All Teachers are Teachers of Reading

Series 2 Teacher to Teacher Podcast

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[00:00:02.59] NARRATOR 1: Welcome to Corwin's Teacher to Teacher podcast with host Carol Pelletier Radford. Carol is an experienced classroom teacher and university educator, founder of mentoringinaction.com and author of four bestselling professional books for teachers. She believes the best form of professional learning happens when teachers engage in authentic conversations and share their wisdom.

[00:00:23.97] In every episode, Carol and her guests share stories about pivotal moments in their careers, successful classroom strategies, and personal actions they take to minimize stress and stay healthy. The Teacher to Teacher podcast is a place to engage in authentic conversation and reflection with experienced educators. We hope these conversations will energize you, keep you inspired, and remind you why you chose to become a teacher.

[00:00:48.42] TORI MELLO BACHMAN: Hello. Welcome to the Teacher to Teacher podcast, sharing our wisdom with our host Carol Radford. I am Tori Bachman, a Corwin editor and co-producer of this podcast, which we've created for teachers at all levels who are searching for practical wisdom they can use in their classrooms.

[00:01:05.41] We believe we're all constantly learning and we're learning together. I'm excited to introduce today's guests-- two dynamic and wise educators here with Carol to share their wisdom and some stories from their teaching. On today's podcast we will talk with Jennifer Serravallo and Jessica Concha. Jennifer Serravallo is a New York Times best selling author, award-winning educator, literacy consultant, frequently invited speaker at state and national conferences, and former member of the Parents magazine editorial board.

[00:01:38.07] Jen is best known for creating books and resources rooted in research that help make responsive, strategic, differentiated literacy instruction possible for all educators. In 2023, Jen launched her podcast, To the Classroom-- Conversations with Researchers & Educators, and her new book with Corwin titled Teaching Reading Across the Day, K-8 is available in April of 2024. Hi, Jen. Welcome to Teacher to Teacher.

[00:02:07.74] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Thank you so much for having me. Hi, Tori.

[00:02:11.05] TORI MELLO BACHMAN: And Jessica Concha is in her fifth year teaching and currently teaches fifth grade English language arts in Forsyth County schools in Georgia. She serves on the Positive Learning Committee at her school. Jessica has a passion for helping her students become better readers and writers. And she loves to collaborate with other teachers to promote deeper student thinking.

[00:02:32.52] Jessica is also one of the educators who's featured in Carol's recent book titled, When I Started Teaching, I Wish I Had Known-- Weekly Wisdom for Beginning Teachers. Hi, Jessica.

[00:02:44.48] JESSICA CONCHA: Hi. Thanks for having me.

[00:02:46.02] TORI MELLO BACHMAN: Thanks for being here. We're so happy to have both of you today. We've been really looking forward to this conversation, and we appreciate the time that you're taking to talk with us and to share some wisdom with educators out in the world. So I will now turn this over to Carol.

[00:03:02.05] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Thanks, Tori. So what I love about this podcast is that we have teachers at all stages and ages of their career sharing wisdom. And sometimes we think wisdom has to come after you've taught for 40 years. And that certainly is the case. And I call those legacy teachers. And I admire and acknowledge and honor all the teachers who have really committed to a career in education.

[00:03:32.99] But what I really love and enjoy is having Jessica here, who's a fifth-year teacher and having her share her wisdom as a beginner, and also Jen-- who is a former teacher who's now such a gifted writer and her gifts and talents are sharing with all of us how we can collaborate with each other and just be the best teachers we can be. So I'm grateful to Corwin for this Teacher to Teacher podcast where we create conversations.

[00:04:07.23] So I want to just dive in and have each of you introduce yourself by telling me what you're doing right now and maybe share, did you always want to be a teacher or what's the hidden story? Jessica, I'm going to start with you, our beginning teacher.

[00:04:25.80] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. Thanks for having me. I was really excited when I found out I had this opportunity being so early on in my career. I'm excited to hopefully share some encouragement with new teachers. This is currently my fifth year. And I've only been teaching fifth grade. And I can't remember wanting to be anything else but a teacher. My desire to work in a classroom with kids came from the positive impact that I had and specifically from my third grade teacher Mrs. Davis.

