Dave Stachowiak [00:00:00]:

Today on episode 490 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, navigating insecurity in teaching with Bonni Stachowiak.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:00:12]:

Welcome to this episode of Teaching in Higher Ed. I’m Bonni Stachowiak, And this is the space where we explore the art and science of being more effective at facilitating learning. We also share ways to improve Our productivity approaches so we can have more peace in our lives and be even more present for our students.

Dave Stachowiak [00:00:40]:

Hi. It’s Dave Stachowiak, and today, We are having a conversation about navigating insecurity in teaching. And, Bonni, one of the things we’re gonna talk about today is structure, the importance of structure. And so it would be just, like, right on the nose for us to have a structure for this conversation, wouldn’t it?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:01:00]:

Imagine that.

Dave Stachowiak [00:01:01]:

So we have a structure that we have thought through, and every structure has to have, like, a theme. So the Theme is the letter p today. I feel like I’m enjoying a Sesame Street episode here. So this episode brought to you by the letter p, Five P’s on Navigating Insecurity in Teaching. All joking aside, Bonni, this is a topic that keeps coming up every semester, every week. May I say every day? Both of us are teachers. You’re a teacher in a more traditional capacity. I’m a teacher in More of a business capacity, but insecurity is something I think both of us experience, if not daily, at somewhat regular intervals.

Dave Stachowiak [00:01:42]:

And so How’s the semester going for you so far?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:01:48]:

I wonder what on earth when there was An empty spot in the content calendar for the podcast. Why, I might have been thinking about these things. It surprises me every time. It doesn’t surprise me anymore that when a when a new term or a new semester starts that I feel the nervousness, like, that doesn’t surprise me. But We get here we are 60, 65, 70% through, and then it comes back in full force. That’s the one that surprises me. It really, really does. Where I just think, would don’t you at some point at some point, don’t you outgrow that? And I guess the answer is no.

Dave Stachowiak [00:02:23]:

No. No. No. I don’t think so. I I run into that Nervousness, anytime I start a new client project, which I’m doing a lot of online facilitation, I run into that nervousness every single time as many years 20 some Years I’ve been doing this now, and still I run into that nervous. Now it’s different. The nervousness is different than it was 20 years ago, both the intensity and the kind of nervousness, but also often comes up in unsuspecting ways during Yeah. A pros a project too.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:02:52]:

Yes. The happy news is That there are techniques that you and I have both found that it doesn’t matter how long we’ve been doing this, and we’ve been in education in various contexts and capacities for Our entire careers

Dave Stachowiak [00:03:05]:

Pretty much. Yeah.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:03:06]:

And so there are things that we can trust that are solid as a rock that will be there for us, and that’s really what we wanted to talk about today. And one thing I’m excited about, Dave, is that not only is today I forgot what you said about not sponsored by, but but it’s the letter p brought to you by the letter p. It’s also brought to you by episodes that have been airing. The earliest one we’re gonna talk about today, July 17, 2014.

Dave Stachowiak [00:03:33]:

Oh, wow. Oh, wow. These are

Bonni Stachowiak [00:03:34]:

things we’ve been talking about a long time, and we thought it’d just be fun to kinda put this context of When we start to feel those nerves, when we start to feel that insecurity, what are some approaches we can use?

Dave Stachowiak [00:03:45]:

Yeah. And so many of the things that are timeless we keep coming back to because They are timeless. They’re the things we keep running into. So let’s let’s start with maybe even before a class begins, which there’s lots of ways that shows up, but let’s take a class, for example. Before class begins, the first p.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:04:04]:

The first p is preview, And I wanna mention, by the way, that there’s lots that’s out there about the first 5 minutes of class. James Lange did some phenomenal things about In The Chronicle of Higher Education, which I’ll link to in the show notes about those first 5 minutes of class, but it was really Peter Newbury Who got me thinking about before class even begins. And he has a blog post which I’ll also link to where he talks about putting up a picture. Sure. His his field is astronomy, not to be confused with astrology, which by the way, I will regularly Call those 2 I wonder if, like, if that’s your discipline, you probably never do that. He’s probably never done that. But in but anyway I

Dave Stachowiak [00:04:45]:

don’t think there’s probably a lot of astrology classes in higher education institutions. I’m sure somewhere

Bonni Stachowiak [00:04:50]:

No. Just mean getting the words confused in your mind before they come out of your mouth. Anyway, so he’ll have up there an astronomy picture, And he’ll ask students to think about what do they notice, what do they wonder. And the other day, at the last minute, our Senior director of our library, Jim Darlach, had to had to be called away at the last moment. And so I was I got to step in in my hero’s cape and then host a Library speaker series, and it was one of our professors, doctor Mike Jimenez, was talking about Cesar Chavez and his legacy. And so we got to go visit his office. We took all these props from his office and and put them out on a table where he was speaking. And I also put up a poll question to uncover how much the people who were attending knew about the legacy of him.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:05:40]:

And it was so fun just to watch The difference in terms of engagement and interaction, because not only would they fill out the poll everywhere question, but they also then Would start talking to each other. It just it brought a whole different sense of life. So whether or not it’s just something that someone asks themself As they’re joining, what do you notice? What do you wonder? Or whether it’s a formal poll question that they can answer and then start to engage with each other what they think and what their Level of familiarity. We used a little bit of humor in the question asking, and I think it set a really nice tone for those who were coming Who didn’t have any awareness of that topic and were just coming around to to see what was what the speaker series was all about.

Dave Stachowiak [00:06:24]:

It’s interesting you mentioned James Lange in the first 5 minutes of a class. That is where my attention has always been. Bonni being a having been a Dale Carnegie instructor for years, there was Ton of emphasis on how do you open the 1st 10 seconds of a class and really capture an attention and telling a story and engaging participants. And What I have not thought as much about is what to do before then. I always send a note out to again, different context. I send a note out to our client participants in a we meet regularly every couple weeks about 48 hours before a class, but it tends to be more of a what are we gonna do during this class, which is super helpful, I think. But I haven’t really thought about it of, like, here’s a question in advance or to have, like, in an online context, Have a screen share already up as people come in and have a slide, like, with a question? I might try that. So thanks for the suggestion.

Dave Stachowiak [00:07:15]:

I love it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:07:15]:

Yeah. And thanks to Peter Newbury, James Lang, and everyone else who’s given us so many great recommendations around this across all these years.

Dave Stachowiak [00:07:23]:

The 2nd p is patience. How do you see patience playing a role in this?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:07:28]:

Well, I’m hearkening back to episode 6 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, which aired on July 17, 2014. Whenever I go back, which doesn’t happen that often, but when I go back and I think about Or if I ever listen to our early podcast, it’s not my proudest moment. I mean, just because we’ve both learned so much in that time, me Specifically but this is one that I haven’t changed my mind about at all, and that is that that episode was all around something called the eight 2nd rule. Dave, tell us what is the 8 second rule?

Dave Stachowiak [00:08:01]:

When you pose a question waiting at least 8 seconds to see who will respond before you jump in and start to answer your own question or say more or jump into lecture mode or whatever you might normally do.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:08:13]:

Yeah. And I’m laughing because I I really want to recreate how long 8 seconds actually is, but see a lot of us use podcast Players that smartly skip silence. And so I can’t even really do it, but maybe put put the podcast player on pause right now and just feel how long that is. And what’s happening when you do it for the 1st time, you’re almost conditioning people that you actually Want an answer to your question. And our nervousness sometimes covers it up where we’ll ask a question and then it feels like an eternity, no one’s saying anything, and I gotta I I gotta fill in this gap of silence. It’s just so uncomfortable. And what we inadvertently do is we condition people twofold. One is we conditioned them that no, I actually didn’t really want the answer to your question, and 2, if this ever if things ever get uncomfortable, I’m gonna rescue you.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:09:06]:

And what people don’t need in learning is us rescuing them from the aspect of learning that creates The most learning and that is when we are challenged, when we are challenged in a compassionate way. That’s by the way, Sarah Rose Kavanagh. She’s the person who introduced to me this this phrase of Passionate challenge, and that resonates with me so much. If we’re gonna rescue people from their discomfort in a learning context, well, we’ve just Pretty much bottled up that opportunity for that learning to occur, for that challenge, for that compassionate challenge. So counting to 8 seconds, Literally counting in your head. I wouldn’t recommend counting aloud. That gets a little weird. But, in online spaces, so when I’m Teaching on Zoom or in some kind of a web platform, I find it sometimes even has to be longer because if I’m waiting for some kind of engagement in a chat box, Then people literally have to type their words, and some of them don’t type as fast as I do.

