Ixchell Reyes
The DIESOL podcast

Brent Warner
Digital Integration in English as a Second or Other Language,

Ixchell Reyes
Episode 30: ISTE standards and ESOL.

Brent Warner
Welcome to DIESOL. This is Episode 30. We are your hosts I am Brent Warner.

Ixchell Reyes
And I’m Ixchell Reyes. Hey, Brent, happy December

Brent Warner
Happy December! Happy Episode 30. Some some exciting stuff we made it through through Thanksgiving and everything. So that’s nice.

Ixchell Reyes
I know, it’s felt like forever, but we made it through the year.

Yeah. And sorry to those people who were hoping that we were going to do drinks with DIESOL, we did end up canceling that one. So we hope you had some nice drinks with friends or family instead. So end of the year, we’re getting close. Any, any upcoming plans for you to show?

I’m just gonna visit my family. So being California socially distancing, and careful. I know, I’m totally happy to be like that. And as long as it is with other human beings.

Brent Warner
Fair enough. Yeah, so we are moving into the end here. And the end of the beginning of the end, I don’t know whatever we’re at. But yeah, so let’s get to it. Today we’re talking about ISTE standards in ESOL. And I think we’ve got quite a lot to talk about here. And we’ll try to kind of we’ll do our do our best to present everything that’s important. I think let’s just jump right over to it. Okay, so ISTE a, why are we talking about ISTE standards compared to TESOL. So this is kind of the last of our little series about standards. We’ve been doing that for a few episodes. Now. This is the third episode. And we kind of thought, Hey, we wanted to talk about the TESOL stuff, which we did in episodes 26 and 28, respectively, right. And now here we are at ISTE. And I think there’s gonna be a lot of people listening that are going what’s ISTE. So? So Ixchell, what is ISTE first?

Ixchell Reyes
Well ISTE as an organization. It is the International Society for technology and education. And of course, it is technology and education. So for those people who are often called that, you know, others will call you the techie or the person who’s tech savvy. This is the place where you go to share all of your ideas to learn more, and also to get a framework for what you’re doing. Because we’re not just doing tech for the sake of tech. Right? There’s frameworks and also to look at how that plays into our students what our students are learning in school, so K through 12, and others. So

Brent Warner
yeah. And also ISTE really is the big… the big, big, big organization that talks about technology and education. They have a very large annual conference, which actually just I think it’s actually still happening as we’re recording right now. I am not signed up this year, I’m kind of conferenced out but virtual conferenced out, so but there’s a lot of cool stuff. I’ve seen friends posting about it on Twitter. So anyways, ISTE International Society for teachers in education

Ixchell Reyes
Technology

Brent Warner
…teachers in education? We’re almost to the end of the month here. Technology in education. So here’s the deal that we need to talk about this, why? right? Why are we talking about ISTE? Because we said, Hey, we did all those TESOL ones, like I think I get it right? I would say that the TESOL ones fit under ISTE standards in a way that I actually kind of hope that TESOL kind of moves more towards this with their standards in the future. So what did you think when you were looking at these Ixchell at when we’re gonna get into the into the thing a little bit later. But let’s talk about why we’re talking about this.

Ixchell Reyes
Yeah, so one of the things So, I mean, I was very, I was happy that there’s TESOL standards for technology. But when we take a look at the ISTE standards, a lot of the language is broader. And we’ll we’ll look at it but because it’s broader language, it allows for personalization of our students need because the reality is that we might have a class that were a couple of students maybe using a mouse for the first time but the rest of them may not be so it you know, those kind of things. If you take a look at the TESOL standards. It almost seems like It’s assuming that none of your students are going to know any of this technology. And so,

Brent Warner
yeah, it’s all like, yeah, I felt like almost, we could we kind of mentioned in the pre show, I felt like the TESOL standards are great, but they’re kind of making a really low level assumption on where students are. And so yeah, if you’re doing a basic computer skills, class and helping in English, for sure, right, here’s the mouse click, here’s all those things, those are, those are great to have. But at the same time, there’s so much more to technology than that, and I feel like kind of the TESOL standards are really step one, and like, and then there’s a lot a lot to grow, to grow up to. And to move up to beyond that, and I think is the, the ISTE standards are really a noble goal for teachers to, to kind of put their focus on because it’s not it’s not language focus, it’s not really, you know, it’s not about, hey, you can do these language things. It really is technology focus, and what what technology can help us do to learn and learn anything, but in our case, you know, English language acquisition,

Ixchell Reyes
right. And another thing here is that the emphasis in the language, you’ll see as we as we go through some of the standards, that the emphasis is really on community diversity, transformative learning, and then also roles of the learner and the teacher. And I think that’s important. Because if we take on roles, and we know what our roles are, and our students know what their roles are, then they’re able to communicate what they’re achieving with technology, right? And they’re also able to see how technology is helping them to reach that goal, which in our case, happens to be language or happens to be doing something through English. TESOL doesn’t necessarily have that. I mean, I didn’t see that clearly spelled out, but I like that it it’s, it’s a clear definition of what the teacher should be doing, what the role is,