[00:04:55.71] I was always quiet in school. I felt like sometimes I flew under the radar. And she was the first teacher that I remember that would help me when I was struggling. But most importantly, she would share my success with me and pull me over to congratulate me and celebrate my growth. And so that kind of helped me start my mindset of this is what I want to do one day to help teachers. Because it completely changed how I was as a student.

[00:05:21.90] I learned to speak up for myself, to advocate for myself within the classroom, and I'm excited now that I get to do that for my kids at school.

[00:05:29.76] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Oh. I love that. A lot of times when I was doing teacher education pre-service, beginning teachers and student teaching weren't sure what grade level they wanted to teach. So I know you referenced your third grade teacher, and is that why you chose to do elementary, or did you have any other options for teaching other grade levels? I'm always curious about that.

[00:05:52.38] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. I've always been drawn to early elementary education. I definitely think that's why as having Mrs. Davis be that influence, it was elementary where I decided I wanted to become a teacher. So I feel like those early on years are so important in student's life. And I was excited to build to do that.

[00:06:08.49] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Well, so I want to dive in a little bit more before we go to Jen. Could you tell me then what a pivotal moment has been in your small but very rewarding career of five years? What has happened to you that stands out as influencing you and the decisions that you've made as a teacher? And you're still teaching. Yes. I'm so happy about that.

[00:06:32.54] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. Absolutely. I think the hardest thing for me when I first started teaching was I had all these ideas from college. You start your first year and you come with so many different ideas from your professors and just from student teaching and observing different teachers. And I was so excited to try and do all those within my classroom.

[00:06:52.11] But the problem was I wasn't seeing the success of them working and I wasn't sure why at first, every weekend, I would be reading different books or listening to podcasts and trying to find the next best strategy of what's supposed to be the best classroom management strategy within your classroom.

[00:07:10.02] So it wasn't until my third year that I actually decided, I'm going to try one strategy and just stick with it. Because every couple of weeks, I was trying something different. And that changed my entire classroom management system and just the climate of my classroom as a whole. The biggest thing I learned was setting procedures within my classroom.

[00:07:33.03] And so the kids knew expectations, they knew how to sharpen a pencil, how am I supposed to ask to go to the restroom, and then that allowed me to grow better as a teacher and continue getting better within my classroom management.

[00:07:47.72] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I love that. So you were teaching the students what to do and modeling it just like you're teaching your content and everything else and that gave you the freedom. I can remember when I was doing-- I taught fifth grade as well for 21 years. Loved fifth grade. And I remember one day what my kids loved the most is when I did a role play of what not to do. And everybody wanted to do that.

[00:08:13.48] So they were like, can I volunteer to go-- this is what you don't do to do this. And they'd fall off the chair and they'd do all the things that we didn't want them to do. But they knew the difference. So--

[00:08:28.15] JESSICA CONCHA: I love that.

[00:08:28.81] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: --reminding me about that. And the beginning teacher listeners or any teacher that's having issues, I think routines and rituals really do make that difference to managing to kind of minimize the misbehavior issues that come from distractions.

[00:08:46.24] JESSICA CONCHA: Yes. And I also learned-- this is not a beginning of the school year thing. I mean, every single week, we go over reminders of the expectation. And I think it's just constantly having that part of your classroom conversation and to remind them. Whereas I thought my first year that I taught it to them once you know within that first week or two of school and that they should have it. But they need repetition over and over.

[00:09:12.92] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Thank you. Thank you for saying that. It's all about the repetition and the reminders. And the that's all part of it. So that's a lot of wisdom that I don't you wish you had it in your first year.

[00:09:24.68] JESSICA CONCHA: Yes. Absolutely.

[00:09:26.05] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: We'll talk more about that. So all the listeners can absorb that information. Jen, what are you doing now? I know you're a published author of many books. And did you always want to be a teacher? And a little background on your teaching.

