Episode 44: "The Grade Doesn't Match What They Can Actually Do"
Grading in a comprehensible input classroom rarely matches a traditional gradebook cleanly, and this episode of Comprehend THIS! is about the gap between what a student can actually do and the letter grade that's supposed to represent it. Pamela and I talk through the quiet workarounds CI teachers use and what a grading system built for acquisition might actually look like.
Progress reports just went out, and there's a mismatch a lot of CI teachers know well: a student who can genuinely function in the target language earning a lower grade than one who memorized a list of vocabulary. In this episode of Comprehend THIS!, Pamela and I talk about the moment we each first noticed that gap, the frustration of grading acquisition-based growth inside a traditional grading system, and the quiet workarounds we've used but rarely said out loud.
We also share a concrete piece of how we grade differently now, what we stopped doing because it wasn't measuring anything real, and what we've had to accept about grading that we didn't want to accept. There's no perfect answer here, but there's a more honest starting point than most of us had in our first few years.
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If you want a done-for-you way to keep your CI instruction consistent and easier to assess honestly, check out the CI Survival Kit - monthly, ready-to-teach materials built with acquisition in mind: https://imim.us/kit
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comprehensible input, CI grading, acquisition based grading, world language teacher, TPRS, language teacher podcast, grading language proficiency, Spanish teacher, French teacher, standards based grading
Hosts:
Scott Benedict - https://www.instagram.com/immediateimmersion
Pamela Parks - https://imim.us/pamela
Tracey Collazos
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Dynamic Discipline Course - https://imim.us/discipline
How to Grade for Learning - Ken O'Connor - https://link.amazon/B08L4VbG4
Formative - online assessment - https://imim.us/formative
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Transcript
Hey everybody and welcome to episode 44.
Speaker:Oh my gosh I can't believe we're already
Speaker:almost halfway through season number 5.
Speaker:I don't know about you but progress
Speaker:reports just went out and somewhere a kid
Speaker:who can actually hold a conversation in
Speaker:the target language is staring at a C.
Speaker:While a kid who memorized a vocab list
Speaker:perfectly is staring at an A.
Speaker:You know exactly which two students I'm
Speaker:talking about. You have their faces in
Speaker:your head right now.
Speaker:This week Pamela and I are joined by
Speaker:guest host Tracey
Speaker:Coyathos. Welcome back Tracey.
Speaker:Tracey switched to a CI classroom 8 years
Speaker:ago and hasn't looked back.
Speaker:And she's currently teaching Spanish too
Speaker:in level 3, Medical Spanish.
Speaker:She's passionate about student centered
Speaker:learning, storytelling and using
Speaker:self-assessment and rubrics to motivate
Speaker:kids instead of just sorting them.
Speaker:Which makes her exactly the person you
Speaker:want in the room when the
Speaker:grade book starts lying.
Speaker:We're getting into the gap between what a
Speaker:student can genuinely do and what the
Speaker:letter grade says about them.
Speaker:The quiet work arounds we've never said
Speaker:out loud until now and one concrete piece
Speaker:of how each of us grades
Speaker:differently because of it.
Speaker:If you've ever stared at a progress
Speaker:report and thought, "This number is
Speaker:lying. This one's for you." We'll be
Speaker:right back after these short messages.
Speaker:"Love teaching but hate the part where
Speaker:you're the classroom bouncer?" Yeah,
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Speaker:saying, "Stop looking the
Speaker:white board for the 500th time."
Speaker:You'll get 10 on-demand lessons full of
Speaker:realistic relationship-based strategies
Speaker:that actually work without turning into
Speaker:the teacher who yells or
Speaker:gives up and plays Netflix.
Speaker:Watch them on your time, rewatch when
Speaker:you're having a week and start handling
Speaker:behavior without losing your soul.
Speaker:Sign up now at mm.us.discipline. Your
Speaker:sanity will thank you.
Speaker:Welcome to Comprehend This, Real Talk for
Speaker:Real Language Teachers. No drills, no dry
Speaker:theory, just honest stories, practical
Speaker:ideas, and a reminder you're not going to
Speaker:see eye trenches. Let's dive in.
Speaker:And good morning. Welcome, Pamela. And
Speaker:welcome back, Tracy. How
Speaker:are we all doing this morning?
Speaker:Tracy, I'm so happy to see you again.
Speaker:Thank you. It's nice to see both of you
Speaker:as well. I'm thrilled. It is so hard to
Speaker:get up on Sunday mornings, but I am so
Speaker:thrilled to be here. I'm glad I did it.
Speaker:I thought I had slept in. I was like,
Speaker:"Wow, I feel good." I slept in. I got up.
Speaker:I did all my morning stuff I need to do.
Speaker:And it turns out my alarm clock is a
Speaker:really, really old alarm clock. And I
Speaker:think I got it because somebody gave it
Speaker:to me because daylight
Speaker:wasting time had changed,
Speaker:and the alarm clock was set to change
Speaker:over. So it thinks it's daylight wasting
Speaker:time right now, but it's not. So I didn't
Speaker:actually sleep in. It was normal time.
Speaker:Oh, no.
Speaker:Well, I get up at seven every day and
Speaker:then I stay in bed watching TV for 45
Speaker:minutes. Oh, no, actually half hour
Speaker:because I get here at seven. I get to my
Speaker:desk at 730, which was good to do because
Speaker:the app that we are on right now had a
Speaker:major update, and it wouldn't let me get
Speaker:on until it updated.
Speaker:Yeah, so that was scary. I was afraid
Speaker:that something is going to break when
Speaker:they update something, especially when
Speaker:they forced it on you.
Speaker:Well, Scott, you sound like a teenager
Speaker:sitting in bed and watching TV.
Speaker:It's just my little, I don't get to watch
Speaker:TV very often. So it's my little bit of
Speaker:time that I do. I do it before my Maltese
Speaker:class too. I get up Maltese classes at
Speaker:seven. So I get up at six and for 45
Speaker:minutes I watch some TV
Speaker:catching up on some stuff. So.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, today we're talking about grading
Speaker:and this has been my baby since 2002.
Speaker:Yes, yes. But this is so timely for me
Speaker:because these are exactly the
Speaker:conversations we're
Speaker:having in my district. So.
Speaker:And I have this parent that we'll talk
Speaker:about too that's driving me crazy about
Speaker:the grading. So also applies. So I,
Speaker:Tracy, you sent me an email yesterday. I
Speaker:read it this morning about how you set
Speaker:your grade up. Will you just talk about
Speaker:yours a little bit? And then we'll let
Speaker:Pamela go and then because mine's going
Speaker:to be long winded because
Speaker:I've been doing this for so long.
Speaker:That's great. Yeah. Well, it's funny. I
Speaker:know I mentioned this the last time we
Speaker:all got together, but Scott, your rubrics
Speaker:are one of the things that really
Speaker:resonated with me when I first started
Speaker:CI. They just made sense.
Speaker:It allowed me to move beyond line item
Speaker:editing and just really opened up the
Speaker:possibility of students.
Speaker:Of me recognizing what students could do
Speaker:rather than looking for the things that
Speaker:they were making errors on. And that was
Speaker:super fabulous for me. So moving from
Speaker:that idea to what can students do and how
Speaker:does the grade book reflect that, which
Speaker:is what we're talking about this morning.
Speaker:From there, I shifted to a skills based
Speaker:breakdown for migrating categories. So
Speaker:still trying to make it make sense in the
Speaker:hundred point scale or the hundred
Speaker:percent scale, which we tend
Speaker:to use here in the US a lot.
Speaker:I took each skill and made it a certain
Speaker:percentage. So your reading is 20 percent
Speaker:of your grade. Your writing skills are 20
Speaker:percent of your grade. Your speaking
Speaker:skills are 20 percent of your grade and
Speaker:your listening skills are 20 percent of
Speaker:your grade in my class.
Speaker:And then the rest is reserved for what I
Speaker:would call student training is 10
Speaker:percent, which is classwork and homework.
Speaker:And that is more of a training piece,
Speaker:making sure that students are practicing
Speaker:when they need to if it's meaningful.
Speaker:And if it's not, we don't have it. You
Speaker:know, we just we only do meaningful
Speaker:things that will help them move their
Speaker:learning forward. And then the last 10
Speaker:percent is the final. And in my
Speaker:philosophy, the final should just confirm
Speaker:that you are where you are.
Speaker:So, yeah, you know, not a gotcha for
Speaker:students. It's a come in, take it and
Speaker:show that everything you've learned this
Speaker:semester or everything you've learned
Speaker:this year, you can still do.
Speaker:And so if they've been doing well all the
Speaker:way through the semester, their grade on
Speaker:the final is usually
Speaker:their grade in the class.
Speaker:If they kick it into high gear because
Speaker:they're you know, they really want to
Speaker:work on something, maybe they've worked
Speaker:on a skill over the past five weeks and
Speaker:it gets better, then we see a little bit
Speaker:of a jump on the final.
Speaker:But usually it's about where they are in
Speaker:class, which tells me, OK, this is this
Speaker:is where their skill level is. This is
Speaker:where their skill set is. And that seems
Speaker:to work pretty well.
Speaker:I'm passionate about it being a
Speaker:communication tool with parents and with
Speaker:students. I really think our grade books
Speaker:should communicate. Hey, this is where
Speaker:you are. And if you want to get to this
Speaker:point, let's figure out how to help you
Speaker:do that rather than a judgment.
Speaker:So I really try and think of
Speaker:a great communication tool.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Excellent. Yeah.
Speaker:What you, Pamela, what do you do?
Speaker:Well, my district has been through about
Speaker:20 grade books because, you know, I mean,
Speaker:I've been around a while and so we had
Speaker:the first grade book. And then I don't
Speaker:know if you realize why sometimes the
Speaker:grade books change. It's because our
Speaker:students are the number one target for
Speaker:cyber hackers because it's going to be a
Speaker:good five years before they realize that
Speaker:their identity has been stolen.
Speaker:So occasionally the state will realize,
Speaker:oh, there's a hole in the grade book
Speaker:where the cyber hackers can come in. So
Speaker:we've got to change everything.
Speaker:So I have worked for I want to say we're
Speaker:on our fifth grade book now. And this
Speaker:one, I like the best because it lets me
Speaker:set up my own categories. I couldn't set
Speaker:up categories with the other ones.
Speaker:The other ones, it was just like, oh, is
Speaker:it homework or is it classwork or is it a
Speaker:project or is it extra credit? That was
Speaker:it. Now I so I can name my categories and
Speaker:I've named my categories speaking,
Speaker:writing, listening, reading.
Speaker:OK, so now I can track very easily. Where
Speaker:are you in what? But like I said, this
Speaker:was yeah, this was this
Speaker:was a long time coming.
Speaker:So I know all the tips and tricks for how
Speaker:to make your dinosaur grade book look
Speaker:like mastery because it's really hard. So
Speaker:I do make copious use of the comment
Speaker:field to say this was a retake because I
Speaker:want to I want to see growth.
Speaker:You know, I want to see it. Not
Speaker:everyone's going to memorize everything
Speaker:the first time. The light bulb isn't
Speaker:going to go off the first time. It's
Speaker:going to take more than one time.
