Welcome 2024! Teacher Plans and Goals

Making Plans for 2024

All right, we’re back.

We.

Are so good to see you now I’m laughing at our conversation before we started this, but welcome back everyone.

0:20

We’re not going to talk about that.

It’s 2024.

It seems weird to say, but DD is here.

Adam is here.

So excited to see your face.

I’m excited to see you too.

I mean, I know I haven’t aged at all in the.

Last.

Oh, thank you.

I pay him to say that.

0:36

And Adam, you look amazing as well.

We were just chatting about like, what has been going on with your life in the last year?

Are you in the same sense that, like, I feel Trish and I were just talking about this recent, like December came.

I know we say this every year came and went like that.

0:53

Like, I feel like like we, I don’t know.

I feel like we were just prepping for the holidays and now it’s it’s past.

And yeah, I think that’s the thing about the Hall.

The Christmas season every year is like, you build so much up to it and it’s awesome.

I love Chris.

It’s my favorite.

Holiday but.

1:09

It just comes and goes so quick.

Let me give you my old lady voice.

But you know, Adam, as we age, time goes by faster.

Good at that.

I am good.

Well, never.

Considered voice acting a word.

It’s it’s not a stretch for me, so I’m so glad to see you.

1:27

I’m so glad that we were able to connect and make a plan to get back together ’cause I do miss our talks.

Me too.

And I’ve had so many people e-mail me saying, when are you guys getting back together?

So yeah, we’re.

Here, and we’re trying this new like they can see us.

Now we’re going to put this video out there and put it on you.

1:44

Ignore my graze in my messy office, but I’m hiding as much as I can.

And and.

And and when you see me, please just when I said I look I have an age to but cameras don’t lie.

So anyhow but you know we were going to talk about you know what 2024 is going to look like for for you for me and you know maybe you know for teachers out there.

2:08

So you have some plans for 2024.

I have very weak plans that are not in writing, but I have some ideas for 2024.

That’s where we start.

That’s, that’s the thing and I think let’s let’s start right there with teachers.

2:23

Like it’s an idea, right.

Don’t.

Don’t disown that.

That’s huge.

Yeah, I’ve I it’s been nuts.

We’ve been so busy with with with family and and stuff and it’s awesome.

Don’t get me wrong, my kids are at the age that they are on the go non-stop with sports and and whatnot and it’s the best.

2:43

I love being a dad.

I love being a fan.

I love being a coach.

I know I told you before we started I started substitute teaching which is is awesome.

I love it.

I’ve been teaching voluntarily music for the past year, two years now.

Absolutely love it.

I go twice a week, work with these kids.

2:59

It’s amazing.

But I was in there one day and the teachers, the only one of the teachers was there for these two classes of 20, you know 20 kids with with special needs and it’s it’s it’s tough.

And I said wait, where’s where’s Aaron?

And the other teacher was like, they didn’t get her sub.

3:16

I have both classes and like how do you do that?

Like, I only see him for 30 minutes and I was like and she’s like.

We.

Can’t get, yeah, she’s like, we can’t get Subs.

And I’m like, well, I’ll do it if I’m around, if I’m not traveling.

And she texted me the phone number of the the coordinator of the special Ed Co-op that instant.

3:34

She’s like, here, call her.

Tell her you’re coming in to fill out paperwork.

I called her.

She’s like, Oh my gosh, Adam, that’s awesome.

I’m gonna tell them you’re coming right now to fill out paperwork.

So within a day I had it all filled out, background check done, fingerprinted.

And I got called the next day to do 1/2 day or one of my friends because their sub cancelled on them last minute.

3:55

Which I get.

Everybody has things going on.

I’m not trying.

To absolutely cancel or not, you know, you say, you say I’m going to go and then you wake up and you you’ve got some kind of bug and you’re like, there’s no way I can even move, let alone teach a class of of children, so.

It actually even happened the day before Christmas break.

4:10

I I got asked to sub but Trisha was fighting a cold.

I was fighting a cold.

Trisha had stayed home that previous day which she never stays home from school and and I was like, I looked at her and like, are you going back to school tomorrow?