Brent Warner
yeah, in terms of technology. And by roll like they even get, they’re basically like titles, right? And so it’s ISTE standards work, as they call you, a learner or a leader or a citizen, and like, how do you live up to that role is what you know what you’re saying here, which is great, as compared to, you know, teachers will be able to show students blah, blah, blah. And so that, to me is two different things. Even though they might overlap it to me it to me, when I’m when you say, Hey, you know, you are a learner, right? That, to me means something different than you demonstrate ability to, you know, I don’t know, whatever, put together these these two tools or something like that. So, so I really like the idea of the roles here. And then the last part that I was thinking about here, shell is like, to me, I really felt like the TESOL standards. And again, go back and listen to those episodes, because I do think they’re valuable. But I also feel like those are kind of telling students here is a hammer, can you say hammer hammer? Right? Can you say nail nail, right? And then you’re really learning the basics of those fundamental skills. But that is like, here’s a hammer and a nail. Do you know how to hammer the nail into a board? Right? Okay, yeah, this is what we’re showing. But this is a totally different level than, do you know how to design a house, right to design and build a house that you want to live in? And go, Okay, hold on a second. So we’re really granular and kind of, you know, fundamental skills here. It’s not completely like that. But But, you know, it feels more like that to me as compared to like, with ISTE is like, okay, we have those, we’re assuming those basic technology skills, kind of and then what are the next steps? What can what can tech help us do beyond that?

Ixchell Reyes
Sure. And I just wanted to add to that, if if we do feel like the students aren’t, the majority of your students don’t come to you with the basics of what a hard drive does what a computer is. And that’s something that you would take care of in a basic computer skills class, as he said before, so that would be you know, totally different than trying to cover the core content subjects.

Brent Warner
Yeah, I, I and those are, again, those are great skills. So you Ixchell, you were mentioning earlier, that, you know, you sometimes have students that show up and don’t know what a mouse is, and don’t know, you know, and so we need to approach those we need to help those students out. But many, many, many, many of our students do have fundamental basic ideas of technology. You know, it’s it seems to me less common that they’re coming in. Not having heard of a computer, you know, is is not really a thing I was reading a statistic recently it said 50% of households in the world and this worldwide have computer access in their household, right. And so that to me, says, you know, you’re gonna have, you know, 50% of the world have it inside of their house, which is kind of a shocking number in a certain way, you’re like, really, it’s only 50%. But God also means that every other person walking around in the world has a computer in their house, which probably says, most of the other people know what some level of computer things are, too. Right?

Ixchell Reyes
Right. And so then they’re moving forward. I mean, they while some places, or some communities overseas may not have a computer in their household, they do have internet cafes, and so many of them are used to going to someplace like that. So I think the further we go, the more time passes, the more students are going to be familiar with those tools. So and, of course, it’s important to identify the ones that you know, that don’t come with that with those basic skills. But I think we’re seeing more and more our students do come with some level of skills, even if that’s a mixed bag within the classroom. Yeah,

Brent Warner
yeah. So let’s talk for a second Ixchell about how the ISTE standards have have evolved, right?

Ixchell Reyes
Yeah. So

Brent Warner
we’ll find you you found hidden in there. But it’s like, oh, this is?

Ixchell Reyes
Well, this is really cool for me as an easel, you know, instructor because I and also as someone who promotes the use of technology in the classroom with my students, not just for learning language, but you know, knowing how to use technology makes you a more competitive candidate. No matter where you are, if you’re whatever you’re going to be doing, after you pass your English courses, you’re going to need to compete with other people or you’re going to be sometimes be asked to take on a role that maybe as a project manager, maybe as someone who’s designing something, or planning or delegating, and if you’ve got these skills that you’ve not transferred, then that makes you someone who is a better candidate, or someone who’s going to do a really good job. So I always like to see where you know where we are. And at the bottom of the, on the ISTE standards for students, if you scroll all the way to the bottom on their website, and I kind of wish they had this at the top, because it’s cool. It’s got this little timeline, and it says how have the ISTE standards for students evolved? And so they start from 1998. So in 1998, it was learning to use technology. Okay, nine years later, 2007, using technology to learn. Okay, and then 2016, which is a most recent version of these standards, we’re at transformative learning with technology.

Brent Warner
Yeah. So break that down for a second. So if the ISTE standards back in 98, are learning to use technology, right? That really is the TESOL standards that we’ve been talking about.

Ixchell Reyes
Right? Yeah, that’s how I feel.

Brent Warner
I mean, that’s what it is. That’s what they’re talking about. And, and again, I don’t want to minimize it. I don’t want to say like, hey, none of the stuff we talked about before is important. Like that. That’s not the goal here. But what we’re trying to say is like, ESOL desperately needs to catch up, right? Our field is just so far behind all the time. That right, you know, we need to start paying attention to these things. So for, for TESOL, they, you know, their, their last iteration was 2008. And that was 10 years behind that, that’s 12 years ago now, right, almost almost 13 years ago. And that’s 10 years behind where ISTE was in 1998. Right? And so we got to say, Okay, well hold on a sec, we got a lot of catching up to do, we got a lot of processing and understanding of how technology affects our learning needs to be applied. So so then a 2007, “Using Technology to Learn,” right? What does that mean to you Ixchell?

