math Texas is undergoing an official third-party study conducted by WestEd, a nonpartisan, nonprofit research, development, and service agency. This in-depth validation analysis aligns with our commitment to transparency, data-driven enhancement, and providing the most effective educational tools for our users. The findings of this study will be available by fall 2025. Stay tuned to learn how mCLASS Math Texas will revolutionize your math assessment experience.

El maestro ayuda a los estudiantes a trabajar con computadoras portátiles en un aula; los estudiantes usan auriculares y se concentran en sus pantallas.

Data informs instruction.

The integrated insights and intervention recommendations of mCLASS Math Texas empower teachers to implement timely scaffolds and targeted intervention when needed. Following screening and progress monitoring, teachers can differentiate when, where, and how it matters most with customizable, high-impact instructional resources to support all learners.

One integrated math solution

Amplify’s comprehensive math suite, Amplify Desmos Math Texas K–5, provides seamless alignment to help teachers diagnose and capitalize on student strengths, foster deep investment, and build student agency.

Everything is in one place—with screening and progress monitoring, core instruction, integrated personalized learning, and embedded intervention teachers can trust.

Ready to learn more about mCLASS Math Texas?

Fill out this form and we’ll be in touch with you shortly.

Professional development for supplemental programs

Amplify professional development provides learning experiences that intentionally develop the knowledge and skills you need for effective and self-sustaining implementation.

Learn and apply effective instructional techniques and develop a deeper understanding of your Amplify supplemental program(s) by investing in professional development (PD).

Amplify professional development has been vetted by Rivet Education’s team through a rigorous three-step process and is listed in the Professional Learning Partner Guide.

Contact us
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About Amplify PD

Take a systematic approach to drive lasting change. Partner with us to create a learning plan that enhances implementation, instruction, and student impact.

Amplify’s professional development ensures successful, sustained implementation through strategically bundled packages that provide continuous support adapting to your educators’ evolving needs.

Session types

Our supplemental sessions include:

LAUNCH STRENGTHEN  
Beginning of the year Mid-year, end of the year  
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Introduce programs and support implementation. Target specific instructional practices.  
Before teaching
 After 6+ weeks of teaching
  

Amplify supplemental programs

Providing students with personalized targeted instruction and practice, Amplify’s digital intervention and supplemental programs empower teachers with tools to enhance the teacher-student relationship, making it more informed and responsive.

Learn how to get the most out of your supplemental program(s) through Amplify’s PD.

  • Boost Reading is a K–5 digital intervention program that helps students close literacy gaps through adaptive instruction based on the Science of Reading. Built for Multi-Tiered System of Supports frameworks, it delivers differentiated skill development across every tier, providing targeted, student-led practice alongside growth reporting that empowers teachers to intervene where support is needed most.
  • Boost Lectura is a K–2 digital intervention program that delivers differentiated instruction in foundational Spanish literacy skills. Built on the Science of Reading, Boost Lectura uses riveting storylines and an adaptive curriculum to engage students in powerful, targeted digital reading instruction.
  • Boost Close Reading is a differentiated reading program for grades 6–8 that helps students acquire the close reading skills needed to read and understand complex texts. Students build their skills as they journey through the dystopian world of “The Last Readers,” making progress by practicing critical reading through guided instruction and text-dependent questions that prepare them for the challenges they will face on assessments.
  • Boost Math™ drives tiered intervention and practice for grades K–8 by using assessment data to place students into targeted learning pathways. Through a research-backed mix of personalized learning, teacher-led small groups, and student-led practice aligned to core instruction, Boost Math turns assessment into action.

Whatever your unique needs this school year, you’ll find professional development offerings that will help you meet them. Find out more below!

Boost Reading and Boost Lectura

Launch sessions

Propel your teachers into the new school year with sessions that introduce them to their Amplify program(s) and support a strong implementation.