She goes, probably why I’m like, because I just got asked to sub if you’re going, I’ll go.

4:26

I’m not going to say like.

We’re in this together.

But if you’re staying home, I’ll stay home with you.

No.

But yeah, it’s been a blast.

I absolutely love it.

It’s it’s it’s one of those things.

If you’re listening to this and you’re not in a classroom right now and you’re looking for something fun to it’s, it’s not bad at all because there’s zero prep.

4:44

You don’t bring anything home, right?

You You show up and you get to teach and.

And then you can block out those times when when you need to, you know, you need to take care of other things, which is which happens from time to time, right.

We have other things.

Speaking of other things, I think I was like scrolling and trolling on Instagram the other day and I came across your speaking calendar.

5:07

Yeah, I was like, dude.

Does that look bad?

Like, I don’t want to put myself out to be like look at me.

I was worried about that, but I was.

No, I actually, you know, I thought it was a really good idea because.

And and FYI, I’m going to copy you because, you know, often times, you know, I’ll, I’ll go somewhere and I’ll speak and I’ll put a picture of, you know, you know, thanks for letting me spend the day with you guys and blah, blah, blah.

5:36

And people were like, I had no idea you were here.

I’m like 20 minutes away or 10 minutes away.

And then I always feel bad and I’m like, well, you know, I, I, I was the same as you.

I didn’t want it to be like, oh, look at me.

People want to hear what I have to say.

But at the same time, you know, if people can make things happen and they can attend things, there’s, you know, there’s such a variety of events out there that I think that, yeah, there’s some great opportunities for people to get either virtual PD or on face to face.

6:09

And if it works out, it’s great.

If it doesn’t, that’s fine too.

But you are going.

You know, it looks like every month you are you’re at least you’re traveling.

And it’s it’s, it’s it’s a mix.

There’s virtual, there’s traveling.

The cool thing is, a lot of it is is within a couple hours of my house, which is wonderful.

6:28

Don’t get me wrong, I love jumping on a plane going.

So you know how I feel about planes.

I know you love planes.

Did you see today?

I just saw today a post about an Alaskan Airlines flight.

Did you see that one?

No.

It was from, I think, like Portland down to somewhere in California.

6:45

The emergency door blew off like 20 minutes into the flight.

It like something deep pressure.

I don’t know what the right wording is.

I’m not a pilot.

Did anybody?

Die.

No, they got everybody back.

As far as I know, everybody made it back safe.

They were 20 minutes in.

I think everybody was safe.

7:02

I don’t think they would have posted the video on.

I mean it was showed a video of like them just kind of coasting with this door gone.

That’s helpful.

I don’t mean to like laugh.

Hopefully everyone was OK.

I think they would have said if there were injuries in the article.

But yeah, like, not just the window, the whole, like, it looked like maybe I’m speaking wrong, but it looked like the emergency, like, hatch was just just not there and like, oxygen, yeah, that’s your favorite part of flying, right?

7:28

Knowing that that’s going to happen.

No, I don’t like getting on and off the airplane.

I I don’t like.

That’s it.

Just don’t.

Like that I I don’t.

I love when I’m there.

I absolutely love it.

But the process of flying for me is like, I don’t know, it’s like a rash.

7:44

You know I will never forget our time together in in Nashville’s airport for 9 hours when we got delayed and you and I were.

I just remember you like you heard everybody else’s conversations and you couldn’t tone them out and it was driving you nuts about out loud.

7:59

People were talking.

I know I’m like, you’re sitting my next to mom.

There’s no need to scream anyhow, so.

Yeah.

I’m, I’m, I’m on the road here and there it’s it’s it’s cool.

And like you said that the the thing you read, the reason you want to post that out there.

If there’s presenters listening to this.

8:14

One cool thing that happened was I posted that I was going to be in in this town and a friend of mine that teaches in that town but in that town that the like the high school district is different than the elementary district.

Oh OK.

The elementary district is who has booked me and and she messed me She’s like wait are you going to be at the high school?

