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Would You Rather? – STEM Teacher Edition [ep.137]

Would You Rather? STEM Teacher Edition [ep.137]

would you rather STEM teacher

Check out the full episode on Would You Rather? STEM Teacher Edition:  

 

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Episode Summary

This time of year is such a busy time for STEM teachers, so I decided to do something fun in today's episode. Today we're playing Would You Rather STEM Teacher edition. A while back on Instagram, I asked you all to vote on these would you rather questions. So today, I'm sharing the results and my answers to the questions.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • The Would You Rather STEM teacher edition questions I asked on Instagram
  • The results of the Instagram poll
  • My answers to these questions

Resources Mentioned:

 

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith [00:00:00]:


It's a busy time of year, and I have a fun episode and game that we are going to play together, and it is Would You Rather STEM edition. Get ready to think of your answers and laugh along with me with these STEM specific questions. And some of them are a lot harder than you think. For this episode, I knew I wanted to do something fun for this time of year.


Naomi Meredith [00:01:03]:


I love sprinkling in these fun and more personal episodes. It is so much fun for me, and I knew I wanted to do something really cool during the holidays when this airs. And it popped into my head one day when I was walking my dog, Frederick, just like everything I plan, it pops into my head when I'm walking him. And I thought, oh, it would be so fun to play a would you rather game and get all of your responses and then share them on the podcast. This is what I do. I just, like, think of stuff, and I say we should, and then I just do it. A while back, I actually asked the questions. I came up with some STEM specific questions for this would you rather game, and I did post them on Instagram.


Naomi Meredith [00:01:55]:


And 50 of you answered and played along with me, and it was so Funny reading the messages that you guys would write to me after you would vote. Like, a lot of you would vote, and then you're like, I'm not sure what to say or, Oh, that was a hard one or, oh, I need to change my answer. It's not what I thought. Or you guys would just send me emojis about the questions. And so this is so much fun to put together and I wanted to release this episode even sooner because I knew it would be a lot of fun to record and see the final results. And I was even sharing the final results with my teacher honey, which one of the fun episodes that I did is I interviewed him the week of our wedding, so you can actually listen to that interview. There's no video. I told him we won't do video, But he actually was laughing at the answers, and he teaches high school Spanish and so completely different than the world of elementary STEM.


Naomi Meredith [00:02:55]:


But he was laughing. He thought they were pretty funny. I asked him if he would vote, and he said no. So, at least he listened to the questions, which is props to him. That's good. So what I'm gonna do for this episode is I have a handful of questions, and I'm gonna read them. And I want you to think about your answer. How would you answer this? And maybe if you did play, is it the same answer at this time of year? Think about your answer.


Naomi Meredith [00:03:23]:


I'm going to share the results, And then I'm gonna share with you my answer and probably some side comments or stories that I have related to all of these because all of them, while I was writing them, I was making myself laugh, and that's a daily thing for me. I do all sorts of stuff to make myself laugh. So let's get into these fun would you rather STEM teacher questions. Alright. The first one is, would you rather have unlimited tape or hot glue? Really think about it here. Unlimited tape or hot glue? They will get progressively harder, by the way. Alright. So 79% of you said you would like unlimited tape, and 21% of you would like unlimited glue.


Naomi Meredith [00:04:12]:


And some of you are messaging me, is it any kind of glue? Yes. Unlimited glue of anything. I would also agree on the tape, and I talk about my tape love, hate relationship very much here on this podcast. And one trick that I figured out actually during COVID was creating baby tape rolls, And I have a couple videos if you scroll way back, in my feed on Instagram, but baby tape rolls are essentially a baby version of a big tape roll. So what you do is you take the amount of tape that you want students to use, like, a couple of feet, And then you wrap it on a popsicle stick around itself, and it doesn't lose its stickiness, and students can save their baby tape roll for future projects. You do have to teach the kids how to rip the tape, and also the younger kids like to squish the tape in their hands. I'm like, no. Don't do that.


Naomi Meredith [00:05:11]:


Like, I can't I can't fix it. So baby tape rolls are my thing. I called them baby tape rolls, and it's something that actually stuck after COVID because we weren't allowed to share materials. So I'm really, really fast at making baby tape rolls, and you can actually see me, like, Do it, like, mindlessly. I have a 1 Instagram reel where it's, like, explaining STEM teaching through Taylor Swift songs. And in one of them, I'm actually making baby tape rolls because I've made probably thousands of them. So, I definitely would go for unlimited tape because I swear the kids eat tape more than they eat pencils. Alright.


Naomi Meredith [00:05:50]:


Second question, would you rather have Your classroom magically clean itself every day or plug in all of your devices each day. Magically clean itself or plug in your devices each day. 85% of you would like a magically clean classroom every day, and that left The 15% of you would like the plug in devices. I would pick the plug in devices. My room, I actually would keep pretty clean, and people would know that about me. I'm not like a scrub kinda clean, like, get on my hands and knees, like, scrub stuff. But I'm actually very, very, very organized, and so I didn't have an issue with having, like, a super messy classroom, and I made my students clean and Do all of that. So I really hate the plug in in devices.


Naomi Meredith [00:06:49]:


I think it's so annoying, especially if you were teaching all the kids in the school and then you have shared devices. It is one of the most annoying things. I hate it. Like, You develop, I swear, you develop these pet peeves as a STEM teacher that you never thought you would have before. Definitely developed pet peeves when I came into the K through 5 STEM space. 1 was plugging in devices, and another one was when Kids would come into my room, and the first thing they would ask me is, what are we doing today? And my response was, I'm gonna tell the whole class at the same time. So plug in devices is what I would choose for that question. Alright.


Naomi Meredith [00:07:29]:


Next question. Would you rather teach August kindergartners or May 5th graders. August kindergartners or May 5th graders? And I got the most comments on this one. This one, you guys cannot The side. So here's the results on this one. For kindergarten, 47% of you said You would teach August kindergartners, and that left the remaining 53% of you who would teach May 5th graders. And I would say both are very, very comparable, and those results make sense to me. I would rather teach August kindergartners.


Naomi Meredith [00:08:15]:


I love the little ones. I was so close to getting my degree in early childhood, but went a different pathway, thought there'd be more opportunities in elementary. I actually did teach at a preschool and college, and I just love that age group. If you hear squeaking, by the way, that is little Frederick, who is acting like a toddler and wants me to play with him right now. So he keeps throwing toys at my feet. But I would definitely teach August kindergartners. May 5th graders are so annoying. No.