[00:09:42.74] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I did always want to be a teacher. The kind of teacher I wanted to be changed. I remember when I was really little, I wanted to be a preschool teacher, that was like when I was in kindergarten. I said I wanted to be a preschool teacher because [INAUDIBLE]. I was like drawing out what my preschool classroom would look like. I was making like classroom maps at age six.

[00:10:01.88] And then later, I fell in love with theater in high school and I thought I wanted to be a theater teacher. And then I got to college. And I was like, no. Not theater. And so I found my way into elementary education. And had a lot-- I really was an elementary school teacher who loved all the subjects.

[00:10:19.94] I loved teaching science, I loved teaching math, I loved teaching history, I loved teaching ELA. All my books really now are more focused on reading and writing. But I love all the subjects. And I just love the ages.

[00:10:32.44] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: And you taught in New York City-- you taught in New York City for how many years or how many--

[00:10:38.90] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Yeah. For many years after college. Yeah.

[00:10:41.00] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Oh. I love that. So pivotal moment. You're a writer now. Tell me a little bit about what you're doing now from the teaching and then we'll go into-- I want to hear your pivotal moment.

[00:10:53.18] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Well, I never thought I was going to be a writer. That never-- in all my drawing of classroom maps when I was younger, I never thought I was going to write a book one day. And in fact, even if you asked me in college, I would have said, I have a hard enough time getting out of 15-page paper. I can't imagine writing a book.

[00:11:08.69] So I have a lot of pivotal moments and a lot of people I'm grateful to for my career. But I think one thing that comes to mind was early on in my career, I had a classmate from college, her name is Stephanie Lucas. She's a principal now at another school in New York City. And she taught at a school in Manhattan, and there was this holiday in New York City called Brooklyn Queens Day, where the Brooklyn schools and the Queens schools were closed for a holiday but the Manhattan schools were not.

[00:11:34.58] So I went and I visited her one day at her Manhattan school and immediately saw what a giant difference the school community was. At my school in Brooklyn, the doors were always closed, the teachers didn't collaborate, there were no coaches, no outside consultants, but what was so different about this other school was the professional learning community.

[00:11:57.21] So teachers met together at lunch and they planned together. They visit each other's classrooms and gave each other feedback. There was a coach on staff, in the school to come and give you feedback on your lessons and help you plan. And there were outside consultants from teachers college that came and supported us. And it was just such a different. And I made the decision to go and teach at this other school. And I'm so, so glad I did, because I think it just opened my eyes to what a difference that amount of support is, especially for a new teacher.

[00:12:31.16] But I think it's true for any stage in your career. You can always get better. And one of the things that's so amazing about teaching is that we have these opportunities to be creative, to outgrow our best thinking, to stay up-to-date with the most current research, and that just takes an ongoing curiosity and I think collaboration with colleagues. So this second school had that. And I got to experience that. And I think that is what eventually led me to wanting to support teachers in the classroom.

[00:13:00.54] So that is what I do now. You asked me, Carol, what to do now, I support teachers in the classroom, either through coaching directly, through speaking at workshops and events like that. And I also lead a team of consultants. And so I visit them in schools and I support them in their planning. So I really do a lot of work around professional learning and then also through my books, of course, as another way to reach teachers.

[00:13:23.49] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I'm always inspired by these stories of pivotal moments because when we go back and reflect and then talk about them, articulate it out loud, it shows a clear path to how you changed your vision, your expertise, the way you taught. So Jessica, what do you think about her story, about changing schools? Not that she changed schools. No. But how she made that decision, how Jen made that decision. Did anything resonate with you?

[00:13:56.08] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. I always reflect on the fact that I'm just so fortunate at the school that I started out at. We have people in place at our school where we do have coaches and we have the things that Jen was sharing. And I don't think I realized that that's not at every school.

[00:14:13.03] And so that that's just, I think, really encouraging for the new teachers to know that if you are at a school where something doesn't seem right or you're not super happy that there are other places. And you can always grow and learn from others. And I think that's huge that Jen was able to share that.