Speaker:So I do offer infinite retakes. There's
Speaker:no late fees. There's no charges like,
Speaker:you know, because I tell the students
Speaker:this is my long story. OK, I'm going to
Speaker:tell you a long story.
Speaker:So you understand why this is my
Speaker:philosophy. I was 16 years old and I was
Speaker:about to be 16 years old and I was about
Speaker:to get my driver's license.
Speaker:OK, and my parents owned this big honkin
Speaker:station wagon because this is the 80s and
Speaker:there's no minivans. It's station wagons,
Speaker:which are longer than minivans.
Speaker:And I was very nervous about parallel
Speaker:parking. So I said to my mother, can you
Speaker:take me down to the DMV?
Speaker:It's Saturday. It's closed.
Speaker:I'm going to try and find out where they
Speaker:want me to parallel park so I can
Speaker:practice. So we go down there. There's
Speaker:nobody there, of course.
Speaker:But there's cones set out, traffic cones.
Speaker:And I'm like, I bet this is where they
Speaker:want me to parallel park. So I practiced
Speaker:and practiced,
Speaker:practiced for like two hours.
Speaker:So I'm like, can we come back tomorrow,
Speaker:too? So we came back on Sunday. We
Speaker:practiced, practiced, practiced. And then
Speaker:I was like the next week.
Speaker:So like for a month, a month and a half
Speaker:on the weekends, I was coming down the
Speaker:DMV and practicing parking
Speaker:this giant blue station wagon.
Speaker:The day comes to get my driver's license.
Speaker:The proctor gets in the car. He's like,
Speaker:all right, we got a parallel park.
Speaker:I parallel parked like a boss. I was
Speaker:amazing. I have never seen a 16 year old
Speaker:parallel park so
Speaker:confidently. Let's take her on the road.
Speaker:I froze up when I went to make a left
Speaker:hand turn. Oh, and he said, OK, I'm not
Speaker:going to give your
Speaker:driver's license right now.
Speaker:Practice some more. Come back next week.
Speaker:Come back in two weeks. So I came back
Speaker:and so I asked my students, do I have 80
Speaker:percent of a driver's license?
Speaker:No. Does my driver's license say failed
Speaker:first time on it? No, you wouldn't know
Speaker:unless I told you that. That's my
Speaker:philosophy of learning.
Speaker:It's going to take more than one time and
Speaker:that's OK. It might take. I mean, we know
Speaker:that for a vocabulary word, Susie Pepper
Speaker:Rollins says seven to 20 times.
Speaker:I believe for a foreign language, it's
Speaker:probably more like seven to 50 times. You
Speaker:need to hear the word, hear the word,
Speaker:hear the word, use the word, use the
Speaker:word, use the word, write the word, write
Speaker:the word until you've
Speaker:got it internalized.
Speaker:It's going to take more than one time. So
Speaker:I want to see I want to see the tri-fail
Speaker:cycle in my students. And that is
Speaker:difficult to track in a grade book.
Speaker:So I do use the comment field a lot just
Speaker:to say this was a retake. We took three
Speaker:times, we took four times, whatever. But
Speaker:they still get 100 percent.
Speaker:And I can also use the comment field if I
Speaker:want to track the previous grade. But
Speaker:normally I just erase the
Speaker:previous grade. So that's my.
Speaker:I have a question for you listening to
Speaker:you talk about retakes because it's
Speaker:something I'm actually struggling with.
Speaker:And maybe some of our viewers are
Speaker:struggling with as well.
Speaker:I definitely believe in retakes. However,
Speaker:last year I did retakes and it was such a
Speaker:nightmare for me to manage personally.
Speaker:The executive functioning portion of it
Speaker:was really tough for me.
Speaker:And so this year I decided that I would
Speaker:drop a grade instead so that if there was
Speaker:a moment of progress from one to the next
Speaker:or there was a time when they needed more
Speaker:time to kind of process the information,
Speaker:that I would go ahead and drop the grade
Speaker:because that for me was easier in terms
Speaker:of the executive functioning portion.
Speaker:And I'm trying to include, and it hasn't
Speaker:happened each time, a review section
Speaker:which would count as a
Speaker:retake on the next assessment.
Speaker:But how do you manage all your retakes?
Speaker:That would be my key piece there for me.
Speaker:I need help with that.
Speaker:Yeah. Sometimes I mean, you're right. It
Speaker:is a lot of work. And there are sometimes
Speaker:I say to myself, this
Speaker:is a ton of work for me.
Speaker:But because I feel that first of all,
Speaker:we're training our students to study,
Speaker:right? I mean, a lot of it is, look, what
Speaker:you learn in my class is
Speaker:going to help you in math class.
Speaker:It's going to help you in science class.
Speaker:It's going to help you in history. I
Speaker:mean, don't you have to memorize the
Speaker:states and the capitals and
Speaker:the countries and the capitals?
Speaker:Well, all these memorization techniques
Speaker:I'm teaching you are going to help you
Speaker:here. All these study habits I'm teaching
Speaker:you about, we were just talking before we
Speaker:started about how you
Speaker:can't stay up all night
Speaker:and cram and wake up fluent in the
Speaker:language the next day. So if they learn
Speaker:these study habits with us that, you
Speaker:know, slow and steady wins the race,
Speaker:that's going to help
Speaker:them in their other classes.
Speaker:So sometimes I'm like, deep breath. Yes,
Speaker:it takes a long time. I'll do it. So
Speaker:sometimes also if a student. Well, first
Speaker:of all, let me just say before I forget,
Speaker:I do not offer retakes a
Speaker:week before grades are due.
Speaker:If you have not been working on your
Speaker:language, I'm sorry, there's no such
Speaker:thing as cramming. You're not going to
Speaker:take a test a week before the grade is
Speaker:due just to bring your grade up.
Speaker:No, no, I'm trying to tell you a
Speaker:philosophy. So that's number one. The
Speaker:second thing is sometimes they'll want to
Speaker:retake something from, I don't know,
Speaker:let's say the first week of school when
Speaker:they were learning the subject pronouns.
Speaker:I was like, okay, you should know the
Speaker:subject pronouns by now. So I'm not going
Speaker:to give you that as a retake. I'm going
Speaker:to give you a more recent thing. And then
Speaker:in embedded in it, you've already shown
Speaker:me, you know, your subject pronouns.
Speaker:I can go in and fill that and then that's
Speaker:not hard. You know, so sometimes I will
Speaker:do that. Like, I'm kind of dying this
Speaker:year because I, again, I do a lot of
Speaker:things, even though there are a lot of
Speaker:hard work because I feel
Speaker:like it's really worth it.
Speaker:Sure. Duolingo has kicked us to the curb.
Speaker:They're not supporting teachers anymore.
Speaker:And I used to do my homework on Duolingo
Speaker:just because I want the students to look
Speaker:at the language one
Speaker:time outside of class.
Speaker:And since not using Duolingo now, I'm not
Speaker:going to have my students pay and I can't
Speaker:track them anyway through Duolingo. I've
Speaker:moved to other things like BlueKit and
Speaker:Wayground and Roxam for my homework,
Speaker:which means I'm tracking a lot more.
Speaker:But also, I don't want to go back and try
Speaker:and figure out what did I assign on
Speaker:Wednesday three weeks ago that you
Speaker:missed. And so I'll just say, all right,
Speaker:you know, I know in class
Speaker:we're working on this right now.
Speaker:Go grab a book off the free voluntary
Speaker:reading shelf, read it, write me five
Speaker:sentences, ten sentences about what you
Speaker:read. And I will look for this skill that
Speaker:we're working on because every, you know,
Speaker:we always spiral, right?
Speaker:Everything we do is a spiral. Whatever it
Speaker:is we're working on is going to be
Speaker:embedded there. And so that's much easier
Speaker:for me than saying, I gotta open up the
Speaker:gradebook and I gotta open up this
Speaker:program and I gotta see what exactly what
Speaker:did you do at this point.
Speaker:And, you know, I'm teaching Spanish and
Speaker:French and Japanese and English language
Speaker:arts nine and it's a little a lot to hold
Speaker:in my brain. Oh, you missed this
Speaker:assignment. What? Okay. What exactly was
Speaker:that assignment? Hold on. I gotta look it
Speaker:up. I got my notes. I gotta look up in my
Speaker:notes. What did we do that day? No,
Speaker:that's just too much for me. So a lot of
Speaker:times I'll just substitute something else
Speaker:for the thing. You know, if it was a, if
Speaker:it was a writing assignment that they
Speaker:missed, because a lot of times they're
Speaker:just making up stuff that they missed
Speaker:because they were absent
Speaker:and they haven't made it.
Speaker:I haven't made it up yet. I love, I love
Speaker:the idea of a reading book that had not
Speaker:occurred to me. And so last year what I
Speaker:did is I made multiple versions. And as
Speaker:we know, that's a lot of extra work. And
Speaker:then that's great. Yeah. And I'm not
Speaker:opposed to working hard, just like you're
Speaker:saying we all work hard. And so, but I
Speaker:was struggling to manage that and getting
Speaker:the grade in the gradebook in time. So it
Speaker:wasn't timely feedback. So I felt like it
Speaker:wasn't beneficial, right?
Speaker:That's it. Exactly. You want that. We
Speaker:know that quick, timely feedback. What's
Speaker:the Haddie effect size for
Speaker:that? It's huge, right? Yeah.
Speaker:But the free reading book is a great
Speaker:idea. So you said you do like five to
Speaker:seven sentences and then you look for
Speaker:what you're working on. I
Speaker:love that. That's so cool.
Speaker:It's going to depend on what the student
Speaker:is missing. If they're missing writing,
Speaker:then I'll have them write it out. If
Speaker:they're missing speaking, then I'll have
Speaker:them read the book and then
Speaker:talk to me about the book.
Speaker:That's so great. If they're missing
Speaker:listening, then maybe I'll read something
Speaker:to them. But Scott was talking about his
Speaker:intervention time before we came on. My
Speaker:intervention time. Are you doing
Speaker:intervention time at your school, Tracy?
Speaker:No, we are not. We are working.
Speaker:It's being sort of planned and put to our
Speaker:members to see if that's something that
Speaker:people are willing to move forward with.
Speaker:So I think this is the
Speaker:trendy thing right now.
Speaker:I think the schools have this time carved
Speaker:out. We've got Tuesday, Wednesday and
Speaker:Thursday. We've got a half an hour where
Speaker:the students sign up for
Speaker:where they want to go. Okay.
Speaker:My I love the idea. The idea is solid.
Speaker:It's great. You need math help. You go to
Speaker:the math room. You need history help. You
Speaker:go to the history room. My intervention
Speaker:time is absolutely friggin insane because
Speaker:I got my Spanish students. I've got my
Speaker:Japanese students. I've
Speaker:got my French students.
Speaker:I've got my English students. And by the
Speaker:way, I teach Spanish one only, but I
Speaker:teach French one, two, three, four. I
Speaker:teach Japanese one, two, three, four. Oh
Speaker:my gosh. It is insane. I can't give them
Speaker:like real like I'm like, okay, I got the
Speaker:broken leg that won't heal. Gosh, I
Speaker:wonder why it won't heal. Okay. Can I
Speaker:please have all my Spanish students
Speaker:sitting over here so it's easier for me?