Naomi Meredith [00:08:47]:


Like, I would take a little kindergartner who pees their pants any day over a stinky 5th grader in May. Alright. Next question. Would you rather go on a field trip with Miss Frizzle or have an in house field trip with Bill Nye, the science guy? I told you the questions are going to get progressively harder. Alright. 46% of you said Bill Nye, and 54% of you said Miss Frizzle, and I feel the same way. I am so torn on this question.


Naomi Meredith [00:09:29]:


I'm obsessed with Bill, and I loved that show as a kid, and I want him on my podcast. And I have reached out through Instagram before and didn't get a response, which he has so many followers. It probably was in the, the hidden messages. So I need to try a different avenue know, because ever since I started this podcast, I've wanted Bill Nye on this show. I think it would be amazing. It'd be a childhood dream. I've told my Students, I want them on the show.


Naomi Meredith [00:10:00]:


I have been manifesting Bill Nye to be a guest on the Elementary STEM Coach podcast. So go, like, at him on Instagram. Go message him. Tell him to be a guest because that would be an absolute blast to have him on this show. But on the flip side, Miss Frizzle's not real now. I guess Bill Nye is not real. He's a person playing. Well, Bill Nye is no.


Naomi Meredith [00:10:22]:


Bill Nye is real. That's his real name, But he, like, plays kind of a character. Anyway, miss Frizzle's a cartoon, and I'm talking about the original Miss Frizzle. Okay? Not the new one, but the new one's good. I was Miss Frizzle for Halloween 1 year, so I was Miss Frizzle, and Frederick was Liz, the lizard. I found a little lizard costume, and we dressed up as them for 1 Halloween. And I also had my 1st keynote speech. It was all based on lessons from Miss Frizzle, which is episode 100.


Naomi Meredith [00:10:57]:


You can hear my 1st keynote speech that I did for Wonder Workshop. So I took a lot of lessons from her, and her field trips would be pretty cool, but also I think really scary when she does the field trips where she's really, really tiny. So I would take Bill and I probably a little bit more over miss Frizzle because, like, that's a little bit dangerous. And also okay. Question. Would you rather go on a field trip where Miss Frizzle by yourself, or would you wanna go on a field trip with Miss Rosalynn all the kids, because some of those kids are freaking whiny. What's what's his name? Ralphie or Ronald or something? The one with the orange hair and glasses is So whiny and so annoying. He he I'll take his spot.


Naomi Meredith [00:11:39]:


You know what? I'll go with the kids, but he has to stay back. Like, he can't come. That kid's so annoying. So Bill Nye for me, but Miss Frizzle a close second. Alright. Last question. Would you rather teach year long STEM on topics you're unfamiliar with, but have unlimited resources. Okay? So, this is a little confusing.


Naomi Meredith [00:12:06]:


Or teach your favorite stem topic with minimal resources. So we have Unlimited resources, but you're teaching stuff you've never taught before, or limited resources and you know what you're gonna teach. That one's pretty hard. Unlimited, but you don't know what you're gonna teach. Limited, you do know what you're gonna teach. And here for this one, I thought it was interesting. So 61% of you said you would rather teach unlimited resources with unfamiliar topics. And then 39% of you said you'd rather teach familiar lessons with limited resources.


Naomi Meredith [00:12:45]:


And I feel like I've been in kind of both situations. Now I wasn't with unlimited resources when I taught Stan. But when I first got started, I had a really big budget and I don't know why. So I was really lucky and was able build up my program and trial these materials and, in turn, give my students a lot of experiences, but also I remember those and can share those with you. And a lot of us who are in the STEM space don't know anything we're teaching, and so I think I would be, like, the majority on this question, I would definitely want the unlimited resources and don't know what I'm teaching, but I like that open ended, like, What if, what could we do, what are the possibilities? That's why I like Miss Frizzle, but, I definitely thrive in those types of environments. And when I feel really restricted, I can actually do a lot with limited materials, but if I'm teaching the same thing over and over and over and over again, I get really, really bored. I think partly why I got a little bored teaching 3rd grade because it's the same topics every year, but that's just my personality. I like keeping it up and make it get fresh.


Naomi Meredith [00:13:54]:


So that's definitely a hard question, though, because I can definitely see the other side. Alright. Well, that is it for this fun Would You Rather game. If you liked it, send me a DM. If you're watching the video, put it in the comments below. But I love doing these fun episodes, sprinkling them in for you. Thank you so much for playing along and voting on Instagram when I posted these. And, also, for those of you who are listening along with me wherever you're at, I know you were playing along too, and you were thinking of your answers.


Naomi Meredith [00:14:26]:


And I appreciate you guys so much, and I can't wait to do more fun episodes like this and keep bringing in All of those fun STEM concepts for you in the new year.

would you rather STEM teacher

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

Behind the Scenes: Inside a STEM Coaching Session-Part 2 [ep.95]

Behind the Scenes: Inside a STEM Coaching Session-Part 2 [ep. 95]

Check out the full episode on Behind the Scenes: Inside a STEM Coaching Session-Part 2:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Today’s episode is another behind the scenes inside the STEM Into Summer Group Coaching Program. In this session, I am coaching Miranda B., who teaches pre-K through 5th grade STEM. Miranda sees students twice a week and teaches all of the pre-K through 5th grade students in her school. I know that many of you will be able to relate to Miranda’s story. During this STEM coaching session, we looked at what Miranda is currently doing in her STEM classroom and discussed what’s working and not working. I also shared some strategies she can implement to simplify her current processes, and we talked through her goals for the upcoming school year and how I can best support her in achieving those goals.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Miranda’s STEM teacher journey
  • The lessons she’s currently implementing in her STEM classroom
  • Strategies I recommended to help simplify Miranda’s STEM lessons and structure
  • The level of support I provide each teacher that joins the STEM Into Summer Group Coaching Program