[00:14:29.74] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I know you mentioned you were on a committee in your second year positive-- a positive learning committee. At the very beginning of your career, what was that like for you?

[00:14:42.09] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. I was really excited where we helped support the staff where we help-- involve different things within their classrooms that could help their kids while maybe it's helping them do a classroom morning meeting, what does that look like? And just establishing those routines to help teachers. And it was fun to be able to collaborate with other teachers. We have one teacher from each grade level on this committee where we get together about once a month to review different things that we could share out with the other staff.

[00:15:11.30] So what I think it's really important, and Jen you can chime in, is that we bring beginning teachers in early. That in the second year, it's OK. We don't have to wait until teachers have taught for 10, 20, 30 years to be part of these committees. And I know beginning teachers have a lot on their plate. But I don't know. What do you think about that idea, Jen?

[00:15:32.12] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Oh. I couldn't agree more. I was going to tell you earlier that I think it's so wise for you to be inviting people newer to the profession on this podcast because I remember in those early days how exponential my learning was. Like you have no choice but to rapidly outgrow your best thinking every single day. And I think when that new learning is just so top of mind, teachers at every stage of their career have so much to share and should be participants in professional learning in all ways.

[00:16:08.02] Leading it, participating in it, and I think like I said before, having those experiences and getting an opportunity to be creative and be collaborative I think helps keep people in the profession. So yeah. All of that. Absolutely.

[00:16:22.66] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: And I think retention is-- it's a big issue right now. We all know. And it's not a simple solution because as you shared, schools have their own cultures. And then teachers have their own learning processes like Jessica was sharing. Like, it took her three years to kind of figure out it wasn't like she was making any mistake but to make a decision about I just need to teach this. Now, maybe somebody told you, Jessica, but it didn't sink in the same way until you experienced in practice.

[00:16:54.76] So what I like about these conversations is this wisdom is coming from practice. However, having said that, research does have its place. And I know Jen, you highlight all your books and your writing as research and practice. I'd like you to just say a little bit about that because a lot of teachers that I work with are just like, oh. I don't really want to hear about the research. Give me the practical strategies. I just want to do it. And you have made a real effort to integrate the research and practice. And I don't know. Tell me a little bit about that.

[00:17:35.04] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I think it's really important to honor the kinds of things that we know from research work. It can save us time. If we have a meta-analysis that has looked at a number of different studies and see what rises to the top as a practice that really seems to make an impact on kids rather than trying a bunch of things, we could try that first. It could save time, help us cut to the chase, help us make the biggest impact on kids.

[00:18:01.76] At the same time, I think we need to be realistic that sometimes the researchers that are conducting these studies are not actually conducting them in classrooms. And often, they don't have the experience that Jessica or I have in being with kids every day, day in and day out. It's even rare sometimes to find a researcher that's in classrooms at all, let alone spending every day, day in and day out, year over year.

[00:18:27.34] So I think we really need to be honoring the experience and wisdom from teachers alongside the kinds of things that we've learned from research. And like you said, one of the things that I try to do is to be very informed about that research. I've got you know 600 studies in my last book, 300 in this new book that's coming out with Corwin. I mean, I read a lot of research.

[00:18:48.44] But I also have one foot in the classroom. And I can read the research and think, how could this look in the classroom? Or which of this is actually helpful for a teacher that has a million things. Like you said, Jessica, you can find a million different ways that you could go about this. But what's the thing that feels the most doable, the most realistic, the most practical, and that's what I try to share with the teachers that I work with. So you know the research, but you also have the practical classroom.

[00:19:15.29] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Yes. This is so inspiring and to hear you honor the busyness of teachers because we can't just keep piling it on anymore. It's too much. So to have someone like you that we trust and that you read the research and synthesize it for us so that you are pulling out the strategies, but like as Jessica said, there are so many. She had to find the one that fits for her as well.