Speaker:Can I please have at least all my French
Speaker:students? Okay. I know
Speaker:you're French one and French four.
Speaker:Go sit over there so at least it's easier
Speaker:for me. And that way I can differentiate
Speaker:a little more as I hobble around the room
Speaker:trying to get to everyone. I'm like, Oh,
Speaker:Bob, I see you over there. I'll be right
Speaker:over there. I got to hit these people
Speaker:before I come over. I would like you to
Speaker:go grab a book off the shelf and start
Speaker:reading and I'll be right over to tell
Speaker:you what to do with it in a second
Speaker:because oh my God, it is so insane. But I
Speaker:get nine preps. I have only ever taught
Speaker:five preps and that was plenty. Nine.
Speaker:I just, wow, that you must feel like an
Speaker:octopus with one. I got four missing. I'm
Speaker:kind of greedy. I really like, okay, just
Speaker:between us. Okay. Hello to all my
Speaker:students who are listening. My students
Speaker:found out I'm doing this on the weekends.
Speaker:Hello. I love you all dearly. Gosh, I
Speaker:wish I didn't teach English. Okay.
Speaker:Because I don't know. I was
Speaker:doing just fine for 14 years.
Speaker:I was teaching Spanish, French, and
Speaker:Japanese. I was doing just fine. But the
Speaker:second they added English on my plate, it
Speaker:was like, I can't handle anything now. I
Speaker:feel like a first year teacher with
Speaker:English. Like I don't, like, I don't know
Speaker:why I like to, I've written books. I love
Speaker:to read. I'm a voracious reader. That's
Speaker:why I'm fluent in so many things. I don't
Speaker:know why I can't teach English. I feel
Speaker:like a first year teacher. But anyway,
Speaker:that's, that's my problem. But, um,
Speaker:I gotta be organized. That's the only
Speaker:thing I can say. Well, after listening to
Speaker:both of you, I've got lots of notes I was
Speaker:taking. Yeah. Okay. Scott's got a bunch
Speaker:to say with his, this is something I have
Speaker:been working on for years. So let me
Speaker:start, you know, I, most of you know,
Speaker:I've told a story many times. I started
Speaker:on an emergency permit. I had no teaching
Speaker:experience and no teaching classes when I
Speaker:started. Um, so I had nothing. And my
Speaker:major, my major is in the
Speaker:school. My major was German and they
Speaker:hired me for Spanish. Okay. So this is
Speaker:what it was. So this was 25 years ago, it
Speaker:was 2001 right after 9 11. I haven't
Speaker:started in the middle of the school year.
Speaker:It's not middle, but the late I started
Speaker:in October. So it was all new. So what do
Speaker:all, what do all beginning teachers do?
Speaker:We steal everything from other teachers.
Speaker:So I stole someone's syllabus with their
Speaker:grading plan, which was tests and
Speaker:homework and projects and
Speaker:participation. All those
Speaker:classes. Participation. Me too. First
Speaker:year. Yes. Okay. So then I had this
Speaker:wonderful child. I still have her senior
Speaker:picture. She gave it to me and she put on
Speaker:the back. Thank you for passing me. Cause
Speaker:she knew she didn't know any Spanish
Speaker:either. So here's what happened on every,
Speaker:she failed every single test and quiz
Speaker:because she couldn't do Spanish. This was
Speaker:Spanish too. Cause I, my first year
Speaker:teaching and I only taught Spanish too.
Speaker:So it was Spanish too. She knew nothing.
Speaker:But she always did her homework and she
Speaker:did her projects. And back then we graded
Speaker:projects and how pretty they looked. They
Speaker:were like, draw a body and label the
Speaker:parts, you know, that kind of thing. And
Speaker:she drew one that was half with the skin
Speaker:on and half with the skin off. And so she
Speaker:labeled all the different parts. So I
Speaker:mean, how could I not
Speaker:give her an A on that? Well,
Speaker:she ended up with a C in the class, but
Speaker:she couldn't do Spanish. So I'm like,
Speaker:that will never, ever, ever, ever happen
Speaker:in my classroom. Again, because that is
Speaker:the exact same epiphany I had. Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah. So I wanted to know my, I had to
Speaker:look at the kid and go, that kid knows B
Speaker:is worth a Spanish. That kid knows A is
Speaker:worth a Spanish. And then look at the
Speaker:grade book and it needed to match. It
Speaker:needed to match. And so I worked for the
Speaker:next seven years on doing that. I am not
Speaker:a math person. I am deathly allergic to
Speaker:math. And the algebra teachers at my
Speaker:school grew to hate me because I'm like,
Speaker:I just entered in a grade of a hundred
Speaker:percent and the grade went down. How is
Speaker:that possible? And there were, you know,
Speaker:I had to work through all the algebra to
Speaker:figure it out. It was weighted, but
Speaker:that's the thing. But
Speaker:it was, it was just, you know, how things
Speaker:were all being affected with that. I work
Speaker:with percentages. I work with skills. Um,
Speaker:I tried different grading systems. Oh my
Speaker:God. My second year of teaching. We had
Speaker:quarters every quarter. I graded
Speaker:differently and I made the kids vote, but
Speaker:I kind of did what politicians do. I kind
Speaker:of rigged it where I made more positives
Speaker:with the way I wanted to try out. So they
Speaker:always voted me, but that way
Speaker:I had no complaints. I'm like, you voted
Speaker:for this way. So, I mean, I did the mode.
Speaker:I did the median. I did the mean. I did
Speaker:them all. Right? Trying every quarter we
Speaker:switched. You don't like math. Look at
Speaker:you. Oh, I had to learn. I had to learn.
Speaker:And someone gave me the book, how to
Speaker:grade for learning by Ken O'Connor. And I
Speaker:am not a fan boy in anything except for
Speaker:Ken O'Connor. And when Ken O'Connor
Speaker:responded to one of my comments,
Speaker:and requested to be my friend on
Speaker:Facebook, I freaked out.
Speaker:Cause I love his book is my Bible, how to
Speaker:grade for learning. I learned so much
Speaker:from that book that I applied. So it took
Speaker:me seven years and I finally have it down
Speaker:to a system that I had to adapt this year
Speaker:because we're grading differently. Um, I
Speaker:have it down to a
Speaker:system that really works.
Speaker:And gives me what their ability, when I
Speaker:look at them, their ability and what's in
Speaker:a grade book pretty closely matches where
Speaker:they are. Now, one of the things that
Speaker:everybody says, because I do weighted
Speaker:categories, kind of like you Tracy, but I
Speaker:don't do equal because not all skills are
Speaker:equal. So I don't do equal. Um, my
Speaker:receptive skills, listening and reading,
Speaker:those are building blocks. You need them.
Speaker:You need them to get to listening, I
Speaker:mean, to get to read, uh, speaking and
Speaker:writing. Yeah. I can't tell how well you
Speaker:can do language just by listening or
Speaker:reading because it's co-communication.
Speaker:The co is short for
Speaker:con with, I need both.
Speaker:That's very true.
Speaker:So yeah, I can actually have a grade book
Speaker:with just speaking and writing in it and
Speaker:know how well, because if they speak, I
Speaker:know that they understood what they, they
Speaker:can understand what they hear. Cause
Speaker:that's how you learn speaking. And if
Speaker:they can write, I know they can read
Speaker:because that's how you learn to write.
Speaker:So I could technically have just those
Speaker:two categories. I don't obviously, but I
Speaker:have it now some people. So when people
Speaker:said that they, it didn't work for them,
Speaker:they got skewed amounts. I'm like, what
Speaker:were your percentages? Well, they're
Speaker:like, we're a comprehensible input class.
Speaker:So I wait my input really high. I'm like,
Speaker:my kids get A's and B's on input. That's
Speaker:not a problem. So you've, that's why
Speaker:you're skewing the grades right off the
Speaker:bat. Because that lets you think that
Speaker:they can do language, but they can only
Speaker:perceive languages all
Speaker:you're getting from that grade.
Speaker:So yes, we do the input, but the result
Speaker:that we're looking for is eventually the
Speaker:output. So that's why it's weighted so
Speaker:heavily. So that was one thing that, that
Speaker:was my, my little epiphany there. And I
Speaker:worked with the percentages.
Speaker:That's a very interesting way
Speaker:of looking at it. I like that.
Speaker:And so I do that in level one, in level
Speaker:one, I weigh, I weight them differently.
Speaker:By the time I get to level two and level
Speaker:three, I weight them the same. And I
Speaker:found for me that students that they
Speaker:needed to be listening as actively as
Speaker:they were writing and game.
Speaker:Well, true.
Speaker:Yeah, that, that part of it. But, but in
Speaker:level one, I do what you do, Scott, I do
Speaker:weight them differently.
Speaker:Yeah, anyway, go ahead.
Speaker:Yeah, I do them all for all levels. But
Speaker:in level one, the difference is the first
Speaker:grading period, and my one school was
Speaker:trimester. So the first trimester, and
Speaker:now it's the first quarter, they don't, I
Speaker:don't assess them on speaking or writing.
Speaker:So it lasts for that silent
Speaker:period. It's only for level one.
Speaker:It's not that we don't do that in class,
Speaker:we do, I just don't put it in the grade
Speaker:book yet. So that it, they have that
Speaker:silent period that time to develop
Speaker:language. And the math will work out. The
Speaker:gradebook will figure it out that they're
Speaker:missing. And it will adjust
Speaker:appropriately. So I don't change my
Speaker:percentages from first quarter to second
Speaker:quarter to third quarter. I don't do
Speaker:that. It's just how it works. So that's
Speaker:the one thing. I love how you said that
Speaker:grade books inform, Tracy,
Speaker:because that's what it is.
Speaker:It's really for me and the students, but
Speaker:parents and administrators can get
Speaker:informed too. I train my kids instead of
Speaker:saying I have a C, what can I do to get
Speaker:better to I am weak in reading, what can
Speaker:I do to help my reading? So
Speaker:I train my kids to do that.
Speaker:And that's why I have so
Speaker:what did you do to train them?
Speaker:I just told them every time they go to
Speaker:see go look at your grade
Speaker:book, what do you weaken?
Speaker:Okay, good.
Speaker:I said, if you're a if you are a sports
Speaker:person and you are playing sports, or you
Speaker:are a dancer or you are a musician, you
Speaker:don't say I've got a C. How do I get to
Speaker:an A? You say, I can't do this. Can you
Speaker:I'm having trouble with my sharps or I'm
Speaker:having trouble with
Speaker:throwing or whatever it is.
Speaker:And then you they help you with they
Speaker:coach you on that particular thing.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So I put it back to that. So I trained
Speaker:him to do that. And that is why I cannot
Speaker:do and I think it's where when actual
Speaker:came out with interpersonal,
Speaker:presentational and interpretational
Speaker:skills, everybody went to waiting their
Speaker:grade book that way
Speaker:and those three things.
