Podcasts about classcraft

In this episode of House of #EdTech, I discuss the what, why, and how of gamification in education! By incorporating game design elements into your teaching, you can boost student motivation, engagement, and learning outcomes—all while making lessons more interactive and fun! Segment 1: What is Gamification in Education? Definition of gamification and how it differs from game-based learning The psychology behind gamification: motivation, engagement, and dopamine Why gamification works in both K-12 and higher education settings Segment 2: Why Gamification Works Teachers and schools successfully implementing gamification How gamified learning platforms like Classcraft, Kahoot!, and Quizizz enhance the classroom experience The impact of leaderboards, challenges, and achievements on student motivation Segment 3: Practical Gamification Strategies for Educators Points, Badges, and Leaderboards (PBL): Reward students for progress and effort Quests and Challenges: Break down lessons into missions and problem-solving activities Choice and Autonomy: Let students pick their learning paths through differentiated tasks Storytelling & Themes: Create immersive experiences (e.g., a classroom space mission or historical adventure) Resources & Links Mentioned: Classcraft – Gamify classroom management Kahoot! – Interactive quizzes Quizizz – Fun game-based assessments Minecraft: Education Edition – Learning through creativity

What will be trending in education in 2025?Host Kailey Rhodes sits down with Classcraft cofounder and HMH's SVP of product management and strategy Shawn Young to discuss ed predictions. They cover topics like simplifying EdTech, leaning on AI tech tools to build teacher-student relationships, and bringing the "human element" into technology.Teachers in America profiles K–12 teachers across the country. Hear firsthand from the people who are shaping young lives in the classroom every day. If you or someone you know would be a good candidate for Teachers in America, please email us at shaped@hmhco.com.

Comment peut-on exploiter le jeu comme un outil d'apprentissage ?La question de l'importance du jeu en tant qu'outil pédagogique se pose. Peut-on réellement apprendre par le jeu ? Et si c'est le cas, dans quelles conditions cela est-il possible ?De nos jours, les enseignants et les formateurs montrent un intérêt croissant pour l'utilisation de divers types de jeux. Cependant, comment se produit l'apprentissage à travers le jeu ? Quels facteurs doivent être pris en compte lors de la conception de dispositifs d'enseignement intégrant des éléments ludiques ?Pour répondre à ces questions, nous allons discuter avec Eric, auteur du livre “Le Paradoxe du Marionnettiste - Jeu et apprentissage” et professeur en technologies éducatives à l'Université de Genève.Avec au programme :LudificationLes situations d'apprentissageLes posturesPour plus d'informations et d'autres contenus :Le jeu Classcraft : http://tinyurl.com/outils-numeriques-enseignantsLa méthode du chocolat sur les brocolis : Egenfeldt-Nielsen S., Overview of research on the educational use of video game, Digital kompetanse, vol. 1, 2006-3, p. 184–213.Ressource EtrePROF - Expérimenter des activités ludiques au collège : http://tinyurl.com/7-activites-a-experimenterLe collectif Team Ludens : https://www.semperludens.fr/Une série audio animée par Nathalie Dreyfus, enregistrée par Yannis Do Couto, réalisée et mixée par Benjamin Macé, et produite par Lacmé Production.Hébergé par Ausha. Visitez ausha.co/politique-de-confidentialite pour plus d'informations.

Guest: Leslee Mizen-Stroud, Middle School Social Studies Teacher In this episode, Brit gets all the details on how Leslee is leveling up her teaching game with Classcraft! This edtech gem is a gamified tool that even non-gamers can rock with their students. Listen in as Leslee "spills the tea" on how Classcraft has revolutionized her teaching style and made her classroom a more engaging and dynamic space for learning.  Resources: Leslee's Top "Random Events" for relationship building and creating a classroom culture. Classcraft - Student Engagement (can be used in partnership with PBIS, CASEL, Digital Citizenship, IB Standards, and the 4C's).  Classcraft 101 Vimeo: Getting Started

Embark on a Riveting Journey: AI and Human Intelligence Decoded for Modern EducatorsImmerse yourself in this exciting episode of 'AI for Teachers,' where host Harvey Spencer unravels the captivating parallels between Artificial Intelligence (AI) and human intelligence in an engaging, easy-to-understand manner, drawing on relatable examples from everyday life.How is AI Transforming the Classroom Experience? Set sail on an intellectual odyssey as we delve into how AI learns, simulating our brain's function but with distinct limitations. Unlock the Potential of AI in Education with game-changing tools like Classcraft and Edsby that revolutionize teaching methods and elevate classroom management. Can AI Fully Mirror Human Cognitive Abilities? What Barriers Remain? We explore the fluid, adaptable nature of human intelligence and the limitations of AI. From AI's pattern recognition capabilities to the realms of empathy and understanding, this episode offers a deep dive into the intriguing world of AI.What Ethical Dilemmas Should Educators Be Aware Of? Venture into the often-overlooked moral and ethical considerations, a critical topic every modern educator needs to understand, enriched by insights from thought leaders like Houman Harouni.What's Coming Up in the AI for Teachers Series? Get a tantalizing glimpse of our next episode, your go-to guide for navigating the complex landscape of AI in 21st-century education.Show Notes:  - Setting the Stage: Recap and an attention-grabbing hook.- Understanding AI: What every educator needs to know about AI.- The Human Element: The irreplaceable facets of human intelligence.- AI Tools You Should Know: Practical applications for your classroom.- Navigating Ethical Waters: Unpack the moral implications of AI.- Valuable Takeaways: The key insights you won't want to miss.- Get Involved: How to stay connected and contribute to the dialogue.Ready to Dive In?  This podcast episode is perfect for educators seeking to understand AI's role in the classroom, curriculum designers aiming to incorporate modern technology, and anyone interested in the ever-evolving landscape of AI education. Click that 'subscribe' button now and become part of our educational revolution!

Shawn Young is a co-founder and CEO of Classcraft, the Engagement Management System for schools. Since its launch, Classcraft has gained incredible traction with educators worldwide, providing tools to gamify their classrooms. Shawn taught 11th-grade physics for nine years, holds a bachelor's degree in physics and a master's in education from Université de Sherbrooke, and is also a seasoned web developer. Shawn sits on the Scientific Advisory Board for UNESCO's MGIEP, sits on the corporate advisory board for Future Ready Schools New Jersey, sits on the corporate advisory board for SETDA, is the vice-president of the Edteq Association and is an Ambassador for the Education faculty of the University of Sherbrooke. Shawn is interested in how we can create a community in the classroom and how playful principles can help teach the whole child. How to Connect with Shawn: Email: shawn@classcraft.com Website: https://classcraft.com Twitter: https://twitter.com/classcraftgame Instagram: https://instagram.com/classcraftgame Facebook: https://facebook.com/classcraftgame LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/shawnyoung1/ How to connect with Benita G. Email: theeduconciergepodcast@gmail.com Website: https://www.podpage.com/the-education-concierge-1/ YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/@chatwiththeeduconcierge Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theeducationconciergepodcast Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theeduconcierge --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/educationconcierge/message

Amanda Hunt shares her rationale and process for supporting her readers by providing advisories inside the cover of her library books. I would like to thank composer Nazar Rybak at Hooksounds.com for the music you've heard today.   Literati Book Fairs: Schedule your first Literati book fair by July 31 for Fall 2023.  Use the code UNITED to receive a $500 Titlewave gift card  Capstone *use UNITED for $20 off $100 or more on print and ebooks Editable PD Certificate FAQ's and ISO (In search of…) Online Doctoral Programs SLU Playlists APA format for citing a podcast/podcast app Amanda Hunt Twitter/IG: @thenextgenlibrarian  Blog post on Content Warnings Resources Trigger Warning Database Sign up for ARCs:  eARCs via NetGalley and Edelweiss ALCs (listening) Libro.fm How I read  Classcraft presentation  

On this episode of the TeacherNerdz podcast, Joe and Ron welcome back Shawn Young, founder and CEO of Classcraft. On Shawn's last visit we discussed a bit about teaching and relating with Generation Z and Alpha and we dive deeper into this topic in this episode. We also end the episode talking about ChatGPT, what it means for education, and how educators can use it. Show Links: https://wakelet.com/wake/-HpWNY9pt_gEUMZhb8Cmp --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/teacher-nerdz/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/teacher-nerdz/support

On this episode of the TeacherNerdz podcast, Joe and Ron continue their conversation with Shawn Young, creator and CEO of ClassCraft. We discuss the current generation of students, what school is like for them, how educators need to redesign learning to fit student needs, and how Classcraft can fit into it all. Show Links: https://wakelet.com/wake/y8BY9zrV0N_sSujGHpUde --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/teacher-nerdz/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/teacher-nerdz/support

This week, Ryan sits with Shawn Young, the CEO and co-founder of Classcraft. On this episode, Shawn talks about the use of video game psychology and how a Classcraft class looks different than a traditional classroom. Shawn also talks about how gamified elements can help support non-curricular cognitive skills in students and the role of these elements with SEL. Tune in! You can also find out more about our guest's work by visiting www.classcraft.comHost: Ryan Kairalla (@ryankair)Producer: Ross Ulysse

Tom und Tim schnacken in dieser Folge über agile Spiele, welche sie gut finden und warum und welche es denn noch so gibt. Wir erklären, welches mindset und Setting notwendig ist, wie wir die Klammer setzen (warmup, Spiel, Retrospektive) und ein paar Tipps haben wir logisch auch parat ;-) Die in der Folge versprochenen links findet ihr hier:21 Jedi Game (Toms Adaption)Paper Airplanes (Tims Empfehlung)Schiffe versenken das Masterpaper des Fraunhofer-InsitutViel Spaß und viele learnings beim Spielen wünschen euch Tom & Tim!