Ixchell Reyes
To me, it’s like we’re no longer focusing on the individual technology, if that’s just something expected as you’re going to some, you know, whatever goal it is that you’re learning, whether it’s science, whether it’s grammar, but you’re using the tools as something to help you. It’s not that you’re focused on the tools, right. And of course, students do need to know how to use them. But again, if they’re getting an education, where English is going to be the goal as the medium, whether they’re going to university or getting another job, they need to be able to use those tools. That’s expected, right? That’s just like an expectation. It’s not. Do you know how to use Microsoft Word? It’s now can you use it in the cloud? Can you use this can you collaborate, can you use live you know, live updated our live updating tools?

Brent Warner
Well, to me, it’s also that this is like Krashen, right? Really like, hey, it’s the immersive experience we’re going to be talking about… You know, we’re gonna be talking about this book that we’re reading, we’re going to be collaborating on this. We’re going to be sharing our notes and giving feedback to one another on Google Docs, or whatever it is, right? We’re not really talking about Google Docs, we’re talking about the novel that we’re reading, we’re talking about sharing ideas, we’re talking about how to type together even though we’re, we’re all in our own houses here in the pandemic, right? That to me is using the technology to learn. And yeah, of course, I need to spend some time with my students saying, Hey, this is how Google Docs works, right? This is how you share a document for sure. But we’re, I’m not teaching a class on Google Docs. I’m teaching a class on whatever we’re learning, and we’re just using the technology as as the method for for moving through. But that’s still 2007. So like, we got it, we got to talk about this. Right. Okay. So Google Docs, of course, came out after 2007. But still, like the idea here of like, the, the, the frame that you’re looking at it through is still way back in 2007. So we’re, we’re back, you know, again, 13, almost 14 years ago now at this point. And so then we move forward into 2016 for ISTE standards, which is transformative learning with technology. Right? I think we’re gonna have to talk about this version a little bit more in the future, Ixchell. we had mentioned that we need to do a SAMR episode. And for those who don’t know, it’s a model. Yeah. The SAMR model, I think we’ll probably do that, for the first episode in January

Ixchell Reyes
In January. Back to basics!

Brent Warner
Back to basics, making sure we understand all of these things. But then, but really about, like, what are the things that you can really do that you could never have done before? Right? So how does the technology completely reinvent our our understanding of learning and of what we can do and how we can get a lot better? So I think that’s what we’re looking at here. So I think these are really powerful to look at, I hope that they can be kind of a guide for, for TCL organizations in the future as well. That’s what we want to start seeing. And there’s just, it’s just so cool to be able to look at this, because this is a again, it’s what lens are we looking at technology through? Is it just, hey, do you know how to click on something? Or is it let’s communicate with each other and spread our message out to the world by language that we’ve just learned to acquire and are now practicing with, you know, there’s just so much more to that. So, now, I think we got it, we’re going to take a take a quick break, and then we’re going to jump over and actually look at the individual standards.

Alright, so Ixchell, iTunes we haven’t had — Well, we had a review a little bit ago, we’d like we’d love to get more. One thing that we noticed is that we’ve got a lot of star reviews so people are on their apps or whatever and hitting the stars but we also would love to get those written reviews right? Yeah, those are the ones that really help people see if they want to check out the show and they It’s crazy how much it does for like bumping up the show when people type in things if there’s if there’s more reviews from people saying like saying “Hey, this is a show you should check” out so if you guys want —

Ixchell Reyes
Yeah, it also gives us feedback. I like the person I like to read the ones where they comment on a specific show because then it tells me Okay, that one got one compelled someone to write something because it is harder to to sit you know, to write a to write a review. So if you do hear us right now, I’m asking in 2021 leave us some reviews.

Brent Warner
Do something nice for … this will be a Christmas present for us, right?

Ixchell Reyes
Yeah,

Brent Warner
If you want to get us a Christmas present, leave us a review. Also, though, we haven’t mentioned this very much. We we have the bias of coffee. So there is on the website, if you if you like the show, if you think it’s been useful. There’s a little button on DIESOL.org that you can click to buy us a coffee. A few people have done this in the past and it’s been very kind that all just kind of goes into our little our little piggy bank which we’re trying to decide if we’re going to use that for paying for hosting or for swag. Normally I get some stickers and things like that. But uh, but if you like, you can also use buy us a coffee.

All right, so we Ixchell we’re gonna have to move fairly quick because there’s a lot of these, but these ISTE standards so we’re not going to go into the details just like we didn’t go into the details in the past, but let’s, there are seven ISTE standards for teachers. And then there are seven ISTE standards for students. As you said, they’re kind of broken down into roles, right? Like, what, what is your role doing this? And so let’s start off with number, we’re gonna start off with the ISTE standards for teachers. So what is the first role?

Ixchell Reyes
Okay, so the first rule is, again, this is for teachers, the first rule is learner, educators continually improve their practice by learning from and with others, and exploring proven and promising practices that leverage technology to improve student learning. And I think that’s pretty powerful here. Yeah, already. And it’s very defining.