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

The elementary STEM coach podcast is almost a year old and this coach is coming out of the podcast and is here to personally help you. Well, this podcast is a great resource to help you learn and grow on the go. There are times when you need more personalized attention. What does it actually mean to have a STEM coaching session with me, Naomi? Well, I'm taking you behind the scenes in part two of this type of episode, where I actually recorded another coaching session with a teacher in the STEM Into Summer Group Coaching Program. As one of the bonuses in this group coaching program, you receive a free one on one 30 minute video coaching call with me, where we get to know one another, your STEM program, and the goals that you have for it to set you up for success for back to school. If you go back to Episode 93, you can hear a different coaching session that I had with a member of my program. In this session, I'm talking with Miranda and she teaches pre K through fifth grade STEM in her building. She teaches two days a week and sees all the students in her school within those two days. I know many of you listening can relate since you also see the whole school within a week. This is a very common schedule. Miranda has many years of experience teaching and is in fact retired but found this awesome STEM role. She has a few great units already in place that were really successful, but wants to nail down her whole year long plan so that it can go smoothly, and she can adjust as needed. She has also noticed that her students have been needing support in specific tech skills and wants to integrate that content into her curriculum. Together, Miranda and I set up a plan of action of next steps to take now and what to expect going into the STEM Into Summer group coaching program. During this session, I'm sure you're going to find similarities in her program and the struggles that she is facing to what you're experiencing in your STEM space. If you're interested in joining forces with me and other teachers who are building their STEM programs, there's still a few spots available, you can jump in at Naomimeredith.com/stemintosummer, our kickoff call was recorded for June and you can still catch up and access all the pre-work you'll need to complete as you set up the foundation that will build up your success for July through September. Likewise, if you are unsure about this program, and if it's a right fit for you, let's talk about it face-to-face. Schedule a free live call with me at Naomimeredith.com/call spots are limited in June, but more times will open up in July. Now let's get into this coaching session. 


Naomi Meredith  02:45

I'm so glad that you signed up. I remember I saw your email when I was driving to the airport and it pops up on my watch. Like, oh my gosh, I'm so happy to work with you this summer. 


Miranda B.  03:29

Yeah, me too. I'm excited.


Naomi Meredith  03:31

Yeah. So remind me your schedule. So you teach STEM twice a week. All the kids in this school. So you have small class sizes. 


Miranda B.  03:39

Only once a week, I only see them once a week. 


Naomi Meredith  03:42

You see them once a week, but you teach twice a week.


Miranda B.  03:45

I teach two days. Yeah. 


Naomi Meredith  03:46

Okay. 


Miranda B.  03:46

Tuesdays and Wednesdays. And yeah, I see preschool, Kindergarten, fourth and second on one day, and the other day is first grade, third, and fifth.


Naomi Meredith  03:57

Okay. And then you just got that which and then you see him again. You said there's one of each class, right one of each grade level. Yes. That's so crazy. So how did it go? So last year was your first year so you're telling me a little bit when we were talking? So it was your first year in STEM, but you have tons of teaching experience? You kind of mentioned a little bit but what were you doing with your lesson plans before like what were you doing for lesson plans? Are you picking and choosing or were you making your own? 


Miranda B.  04:28

I was doing a lot of like storybook STEM because that's what I was used to doing from the library. Yeah, because that's what I did in the library. I did a lot of yours like I looked at your year long plan. I did a lot of those. I would do some Carly and Adam lessons. I did some vivify STEM lessons at the beginning of the year they have some really good like icebreaker kind of lessons. I just did those but yeah, I mean, I had some units like we did a 3D printing unit where everybody except preschool and Kindergarten did that district As Kindergarten doesn't have one on one, everyone brings their own devices. They are okay to bring from home. But yeah, Kindergarten and preschool, so they couldn't do it. But everybody else did a 3D print. We did coding, like in December, we did Hour of Code, but I did for the whole month. Yeah. We did a lot of tinker with the older kids. And then we did doodle 3D with the younger kids. Different coding. Let's see we did robot's. I don't know how many dashes we have.


Naomi Meredith  05:29

I saw one hiding back there yesterday.


Miranda B.  05:33

Because Maverick was afraid of it. Yeah. And it was going on. So I had to pick it up. I had it sitting behind me. And I had to pick it up because he was afraid of it. I brought it home for my niece, because I watched my niece this week. And so she wanted me to bring it home so she could play with it. 


Naomi Meredith  05:47

Oh, cute. 


Miranda B.  05:49

But yeah, now he's down here asleep. And I'm like, where to go? Yeah, he was afraid of it growling.


Naomi Meredith  05:55

I don't know why dogs don't like that. 


Miranda B.  05:56

No, they don't like it. I have code and go mice, those. So we do that for robotics. I have some oh, what are they called? What are the ones that follow the lines?


Naomi Meredith  06:10

Ozobots. 


Miranda B.  06:11

We have Ozobots I have I think six? Six of those. That's kind of about all we have for robotics things. So I did those units. And then the rest of the year was just kind of yeah.


Naomi Meredith  06:24

Would you say? So? Like when you did 3D printing or your robotics? Just an hour? Could you do with everyone? For your 3D printing and robotics? Did you do that all the same month? Or did you break it up throughout the year?


Miranda B.  06:38

At the same time. 


Naomi Meredith  06:39

Okay. 


Miranda B.  06:40

So everybody was doing 3D printing. They were doing different projects. 


Naomi Meredith  06:44

Yeah. 


Miranda B.  06:44

But they were all doing the same. It was all 3D printing. Yeah. 


Naomi Meredith  06:48

So that's good. And then do you think it took about a month for all of those? 


Miranda B.  06:55

Yeah. Because I didn't see them  like, even my like, so K-2 I just see 30 minutes a week. So you know, it took us, you know, a week or about a week just to learn how to use it one time. And next time, they kind of played around and started on it. And then you know, so yeah. And then yeah, about a month for that.


Naomi Meredith  07:14

Okay. Well, that's good. I mean, and once we take a deep dive into that tonight, with our live call, you're gonna organize all the lessons that you did. And if you hear me typing, I'm typing what you're saying. So and I have my screen to the side, but we'll you'll organize everything based on what you did. So this won't necessarily be the year long plan, but really auditing what you've done so far. And the types of units because it sounds like you have like good units and they were successful. Did you feel like the times that you did like the 3D printing, the robotics, the Hour of Code, did you how did it feel compared to like the hodgepodge? 


Miranda B.  07:56

Much better! 


Naomi Meredith  07:56

 Okay. 


Miranda B.  07:57

It's been nearly the time on lesson planning, because I know where it's going. 


Naomi Meredith  08:01

Yeah. Yeah, that's good. Okay, good, that's good, okay, so that when that will set up your rest of the year like that, too.