[00:19:43.59] And yes. The protocol of teaching the kids how to do it or not do it is part of a procedure. But that's also based in research as well. So the teaching of the strategies. I'd like to-- actually, Jen, let's go into this-- say, the title of this new book. Give me a little-- what would I expect to see. When I open this book, I know it's not quite out yet. And how would it help me?

[00:20:08.06] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: So it's called Teaching Reading Across the Day. And there's a few themes and threads throughout the book that I could highlight. So one is that I think we all need to be reading teachers. And that means math teachers, science teachers, social studies teachers, of course, ELA teachers. We need to think about how do we help develop proficient readers and what can that look like in our specific disciplines.

[00:20:31.37] So there's lots of videos of me teaching in science classrooms and history classrooms and ELA classrooms, literature, informational texts, expository texts. And what does reading look like in those different areas and those different domains? Another thread throughout the book is the importance of predictable structures.

[00:20:50.36] So like I already said, I like to keep things as streamlined. I don't want to say simple, but doable. Manageable. And so I have these nine different teaching structures that you can use in any discipline. And I talk about the gradual release of responsibility and structures that have a little bit more teacher support and structures that offer kids a little bit more opportunity for independent practice.

[00:21:13.31] And what these structures look like, how they're paced, how they're timed, how they're organized, and it's really kind of like a drag and drop your content into this planning template and you get to see it in small group and whole class on videos and different grade levels. And it kind of works universally no matter what.

[00:21:30.32] So the idea there is, we don't need a million ways a lesson can go. And in fact, it's better if they don't go a million different ways because kids come to expect what their job is, what the teacher's job is, what's expected of them. Like you were saying, Jessica, like the routines and the repetition of the structure frees up kids' cognitive energy to be able to focus on the content and what you're teaching.

[00:21:54.76] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: And you give us another thing-- can you just give us an example of one of the structures that [INAUDIBLE] just so I can understand?

[00:22:04.74] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Yeah. So there's a range. Everything from what makes a good phonics lesson and how a good phonics lesson goes to how to do a really tight, explicit read aloud lesson so that kids leave with concrete strategies as well as knowledge and vocabulary. How to do close reading lessons with older kids to help them analyze and interpret. So it's a variety of different types of lesson structures for different situations and different purposes but that can be used across different content and contexts.

[00:22:36.49] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: So that's really interesting because I do believe every teacher is a teacher of reading because you can't be a math teacher if the student can't read the word problem. The science is all through the reading. And I think-- so my two sons are teachers, my husband's a former teacher. And teachers-- high school teachers, especially, kind of balked at, well, wait a second. I'm teaching math here. I'm teaching science here. So how do you convert or integrate or influence teachers at the middle and high school level to do this or any of it?

[00:23:13.37] JESSICA CONCHA: Yeah. First, of all I love-- Carol, I love when teaching is a family business because what that means to me is that everybody in your family wears the love of it on their sleeve. If you then have children, are like, I want to do that too.

[00:23:28.03] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I don't know. They said they didn't want to, but they ended up being teachers.

[00:23:31.37] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Oh. It's in their blood. So your question was, how do I convert people who don't see themselves as reading teachers? And I think it's not just the grade level, but it also could be the content. I'm a content specialist. I teach biology. I'm not a reading teacher. I think if you talk to a lot of teachers, and in fact, I just shared an article this morning on Twitter about or X or whatever it's now called about teachers being frustrated that kids are having difficulty reading more than short passages that even in short passages, they don't seem to be understanding what they read.

[00:24:05.81] I think you will hear from teachers that are frustrated because they assign reading and the kids come in and they're not sure what they've read. Now, that to me, it doesn't mean that-- that to me means that kids just need instruction. They need you to teach them how to read it, not just assign it. Just like Jessica, you had to teach kids how to how to follow these classroom routines for your management, they just need the how-to.

[00:24:29.42] So throughout the book, and a lot of my work, I talk about the importance of strategies of just breaking things down explicitly and clearly for kids. Exactly how do I annotate, exactly how do I read a complex text, exactly how do I integrate the text features with the main text on the page. What do I do when I come to unfamiliar vocabulary words? How do I learn what they mean? And how do I understand the importance? How do I figure out the structure of this text? And then how to write a good summary based on that?