8:32

And I’m like I didn’t even know they were separate.

So I looked up and I’m like, well, I think so.

But then I realized that it’s two separate entities.

Oh wow.

So I reached, I reached out and I was like, I haven’t heard back yet, but I’m, I’m in communication with saying, like, hey, why don’t we just make this your whole town, not just your elementary?

8:49

Like, the more the merrier, right?

Like so.

I’m hoping that will lead to other stuff.

Yeah, Tell everybody like what is like, if you could say three things that you mostly talk about when you’re out on the road, what are your 33 big ones?

It’s coffee, beer, and cocaine.

9:04

No totally kidding.

That’s what gets me through the day.

No.

That’s not.

I don’t want your coping mechanisms.

No.

What do you speak mostly about us?

Sorry, I That was horrible.

That’s how I I work in the mornings, OK?

9:20

Well, I thought I heard the last thing you said was a Coca-Cola, but then I didn’t.

Know if that is that, that’s it, that’s it.

I didn’t know if you.

Just stopped with Coke and then I felt like we needed to carry on that conversation.

But.

No, I wake up in the morning, I shoot.

No, no, I no, it’s all about my my biggest passion is just just motivation.

9:37

So like, my back to school keynotes, the first one that I the the one I’ve been doing that gets booked the most is called teachers are the Best.

And I break down what makes us the best at what we do because let’s be honest, other people can’t do what teachers do.

Like, there’s no way.

9:52

You know, and and I, it’s just been one of those things that regardless of whether it’s pre-K teachers I’m speaking to or high school, you know, 12th grade teachers that I’m speaking to, I get awesome feedback saying, like, this is just what this is, what we needed.

We didn’t need you to come in and try to teach us how to do this and this and this.

10:09

We just needed someone to remind us that, yeah, this is what we should be doing with our lives And that’s what that keynote’s all about.

Just motivation.

Trying to, like, pump you up, remind you to do what you do with ideas in it that you can take back to your classroom regardless of what grade you teach.

10:25

Which great.

That’s fantastic.

And then I’m debuting soon actually next week from when we’re doing this this recording a new keynote called failure is not an option.

But failing is.

And it’s it’s trying to get people to understand that that whether you’re an adult or a child in a classroom, failing is all a part of what we do.

10:45

I mean, the reason we get to, the goals we get to is because we’ve found our right path to get there and not everything is perfect and.

Trying.

To get people to understand that we don’t want to like, we don’t want to get to the point of failure, right?

But but failing is all a part of how we get to where we’re going.

11:02

So yeah, those are my two favorite.

And then I do workshops as well.

So you know, you do a lot.

Of play stuff, right?

Play baseball, play, you know, teach, play, learn science, room transformations, engagement.

It’s it’s kind of a mix of it’s it’s interesting what schools reach out to to say like, oh, we want to see this or this or this.

11:20

Like, I’m doing some work in New Jersey and I’m going the first time to this school to do all play driven stuff.

But then I’m going back the next month and they’re like, we need a strong focus just on fun writing.

Like we don’t want writing practices.

11:36

We don’t need like the research behind it.

We just want fun ideas to get our kids excited about writing.

I’m like, hey, I got a session for that, right?

So.

Just guess what I got something for.

That that was one of the first sessions I ever did was just fun writing ideas, yeah.

Awesome.

But you’re still working with schools, too.

We’re.

I’m doing, I’m still doing a lot of work with schools.

11:53

So in fact I’m trying to think, well, I’m, I’m talking at the Plain Talk conference in in New Orleans which is apparently a big deal.

So I’m really, really plain talk.

Yeah, it’s a huge like science of reading structured literacy conference.

12:13

Like there’s I’m going to be fangirling because there’s going to be some like big names in research there.

So I’m excited that’s the end of of January.

I’ll be talking about small group instruction surrounding you know science based small group instruction for reading.

12:31

So that’s exciting.

And then you know Illinois Conference, which is always my favorite, one of my favorite conferences and then you know I have a couple of other like kindergarten association ones.

I’ll type them all out and and I’ll I’ll do the the little.

