In an effort to explore this shift in education and highlight how teachers are rising to the challenge, CCSSO is launching Voices from the Classroom: The State Teacher of the Year Podcast. Through the first series, My First Lesson of the Year, we hear directly from the 2020 State Teachers of the Year on what the return to school was like from an educators’ perspective.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: [Background Music] Hey everyone, Sarah Brown-Wessling here from the Council of Chief State School Officers National Teacher of the Year Program. And I'm excited to introduce Voices from the Classroom, the State Teacher of the Year podcast. CCSSO's National Teacher of the Year Program provides a platform for exceptional educators to elevate issues that affect teachers and their students to expand their leadership roles and to inform policy and practice. I was named National Teacher of the Year in 2010 and since then, I've been committed to sharing the stories and elevating the voices of state teachers of the year. It is my hope that this podcast will give you insight into the incredible work they do. As we are very much aware, the 2020-2021 school year is so different from anything we could have imagined. Not only do the physical classroom environments look different for students, they feel different. As educators navigate responding to two radical changes in our society, the COVID-19 pandemic and the heightened awareness of institutionalized racism. Through this first series, my first lesson of the year, we hope to capture the true essence of the return to school from an educator's perspective. In these episodes, the 2020 State Teachers of the Year will walk us through the ways they are approaching instruction and maintaining a connection with their students in this new environment. You can join the conversation on social media too, by using the hashtag ntoy20 or by visiting us online at ntoy.org. That's N-T-O-Y.org. Let's begin. This is Sarah Brown-Wessling. Welcome, Chris Dier and thank you for joining me for this conversation today about lessons from the classroom as we teach in a pandemic. How are you?
>> Chris Dier: I'm doing all right. Yeah, my name is Chris Dier. And I represent Louisiana. I'm the 2020 Louisiana Teacher of the Year and I teach US history at Ben Franklin High School in New Orleans.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Wonderful. And you are completely online right now?
>> Chris Dier: Completely virtual. Completely virtual.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Got you. Well, we are really curious. Can you tell us about one of your first lessons of this year?
>> Chris Dier: Sure. Yeah, so I'm actually -- this is my first year at the school. So it was interesting to teach at a new school and do it virtually. But one thing that I wanted to do was give the students an opportunity to tell me about the school itself. So, some teachers and I got together a document-based question, what should we know about Franklin, and we got together different documents like Google reviews that people have left and different -- yeah, emails that, you know, were sent out. And over the summer, the students collectively wrote a letter calling for more equity within the school and for the school to address, you know, racial disparities and lack of teachers of color and I thought it was really powerful. So I took some snippets of that letter and put it into DBQ.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: And I think the students saw that and was -- they respected it like, you know, he's --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Absolutely.
>> Chris Dier: -- trying a bit and then they -- so they got -- they had the opportunity to tell me about the school and sort of teach me and I thought that was a really fun lesson. I got to know about the school through their lens instead of --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: -- you know, I've heard. The next lesson that I did -- and this is all in collaboration with other teachers, by the way, it's not just --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Wonderful.
>> Chris Dier: -- my idea, I think.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: But I had them listen to a local podcast that discuss the history of New Orleans from the perspective of the indigenous. So before New Orleans was founded by the French, it was called the Bulbancha. And so, this podcast explored the 300-year anniversary of New Orleans that people were celebrating. But it also highlighted the history of New Orleans before the French and the Spanish came here. And it interviewed multiple people from different nations from, you know, people in the African-American community and their intersection, and how that shows in its culture. For instance, the black community here has the Mardi Gras Indians, which is a really famous type of cultural, you know, trait that is here when people dress up in, you know, beautiful beaded garments, and whatnot.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: So we did that. And then we got to talk about the history. I gave them an opportunity to talk about the history of their name as well. So they can talk to me about what their name is, what it means. And so, I got to know about the school and some background about them, but also wanted to let them know that we're going to learn about different histories in here, not just, you know, things in the textbooks or not just, you know, and I think there was some concern there from the students. So I would say that first lessons were -- went pretty well, all things considered.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: That is so wonderful. There's so much in those descriptions that I think it's just so powerful. So first of all, some teachers may not know what a DBQ is, but I think it would be helpful, right? Because you're kind of layering here. So when you talk about --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: You know, creating a DBQ, that's also a get to know you learn about the school lesson. You're like layering some central skills to what you teach, right?
>> Chris Dier: Right, right. And a DBQ essentially is, it starts off with a question, a document-based question and the question that I post is what should I know about Franklin as a new teacher? And then I gather the documents that we analyze together.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: And the conclusion is they let me know and DBQs are something that is really, you know, popular in AP US history. So, it's something they're going to have to learn how to do. So I thought it was an interesting way to kind of teach that skills content, but also incorporate it with a get to know you. And then they, the kids can tell me about the school and what I need to know. So I thought --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Right.