Speaker:But here it's sloppy, because
Speaker:interpersonal includes listening,
Speaker:reading, writing, and speaking. And I
Speaker:need to know exactly what skill I am
Speaker:actually working on or what their
Speaker:speaking part. That's right. So how I do
Speaker:it is I do it like you, Tracy listening,
Speaker:reading, speaking and writing, I limit my
Speaker:practice to 5% of the grade 5% because my
Speaker:practice if it's let's say if it's not
Speaker:listening, reading, speaking or writing
Speaker:practice, it may be vocabulary practice
Speaker:or maybe even grammar practice, so they
Speaker:don't do grammar like you think you do.
Speaker:That stuff just gets graded for
Speaker:completion. I can see the grade so I can
Speaker:look at it and go, oh, they really are
Speaker:struggling in this. But in the grade,
Speaker:they put the effort forth, they get 100%.
Speaker:So that category does not tell me
Speaker:anything in the grade book.
Speaker:So that's where reflections go, warm ups
Speaker:go, exit tickets go, it's true practice.
Speaker:But when I have a listening practice,
Speaker:that's going to go in the listening
Speaker:field, but obviously be weighted a lot
Speaker:less than a quiz or a test. So that's why
Speaker:I don't do the interpersonal,
Speaker:presentational and interpretational.
Speaker:Obviously, listening and reading is all
Speaker:interpretational period. Presentational
Speaker:and I lost the other one.
Speaker:Presentational and interpersonal.
Speaker:Interpersonal.
Speaker:Yeah, I have my everything has one of
Speaker:those components in it. So writing, I
Speaker:make sure that I have interpersonal
Speaker:writing in there, meaning they're reading
Speaker:something and they have to answer.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But also presentational, where I want
Speaker:them to write a story based on pictures
Speaker:or based on a topic. So they have both of
Speaker:them. I make sure I cover all the modes,
Speaker:but those aren't my basis for grading.
Speaker:The other thing is same thing with
Speaker:speaking. I have interpersonal meaning
Speaker:they listen to me, say, ask them a
Speaker:question, and then they've got to respond
Speaker:to that question. So I get that grade and
Speaker:then presentational. They're usually
Speaker:talking about a picture
Speaker:they've not seen before.
Speaker:And then they describe what's going on.
Speaker:So I'm getting all three modes in my
Speaker:grade book, but I'm not breaking my grade
Speaker:book down by that. So an administrator
Speaker:can look and see what skills
Speaker:are good and which ones are not.
Speaker:And it's really helpful in a parent
Speaker:conference where I can say your child is
Speaker:doing really, really well in listening
Speaker:and reading. But I see that they're
Speaker:struggling more so in speaking and not as
Speaker:much in writing. But let's work on
Speaker:speaking right now, because that's going
Speaker:to give you the biggest bang
Speaker:for your book in your grade.
Speaker:And then I can look at specific
Speaker:activities that will help them with that
Speaker:particular thing. That's what I love
Speaker:about the grade book.
Speaker:So that's one thing.
Speaker:Let's see. I hate the word study. I never
Speaker:use that word with my kids. I like
Speaker:practice because I tell them just like
Speaker:sports or band or music or dance that you
Speaker:don't study those things. You practice
Speaker:them. And if you don't show up to the
Speaker:practice on concert day, recital day,
Speaker:game day, you are going to suck.
Speaker:So you're right. Practice is not worth a
Speaker:lot in my class, but it's worth
Speaker:everything because if you don't do the
Speaker:practice, you can't play the game. You
Speaker:can't do the concert, which is my test.
Speaker:So that's a big issue there. So I use the
Speaker:word practice. I don't use the word study
Speaker:because you can't. I'm with you, Pamela.
Speaker:You can't study for
Speaker:it and you can't cram.
Speaker:But you can practice the skills of it.
Speaker:Just like you can.
Speaker:Yeah, it is a skill. Yeah. Trends versus
Speaker:retakes. Retakes are I hate them.
Speaker:Absolutely positively hate them. I get
Speaker:why they're there. But like we both we've
Speaker:you both have acknowledged they are a
Speaker:pain to administer a pain to keep track
Speaker:of making multiple forms
Speaker:of a test is difficult.
Speaker:Kids think a retake is the exact same
Speaker:test, but then if they've taken it three
Speaker:times, it becomes memorization. They
Speaker:memorize the answers. They're not showing
Speaker:you what's right. So right. And I don't
Speaker:do the drop a quiz either.
Speaker:I look for trends. I got this from how to
Speaker:grade for learning. There is an actual
Speaker:mathematical thing. It has got like seven
Speaker:pages dedicated to the math. I ignored
Speaker:it. I like I understand
Speaker:what the goal of it is.
Speaker:And I had one grade book that would
Speaker:actually calculate for it. And what it
Speaker:would do was it would look at the trend.
Speaker:It would look at the average. But if the
Speaker:grade was improving over time, it would
Speaker:give a grade slightly higher than the
Speaker:average. And if it was going down, it
Speaker:would give it slightly lower than the
Speaker:average. So it would take in the account
Speaker:the learning trend that was going on. So
Speaker:it wasn't a straight average.
Speaker:I like the idea of that. I've only had
Speaker:one grade book that could actually do it.
Speaker:And so, yeah. And so I don't do that. I
Speaker:do trends. I look so at the end of it
Speaker:right before the final grade. So I do
Speaker:this at the semester. I look at
Speaker:all their speaking grades. If I see one
Speaker:that is not in alignment with the rest of
Speaker:them, let's say because usually kids are
Speaker:very consistent. They usually get the
Speaker:same kind of grade on there because they
Speaker:only practice the things that are easy
Speaker:for them. So they keep getting good
Speaker:grades in that area. And they don't want
Speaker:to practice the things that are hard for
Speaker:them, which is what
Speaker:they actually need to do.
Speaker:We're all like this. Path of least
Speaker:resistance. Yeah. So I look for the
Speaker:trends. So if I see that they normally
Speaker:get Bs in speaking, but this particular
Speaker:one shows a D, I'm going to throw that
Speaker:one out. I'm not going to take that into
Speaker:account in my grade. So I will like you,
Speaker:Pamela, I will exempt that one. But I
Speaker:will put the actual grade in the
Speaker:comments. So that I know that that's what
Speaker:it was there. So that the grade. I don't
Speaker:take away the high ones.
Speaker:I only take away the low ones, but I do
Speaker:it on multiple ones. So I'll just look if
Speaker:there's no anomalies, if you know,
Speaker:they're normally a B, but they got a C.
Speaker:That's close. I'm not going to do that.
Speaker:It's when they went down to a D or an F
Speaker:that I'm going to pull those grades out.
Speaker:The anomalies, you could add a bad day,
Speaker:but you have to have enough assessments
Speaker:to do that too, because you have to have
Speaker:enough to be able to see that there is
Speaker:some kind of a trend. So I need at least
Speaker:three in every category to be able to do
Speaker:that. So I do that one.
Speaker:The final exam, my school, I've had final
Speaker:exams. This school does not do final
Speaker:exams. But I was telling Pamela before we
Speaker:started, we only give Cs and higher. We
Speaker:don't give lower grades. They get no
Speaker:credit for anything lower than a C.
Speaker:So they fail if they have to retake it.
Speaker:The exception is if the parents or the
Speaker:counselors petition us and parents and
Speaker:children sign off, they can get what we
Speaker:call a grad grade, which is if they
Speaker:earned a D or better, a D.
Speaker:So they'll get high school diploma
Speaker:credit, but they're signing off that this
Speaker:does not count for college. You are not
Speaker:college ready and that you know this and
Speaker:you can't come back later and say, but I
Speaker:can't get into college with this grade.
Speaker:So that's how we handle that. And most
Speaker:departments have what we call ESAs,
Speaker:essential skill
Speaker:assessments that they must pass.
Speaker:We don't have that in language because we
Speaker:don't have a point where you say you
Speaker:should know this at this point, because
Speaker:it is a growing it's a graph. It's not a,
Speaker:you know, it's not like biology where
Speaker:we're learning it cell development this
Speaker:week. And then next week, we're learning
Speaker:about something else. We
Speaker:don't have that checkpoints.
Speaker:So this is the argument I have always
Speaker:with administration. Yeah. So this is
Speaker:what we decided to do that we're going to
Speaker:do an IPA at the end of each semester,
Speaker:not at the end end, like the final a
Speaker:month before, because technically by the
Speaker:school and district rules, they have to
Speaker:be able to retake these to be able to
Speaker:have the opportunity to pass.
Speaker:So our semester ends winter break. So the
Speaker:week after Thanksgiving break, when we
Speaker:come back, we're going to give that ESA
Speaker:to all of our students. And then they've
Speaker:got multiple times to pass it afterwards.
Speaker:How are we going to do it so that it's a
Speaker:different test? We're going to write the
Speaker:first IPA, and then we're going to cheat.
Speaker:We are going to put it through AI and say
Speaker:give us four more
Speaker:variations of the same test.
Speaker:So it's going to change the stuff but
Speaker:give us the same format in there. And
Speaker:it's going to be inclusive of everything
Speaker:else. And if they're on the regular
Speaker:track, A through C track, if they don't
Speaker:pass it, they do not even though they may
Speaker:have an A, if they do not pass this, they
Speaker:have to pass because the way it says in
Speaker:our class descriptions, they must pass
Speaker:all ESAs and have a C
Speaker:or better in the class.
Speaker:If they don't ask the ESA, which is
Speaker:cumulative, bingo, done, you don't pass
Speaker:the class. Here's what I do for the kids
Speaker:who are slow learners. I make a deal with
Speaker:them. They're walking into class with a
Speaker:D. Let's say they got 66%.
Speaker:I say to you, I say to them,
Speaker:if you do better on your final, or this
Speaker:is our ESA, our IPA, if you do better on
Speaker:that than what your current class average
Speaker:is, I will make that equal to your
Speaker:semester grade. Why? Because they've
Speaker:proven to me that they've learned it
Speaker:because this is cumulative.
Speaker:So if they can pass a listening, reading,
Speaker:speaking and writing test better than
Speaker:what they have. So if they got a C on it,
Speaker:I'm going to give them a C. I'm not going
Speaker:to average everything together. I'm just
Speaker:going to give them that C. I had a kid
Speaker:who really studied, got a B. They had a D
Speaker:walking in. They got a B on the test. It
Speaker:was a real B. Guess what? I gave them the
Speaker:B because they showed me they learned it,
Speaker:which also takes away
Speaker:from the retake pressure.
Speaker:That's true.
Speaker:Okay. And then my last point, I've been
Speaker:talking a lot, but I had all
Speaker:these points I wanted to cover.
Speaker:Intervention time. Here's what you do,
Speaker:Pamela. This is what I started doing.
Speaker:Because like you, I have multiple. I have
Speaker:multiple kids coming in. I have two
Speaker:subjects. I don't have as many as you,
Speaker:but I have multi culture needs help over
Speaker:here. And I have Spanish that needs help
Speaker:over here. But in my Spanish, I have kids
Speaker:who need vocabulary help. And these kids
Speaker:need listening help.
Speaker:These kids need reading.
Speaker:So in my grading program that I use, not
Speaker:the grading program, my assessment
Speaker:program, formative.com, absolutely love
Speaker:this thing. I need to own stake in it
Speaker:because I tell you this is the best
Speaker:thing. It's not perfect, but it's the
Speaker:closest thing to perfect I have found.
Speaker:I make extra activities for my kids to be
Speaker:able to do independently.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:During the intervention time.