12:52

Yeah, I think I’ll do.

I think I’ll do that so that, you know, kind of people will know I’m doing Frog St. in July.

Did you get it?

You’re going.

Yeah.

I know we talked about it.

Oh my gosh, you’re going to love it if any of you are listening to this and you’re like in the pre-K primary sector of education.

13:08

In in the Dallas area or.

Or anywhere.

I mean, there were people from all over the the world that I met last year that came to Frog.

Street Oh my gosh, it looks like a party.

It’s so fun.

You know the cool thing about it was it was like, it was it was a celebration of pre-K and primary.

13:28

That’s what it was.

It was, it was reminding teachers that hey, this is this job is awesome.

But it was it was a blast.

It was my first time ever being there.

I remember being in Vegas years ago at SDE and in the National Conference and hearing people like Doctor Jean and Kim ads that always say like, oh, we’re not going home, we’re going, we’re going to.

13:45

Frog St.

And I’m like, I want to go Frog Street, but I never got invited, I feel.

Like that’s the place I need to be.

I know.

But I got invited last year and it was it was phenomenal.

So to get invited back was was huge.

And then to hear that that you’re going and our good friend Doctor Laurie Elliott is going, I’m oh, I’m.

14:01

So I’m seen her in forever and I I cannot wait.

And then, of course, we have the Educator Summit this summer.

I keep sipping from my cup from.

The cup, it’s empty, but he just keeps holding it to his lips.

Just.

Keep holding it up there.

Yeah.

14:17

I need to like use a sharpie and write my promo code out here and just keep holding it up every time I.

Drink.

That would be perfect.

I mean it would just it wouldn’t be obvious.

I’m totally doing that next time.

You know what’s really exciting about the summer?

One that we have is we have got some great keynotes, but we also are going up to 5th grade.

14:36

That’s.

Exciting.

That was a big question about, you know, whether or not you know there because we always will get questions My, you know, we have administered like I have these 35 do you have anything for them?

And we always like, no, no, no.

So we decided, I say we, Mark and I decided my husband, that we would expand it up to 35.

14:58

And then we’ve actually decided to hand the baton off to a new kind of, I don’t know, a kind of owner.

He’s 100% an owner and.

You’re like having trouble separating.

That I know, I know.

It’s like it’s I, you know, I told him it’s like having a litter of kittens or not kittens because I have never a kittens, a litter of puppies.

15:19

And like you love each of those puppies but you know they can’t stay with you because they’re going to get big and you you know you don’t have the time to spend with those things.

So I said, but of course, you know, you give that or you know, in my case, sell that to somebody who’s going to be a good steward and a good person for this.

15:39

And this guy 100%.

I knew within 5 minutes of talking to him that he understood the mission of the Educator Summit was to bring top notch speakers, speakers together, you know, really grounded in pedagogy.

Yeah, I love a good rah rah and we definitely have a few of those.

15:59

But you know, we’re not into edutainment.

You know, that’s not our thing.

We we want to have kind of experts in their field.

So we’ve curated a great group for the winter summit, which is finishing, not finishing up.

It started January 1st and goes through the end of March.

16:16

So people can still sign up with Adam’s promo code Adam 10?

Is it Adam 10?

Adam, 10, and seriously, I’m going to cricket that right onto this so anytime I do the podcast.

Yeah, that gives you a good little discount, but you can still sign up.

16:33

But because it’s all virtual on demand, but really, really excited about the summer one as well.

We have a lot of repeat people and we have some people that are brand new and.

You wouldn’t believe and I’m sure you hear this too but you wouldn’t believe the number of people I run into that that if that have said I saw you on on the summit like I just I just got a gig to do a pre recorded virtual session for a school in Texas that was hosting their own like little back to school teacher conference but not not bringing in speakers.

17:05

They were just having some of their own staff do some cool stuff and they brought in and they said hey we’d love to have you do a pre recorded session much like the educator summit.

We loved that summit.

You know what would you charge?

To just talk to our teachers.

And I’m like, this is cool, but the cool thing is I know my wife Trisha, she even says too.