Miranda B.  08:07

That'd be great. Because I do want to include, like something I do want to put to Makerspace in because we're going to use that query, because I got approved to use that. So we're going to do that. I want to put that in there. And I also need to put my kids have no computer literacy, like they don't drop down menus, they don't know how to copy and paste, they don't know how to do those things. So I want to do that at the beginning of the year. So we're not gonna have so much of our time when we're doing our units, trying to figure out how to copy and paste. 


Naomi Meredith  08:35

Yep, that is something that my first year in STEM, I definitely had to do that. I only saw the kids three days a week and we did a lot more computer literacy based things just based on the same thing you're saying. And I normally don't do STEM stations for my older kids anymore. But that was something that I started implementing is I would do some stations and one of the stations was me. So like when you're a classroom teacher, you have them rotate through and one can be you and just teaching those skills so it's not chaotic, and everyone's like, “I can't, that's hard!”


Miranda B.  09:16

That's what I hear. And I'm going around to every single person trying to show them Okay, here it is. Here it is. Yeah, and I even have a to make things easier for them to find links. I made a Weebly. 


Naomi Meredith  09:26

Oh, good. 


Miranda B.  09:27

And then I've made on that Weebly, we have a oh, what's it called? But I have all my links. Hold on, what's it called? Oh, a Symbaloo. So I made a Symbaloo with all their links. So once they bookmarked that, Weebly page, then it popped up with all their links, so they don't have to search for them. So that does help and they are getting better. They were getting better at that even good. There's a finding that they'd say, Oh, I didn't bookmark it. I'm like, Yes, you got there. This YEAH. OKAY. Good, teach them how to bookmark. Bookmark that. So I would like to have a lesson to, you know, some lessons that use those skills. Not only not just okay, let's let's type something and copy and paste, you know? Yes, I'm purposeful using those things.


Naomi Meredith  10:18

Yeah, we can definitely do that. What do um, do they use Google Docs? I have a couple of questions. What platforms do they use like Google Docs, PowerPoint? And are all their devices the same? Or are they all different? 


Miranda B.  10:32

Most of them are Chromebooks. But I do have a few kids that have a apple, whatever it is. 


Naomi Meredith  10:39

Oh, really?


Miranda B.  10:41

So yeah, because they all buy their own devices. So some parents buy what? I don't even know the word I'm looking for. Because I don't have one.


Naomi Meredith  10:49

Like the MacBook Air?


Miranda B.  10:51

Yeah, I guess. Yeah. So yeah, they have expensive computers, but most of them have either a Google Chromebook or PC or just a regular PC. Okay. I just got a couple kids that that have the apple.


Naomi Meredith  11:05

And then are you guys allowed to use Google Docs or anything? Do they have accounts?


Miranda B.  11:10

We have Google Classrooms. Yeah. 


Naomi Meredith  11:11

Okay. Yeah. 


Miranda B.  11:12

Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  11:13

Okay. So you do that's good. That'll help too. I do have some scavenger hunts for Google that I can give you can use. But it really it actually teaches them the actual tools of how to do things. Yeah, so there's a Google Docs one, and then you could do Google Slides. I'm thinking probably this first year, you might be doing a lot more of the same skills, or your older kids might move through a little faster, kind of creating that base. And then, as we do it, yeah.


Miranda B.  11:49

Yes, yeah. Sometimes my fourth and fifth graders were having issues. And I talked to my principal, and she said, that would be great if he would do that. Because I think just a lot of times the classroom teachers don't have time. 


Naomi Meredith  12:03

Yeah. Yeah. 


Miranda B.  12:05

But I'm thinking they're wasting all their time going to every single student doing it for them.


Naomi Meredith  12:10

Yes. Yes, exactly.


Miranda B.  12:13

I know when they get in here, they look at me like I'm talking a foreign language, “right click, copy.”


Naomi Meredith  12:18

Yes. Yeah, I know. But that's something for, we don't have to plan the lessons quite yet. But something as it's coming to your mind, throughout the month, I would make a list of the tech skills, and maybe you already have one, make a list of those skills you really want them to work on or things you've struggled with. And I can take a look at it to like give my suggestions like, oh, make sure you add this. And we can even talk about like how to teach those tech lessons. Because yes, like, it's just like with any tool, like when you're using Dash or 3D printing, all those things, you're teaching them, here's how to use the tool if they've never used it before. Okay, now we're going to like implement this in our authentic way.


Naomi Meredith  12:19

Right? Yeah. And I think that's why the 3D printing like took it took the whole month, because like the first couple of weeks, in the month, it was, here's what it is, here's how we use it, they kind of played around with it, then we got to the stuff we were actually going to do with it.


Naomi Meredith  13:21

Yup, you're gonna be so excited when you do 3D printing this year, because the kids are gonna be better at it. 


Miranda B.  13:27

Yes, I'm hoping. 


Naomi Meredith  13:29

No, they will. Well, if I like try like this, this, what you're saying is very, very, very common in a good way. Like, you're teaching those foundations. And then this year, you're not going to have to teach as much of the tech skills and you're going to have more kids, oh, I can help you with this, I can help you with this. So you're doing the right thing. You're doing awesome already.


Miranda B.  13:50

It is nice when the other kids go, oh, I figured that out, I can show you how to do that. I'm like great, you go!


Naomi Meredith  13:55

Yup! That is so okay, if you read this month's book for the STEM teacher bookshelf, the book Invent to Learn, you're really gonna like it. You can buy it on Kindle too. And then the reading guide is there. It's a little cheaper on Kindle. But there's a whole chapter about giving kids ownership and letting them be leaders and doing what you're doing is exactly what we want kids to do. Because we're the facilitator of their learning. And so that book talks about that in there. And there's also some really cool ideas. Just different things you can do in your class, but there's a really good chapter about that in that book that I think you'll really like. Okay, um, so making a list of the tech skills you want kids to know. Do you ever use so you use the links your Weebly and Symbaloo Oh, do you use like when they're planning out projects? Do you do digital forms of research or anything like that?


Miranda B.  14:59

Yeah. Like I put it in their Google Classroom, and I usually have an Epic collection I've made for them that they can do some research from or that they can watch. Yeah. 


Naomi Meredith  15:11

Okay. 