Boost Reading, Boost Lectura, Boost Close Reading On-site or virtual
2 hr.
 Online course
Self-paced
Getting started for teachers  
Getting started for leaders  
Getting started for teachers  
Getting started for leaders  
Boost Math
Boost Math is powered by mCLASS Math data. For Boost Math users, the recommended Launch session is an on-site or virtual three-hour mCLASS Math Program overview.

Getting started for teachers

On-site or virtual, 2 hours

Learn the essentials of your Boost program(s), including program structure and navigation, and leave ready for a strong implementation.

Session options: Boost Reading, Boost Lectura, Boost Close Reading, Boost Math

Audience: Teachers, instructional staff (maximum 30 participants)

Language: The Boost Reading and Boost Close Reading sessions are facilitated in English. The Boost Lectura session can be facilitated in English or Spanish.

Getting started for leaders

On-site or virtual, 2 hours

Prepare to support effective program implementation and leave ready to leverage Admin Reports to accelerate student outcomes.

Session options: Boost Reading

Audience: Leaders (maximum 30 participants)

Getting started for teachers

Online course, self-paced

Learn the essentials of your Boost program(s), including program structure and navigation, and prepare to implement the program through this on-demand course.

Upon finishing the course, participants can download a certificate of completion. This subscription includes an individual seat in the course, which takes approximately 2 hours to complete. Participants will be able to access and revisit the course as needed for up to one year.

Session options: Boost Reading, Boost Lectura, Boost Close Reading

Audience: Teachers, instructional staff (individual seat)

Language: All online courses are presented in English.

Getting started for leaders

Online course, self-paced

Prepare to support effective program implementation and learn how to leverage Admin Reports to accelerate student outcomes through this on-demand course.

Upon finishing the course, participants can download a certificate of completion. This subscription includes an individual seat in the course, which takes approximately 2 hours to complete. Participants will be able to access and revisit the course as needed for up to one year.

Session options: Boost Reading

Audience: Leaders (individual seat)

Available July 2026

Begin: mCLASS Math: Program overview for K–5 or 6–8 teachers

Available for grades 6–8 teachers July 2026

On-site or virtual, 3 hours

Dive into the essentials of your mCLASS Math assessment program to learn how these assessments both highlight students’ strengths and help identify what’s next through an asset-based approach. Leave ready to administer assessments and understand reporting.

Audience: Teachers, instructional staff (maximum 30 participants)

Strengthen sessions

Strengthen your Amplify implementation with a program-specific session that supports personalized learning and practice in your classrooms.

Boost Reading, Boost Close Reading Virtual, 1 hr.
Maximizing data for teachers
Boost Math On-site or virtual, 3 hr.
mCLASS Math and Boost Math: Understanding and using data to plan intervention for K–5 teachers

*Supplemental Strengthen sessions should be scheduled after participants have at least six weeks of student data to enable participants to work with their own data.

Focus Strengthen: Maximizing data for teachers

Virtual, 1 hour

Learn how to leverage the Boost teacher dashboard to accelerate data-driven student outcomes.

Session options: Boost Reading, Boost Close Reading

Audience: Teachers, instructional staff (maximum 30 participants)

New session

mCLASS Math + Boost Math: Understanding and using data to plan intervention for K–5 teachers

On-site or virtual, 3 hours

Explore how Boost Math uses mCLASS Math data to inform intervention recommendations and monitor student progress. Dig into your student data, explore relevant instructional resources, and leave with actionable next steps for intervention.

Session options: For users of both mCLASS Math and Boost Math programs

Audience: Teachers, instructional staff (maximum 30 participants)

Additional supplemental programs and PD

Additional sessions are also available for Boost Reading+.

To learn more about enhancing your Amplify experience by purchasing additional supplemental programs and/or accompanying PD sessions, contact your account executive.

Get in touch with a PD expert.

Desmos Math 6–A1 correlations with Carnegie Math Texas

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Season 2, Episode 1

The science behind a joyful classroom, starring Tracey Severns, Ed.D.