On this episode of the TeacherNerdz podcast, Joe and Ron chat with Shawn Young, the creator and CEO of Classcraft. Classcraft uses gaming principles to re-imagine students' learning experiences to help motivate students to achieve more. Show links: https://wakelet.com/wake/y8BY9zrV0N_sSujGHpUde --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/teacher-nerdz/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/teacher-nerdz/support

Heute macht Retrospektiv einen Ausflug in die Gamification und das Storytelling im Bildungskontext. Daniel aka Teacher Rogue One (klicken und ihm auf Mastadon folgen) erzählt Tom in dieser Folge von seinem Unterricht mit Geschichten, Banküberfällen mit Schulklassen und wie er Classcraft im Unterricht einsetzt. Sehr hörenswert!

It's an exciting time to talk to Shawn Young, CEO of Classcraft. Classcraft has already gained incredible success, revolutionizing the classroom experience with its groundbreaking tools and technologies. From providing new insights into student behavior to helping teachers create positive and engaging classroom cultures, it's no surprise that this innovative platform is being used by thousands of educators worldwide. Connect on Twitter! https://twitter.com/myedtechlife Visit the My EdTech Life Podcast page! https://www.myedtech.life/ Buy me a coffee to keep the creativity flowing! https://bit.ly/3LxSojF Check out our merch store! https://myedtechlife.myspreadshop.com/ Check out our blog page and follow! https://medium.com/@myedtechlife Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/myedtechlife/support --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/myedtechlife/support

YOU HAVEN'T EXPERIENCED BEHAVIOR MANAGEMENT LIKE THIS BEFORE…But you're about to.Teachers know that success in the classroom begins with classroom management.And classroom management starts with relationships.Without building positive relationships with students, you'll be swimming upstream all year long.Shawn Young, CEO of Classcraft (a behavior management tool), knows this all too well.  As a student himself, he often felt bored with school and didn't feel a sense of belonging.  When he became a teacher himself, he wanted to create a different experience for his students - one that was built on the foundation on positive relationships.Out of his own need in the classroom, Shawn began building an online platform that focused on positive behavior interventions. And Classcraft was born.Classcraft is an innovative platform that helps educators make learning meaningful and motivates students through gamification. Not only did he see the impact it had on his own students, but others began to notice as well.  And now - Shawn is on a mission to replicate this same positive experience in classrooms around the world.  Since launching Classcraft into the world of education, it has been a force to be reckoned with in transforming behavior and classroom cultures.And - I had the privilege to have Shawn on the podcast to talk all about positive behavior intervention & supports, also known as PBIS - and how Classcraft supports PBIS programs.FOR COMPLETE SHOW NOTES VISIT:  classroomnook.com/podcast/146

In this episode, Toria chats to Shawn about the role school plays today in the lives of our young people. With our ever-changing world the role that school plays and the job of an educator has changed significantly over the last ten years. Shaun joins Toria all the way from Canada and they discuss this worldwide change. Shawn Young is the co-founder and CEO of Classcraft, an innovative platform that helps educators make learning meaningful and motivate students through gamification. Since its launch, it has been a force to be reckoned with in transforming behavior and classroom cultures, having been successfully implemented by educators in their pedagogies worldwide.In alignment with his mission to improve teaching pedagogy and students' motivation in learning, Shawn co-chairs UNESCO's MGIEP Global Collective for SEL and Digital Learning, serves as the President of the Edteq Association, and is an Ambassador for the Education Faculty of the University of Sherbrooke.Shawn has an extensive experience in professional education, having taught 11th-grade physics for nine years. He holds a bachelor's degree in physics and a master's in education from Université de Sherbrooke. In addition, he is also a seasoned web developer, combining these skills and experience to start Classcraft.School and district leaders are some of the many types of listeners that will definitely benefit from Shawn's insights on motivation, education, skill development and culture, and leadership. He can't wait to get booked to talk about creating a sustainable community in the classroom and the role of playful principles in teaching the whole child!Support the showIf you enjoyed this episode please share it with others and I would love it if you would leave a review on Apple, Spotify or anywhere else. The Tiny Voices Talk book is out now . Use the code ITL25 to get 25% off it until the end of 2022. https://www.independentthinkingpress.com/books/teachingskills/tiny-voices-talk/