Dave Stachowiak [00:10:01]:

No. It it’s it’s the first couple of times you do this, Both for yourself as a facilitator, it’s uncomfortable, but also it’s uncomfortable for participants and students because they’re not used to a facilitator professor doing this in most cases. I’ve had clients tell me that the first few times I did that in a event, They found it really awkward, but people if you keep doing it, people move past that pretty quickly.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:10:30]:

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Dave Stachowiak [00:10:31]:

And and because Everyone realizes, oh, this isn’t just like the question that the professor, instructor, lecturer, insert title here, asked and is just hypothetically and then, you know, answering their own question as the next lecture point. They actually do want my input, and it takes people a little bit to re realized that, oh, no. Actually, I do wanna hear what you are going to say, and we’re setting this up as a place of dialogue and learning and facilitation. And so it’s a little awkward the first few times, but if you stick with it, people will come along with you pretty quickly, and then it won’t be as awkward, and you will, more importantly, get to a place where you have a lot more dialogue happening in a classroom.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:11:13]:

And I will also say if you decide to tell people about this Because it’s an approach or a technique you might wish to see them using when they present, when they facilitate in your classes, then they will Totally messed with your mind. At least that’s been my experience.

Dave Stachowiak [00:11:26]:

Well, under undergrad students, especially, like, didn’t you have them all gang up on you once to, like, not refuse to just

Bonni Stachowiak [00:11:32]:

Yes. That’s so funny. You could really be messed with if you decide to let this out. I would suggest this is just one of those approaches that’s just between You and Dave and me, and you don’t you don’t necessarily tell students unless it’s going to be a helpful thing for them to know.

Dave Stachowiak [00:11:47]:

We started this conversation talking about Structure, and past guests have talked a lot about the importance of structure, and this is coming under The lens of, 3rd p, preciseness. Tell me more about that.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:12:04]:

So there are 2 ways that structure that this Precise and this have come out for me, and the these are conversations that have continued to echo, and I’m so grateful for these people for challenging My thinking and my mind in this way. The 1st guest that come to mind for me are Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy, and they’ve talked about Inclusive teaching, they’ve come on a number of times and all these different slices around that. And both of them teach In what would traditionally be thought of and actually experienced as challenging classes, so Kelly Hogan in the STEM fields, Viji Sathy teaching statistics, these are contexts, these are disciplines where people can go in there feeling insecure, like I can’t do this, And they really do need that compassionate challenge. And so they are advocates for high structure. And Kelly talks about what it was like to see the statistics from her classes where there were large d, f, And w rates, and w by the way for those who don’t use that vernacular, that would be withdrawing people who drop from the class. And so seeing the rates And the disparate ways in which students of color would experience negative scholarly outcomes. And then that’s I mean, no one wants to see that about about our teaching that we wouldn’t be offering an equal opportunity, an equitable Opportunity for people to thrive in our classes. And so she then encountered various types of learning and the ways in which that can can be a way of negating some of those effects.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:13:50]:

And so Kelly and Vicky talk a lot about Content classes that we need to we need to have them understanding these concepts, these ideas, these practices, and how to do that in a highly structured way. And then the other, the 2nd type of preciseness, the 2nd type of structure Comes from almost the opposite of that and that is where we don’t know as much what the content of a class is gonna be because we don’t know Who the learners are yet, and we don’t know exactly what our class is gonna be about. So when Mia Zamora came on on episode 475, she talked about making space for emergence. And I just I’ve been thinking about this so much that She’s all about the high structure, and it’s interesting to me that she meets the Kelly Hogans and the Vinci Southees in the world in terms of how powerful the high Structure can be, but in her case, she’s using it to allow for the fact that we don’t know exactly what that content is going to look like yet. And I just love the 2 aspects of the ways in which the preciseness, the high structure. And by that, it and just in case someone’s going, what do you even mean by the high structure? These are all the things you might do in active learning, or in the case of Mia Zamora using a lot of Liberating structures or, you know, Dave and I are are trained in a lot of different facilitation techniques. What’s working? What’s not? What are the opportunities? What are the threats? I mean, all All of the kinds of questions and structure and facilitation that we might bring about and just the power of that. And and by the way, We’ll tie it back, once again to that feeling of insecurity.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:15:34]:

You know what else really helps when you have this preciseness, when you have this high structure? It’s not about you. It’s all the way back to the students, and it’s about you kind of getting out of the way. I’ll I’ll share one last thing and that is Kelly is so wonderful About sharing both in their book and also when she speaks about her own feelings of insecurity and also as an extreme introvert, And just how freeing it is to say this is not about charisma and edutainment. This is about facilitation of learning in these high structure ways. They’re really, really such inspirational figures for me. I’m so grateful for all the things that they’ve taught me.