Speaker:So if I want to pull one kid one on one,
Speaker:I can pull that kid because the other
Speaker:kids have got something else to do.
Speaker:Because I have multiple kids for
Speaker:different reasons in my classroom, I
Speaker:can't do a reteach.
Speaker:It's just not possible.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:I can't do that. So I make five
Speaker:vocabulary activities. I make five
Speaker:reading, five listening, five speaking,
Speaker:and five writing activities.
Speaker:And then I assign all of them.
Speaker:Because I make an extra class called
Speaker:intervention. And all my kids who are in
Speaker:my intervention, I put them in that
Speaker:class. And then I can assign all those
Speaker:assignments at once to them.
Speaker:Instead of having to find out what
Speaker:classes is Jason in and assign it to him.
Speaker:It took too much. Just easier for me to
Speaker:put in class and putting them there.
Speaker:And then I tell them, if you're if you're
Speaker:lowest grade isn't speaking, please work
Speaker:on the speaking activities today.
Speaker:Do the speaking one.
Speaker:If you're lowest grade is in writing,
Speaker:please go to the writing ones. If you're
Speaker:lowest grade is in
Speaker:reading, etc, etc, etc.
Speaker:My vocabulary ones are a combination of
Speaker:activities that ask questions
Speaker:about the vocabulary. Lookit.
Speaker:And Formative, which is the app that I
Speaker:use, also has a like a
Speaker:flashcard built into it.
Speaker:But they can choose flashcard quiz or
Speaker:writing or a matching game. I tell them
Speaker:to do the matching game. But the writing
Speaker:hasn't actually type out the answers.
Speaker:The quiz is multiple choice. The
Speaker:flashcards are flashcards. But I do the
Speaker:matching. It's a timed. It's points and
Speaker:they can have a high score
Speaker:and compete with other kids.
Speaker:I've assigned that with so they can
Speaker:compete with that. And Quizlet used to
Speaker:have something like
Speaker:that and they took it away.
Speaker:Yeah, I love this game and it helps my
Speaker:kids. So those are the
Speaker:things that I do with the grades.
Speaker:And it really helps in conversations when
Speaker:I go to a parent conference and I go,
Speaker:your child is weak in this. And these are
Speaker:the activities that need to happen for
Speaker:them to get better at
Speaker:that particular skill.
Speaker:It's not about the grade. I don't talk
Speaker:about the grade. I'm talking about the
Speaker:skill and what they need to do. And then
Speaker:I use actful based rubrics so that I can
Speaker:back it up because I have a parent who's
Speaker:questioning me about my rubrics.
Speaker:I'm like, you need to question actual.
Speaker:Try their rubric.
Speaker:Try.
Speaker:Try because they are bigger than you and
Speaker:me. If us teachers can't get them to
Speaker:change the rubrics, one parent is not
Speaker:going to get them to change the rubrics.
Speaker:So that's the defense that I have and
Speaker:it's been working really, really well. My
Speaker:challenge is when I go to a new school
Speaker:with a new grading system to
Speaker:fit that into my my system.
Speaker:So right now we have it and it's going to
Speaker:change because we've been making this
Speaker:change and because we've had two cases.
Speaker:I had one case with a parent and another
Speaker:teacher and the ASL teacher had another
Speaker:case, the parent where they're
Speaker:questioning the grades and it
Speaker:was really hard to pick out.
Speaker:I could pick out mine
Speaker:because I set mine up right.
Speaker:But she did not because she did it the
Speaker:same way everybody else does.
Speaker:70 percent assessments, 30 percent
Speaker:classwork and homework.
Speaker:I can't manage that.
Speaker:So but this is what I did.
Speaker:This is how I did it.
Speaker:I went through my 70 percent.
Speaker:I divided it into my four skills,
Speaker:listening, reading, speaking and writing.
Speaker:And then I took my practice.
Speaker:I took out that five percent that I'm
Speaker:going to give for that completion grade.
Speaker:And then the other 25 percent I divided
Speaker:into listening, reading,
Speaker:speaking and writing practice.
Speaker:So the whole thing is
Speaker:still 30 percent practice.
Speaker:70 percent assessments.
Speaker:OK, but I just broke it down.
Speaker:So in the grade book it says it says
Speaker:assessment 70 percent.
Speaker:And then underneath it says speaking and
Speaker:a percent writing and a percent and
Speaker:listening and a percent and writing and
Speaker:reading and a percent.
Speaker:And does same with the practice so they
Speaker:can actually see how the breakdown is.
Speaker:And then anybody looking at the kids
Speaker:grade can see, oh, I see this.
Speaker:When you add up the listening practice
Speaker:plus the listening assessment, that's his
Speaker:overall listening grade.
Speaker:Yeah, that's really good.
Speaker:So it's much more clear.
Speaker:And I've done that in the last two
Speaker:schools I worked at where I had to come
Speaker:up with a different grading system to fit
Speaker:within what I had to do.
Speaker:And that's how the way I've done it.
Speaker:And it's been working just fine.
Speaker:So I still have kept my
Speaker:percentages the same way.
Speaker:I just divided them up differently
Speaker:because I had that have those two major
Speaker:categories, 70 percent
Speaker:assessments and 30 percent
Speaker:practice. In one school it was 90 percent
Speaker:summative and 10 percent formative.
Speaker:I just still broke it up.
Speaker:I use it.
Speaker:Yeah, OK.
Speaker:So yeah, like like you, Scott, I found
Speaker:that it's very easy to talk with parents
Speaker:and students about what
Speaker:they need to work on and about what
Speaker:students are strong in with those
Speaker:particular breakdowns.
Speaker:It makes the conversation super clear.
Speaker:And then the parent can say, OK, what can
Speaker:you give my child to
Speaker:help them improve in this?
Speaker:And it becomes such a wonderful
Speaker:conversation because then all of us are
Speaker:working in the same direction.
Speaker:Right. Student, parent and teacher to
Speaker:help that student
Speaker:improve that skill area.
Speaker:And then it's also so affirming, I think,
Speaker:for the student because the
Speaker:student can see, oh, I really
Speaker:have great skills in these other areas.
Speaker:It's just this one area that I really
Speaker:need to kind of kick
Speaker:it into high gear on.
Speaker:And that shows them like,
Speaker:oh, I'm not terrible overall.
Speaker:I just have one little spot that I'm
Speaker:working on and everything
Speaker:else I'm really doing great on.
Speaker:And I like being able to point that out
Speaker:to both student and parent, like, look at
Speaker:all the fabulous things you're doing.
Speaker:Now let's just figure out how to get you
Speaker:going in the right direction on this one.
Speaker:And we talked about it last week and
Speaker:something that I did.
Speaker:I told Pamela, I don't use chat, I call
Speaker:it chat, but I use claw.
Speaker:I use that's the one I like better.
Speaker:But I take the grading breakdown, I take
Speaker:out the completion practice grade.
Speaker:I don't put that in there, but all the
Speaker:other grades are in there.
Speaker:I take the kid's name out, I copy it into
Speaker:to clawed and I say, please create a
Speaker:success plan for this student.
Speaker:Oh, interesting.
Speaker:And what it comes back with is a really
Speaker:detailed and it's all positive.
Speaker:I tell it, keep it positive.
Speaker:So it'll say you are
Speaker:a superstar in blank.
Speaker:It tells you which one you're really
Speaker:doing really well on.
Speaker:And it says, here's your
Speaker:overall grade in all the categories.
Speaker:Here are is the first
Speaker:skill that I would work on.
Speaker:And then I tell it in the thing what
Speaker:activities that I have already created.
Speaker:It will help them and other suggestions I
Speaker:give like reading a novel or doing
Speaker:watching a familiar TV show,
Speaker:but in the target language with English
Speaker:subtitles, those kinds of things.
Speaker:I put those things in there and then it
Speaker:comes out with a two week success plan
Speaker:for them to work on.
Speaker:It gives them like 10 activities to do
Speaker:over the next 10 weeks, two weeks.
Speaker:And then at the end, it's got, I can,
Speaker:they're supposed to
Speaker:schedule a conference with me.
Speaker:And based on what was in there and what
Speaker:their skills are, like we're
Speaker:working on school right now.
Speaker:So the school stuff, it says based on
Speaker:that, I can talk about my classes.
Speaker:I can talk about my
Speaker:materials for classes.
Speaker:And it says, yes, I can.
Speaker:Kinda not really.
Speaker:They circle those and then
Speaker:they schedule a point with me.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:You come and tell me.
Speaker:And then we talk it out with each other
Speaker:and come up with a new plan.
Speaker:And all I did was tell it
Speaker:what I wanted in the plan.
Speaker:And then I just copy
Speaker:the kids grades in there.
Speaker:It gives me the plan.
Speaker:It creates me a Google doc.
Speaker:I put at the top of kids name because it
Speaker:doesn't know the name.
Speaker:I don't put the name in there.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, um, but it works wonderful.
Speaker:And I'm only doing that for my low end
Speaker:kids or if a kid wants it, because I'll
Speaker:say I can create a success plan for you
Speaker:and I can tell it the
Speaker:kids goal is to get a 90% or
Speaker:better or the kids goals just to pass.
Speaker:So it will look at all of the things to
Speaker:help him and what he actually needs to
Speaker:work on the most and it gives him skills.
Speaker:I really like that.
Speaker:Um, yeah.
Speaker:And it's been working really, really well
Speaker:for some of the kids to use that.
Speaker:So it's another way to use AI.
Speaker:Could I have done it by hand?
Speaker:I could, but I have 200 students.
Speaker:So if I'm even doing it for 10 students
Speaker:will take me hours to go and figure out
Speaker:the math and figure out which ones, you
Speaker:know, what areas and
Speaker:all that kind of stuff.
Speaker:And mine will not be as good or as
Speaker:detailed as it took claw to do in less
Speaker:than a minute per student.
Speaker:And it writes.
Speaker:I'm sorry.
Speaker:I was saying writes the
Speaker:whole document for me.
Speaker:It writes in perfect English.
Speaker:And all I do is put it's a,
Speaker:it titles it a success plan.
Speaker:I just put the kid's name
Speaker:Tom's success plan in front.
Speaker:So I've also been creating different, you
Speaker:know, activities and things like that for
Speaker:students to do using AI,
Speaker:mostly Gemini at this point for me.
Speaker:Um, I haven't used cloud a ton.
Speaker:So I'll have to try that.
Speaker:I know that I do have some colleagues who
Speaker:use cloud who really like it.
Speaker:So it's one of those, I don't know about
Speaker:you, but I have a list of these things
Speaker:like I need to try this
Speaker:and then I need to try this.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:In all of my extra
Speaker:time, I need to try this.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's the problem.
Speaker:Always something more to learn about.
Speaker:Um, but, uh, I think where I'm, I thought
Speaker:I find the learning curve with using
Speaker:something like Gemini is
Speaker:to know the exact verbiage.
Speaker:And so I'm getting better at it.
Speaker:You know, what's going to give me the
Speaker:outcome that I want.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:How specific do I need to be?
Speaker:You know, what do I need to include in
Speaker:order to have exactly what I need for
Speaker:that student or for whatever
Speaker:activity I'm doing come out?