17:23

She’s like the thing I love about that is we get months to watch it and I can do it on my own time.

Like, don’t get me wrong, I love being face to face with teachers.

It is the best to be in front of them and talk to them and build relationships.

But some teachers don’t have the opportunity to go to an event, and I know.

17:43

It’s such an expensive thing to go to a conference.

Oftentimes, you know, the cost of conference is really prohibitive for people.

You know, travel, childcare, all of those things that are are necessary to be away from home for a couple of days, well, you know, back.

To the Subs, too.

Just even getting out of your classroom.

17:59

Yeah, I mean paying like, you know, $27.00 for a bagel and cream cheese, you know, you’re like, those things are like, what?

That’s the thing.

Yeah, pack them in your bag.

That’s my word.

So yeah, we love, we love that teachers can get it on demand.

18:15

You know, last summer we had over 6000 teachers attend the winter summit’s always a little smaller, so, but we have a growth over growth, which tells me that what we’re what we’re what we’re cooking, people want to eat.

18:32

So we’re happy.

We’re happy about that.

The other thing that’s different is we have gone from state to state to find out what is your state requirement to become an approved professional development.

And what we found is shocking.

Everybody does it differently.

18:49

You know, some states were blanketly approved like Texas.

I can’t think of them all.

I just think of Texas because it’s so big Texas and there’s quite a few.

But what we found is those states that don’t have that process for blanket approval or for independent companies to do, to do that sort of thing, to do to be approved, then it’s up to the district.

19:11

So if your principal says sure then then you can hand in those hours for continuing education for your for your school license.

So we haven’t had any state say Oh no, there’s no way to do this every state, Florida, California, Illinois, quite a few of them.

19:28

We’ve heard the same thing.

Well you know if if you’re in Illinois you have to be an I think it was, you had to be like an Illinois based university city or a nonprofit.

Yeah.

So those were and I don’t even.

I I don’t even.

Know.

Nonprofit had to be based in Illinois.

19:44

So I mean, obviously I don’t have a home in Illinois, but you know, we had a a really great, you know, path so teachers can get those hours approved.

Yeah, it’s just different state by state and so.

Keep my address.

I know.

20:00

I live at Adam’s basement.

Which is not a bad place to be, I’m sure.

But so that’s we’re continuing on with that.

I mostly speak on science of reading, implementation, really, the five pillars of reading, and I do that.

20:22

K5 and then a lot lately has been about writing under the umbrella of the science of reading.

It’s basically a science of writing.

You had talked before we started about writing books.

And last year, I mean, OK, let’s be honest, 16 months ago I said I’m going to write a book about writing.

20:43

I think that’s just such a great idea.

DD Wills is going to be a published author, but.

That was Doesn’t 16 months ago feel like yesterday like it just.

It kind of does so.

I.

I spent.

I have buckets of research pulled, you know, so many articles, read so many books.

21:00

And I’m like, I now know not everything, obviously, but I know so much about it.

Then I sat down to write.

It was like cricket, cricket, cricket.

And I spent.

I like, I I laid out three weeks to get something down and honestly I couldn’t do it.

21:18

And then I was like, OK, it’s important to know what you can do and what you can’t do.

And I’m like, I am not.

I I can’t write for academia.

That’s just not how I am.

I I so anyhow, I I said, OK, I’m not writing a book, and I ditched that plan.

21:36

But you’re writing.

You’re planning on writing some.

You said something about fiction, but are you writing anything for the teacher world?

Not right now, I probably.

Yeah, I mean, you just did.

I mean, yeah, we’ve.

Got those two back there.

I know I.

21:51

Learned Science Box.

And you know what was so easy about those?

I I got to give a shout out to my publisher, Dave Burgess.

The thing I loved about writing for him was I didn’t have the stress of what you said.

You were just like dealing with like the the research.

And I’m not saying there’s not research behind what we wrote about.

22:06

But the someone asked me one time like, Oh my gosh, how much research did you put in to write a book about teach like play.

And I said, you know what?

Teach, play, learn is it’s 13 years of me teaching kindergarten.