Shawn Young is the CEO and Co-Founder of Classcraft, an innovative platform that motivates students using the culture and mechanics of games. Victoria talks to Shawn about edtech, behavior intervention, and the challenges he's faced with going from a homegrown tool to something big and out there in the world. Classcraft (https://www.classcraft.com/) Follow Classcraft on Twitter (https://twitter.com/classcraftgame), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/classcraftgame/), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/classcraftgame), YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/c/classcraftgame), or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/classcraft-studios/). Follow Shawn on Twitter (https://twitter.com/_shawnyoung_) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/shawnyoung1/). Follow thoughtbot on Twitter (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/). Become a Sponsor (https://thoughtbot.com/sponsorship) of Giant Robots! Transcript: VICTORIA: This is the Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots Podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Victoria Guido. And with us today is Shawn Young, the CEO, and Co-Founder at Classcraft, an innovative platform that motivates students using the culture and mechanics of games. Shawn, thank you for joining us. SHAWN: Thank you. Thanks for having me, Victoria. I'm happy to be here. VICTORIA: Wonderful, yes. So just tell me a little bit about yourself and maybe what brought you to start out as a teacher initially. SHAWN: [laughs] I have an interesting journey. I was originally a physicist, a physics major. Although I loved physics because it really gives you a deep understanding of the world, I realized that physics research in a basement with machines just on your own [laughs] wasn't for me, so that's when I started substitute teaching. I really wasn't going to go into education at all. It was just there was availability, lack of teachers. And it's kind of ironic. I really did not enjoy school. High school, in particular, was just a really challenging time for me, mostly because I just didn't see the point of it. I didn't have any problems in school. I had great grades, but I just was bored out of my mind. And so, as a teacher, I became really, really obsessed with making school meaningful for the students that were there, and because so many kids, so many learners just don't see the point. And so I did a lot of really cool project-based learning type of stuff. So that's where instead of lecturing the kids, you get them doing things and learning by doing. And so I was teaching physics, obviously. And so we were building hot air balloons and cannons and all kinds of stuff to study Newtonian physics. And kids were super happy to come to the class because we were doing some cool stuff. But I realized as that was happening that another part of meaning generation for kids and learners is the community and the social aspects. And so, I started thinking about how I can build community in the classroom, make the social experience of school relevant for them? And that's how Classcraft was born, really. I kind of put together my interest in motivating and building community with kids. I was a developer at the time as well, so I was able to develop a platform. And, of course, I'm a gamer, so I kind of put all those things together and built this platform in my classroom. VICTORIA: That's great. I was going to ask what skills or experiences from your teaching background translated to being a founder. SHAWN: That's interesting because clearly in the product...Classcraft was never meant to be a company. I already had a company. [laughs] I was freelancing as a developer for pretty large clients in New York. I was working with my brother, who's a creative director there. And we worked for Chanel for three years building apps and websites, and that was probably our biggest client. I wasn't looking to make a company. I just built it for me. It was my quest to make school meaningful and relevant. And after three years of just tinkering around with it with my students, I realized it was having a massive impact on their outlook, on the way they collaborated together, on their motivation. And because Classcraft is a platform that basically gamifies education, so kids level up and they earn points. They're on teams. They have a character class. All the things you would see in an RPG are translating to how teachers are running a school. And so I made a website just to talk about it after three years of this garage project I had going on. And the day that website went online, 130,000 people came to the website. It just started trending on Reddit gaming. And overnight, a lot of people were asking, "How do I download this?" I'm like, "You can't. There's no company." [laughter] So that's how the company started. Teaching is an interesting profession. I think that teaching is a job that requires you to, A, motivate and manage a whole bunch of people, so there's a lot similarility there to management. It's a group of humans that you want to work together to get to their full potential, just like your team should be. But then there's also independent planning. As a teacher, you have a set amount of time to get through X amount of curriculum. So you're always, you know, project management basically, 101 is the same thing as running a curriculum through the year. So there are a lot of those types of soft skills that translate really easily to entrepreneurship. And ultimately, as a teacher, you're responsible on your own for your own successes and failures, which is the type of attitude you need to have if you're going to be a successful entrepreneur is to be responsible, you know, [laughs] take control of your destiny a little bit. VICTORIA: Right. I hadn't thought about it from that angle. It makes a lot of sense. You're really an independent owner of that classroom, right? [laughs] SHAWN: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And trying to get humans to collaborate and do stuff sounds a lot like running a company. [laughs] VICTORIA: Right. I saw the tagline on Classcraft: relationships are everything. And I was like, that's a perfect DevOps kind of statement. [laughs] SHAWN: Yeah, that's funny. [laughs] We're thinking more like human relationships, but that's so funny [laughs] from the DevOps side for sure. VICTORIA: In and outside of the classroom, you need...it doesn't matter how great your technology is or your strategy. If the people aren't talking to each other and you don't have the right relationships, you're not going to be successful. SHAWN: Correct. And ultimately, that's the value proposition of Classcraft. Schools that don't build good relationships between students that don't do it between teachers and students, that don't do it between teachers and administration are dysfunctional. And what we're seeing in education today is one of the fundamental breakdowns that's happening and, you know, that's proxy for what's happening at large, and society is relationships are quite strange right now in schools, and that's making it really hard for them to be effective. VICTORIA: Right. It sounds like this app was built out of your direct experience and your direct experience working with these students. What do you find is unique in working with students, and how do you appeal to them as a user base? SHAWN: What's really special about edtech is that your buyer or the user that makes the decision to use the product is not the end user, and that's true in all B2B, SaaS. The decision maker who purchases the software isn't necessarily the employee who's going to use it. But in education, there are multiple levels. Like, if we sell to a district, they're the ones buying, but ultimately, they need to get the teachers to use it. And then, at the end of the day, the actual real users are the students. And so, there are a lot of design considerations when you think of UX. And even when you think of user permissions, there's a lot of complexity there in education because our goal is to build as much motivation and engagement mechanics as we can for kids. And so that means leveling up, and random loot drops, and all these things you see in video games but applying that to school. But then you need to build all this plumbing [laughs] basically to make it usable by a user who's the teacher who doesn't really know much about games, and that's changing as the teacher...average age of teachers is going down, a lot of retirements, et cetera, so that's changing. But at the base of it, the kids are really well versed in games, game mechanics, game culture, but the teacher who's running it is not. So we have to speak two languages, one of pedagogy, and classroom tools, and data, and saving time. These are the things that educators care about. And incidentally, they care about motivation and motivating the kids, and all of those things. But for kids, we're talking about avatars, and pets, and gear, and leveling up, and all this whole other set of language. And so when you think of design considerations, we always have to be thinking about how do I make this as motivating and engaging as possible for the kids, but how do I make it as easy to use and not complicated for teachers? Because if the teachers don't use it, then these kids aren't going to see the value anyways. So it's pretty complex because we don't have one single end user. VICTORIA: And so you have the challenge of making it fun for kids and then also providing useful and understandable data for teachers and probably parents and other people, right? SHAWN: Yeah, yeah, exactly. There are lots of stakeholders. [laughter] VICTORIA: So I want to ask more about how you make it fun, and then I also want to know more about the teacher's perspective, so whichever one you want to start with first. SHAWN: Perfect. I mean, those two questions are literally the placement of what Classcraft is. Classcraft is the Venn diagram between what in education is behavior intervention, so managing kids' behavior and motivation. And so, from a motivation angle, how do we make it engaging for kids? In essence, kids are earning points in Classcraft for things that they're doing in school that we want them to do. And by we, schools can configure whatever it is, but it'll be things like handing in homework, being respectful, being inclusive, participating, being on time, these behaviors that they want to see in kids to make them better learners. When those behaviors occur, teachers can give them points. And the points allow them to level up. As they level up, they each have a character. They have an avatar, and they can be warriors, healers, or mages. And based on that character class, they have a different role in the team. So they're playing in teams just like in an MMORPG or on a football team. And everybody has a different role within the team. And you win as a team. And so school is quite competitive. Kids are always compared to the class average and their grades. And there's a lot of competition happening in schools. What we've built is a way for kids to be motivated by collaboration. And so they're playing on teams. If they do good things, they get these points, and they level up. And there are millions of combinations of gear that they could buy for their avatar, but they're also unlocking real-life powers. And so these powers are things like, you know, in a video game, power could be like you could shoot a fireball. In Classcraft, shoot a fireball is the equivalent of you can skip a question on an exam, or you can go to the bathroom, or you can hand in homework a day late, or you can listen to music while you're doing your classwork, so giving them real-life privileges as they level up. And these aren't one-offs; they're skills that they have that they can trigger whenever they want, just like in a game. And some of those skills are things like being able to heal up your teammate because kids can also lose lives if they do negative things. So if you're late or you're rude, or whatever it is, just like in Mario, what's failing in Mario is falling in a hole, and what's failing as a student, it's not doing what you're supposed to do, or being a bully to other kids. And so, as that happens, they can lose lives. But then they can come in to help each other out. There are boss battles where they can fight monsters by answering quiz questions, et cetera. So all these motions that are ultimately the things that are happening anyways in school, what we're saying is instead of punishing kids or forcing them to do this stuff, make it feel like a game. Speak their language, use the same mechanics that we know are super effective at motivating players. Nobody is forcing people to play video games. Everybody's doing that of their own volition. It's the most popular cultural medium that exists today, well surpassing film, movies, music. And so, why are games so good at doing that? It's because they fulfill fundamental needs: being in control, feeling like we're progressing, social relatedness. That's what we're bringing to school. So that's the student side of it. The other side of it, behavior intervention, is...well, one of the biggest challenges for teachers is managing kids. It's not like showing you how to do a math problem; it's getting you to care about it, listen to it, stop disturbing other people. And so, a lot of time and energy is spent on classroom management for teachers. And so what we do is we use best practices there. For example, there's a lot of research out there in education that says that praising kids for good behavior is a lot more effective than punishing them. And so games are really good at praising you. You level up, and you gain points. It tells you your score. What we're doing here is giving them that framework but applying that to classroom management. And so instead of saying, "Hey, Victoria, stop goofing off," or "You're not dressed well, go to the principal," or whatever it is that's happening in schools, what we're telling teachers to do instead is say, "Hey if Victoria does something good, recognize her. Give her a high five." And in Classcraft, a high five is gaining points. And so we're shifting and applying this pedagogy, shifting towards a positive reinforcement mindset. And at the same time, because these high fives are digital, then you get all the data so you can know which behaviors did Victoria do at which time with which teacher? Hey, she didn't get a lot of points this week. What's going on with her? Maybe we should talk to her and see what's going on before her behavior escalates. And so there's a lot of value from a behavior intervention standpoint. But ultimately, it's super effective because the kids really care about it in a way that they don't normally care about classroom management. VICTORIA: Well, that makes a lot of sense. And I'm hearing something I've studied before when looking at technology organizations which is that growth mindset I think you're describing, the positive reinforcement, praising the effort for something versus their intrinsic skills. And that's something I love about teaching. I think that really, really translates to running a technology organization. SHAWN: Yeah, totally. Ultimately, what we're doing is giving schools and teachers a platform for really effective culture building. And what you're talking about is culture within a company, in essence, and it's really the same thing. It goes back to what I was saying earlier about managing a group of kids [laughs], and managing employees is super similar. It's all about what type of positive culture you are building. VICTORIA: I think there's something really universal about that. It's actually even true with dog training. I have a dog, and it's the same kind of motivational theory that works for them too. [laughs] SHAWN: Yep, yep. VICTORIA: I love it. And you mentioned that you built this tool yourself, and then suddenly, it became very popular, and now it's really, I'm sure, scaling. So what challenges have you faced with going from this homegrown tool to something big and out there in the world? SHAWN: Lots of challenges. [laughs] I would say working in education itself is a challenge. It's a pretty challenging vertical to work in. It's ripe for disruption at the same time, pretty conservative. There are a lot of forces working in education systemically not have it move forward. Working with schools and districts is challenging. They have a lot of requirements. And, of course, they're custodians of kids, so that's legitimate, but it does make it more challenging. One of the things that we had to evolve was we were very much a teacher-only tool when we started. I had built it as a teacher. Our user in mind was a teacher. Even our business model initially was selling to teachers basically. There was a free version, and they could upgrade to a paid version. And as we got more and more scale, you know, we have ten million-plus kids in the platform now. As we got more and more scale, what ended up happening was we were working more and more with schools and districts. And so we went from a B2C go-to-market and product vision to a B2B/enterprise where we have to roster 10,000 or 100,000 kids in one shot, so all the user provisioning, connecting to information systems that these districts have, et cetera, all of this ginormous plumbing that needs to happen in order for it to continue to be easy to use for every single teacher. And alongside with that, the other challenge is we were super appealing to teachers that were interested in games. [laughs] And so when you think of some teacher who's in their 60s and has never really played any games and just thinks that they're a silly waste of time, there's a different sales pitch that needs to happen there to get them on board and a different onboarding. One of the things we had to completely overhaul was the onboarding to make it really progressive. Classcraft, now when you start it, there's no avatar. It starts super lean on the feature side so that these teachers that are, you know, we're basically educating them as they're using the platform, educating them on all this game stuff. There are a lot of learnings in terms of what's our actual target audience. And if our target audience starts to be enterprise customers, how do we evolve our platform to appeal to a much more diverse type of persona from a teacher standpoint? VICTORIA: I was thinking, actually, a good friend of mine who is a teacher and has been running Dungeons & Dragons campaigns for us for several years. [laughter] SHAWN: There you go. VICTORIA: And, like, you'll love it. [laughs] SHAWN: Exactly. [laughter] VICTORIA: But I could see that being a challenge now that you're shifting your target business model, really, and how do you adapt to that? Mid-Roll Ad: As life moves online, bricks-and-mortar businesses are having to adapt to survive. With over 18 years of experience building reliable web products and services, thoughtbot is the technology partner you can trust. We provide the technical expertise to enable your business to adapt and thrive in a changing environment. We start by understanding what's important to your customers