Miranda B.  15:12

And what I'd really like, and then I don't know what to do with it, I'd really like to have something that was really quick at the beginning of class that just introduces kind of, you know, a little quick little video or something for them to watch to sit to just introduce them to what we're going to do. Yeah, I mean, yes, instead of me saying, here's what we're gonna do today.


Naomi Meredith  15:32

Yeah, I do that. 


Miranda B.  15:34

It sparks their interest.


Naomi Meredith  15:36

Yes, I do that for most of my lessons. And it's like two full days. So extra interest, but also frees you up for a second to gather your material. So quick video to introduce so yeah, I have some suggestions. Um, so when we're planning out your lessons, so maybe the video is yeah, like building background knowledge, like, SciShow kids? Have you used that? Use that a lot? 


Miranda B.  16:05

Yeah. Yeah, I've used that quite a bit. 


Naomi Meredith  16:07

Mm hmm. But purposely planning that. So having that all ready. 


Miranda B.  16:11

Yes. Right. 


Naomi Meredith  16:12

That's we're gonna do.


Miranda B.  16:13

Because when I do my lesson plans, I do you know, and Google Docs, I have all my links right there for every day and pull that up, and it goes up onto the TV.


Naomi Meredith  16:23

Perfect. Yeah. So you already have great structure in place. So I'm excited to fill in the holes with you. And we don't have to get rid of everything you've done. Like even your storybook STEM, based on the lessons that you're doing, that still could be a really good unit to do with the kids. If you enjoy, you don't have to get rid of everything. 


Miranda B.  16:45

We don't have a librarian. So um, that's kind of my passion because I did that for 11 years. Yeah. So I like to do a lot of books introduced. And sometimes it's a book that we introduce, you know, it doesn't have to always be a video or it could be a book that I read or watch because there's no library. So if I don't have the book, yeah, I just find the YouTube link.


Naomi Meredith  17:08

Oh, yeah. I there's nothing wrong with that. I do that.


Miranda B.  17:11

I have bought a ton of books, but that gets expensive. 


Naomi Meredith  17:14

Yep. 


Miranda B.  17:15

So we watch the YouTube videos quite a bit, but I like to use that too. And I like to do storybooks more like with my little Kindergarteners, more so than with the because just STEM is hard for them. I guess it's hard for me. It's hard for them.


Naomi Meredith  17:31

Yes. Yeah. 


Miranda B.  17:32

I can make it meaningful, I guess. 


Naomi Meredith  17:33

Yes. And making those connections. Do you when you're thinking about your little kids, what is the structure? Because you do have a little less time, which isn't bad. How does the day go? Do you do whole group stations? What do you normally do with?


Miranda B.  17:51

I have only done whole group. I have STEM stations. I've watched you know several of your things. And I would like to do more stations. Yeah. My problem is I share my STEM room. We have a huge STEM room, but I share it with our high school STEM teacher. I have kind of the front of the room is my area. The back end is his area. And so but when on days, I'm not there, his kids sit at my tables too. Oh, yeah. So I can't leave things out. Now, I can from Tuesday to Wednesday. Yes, but I can't leave them on Wednesday for the next week. Yes. So I kind of struggle with that a little bit. He tries to if I come in, he's like, “Guys, remember Mrs. B. is here today? You can't be at her table. She's got to get stuff.” And I do have 30 minutes before I have kids. I have to be there at 1130. I don't have kids until 12. Okay, so I do have time to set up. Yeah, leave it set up. 


Naomi Meredith  18:45

I have the same issue in my K through five STEM class because I had fifth, fourth, and third in the morning, then lunch and then first, Kinder, and second. And I actually didn't leave up my STEM station. So the way that I planned it was like super minimal materials. And then you know, those fabric cubes from like IKEA. I actually put all the materials in those and there was a clip with the instructions on the box. And then the box would go on the table. So like during that quick video, I could go around in like five minutes and go put the box where I want their station in the classroom. And then all the materials were in there. 


Miranda B.  19:23

Oh, that's a good idea. 


Naomi Meredith  19:24

Yeah. 


Miranda B.  19:25

I thought about buying those trays. You know, they're like, have a lid on them to keep everything in like for each table. I have five tables because we don't have any more than 18 kids. So I have 20. I just have five tables. So I thought if I could get those for each table and all their stuff is at that in that table even if we're not doing a station, whatever supplies it is they need and that way I have it ready and I don't have to have that left out. I can just put it on my cart.


Naomi Meredith  19:54

Yes.


Miranda B.  19:54

I have, you know and then put it out. 


Naomi Meredith  19:56

Yeah, that'll help prepare. Yeah. So thinking it through our lessons, it sounds like to like systems like that will help because of your I mean, everyone has limited time, but systems to help with, like cleanup and just like more efficiency. And that's you probably saw that too with your units. Like when you're doing a whole unit, if you're doing robotics, all your robots are out, and then you're ready to go. And you're not switching from Makerspace, to robotics, and to computers. And so that will help. But even just thinking through like the process of like the supplies, we can work on that too. And I think STEM stations with your little kids, since you, you can do up to station you kind of plan out for and then the kids have time to go to two for the week. And then they can go to two more than next week. So you're not double planning, you already have the force setup. And I was telling the other the other teacher in our group that you can do the station's again, like you can, they might I've done that before in a week. So you haven't once a week. So you could do four stations to the first week to the next week, and then do them again. Or maybe you switch out something but it's like the same materials. But okay, we were doing the sun, moon and stars, and now we're going to really focus on the moon or on or something with that one. So that way, you're not like scrambling every single time. You know what you're counting on. And the kids do really Well with stations, especially when you have 18 kids.


Miranda B.  21:32

Yeah, so you don't think like nine kids at a station? That's not too many.


Naomi Meredith  21:39

I think that's a little bit too many. I would do 4 or 5.


Miranda B.  21:44

So you're saying have four stations set up and they only go to two? 


Naomi Meredith  21:48

Yeah.


Miranda B.  21:48

I gotcha. So yeah, they would have like, you know, four, five at each.


Naomi Meredith  21:52

Yeah. Yeah. 


Naomi Meredith  21:53

So then, I can put on the TV who's at what? 


Naomi Meredith  21:57

Yep. 


Miranda B.  21:57

And then I could just rotate them. Okay.


