So many times we see our students glued to their personal devices, completely engaged with their social media accounts.  In an effort to learn more about what is actually happening when my students are distracted, I invited Grace and Nicole to teach me a little bit about social media and what it means to them.  

When digital technologies are utilized, do the tools overshadow, mask, or otherwise draw the focus away from important learning? Gina and Omari talked with us this week about how they use technology both inside and outside of school.  Both seniors, they shared a unique insight into when technology can foster creativity and when it makes a task seem less meaningful.  Listen in to get their perspectives on how teachers use technology for learning. Tune in to our REAL Messy Podcast to hear us discuss the same question after getting a chance to hear from our students.

Are we preparing students to be effective communicators within and outside of our school?  We asked Yasmine & Shea, two Seniors at Grayslake Central High School, about their perspective on this question. During this season, we are working to get a student perspective of the topics from our REAL Messy podcast.  Excerpts from this full-length podcast are used in the REAL Messy podcast season 2 episode 2 on communication.

Teachers and staff members are here because they care about students.  The understanding when taking this job is that you will be doing more than just teaching, you will also be supporting the whole student.  In this episode, we are hearing from Savannah, Montserrat, and Alondra about how they feel about the supports in place in their school, and how effective they perceive them to be. 

 As our school moves more towards real, authentic, engaging tasks for students, and more project-based learning, it is inevitable that our kids can begin to feel overwhelmed with the number of projects they are assigned.  In this episode, we are hearing from Brenden and Sydnee about their perceptions of school projects and suggestions on how to make them better.

 When we talk about issues in high school we can’t forget the importance of our student’s social-emotional well being.  What are some of the challenges of being a high school student?  How does their social-emotional well being affect their ability to learn?  In this episode, we are hearing from Joshua and Dominick about some of the challenges of being a high school student and how they think social-emotional wellbeing is being addressed in school.

 As teachers, sometimes we work really hard on building curriculum and creating engaging lessons, but one of the best things we can do is stop, and listen.  How do we hear what our students are saying?  What do we really want to know from them?  What is the perspective from their desks?  Change shouldn’t be about creating more work, but about working smarter.  To do that, we need to stop and listen to what our students are trying to tell us about how they learn best.   Episode 1 we have junior students Grace and Priscilla talking about student engagement.