>> Chris Dier: Yeah, I enjoy that as well. And --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Well, that's so neat. I mean, I think it takes these skills that can sometimes feel really intimidating. And it makes them accessible. It makes them personally relevant. And I think it just really gives them access to this critical thinking. I think through the -- just this really powerful lens. And like you said that you are exploring all of these histories, right? That there's -- they're -- like, that's part of the work is telling the story from different vantage points and telling as much of the stories as we possibly can.
>> Chris Dier: Right. Yeah. And I want to do that real quick. I wanted to let them know that that's what it's going to be about. So, you know, history, we live in New Orleans and rich history here and why not dissect that from the get go, from the start.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: And so much more powerful than just saying, I value local histories. You're actually, you know, embedding it in those first days. So whether you say it or not, they know it. They've experienced it. They've lived it.
>> Chris Dier: Right. Yeah. This is their history. This is not just -- yeah, so.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah, that's so neat. So, I'm kind of imagining the ways that this is different than how you usually start the year. But I would like to hear that from you.
>> Chris Dier: Where do I begin? This is very different from my usual start of the year. I'm not teaching in a parish that I taught in for 10 years. So -- It's a neighboring parish, which might not seem like a big deal outside of Louisiana, but people are, you know, people stick to their neighborhoods and their parishes here. So I'm teaching in a place where I may have been born here but I'm not actually like from here --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Sure.
>> Chris Dier: -- in New Orleans. So that was different to do that. And to do it virtual was incredibly challenging, as well. So, yeah. So teacher virtually, and in a new school and a new environment, I think it was incredibly challenging. So these first few days, I couldn't do any collaborative assignments in terms of, you know, getting up and getting to know one another and having that physical face-to-face. So, trying to compensate that with these different lessons and ideas here. It was a challenge, but we made it work. And that's what we had to do as teachers, right? We have to continually make it work whenever we can with what we have.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: So true. So what did you learn from this?
>> Chris Dier: One thing that I learned is that students were eager to be back in some type of classroom setting, virtual or otherwise. So they were excited to see one another. They knew one another. They were eager to see, you know, what kind of teacher I was going to be and who I was going to be. So, I learned that -- I also learned that they are interested in learning about histories that are not, you know, just centered on whiteness, or colonization and whatnot. So -- And that's what they wrote about in their letter. So that's something that I realized was very clear from the start. And I also learned that, you know, virtual teaching is hard. I learned that from the start.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Right.
>> Chris Dier: It's not easy to replicate what happens in the classroom over the computer screen. And I think all teachers know that. But I also learned that it is doable. That it can be done with the right tools, the right guidance and the right mindset. So, yeah, I would say that I learned a lot about my students. I think they got to know me a bit. And I learned just the challenges of virtual learning.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Right.
>> Chris Dier: Also the successes of virtual learning.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah, yeah. Well, it takes patience for sure.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: And it just, it moves at a different pace. And some things seem faster and some things seem slower. And just, you know, relearning all of that I think is tough and also in some ways, it's kind of liberating, because I think it forces us back into some really central questions about who we are as teachers and about our craft, and maybe some questions we haven't asked ourselves in a long time.
>> Chris Dier: Yeah. And I think also there's a lot of issues that are always happening. With virtual learning like you don't really, you know, experience in the classroom. I was teaching a class in the first week, and my dog got tangled up in my headset wire, and just completely like, you know, choke me and the kids are just watching this go down. And then he unplugged the internet. And I'm kicked off my own calls. They were real chill about it. But --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Yeah.
>> Chris Dier: -- it's like -- this is, you know, something that you don't expect to happen but --
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Right.
>> Chris Dier: -- you're just teaching all of a sudden, it's absolute chaos.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: And there it is. And there it is. Well Chris, thank you so much for taking the time to, you know, have this conversation to be so transparent about your classroom and to share the ways that you're figuring this out and making this work. So, we're really excited to share this with teachers broadly. And I know it's going to inspire people the way that it has inspired me. So thanks so much.
>> Chris Dier: All right. Well, thanks so much for having me, Sarah. It's my pleasure.
>> Sarah Brown-Wessling: Absolutely. [Background Music] Thank you for listening to the first series of Voices from the Classroom, the State Teacher of the Year podcast. This podcast is brought to you by the Council of Chief State School Officers, National Teacher of the Year Program. It's our honor to elevate the voices of educators across the country and provide them with a national platform to amplify their message and advocate on behalf of their students and colleagues. Please share these lessons on social media with the hashtag ntoy20. That's hashtag N-T-O-Y 2, zero. Let's keep the conversation going.