[00:25:00.06] So I think we all need to be thinking about being reading teachers. And I think the selling point for everybody is your kids are going to learn more. They're going to get more--

[00:25:10.00] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: They're going to learn more content.

[00:25:11.43] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: They're going to love the content even more because they're going to be able to learn more when they have those skills.

[00:25:16.06] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Makes sense. Common sense. Oh. I'm inspired. I think this is a book-- because you're a teacher, it's the what's missing that's been missing. So all of your other books have built up to this moment in this time that we're in for education. Jessica, what do you think about this book? I know you've used some of Jen's other books. But what--

[00:25:40.75] JESSICA CONCHA: I'm really excited. I'm excited to get my hands on to it. I love that it sounds like it's great for different levels or different students are. I have a student who just moved from Turkey and he's in my room. And I am doing phonics lessons with him. And then I have other students who are constantly needing that extra growth.

[00:26:02.14] So I love that it sounds like that. No matter what level your students are on, you can pull from this book and do different small groups with it. Or whole group. So I'm really excited to read it one day. Get my hands on.

[00:26:13.45] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: We'll get you a copy. So here we have, Jen, who's a prolific writer and experienced. And Jessica, you have published your first story that was submitted to the book, When I Started Teaching, I Wish I Had Known. And I'm thrilled to have beginning teachers contribute. Can you just share a snapshot of the story that you submitted that was selected. The title is called Make Student Confidence Your Goal. So--

[00:26:41.87] JESSICA CONCHA: I would love to.

[00:26:43.09] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: --wisdom.

[00:26:44.57] JESSICA CONCHA: So my story was actually inspired by the way I wanted to come into being a teacher. As I mentioned, I was always quiet in school. And it is a lot easier for introverted students to feel overshadowed or unnoticed. Because that's what I felt when I was in school.

[00:27:05.17] But are less likely to approach the teacher. And so I think it's critical that you as the teacher you set out to develop your relationship with them and constantly seek opportunities for their personal growth. And so last year or two years ago, I had a student she was afraid to even speak in conversation with me, with her classmates.

[00:27:28.06] But I decided that I really wanted-- I wanted to make it my goal to find ways to increase her confidence and communicating with her other classmates. So early in the school year, I set a goal with her that I want her to raise her hand at least two times during the class period. And she was with me all day. So just two times a day. I'm like, I want you to raise your hand.

[00:27:48.82] But then made her really nervous. So my co-teacher at the time had an idea that if we tap on her desk before we're about to call on her, she would know, like, OK. Get ready. Mrs. Concha is about to call on me. So I tap on her desk and she would know, OK. The question that I'm about to ask is going to be for her. And she started answering the questions. She would actually answer. And I just remember even the classmates were like, wow. Like she can talk. She's participating.

[00:28:17.15] And over throughout the course of the entire year, she started actually raising her hand on her own. And then eventually it became-- she wanted to write on the board. And so it was just incredible to watch how much she grew from that first day at open house when I met her when she wouldn't even look at me much less say anything at the end of the school year where she was volunteering all the time, wanting to come up to the board, discussing with her classmates. And it was just great to see her confidence grow so much.

[00:28:46.10] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Well, you created a beautiful relationship with her, and she trusted you. So Jen, any feedback on that story that relates to you or something that stood out to you?

[00:28:58.44] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I think what's striking to me is how you honored her as an individual and you thought about what it is that she needs and you made her feel safe, like you said Carol, and gave her an opportunity to work with you on a specific goal. And I'm sure you celebrated as she made progress toward that goal and even exceeded that goal.

[00:29:24.27] And I think that at the end of the day, all kids really want to be seen, all kids want to be given that individualized attention from their teacher. And I think that it's so important to balance whatever kind of whole class instruction we have with those opportunities to really connect with and support the individual growth of each child. So that was beautiful Jessica, thank you.