Naomi Meredith  21:59

Yeah. And then one of your stations could be a teacher led station. So even with a younger kid, I do that a lot, too. I still do that. With the little kids. Like one of this. I plan the stations with STEM. So science, technology, engineering and math station. And a lot of times with the technology station, I'll be there. So maybe I'm showing them something and see saw, like how to use certain tools or even using epic books like how to get to the collection? Or will do their 3d print? I am. Do you have iPads access with them or anything?


Miranda B.  22:38

I just have some iPads they have, but they don't bring them to STEM because they're only four in their classroom. Yeah, but just okay. Yeah. So they don't bring him to STEM.


Naomi Meredith  22:50

But just having a few would work out for a station. Yeah, if you only have a few and then they're used to that in their classroom. So then even talking with that might be something to I don't know, if you have access, but even asking, thinking back to those text skills, you can already see what the older kids what you want them to know and what you've seen, especially with your teaching experience, but maybe to even seeing what the Kindergarten teachers are hoping for when it comes to technology since I know they don't use as much. And that's pretty common. But doesn't mean you don't have to. Do they use seesaw? Do you now? 


Miranda B.  23:34

I don't think they do. Okay. I don't think so. I think everything they have. Yeah, we have a blog every week that we post to on what? in their classroom. I just have to post once a week. Like, one week I do Kindergarten the next week. The next week? I do. That's why I just have to post once a week. Now for every class. Yeah. So but yeah, we put pictures or videos in there. That way, are overloaded. Yeah, they get one special update a week like, Okay, we haven't organized like music is this week or first grade STEM is next week for first grade. You don't I mean?


Naomi Meredith  24:13

That's good. I like that. That's a really good system your school has. That way parents aren't getting five specials emails, every Yes, yeah. Yeah. Um, Well, even if Yeah, so I would ask the pre K Kinder teachers, what types of technology they use with their students. And if they don't, I mean, that's a great opportunity for them to use it in STEM. It just, I've had that happen with my younger classes, especially since COVID. They've been using less technology. But it's still important for them, because if we're exposing them, they're not on their iPad the whole time, but we're exposing them so then when they are in those older grades, they're not scared of using things and they can problem solve. So that would be helpful to know or even if you just want to check out got their newsletters? And then if they don't, there's still a lot of things that we can do. Yeah. And that would be a great opportunity in STEM for them. Yes, yeah. That'd be really good. Is there anything else like so you really want those units? So thinking about Makerspace? Just refining those units? I'm even thinking about the structure of your younger students. Is there anything else you really want to work on when we work together this summer?


Miranda B.  25:30

I don't think I mean, that's it just having some some units on, you know, so I know where I'm going from the beginning of the month to the end of the month. And I'm getting all those skills that they need. We kind of just used I mean, I don't have a curriculum. So I've been just using like the NGSS standard. Because I asked her upper school STEM teacher, he goes, Oh, that's just what I use. So, and she did tell me to go ahead, and I can start putting my plans into like their Google Drive. So she goes if you leave, the next person isn't starting from scratch, like you've had to.


Naomi Meredith  26:01

Okay, yeah, really put those standards anywhere else. Yeah. I know they're in there. Yes. So that'll be good. You'll like in this. So this template, when you're auditing, you can actually list those out. And then when we create the year long plan, you'll have them there. So even though you know them in your head, then you can see if you're even overlapping things. The I use the NGSS as Well, because usually, I mean, I heard Texas is getting STEM standards. But other than that, we're Yeah, no one else. No one else. Yeah. But at least you're using standards, because yeah, sadly, not all STEM teachers do. But um, I think that will help you just visualize, Are there standards that I'm missing. And if you are missing some, then that can help us plan units, then give you some inspiration, oh, here's how we could teach this type of standard anyway. So I'm just even just visually seeing it out there. So you're not like recreating, again, what you're doing, but just seeing what you have already can help us fill in those holes of what we can do for the kids. But yeah, awesome. Well, it sounds like okay, aside from what we're going to talk about tonight, so the biggest thing is to think about those tech skills that you really want kids to know, or even less out what you've seen with the kids. And then same with kinder and pre K, asking or saying what types of technology they use, or don't use or are hoping to use. Okay, that could be a chance that you're not necessarily co teaching, but it could be a good way to expose them to stuff that classroom teachers might end up using anyway. Okay, which really helps. I know, classroom teachers, like thank you so much for showing them epic!


Miranda B.  27:50

Digital citizenship too. I'm going to incorporate that this year, just because they have it in the classroom, but they don't get to it very often. Yes. So I do want to do digital citizenship unit at the beginning of the year, and I thought that might be a good one to kind of put those tech skills into your one. Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  28:08

Okay. Well, we can make that first unit digital citizenship anyway. Um, there's a lot of great stuff out there. Do you use common sense media at all? 


Miranda B.  28:18

Yeah, okay. That's what I've used. That's what I've used before when I was in the library. 


Naomi Meredith  28:22

Yeah. So that can be your first unit. I do digital citizenship, my second unit. And this is just based on preference. I used to do it first. But then I realized I needed to do more team building and getting accustomed to my space. So I did it as my second unit.


Miranda B.  28:41

And that's okay with me, because I do like those getting to know you, even though I know most of the kids because there's not that many. We did have several new kids starting next year, but just getting them, you know, used to bring in a new grade level. And so I do like that those community building kind of things at the beginning of the year.


Naomi Meredith  29:01

Yes. Okay. So we have community building first, and then we'll do digital citizenship computer literacy next and then we can go from there, maybe Makerspace you put that in and that's that's actually the layout I do. Or you could do this storybook STEM slash Makerspace it could be a combo but yeah, I'm excited yeah, you already have great stuff already do unit so awesome. Like your first year but you were doing STEM already in the library. 


Miranda B.  29:31

And I was doing a lot just with books like we have the Show Me nominees like the picture books, you know, 12 picture books, they could add picture books for the and so we always had a STEM activity to go with every one of those. Oh, wow. And then whatever else I was doing, I would come up with a STEM lesson. 


Naomi Meredith  29:49

Yeah, that book. Perfect. Yeah, so don't get rid of any of this stuff. We're just gonna organize it and fill in some holes and even thinking about Now that you've had the kids is going into your second year, what are things that you can do that are even a little bit more challenging now that they have that exposure with you then are like okay, now we can get into this next thing. Oh, now you're ready for this. What are some things we could write a grant for? and enhance this space to?


