Naomi Meredith  00:00

Wondering what it's actually like having a guest speaker that connects with your STEM content? In this episode, I had the pleasure of speaking with Shauna Douglas from SAM Labs, where she interviewed me for their STEAM and sip video segment. She asked me how I set up an industry expert for my whole school and that entire process. I also talk about other creative ways you can have industry experts come and speak in your classroom. There's also a checklist that is mentioned that I helped create with SAM Labs where it guides you through connecting with an industry expert. This will all be linked in the show notes for you to check out. Likewise, if you haven't already, make sure to go back and check out episode 59 where I share three classroom guest speaker ideas for STEM. Thank you again for being here and enjoy this episode. 

Shauna Douglas  01:20

Welcome Naomi Meredith to STEAM and sip. This is our I think officially second STEAM and sip. And we're so excited to be able to talk to you today about seem outside your classroom walls. And I'm gonna have you kind of talk about yourself and the things you do in your position. And I didn't write this question down. So I might throw you but oftentimes we say seem STEM, it's all the same. And so I always want to make sure that that's clear as we're using them kind of interchangeably today. So thank you so much for joining me. First, can you explain your role as a K five STEM teacher in Colorado?

Naomi Meredith  02:03

Well, thank you so much for having me. I feel like we're at a coffee shop right now and just having a good, good to chat. So hopefully, those of you who are watching have your coffee as well. But yeah, I am a former classroom teacher turn current K through five STEM teacher. And I wear a lot of hats in this role. So I will say my classroom experience definitely helped prepare me to be a teacher of 500 plus kids. So I do see all the students in my building. I will I see them five days a week, once a month. So I have the same students K through five, Monday through Friday, and then my rotation switches three more times. So it's a lot like Groundhog Day where my lessons repeat which I get really good at it by the third lesson. And then by the fourth time, I'm kind of tired of it, but no, it's all good. Um, so I do teach all the students in my building. But my role has been very different throughout the years and what my responsibilities have been, which has also been a really awesome experience. So when I first jumped into this role five years ago, the first part of my week, I was actually co-teaching and co-planning with all the other teachers in my building. So I had the opportunity to be in the classroom. So I was just out of being a classroom teacher. And then I was in this role and a brand new to the district brand new to me school brand new position. And it was a really great way to get to know the kids in their classroom setting and also get to know the teachers and what their needs were and what they were looking for when it came to STEM in innovation. So that was really fun. With some hiring changes, that's when it went to me being five days a weekend STEM. So the projects have definitely changed. Since I have more time I have double the amount of time I've known the kids for a lot longer. So that has been really awesome. But likewise, I am also the technology support person. So there's no tech person in my building, that is me. So I'm the one doing all the technology. With that I also run a tech committee and innovation committee for my teachers. So we meet once a month to talk about things that are happening in the district, happening in our building what they're looking for which that's actually an A go along with what we're talking about later in the topic. And then I if not busy enough, I do run some after school clubs for my students to help them explore their passions further. And then I also collaborate with other STEM teachers in my district and have I'm on committees with them to help them with professional development and event. So like I said, I have a lot of hats and roles in this position during the school day. So just really excited and passionate about this and how to help other teachers as well.

Shauna Douglas  04:49

I love it. You must have endless energy. I don't even know if I remember when I had that much energy but maybe I do. Well, the reason we kind of got in touch with each to other to start was recently you set up a school wide speaker, that was a community expert. So can you tell me a little bit more about that? Who was why you selected them what they spoke about? And just kind of how it worked in general?