Brent Warner
Yeah, it’s a great, great, great first step here. They, you know, one, if you’re listening to the show, you’re probably are the type of person who is a learner, right? Because you’re saying, hey, how can I find ways to build out my practice, or, you know, to improve my practice, and then get better at it and talk to other people interact? You, you know, podcast listeners are learners. And so I think this is a great step. But it’s also a great way to define people. Because when teachers define themselves as learners, it really transforms in my thinking.

Ixchell Reyes
Okay, so the second role is the teacher as a leader, educators seek out opportunities for leadership to support student empowerment and success and to improve teaching and learning. And again, I think most of us, we we know that we’re leaders, but we’re actively seeking out opportunities that are going to be supporting our students. I don’t know what else to say about this one,

Brent Warner
I have a brief comment on this one. So you know, sometimes when we get like full time, jobs coming up as opportunities, or whatever, I get some teachers who say, Well, I want the chance to, you know, I like it would really be great for me to become this, you know, a full time teacher. And to me, I’m like, Well, what are you doing in the leadership role, right? Because sometimes it’s just like, I’m just teaching and I disappear. And that’s it, right? And no qualms necessarily with just being a teacher. But like, getting full time positions can be really hard, especially these days, right. And so, like, when you’re showing that you have leadership, when you’re when you’re seeking out the those opportunities. This is the type of thing that we that, you know, like at an art school, at least when we’re hiring. They’re all different types of leaders. But like, what are you doing this proactive, that’s helping that’s creating something new, all of those, those ideas, so really worth paying attention to?

Ixchell Reyes
Right? Okay, rule number three is citizen. So educators inspires students to positively contribute to and responsibly participate in the digital world. I’m a big fan of this one, because, number one, we are constantly talking about, you know, we’re talking about social media platforms, and just public platforms. And, you know, students may know how to use them and teachers as well. But again, what does it mean to positively contribute? Is that you sharing out material that that worked for you, is that you giving tips to other teachers or other you know, people that are reading, are you blogging? are you sharing, how are you positively contributing, and also, being a responsible participant, you know, you might have had a terrible day at work or, you know, a terrible 2020. But you’ve got to be careful what you put out there, because people are reading that, and, and that’s okay. You know, there are certain times when you you, when you have a private network, or a private, you know, social media page, and I that’s what comes to mind, maybe right now, because of, you know, 2020, you’ve been stuck, and that will need place to go for information, his social media. And of course, that might change next year, when we’re hopefully back to face to face. But again, we’ve got to be responsible about what you’re putting out there. And that might mean withholding from posting something. Or waiting until the right time or also in the way that you’re phrasing something. I don’t know, I don’t know what else I have there for this one.

Brent Warner
Well, there’s quite a debate around this, actually. Because there’s now there’s right now, you know, people are frustrated and depressed and all sorts of issues, right. And so, some people are saying don’t post anything negative. And some people are saying, well, that’s toxic positivity, right? Because we can’t just be 100%. So I think it’s actually okay to complain or to show that you have issues to when you’re online if you’re being real. And if you’re trying to if you’re trying to open that to a real communication. If you’re just saying, Hey, this is a this is terrible, and there is no there is no solution to it. And I just made claims like well, then that doesn’t really help anyone. But if you’re saying hey, these are problems, I think bringing it up and bringing it to light can help other people. Sure, exactly. You know what I mean? So there’s, there’s a difference there. And it’s not the end of the world doesn’t have to be all cheery and happy. And it isn’t.

Ixchell Reyes
Right now to say that, you know, in 2020, we’ve been super successful at moving our teaching to online teaching would be a master. But

Brent Warner
the way that we do citizenship? Yeah, no, no, but you’re right. Like, it totally would be right. And so it’s like, hey, this, you know, I think, you know, their honesty and citizenship here, kind of, should not be mistaken for like one another, like, Oh, hey, positivity and honesty are not the same thing, right, or citizenship and positivity are not the same thing. We need to isolate those.

Ixchell Reyes
Mm hmm. All right. So rule number four is the collaborator, educators dedicate time to collaborate with both colleagues and students to improve practice, discover and share resources and ideas and solve problems? And

Brent Warner
yeah, pretty straightforward.

Ixchell Reyes
Collaborating.

Brent Warner
Yeah, I mean, work with other people. You know, if you’re, if you’re an isolated person, I get it too. Like you can do your own things. But like, there’s so much just to share. So share help each other out. I think we’re all trying to do that. I think a lot of people are recognizing that more like, Oh, hey, there’s these people that want to help me and like, and I Oh, I had ideas that are actually good, good to share, too, right? A lot of us kind of talk ourselves out of that. But, you know, if you’re out there, if you’re teaching, I guarantee you, you have good ideas. Mm hmm.

Ixchell Reyes
Rule number five is a designer educators design authentic learner driven activities and environments that recognize and accommodate learning variability. This one’s great, because this one’s the one that gives you your you know, the ability to, or the opportunity to to look for your learner’s that need a little bit more support versus your learners that can be more independent, or, you know, put those independent learners with your ones that need more support, and vice versa. But again, recognizing that in the real world, your the skills within the skill set within a class will vary. Right? And you’ve got to design for that.