Miranda B.  30:18

Yeah. Oh, I did get I had a parent give me $1,000 to lego.com got $1,000 worth of new Legos. Oh, Well, all the Legos are in your room and the cart you ordered to put a ball in his in your room next week and kind of sort it all and


Naomi Meredith  30:35

yeah, let me know what LEGO is. Good. That's so good. You're gonna have to show me what you have. Okay. Oh my gosh, I'm so excited for you that I was gonna ask you if you had Legos. 


Miranda B.  30:48

So I didn't. See I do a LEGO club after school. Yeah. And so we just didn't have a ton and bought some but oh, we have a ton. Now. She said this mom said you were always telling the kids Oh, I don't have any more of those bullet kind of blocks, you know, oh, we don't have enough. And so she gave us two $500 gift cards to lego.com


Naomi Meredith  31:07

Oh my gosh, that is so awesome.


Miranda B.  31:10

Yeah, I was so excited. Yeah, LEGO club over the summer. Good summer school. And we're doing a storybook STEM. Yeah. And then we're doing a LEGO. It's Imagine your story. Why would we take a fairy tale? And then they have to kind of build something about the fairy tale, solve a problem with Legos.


Naomi Meredith  31:31

Yeah. Oh, that's so good. Yay. And that'll be fun, too. Because then you can play with all the like, see what you have and be like us?


Miranda B.  31:40

Yeah, yeah, email me she because our limit was 18 kids. She goes, you know, your your LEGO classes filled up really fast. I had two parents asked if they could please come. Would you want to increase it to 20? Kids? Oh, no. Like she goes, I'll see if I can get you to help her because usually over 15 kids, they get us a helper 


Naomi Meredith  31:57

Cool. I love your school's philosophy. Like everything that we're talking about for everything that you hope for teaching is like what you have in your position.


Miranda B.  32:09

Oh, I know. It's It's so different from when I was in public school. Yeah. That's to be the professionals. They don't tell us what we were supposed to do. They trust to know, she's like, you're the expert in this. You do what you think is best?


Naomi Meredith  32:22

Ah, that's that's how it should be. Or should be? Yes. Ah, I'm so glad you found this school. And you just still seem very excited about it and passionate, which I love


Miranda B.  32:33

  1. My husband loves this. He's like, You are so happy when you're talking about what you're doing with those kids. Oh, my God, they make you happy.


Naomi Meredith  32:39

Ah, that's so good. Well, any questions for me? I'll see you tonight as well in our live call and show you all the templates and everything that'll help you get organized. But anything else from me right now that you're wondering? 


Miranda B.  32:56

I don't think so. 


Naomi Meredith  32:57

Awesome. Okay. Well, let me know. And I'll see you tonight. And you'll have access to talk with me. And yeah, I think you have a really great base. And I'm excited to like fill in everything. It's kind of like a big puzzle. Just like filling in what do we have. 


Miranda B.  33:12

Yeah, it'll be awesome. 


Naomi Meredith  33:14

And then thinking about all the cool lessons that you'll start doing. Yay. Well, thank you so much, Miranda for your time and enjoy your afternoon. 


Miranda B.  33:26

All right, you too. 


Naomi Meredith  33:28

I'll see you later. Bye. 


Naomi Meredith  33:31

I am so excited to work with Miranda this summer. She already has a great start for her program. And there's so much room for streamlining lessons in her space so that the days she has with students are an absolute success. If you're interested in having a one-to-one coaching call like this one and support throughout the summer to build up your program. Join us. There are only a few spots left at Naomimeredith.com/stemintosummer.

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

married to a STEM teacher

What It’s Like to be Married to a STEM Teacher [ep.94]

What It's Like to be Married to a STEM Teacher [ep.94]

married to a STEM teacher

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Episode Summary

You’ve heard me talk about my Teacher Honey on this podcast many times. Well, today, he is a guest on the podcast. Today’s episode is even more special because it is airing on the day of our wedding. In this episode, my Teacher Honey shares what it’s like to be married to a STEM teacher. We also discuss how we met, our engagement, the differences in our teaching jobs, and so much more. This was such a fun episode to commemorate this special occasion.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • What it’s like for my Teacher Honey to be married to a STEM teacher
  • Our dating and engagement stories
  • The differences between our teaching jobs

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

You've heard me mention him here on this podcast before but my Teacher Honey, aka my fiance, is my special guest on today's episode. Well, what is extra special about today's episode is that this is being released the day that we are getting married, June 8, 2023. So if you're listening to this after that date, we are officially married and he's officially my husband. Unlike me, he's not into the podcasting and social media thing. So be sweet on him. I thought that this would be a fun episode behind the scenes of what it's like being with me, and what he's very into. This is a fun mix it up episode that I think you'll enjoy and more so for me to document a fun memory for us. 


Naomi Meredith  01:18

We'll welcome Eric, my teacher, honey to the podcast. I hardly ever use your first name. So they know you're like this secret mystery person. 


Eric  01:32

Perfect. 


Naomi Meredith  01:34

And this is your first and probably your last podcast interview. 


Eric  01:39

Absolutely. 


Eric  01:42

Well, thanks for doing this. And we have a little Frederick, we don't have video of this. But Frederick is actually sitting in the middle of us. Whenever we're together, Frederick insists he has to be in the middle. So he's not in one lap or the other. He's sitting here with a blanket, cuddling up. Poor little guy. So for those of you who don't know, my teacher, honey is actually a teacher. I'm not just saying that he's a teacher honey, because I'm a teacher. Now he really is a teacher. And he teaches high school Spanish, which is entirely different than elementary STEM. And when we first met, which we'll get into in a second, I was a third grade teacher at the time. So he's seen my whole transition from me being a classroom teacher to a STEM teacher, business owner the whole time, but that's really grown as well. And so that's so much fun for you. You get you see all the behind the scenes every day. My office when I'm when I first claimed this room as my office, I was like hey, can you can you hang up a shelf for me? And you're like, sure and then what is my office now. 


Eric  02:51

Then she took the doors out to the closet and removed the bed and yeah, now it's it's a whole it's a whole something.


Naomi Meredith  02:59

And it's like not girly at all right? Oh my god. Yeah. Oh, you like my pillow? What does my pillow say? Oh, babe cave. 


Eric  03:06

Yeah, it's definitely a babe cave. 


Naomi Meredith  03:12

Okay, so people are probably want to know. So this is behind the scenes. There's a little bit of STEM but not really. So Eric, how did we meet?