Speaker:And then of course, I'm sure as you all
Speaker:do, um, we always have to check it
Speaker:through for errors or sort of, you know,
Speaker:things that are a little bit.
Speaker:But, um, Scott, it sounds like you really
Speaker:have, um, mastered the verbiage needed to
Speaker:get what you want out of cloud.
Speaker:That's that.
Speaker:I just learned and I'll
Speaker:tell you why I choose cloud.
Speaker:I know chat GB just added this feature.
Speaker:I don't know if Gemini has it.
Speaker:Um, but, um, it's, we have to understand
Speaker:it's a conversation.
Speaker:You don't get what you want.
Speaker:Always the first time out.
Speaker:So just like if you're training an
Speaker:employee, you know, you,
Speaker:you give them feedback.
Speaker:Go, Oh, I don't like
Speaker:this, or it wasn't this.
Speaker:I want it to be more casual.
Speaker:I need it to be in student
Speaker:speaking, use grammar terms.
Speaker:Kids don't understand grammar terms.
Speaker:I just use regular
Speaker:English to talk to them.
Speaker:I said, you use grammar terms.
Speaker:My kids don't understand grammar terms.
Speaker:Can you please make it more student
Speaker:friendly or, you know, whatever I want.
Speaker:I just go back and forth.
Speaker:I look at what it gives me
Speaker:and I'm like, what do I tweak?
Speaker:If it was an employee and I was a boss,
Speaker:what would I tell them
Speaker:they need to do differently?
Speaker:And I say, can you please try again?
Speaker:Now this is what Claude started and I
Speaker:know chat GBT has it now.
Speaker:I don't know if Gemini
Speaker:has, they're called skills.
Speaker:So after I've done this, so I have this
Speaker:success plan and I told
Speaker:them everything I wanted.
Speaker:I've tweaked it.
Speaker:So now I've got a product that I like to
Speaker:give out to my kids.
Speaker:I will say, can you please
Speaker:wrap this up into a skill?
Speaker:So then I don't have to reference all the
Speaker:details I did the last time.
Speaker:So I'll say, please make this skill that
Speaker:you can repeat without
Speaker:having to do it over again.
Speaker:So all I do is go, I need a
Speaker:success plan for a new student.
Speaker:Here are their grades.
Speaker:Boop.
Speaker:And it gives me the same format every
Speaker:time because it already knows that.
Speaker:And I told it now create a
Speaker:skill based on what we just did.
Speaker:So after I tweaked it and done all this
Speaker:stuff, you're not copy
Speaker:pasting all of your prompts.
Speaker:See, in the old days, that's
Speaker:what we used to have to do.
Speaker:And I do have a whole
Speaker:document of all my prompts.
Speaker:But as they started having these what
Speaker:they call skills, I will put those
Speaker:prompts in there and I will say,
Speaker:can you do you have any more suggestions
Speaker:on how to make this prompt better?
Speaker:And it will do that.
Speaker:Then after I get what I want, then I go,
Speaker:please turn this into a skill.
Speaker:That's great.
Speaker:And it will do that.
Speaker:And another thing I always add.
Speaker:Here's another thing that you can do,
Speaker:Tracy, when you're doing your chats.
Speaker:Tell it at the end.
Speaker:Ask me any questions you may have.
Speaker:So then it will go,
Speaker:well, I'm unclear about this.
Speaker:Can you and it will ask you a question.
Speaker:You can answer it.
Speaker:Do you want me to do
Speaker:it this way or this way?
Speaker:Or it's a human being.
Speaker:I know it's hard to say that, but act
Speaker:like it's a human being and talk to it
Speaker:like you would an employee.
Speaker:And that's how I use it as an assistant.
Speaker:It is not my brain.
Speaker:Like I tell my kids, I have to do
Speaker:something and put
Speaker:something formatted into Canva.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It used to take me forever because I've
Speaker:got this template and I copying and
Speaker:pasting each little section.
Speaker:And it doesn't always
Speaker:get formatted right.
Speaker:And I got to go through
Speaker:and fix all the formatting.
Speaker:Oh, my God.
Speaker:I did it in 15 minutes yesterday.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:Because I go, I just I go.
Speaker:I wonder if Claude can do this.
Speaker:I said, I have this Canva template.
Speaker:Can you put all this information I copied
Speaker:and pasted from my Google Doc that I made
Speaker:where I start all of it
Speaker:and put it in my format.
Speaker:It asked me a question.
Speaker:I said, yep, that's what I want.
Speaker:And it did it three minutes later.
Speaker:My one time internally now.
Speaker:I'm sorry, what can was
Speaker:not doing that internally?
Speaker:Nothing.
Speaker:No, because I have to copy
Speaker:and paste it, copy and paste.
Speaker:OK, so I have a 20 page template, a 20
Speaker:page template, and it filled it in in
Speaker:five minutes and format like the titles.
Speaker:It even shrunk them because it sometimes
Speaker:were longer than the with the lab.
Speaker:It changed the sizes.
Speaker:I had a proofread it,
Speaker:but it did it perfectly.
Speaker:Bingo.
Speaker:Done.
Speaker:Save as PDF.
Speaker:I was done.
Speaker:That's so great.
Speaker:I feel like personalization is so much
Speaker:more at our fingertips because of some of
Speaker:the tools we currently have, like what
Speaker:would have taken me an hour to prep for a
Speaker:student to make sure every activity was
Speaker:exactly what they needed.
Speaker:I can now pull out of AI as I get better
Speaker:and better at using it.
Speaker:And and I understand
Speaker:the controversies with it.
Speaker:I understand.
Speaker:But I'm at the point where this is
Speaker:exactly what happened during
Speaker:the age of industrialization.
Speaker:Everybody thought the world was coming to
Speaker:an end and that all the jobs were going
Speaker:to go away and everything.
Speaker:But that's not what happened.
Speaker:We developed new jobs that had to work
Speaker:with the industrialization.
Speaker:We would not have cars that we have now
Speaker:or manufactured homes or any of the lot
Speaker:of those things that we take for granted
Speaker:now without industrialization.
Speaker:Is it going to take away some jobs?
Speaker:Yes, the lower end jobs
Speaker:it's going to take away.
Speaker:I'll be honest, it's going to take.
Speaker:But but we're going to need to create
Speaker:other jobs to be able to adapt that they
Speaker:will need to program them and they're and
Speaker:they're not perfect.
Speaker:They can't.
Speaker:That's why I say it's not
Speaker:to replace your thinking.
Speaker:It's great for brainstorming.
Speaker:It's great for organizing.
Speaker:And I go back to Bryce Hedrum said who
Speaker:always said classroom jobs.
Speaker:If it doesn't require a college
Speaker:education, a child should do it because
Speaker:why waste your college
Speaker:degree on stapling papers.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So those are the kinds of things that I
Speaker:offload to a I that it doesn't take a
Speaker:college professor to to do it.
Speaker:I'll write my stories.
Speaker:I'll have a I write my questions.
Speaker:Why?
Speaker:Because you know how long it takes to
Speaker:write a question that doesn't give away
Speaker:an answer to a previous question and that
Speaker:common sense can't answer.
Speaker:It's difficult.
Speaker:It's really difficult because you'll say
Speaker:what was the character at
Speaker:the beginning of the story?
Speaker:A dog.
Speaker:And then later on the
Speaker:question is so the dog is doing what.
Speaker:And you're like you
Speaker:just gave away that answer.
Speaker:So I'll tell it to come up with questions
Speaker:that do not give away any previous
Speaker:answers and that cannot be guessed by
Speaker:logic or common sense.
Speaker:And I'll have it do those times.
Speaker:And again, I proofread them and make sure
Speaker:that they're the right is supposed to be.
Speaker:But it works so much easier.
Speaker:I wrote the content.
Speaker:The questions I can
Speaker:offload to somebody else.
Speaker:And a lot of teachers
Speaker:offloaded the kids anyways.
Speaker:They go you read this.
Speaker:Write 10 questions and then she pulls all
Speaker:the questions from all the kids and she
Speaker:chooses the 10 that she likes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that's kind of how I use and I know
Speaker:it's controversial to say all we're
Speaker:taking away resources like the computer
Speaker:that you're using right now uses the same
Speaker:Internet resources that I does.
Speaker:It takes a server to do Internet.
Speaker:So it takes the same water takes the same
Speaker:energy that it's that.
Speaker:You know that that everything that we're
Speaker:doing uses so they're
Speaker:like picking and choosing.
Speaker:I don't like AI and the excuse I'm going
Speaker:to use is it's restoring the environment.
Speaker:I'm like well let's see cars destroy the
Speaker:environment using the
Speaker:Internet destroys the environment.
Speaker:Everything that we do destroys the
Speaker:environment at some point.
Speaker:And I'm not for
Speaker:destroying the environment.
Speaker:Please don't take that wrong either.
Speaker:I'm for minimizing as much of the
Speaker:destruction of the environment.
Speaker:But if we if you want to die on that hill
Speaker:about the environment then you got to
Speaker:pretty much live like the Amish because
Speaker:everything that we do destroys some part
Speaker:of the environment building a house just
Speaker:even if you build it yourself.
Speaker:You you're tearing up the environment to
Speaker:do that and you're preventing other
Speaker:animals from living in that area.
Speaker:There's lots of impact.
Speaker:And so I.
Speaker:I don't disclaim that that's not true.
Speaker:I'm just saying that are you willing to
Speaker:give up your iPhone for the same reasons
Speaker:that you're saying you want to give up.
Speaker:And in there right.
Speaker:And everything's a tool.
Speaker:Everything can be used for good or evil.
Speaker:You can make threats on the phone and
Speaker:that's using it for bad.
Speaker:Or you can call your grandma
Speaker:and tell her happy birthday.
Speaker:That's for good.
Speaker:Everything has its good and bad.
Speaker:It's how you use the tool.
Speaker:It is a tool.
Speaker:I think I'm always a toe dipper.
Speaker:I just kind of start and try it.
Speaker:And you know I don't know my my concerns
Speaker:I think skew more towards diversity and
Speaker:you know making sure that there's you
Speaker:know diverse representation.
Speaker:Yeah I think not do that.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:How it's kind of tell it to do.
Speaker:And it will.
Speaker:It's funny.
Speaker:I tried that with a slide deck at one
Speaker:point and it didn't but
Speaker:it also may have been.
Speaker:No I tried to.
Speaker:I was like whoa this is really not what I
Speaker:want represented in my side.
Speaker:So I threw it out.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Completely.
Speaker:Don't go to completely.
Speaker:Tell them adjustment.
Speaker:This is not diverse.
Speaker:This is what I mean by diverse.
Speaker:I need a an ability.
Speaker:A differently ability
Speaker:ability person in there.
Speaker:I need a couple people of color.
Speaker:I need you know I need you know LGBTQ
Speaker:plus represent you tell it what you want.
Speaker:And it gets better it learns as it goes.
Speaker:It learns as it goes because last time
Speaker:you put diversity it says OK here's a
Speaker:black kid here's a
Speaker:white kid that's diverse.
Speaker:That's not diverse.
Speaker:And I just watched
Speaker:one of my favorite guys.
Speaker:He wrote a book Talk Your Class Off.