Brent Warner
Yeah, well, and also, this one’s the fun one, too, right? Like, you get to design your lessons, you get to do all the games, you know, you get to, to build things that show that really can show students the path through and you know, I mean, if you say, hey, my role is an education designer. Oh, that sounds so much more fun than like, I’m a teacher, right? You know, like, not to dismiss teachers, of course. But like, Yeah, but I think viewing it in a different way is a

Ixchell Reyes
word itself, design, it just, you know, implies that you are carefully looking at something right, you’re designing, you’re not just making for the sake of making and creating, you’re thinking about it deeply and with the purpose in mind. And in this case, it’s the, the needs of your students. Rule number six is the facilitator. Educators facilitate learning with technology to support student achievement. And in this case, it’s of the 2016 ISTE standards for students.

Brent Warner
Yeah, pretty straightforward with that one, but, you know, how are you facilitating? How are you helping out? We talked a lot about this idea, sage on the stage versus guide on the side, right. And I think facilitator is definitely the guide on the side and say, Hey, I think you can work through this, what can I do to help you out not like, I’m gonna give you the top down version. So

Ixchell Reyes
right. And finally, rule number seven for teachers is the analyst. Educators understand and use data to drive their instruction and support students in achieving their learning goals. This one’s really important because you’re taking, again, you’re taking data, you’re taking numbers, you’re taking results to see how you’re going to tweak something, or how you’re going to pull back or how you’re going to change something in order to to, to achieve those goals. So yeah, I think that’s pretty important. And if you say, Hey, I’m an analyst, of course, you’re looking at data all the time, right? You want to know what they are students and prove that that strategy work? How did it work? Who did it work with? Why did it work? Can I, you know, use that for another subject, etc.

Brent Warner
Yeah, and I hope that also, this is something that we do a lot of, you know, in many of our shows, we try to talk about the analysis, we look at the research first, and then we talk about how do we apply that research, right and right, you know, anyone can do that, right? Anyone who has access to these, you know, get on to your library and go find the research and, and then think about it, right? So you get to analyze, I would say it’s even goes backwards. So analyze and then design, right? There’s a great combination for, for bringing these together and, and, you know, building your students success,

Ixchell Reyes
right? And I think Brent, it’s, again, one of the reasons why I think it’s really important to look at the ISTE standards, as we’re, you know, navigating through ESL, is that you’re reminded that you’ve got to stay on top of the field, right? What’s going on out there, you’ve got to keep updated. And as an analyst, you’re doing that, because you’re looking at what’s working for other teachers what’s not working? Or how are these people doing? And I think that’s really important to not get stuck and not get. Yeah, you know, we get comfortable with a strategy that we like, that works for us, but is it working for your students? And is that something that you are there other ways to do it that are better? So as an analyst, you know, when I when you think about yourself as the teacher, being an analyst, that’s something that I think is really important to remember? And keep in mind?

Brent Warner
Yeah, so those are the standards for teachers and their their breakdowns and examples and ideas on their site. We’ll have them in the show notes. But next, let’s transition over to ISTE standard for students. Okay, so is the standard for students. And we also have seven here, and we’re going to start off with empowered learner. So again, same same type of setup here, shell, they’ve got the the titles, they’ve got their roles here. And what does that mean? so empowered learner, this is a student’s leverage technology to take an active role in choosing, achieving and demonstrating competency in their learning goals, informed by the learning sciences. So this one is saying, hey, it’s not just the teacher saying, you know, like, hey, you’re here, your activities and just do them, right? How do you get the learner themselves to take control of that, right, and really understand what it means and to say, I want to set it up in this way, I want to do this type of thing, right? And, And that, to me, is this idea of an empowered learner.

Ixchell Reyes
Well, you’re also allowing for students to be autonomous, and you’re also allowing them to think for themselves and decide what the best course of action is, depending on what their what their assignment is, right. So if you know if they have a choice between using Google Slides, or using a Google doc or using a, you know, some kind of some other way to illustrate something, illustrate their knowledge that’s giving them autonomy. And that’s the whole empowered learner. Right? The concept of that?

Brent Warner
Yeah. So next is digital citizen. students recognize the rights, responsibilities and opportunities of living, learning and working in an interconnected digital world. And they act and model in ways that are safe, legal, and ethical.

Ixchell Reyes
This one’s important. Yeah, especially when we’re talking about students coming from, you know, countries where either, you know, posting against the government might lead to, you know, dire consequences, or you, the penalty for plagiarizing is, you know, very soft. So those are things that are very important for students to understand, especially when they’re going to be navigating English. In a country where that’s not their own.

Brent Warner
Right? And it’s also, you know, even in a small setting, like inside of our class, and we’re interacting with each other digitally. How are we responding to one another, right? Like, is this an appropriate response? I haven’t had anything that’s like, been nasty. But of course, I mean, zoom bombing is a great example of very poor citizenship. But I also talk about the common example that I use is encouraging students to have their pictures up in our LMS, right, so have their actual face pictures, because we connect with people’s faces, we connect with people’s, you know, with seeing them, and I totally understand all the arguments, of course, like the cameras don’t have to be on and those types of things. But I also, you know, I do strongly believe in just basic human psychology that when we see a face we are we are attracted to that face and to to want to interact with it more than we will if we see a, you know, a picture of a flower or a, you know, like just some sunset or something like that. It’s like, I don’t know who that person is. Right? So Africa one, yep. Third one is knowledge constructor knowledge constructor. So students critically curate a variety of resources using digital tools to construct knowledge, produce creative artifacts, and make meaningful learning experiences for themselves and others. So this one’s big. There’s a kind of a lot to it. And I think this is where this is where I kind of feel that I’ve spent my time trying to teach my students to do this.

