In this episode of Navigating Education - The Podcast, Dr. Rhoads discusses with Jillian DuBois, who is the contributing author of one of Navigating the Toggled Term: A Guide for K-12 Classroom and School Leaders Chapter 12 case study on educator self-care. Her topic in the case study on self-care is on letting go of perfectionism and focusing on joy versus happiness. Our conversation in this podcast outlines her evolution as an educator as well as how she navigated the past 15 months as an elementary teacher. The conversation then discusses how letting go of perfectionism takes a lot of stress and anxiety off not only the teacher but develops a culture within classrooms that is beneficial to student learning and social-emotional well-being. Finally, Jillian provides a great analogy contrasting happiness and joy, which can help educators avoid burnout and model to students that we can find joy in our challenges and successes without it fleeting over time.

Order the Book: Navigating the Toggled Term: A Guide for K-12 Classroom and School Leaders

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Jillian DuBois currently serves as an elementary educator in Clearwater, Florida. She earned a Bachelor’s in Education and has worked both in public and private educational settings for over two decades. Her journey continues to bring much JOY and fulfillment as Jillian thrives on building authentic relationships with her students and guiding their curiosity and wonder. She relies on ed-tech tools such as Wakelet, Flipgrid, and Nearpod to strengthen differentiation and uses her voice to foster hope for student equity and empathy. Her passion is to initiate, instill, and infuse joy to those in educational leadership through blogs and podcasts. She focuses her efforts on learning, stretching, and growing alongside colleagues and her Twitter PLN. Currently, Jillian is the Optimistic Originator of Imparted Joy LLC and author of a number of children’s books. Jillian personally spends her free time outdoors, soaking up the sun and surf and finding new paths to hike with her husband and son.

Twitter: @jilldubois22

Website: www.impartedjoy.com

In this bonus episode of Navigating Education - The Podcast, Dr. Rhoads interviews Mark Ureel who is a contributing author for the chapter three case study in the book Navigating the Toggled Term: A Guide for K-12 Classroom and School Leaders.  Within his case study, Mark outlines how he utilized instructional strategies to amplify his students learning in several classroom settings. In our conversation, we discussed how Mr. Ureel has toggled numerous times throughout the school year (more so than many teachers throughout the country) and he gave some great ideas on how to navigate multiple classroom settings throughout the school year. Additionally, Mr. Ureel and Dr. Matt discussed Project-Based Learning. Mr. Ureel provided us some insight as to how he utilizes the strategy to create personalization and student choice in his classroom setting. He also outlined how he was able to sustain PBL instructional model for his classroom throughout the many toggles that happened throughout the school year. 

Order the Book: Navigating the Toggled Term: A Guide for K-12 Classroom and School Leaders

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio: Mark Ureel, Middle School Social Science Teacher

 Mark Ureel is a secondary educator from Canton, Michigan. He has had the honor of teaching middle school Social Studies and Spanish to hundreds of remarkable young adults for 17 years.  He earned his bachelor’s degree in History with a minor in Spanish from Oakland University, a minor for teaching certification in Social Studies from Eastern Michigan University, and a master’s degree in Educational Leadership from Grand Valley State University.  In 2017, he was awarded the Grand Valley State University Charter School Office’s Outstanding Teacher of the Year.  He attributes his success in education to his amazing teammates, administrators, and wife, who have provided him with support and guidance throughout the years.

Twitter: @markureel

In this episode, Dr. Neil Anderson was interviewed by Dr. Rhoads on the topic of Fine Arts and Music Education. Dr. Anderson provided his background and context in education, which provides listeners a great synopsis of the state of fine arts and music within education. Throughout our conversation, we discuss how to embed fine arts and music into the curriculum as well as being active collaborators to create cross-curricular learning experiences for students. Additionally, Dr. Anderson outlined mechanisms to help retain music and arts teachers as they are some of the vulnerable teachers to leaving the profession. Last, we outlined how Dr. Anderson's current work of his podcast and professional learning opportunities, can connect art and music educators with general education teachers and school leaders to create opportunities for enhancing the arts education in schools. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio: Neil Anderson, Ed.D. Assistant Principal, Podcaster, and Arts & Music Consultant

Originally from Scottland, Dr. Anderson is an Assistant Principal based in Orange County. He has a Bachelor of Music from San Diego State University. He received his Masters Degree in Music Education and his doctorate in Educational Leadership from Concordia University, Irvine. Dr. Anderson spent over 13 years as a Music and Band Teacher at the secondary level and then moved to being a Visual and Performing Arts Coordinator at the district level. Right now, he is producing a podcast called Musings from the Cheap Seats, which was released in June 2021. 

Twitter: @_neila78

Podcast: Musings from the Cheap Seats

In Episode 14, Dr. Rhoads interviews Dr. Jasara Hines on the topic of cultural responsiveness and teaching. Throughout the conversation, we discussed what culturally responsive teaching looks like within classroom settings as well as how to establish and maintain relationships with students using many strategies related to culturally responsive pedagogy. Dr. Hines outlined her experience incorporating culturally responsive teaching into AVID courses at the secondary level in addition to embedding it throughout the curriculum. This is an episode you will not want to miss out on as it is very practical and discusses several key strategies every educator can implement within classrooms and schools that are culturally responsive and relevant to students. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio - Jasara Hines, Ph.D., Secondary English Teacher and AVID Coordinator

 Dr. Jasara Hines earned her Ph.D. from the University of Central Florida in Texts and Technology. She continuously seeks to research and implement strategies for creating technology-infused classrooms that encourage civic engagement and student voice. Dr. Hines is an AVID program coordinator at Thornwood High School, which is located in the south suburbs of Chicago, IL, and is in her 17th year of teaching. She is also a Google Certified Trainer and Coach, who spends the majority of her non-teaching time providing professional development and coaching opportunities to faculty and staff.