That’s the research I did to show what is on the pages of that book.

But.

Well, you also you also you also have, you know, research quoted in there.

22:26

Yeah, yeah, totally.

You know, it’s not like you said.

This is why the thing.

Right.

It wasn’t like.

But you were hammering it out.

No.

Yeah, it wasn’t like crunched over a typewriter trying to find all the research I could.

Can you hear Augie barking right now?

Sorry.

That’s OK.

I don’t hear probably at our house.

22:43

I I’ve always been into writing.

Like, I remember sitting through college like writing down stories, And even as a kid I wrote short stories all the time.

And I’ve always wanted to, to write like a novel.

I’ve written children’s books.

I love doing that.

But I think I joked before time.

23:00

I’ve over the past 10 years, I’ve probably written, you know, 30 different stories that have started and then stopped and started and stopped and started and stopped.

And I’m making it a goal for myself, for for this year, for 2024, to write at least.

At least I want to do more. 20 minutes a day, 20 minutes a day.

23:16

I’m sitting down in front of my computer and only focusing on writing the story that is in my mind at that time, right?

Like and I I started that.

I started this little story idea right before the holidays and it’s it’s kind of like a thriller type thing.

23:32

I’m not going to go into it now because I I don’t know what it’s going to become but it’s it’s like a thriller mystery love triangle type story.

I don’t know if that’s even though I don’t know if that’s the right description or not.

There’s there’s characters in my mind like it works in mysterious.

Way you know what, when you get closer, you can tell everybody.

23:48

I’ll tell everybody what it is.

Yeah.

My goal with that is 20 minutes a day and and I’ve, I’ve been doing that.

So over the past, what is today, the 7th, over the past seven days, I’ve got like 4000 words knocked out and I’m just, I’m just sitting down and I Oh my gosh, it could be more but I am.

24:06

I am one of those people that I write a timeline like in a story like it’s playing out in my mind.

It makes total sense.

Oh yeah, so you’ve already seen this movie, right?

And I read it and I’m like that doesn’t make sense at all.

So part of that 20 minutes is really piercing things around and and where they go.

24:21

But yeah, I’m trying.

I’m trying to do that whether it’s it’s a children’s book or that book or or whatever it is.

And I’m trying to trying to break up my days when I’m at home into goals like that.

Like, I know as teachers we we try to take it all in on right.

Like we we say OK I’m going to do this this this this this this this.

24:39

And I have to have done by this date and all these ideas that I’m going to push into my classroom this year.

I know I was I was notorious for that when I first you know I’d go to conferences and I’d see you know two days worth of content and I’d be like I got to I got to put this into action right now and I can’t remember who it was that I saw speak one time.

24:58

I wish I could give this person credit it may I I don’t even I don’t remember.

But whoever it was said you know when you leave this event it might have been Kim Bearden.

Might have been Kim Bearden that said this.

Like, try putting one thing into place this month.

25:15

One new thing, one new thing a month.

And and you know, if you do that, the next month you got one new idea in your classroom.

And then the next month, you know, after the year you have 9 brand new ideas that starting next year you’re going to start with, right.

25:31

You’re not going to start fret like you have 9 cool things that you know, maybe they all didn’t work, but let’s say that nine cool things that worked last year that you can now put into effect with without, you know, little prep without stressing.

And then try it again the next year, you know.

25:47

That’s something that, like new teachers need to also hear when they start out the year.

I think we talked about it before of you know, you, you know that you have to teach math and you have to teach writing.

You have to teach reading.

You have to read all these subjects and you also have to learn how to manage a class on your own, right.

26:08

So you know, I think you know the same.

Give yourself grace and think you know.

For new teachers, you know.

Let that first month be about managing your class.

Teachers who are going back in the classroom after winter break.

Make sure you got your routines back down, reminding, reminding students you know.

26:28

I think, I think teachers already know that.

But you know, new teachers may not know that.

So or whenever you come back from an extended break, spend, if it’s a, you know, two week break spend a day, you know, just kind of going over routines building excitement for your classroom, building excitement for you to teach again.

