EDUC 431 – October 17, 2019 – REFLECTION

OK. I’m not embarrassed. It’s now a “thing” to take a selfie with my guest speakers who join my EDUC 431 class online. THANK YOU Tim Cavey (@MisterCavey) from the TEACHERS ON FIRE (@TeachersOnFire) podcast for sharing your learning, your experiences, and your WHY with my EdTech class. AMAZING!!! I have to admit, your session was “easy listening.” You have a radio/broadcaster voice… hands down. You came in loud and clear (which is phenomenal given our tech set up on our end at the university) and what you had to say to my class was meaningful and engaging. Although you had questioned during your online session if being visible on YouTube was desirable or not given that “Teachers On Fire” is audio only on YouTube, I think after this afternoon’s chat to my EDUC 431 proves that maybe showing your face via YouTube WILL have an audience. We were so captivated with what you had to say. I wanted to catch a picture of you with your phone in hand (see below). Can you see it? (um… kinda)

You can kind of make it out at the bottom right hand side of the screen. This is what I noticed. You were reading your notes from your phone. I LOVED THAT. How can you get any more META in an EdTech class. Here you are talking about using PodCasts as a vehicle to CREATE and have VOICE, yet you are video conferencing in to Prince George from Surrey via BlueJeans and you are referring to your notes and prep on you phone. This was absolutely INCREDIBLE to me. I hope my students noticed. And, I really appreciated the prep that you (and my other guest speakers) have put into your guest speaks for my EDUC 431. I loved that you spoke about your why. Your commentary about what is a Podcast and what motivated you to start a podcast was inspirational and exciting. Sure… why not? I have a week free during spring break… LET’S START AN EDU-PODCAST inspired by “Entrepreneurs On Fire.” That seems so crazy to me. When I think about having a week free during spring break, I’m thinking about SLEEP, not content creation. Your story was so impressive and I appreciated the gesture of you willing to mentor anyone in my class who would want to start a podcast. I love the modelling and the willingness paying it forward. Thank you Tim. I hope someone takes you up on your offer.

I really appreciated how methodical you were with what you had to say. I loved that you cited examples from your podcast and how your classmates from your Masters Cohort from Vancouver Island University (VIU) were willing participants as part of your first 10 podcasts. Wow. What a cohort!!! I love that collegiality and the collectively willingness to lift others up. I also want to congratulate you on SURPASSING your 100th episode this month AND successfully completing your Masters program in leadership. What I appreciated about what you had to say during your talk was starting your presentation with this accomplishment and referring to your thesis, which was about podcasting and professional learning. I loved that you were willing to share examples of mistakes and challenges and how you were able to overcome and learn from them. I love how your professional learning is learning from what you are doing from making the podcast, learning from those who are guests on your podcast, and how you are able to make connections from around the world to learn more about what’s the next progressive edu-idea you want to share in your podcast. Best of all, you accomplish this using TWITTER and I am so glad that we were able to meet face-to-face at CAfLN earlier this year. It makes these connections via Twitter REAL!

You had a tonne to say… Carol Dweck’s “Growth Mindset” is a MUST read for all educators!!! That was one of my biggest take-aways. I love how reading someone’s ideas can be so transformational. We talk about growth mindset in our teacher education program at UNBC, but I am compelled to return back to that book and dig deeper. I cannot believe that you thought you would be a half-hour to talk and a half-hour for questions. When people have a passion… it’s tough to capture those big ideas in 30 minutes. That said, time really flew by when you were speaking and thank you for fielding questions from my students. We loved what you had to say and we loved your recommendations and ideas. It was a fulsome hour and THANK YOU for your patience on our “technical difficulties” in setting up our A/V equipment at the university. It was our first time setting it up and I am so grateful to have students who were all willing to help out to make this video conference possible. Sorry we could not fly you up to Prince George, but having you there LIVE using BlueJeans was the next best thing. Can’t wait to listen to your next podcast. Your productivity is astounding and I hope our students will content create (like you) via BLOG, podcast, YouTube, or Twitter. Thanks Tim!!!