Naomi Meredith  05:14

Yeah, this was a really cool opportunity. And I had posted about it, and then you were messaging me. So I'm like, Oh, I'm glad that this is a relevant topic. I think I put something out there, would you guys be interested in learning more. So I'm so glad we're talking about this, because I think it can be overwhelming for teachers to talk to a expert in the community. But literally, it's not as scary as you think. And actually, it was like a lot of fun. I actually got an email that was forwarded to me by someone in the district, not sure where I got it, and basically said, if you wanted to sign up and connect with somebody from the US space, force a mom, sure I'll put my name in, I don't know what to expect and what this means. So I put my email in, didn't really know. And then we eventually got connected with an expert, who works at the US Space Force, which is pretty cool. Since it is a newer branch out there. They're only a couple years old. And so I learned a lot as well. And it was really awesome to because yes, it was a random email. But I was also teaching about space in my classroom, K through five. So I didn't want to just have some random person come talk to my students, but it was connected to the content. So we were exploring space in different ways, with video and audio production. And so eventually, when I scheduled it, the timing of it was really, really awesome, because we just finished the unit, and then he was able to talk to the kids. So the timing was really great. So anyway, I connected with him. And this was his first time to actually do a presentation with elementary. So he hadn't actually spoken with high school before. So we were emailing back and forth. And then I offered to meet with him over zoom. And since he said it was his first time with elementary, so he was actually nervous, and I was a little nervous. So sometimes these experts aren't always around kids. So just keep that in mind. They want to get involved in sometimes they don't always know how to get involved. And so we actually collaborated together on what the topic would be and how it would be relevant for K through five. And then we talked about it and we met again, we went over his presentation. So he ended up talking about space rovers, and how they're sent off to space. What this US Space Force is, what his role and then also different jobs within NASA or the Space Force and how people collaborate together. So that was really cool to see. Like, there's engineers, there's geologists, there's scientist, he was explaining all of those roles. And that was really cool for kids to see, like not just hearing it from me, like, I mean, they love STEM, but just hearing it from somebody else who's in the field who's actually experiencing this every day. And so that was really exciting for them. So the way that I set this up with the kids, so him and I had come in collaborating for probably about a month and setting up a time we actually funny story, we had a time setup, and then I got an email that or something in the mail, but I had jury duty. So I actually had to change the day and I'm so grateful it worked out because it was the same day I would have jury duty. But that's aside now. Anyway, he's since he lived a few hours away, I actually set it up as a school wide virtual assembly. And thinking that too with post COVID. A lot of our students haven't been in a school wide assembly K through five since then. And so I was really worried about the behaviors of how they would act in a space where it's all 500 Plus kids together. And this Yeah, so it actually worked out really well. Kids are familiar with virtual. Most people are familiar with it. The teachers actually were fine with that. I know we'll talk more about their reactions, but we set it up a school like virtual assembly, my school has an assembly schedule. So that's something we already had set in place. So I was promoting this a lot set up a lot of reminders, talked about in the committee have pumped it up in class. Like I said, I run a lot of after school clubs. One of them is a our school wide news. So I do a video school wide news. So we would talk about it kind of like a commercial like this is coming. So there's a lot of like buy in with the kids and getting them pumped up about it. And so the actual session he did have presentation slides, video clips, I said the more pictures the better. The kids will love that. And he did he followed through on that he did awesome. So it was about 30 minutes with him and then at the end we set aside 10 minutes of q&a time so the younger classes needed to drop out. Just they are in their classrooms watching with our classroom teacher. They could but there's some really great questions from the kids he answered. Those and it was a great end of the day it was before winter break. So I highly recommend doing these before break. But it was really awesome is a really positive experience. So a lot of behind the scenes, I would say before the actual presentation, but I think that prep work is really worth the time.

Shauna Douglas  10:17

Excellent. Oh, I love that. And I think the prep and the promoting it within your own students that you see. And on the announcement, that is brilliant, because they're gonna get so much more out of it when they have that buy in. So it was very smart. Very, very smart. So next question, how did the students and the teachers respond to this speaker.