Dave Stachowiak [00:16:14]:

And I’m I’m recalling that Mia Zamora does a lot of teaching or at least in the context of that episode of, like, current events, things happening. So That becomes even more critical in a class like that where, literally, the content of the course, you may not know in advance just because you’re in the moment of trying to navigate what’s going on in world events. And I think the invitation I’d have here for folks is thinking about, I I think a lot of us when we’re planning a course, writing a syllabus, all the things that are that you’ve talked about so much on the show over the years, Bonni, is there’s there’s an emphasis, of course, on curriculum and thinking about the curriculum and the content. And I think there’s a both end here in that we rarely, especially in a higher ed context, I think think about the and, which is the structure. What are the questions I’m bringing to this conversation? What kind of activity might I have students engage in today? What might be the modality that I change up instead of it being lecture? Maybe I have people pair and share. What story will I tell to open up the class today, or what story might I tell to close the class today? And I think that that’s the piece that I’ve seen a lot of folks in the higher ed context just not think about as much is there’s a lot of thought of like, okay, what’s the content I’m gonna cover today? And what if I run out of And how the timing and all that and all that’s really important. And I think this is where maybe we come back to James Lang as the small teaching. If you haven’t done that before, you don’t need to change up the whole class.

Dave Stachowiak [00:17:53]:

In fact, you probably shouldn’t. Right? Just start with something small. 30 seconds at the start, tell a story if you’ve never told the story before, or put that slide up with the question. And if you just do something small to move in that direction, I’m more worried in a facilitation often of running out of questions than running out of content. So I’m always thinking, like, what are the questions that are in my back pocket that I might ask?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:18:15]:

Yeah. And there are 2 resources that I wanna tie to that. Of course, small teaching, wonderful, wonderful resource. But there’s a Harvard University, they have an Active learning database, and I apologize that in this exact moment, I can’t remember what it’s called, but I’m gonna look it up. Essentially, Dave, what it does for you is you can go up and it’s a whole entire database of the kinds of things you could do, and not only that, but then they have videos of people showing you what it looks like in a classroom. True. And people who have used that approach, that active learning approach, and what’s worked for them, they have cautionary notes, etcetera, and it’s just a really, really powerful wait. But as you said, we can go to databases, lists, you know, resource collections like that and just pick one thing, And then try that for the rest of the semester.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:19:03]:

We’re gonna do this particular type of approach and see what that’s like for you. And then you talked about telling a story, and that reminds me of the Time foretelling from Bransford and Schwartz, which I first heard about from Derek Brough. And that’s just this idea that, no, I don’t have to have an entire set of the most amazing stories and examples that anyone has ever heard, but if we Plan it out once, and we think through that thing that’s just going to ignite curiosity, ignite imagination That will really carry us a long way where students then will be primed for the more dense and potentially not as invigorating things that we have to share that That particular session.

Dave Stachowiak [00:19:47]:

Closely related, let’s talk about timing. The 4th p is pacing.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:19:53]:

So if we’ve done that preciseness, we’ve got the structure there, we’re gonna need to get real about timing. How long does stuff take? And for those of you who are teaching online, I’ll tell you something kinda neat. At least I find this neat. Zoom has recently updated their clients so you can have timers right There. And I sort of like some because I do so much teaching on Zoom these days, when I end up at a at a in a classroom context, I was like, I wish I had my timer. You You know, all these these tools that just become seamless for me. By the way, I do have also old fashioned timers, but they’re not as fancy and as nice as the as the one on Zoom. But anyway, so we wanna think through what our times are, and I I remember early on in the podcast hearing from someone about this fear of, oh my gosh, what do I do If I run out of stuff to say or if I run out of stuff to do and my reaction to this person first was, you know, that can occasionally happen, then you would just let the Class go a little early, and that was seen in their particular university as something you just don’t do that went contrary to their social norms.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:20:57]:

They felt like they might, You know, have the students really feel let down by that if that were to happen. So if that’s not culture culturally acceptable to do or just doesn’t make sense for you to do, I always have something in my back pocket to always use. So I might use a there’s a app called Quizlet, which is digital flashcards, And it’s got these games you can play. So I’ve always got a flash card deck of the key concepts and things that we’re learning, so I could always pull that out And play a round or 2 of that before people leave. And then there’s also these things called exit tickets. Exit ticket is just a fancy way for, like, when James Lang’s talking about the 1st 5 minutes of class, well, in that last 5 minutes, we could do an exit ticket. What is one key point that you’re gonna be really thinking about or that really resonated or made a lot of sense to you today, and what is one thing They call this the muddiest point, as in what was the one most confusing thing that you’re still gonna be having questions about that you need a little bit more emphasis. And if you take the 5 minutes to do that kind of exit ticket, then guess what the next session’s first 5 minutes can be all about.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:22:05]:

Well, the things that were the muddiest and the most confusing, you know, that that kind of a thing can help. And some of this I think comes from Dave. I used to be a Summer camp counselor every summer when I was in high school. And so your camp counselor, that never sort of leaves you. You’re always a camp once a camp counselor, Always a camp counselor, and we just always had to have stuff. I used to by by the way so I I became a camp director. I used to drive the bus. I would drive an 87 passenger bus all around San Diego County.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:22:34]:

And it was funny because back then, I had to decide what was harder to teach someone who is a truck driver How to take 10 small children to a fair or a beach or, you know, fill in the blank and care for them well and not have any of them get lost or how to teach me how to drive an 87 passenger bus, and I ultimately decided

Dave Stachowiak [00:22:57]:

The first is harder.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:22:59]:

The least. And so I it’s kind of wild to think. I know this is hard for you. Like, I used to be able to even parallel park a bus. I mean, not in any ridiculous situation, but I mean, like, I I It is hard

Dave Stachowiak [00:23:11]:

it is hard for me to picture.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:23:12]:

I know. I’m a very good driver, but but just just sometimes the parallel parking. Although it’s changing because we now have a car that, like, it’s got the camera that’s looks like you’re looking from above, and that thing helps out like nobody’s business.

Dave Stachowiak [00:23:27]:

Parallel parking is something a lot of people struggle with. I don’t think you’re alone in Yeah. Anyway.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:23:32]:

At any rate, think of yourself like a camp counselor in the sense of we’re always gonna have some kind of Activity that we could do if we do run out of questions to ask to Dave’s points earlier or activities we could possibly do, have something available Such that that can be, be a way of of handling your unexpected timing, your pacing when it goes awry.

Dave Stachowiak [00:23:53]:

Yeah. I I always have a something in my back pocket either literally or figuratively, and I’ve you and I have been doing this enough years now that I think We don’t think about that quite as consciously as maybe we did 20 years ago, but I’ve certainly learned that the unexpected happens. You know, you have a class of Ten people, say for example, in a graduate program and 4 people don’t show up for whatever reason that we can all of a sudden you got 6 and you planned an activity that involved all 10. How you gonna handle that? Or the technology goes down or the projector isn’t working or the room isn’t available that you planned on being in, and there’s 8,000 variables that can happen in any classroom experience and having just a, like, okay. If things really didn’t work out during In this class session, the semester, whatever, like, I’ve got a couple things in my back pocket that I’ve thought through in advance because it’s so hard in the moment When you’re stressed, if something’s not working, and if you’ve just done a little bit of thinking of that in advance, you got 1 or 2 things written down somewhere, it’s so much easier when that happens.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:24:51]:

I wanted to mention that when Kevin Kelly was on, he talked about having a show flow. I’m not sure if that’s what he’s called it because these things can be called different names, but essentially, for every class session, we should have that high structure, That preciseness of what are we going to do, what questions, what activities are we going to do, and then, yes, how long those things are gonna take us. And then when we’re off base because something takes way way shorter or way way longer than we anticipated, which by the way for me, Dave, almost every time it takes Way, way longer than I thought it was going to. That’s just my that tends to be my weakness. I’m not worried about running out of time. I’m worried about, oh, gosh, I don’t wanna I don’t wanna Keep people past the time that we’re committed to go. But, yeah, having that show flow, you can adjust it over time, but it can really help you in the moment Stick with what your plan was and make adjustments as needed.