to help you transition to intuitive digital services your customers will trust. We take the time to understand what makes your business great and work fast yet thoroughly to build, test, and validate ideas, helping you discover new customers. Take your business online with design‑driven digital acceleration. Find out more at: url tbot.io/acceleration or click the link in the show notes for this episode. VICTORIA: What else are you looking ahead with Classcraft? What's on the horizon? SHAWN: There's a lot. Like I said, we have 10 million kids in the platform plus. But we have teachers in every single country you could imagine, and there's a universality to what we're proposing. We're not saying here's the best tool for fifth-grade math in the U.S. We're saying, solve this universal human problem that's prevalent in education. And so we have teachers in, you name it, Taiwan, and Australia, and Singapore, and all over Europe using Classcraft. And so there's definitely opportunity for us to look at the international landscape and identify opportunities. Another frontier beyond going out of North America is going beyond the brick-and-mortar experience of the classroom. A lot of what's happening in and around your software is actually not happening 18 inches from the screen. It's happening in this context where there are 30 other kids, and there are all these interactions going on. For example, if you made a reading app, you can imagine the kids sitting in a quiet space on their sofa at home reading this thing, but the reality that's happening is they're in a really loud classroom [laughs] with lots of other kids around them, et cetera. And so the design context for designing for edtech is really interesting. We have some views that are meant to be only on a projector in front of the class. And when that happens, the font size needs to be 80 point because a kid in the back needs to be able to see it. So the screen real estate you're playing with is pretty unique scenarios. Like, what does this look like at 120 feet, let's say, because people are using it in the gym? So interesting design challenges, but they have been really ensconced in the idea that a lot of how people are using Classcraft is with real-life physical situations. But Classcraft, in essence, we have an API. So you can also imagine behaviors that are not brick and mortar behaviors, like, if I'm being participative, that's something that a teacher would see and observe and give you points for. But there are 3,000 edtech platforms, and all of them have digital behaviors that teachers want to see. They want to see kids handing in homework in these platforms. They want to go see them complete assignments. They want to go see them participating in digital communities. These are all basically the new frontier for digital behaviors that are a part now post-pandemic of the ecosystem of education. And so we're really interested in connecting to other platforms. I don't need kids to be in Classcraft; I just need them every day. I need them to be earning points. And I'm happy if they're doing that in other platforms and that those interactions are rewarding them experience points and points in Classcraft. And ideally, automatically, that way, the teachers don't have to do anything. VICTORIA: And so you're integrating with all these different platforms, and you're working with all these different school districts. So you've had to make some difficult technology choices in your stack. Do you have any examples of those? SHAWN: Yeah, absolutely. When I started the company, I'd come out of programming in...I started building cool websites in ActionScript, [laughs] so that dates me a little bit. But I'd just come out of a decade of ActionScript and PHP. And I'm like, PHP does not scale, and it doesn't afford the same type of real-time interactions that you'd expect from a game. When I decided what the tech stack would be, right at the outset, it was, okay, we're going to do this all JavaScript. It's going to be Node. And at that time...now that's a pretty, like, anybody would make that decision. But this was nine years ago, and it wasn't as mature as it is now. And so that was a pretty ballsy move and one that we never looked back on. But we had a lot of things that we had to build ourselves because the libraries didn't exist yet. And we were really pushing the edge of what was possible in a browser, especially in a browser in school with a crappy internet connection. And often, they are on older browsers. Although it was the right decision to lean into the leading edge on the tech stack, it did afford us with a lot of specific challenges that we might not have had if we'd said, oh, let's just keep this super old school. Some other things that we've been challenged with over the years is just scaling the number of concurrent users is always a thing. When we started, we had a single database, one server, and I was doing all the DevOps. And a lot of what we've done since that is just move everything to services. So we've got, you know, MongoDB database-as-a-service. [laughs] We're all on Google Cloud now. From an IT standpoint, we think a lot about what stack we're going to be using. And to me, what really matters is build the product as fast as you can and as well as you can. So outsourcing all of the DevOps pieces to cloud providers is, in my opinion, [laughs] a really good use of funds versus maintaining it yourself and spending tons of money on sys engineers and architects. The reality is that for most products today, what exists as a service in the cloud already bundled is, you know, and we've got auto-scaling. When there are too many concurrent users, it automatically spins up new Docker servers, et cetera. So we've really evolved from this monolithic single-server approach to this imminently highly scalable solution that is all virtualized, but in doing that, moved all of it to services. And I think that's the right move because we're not, you know, if I was really, really core, if was, I don't know, [chuckles] an online video game, then the speed of connections and all these things become super important. But in our case, reliability, scalability is more important than the fine-tuning to a precise degree of specific tech infrastructure. And I'm seeing more and more founders now, Victoria, as well go-to codeless solutions as well. I think we're kind of abstracting a lot of what was core to product development from a tech side. You know, first, it was the DevOps, then it was the cloud, and even now, code, I think, is moving in the direction where we're systematizing, bundling, and having other services generate code more and more. I think we're moving towards that just in software in general. VICTORIA: Yeah, I think that is becoming prevalent. I do think low-code automation has also been coming around every 5 or 10 years or so. [laughs] I have the belief that technology never disappears; it just keeps building, and new tech gets created, and the user base shifts around a little bit. And, of course, for you as a technical founder, putting it all in Docker and setting up the auto scaling on Google is probably within your reach, whereas a lot of founders, that might be something more challenging, and you might need to have some support for. But that's essentially what we work on for Mission Control as well is helping teams set up their platform so that it will scale automatically that if there's an issue, you know about it in advance. [laughs] You can take care of it before it falls over, and that way, your users just see a reliable, happy system. SHAWN: I'm so grateful that I am a technical founder. [laughs] I know a lot of founders, and the ones that don't know how to code really are at the mercy of so many unknown variables. I'm not coding anymore, but I'm very aware of what's going on in the platform. And I think that helps me make better business decisions every day. So I have a lot of gratitude when I compare myself in that regard. VICTORIA: And I think it's really about communication then too. Like, having a good understanding of your system is helpful but being able to understand it well enough to then communicate it to other people, and what the value is, and how you want to invest money in different parts of the system. I think those are two things that having maybe a little bit more of experience in technology and then also having a teacher experience, I think, sets you up to be successful. But we also, of course, at thoughtbot, we offer a lot of that technical expertise to help founders navigate some of that. So there's a little pitch just for us. [laughs] But let's see, let me go through...I think I've gone through a good amount of questions. Here's one that I like to ask everybody. But if you could travel back in time to when you first started Classcraft, what would be the main piece of advice you would give yourself? SHAWN: If I could go back, there are some big lessons that have been learned. I've been for almost a decade now as a founder and CEO. One of the things we didn't do early enough was user testing. If I split the life of Classcraft into three eras, there's the first third we didn't need to because we had all of my own experience. But once we started moving past what was the initial product that I had built in my own classroom, we continued to make assumptions. And we, of course, always listen to our users, but now we're super systematic about it, and any new feature has research behind it and a really solid UX practice that we should have implemented much earlier. I think we're making much better roadmap decisions today than we were three years ago. A lot of companies hire UX people super late, and I would do that early or at least develop the chops to do it myself as early as possible. So I think that's one thing. I think as well...and maybe this is tied to that. I think we should have and could have iterated faster as well. A lot of startups in the tech scene talk about iteration, but there's a difference between incrementally iterating and just adding on, adding on, adding on, and actually making the kind of iterative decisions that, for example, pulling part of the product and discontinuing it for example. And we've done some of those moves, but I think we could have done them faster. And we should have done them faster if we'd had that UX research data to help us make decisions faster. So it's more than, like, common truism is like, oh, listen to your users and listen to their feedback. Like, yes, that's true, and we were doing that. But I'd say go further and create robust structures to get that data faster, not just wait for it to come in but actually go out and get it and digest it in a way that's actually usable. Because you have a whole bunch of testimonials and feedback, but if it's not organized, it's not somebody's job to make sense of it. It's just kind of sitting there. So there's a lot of value from that perspective that you can quickly generate for your users and, therefore, for your business. VICTORIA: Right. Save you some time and some money, probably in validating your ideas, right? SHAWN: Yeah. And the problem with education is that it's a yearly cycle, right? VICTORIA: Mmm-hmm. SHAWN: We're not looking at monthly scales; we're looking at the whole school year. So back to school happens once a year, and that's when you get a ton of data because that's when there's the most activity. Like, right now, August, September, October, these are the moments where we're getting the most data. And then when you make changes, you got to wait all the way back to the next back to school. So, in particular, in education, I think the cycles are long versus, let's say, more B2C-type consumer verticals where the test length is like a week. [laughs] So if it's coming once a year, you better make sure you're organized, I guess, is what I'm saying. [laughs] VICTORIA: Because we only have one shot. [laughs] SHAWN: Yeah, exactly. VICTORIA: That makes sense. Well, thank you so much for sharing all those insights. And I want to give you a chance to promote anything else you'd like to share with our listeners. SHAWN: Thank you so much for the conversation, Victoria. I appreciate it. I think if anybody wants to find out about Classcraft, classcraft.com, tons of content and resources that we're generating about these topics of building meaningful relationships in school but in general with human beings. Classcraft is a B Corp, and so for people who don't know what that is, it's a certification around impact. And so we have built-in commitment to generate good in the world. And it's a pretty hard certification to get, so we're pretty proud about it. But I think that this commitment that we have of generating meaningful relationships both with kids but also with our employees, with our community, with our different stakeholders, has been really core to a lot of the decisions we make and how we make them, and how we approach different problems. And so I think that as a tech founder, sometimes we can lose sight of what are we actually generating in the world. And so I would encourage people to think about, you know, if you're thinking about starting a company or thinking about your own company and the impact its having to look up that certification. But also, just look up triple bottom line, these types of concepts that are becoming more and more prevalent that really give meaning to the endeavor. Starting a company and running it is a lot of work. You need to believe in what you're doing. [laughs] And I think having a mission that generates impact in that way is a good way to motivate yourself and your team to go the extra mile and deliver. VICTORIA: I love that. And did we really cover the full impact this app has had on kids that are using it in schools? SHAWN: There's a ton of research about Classcraft; actually, that's been done by pedagogy professors in colleges. Literally, thousands of papers have been written on Classcraft because there just aren't a lot of...everybody's interested in student motivation. There aren't a lot of scalable systems for doing that other than Classcraft. And so a lot of research that's been done about that topic incidentally happens to be using Classcraft. And a recent meta-study about Classcraft was conducted, and they saw a significant statistical impact on student motivation and learner outcomes. And so it's hard in education to really understand impact easily because it's social sciences. So you need a lot of big data samples, and you need the control groups. It's complicated. So we're pretty proud about that because a lot of companies that work in education don't have that kind of hard data. It's like, okay, it seems to be having an impact. We've got pretty hard proof; literally hundreds of millions of positive behaviors that kids have done that are being reinforced every single year. And when you think about that, most kids don't get any positive feedback. The kids that get the most attention are the ones that are acting out and being the worst. So 90% of teacher energy is being directed at 10% of the kids, and so most kids go through school without ever feeling a sense of belonging, or accomplishment, or praise. And we've had kids write us saying, "I was suicidal. Classcraft changed my life," like these types of user testimonies where the impact, the human impact of the approach, is really, really real. And for teachers as well, like, "I was so demotivated with teaching. I found the spark again thanks to Classcraft because school is fun again." [laughs] So there's a lot to be proud of there, for sure. VICTORIA: That's wonderful and really powerful that you've had that impact and have been able to see it both from a scientific perspective and from those user testimonies. So I think that's wonderful. And I think it's an inspiring story. And that's probably why you're also so involved; it seems, in leadership groups in edtech and in other communities in Quebec. Is that right? SHAWN: Yeah, totally. I mean the reality...so I'm the president of the Edtech Association here in Quebec, which I helped co-found. We've got 100-plus organizations working in edtech that are part of the association. I'm also Co-chair for The Global Collective for Social Emotional Learning, Digital Learning for UNESCO. And I have been involved in numerous different systemic endeavors in education throughout the years. The truth is changing education is hard, and the way we're going to succeed is...it's fundamentally something I believe that we should really be focusing on as a society is improving education, education outcomes. All the positive changes we need to see to tackle the incredible challenges that are upcoming for us as a species are going to happen through education. But for that to happen, we need to make education evolve, and for education to evolve, we need to all work together. So the association is interesting because it's like a coopetition [laughs] in a sense. All these entrepreneurs we're all competing for the same budget dollars, but we're looking at education problems in different ways. And if we're more successful as an industry, individually, everybody's going to be more successful, and more kids are going to be impacted. So I just believe that and this is true specifically for education, but I do believe this for any vertical. If businesses are collaborating to elevate, if the water rises, everybody's boat goes up. I really believe that that's true in business in general and in education in particular. VICTORIA: It reminds me when I was at Pluribus Digital in my last position. We were a part of the Digital Services Coalition, which is another coopetition group of federal contractors who are going after the same money. But we are all trying to see the government be better, part of that collaboration which sounds like what Classcraft is all about too. We're all in it together. [laughs] SHAWN: Yeah. And if that's not the case, especially for incumbents, then what happens is status quo. And for startups, for tech companies, usually the status quo [laughs] is bad. That's where you're trying to generate opportunity from. But sometimes the systems that are there, government systems in particular...we've seen a lot in health as well over the last few years in clean tech. All of these impact tech sectors part of what they're fighting against are market forces of status quo. And so it's only by all working together that we can really move that. VICTORIA: Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure we could keep talking about that for a long time. [laughs] But unless you have anything else you'd like to share, I'll go ahead and wrap up. You can subscribe to the show and find notes along with a complete transcript for this episode at giantrobots.fm. If you have questions or comments, email us at hosts@giantrobots.fm. You can find me on Twitter @victori_ousg. This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot and produced and edited by Mandy Moore. Thanks for listening. See you next time. ANNOUNCER: This podcast was brought to you by thoughtbot. thoughtbot is your expert design and development partner. Let's make your product and team a success. Special Guest: Shawn Young.