Ixchell Reyes
Yeah, this one for me is the most fun as an instructor because, you know, yes, we use the tools we use technology, but I’m I tell my students look, look what you’ve created at the end of this. You will have gone and you’ve gathered all this information, you illustrated it, you used icons, you use pictures, those are all skills. And sometimes students don’t recognize that copying and pasting and putting something on a slide. That’s design, you have to think about it. It’s not just, you know, dumping information and so on acknowledging that and letting students know that Look, you’ve you’ve created this, it’s meaningful, it mew. That’s the way that it looks for you. I’m not looking for, you know, sometimes students want to know, Teacher, what exactly do you want? Do you want it to look like? Like, no, you decide, you decide, right? And so that helps them be more proud of the work that they’re creating. And there’s more of a personal connection, I feel. And they’re more likely to replicate that skill in another class where maybe the instructor may not necessarily ask for that. But they’re more likely to say, Hey, I did this before I built this. And I know I can do it. Let me replicate that again. And so that’s where I find the most. It’s just really, really rewarding. When students do that.

Brent Warner
Yeah, I taught a student how to use Adobe Spark video. And then she she’s been cutting back and sending me emails, like, I did this for this other class.

Ixchell Reyes
And I have, you know, I have a friend, a colleague of mine, I told her, I think your kids will like spark let them play with Spark, okay, it gets figured it out, showed it to her, and now she’s made for the last I don’t know how many days she’s on. Every day. She’s counting down the days of the pandemic. She’s,

Brent Warner
cuz that’d be really useful for me.

Ixchell Reyes
She has no she. I mean, she’s not counting them that I guess she’s counting them. Oh, I wish she were counting. counting up. Yeah. Well, she’s got an Adobe Spark image for every one of them. And again, she’s having so much fun creating these and she’s continuing. So cool. Okay, cool.

Brent Warner
All right. Next is innovative designer, students use a variety of technologies within a design process to identify and solve problems by creating new, useful or imaginative solutions. Do you think about this one I show.

Ixchell Reyes
This is really cool. Because this is where you know, you, your students have seen several, for example, students have seen several tools. And now they get to, they get to choose what it is that they want, they get now there it’s a higher level of thinking, right? Because they’re not just saying, oh, teacher told us to use Google Docs, okay, going to use Google Docs. Now they’re deciding, Oh, I think I can make a video for that. Or Oh, I think I want to make again, an image like with Adobe Spark, or Canva, or whatever it is that they want to use. But now they’re they’re thinking of different options, right? And thinking of, you know, assessing which one might be more effective, which one might take more time? Is there an easier way? Is there a way to combine them? And so, to me, that’s a different level of thinking. And that’s where I think that innovation comes in. Right? Yeah. Because how many times you’ve come to another show and said, I gave this to the students, I told them, You have this option? And this student blew me away by doing this, right?

Brent Warner
Yeah, I’m thinking here, like, when when we start kind of giving some of the control over to students, so say, hey, you’re going to design a game around whatever we’re doing this week, right? And then they’re like, Okay, hold on. Am I gonna do like, Am I gonna go build a quizzes or a Kahoot, or, you know, something like that, or, you know, I’ve had some of these students building, I’ve shared them online, the RPG games, you know,

Ixchell Reyes
I, it’s exactly what I was thinking of. And it’s like,

Brent Warner
like, they spent all this time building this game and not in and it’s like, I’ll tie it into what we’re doing. But they’re really like, having fun building games and designing it and planning out and thinking about, like, what works, and then I’ll have conversations with them and say, Well, you know, you’ve got this, you know, this distractor question, but is that really a good distractor? Or not? Right? And they go, Oh, well, hold on a second. Yeah. Maybe there’s a reason why I would choose this one or another one. And so yeah, there’s a lot of cool stuff going on here.

Ixchell Reyes
And and I want to say one more thing here, Brent, that I’ve haven’t run into this often, but I do run into instructors who might say like, well, that that’s gonna take too much time. Why do they have to use that when we’re never gonna play the game or etc, but what I guess, you know, it’s not about that and product necessarily. It’s about the process that that the students experience because within that process, there’s problem solving, there’s decision making, there is on the spot, thinking there is a lot of, again, higher level thinking, critical thinking and so that’s what students are practicing. So even if in the end their quizzes or the Kahoot, you know, happen to have a couple of questions that could be tweaked or if you know, our RPG, maker, game, whatever module they used, didn’t cover everything, but they had there were skills that were used in a To get there, and it’s about that process and those experiences, we cannot discount that. That’s why when people will ask me, Well, why do you use flipgrid? If you’ve got to, you know, it takes so long for the students do this, like, no, but do you have any idea how many times they had to record themselves? That is practice, right. And then they were assessing their video, which means they weren’t thinking about their video, which means they were there’s a lot of metacognition, because they’re thinking about, they’re thinking, they’re thinking about how they’re going to look in front of an audience. And then they’re making those tweaks. And it’s those skills that sometimes get forgotten. And again, it’s about the process.