Naomi Meredith  10:42

So I will say, at my school, the teachers were skeptical at first, because we had a virtual assembly earlier in the year, but it wasn't really set up to be virtual, it was our spelling bee, and it was a little awkward. And there is just some negative connotations behind what a virtual assembly could be. So there was that skepticism. However, this was set up in a way I was very intentional, where we're creating this and he's at home, he has presentation slides like this is made to be virtual. And then the structure of having the teachers in the classroom. So just me even talking about in a positive way, the reason why behind it because as teachers, we want to know, what's the purpose of this? Why are we doing this? And also getting the buy in from my admin, they were totally OK with it. So really explaining the why is important, why are you having this person come in mind was to connect it with the content and having a person instead, the kids first, they didn't really understand what I was talking about, I had to explain to them the difference between the US Space Force and NASA to them, because they don't all know. And so they were getting excited. And like I said, it was just a lot of marketing. If you think you're a teacher, you don't do marketing. If you want to do something like an event, you really have to promote it in a lot of different ways. So I was creating images, like I said, the news, talking about it, and class talking about it word of mouth to teachers, the ones who I know who would be excited. So I really had to keep repeating myself for like a month just to get everyone excited. But they were really, teachers came up to me after the event. And they said, Thank you so much. That was really awesome. The kids loved it. They were taking pictures during the event and sending them to me. So overall, it was a really positive experience. And I think they're excited. They're hoping to do more of these with me later on in the spring.

Shauna Douglas  12:43

Fabulous. It's anytime we can make those STEAM careers STEM careers relatable, and be able to show them a real person that does that I think is so powerful. What do you feel are the benefits of showing students experts in STEM and STEAM in your elementary school?

Naomi Meredith  13:03

Well, exactly what you're saying, when I was getting my master's in STEM leadership, there was so many articles about this, that kids need to see people like them, to help them dream bigger. Now I'm a girl, a girl teacher in STEM, which is not always very common, even in elementary, which is awesome, I can be a role model for them. However, they also need other people who are real and doing these things. And so even if you don't have a STEM class or a STEM teacher, and I know a lot of schools don't have that it doesn't mean you can't have these opportunities. So these are ways to actually connect with the content that you're already doing, having multiple perspectives. And it's also bringing that content to life. And likewise, a lot of kids and even kids in my own building, they say they don't like science, because they all they do is read about science. So I know I was a former classroom teacher, it's hard to fit in for fit in science. It's one more thing, there's more materials, but keep doing it. I know it's more prep. But think about ways how you can bring it to life. So having these experts, it's different. Oh, cool. We're reading about it. That's great. Do that. But also add in is there somebody who can come and talk about this with kids, even if it's 10 minutes, it benefits something virtual, because this is going to help them really understand Oh, this is actually a real thing. Like maybe this is what I want to be when I grew up. I never knew the Space Force didn't exist five years ago. And now here it is. So whatever you're doing already think about ways that someone could come in and chat. Also, it might not even be somebody you connect with personally, I just recently did a webinar and had the chance to interviewing NASA scientists. I know it's all space. It doesn't have to always be space. But there are lots of people out there who are connecting experts and providing those resources. So even look, keeping an eye out for those and, and tuning into those opportunities can be really helpful as well. So that way, you don't even have to do all that back end work that I just talked about. Just even setting aside the time, a lot of these are even pre recorded anyway. So you might even watch the playback. So those are other ways to bring in experts as well. And maybe you can email the person afterwards. And they could answer your question. So let's say you watch the recording can email them. So people are more familiar with video calls, it can be someone locally, but also with virtual people are more used to it. So there's so many things out there. So it's just a really cool thing to bring into your classroom.

Shauna Douglas  15:44

It is definitely one benefit of having to go virtual is now so many people are just better at it, they're more comfortable with it, including inside my own school when I was in the school setting. We knew how to do all that because we can go and it does make something like this a lot easier. So I do appreciate that a lot. I want to make sure that I mention the elementary STEM coach podcast that you do, you're going to do an episode on this as well. So I will make sure wherever we put this video that we also tag that so that we can hear even more details about it. Another way to experience seeing because we said this is about outside your school, our field trips, and it might be virtual or in person. Is that something that you've done?