In this episode, Kasey chats with Shawn Young, a former teacher and CEO of Classcraft. When so many teachers are struggling with behavior management, student engagement is at an all time low, and teachers are burnout, we need tools and strategies to help. Shawn shares the importance of building relationships with students (Ted Lasso style), managing behavior with positive reinforcement through gamification, formative feedback, and tracking actionable data. This episode is full of great ideas to help teachers and schools! Access the full show notes and blog post here

A well-run, fun classroom is pivotal to the way students learn. But for some educators, meaningful classroom management can be a challenge. Gamifiying a classroom is one strategy educators use to improve this. In Episode 230 of Class Dismissed, we chatted with Shawn Young, the Co-Founder, and CEO of Classcraft, a platform that helps educators motivate their students using the mechanics of games. Young says classroom management is core to a teacher's job, but ironically, there are few digital tools to support the cause.  Consequently, Young and his colleagues created Classcraft to make the classroom experience more exciting for students.  Young says that the classroom experience for many kids is meaningless.  "It's just tasks they need to do, and that is work," says Young.  So they created Classcraft to repackage students' engagement rules with the hope of developing intrinsic motivation. When gamifying with Classcraft, kids strive to gain points and improve their avatars. For instance, Young says they have a thing called "random events," and it's a way to kick start a class.  An example would be that everyone has to speak like a pirate, or students have 20 seconds to build a paper airplane, and whoever goes the furthest gets a hundred points. To hear more of our interview with Young and find out if it's challenging to gamify your classroom, listen to Episode 230 of Class Dismissed. You can find each episode on your favorite podcast app or iTunes. Other Show Notes Red Shirt the Boys All Rights Reserved. Class Dismissed Podcast 2017 – 2022 

Did you know the classroom community can be shaped by the games students play together? I'm joined by Shawn Young, the CEO and Co-Founder of Classcraft, an innovative platform that motivates students to learn using the culture and mechanics of games. We'll discuss new teaching methods in education, and why they are so important to the way students are learning and connecting with one another. By providing games like Craftclass, teachers can create compelling ways to teach students using hands-on approaches that add meaning and develop relationships among students and educators. We'll dive into Shawn's game to try and understand why this new time tested modern approach to education works so well to create community within the classroom!   More from Shawn Young:  Visit www.classcraft.com   Email: social@classcraft.com  LinkedIn: @Shawn Young  Instagram & Facebook: @classcraftgame  Twitter: @_shawnyoung_ & @classcraftgame Youtube: @classcraft   Find the transcript to this episode here   To connect with us about the podcast visit our website   Please be sure to subscribe, rate and review us on apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts!  

Shawn Young is the co-founder and CEO of Classcraft, an innovative platform that helps educators make learning meaningful and motivate students through gamification. SInce its launch, Classcraft has had an incredible impact, with over 10 million students making use of the platform. He has a background in teaching himself, and in fact built Classcraft to meet the needs of his own classroom before it became a tool that is deployed in classrooms around the world. We talk about why gamification is such a great tool for encouraging student participation, and how Classcraft presents these features in a way that puts real-world learning upfront and wraps it in an appealing package. To learn more, visit: http://pastfoundation.org (pastfoundation.org) We unbox: How Classcraft came about The gaps that Classcraft fills in the classroom Why gamification increases intrinsic motivation Addressing the concerns about adopting Classcraft Bringing Classcraft into your classroom Resources: Learn more: https://www.classcraft.com/ (classcraft.com) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/classcraftgame/ (@classcraftgame) Mentioned in this episode: Learning Unboxed Audience Survey Thank you for listening to Learning Unboxed! As we work on the next 150 episodes we want to hear how we can best tailor this podcast to your needs. Please go to https://www.pastfoundation.org/survey to share your insights. https://learningunboxed.captivate.fm/luaudiencesurvey (Audience Survey)

What is it like to grow up in a family that casually relies on creativity and crafting in all areas of life? Listen to Tania's fascinating story about her crafting journey, how she finds joy in crafting, what she learned from her elders regarding DIY, and how she is adjusting to her new crafting lifestyle as a first-time new mother. Learn about her surprising hobbies and more in this fun-filled episode.Catch Tania's Altenew Academy Classes!Demystifying Mixed Media Online Cardmaking Class - https://altenew.com/products/demystifying-mixed-mediaDemystifying Mixed Media Art Journals Online Class - https://altenew.com/products/demystifying-mixed-media-art-journals-online-classCraft your life with Altenew! Follow us for more design inspiration:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/altenewllc/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/altenewYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/altenewPinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/altenew/Card blog: https://www.blog.altenew.comScrapbook blog: https://www.mixedmedia.altenew.comVisit https://www.altenew.com to shop for your crafting stash.Contact our Customer Happiness Team at support@altenew.com if you have any questions.

