Personalized Learning with Matt & Courtney

Matt and Courtney wrap up seven seasons of podcasts with a remembrance of all the biggest do-do's they've dropped in the past few years. Wait....

Matt and Courtney talk about what to do when designing summer PD sessions for teachers.

Matt and Courtney talk about some entry points into personalized learning - it's different for everyone!

What could summer school be like? Here are some ideas from Matt and Courtney.

Matt and Courtney talk about the struggle of ending the year appropriately with motivation for our learners AND teachers.

Matt and Courtney return with some strategies for using assessment for learning in the classroom - including some cool KISS faces!

Matt and Courtney go full-on retro - bell-bottoms and everything! We talk about assessment for learning, and how it is needed more than ever coming out of (?) the pandemic.

Matt and Courtney are back with a conundrum of sorts: what do we do with scheduling, and why is it so frustrating? We don't have all the answers this time (ask the kids!), but we do have some things to think about. Find our parking lot here. Thanks for listening!

Matt and Courtney talk about one of their favorite topics they have a love/hate relationship with: 4's! Fortunately, they have a plan of what works and what doesn't;t when it comes to creating 4.0 level opportunities.

Matt and Courtney talk about scales versus standards, and how they stack up against each other. Standards are great, and scales make them greater.Oh, and Courtney might be Anna Delvey.

Matt and Courtney discuss what project-based learning is, and how to use some frameworks. As we told you last week, there is research out there to show PBL works!We talked about PBLWorks.org and the High Quality Project Based Learning frameworks, and mentioned our favorite way to get questions form kids, the QFT model.Let us know what you think at PLearnMC on Twitter, Facebook, and on our website!

Matt and Courtney talk about an overview of one of the studies in the Edutopia article we've been discussing - project-based learning! Link: High Quality Project Based Learning

Matt and Courtney discuss their favorite ways to think about SEL in the classroom that you can do today!

Matt and Courtney return with another study from Edutopia's 10 Most Significant Education Studies of 2021. We talk about the role of intentionally teaching social and emotional skills, and show how it affects learners both during and after their school life.Find us at all things PLearnMC!!

Matt and Courtney return with some strategies for pre-assessment opportunities.

Matt and Courtney dig into the first educational study from the Edutopia list of the top 10 of 2021. This study is named "Pretesting versus posttesting: the pedagogical benefits of ". Rolls right off the tongue.Matt asks lots of questions, while Courtney talks it through with him. Next week, we'll be offering up some opportunities for pre-assessment, and what it could look like in the classroom.Thanks for listening! Find us on all platforms at PLearnMC!

Well, we took a lot of time off. We have had many many things happen in the autumn of 2021, as the rest of the world happened to us. We have returned, and you won't be able to get rid of us.We look at overviews of three recent education studies, and plan on getting deeper into them over the next few weeks. Find them here: https://www.edutopia.org/article/10-most-significant-education-studies-2021Find us at PLearnMC on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Thanks for listening!

Matt and Courtney are BACK with some tips and ideas for how to address learning needs that may have arisen over the past year and a half. What formative assessment strategies can teachers use to help find out where learners are - in a systematic manner?Music by Lesfm from Pixabay.

Matt and Courtney are here with a summer sendoff as they prepare for the new year. They are joined by their good friends at the Maine Education Matters podcast to talk about why they started a podcast and what keeps them going. Follow the MEM pod wherever you listen to this pod!

Matt and Courtney interview Katherine Prince, co-author of the publication Envisioning Human-Centered Learning Systems, and Abbie Forbus Everett of KnowledgeWorks. They discuss the vision for the future of learning, the key takeaways, and much more. Download it at the link above!

Hint: lots of sticky notes. Also, two other great ideas from Courtney, and Matt shows his age when talking about Trapper Keepers.

Matt and Courtney talk about reflections on the last year and a half of crazy times, and where we can go from here. It's our season finale, but we'll be around with some intermittent episodes during the summer before coming back in mid-August for the new school year. Thanks to some inspiration and callbacks to our child-pod, @MaineEdMatters. Courtney also has a great story from a 6th-grader at the end.

Matt helps Courtney with her upcoming presentation about engagement strategies. Spoiler: this is how we did things when we worked together in-person. We both miss it, but thought it would be a good way for you listeners to get a glimpse of how we do things. Let us know what you think on our parking lot at plearnmc.com!

It's that time of year! Whether you are interviewing for a new position or interviewing others for positions in your school, the question is how would I get the point across that I am a learner-centered person/school, and I am looking for the right fit? Fortunately, Matt and Courtney have some ideas and advice.

Do we address this in an interdisciplinary way, or as stand-alone dedicated units? Are these insulting discussions? Spoiler alert: we don't really know, but we think the discussion is a good one, and we will be following up on this topic in future episodes.

Well, kind of. They discuss learning progressions without grades, and how you can show growth for learners while doing that - or can you? Let us know who won the fight on any social platform with #plearnmc

Matt and Courtney answer a listener question about defining competency. We offer ways to break down the existing framework into something more meaningful for both teachers and learners.

Matt and Courtney respond to some media about mastery of standards, and how some people reject mastery in favor of the older system. You know how we feel about this.