Brent Warner
So next in tied to that is computational thinkers. So students develop and employ strategies for understanding and solving problems in ways that leverage the power of technological methods to develop and test solutions.

Ixchell Reyes
This is a big one. This is a big one. I think it goes back and all of these build upon each other right. Computational thinkers, you’re solving problems? How are you going to? How are you going to present this material? How are you going to present that information? Is it better as a digital

Unknown Speaker
board? Is

Ixchell Reyes
it better as a slot slide? Is it better as a presentation that you’re recording? Is it a panel of you and a couple of students? And I guess I’m thinking of it in terms of presentations right now and information because we do so much of that in an easel. But that’s what I’m thinking of right now.

Brent Warner
Yeah. And then there, this one’s a little bit more complicated. I think it’s worth digging into the details on it. But their points here, it’s like how do students identify data? And what’s relevant? And how they’re going to use that? Right? How do they pull out key information? And, you know, these are skills that we’ve been teaching for years, right? But it’s like, okay, but now we got to think of it on a different level. So it’s like, if you’re pulling out information out of a text, well, now how am I pulling out information from digital resources, from videos from, you know, researching a hashtag, and figuring out what people are talking about around this topic? So I think that a lot of these things are, are valuable. And then, you know, there there are so many ways to, to approach this computational thinking, which, you know, then really does lead to critical thinking, because you could say, Hey, is this valid? Is this not valid, and you can move forward from there? Next is creative communicator. Students communicate clearly and express themselves creatively for a variety of purposes, using the platform’s tools, styles, formats, and digital media appropriate to their goals.

Ixchell Reyes
This was this one’s fun to me. I’m thinking of like, okay, students know how to respond in a class discussion, right? They know that you’re, depending on the topic, you’re probably not going to respond with a meme. Or if the topic lends itself, if it lends itself to it, you might respond with a meme. You might respond with the video, you it’s just like we talked about register in writing, knowing how to respond or you know, in communication, it’s the same thing. How are you going to do that? And what tools are you using? Right? And what’s so appropriate? So you might not want to do a five minute video for something that is a very quick I don’t know, response? I’m thinking on a on a collaborative board or?

Brent Warner
Yeah, well, and I also think here, like, you know, if you’re learning how to communicate in different ways there for students, right? A lot of them have background knowledge, especially if they’re, like, younger, you know, college age, something like that. They’re probably on social media. And they’re probably like, recognizing that they’re presenting information in one way. But they’re maybe not a an influencer on, you know, Instagram or whatever. But you could actually take a look at those things and go, Well, what is this person doing? How are they presenting information? Right? And then they go, Oh, okay. Yeah, that’s why they’re able to do this in a better way than I am in terms of presenting information. And then I just like to think about, like, going way back to like, what do presentations look like, right? And the traditional model is just someone standing in front of a room talking, and then maybe they had I’m going way back, but like a flip chart or writing on the board or, you know, that is way back. Right? Well, yeah. Because that’s when we’re talking about Okay, well, what’s the next step from that? And we’ve seen where we ask students to do this, like do a slideshow, right? And then, and then the slides are up while they’re presenting. But very often, those slides are still just like the digital version of a Flipboard. Right? And so so then it’s like, well, what can you do next beyond that, Oh, well, I can put up a QR code and I can have the audience members scan that and interact with me while I’m actually present, you know what I mean? So, so they are learning these more ways to be communicating with each other. And it’s interactive communication instead of, you know, a one way, a one way messaging. So I think there’s a lot to work with in here as well. Yes. All right. Last one, the last one global collaborator. Students use digital tools to broaden their perspectives and enrich their learning by collaborating with others and working effectively in teams, locally and globally.

Ixchell Reyes
And this is the one we were talking about how it’s, it’s an it’s giving them authentic opportunities to present their work, and also have feedback from others. And what a powerful way to internalize information when you’re and you’ve mentioned this in another episode, Brent, where you had your students, you sent the work that they created for funny FRC to the author. And the author responds right now, those students are not going to forget that ever. And that is just powerful. Not only did you create something that expresses how students responded to the text, but also you shared it with the person who created that text that created the response in them. And that is communication, right? Because it’s not just a one way like, Oh, you completed the assignment, you read the book, it’s you’ve given them an audience, and it’s an authentic audience. And because you have the means of getting that information across now you you’re able to share it with others. Not only that, but then I also saw when you I think you tweeted some of the examples. And teachers right away, were responding. Hey, I want to I want to use that idea. Do you have the template and you shared the template. And again, that’s something amazing, I think, and of course, that also blends the teacher role with the with what your students did. So you’re, you know,