This Week in Canadian EdTech MindShareTV Featuring Shawn Young, CEO of Classcraft, on becoming a B Corp

De Vrienden gaan deze week in gesprek over gamification. Het gebruiken van een spelelement is populair in onderwijsland, maar wat levert het op? Is het alleen leuk of verbeterd het ook de leerprestaties? En zijn er ook nadelen? De antwoorden op deze vragen en onwijs veel suggesties voor gamification in jouw les hoor in deze aflevering!Op zoek naar kant en klare vorm van gamification in je les? Maak gebruik van onze Kahoot of kijk eens naar deze spellen over fakenieuws en cybercriminaliteit. Wil jij net zoals Tom lekker Bingo spelen in je klas met zelfgemaakte Bingokaarten? Klik hier voor een gratis Bingokaarten generator.Ben je meer opzoek naar een blijvende vorm van gamification in lessen? Kijk dan eens naar Classcraft, en daag je leerlingen uit!Nog op zoek naar een leuke game om je lesstof te herhalen? Maak dan eens gebruik van Gimkit. Meer leren over gamification? Bekijk de TedTalk over het Super Mario Effect of bekijk eens hoe jij je leven kan veranderen in een videogame.Heb jij de challenge van deze week uitgevoerd voor klas? Deel je ervaring met ons! Heb je vragen, ideeën of een leuke challenge? Deel deze met ons via Instagram of via een e-mail: vriendenvanhetonderwijs@gmail.comWil jij zo een prachtig stickertje? Laat van je horen via de socials!Op zoek naar een leuke invulling voor je les? Gebruik onze actualiteiten Kahoot. Een wekelijks spektakel in je klaslokaal!Meer te weten komen over de mannen? Bezoek onze website!Wij zijn ook te vinden op Twitter, Instagram en Facebook.Muziek gemaakt door João Neves (Floppy Circus)SoundCloud João NevesBandcamp João Neves

Episode #14: Alvin Crawford, Chief Revenue Officer, Revolution Foods In today's episode, Todd sat down with Alvin Crawford, the current CRO of Revolution Foods. Alvin brings more than 20 years of experience in strategy, sales and thought leadership to help drive Revolution Foods' next chapter of accelerated growth. Prior to joining the company, Alvin served as General Manager for Public Consulting Group's Education Practice, Chief Executive Officer of Knowledge Delivery Systems Inc., and Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing for SchoolNet, Inc. He currently serves on the Board of Trustees for Metropolitan Montessori School in NYC and is on the Board of Advisors for ClassCraft and Kudzoo app, two education technology companies. Alvin is a proud husband and dad of three daughters in NYC. Learn more about Alvin Crawford on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvincrawford/ Stay updated with Revolution Foods on Twitter: @RevolutionFoods

Shawn Young is a co-founder and CEO of Classcraft, the Engagement Management System for schools. Since its launch, Classcraft has gained incredible traction with educators worldwide, providing tools to gamify their classrooms. Shawn taught 11th-grade physics for 9 years, holds a bachelor's degree in physics and master's in education from Université de Sherbrooke and is also a seasoned web developer. Shawn is the co-chair for UNESCO's global collective for SEL and digital learning, is the president of the Edteq Association and is an Ambassador for the Education faculty of the University of Sherbrooke.

Levi Belnap wants to make this clear from the beginning—artificial intelligence will never replace human teachers, at least not in our lifetime. What he and his colleagues at Merlyn Mind believe is that AI can enhance teachers' work. In this episode, Levi introduces us to his nascent company's offering and provides some insights on how they believe the classroom experience can be better for all involved.The company launched out of stealth mode last month to unveil the first digital assistant built specifically for education that empowers teachers to more naturally use the technology in their classrooms and simplify their work. The company also announces it has closed $29 million in funding to date, led by Learn Capital.The Merlyn Mind team spent the last three and a half years working in tandem with educators to create Merlyn, the first digital assistant built specifically for education. In 2021 alone, Merlyn Mind has piloted Merlyn in over 50 classrooms across more than 20 different schools as the company accelerates the release of Merlyn to help educators take back their classrooms from the complexities of technology. Merlyn gives teachers more natural command of the devices and digital services in their classrooms and untethers them from the front of the room. Responding to both voice and remote control, Merlyn empowers teachers with choices that simplify how they use classroom technology.“We've been investing in education technology companies for more than a decade at Learn Capital, and Merlyn Mind has brought together what is quite simply the dream team,” said Rob Hutter, Founder & Managing Partner at Learn Capital and board member of Merlyn Mind. “Incredible professionals from IBM Watson Labs, HP Education, Amazon Alexa, Google, Facebook, Broadcom, and Roku have come together to work on a unified product experience for an extremely urgent mission--that of reclaiming the classroom for teaching from the complexity of technology itself.”“I've worked closely with the Merlyn Mind team to understand what educators really need from their technology, and what we know is teachers don't just need more technology, they need the right technology,” said Emily Schindler, Associate Director at Creativity Labs, University of California-Irvine. “Merlyn Mind wants to give teachers what they need most, more time and freedom to think about student learning and the ability to better leverage their greatest asset, themselves.”Before COVID-19, teachers already spent half of their time focused on administrative tasks (McKinsey & Co., 2020), managing more than 900 different applications in the classroom according to LearnPlatform. After COVID-19, teachers' jobs have become even more difficult, with more than 97% of K-12 educators reporting learning loss in students over the past year when compared with children in previous years, according to Horace Mann Educators Corporation. Merlyn helps teachers manage the complexity of teaching with technology in the classroom and frees teachers to focus more of their time on the individual needs of their students.The Merlyn assistant is accessed through Symphony Classroom, an AI hub custom-built for the unique needs of education. With Symphony Classroom, teachers can control classroom devices like the front-of-room displays, teacher laptops, the internet browser, and the applications teachers use daily. Merlyn integrates with the apps and devices teachers already use and love, including Google Slides, Google Drive, Classcraft, Nearpod, Newsela, and more to meet teachers where they already are.

Jordan Billings, teacher of 7th grade Social Studies including Kansas history and geography at Indian Trail Middle School in Olathe Public Schools USD 233, is our guest on this episode. Billings added gamification to his classroom with ClassCraft then adapted several different themes over the years. Currently, he incorporates a Marvel theme layer to his classes and finds that students are eager to come to class. They have actually asked for more "boss challenges AKA tests." Billings shares the benefits he's found with gamification and offers advice for those who might like to start small and use this tool to increase student engagement in their classroom. If you enjoy this episode, watch for a second episode with Jordan Billings in the future. He will share more strategies of how to integrate gamification for those that are interested, but still a little unsure of how to get started. You can find more information about How We Teach This on our website, www.emporia.edu/HWTT plus watch videos of the presenters, access resources they mention, and find links to other websites related to the episode. If you'd like to leave us a comment about this podcast episode, you can do that here.

James Varlack says that “Engagement is developed.” So, in his interview, I asked him how he develops his engaging instruction. We discuss how James works toward each of the 3 types of student engagement--emotional, behavioral, and cognitive--in both analog and digital ways. We discuss Jamboard, Google Docs, Google Slides, Padlet, Whiteboard.chat, Whiteboard.fi, Microsoft Teams whiteboard, Google Arts & Culture. Show notes also available at  jakemiller.net/eduducttape-episode-53 Today's Sponsor: Texthelp EquatIO - text.help/equatio-fft Soapbox Moment: "The One Who Keeps Score & Gives Permission to Not Take the Shot" This quote was covered in this previous episode. Today’s Guest: James Varlack James Varlack is a Digital Learning Specialist with McAllen Independent School District. He has worked in education for 10 years as a middle school math teacher and in campus technology. He and his wife Dawne moderate the #RGVEduChat and have 3 lovely children, Jayden, Zara, and Jordan. Contact Info: Twitter: @jamesvarlack Email: varlack.james076@gmail.com 2 Truths & 1 Lie Educational Duct Tape Question:  How can I develop engaging instruction? Having the content down is not enough if it’s not engaging Know your learning goals Connect with learners “Engagement is developed...means it has a starting place, grows and is nurtured, etc. Engagement is a work in progress” Greeting students, connecting with students, using names are all big for engagement Adding pop culture references into things like a “problem of the day” Using those pop culture references as backgrounds in Google Slides  Learn about student interests with a survey (Google Forms, etc.) - “attack their interests” Adding students names into problems Hooks, reveals, challenges, brainteasers, puzzles, prodigygame.com encouraging kids to work together on riddles  Using Google Slides to create “reveal” activities Google Arts & Culture Puzzle Party Other Google Arts & Culture "games" here Ditch Summit - Esther Park - talked about interaction - student-to-student, student-to-teacher, student-to-class, teacher-to-teacher Collaborative spaces - Jamboard, Google Docs, graphic organizers or drag-and-drop activities in Google Slides, Padlet, Whiteboard.chat, Whiteboard.fi, Microsoft Teams whiteboard "Become the master of your tool… it’s only time to move on when you’ve mastered it." - David Carradine, Kung Fu "Digital gorge" Pear Deck Complete the squiggle Shared teacher dashboard (allow co-teachers in) Engaging Instruction = attracts and maintains attention, often means students are actively involved and a part of it (engaged in it) Three different types of student engagement: emotional, behavioral, and cognitive -  (Classcraft, Jenny Fulton) Celebration of the Adjacent Possible Question - Adrienne Hudson Edulastic Great Data!!! standards-aligned questions Standardized test prep Edulastic is great for item-analysis, mastery-based grading or standards-based grading, identifying students who need support, creating student mastery profiles that can be useful in parent-teacher conferences, and even breaking down assessment data based on a variety of factors or subgroups. ScratchPad Question Types include: Drag-and-drop, Diagram-labeling, multiple select questions, sets of multiple choice questions in a table questions with images, videos or audio Math tools include: Coordinate plane, Line plots, Fractions, Math formatting, Fraction diagrams Paid features: Rubrics, built-in read-aloud feature, Desmos calculator, Snapscore, Co-authoring & collaboration, Improved data Poll Everywhere Flip phone origins! Question types include: multiple choice, word cloud, Q&A with upvoting & downvoting, clickable images (click on a section of an image to indicate their answer), open ended, Surveys, short answer, select on a map Launch from PowerPoint, Google Slides, Keynote, or Poll Everywhere’s site. Students can respond within any mobile or web browser, using a mobile app or with text messaging. Asynchronous option Competitions - multiple-choice games are a lot like Kahoot or Quizizz Paid - Show live results to participants, better reports Mentimeter Free Version gives you Unlimited audience size, presentations, and content slides, but up to 2 question slides and up to 5 quiz slides per presentation. Presentations are public. Interactive presentations can include videos and images, polls, data, opinions great for with smart phones Question Slides include: Word clouds, Multiple choice, Fun Quiz competitions, Q&A (with upvote), Ranking questions, Image options, Open-ended, Scales questions, 2 by 2 grid, 100 point questions Mentimote remote is pretty cool Can put Surveys and forms in presentation Apple Podcasts Review from guisee Ways to Support the Show or Connect with Jake & other Duct Tapers! Apple Podcast Reviews FlipGrid.com/EduDuctTape Speakpipe.com/EduDuctTape #EduDuctTape on social media Telling your friends & colleagues The Duct Tapers Facebook Group - facebook.com/groups/ducttapers Stickers! Want to pass some out?  Want some for yourself? JakeMiller.net/SendMeStickers The JakeMillerTech Newsletter – Sign up! jakemiller.net/newsletter

Classcraft's CEO and Co-founder, Shawn Young, talks about the launch of Collective Feedback, a new Classcraft feature that enables any school staff member — including teachers and administrators — to reward students for positive behavior. Shawn also discusses Classcraft's evolution as a company, and how they shifted from being a classroom tool to something that helps school districts with PBIS and tiered intervention initiatives improve behavior at scale.