Naomi Meredith  16:33

Yeah, this actually has been something I've done, I did this actually a lot as a classroom teacher, because we didn't really have a STEM class. And we know that real field trips can get expensive with bus prices, there's a lot of management. I know with COVID at my school, we weren't allowed to go on field trips for at least a year or two. So there's just like some great options out there. Even because of COVID, a lot of virtual field trips were actually developed to actually have families experience. So those things are still out there. Off the top of my head. I know Google Earth has some so you can explore the like lots of different places, they have a lot of different virtual field trips. And then I know Nearpod has some as well, with some interactive lessons. So those are just a few off the top of my head. I have a blog post I've written about this. So I'll send this to you. And we can link on the page. I've just different things. I know a lot of museums do this one I really love doing with my younger students in STEM. It's the San Diego Zoo kids live animal cameras. And they have cameras and not all the animals. The zoo is wonderful. I love that Zoo. But they have cameras in some of the exhibits and the kids can actually see what the animals are doing right that second. And one time. During Sam, we were researching about animals in their habitats. And we noticed in I think it's like a vulture I think it's called a candy bar. I'm sorry if I'm wrong. But we saw in the video, there was an egg. And this mom kept going in checking in on the egg. And then when the kids came back four weeks later, I see them one week at a time the a cat hatched, and there was a baby the next time we checked.

Shauna Douglas  18:21

Fabulous, and I'm still talking about that. Yeah, I like that.

Naomi Meredith  18:27

Yeah, it's so it was so cool, because like we had seen this little egg and then we had this ugly little bird hanging out. And it's nests. So that was really cool. And really quick. So that's completely free. And actually it's not on YouTube. So it's not blocked by most filters. When it comes to people in person. Like I said, science can be overwhelming. But think about how you can bring people in. If you search for it. There's people out there who want to get connected. And so we had a geologists come in when I taught third grade, and they talked to them about rocks and minerals and how to identify all the different rocks and minerals. And then they actually all the kids got their own bucket of sand with different rocks and minerals. And they actually had to identify them using the test. And they had a little sheet that they would check off. And they actually figured out which of the rocks and minerals were and they got to keep them at the end. So that was so much fun. The kids loved it. The lady was awesome. She was so great. Like she even had fluoride, which glows under a blacklight. And the kids got to test if the mineral was quartz or fluoride. So that was really really cool. So and we didn't have to bring any of this stuff. So that was she did all that. I think a lot of states have this but we also had a local four h person who talked about chickens and their development because we were learning about life cycles. And they came in talked about that and brought us our chicken eggs. So we had the incubator. We have a little chicks in our class and then they came back halfway. through and talked more about their development, they did a candling session. So they have the egg and they hold the flashlight underneath. And we could check on the little embryos if they were still alive. And then they hatched in our classroom. And they came back and talk more about them as chicks and took the chickens back to their home. So super, super cool. And funding is an issue. I don't remember how much we paid for these. But this was a really neat, it was a field trip. It was just down the road, our local meetup Middle School, our feeder middle school, they actually did a Science Showcase at the end of the school year. So they had the middle school kids and their science class, create a science presentation. And then we were the audience. So we went traveled to different rooms in the middle school. And the middle school kids were teaching our third graders their science lessons. So there was slime, there was a hovercraft station. So really, it was STEAM and STEM just at the time, it wasn't called that. But there was even a room where the GT students created a whole classroom, that was a Rube Goldberg machine. And we got to watch it a few times. So it was so cool, because not only it benefited the middle school kids, because they were the experts about that station. And some of them were nervous, but my third graders aren't scary. Maybe some of them were but then I might middle school, or my third graders really excited to hear about big kids and what they were learning about. So I don't know if that's something you could do. If you are like, if you don't know how to get started, you can definitely collaborate with older classes, even in your building. That could be a great way to have a some sort of field trip, or even the middle school or high school. So those could be even types of experts as well in your area.

21:43

That is such a great idea. And I think about those students probably were like, they couldn't wait till they got to middle school. So then could do the same thing for younger students. I mean, we know teaching, teaching other students is so powerful. So I love that idea. These are all such amazing suggestions. And I so appreciate you taking the time to be on semen soap with us today. And I look forward to picking your brain. I feel like you're gonna be my person. This Yeah. Because you're always thinking and it's fabulous. So I'm excited about all the things you mentioned. And thank you so much for your time. 

Naomi Meredith  22:27

And thank you so much for having me. We'll chat soon.