Dave Stachowiak [00:25:42]:

The 5th p is places, and I know you’re taking some inspiration from this one from Dan Levi. It’s the most listened to episode you’ve ever had. What’s something you’re still taking from him, an inspiration on this?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:25:57]:

Yeah. And I’m saying as of the date of this recording because it could be this episode that we’re doing right now could

Dave Stachowiak [00:26:03]:

You know, this is Excellence in production right here.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:26:07]:

Speaking of insecurity, Dave, I mean, this could this could be it.

Dave Stachowiak [00:26:10]:

This could be it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:26:10]:

You know? People are listening. They’re it

Dave Stachowiak [00:26:12]:

could be it. So be going viral We could now. We could be.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:26:15]:

The camp counselor story, that was priceless right there. Another p.

Dave Stachowiak [00:26:18]:

The bus?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:26:19]:

Another p. Priceless. Brilliant. So places. What I drew from his work, not just when he came on the show, but, of course, he has a wonderful book by the same name, Teaching Effectively with Zoom. And of course, as the global pandemic hit, no wonder that episode was one that a lot of people really wanted to hear more about. And one of the many ideas that he talks about his book and he spoke about in that episode is just this idea of having digital places Where people can go meet, if you will. So if it’s it’s maybe a Google slide deck and group 1 is sort of meeting, if you will, On slide 3 because by the way, slide 1 was the title slide, and slide 2 would be the instructions, and then slide 3 might be groups One place for them to all go and meet.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:27:09]:

And the next slide is group two’s slide, and the next group is group threes. And so you have a Digital place for people to go and meet and convey to each other, and also back To you as a facilitator and to the entire class. And so this has just been a technique that I have found so incredibly useful To and in fact, I was just experiencing this nervousness, this insecurity with a class, and I I had that, like, oh my gosh. I don’t even know how to do this kind of moment. And this is what I did. I was like, okay. Well, what’s the concept? Why why am I feeling nervous about this. What what’s going on? And part of it is just this is the normal part in semester long classes where students also can Start to become exhausted and overwhelmed and, therefore, disengage.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:28:00]:

And so we kinda need a reminder that this is a very normal thing to Hop in, and so I created a Google slide deck at the, you know, 30 minutes as I was prepping before the class started. And it was a wonderful way to Convey and I was able to uncover some confusion in ways that I’m not normally able to with this particular concept. So Whether it’s Google Slides, whether it’s Google Docs, just some sort of collaborative space. And of course, if you are teaching in a classroom, Yes. If people have digital devices and you, you know, have encouraged them to have them out, you can still do that. But I love using sticky notes. I’m a big fan of teaching through Sticky notes so we also can pass out the sticky notes and have people walking around the class. And instead of a Google slide, It is.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:28:44]:

It could be, one of those big giant poster paper sticky notes things, or it could also just be a wall. That wall is gonna be this Question, and that other wall over there is gonna be this question. I love using the tool called Canva. Canva is a really easy to use graphic design program. So on Canva, I can print out what the questions are, and then the sticky notes can be stuck up, you know, the answers, the thoughts that they have can be Stuck up on the stickiness. So all kinds of ways we can create analog and digital places to get outside of people’s heads Into some kind of an external context, and this means we’re not discriminating against people who are more introverted. We’re helping them engage in less extroverted ways, and we’re also really able to see where there may be confusion or some new ideas that are emerging.

Dave Stachowiak [00:29:35]:

This is the time in the episode where we look at recommendations. So, Bonni, looks like you have a few recommendations here, and I’ve got, I actually have 2. I have 1 before, but now I have 2 from what we talked about.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:29:48]:

Oh, perfect. So the first recommendation I have is an Instagram account. I actually have Instagram accounts I wanna recommend and one is just a life lesson. So the 1st Instagram account I want to recommend is called the Loose Ends Project. And, Dave, this is the sweetest thing I’ve seen in a very long time. Thanks to my friend, Carrie, who who shared this with a couple of us on our little text chat. So when people either pass away or are unable otherwise unable to complete their projects, Their crafting projects, there is a massive group of volunteers, thousands and thousands of them all over the world who will finish These unfinished craft or art projects and then send it back to the families and loved ones, and it’s called the loose ends Project.

Dave Stachowiak [00:30:37]:

Oh, sweet.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:30:38]:

Oh, it is so sweet. It is so so very sweet, and I just love that idea. If I was actually crafty, I would sign up to be a volunteer, but I would be of no help to anyone with needle point or quilting or crocheting or knitting or really any of those things.