Speaker:And so he changes
Speaker:YouTube channel to that.
Speaker:It used to be the
Speaker:real talk with Reynolds.
Speaker:He showed how he uses AI which I thought
Speaker:was really good too.
Speaker:He he uses Apple Notes
Speaker:and he hates to type.
Speaker:He's an English teacher.
Speaker:He hates to type.
Speaker:So he just talks throughout the day.
Speaker:He's thinking about lesson plans about
Speaker:what he's got to do
Speaker:what he wants to include.
Speaker:He just rambles in there.
Speaker:And at the end he at the end of the week
Speaker:he takes all of his thoughts puts in and
Speaker:goes please organize this into a
Speaker:comprehensive lesson plan.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so all the ideas are his own.
Speaker:But the organization which
Speaker:he says I'm he's not good at.
Speaker:He's good at other skills.
Speaker:He offloads that.
Speaker:He already did the
Speaker:thinking and the brainstorming.
Speaker:Now it's just putting it into a format
Speaker:that other people can
Speaker:read and understand.
Speaker:And so again use it as assistant don't
Speaker:use it as primary thinking.
Speaker:Use it to get you started brainstorming
Speaker:is a really good activity with it too.
Speaker:It gives me other ideas.
Speaker:I'm like oh crap I
Speaker:didn't think about that.
Speaker:That's a great idea.
Speaker:Or another way you need to
Speaker:differentiate for a student.
Speaker:Ask tell him I've got this five or four
Speaker:kid here their
Speaker:strengths here their weaknesses.
Speaker:These are the modifications I need to do
Speaker:change what I have
Speaker:right here to fit that.
Speaker:And it will do that or an IEP or like we
Speaker:had one person here.
Speaker:I think it was it might have been Lynn.
Speaker:I can't remember but she said she had a
Speaker:was it a death or a blight.
Speaker:Yeah I can't remember is there a deaf or
Speaker:blind and they didn't know what other
Speaker:activities they could do to help that
Speaker:person understand when they're so limited
Speaker:in what the things that we do in class
Speaker:that we use to scaffold half of it's gone
Speaker:because they're right or blind.
Speaker:I can't remember which one.
Speaker:So I said we put it in
Speaker:right live on this podcast.
Speaker:We went I typed in a chat and do Claude
Speaker:and I said OK we've got a student here
Speaker:and this is the class you know I teach
Speaker:what modifications would you suggest.
Speaker:And it gave us some really concrete
Speaker:things like oh I never thought of that
Speaker:idea I didn't think about that and so
Speaker:some of it was OK we kind of do that
Speaker:already and it's nothing really new and
Speaker:brain breaking but this
Speaker:particular idea was awesome.
Speaker:So we stole it and we used it because it
Speaker:really was or I'll put in a behavior
Speaker:issue I've got this problem I've tried
Speaker:this this this this this
Speaker:what else would you suggest.
Speaker:And it's given me some ideas I'm like who
Speaker:I never thought of that you know those
Speaker:kinds of things that
Speaker:really that really really help.
Speaker:So use it as an assistant I'm not saying
Speaker:to use it to replace your thinking
Speaker:because we've got the college degree for
Speaker:a reason it does not
Speaker:have that college degree.
Speaker:But for other things that we don't need a
Speaker:college degree for like organizing and
Speaker:putting things into templates putting
Speaker:things into a lesson plan that your
Speaker:administration requires you to do but
Speaker:probably doesn't even look at.
Speaker:You know that's a big deal yeah at this
Speaker:point there was a time last week when I
Speaker:was like are you going to have your AI
Speaker:talk to our AI because the admin was
Speaker:saying that they were going to run
Speaker:something through AI to check to see if
Speaker:we were doing it right.
Speaker:And I was like I know a lot of my
Speaker:colleagues are just
Speaker:generating this with AI to begin with.
Speaker:So at that point what's the point.
Speaker:It's like I'll have my AI talk to your AI
Speaker:you know basically I'll have my secretary
Speaker:call your secretary but it's it's really
Speaker:good to organize to to organize or to
Speaker:look for patterns that you don't see.
Speaker:Because auto complete so yeah pattern
Speaker:recognition it doesn't there but if you
Speaker:treat I know this is the part of the most
Speaker:controversial treat it like a human and
Speaker:just talk to it like you would if it was
Speaker:a real person treat it like an employee.
Speaker:And it will do what you ask it to do and
Speaker:it might not do it perfectly just like an
Speaker:employee doesn't so
Speaker:just give them feedback.
Speaker:I don't like this. This is not what I
Speaker:think diverse is diverse to me looks like
Speaker:this this this this and this.
Speaker:I was having it try to do the formatting
Speaker:of French and German punctuation for
Speaker:quotes it kept putting Spanish ones in my
Speaker:things I give it my German or my French
Speaker:it kept formatting with the Spanish way
Speaker:I'm like no German uses lower quotes than
Speaker:upper quotes and it kept getting wrong
Speaker:says here's what I need.
Speaker:I wrote one I copied and I didn't copy I
Speaker:took a screenshot of it I uploaded the
Speaker:screenshots that this is what I need for
Speaker:German so when I give you the German
Speaker:please format it this way.
Speaker:When I get the French I need to form
Speaker:because the French uses the angular
Speaker:brackets and they're hard on my keyboard
Speaker:to remember where they are.
Speaker:So I just put regular quotes in there and
Speaker:I tell it to change them
Speaker:to the angular brackets.
Speaker:And it wasn't doing it was doing it the
Speaker:Spanish way which is the long dash so I'm
Speaker:like no not the Spanish long dash please
Speaker:please do it the French way well we use
Speaker:that all for us they also know yeah it
Speaker:depends but sometimes
Speaker:it just takes longer to.
Speaker:To craft your prompt that it does just to
Speaker:do it yourself that's what I eventually
Speaker:like now that they've got the skills once
Speaker:you have it I just say please wrap this
Speaker:into a skill and I have like 30 skills.
Speaker:That's interesting that have gone that
Speaker:have gone together so it does for me and
Speaker:it makes my job so much easier I have one
Speaker:where I've come up with all the
Speaker:information for my multi culture class I
Speaker:planned out a whole unit I've got
Speaker:activities I've got pictures I've got
Speaker:prompts I've got all
Speaker:this thing and the unit is.
Speaker:10 to 15 class period so that's about.
Speaker:I'm.
Speaker:10 classes is a four week so it's about a
Speaker:month to a month and a
Speaker:half of classes for me.
Speaker:I know you're on the schedule yeah so
Speaker:here are my backgrounds for my power
Speaker:points I like to use my Google slides
Speaker:here what they are these are the
Speaker:backgrounds this is the hierarchy I like
Speaker:I like my first one to be this one so I
Speaker:know that this is the start of a new.
Speaker:Day a new lesson and then I want this
Speaker:this this put it all in there put all the
Speaker:graphics in there put all my my Google
Speaker:Docs in there and I say now please can
Speaker:create for me a complete unit plan.
Speaker:Powerpoint.
Speaker:It won't create Google slides I don't
Speaker:know why but it created a whole power
Speaker:point in entire power point it created
Speaker:and they're beautiful
Speaker:power points that they created.
Speaker:Based on what I gave them and then I
Speaker:either power point so that I just open
Speaker:them up in Google and I
Speaker:say save as a Google slide.
Speaker:Right and it saves them all in fact I'll
Speaker:show you one let me get one right here.
Speaker:That it really does a nice job.
Speaker:With them.
Speaker:And all I did was give it the information
Speaker:and give it my
Speaker:formatting where did it just open.
Speaker:Try to get open.
Speaker:Are you look for that I will acknowledge
Speaker:that the I cannot lock the barn door now
Speaker:that the horses out.
Speaker:I will acknowledge that
Speaker:generative AI is here to stay.
Speaker:What by golly I'm not gonna treat it like
Speaker:a human being cuz I think that's what
Speaker:people get in trouble is they think it's
Speaker:intelligent and I know we've named it
Speaker:intelligent but it's
Speaker:really just auto complete.
Speaker:And yes there is a job loss because my
Speaker:brother who has one in it academy means
Speaker:is out of work and he says a third of
Speaker:Hollywood is out of work right now.
Speaker:So there are the upper level jobs that
Speaker:are being replaced just because I could
Speaker:save a buck here if I don't
Speaker:go to the like full artistic.
Speaker:Yeah levels.
Speaker:And I think that is gonna come out that
Speaker:people are not gonna appreciate when that
Speaker:happens all the time because
Speaker:you can really really tell.
Speaker:I think yeah right now they're going for
Speaker:the dollar amount and then they realize
Speaker:that it does cost a lot to
Speaker:use AI I mean I pay for my claw.
Speaker:They have a twenty dollar plan I run out
Speaker:of that plan because I use it too much so
Speaker:I pay a hundred dollars a month for mine
Speaker:most of you would get by
Speaker:with a twenty dollar plan.
Speaker:I'm a teacher I can't do that but it does
Speaker:so much for me it saves me an hour so
Speaker:when I figure out how much I get paid so
Speaker:it's worth it to me for my for that a
Speaker:hundred dollars a month but I started off
Speaker:with a twenty it's just I started using
Speaker:it more and more and more and so that.
Speaker:You know that is causing me more and more
Speaker:things with it here is my little slide
Speaker:let me go ahead and put it on the screen.
Speaker:It's going to cover everybody up here
Speaker:there it is so here is what it created
Speaker:for me look created a hundred and thirty
Speaker:three yeah yeah hundred
Speaker:and thirty three slides.
Speaker:Okay it's got it in here it's the big
Speaker:question for the unit this is our launch
Speaker:day the first day was for September 14 I
Speaker:can guess where celebration is from.
Speaker:We talk about guess these festivals so
Speaker:we're going to look through and we've got
Speaker:pictures that I found.
Speaker:And we talk about each thing.
Speaker:See keep some up here
Speaker:we can talk about it.
Speaker:This was our German editions they had a
Speaker:copy down the German vocab because I have
Speaker:to also put in some languages I picked
Speaker:five languages to go over to a whole year
Speaker:so this is the one where this is our
Speaker:German then we talk
Speaker:about what's a festival.
Speaker:And you can see these are the slides are
Speaker:geared to were Whitney high school so all
Speaker:these slides I made the backgrounds for
Speaker:the slides and told them to use them in
Speaker:this particular order.
Speaker:Sorry nothing here so it's got in here.
Speaker:What's the wildest celebration we can
Speaker:talk in there then I've got a brain break
Speaker:in here stand up if it's true for you
Speaker:said if it is it you've
Speaker:got a few things in there.
Speaker:Then we start the journal the curiosity
Speaker:page the hook reactions everything's here
Speaker:and I told it these kids are mostly
Speaker:special needs kids or disenfranchised
Speaker:kids from school right
Speaker:these are not our top flyers.
Speaker:Please keep everything simple please have
Speaker:instructions very clear put them out and
Speaker:step by step by step what they're
Speaker:supposed to do so that I don't have to so
Speaker:you know they can
Speaker:understand it right away by looking.
Speaker:Because summer visual learners summer
Speaker:audio but they get both this way but it's
Speaker:simplified it's not
Speaker:difficult for them to understand.