Matt and Courtney continue their "back to the beginning" talk with a good one - how do we use scoring scales appropriately in the classroom? And maybe even more importantly, how do we teach the teachers how to do this? We call back to the Yes/No game we did last year as a way to introduce this concept to teachers, and how we can build their skills while changing their mindset.

Matt and Courtney go back to the beginning and talk what/how/WHY standards? Why are the three parts of a standard crucial to writing good ones? And how do we show that to teachers?

Matt and Courtney talk about how we occasionally disconnect what we do upfront with culture building with learners and the follow-through, especially trying to break down the barriers of teachers being always "the boss". Courtney offers up some easy and quick techniques on how to help break down this dynamic.

Matt and Courtney come up with Gary Chapin's next band name while discussing better ways to think about large-scale assessment systems.

Matt and Courtney tackle the big question - how do we make professional learning stick? We have some answers, suggestions, and opinions. As always. Find us everywhere at PLearnMC!Some links we talked about: Committee of Ten; The Battle for Public Education (podcast series).

Matt and Courtney talk about personalized learning, but only using the most used ten hundred words. We think it might explain a lot about what it is and what it isn't.The inspiration came from the great xkcd, specifically this image: https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/up_goer_five.pngMaine Education Matters, you've been challenged.

Matt and Courtney talk about the mind-shift from work completion to learning. It's harder than you think, but there are some ways to help think this through to make it useful for you.

Matt and Courtney ask what we need to know about what learners know. In that, we talk about how assessment and learning are a giant Mobius strip.

Matt and Courtney talk about engagement, and how it is really about two things: motivation and participation. Matt pushes back a bit on this, but we get to talking about voice and choice, and how to start using it with your learners TODAY! Oh, and super buffets. You'll hear.

Matt and Courtney are back with another episode, this time about how to effectively incorporate the arts into our teaching and learning. Watch out for insurrections while you're at it!

Matt and Courtney are still processing the insurrection at the Capital last week, but they discuss how to frame those hard conversations we have to have with kids, and what it looks like at a school/district level. Let us know what you think on our parking lot at plearnmc.com or tweet at us @plearnmc.

After winter break, Matt & Courtney had a pod session planned today - then the riots broke out in DC. Insurrection and sedition didn't stop us from recording, however, and we talk about how we can talk to kids about the harder conversations, especially in the world we live in. Courtney has some great advice that is evergreen, of course, but it's worth saying again, especially now.Warning - we do swear for the first time in this one (at least, the first time on air...), so listen for that (It's right in the first minute, and it's only the s-word, and we don't mean "standardized").Stay safe, wear a mask, and we'll see you next week with another one.

Matt and Courtney have been busy lately, but we are back! We review the first semester of 2020 and how it has gone in this time of distance/hybrid learning.

Matt and Courtney return from their election-induced stress times with the introduction of the Profile of a Successful Distance Learner, developed this fall by the Maine Curriculum Leaders Association. They discuss how it is a document to be used to start conversations with teachers, learners, stakeholders, etc, and how it is NOT something to just hand out and call it good.You can find the document at https://www.mainecla.org/blog/mcla-profile-of-a-successful-distance-learner. It is definitely something we could all use as we head into the winter months.

Matt and Courtney return from their election-induced stress times with the introduction of the Profile of a Successful Distance Learner, developed this fall by the Maine Curriculum Leaders Association. They discuss how it is a document to be used to start conversations with teachers, learners, stakeholders, etc, and how it is NOT something to just hand out and call it good.You can find the document at https://www.mainecla.org/blog/mcla-profile-of-a-successful-distance-learner. It is definitely something we could all use as we head into the winter months.

Matt and Courtney made it through election day, but it's obviously still going. Just a few minutes of therapy from us about what to do next..... Hang in there.

Matt and Courtney made it through election day, but it's obviously still going. Just a few minutes of therapy from us about what to do next..... Hang in there.

Matt and Courtney return with a conversation around student attendance, some things that have been happening since March and into the fall, and how to go plaid.

Matt and Courtney return with a conversation around student attendance, some things that have been happening since March and into the fall, and how to go plaid.

Matt and Courtney are back with a mailbag! Post your own questions in our parking lot at plearnmc.com. Today's question: How do we set a reasonable bar for competency work when trying to hold students accountable in a "new normal" world?

Matt and Courtney are back with a mailbag! Post your own questions in our parking lot at plearnmc.com. Today's question: How do we set a reasonable bar for competency work when trying to hold students accountable in a "new normal" world?

Matt and Courtney return after a week off with a plea - use the damn moment! Education is different these days, we all know that. So this is the perfect time for us to make the system do what we want it to do - encourage learner agency; be standards-based, proficiency-based, or even competency-based; project-based across content areas; etc, etc. This is the time!Read Kelly Young's article here, and follow Education Reimagined on Twitter.

Matt and Courtney return after a week off with a plea - use the damn moment! Education is different these days, we all know that. So this is the perfect time for us to make the system do what we want it to do - encourage learner agency; be standards-based, proficiency-based, or even competency-based; project-based across content areas; etc, etc. This is the time!Read Kelly Young's article here, and follow Education Reimagined on Twitter.