[00:29:50.26] JESSICA CONCHA: Thank you.

[00:29:51.07] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: So I want to thank you both for sharing your pivotal moments and your stories as we wind down the podcast. A lot of our listeners are struggling with how to take care of themselves. We call it self-care, but I don't want to call it self-care. I want to just call it other interests that we have as humans that we're not teaching 24/7. Like, what else do you do that kind of takes you away from school and nourishes you? So what do you do, Jess, that you enjoy?

[00:30:25.49] JESSICA CONCHA: I first wanted to share that when I first started teaching, that I thought this was only for the weekends. But that was the only time that I was able to actually step away from school. But over the last few years, I've learned that it's important to make time for yourself every day, not just on the weekends. And I've noticed a tremendous growth in my teaching. You know, coming to school refreshed, ready for the next day.

[00:30:48.47] Just being able to unplug while I'm at home. So one thing I really enjoy is working out and just being outside. So I make it a priority when I come home. That's the first thing that I do. I feel like it's easy if I come home to want to take out my computer and work on something that that's school-related. But I just really enjoy spending time outside. So I always make sure that I get that time each afternoon.

[00:31:11.51] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I love that. And gets you moving. The brain needs a break.

[00:31:17.00] JESSICA CONCHA: Releases the endorphins. Yeah. It's great.

[00:31:18.92] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. Jen, what do you do?

[00:31:22.70] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I do pottery and I also dance. And I think that if I thought about what they have in common or why they feel like a break from my very kind of intellectual kind of work--

[00:31:37.28] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Cerebral work.

[00:31:38.63] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Yeah. Cerebral. Yeah. It gets you out of your head and into your body. Like, your hands are literally on mud or moving through space. But I also think they're both opportunities for me to be in the role of learner, which I really appreciate. Like, I'm not really good at either one of them. I enjoy my own progress and making goals for myself and seeing progress. But I'm not like I'm far from expert at either one. So it's kind of humbling to be in the role of teacher.

[00:32:07.71] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: It's kind of fun, just to play.

[00:32:07.98] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: So it is. It's very playful. Yeah.

[00:32:10.80] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: It's playful. All right. So I'll share what one thing that I do. So I play bass guitar, bass electric guitar. So for my birthday a few years ago, because I played so much air guitar, so my husband plays guitar, my two sons play guitar. And I'm just usually there listening. And they noticed that I was playing air guitar all the time. So for my birthday, I mean, I have this huge bass-- I have two electric-- I have a big electric guitar and then I have an acoustic bass guitar.

[00:32:43.23] And I'm terrible at both of them. But my sons are such good teachers that they give me positive feedback when I making them. And that's how I know. Because I have no idea. It's really hard. But I love that beat. And then what I discovered from playing bass guitar is the vibration is a healing process really. A vibration. And then I started to do sound baths. Have you ever heard of a sound bath?

[00:33:14.82] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I've done that before.

[00:33:15.85] JESSICA CONCHA: I have not.

[00:33:16.32] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: It's really cool.

[00:33:16.64] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Oh. My God. I love a sound bath. So you can Google that everybody. And you can do it at home. But have you done one Jen?

[00:33:24.48] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I have. Yeah. I went to Costa Rica in the last spring and they had-- at the hotel I was staying at, they had these sound baths. Yeah. They set us in a circle or laid us down or you're laying down in a circle. And they had all these different tones, bowls--

[00:33:39.54] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Yes. And bowls.

[00:33:40.82] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:33:41.76] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: And so it's like vibrational. And you can listen to Gregorian chants. And there are all kinds of sound frequencies that you can listen to. So I encourage the listeners to search that out. Sound bath. Sound bathing. You know me, I'm going to give you a kind of a unique idea to try out for getting us out of our heads. So I asked you earlier to think about a piece of advice that you would give to our listeners. So what would you say to everyone that's listening today that's a takeaway? Jess?