Speaker:Exit ticket I give them sentence frames
Speaker:because these are the kids are gonna come
Speaker:up with their own which festival would
Speaker:you want to attend and why that one I
Speaker:pick blank because of blank.
Speaker:So it's right in there and I it took me
Speaker:the seven minutes to
Speaker:create this whole thing.
Speaker:But you can see it's personalized to me.
Speaker:And it even has you can't see it from
Speaker:this view but it also filled in teaching
Speaker:tips under you know the bottom the what
Speaker:do they call that the the note section of
Speaker:the Google slides underneath the people
Speaker:can't see but you can see
Speaker:it right fill those in there.
Speaker:Oh wow so it's all in there.
Speaker:And then I can say give me some
Speaker:suggestions how to make this better and
Speaker:it will give me that so all of this claws
Speaker:up as one of our slogans
Speaker:claws up because of the wild cats.
Speaker:I put all this stuff in there and made
Speaker:these slides with a school colors so it
Speaker:looks like it was very customized to me
Speaker:all the information came from me I just
Speaker:had it formatted into a slide deck for me
Speaker:and it came up with 130 30 slides.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Which would have taken me.
Speaker:Weeks to do.
Speaker:You wouldn't take weeks now once it's
Speaker:done it's done but I have to create this
Speaker:whole curriculum from scratch so it's
Speaker:already taking me
Speaker:weeks to do the research.
Speaker:Then to do weeks to make a PowerPoint to
Speaker:the presentation yeah yeah would take a
Speaker:long time so it takes a while yeah so
Speaker:it's just the next kinds of things I find
Speaker:that are very helpful.
Speaker:I like that that sentence frame that you
Speaker:had there just for your exit tickets
Speaker:Scott it's I'm a big fan of sentence
Speaker:frames and yeah I know you think that
Speaker:these might be your lower flyers or your
Speaker:students who may need more processing
Speaker:time but I feel like sentence frames help
Speaker:every student they really just.
Speaker:I use them in my class it's sometimes
Speaker:we're out of gas right.
Speaker:Our students are just like wow I've just
Speaker:worked so hard I don't know where to
Speaker:start and that sentence frame just really
Speaker:gets them going and allows them to kind
Speaker:of encapsulate their information in that
Speaker:five minutes and they can
Speaker:use it or not and I just yeah.
Speaker:I have I have to use it yeah I have them
Speaker:for my for my reflection questions in
Speaker:English for my Spanish my Spanish glasses
Speaker:and I have my go you
Speaker:don't have to use them.
Speaker:I also have things here's some things to
Speaker:think about when you're answering this
Speaker:question and gives them some kind of
Speaker:questions and some kids just go right
Speaker:through and answer each one of those
Speaker:questions and some kids will
Speaker:write their own I don't care.
Speaker:But some kids need a
Speaker:staff like them don't.
Speaker:All you care about is are you reflecting
Speaker:yeah exactly so yes I do I do them too I
Speaker:just want to really simple for my these
Speaker:kids because these are the kids who are
Speaker:who need a language credit but either a
Speaker:failed out of language.
Speaker:Or don't qualify for language because
Speaker:they are so low on the special needs that
Speaker:they don't qualify for it and they need
Speaker:one unit to graduate so this they're 11th
Speaker:and 12th graders and if they don't pass
Speaker:this class it is
Speaker:whether they graduate or not.
Speaker:So I don't make it a very complicated
Speaker:class it's mostly discussion and opinion
Speaker:which they like because they can tell me
Speaker:I had one kid we're doing rules and
Speaker:regulations right now and I had them do.
Speaker:Okay, what one rule in school that you
Speaker:don't like but you need to justify it so
Speaker:you need to switch sides you are now pro
Speaker:that role and I want you
Speaker:to do that so that was one.
Speaker:Then I need you to come up with what rule
Speaker:one school rule that you really do
Speaker:appreciate and why and the third was one
Speaker:rule that you would
Speaker:write for school and why.
Speaker:Okay, so this one kid wrote no more
Speaker:English class he's like no more flip
Speaker:flops nobody wants to
Speaker:see your stinky ass toes.
Speaker:Laughing laughing laughing.
Speaker:He's like and he goes and he goes yeah if
Speaker:I see them out I'm gonna
Speaker:say put them dogs away.
Speaker:And it was just I guess cracked up when
Speaker:reading it but he got full credit he did
Speaker:the job and he was supposed to do.
Speaker:He explained it.
Speaker:That was something that he clearly cares
Speaker:about and that you know.
Speaker:It was a chance to contribute to what
Speaker:happens at school I love that idea.
Speaker:It's funny that the whole sentence.
Speaker:Yeah, I didn't I didn't realize is a new
Speaker:teacher I just I know that we do have you
Speaker:know newer instructors that are listening
Speaker:to this podcast and.
Speaker:Yeah, I really didn't really the new
Speaker:teacher just how valuable sentence frames
Speaker:are and really how they allow students
Speaker:who might just get to have a little hard
Speaker:time getting started
Speaker:or not know you know.
Speaker:How to format something that they just
Speaker:really allows them to accelerate rather
Speaker:than remediate and I
Speaker:just really love that so.
Speaker:I love that to accelerate rather than
Speaker:remediate that is perfect we do it in our
Speaker:textbooks look at our
Speaker:textbooks they'll say.
Speaker:De donde iris where are you from and then
Speaker:right next to it they have soy de they're
Speaker:giving it how to ask it how to answer it.
Speaker:Right away that's a sentence frame that's
Speaker:not this low memorized phrases.
Speaker:Yes, I will say that sometimes because a
Speaker:lot of our problem is the students will
Speaker:stop dead when they don't know a word.
Speaker:Yes with the sentence frames I will say
Speaker:if you don't know the word off on say yet
Speaker:if you don't know the word the whole day
Speaker:yet go ahead and write it in English.
Speaker:And then we'll go back later and fill it
Speaker:in but be working in that grammar and do
Speaker:as much as you can in the target language
Speaker:right now so right the whole sentence in
Speaker:Spanish in the one where
Speaker:you don't know put in English.
Speaker:Yeah so I love that for translation but
Speaker:so for translating let's say from Spanish
Speaker:to English from French to English I just
Speaker:have students draw a blank line do you
Speaker:both do this so I'll say
Speaker:don't let it slow you down.
Speaker:Don't know something just keep going.
Speaker:I don't think translation I'm doing like
Speaker:in a written response where I'll say.
Speaker:Let's see.
Speaker:Katie and a sin to mochila what do you
Speaker:have in your backpack and they go in me
Speaker:mochila tango una calculator a computer
Speaker:Dora E unos pencils.
Speaker:Yeah so I forgot the word pencils they're
Speaker:not going to get full credit but they're
Speaker:going to get almost full credit because
Speaker:they had to go and they didn't know that
Speaker:word that we've been working on for a
Speaker:while all my kids know pencil that's the
Speaker:one they always say they've gotten their
Speaker:backpack but it's just an example but.
Speaker:Instead of them going saying I don't know
Speaker:or I or I have in my backpack and list on
Speaker:English which they'll get
Speaker:points to first because.
Speaker:They understood the question it's an I P
Speaker:A so it's integrated so they understood
Speaker:they got the points for the understanding
Speaker:part but not for the expression part so
Speaker:in that particular case but this case he
Speaker:got even more points
Speaker:because he did 99% of it.
Speaker:In the target language in the one word I
Speaker:don't want to stop and say I can't do it
Speaker:because I don't know
Speaker:one word or two right.
Speaker:Generally speaking especially like Tracy
Speaker:like what you say about leaving the blank
Speaker:is perfect because as a professional
Speaker:translator I would always do that when I
Speaker:was in the business like I don't I can't
Speaker:figure out what this is right now leaving
Speaker:a blank and then the thing for me is if
Speaker:you allow the student to write it in
Speaker:English or leave a blank.
Speaker:By the time they're done with the
Speaker:paragraph probably the light bulb has
Speaker:gone off and they can go back and they
Speaker:can scratch it out and I'm like got a
Speaker:racers that's fine or just cross it out.
Speaker:I'll be able to see you draw you write it
Speaker:over here and draw an arrow I'll know
Speaker:what you're talking about you know.
Speaker:And bilingual native speakers do this all
Speaker:the time especially if mom and dad are
Speaker:native speakers and kids are heritage
Speaker:speakers they'll go.
Speaker:They'll go back and forth they'll speak
Speaker:in Spanish and instant English word in
Speaker:there or parents because if you know you
Speaker:were born and raised in Spanish but now
Speaker:you've lived your whole adult life in
Speaker:English you may not know the Spanish word
Speaker:for something that newly
Speaker:came out technology wise.
Speaker:I don't know just that word in English we
Speaker:do it all the time so why.
Speaker:You know why say no wrong used English
Speaker:they're not gonna get the full points for
Speaker:it but they are gonna get.
Speaker:Almost all the points because they
Speaker:understood the question and they express
Speaker:themselves the majority of
Speaker:the way in the target language.
Speaker:You know.
Speaker:Yeah I'm looking really hard on
Speaker:circumlocution with my students these
Speaker:last four years just to teach them okay
Speaker:you don't know that word you can describe
Speaker:it and stick that
Speaker:description in there yeah.
Speaker:Absolutely because we do that all the
Speaker:time in the languages that we're most
Speaker:comfortable in right all the time.
Speaker:Oh you know that thing I was talking
Speaker:about the other day the one with the you
Speaker:know we do it all the time we do do it.
Speaker:Absolutely okay we
Speaker:are 20 minutes over so.
Speaker:That's pretty good because
Speaker:normally we're half an hour.
Speaker:This one we stayed mostly on topic though
Speaker:we did stay really good on topic this
Speaker:week so thank you all for that.
Speaker:So everybody that's episode forty four
Speaker:thank you for spending your Sunday
Speaker:wrestling with a grading system that is
Speaker:never built for what we actually teach.
Speaker:Tracy thank you for joining us and
Speaker:showing us what it looks like when
Speaker:students actually assess their own growth
Speaker:and a rubric becomes something kids work
Speaker:toward instead of something they dread.
Speaker:I owe you a coffee or
Speaker:not hot chocolate isn't it.
Speaker:That's my favorite you know.
Speaker:Hot chocolate and probably some chocolate
Speaker:too because I've heard
Speaker:that's the real currency.
Speaker:Thank you as always especially for
Speaker:meeting the workaround you never said out
Speaker:loud on a podcast before.
Speaker:That's the kind of honesty that makes
Speaker:this show worth listening to so if you
Speaker:needed to hear that the mismatch is real
Speaker:that you're not the only one quietly
Speaker:fighting that grade book.
Speaker:And that there's at least one concrete
Speaker:thing you can try this grading period you
Speaker:got it today subscribe leave a review and
Speaker:share this with the teacher in your
Speaker:department currently staring at a
Speaker:progress report that just doesn't add up.
Speaker:They'll feel less alone by the end of it
Speaker:catch us live on YouTube or find the
Speaker:replay on your favorite podcast out ditch
Speaker:the drills trust the process and I'll see
Speaker:you next time on comprehend this.
Speaker:Bye bye everybody.
Speaker:Bye everyone.
Speaker:Bye my students who are listening in.
Speaker:Here we go.