Twitter: @hinesjasara

Today on Navigating Education - The Podcast, Dr. Rhoads interviews Greg Bagby, a district-level EdTech Instructional Coordinator, about EdTech Leadership within schools and districts. Mr. Bagby has many years of experience integrating EdTech at the school and district level. He discusses how to set up an infrastructure of relationships, coaching, and goals to help establish and maintain EdTech integration in classroom and school settings. As the podcast draws to a close, Dr. Matt asks Mr. Bagby about advice for new and upcoming EdTech leaders. He provides several key points that all leaders, including EdTech leaders, should take note as they take on leadership opportunities and positions. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio: Greg Bagby, Coordinator of Instructional Technology

Greg Bagby is currently a Coordinator of Instructional Technology. He has held many hats in education, including being a principal and teacher. He enjoys the arts and technology education and has written extensively about his experiences in education in his blog.

Twitter: @gregbagby

Website: www.gregbagby.blogpost.com

In this episode, Dr. Rhoads interviews Zach Groshell, who is a Director of Educational Technology and a Ph.D. student in Instructional Design and Online Learning on the topic of cognitive load and its effect on learning. To begin, we define cognitive load theory and then discuss how practices on how we can limit its effects on our student's working memories. Zach provides a number of strategies teachers can do using EdTech tools and learning management systems to limit the effects of cognitive load on students. In this same conversation, Zach outlines his Ph.D. study on cognitive load where he describes the study and experimental design. Then, following this conversation, Dr. Matt asks Zach how we can limit cognitive load when we are assessing our students and providing feedback. Overall, this episode provides many strategies to help students learn and to optimize teacher instruction in online, blended learning, and traditional in-person classrooms. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio - Zach Groshell: Director of Educational Technology 

Zach Groshell is the Director of Educational Technology at a school in Washington State. He has taught in several countries around the world and has a superb worldview on education. Additionally, he is in the process of earning his Ph.D. in Instructional Design and Online Learning. He has quite a presence on Twitter and enjoys posting academic research articles related to how people learn. Check out his website at www.educationrichshaw to learn more about Zach and his work as well as follow him on Twitter @MrZachG. 

On Episode 11 of Navigating Education - The Podcast, Dr. Rhoads interviewed Matthew Downing an EdTech coach and integrationist on the topic of Attitudes/Beliefs and Relationships as the Foundation of Technology Integration. This conversation focused on establishing positive views and beliefs related to integrating technology use in the classroom setting. We discussed how to begin those conversations as well as maintain those conversations over the course of the school year, which focused on having collaborative conversations with teachers. Dr. Matt outlined a few of his favorite coaching techniques based on the Diffusion of Innovations theory, which focuses on making practices more efficient. Additionally, Dr. Matt aligned developing attitudes, beliefs, and relationships towards EdTech integration to Michael Fullan and Joanne Quinn's Coherence Framework. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com 

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

Guest Bio - Matthew Downing: EdTech Integrationist and Coach

Matthew Downing is an experienced educator interested in the way technology transforms the learning process, and engages students in authentic learning experiences. Podcast host of DivingDeepEDU and co-host of RethinkingEDU. Check out mdowningedu.com for more information on Matthew and his podcasts and follow him on Twitter @mdowningedu. 

In this episode, Dr. Rhoads discusses how to select research-based instructional strategies as well as EdTech tools and integrate them together to amplify student learning. Dr. Matt outlines each of these steps in addition to discussing how to implement the strategy integration within classrooms and practice it over time with students. The goal of this podcast is to illustrate to teachers and leaders we can implement strategies that help our students learn with mainstream EdTech tools to further amplify their learning as well as show the framework of how to do it within our lesson design. Ultimately, this is something all modern classrooms need to have as we live in the digital age. Last, we must remember that the strategies and pedagogy are what drive our technology use, which is reiterated throughout this episode. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

In this episode, Dr. Rhoads discusses what classroom routines should look like within digital and physical spaces that encompass modern classrooms. Beginning with outlining what classroom routines are, Dr. Matt provides a framework for how they are defined and how they can be implemented. Then, he goes on to discuss digital and physical classroom routines. This involves EdTech integration as well as navigating physical spaces and relationship building using strategies such as restorative justice and student-involved classroom norms. Last, there is a short conversation on bridging and blended physical and digital classroom routines in addition to what makes them successful over time for teachers and students alike. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D. 

In this episode, Dr. Rhoads discusses how Special Education teachers along with service providers for students with special needs can optimize their case management with EdTech tools. With large caseloads and fires to put out, teachers working with students on their caseload need to build systems and procedures along with integrating EdTech to make their case management efficient and effective. The three segments discussed in this podcast include what does Special Education case management look like as well as its challenges, how we can leverage EdTech to enhance case management, and tips and tricks to effective case management. Ultimately, the goal of this podcast episode is to discuss how this can be done in a very practical way. Thus, by the end of this episode, listeners will have several strategies they can utilize to amplify their case management. 

Website: www.matthewrhoads.com

Twitter: @mattrhoads1990

LinkedIn: Matt Rhoads, Ed.D.