December 4 2020 - Episode 31The EdTech Chat Podcast with @mrkempnz1. Introduction2. Ignite EdTech Team Introduction - Evo Hannan3. Question for you - How will you use Tech over the Holiday season to be the best you?4. EdTech Tool of the Week - Book Creator5. Interview with Steve Isaacs and Alex Quigley7. Win this weeks prize (Alex's Book) by going to bit.ly/edtechwin and completing the short form (Competition ends 9am SGT on Wednesday 9 December).8. Subscribe, Rate and ShareIf you have a question that you want answered on the podcast please emailinfo@igniteedtech.comConnect with Mark Quinn here or via email markquinn9129@gmail.comLinks from PodcastEvo Hannan on Ignite EdTechSteve Isaacs on TwitterAlex Quigley on TwitterClasscraftTwine - Choice based adventure gamesBananarama Principle Microsoft TeamsEEF Covid-19 Remote Learning ResourcesAlex Quigley's BooksConnect with Craig on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram or Facebook to stay up to date.Find episodes you might have missed here.Thank you for your support. Please share your favourite part of today's episode and tag me on your social media and don't forget to rate our podcast so we can reach more people!

Shawn Young is the co-founder and CEO of Classcraft, the Engagement Management System for schools. Since its launch, Classcraft has gained traction with educators worldwide, providing tools to gamify their classrooms. Shawn taught 11th-grade physics for nine years, holds a bachelor's degree in physics and a master's in education from Université de Sherbrooke and is also a seasoned web developer. The Great Exchange Student Engagement Summit, hosted by Classcraft and Google for Education, happens October 29. Learn more here. To download this episode's bonus clip, sign up for The Business of Learning member library.

Harvard University's Chris Dede joins Classcraft's Brian Belardi to talk about the differences between engagement and motivation, and why student motivation is so important in a remote setting.

Vi hører ofte "gamification" begrepet hevet rundt i diskursen rundt spill i skolen. Denne episoden er viet til gamification - Altså bruk av elementer fra spillverden i andre sammenhenger. Selv om flere av Spillpedagogene har gode opplevelser knyttet til gamification i livet utenfor klasserommet: (Fitbit, Sommerles, SimplyPiano, DuoLingo etc.) er vi svært kritisk til mange av de gamificationsystemene (fra Classcraft til ordenskarakterer) som finnes for klasserommet. Medvirkende denne episoden: Aleksander, Halvor, Ragnhild og Magnus Produsent: Odin Nøsen

Classcraft talks with New York City special educator and STEM coach Sean Arnold about why games and play are so effective in engaging students with special needs.

In this series premiere, host Brian Belardi talks with Classcraft co-founders Shawn and Devin Young about The Great Exchange, a student engagement summit from Classcraft and Google for Education. Listen to Shawn and Devin discuss why student engagement is the issue on everyone's minds and what they're most looking forward to about the event.

Your lesson, should you choose to accept it, is to consider a new resource: Classcraft, an app that fosters social emotional development and personalized learning through gaming principles. The resource specialist assigned to help you with this task is Shawn Young, co-founder and CEO.  Click here for a description of our conversation, links to the studies mentioned in the introduction, and more information about the podcast.

Emma and Gil welcome game designer, educator, and birder Chidi Paige to discuss how games and play benefit education, how she designed her bird-themed game Birdwiser, and how competitive birdwatching has affected her as a person. SHOW NOTES 0m22s: From educationcloset.com: "STEAM Education is an approach to learning that uses Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Mathematics as access points for guiding student inquiry, dialogue, and critical thinking." It is an evolution of the older STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) approach in that it adds the arts. 1m29s: The Newark Museum in Newark, NJ. Fun fact: back when Chidi was working at the museum, Gil was a block away working at audible.com. Small world! 1m36s: Columbia University in New York, NY. 2m45s: Wonderstar Foundation has no web presence yet. Hopefully soon! 7m11s: ClassCraft 7m36s: Labster 8m01s: Chidi is referring to polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for DNA replication, and to CRISPR for genome editing. 13m43s: Explorer's Program at the Newark Museum 23m06s: Our episode with Dr. Mary Flanagan was Ludology 226 - Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo 23m43s: You can hear more from Elizabeth Hargrave on Ludology 203 - Winging It. 25m31s: The Big Year on IMDB. 27m29s: Sadly, we could not find the video that Emma mentioned! 30m40s: Chidi's web site for Birdwiser. 32m00s: Whot and Uno are variations on the public domain game Crazy Eights. 33m18s: Birdwiser’s illustrations are by Emily Willoughby, with graphics by Kristine Mathieson of Tropikality Designs 36m26s: Sibley and Peterson are two of the best-known bird guides out there. 38m43s: We discussed Emma's Infinite Potato Problem in Ludology 225 - A Study in Emma-rald. 41m09s: The site Chidi is referring to is Upwork, originally called oDesk. 42m29s: Gil is talking about his word game Wordsy. 42m45s: "Complexity Budget," an idea Richard Garfield popularized. 47m09s: More info about certifying your garden for wildlife. 50m01s: More info about the World Series of Birding. 1h00m05s: The scientists Chidi mentions are Eric Kandel and Richard Axel.

What do video games and teaching have in common? Classcraft has the answer. Participating in different types of games can […]

This week, Scott and Fabian talk about gamification. What is it? Why do it? Where can we find it? This is the first part of a two part series about gamification in which Fabian tries to answer specific questions Scott has about this topic. We also talk a little bit about Classcraft and why it is a great tool to start getting into a gamified classroom. As always, please join us on Twitter for our growing community. Follow us @findingtribepod for our podcast, and also individually @hofmannEDU (Fabian) and @findingmyaloha (Scott)! Or, if you are old school, send us an email at findingourtribepodcast@gmail.com. We would love to hear from you! Rate us! Leave a review on Apple Podcasts! This is how we get found and can grow our community. If you want to leave us a message about this episode or anything else, just go to our page on Anchor.fm and click on "Message": https://anchor.fm/finding-our-tribe/ . We will make sure to reply to you and will make sure to play your message on our show! Give it a try! Anchor is free and super easy to use. Things mentioned in the episode: - Ultimate Lightning McQueen - An amazing feat of engineering! Looks like a real life version of the movie character. - Classcraft - A great tool to delve into a gamified classroom. Lots of features, most of them free!

Je rencontre Shawn Young, PDG et co-fondateur chez Classcraft. Nous discutons de l'éducation de manière globale, en passant par l'influence de Classcraft dans le milieu éducatif, par l'importance de la contextualisation de l'éducation et la place des stages dans l'éducation post-secondaire.

This week we are talking to our lovely co-worker Blake Carrigan! Check her out on Instagram (@mrs.blakecarrigan). This was our first episode recorded during the Corona Virus outbreak, so we talk a little about that and how to explain to kids why hand washing is important by showing them a gross picture of a bread experiment (bit.ly/grossbread), why using “currency” in a SpEd classroom works really well for behavior management, why Classcraft is great and why Fabian moved away from it, why teaching middle school is special, and many other things. As always, please join us on Twitter for our growing community. Follow us @findingtribepod for our podcast, and also individually @hofmannEDU (Fabian) and @findingmyaloha (Scott)! Or, if you are old school, send us an email at findingourtribepodcast@gmail.com. We would love to hear from you! Rate us! Leave a review on Apple Podcasts! This is how we get found and can grow our community. Stay safe!