Brent Warner
yeah, but that can also be a guide for the students too, because I show them, Hey, I’m doing this and look what else is going on out there. And then they can see the potential for growing. The one thing that I’ve it says locally and globally, collaborating locally and globally. And so one thing I have not been good enough about yet, or I hope to build more in the future is, I want to see students interacting with other students and other parts of the world through their activities, right, like, but I haven’t quite figured out how to do I mean, we’ve done things like mystery, Skype, or whatever. But like, I really want to see like, Hey, here’s a project I’m building. You know, we’re here in Southern California, and I’m building this with someone in New York, and we’re trying to do this, you know, like, fully like, I don’t even know who you are, you’re in a totally different school. But I we are building towards the same goal. And I would love to see some more. Some things like that, that could be really just give people the opportunity to connect all over the place. So that’s kind of that’s a future goal for me. Yeah. So those are all the basics of the ISTE standards. And I hope that that everybody got a chance to to kind of understand the the, the fundamentals here, it’s worth going in, on the SEC website, you can go click through, we’ll have them on the show notes for everybody. But you can look at all the examples of these things. And the stats are great, because they have videos. Yeah, there’s

Ixchell Reyes
like videos of the actual students performing some of these some of these roles. And that’s really cool. Because if I were a new teacher, or if I were someone who’s just browsing through the standards for the first time, and I would, you know, I maybe wouldn’t know if I didn’t know what something meant and how it applies. I could click on there and it’s just great. They’ve done a really good job at revamping the site for these standards.

Brent Warner
That’s outstanding, so definitely worth taking a look at.

Ixchell Reyes
All right, it is time for our fun fines. And this time around, I again have something to help with relaxing. I’m an insomniac. I am not an early bird. It is very difficult for me to fall asleep. Anyone who’s known me knows that my mind is always racing. I get an idea it just my brain just doesn’t want to quiet down So recently I went and found in organic tea it’s it’s it’s not a expensive tea I got it from Target it’s called puca p UK k it’s the nighttime organic one and it’s an oat flour lavender and lime flour mix and it’s it’s really good. And I just use that you know at night or I’ve been trying to cut back on coffee. And so I’m switching over to tea for the time being and of course it’s winter it’s well it’s not winter yet, but it’s getting really cold. So it’s kind of nice to have tea. Yeah. And so that’s my fun find. Awesome.

Brent Warner
So mine is a if you have not heard of on Twitter, they have the thing called Twitter fleets, which is basically just in gram stories or every app for whatever reason has decided they want to have stories at the top of their app. And I absolutely love them. They are really, they’re really destructive to the the Twitter experience. I mean, for me, it’s like, this is not what Twitter is about, right? They’re just trying to turn it into like that, that kind of picture as the experience of, you know, that side of the communication, which is fine over on the other things, but I think I’m bothered by the idea that everybody, all of these apps are kind of merging into one kind of same app. So anyways, Twitter fleets, you’ve seen them, if you’re on Twitter, on your phone, I haven’t seen them on the browser. But basically, there’s a row at the top and you click on the little icons of each person, and then they basically have an Instagram story up there. But I don’t want to see those. And so I figured out a hack, which is, when you go click on those at the top, you can go immediately and hit the three dots. So you go watch any any fleet on there, and then you, you click the three dots. And then what happens is if you hit the down arrow, sign up the three dots, there’s a down arrow, and then it says mute, so you can mute that account. But it doesn’t mean it completely. It says Do you want to mute fleets or do you want to mute tweets and fleets. And so you can just click on the red button that says mute fleets. And then at the top of my screen, I no longer you know, it took a little while because everybody who’s doing it or experimenting with it or whatever, whenever they show up, you have to mute each person the first time so if you’re following a lot of people that will take a while but like, but it’s kind of slowly you know, just every once in a while it comes up now I mute it now I mute it and so now I basically don’t ever see fleets in my timeline at all, which makes me a lot much happier.

Ixchell Reyes
So if you’ve got 10,000 followers Good luck clicking mute individually

Brent Warner
Yeah, but not everybody’s doing them so it does it does kind of happen over time right so you know just when you’re sitting on the toilet I think is a good time to go.

Ixchell Reyes
Well, they don’t bother me so much but i’m i’m not a fan just neutral. I don’t really care for them.

Brent Warner
Yeah, they bother me so I’m hoping they disappear completely.

Ixchell Reyes
Alright, thank you so much for listening to the show. As always, you could win a one of a kind DIESOL pin by leaving us a review on Apple podcasts if you’re giving us a shout out any other way tag us on social media so that we know that you are there

Brent Warner
for show notes and other episodes everything you can go to DIESOL.org slash 30 that’s the number three zero we would love to we have a lot of information we were put up transcripts now to show which is I think that’s pretty cool. I’m still trying to backlog him It’ll take a while but but we do have transcripts so if you want to just kind of scan through everything go take a look at that. Of course we are on Twitter we are not I’m not putting up fleets are you putting up fleets for DIESOL?

Ixchell Reyes
No

Brent Warner
Okay. So find the show after

Ixchell Reyes
I draw the line at TikTok

Brent Warner
Okay, yeah, so there you go. You can find the show at DEISOLpod D-I-E-S-O-L-p-o-d and you can find me at Brent g Warner.

Ixchell Reyes
You can find me Ixchell at IXY underscore Pixy that’s I x y underscore p i x y

Brent Warner
in Uzbek. Thank you Is Raxmat. So Raxmat for tuning in to the DIESOL podcast. Thanks, everybody.