[00:34:18.80] JESSICA CONCHA: I will say taking the time to develop close relationships with your students, whether that's in the morning time when they're coming into school, playing a game with them, my kids love what we do. A thing called soft start mornings where they play games. No schoolwork involved. Or inviting them to eat lunch with you. Just doing those things to kind of give them insight onto who you are as a person and outside of the classroom. And it's just amazing the conversations that develop over that course of time.

[00:34:43.72] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: I love that. And Jen, what's your advice for our listeners?

[00:34:47.75] JENNIFER SERRAVALLO: I'll build off of Jessica's, which is to try to connect with adults in the same way and develop relationships with adults. And so I'm thinking from the perspective of a classroom teacher, that would mean the other adults in your school and try to find ways to connect and collaborate.

[00:35:02.98] There's so much collective wisdom within the building and taking time to have those conversations. And then I think also to collaborate and connect with parents who know so much about their own children. And the more your team with the parents, the more learning can happen with the children.

[00:35:21.01] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Thank you. All right. Now we're ready for Tori. All right. A summary.

[00:35:26.01] TORI MELLO BACHMAN: I'm ready for my sound bath too. I can't wait.

[00:35:28.44] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Yes. I know. It's so much fun.

[00:35:30.53] TORI MELLO BACHMAN: You know I'm a fan of sound bath. Oh. Thank you, both. This was a really good conversation. And something that strikes me in all of these conversations, you've never met each other before and you have vastly different experience. But you find these connections and these like common points of wisdom that just really strike me.

[00:35:53.87] And I think Jen, I wrote down something you said that you rapidly outgrow your learning every day as a new teacher. And I thought that's such a really good and bold statement about the experience of a beginning teacher. You're just like figuring it out on the fly. And Jessica, I really appreciated your story about struggling your first couple of years and trying almost too many things until you realized that you had to do like routines. This is a thing that is good for all of us.

[00:36:27.20] And there's a connection there. I think, Jen, your work is so-- your books have been so focused on strategies and routines and structures. I think one of the things that-- actually I know one of the things that teachers love about your work is that there's a format in your book that they can follow. And so routines are really important for all of our brains-- children and adults alike.

[00:36:52.76] So I think I saw that common thread that you both have come to that understanding in your work. I also thought it was really interesting that you both were influenced by other teachers in your career path. And Jess, it was Mrs. Davis, I think, that you said like really influenced you in third grade. And Jen, your relationship with Stephanie that took you to another school kind of showed you this whole other aspect of teaching that you weren't really getting.

[00:37:21.70] The relationships with other teachers and the professional learning is just so important. And I'm so glad that that came through in this conversation today too because there are a lot of teachers out there who don't get that support in their schools. So to know that it exists either in a book or in a colleague or a podcast or an online course, you know, professional learning is really important for teachers at all levels of their-- all stages of their career. So thanks for bringing that to the fore as well.

[00:37:57.59] CAROL PELLETIER RADFORD: Thanks, Tori. And thank you to all our listeners. I'm going to leave you with a quote from our Buckminster Fuller. So the science teachers in that group may know him as Bucky Fuller. And he created the geodesic dome. And there is a geodesic dome in my town Falmouth on Cape Cod that he was part of building. And he wrote this fabulous article called Leadership by Design.

[00:38:25.34] So any leaders in the audience, I encourage you to look that up by Bucky Fuller. And on his gravestone, he had carved, "Call me trim tab." And I encourage you all to look that up and see what a trim tab is. And I encourage you all to be trim tabs as you move forward in helping your students and other teachers in the school. So thank you all for listening to Teacher to Teacher. Until we meet again, bye for now.

[00:38:58.19] [MUSIC PLAYING]

[00:38:58.96] NARRATOR 1: Thanks, everyone, for joining today's Teacher to Teacher conversation. We hope this time together energized you, inspired you, and reminded you why you chose to become a teacher. You can purchase any of Carol's books and any books mentioned in the podcast online at www.corwin.com. Please leave a review and share this podcast with your colleagues. Thank you for listening to the Corwin Teacher to Teacher podcast, a place to share teacher wisdom and engage in authentic conversations with experienced educators.