Its our 2nd anniversary this week! In this episode guest host Mike and Glen talk about the corona virus, how its impacting schools, and how we can best teach remotely. Our guest this week is professional development consultant Naomi Harm.Guest: Naomi HarmNaomi is a passionate advocate for women in education. Her company focuses on hiring amazing women, and her work is centered around training and developing the next generation of women leaders. Naomi is also no slouch when it comes to teaching and training using great computer science tools like Makey Makey. She's the real deal friends.Naomi's 3: TED Talks, The Leader In Me, ReflectionTwitter: https://twitter.com/naomiharmWebsite: https://www.naomiharm.orgNotes:#ChatOnEducation is a slow chat on Fridays with questions at 9am, 12pm and 3pm join us to discuss the topics we talk about on this week's podcast. It's awesome, trust us!OnEducation is now on YouTube! Subscribe to the channel and listen to prior episodes as they are released!: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCu2fkhy9cnZZbggW8_K3FgQSupport OnEducation on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OnEducationPodAre we ready?: https://twitter.com/TCEA/status/1234969102063669249?s=20Fake 2020 Candidate: https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/28/tech/fake-twitter-candidate-2020/index.htmlAwesome Tweet of the Week: https://twitter.com/arcticisleteach/status/1234627021856133120?s=21The Bests: Top Tools and Tips for Remote LearningOur number one tip is not a tool, it's a call to properly train your teachers to be able to transition to effectively teach in an online format.Communication Hub: Schoology, Google Classroom, ParticipateSynchronous Video: Conferences, Hangouts, ZoomAsynchronous Video: FlipgridLesson Delivery: Nearpod, Google SlidesInstructional Video: EdPuzzle + YouTubeReview: Quizlet, GimkitToday's podcast is brought to you by:Classcraft: The presenting sponsor for OnEducation is Classcraft. We are excited to announce Classcraft’s new Story Mode which makes it easy for educators to harness the power of stories. Episodes 1 & 2 of Season 1 are ready for you and your students to play today and it’s completely free! To learn more about Classcraft and the new Story mode simply visit classcraft.com/oneducationPhidgets: OnEducation is sponsored by Phidgets. Phidgets are interactive USB sensors that bring your code to life. There is no soldering or wiring required. Simply plug in a Phidgets sensor, write code in your favorite language, and watch your ideas come alive. Phidgets are used by thousands of STEM professionals globally, and are now available for computer science students. Simply go to bit.ly/phidgetsoneducation to get your introductory kit that includes a free sensor worth over $50. Thats bit.ly/phidgetsoneducationBadge Summit: Do you have plans to attend the ISTE conference this summer? Come one day early and participate in the best hidden gem conference in the United States - Badge Summit 2020 will take place in Costa Mesa, California on June 22. There will be many amazing educators to collaborate with on topics such as digital badges, credentials, gamification and more. To learn more about the badge summit simply visit bit.ly/badgesummit

In this episode guest host Mike and Glen discuss whether schools need to teach the gaming of algorithms. This week, the Catholic education system received a couple of doses of REALLY bad news, we’ll talk about that. Our guest this week, is friend of the pod, Steve IsaacsGuest: Steve IsaacsSteve doesn't need much an introduction here. He's one of our best friends and closest education companions. We brought him on to talk about all the amazing things going on over at Epic Games related to Fortnite and Unreal Engine in Education; something both him and Mike are deeply involved in.Twitter: https://twitter.com/mr_isaacsWebsite:http://gamesandlearning1.blogspot.com/Epic Games Contest: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/events/interactive-3d-contestNotes:#ChatOnEducation is a slow chat on Fridays with questions at 9am, 12pm and 3pm join us to discuss the topics we talk about on this week's podcast. It's awesome, trust us!OnEducation is now on YouTube! Subscribe to the channel and listen to prior episodes as they are released!: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCu2fkhy9cnZZbggW8_K3FgQSupport OnEducation on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OnEducationPodPaolo de Buono reads a book: https://globalnews.ca/news/6570892/the-boy-who-cried-fabulous-book-tcdsb/Jean Vanier's legacy is tarnished: https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/larche-founder-jean-vanier-sexually-abused-six-women-report-findsIs Dreams the next Minecraft Education Edition?: https://www.theguardian.com/games/2020/feb/20/dreams-review-creative-learning-as-delightful-playPocket Points: https://youtu.be/gireuwEOMcsShould school teach you how to "game" an algorithm?: https://twitter.com/mrShakedown/status/1229114470041112577?s=20The Bests: Things in Education That Need to Stop, NOW.HomeworkTextbooksSkipping Recess as PunishmentHigh Stakes Standardized TestingShort Lunch BreaksToday's podcast is brought to you by:Classcraft: The presenting sponsor for OnEducation is Classcraft. We are excited to announce Classcraft’s new Story Mode which makes it easy for educators to harness the power of stories. Episodes 1 & 2 of Season 1 are ready for you and your students to play today and it’s completely free! To learn more about Classcraft and the new Story mode simply visit classcraft.com/oneducationPhidgets: OnEducation is sponsored by Phidgets. Phidgets are interactive USB sensors that bring your code to life. There is no soldering or wiring required. Simply plug in a Phidgets sensor, write code in your favorite language, and watch your ideas come alive. Phidgets are used by thousands of STEM professionals globally, and are now available for computer science students. Simply go to bit.ly/phidgetsoneducation to get your introductory kit that includes a free sensor worth over $50. Thats bit.ly/phidgetsoneducationBadge Summit: Do you have plans to attend the ISTE conference this summer? Come one day early and participate in the best hidden gem conference in the United States - Badge Summit 2020 will take place in Costa Mesa, California on June 22. There will be many amazing educators to collaborate with on topics such as digital badges, credentials, gamification and more. To learn more about the badge summit simply visit bit.ly/badgesummit

We explore the Top 5 Tech Tools to Try Out in Your Classroom with Amber Youngman, High School English Teacher and School Site Technology Coach. Amber shares her five current favorite tools including: Flipgrid: https://flipgrid.com/ - student voice in video and audio - listen @4min55sec mark Padlet: https://padlet.com/ online collaborative board - listen @14min38sec mark Classcraft: https://www.classcraft.com/ - behavioral management tool - listen @27min38sec mark Kialo EDU: https://www.kialo-edu.com/login - discourse and discussion tool - listen @35min45sec mark Canva: https://www.canva.com/ - design and desktop publishing tool for teachers - listen @42min mark Follow Amber on Twitter at https://twitter.com/TeachingandTea and Matthew at https://twitter.com/mattedtechcoach Additional resources on the Top 5 Tech Tools: Flipgrid: How to use Flipgrid in your Subject Area Padlet: 32 Interesting Ways to Use Padlet Classcraft: Getting started with Classcraft Kialo EDU: Getting started with Kialo Canva: Step-by-step guide to designing from scratch​

We interviewed Shawn Young from Classcraft and discussed VR integration, and how to craft VR quests with the engagement management system. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/the-virtual-reality-podcast/support

Classcraft is a tool that teachers can use to "Gamify" their classroom. Find out more about Gamifiying and Classcraft in this latest edition of The Marvin Byrd Show as we welcome Stephani Durant to the show. Please Support the show by visiting our Sponsor, Rodan + Fields

In this episode of The PE Geek Podcast we speak with Mike Ginicola about the value of leveraging student choice & voice in thje Physical Education classroom. This has taken many forms in Mike's classes & has been empowered by the use of Gamification & Emerging Technologies. He also shares his love for the Plickers app and how he was able to take it to the next level using Magnets.Resources mentioned in this episodePlickers, ClassCraft, Balance It Jump It  TranscriptionDuration: [00:19:33][00:00:28] Jarrod Robinson: Alright hello everyone and welcome to episode number 92 of the PE podcast and as always it's an absolute pleasure to have you here. Now, I'm joined today by Mike Ginicola. How are you?[00:00:39] Mike Ginicola: Good Jarrod, thank you for having me here.[00:00:42] Jarrod Robinson: Absolute pleasure. Now, we're sitting here doing a little bit of time zone math trying to work out where we are in relation to each other, but for our listeners where are you based and how long have you been in that area?[00:00:53] Mike Ginicola: Yeah I'm in Connecticut in the United States and I've been teaching here in the area for twenty years. Originally I grew up in Ohio.[00:01:02] Jarrod Robinson: Oh nice, so I mean is that something that you can map back to your childhood as having an interest in wanting to be a teacher or did this come about through a different path? [00:01:13] Mike Ginicola: Yeah I always had a natural affinity for all things sports, physical so it seemed natural that I ended up going in the army to get college money and that kind of cemented even more just really loving the movement of everything.[00:01:27] Jarrod Robinson: Yeah, so I mean sport-wise growing up was there a particular sport that you really enjoyed or it was just an all-around passion?[00:01:34] Mike Ginicola: I've been playing volleyball for about thirty years now.[00:01:38] Jarrod Robinson: Wow, and that's something that you still do to this day?[00:01:43] Mike Ginicola: I do. Not as well as I used to, but definitely keeping up in my mid-forties.[00:01:48] Jarrod Robinson: Yeah, is it one of those sports though because you have had such a lifelong enjoyment with it that it's one of the lesser enjoyable things that you like to teach or is, or do you like that moment when you get to share your passion with the kids?[00:02:03] Mike Ginicola: For about fifteen years I really did enjoy teaching it and now really moved on to just ever since Twitter and social media and the PLN just branching off to all types of striking and making it even more for the students, better experiences for them.[00:02:19] Jarrod Robinson: Yeah, yeah I mean similar for me like I grew up with track and field and I loved it but just that teaching of it is a completely different thing altogether and it was one of my lesser things to teach and I gradually moved away to enjoying other subject areas and other things. With tech being one of those and I know for you've gone through this journey in the last three years and it's been great to see with a lot of sharing of stuff that you're doing in your classroom practice. So, my question is when did you get started with this whole social media journey and how has it helped you in your practice?[00:02:57] Mike Ginicola: Yeah well you're going to make me feel like a dinosaur here, for twenty years of teaching I only joined social media really about a year ago, Twitter I think was last April so it's about 15/16 months now and that set me on course from there. I was invited to Voxer, the PE Central Facebook group and kind of went from there.[00:03:17] Jarrod Robinson: Sure how did that even come about? Because there's way more teachers off line than there are online and it's often difficult to even know that these worlds exist. So for you was it like did you go to a conference and stumble a(continued)

Dans le deuxième chapitre de son épopée, le maître des jeux explique les effets des jeux vidéo sur le cerveau et il présente un jeu de rôle qui aide les enseignants à motiver leurs élèves : Classcraft. En musique, Mortal Kombat et Street Fighter seront de la partie!