Dave Stachowiak [00:30:52]:

You could provide motivation and positivity though.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:30:55]:

I could. And if it was an unfinished slide deck, whoo.

Dave Stachowiak [00:30:58]:

Oh, you’d be good on that.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:30:59]:

I’d be really good about it. I should start my own little Instagram, the unfinished slide project. Yes.

Dave Stachowiak [00:31:04]:

So funny.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:31:04]:

Yes. Alright. The second one I wanna do so this person since I’m not I don’t consider myself to be super crafty, I can I can do this woman’s craft? She her name is Andrea Nelson, and the Instagram account is Andrea Nelson Art. And she does a lot of very, very simple projects. A lot of hers have to do with watercolor, but she does other kinds of art too. But Here’s something I never knew, Dave. She just takes a spray bottle, and she sprays water over all the watercolors, instead, I always learned, like, you dip it in the you dip your paintbrush in the water and then you dip it in the paint, but then it takes forever for it actually to be the kind of consistency that you want it to be. So that’s kinda one cool thing, but I’ve actually done 1 or 2 of her projects.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:31:48]:

Mostly, I just like to watch her projects because I think they’re really creative. But they’re kind of kid friendly and adult friendly, like, anyone could do these things and they’re they’re all doable. I mean, any of us could do any of her projects. They’re just really, really fun to see, so I I enjoy that a lot. Alright. My last one, Dave, I’m not gonna name names. Someone And our family is deciding to express themselves through toilet paper, and we the other 3 of us in our household understand The toilet paper goes over the roll. It comes over the roll so you can grab it easier.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:32:25]:

Easy it’s easier all around. I even saw, like, Some evidence, although I didn’t sift it, that’s a reference to Mike Caulfield’s sift method of testing things. But I I I’m fairly certain this had to be true because, of course, it Supports my opinion that the toilet paper goes over the role. And this individual has just decided, like, this is how the they are going to Express themselves and and stand up for their rights in this household. And so I just feel like the only thing I can now do Is just spread the word to the rest of the world through the outlets that I have available to me because I don’t seem to be able to to fix that particular issue.

Dave Stachowiak [00:33:01]:

We did say this episode was gonna be brought to you by p. So, yeah, there you go. There you go. Seems like an appropriate ending to me.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:33:10]:

Oh, wow. We have the puns. Oh, yes. Absolutely. What do you have to recommend for us today?

Dave Stachowiak [00:33:17]:

I have 2 items to recommend. One of them, I thought of as you were speaking earlier about the cool timers on Zoom, which I don’t know if you talked about this before because I know there’s a rule you’re not allowed to recommend something that’s been recommended before, or maybe that’s just the rule for you.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:33:33]:

It’s just It’s just for me, and it’s just for things I recommended. I can recommend things other people have recommended. Absolutely. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I gotcha.

Dave Stachowiak [00:33:40]:

I don’t wanna wade into any waters I’m not allowed to wade into here, but I mentioned this because you mentioned how cool the Zoom timers were, and I just discovered them whenever you did your thing 3 or 4 months ago where you got a group of people together to teach us how to use Zoom timers virtually. And if you do facilitate on Zoom or teach and timers are helpful and you’ve been doing some sort of Hacky way to try to, like, get around that. Like, I used to have actually an LED screen on the wall behind me to time group interactions and all that, and it was Super helpful, but Zoom now has that built in, and I don’t know if you have a resource you can point people to. I think there’s a couple things you have to turn on, like, in your account in order to activate it. It’s an app. But once you do it, if you take I’m I’m sure it’s on YouTube if we can probably find a YouTube something for folks. But Once you activate it, if you do a lot of that online, it’s great. And every time I use it, people are like, oh, wow.

Dave Stachowiak [00:34:33]:

Zoom can do that. Oh, I see the time up there of, like, how much time we have left for this Group interaction, so I would highly recommend looking into this.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:34:39]:

Yes. And I it’s funny because I was corresponding with Maha Bali about this, and she was laughing at me so hard because like, you didn’t know about that? You didn’t know? But so she helped me understand there is a distinction here that’s important. You can have a timer In your big group with everybody, but you also when you do breakout rooms

Dave Stachowiak [00:34:59]:

Yep.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:34:59]:

You can set timers for the breakout rooms so they See them out in their breakout rooms too. And so I use both now. It’s amazing. Yeah. It’s amazing.