26:48

And then, you know, for new teachers, I always say take one domain, you know, if it’s teaching phonics, let that be your, you know, first semester focus.

And if it’s teaching writing the second, let that be your second, You know, so that you don’t have all these brand new things.

27:05

Because what you, what you don’t want to have happen is kind of doing things right, right.

That’s what you don’t want to have happen.

You don’t want to say, you know, just take a little sample of all these things without really building the routines into a habit for you and then reminding yourself Because like, often times I’ll go in and I’ll do because I’m, I’m working two days a week in a classroom.

27:32

I love it.

But you know, I’ll go in and I’ll, I’ll do something in the classroom and then I’ll come back and do that reflection part and say, oh, I forgot this, this and this and that lesson.

So the next time I go in, I remember those things and I make sure that I include them or I record myself and I’m like, oh, I was not clear in my instructions.

27:52

Then I can go back and make sure.

So it’s just sort of like perfecting it during that that time meanwhile, you know, keeping your children happy, healthy and you happy, healthy.

So just really kind of learning, reflecting, learning, reflecting, get that, get that into a habit for you because that’s that’s the hard part.

28:13

When you try something new is building those everything feels like, Oh my gosh, what do I do next?

What do I do next to make that into a habit?

Read about it, reflect, go back and forth.

Then when you’re ready, move on to a new domain so that you’re constantly growing.

But that teach, reflect.

28:30

You know, as many years as I’ve been in and out of the classroom, I still have to do that.

You know, I, I, I have yet to teach a perfect lesson ever.

You know, there’s always those times when I’m like, oh, I didn’t notice that.

I didn’t notice that.

And so, you know that that would be like kind of the goal that I have as going back in into the classroom.

28:53

But I also, you know, I I know so many teachers do that there’s, but there’s so many pressures as well.

So that’s a whole episode.

Which I I think, and I want to talk about this on a future episode too, is is reminding teachers to to like follow your passions too.

29:09

I mean I know we focus on education in this this podcast, but Trisha has started something this this past week as a goal of hers that I’ll share later down the road because it’s in the works right now.

Something cool she’s doing that is completely outside the realm of her classroom, and I’ve seen her so happy doing it.

29:28

And I think that teachers, we so often pour so much of ourselves into our job that we forget we have a life too, and have.

Curate those hobbies away from or those interests away from.

She’s really pursuing a hobby of hers that might turn into something more.

29:45

I’m super stoked to see where it could go, but I think, you know, I’ve seen a lot of posts recently that say like it’s a it’s OK or it it, it doesn’t make you a bad teacher to not want to go back to school yet, right?

Like after winter break.

30:01

And we need to remember that, like, this is the only career where you, and maybe not the only there’s, you know, I know servicemen and women are pulled away from their families more than anybody else and that kind of stuff.

But I can’t think of anybody else I know in my personal life that puts as much time into their work, outside of their work, as the teachers that I do, you know.

30:21

And I’m not just discounting any of their job.

I know every profession is important.

People.

People you know.

Absolutely are.

Important to what they do but it’s so hard for people to understand that that teachers are putting hours and hours and hours outside of their paid hours to do something for other people’s children.

30:39

You know and and unfortunately in such situations if you have children of your own, that takes away from them.

And I’m so proud of her because she’s she’s realized that recently and she’s.

Setting some boundaries and also yeah.

I’m going to stop bringing so much home.

Pursuing I love it.

30:54

I love it.

Yeah, we’ll talk about that another time.

Yeah, we’ll leave that with you guys right now.

Adam and I have Pinky promised to.

Well, we didn’t really pinky promise, but we should that we will.

We’re going to, we’re going to be like a blood oath or something.

31:10

I don’t know.

I’ll send you a little vial of blood.

No, I’m kidding.

I’m not going.

To Wow.

We’re talking about blood oaths and beer and all kinds of stuff today.

Wow.

It’s not.

That kind of show, but we promise to be more regular in our recording and so we can’t wait to see you next time.

Yeah, buddy.

31:26

See you guys.

All right.

Bye.