Host Ana Torres welcomes former NJDOE Chief Academic Officer Tracey Severns, Ed.D., to discuss not just how to bring more joy to the classroom, but how joy and laughter can draw in even the most vulnerable students. Tracey outlines the current research on what humor can do in the classroom and shares her own observational research in a case-study school on the power of increasing smiles. She shares tips and tricks for both classroom teachers and administrators for how to encourage a culture of joy. Finally, Ana and Classroom Insider Eric Cross reflect on Tracey’s insights, with Eric sharing his top three takeaways and what specifically he incorporated in his classroom after a trip to Disney.

A woman with short blonde hair and a purple turtleneck smiles at the camera; the background, featuring books, apples, and stars, hints at her passion for teaching resources and creative classroom challenges.
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Meet Our Guest(s):

A woman with short blonde hair and blue eyes is smiling, wearing a lavender turtleneck sweater. The blurred background suggests a learning classroom, creating an inviting atmosphere perfect for sharing tips for teachers.

Tracey Severns, Ed.D.

Tracey Severns, Ed.D., has held various roles in education, including superintendent and chief academic officer for the NJDOE. A nationally recognized presenter, she specializes in topics like evidence-centered leadership, educational accessibility, data analysis, PLCs, and school improvement. Her accolades include being named Educator of the Year by the Peace Islands Institute and National Distinguished Principal, and leading her school to become a National School of Change. She is an author on leadership and learning, and wrote Mistakes, Missteps, Missed Opportunities: Lived Lessons from the Real World of Educational Leaders. A recent addition to her career is her work as a stand-up comedian for educators, with her popular presentation, “Let’s Laugh: How to Bring Joy Back to Schools.”

Meet our host, Ana Torres.

Ana has been an educator for 30 years, working in both the K–8 and higher education sectors. She served as an administrator and instructor at various public and private colleges and universities and as a bilingual and dual language teacher, dual language math and reading interventionist, dual language instructional coach, assistant principal, and principal in K–8 schools. Ana is currently the Senior Biliteracy and Multilingual Product Specialist at Amplify, and delivers literacy and biliteracy presentations across the nation. Ana’s passion and advocacy for biliteracy and support for all students from all walks of life has led her to educate leaders, teachers, and parents about the positive impact of bilingualism and biliteracy in our world.

A woman with long dark hair and hoop earrings smiles at the camera while wearing a black blazer, standing outdoors—ready to discuss classroom challenges or share insights on her teacher podcast.
A man with short, closely-cropped hair and a trimmed beard smiles at the camera against a light gray background, ready to inspire diverse learners in the math classroom.

Meet our Classroom Insider, Eric Cross.

Eric Cross is a middle school science teacher who hopes to someday be a lifelong educator, like the guests on Beyond My Years! In each episode, Eric connects with host Ana Torres to discuss her guests’ best insights gleaned from their long and rewarding careers in the classroom. Then, Eric talks about bringing some of their wisdom into his current classroom and busy life.

Transcripts and additional resources:

Connect with Tracey Severns on Instagram
Connect with Tracey Severns on LinkedIn
Read: “Mistakes, Missteps, Missed Opportunities: Lived Lessons from the Real World of Educational Leaders”
Subscribe to Beyond My Years
Follow us on Instagram
Connect with Eric Cross
Connect with Ana Torres
Read the transcript

Quotes

“When we view students not as difficult, but as those who challenge us to be our best, we switch from frustration to growth.”

—Eric Cross

“There's research out there. I know some of us feel like we intuitively know that [smiling] is important, but the data shows how important that is.”

—Ana Torres

“What I discovered is that when I was funny, if I could make them laugh, if I could say something that was unexpected, they paid attention. They hung on every word.”

—Tracey Severns, Ed.D.

“When we teach kids from a place of love and lightheartedness, we can really draw in even the most volatile and vulnerable youngsters.”

—Tracey Severns, Ed.D.

“We can do both rigor and relationships. We can address standards and smiles. We can do content and care.”

—Tracey Severns, Ed.D.

“ When you have a joyous classroom, you have a learning classroom.”

—Tracey Severns, Ed.D.