Dave Stachowiak [00:35:06]:

Yeah. So I’m glad you mentioned about Maha because I when During the pandemic or some point, I’m, like, this has to be a way neat Zoom natively supports us because there was all these third party add ons at at different times, and you had to hack your way in and pay for stuff and all that. And I just gave up at one point. I’m like, alright. I guess Zoom doesn’t have this. And I didn’t even think to look for the last couple of years, and all of a sudden now Zoom does have this. So anyway, all that to say, if you teach on Zoom. And speaking of preciseness and pacing, this would be a very helpful thing.

Dave Stachowiak [00:35:34]:

Completely unrelated As my 2nd recommendation, or maybe not or maybe related, is, I didn’t even tell you about this, Bonni. One of our daughter’s friends, Her mom called me, a couple days ago and said, I need some parenting advice. And we were talking through a situation that had happened at school with some other kids, And we got to just talking about how do you handle tough stuff with kids, like, as they’re growing up. And I I said I don’t have a lot of perfect advice on this, but I think the question I often come back to both as a parent and as a facilitator and as a business person is, what’s the outcome you want? And I think it’s really easy for all of us, gosh, me too, in situations where there’s a lot of emotion or something isn’t going right or we Feel insecurity, like we’re talking about in this conversation, is to get caught up in that and to forget the big picture of, like, what do you Actually wanna have come out of this, like, big picture long term. And I remember when I started working at Carnegie, my first manager Taught me the question to ask in conversations when meeting with clients. What do you want people coming out of this experience, as in a training class, thinking or doing differently? And that would always elicit some really interesting big picture perspective. And then from there, once we knew that, then we could decide, like, okay, What were we gonna do with curriculum restructure that would meet that larger goal? And I know I’m preaching to the choir here a bit of, you know, people who think a lot about learning outcomes, but I think sometimes when we get in those moments of emotion and doubt and insecurity, if if we can Come back to that question or maybe even have someone else asks that question. What’s the outcome you want from this? That has a way of just getting us beyond the moment and resetting a bit so we have a little bit better perspective.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:37:30]:

It’s so fascinating to me that you’re talking about this. I have all these thoughts. I now I just wanna do an episode just Called what’s the outcome you wanna get? Because this is so powerful. But I wanted to mention, I was listening to this amazing episode about artificial intelligence and I will put it in the Podcast, but it was talking about the alignment problem. And so the host, the person doing the interview, was trying to describe the alignment problem As when you have you have the the humans who have a particular goal, and then you have the artificial intelligence that has a different goal And the conflict there, and the expert in AI was going, well, no. No. No. Actually, what we mean is that when the humans have a goal And then the goal becomes it lacks in nuance.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:38:15]:

It lacks in, like, where the artificial intelligence can’t Figure out, like, meet that goal at what cost, at what expense. And it’s funny because it does take me back to the toilet paper question, which is why, of course, I’m not insisting we Quote unquote, force someone to roll the paper on a roll because that is an alignment problem. That is an issue of where The other priorities that I have are far larger than trying to control an individual, ridiculous, silly thing like a thing of toilet paper. So when we think through what’s the outcome we want, it allows us just to ask those Questions of, like, you think that you want this one thing, but at what cost and at what expense, and it helps broaden our horizon to just A both and conversation as opposed to an either or conversation, and those, of course, are the most human And the most possible giving us the most possibilities to facilitate learning, not just for other people, but for ourselves as well. What a powerful Powerful recommendation. Thank you so much for that, and thank you for today’s conversation too.

Dave Stachowiak [00:39:23]:

What a pleasure to be with you. Thanks, everyone.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:39:28]:

Dave, thanks for being willing to be today’s official host of episode 490. Today’s episode was produced by me and kind of by you.

Dave Stachowiak [00:39:37]:

A little bit.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:39:38]:

Yes. And podcast production support was provided by the amazing Sierra Priest.

Dave Stachowiak [00:39:43]:

Yes. And edited by Andrew Kroeger as always. And, if you haven’t already, boy, I would sure suggest you take a moment to go on to the teachinginhighered.com website, teachinginhighered.com/subscribe, and you’ll get all of the episode notes that come each week, all of the resources mentioned. Who knows toilet paper recommendations? You never know what could be up there, and it will give you an opportunity to get a weekly message from Bonni with all those resources and actually have

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