Eric  03:20

We met at Top Golf with a mutual teacher friend's birthday party, actually. And so yeah, we were we were playing golf and…


Naomi Meredith  03:30

But you were playing golf?


Eric  03:31

Yeah. You tried to play golf. Yeah. And we just it was just a natural, like, birthday party. Kinda. No, no, no app, no. Weird first aid. It was just kind of natural.


Naomi Meredith  03:44

Well, and he was so funny, because like we didn't we were not actually set up. It wasn't a setup that I know of. 


Eric  03:51

No, no, it wasn't a setup. 


Naomi Meredith  03:53

And so when it was my turn to hit the golf ball, now, I was a car girl in college. I never played golf, and never had any desire to so it was my turn to hit. Eric would just sit in this chair. Every time it was my turn. He would sit there and just start giggling at me.


Eric  04:10

You're not very good. 


Naomi Meredith  04:11

I know. And then find out later that you're a golf coach. And you gave me a zero pointers? Yeah, I'm sorry. You're not that sorry. So we've been together ever since which the whole teaching world I know was mostly Behera teachers. We've just known each other and so it was a good, good little connection and our wedding will be mostly teachers. What did our DJ say about with teachers?


Eric  04:40

They like to have the most fun as soon as summer comes? Yeah, so.


Naomi Meredith  04:44

Our DJ is super excited to to have our wedding. He's so cute. He's such a he's gonna be a good DJ, which we're recording this like three days before our wedding. So this was pretty fun. That's how much time we have on our hands for recording In your podcasts were not stressed at all. Okay, so then how how did you propose or should I say how I thought you're gonna propose?


Eric  05:12

Well, the fake one. Yeah. Oh, the first time I guess we were in Costa Rica, just on vacation. I think it was just summertime. So there was no expiration date. And we just were enjoying enjoying the beach and in Costa Rica. And so we had a lot of rain a couple days before, and it was our last night. And if you don't all Costa Rica around that time, it's like exactly like six o'clock or 610. The sun goes down. It's on the ocean. And it's like unbelievable sunsets every single night, as long as it's not raining. So we got some wine walked down there. was going to get dinner. Yeah. And for some reason, she thought because we had wine and there was a sunset, just stop. We were dressed up for dinner. So she thought I was going to propose. I don't know why she thought that photographer. Yeah. And so then a photographer, you know, just a random person on the beach, want to take our pictures, like, oh, sunsets calm, and let's get pictures of you. And I, of course, said no, we're good.


Naomi Meredith  06:18

Oh my gosh, in my head. I didn't say this out loud. In my head. I'm like, Oh my gosh, this is all part of the plan. He knows I want pictures, especially for Instagram. He knows I want pictures. I have to say yes. Like he set this up.


Eric  06:32

I said no. And that she went and found her and said, yes, we'll do it. And as I like taking pictures as much as I do in podcast. It's not the most fun. So. So we go through his photo shoot. It's super awkward for him. Yeah, it's so and then she's like, upset with me because I didn't propose.


Naomi Meredith  06:54

Well, I didn't I wasn't upset that night with I've said that night. No, but afterwards. Yes. Yeah. When we got back, were talking to friends about it. And then I just like tell you, I thought you're gonna propose me like, I don't even have the rain or anything. Like I wasn't even planning on it was all made up in her head. It was all made up. So I will post one of one or two those pictures and the links to the show notes for this because it's they're cute pictures are kind of awkward. There's one that's really cute. Okay, so that's the fake proposal. So that was like six months before you actually proposed. Yes. And so how did you actually prep? 


Eric  07:33

So then we went on a cruise, and we traveled quite a bit. So we went on a cruise for Christmas. We did it the year before and we loved it. That's only two cruises we've ever been on. No, that was our first cruise nose or silicone. Now, it was our first.


Eric  07:48

Yeah, it was our first cruise.


Eric  07:50

Yeah. And so we were two friends. And so I thought this would be perfect. I could do it i Christmas. You know, we're in the Bahamas, that sort of thing. Her two friends are there so they can like pictures of it all. And so yeah, we were just at our fancy dinner and had asked Astra friends to take a picture of us. And they they got their phones out. And then while they're getting their phones out, I just just popped the question. And he like freaked out. I had no idea what was going on. And then we find out that night that her friend Dot COVID. And this was in the middle of Congo. This is like, what was it? 2020?


Naomi Meredith  08:30

No, 2021


Eric  08:34

The boats just opened back up. You couldn't go on a cruise forever. And so then we got quarantined for 36 hours or something in our room until our COVID tests came back, which was a nightmare. And so yeah, we spent a whole entire day


Naomi Meredith  08:50

And we snuck out of our rooms too.


Eric  08:53

Well, yeah. Because we celebrated that night. It was Christmas dinner was probably I don't know, like, five, six o'clock at night when it happened. And we were out till I don't know one or two in the morning, maybe. And then we got a phone call saying we have to quarantine but we weren't exactly in the right state of mind to focus on that. And so yeah, we woke up and like we were hungry, like what did they say last night but to stay in our rooms when how do we get breakfast so we just got breakfast, and then they call us over the loudspeaker on the entire boat. I mean, a cruise has 6000 people. And they're they by name. They told us to get back to our room. And we had to sit there for a full nother day in that small little room. They do break room service all time but there was a long day.


Naomi Meredith  09:38

Yeah, I learned how to make towel animals. And we got free Wi Fi that day with her which was horrible. We actually were able to tell her family and so we got engaged. Yeah, that's good. But they found out and then like the whole rest of the trip was fine. Like we got to celebrate and to always go.


Eric  09:56

It's still good trip even though we're quarantine for that day and a half.


Naomi Meredith  09:59

Yeah like, are you sure you want to still marry me? Are you sure you'll like this? Like the true test get engaged and then get locked up for 36 hours?


Eric  10:10

In a very small room. No windows. No windows? Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  10:13

And bad Wi Fi. Yeah. It's good. And now here we are, here's our wedding day that you're listening to this in Colorado. And that's all I'm gonna say about that. Okay, so switching gears. So you're a high school teacher, and for a long time have been an elementary teacher. So based on your whole high school experience, like I know, meeting me was a big shock when it came to the elementary world. Like I would tell you things coming home, especially I had a really, really, really hard class when I taught third grade. But I Kate would come home and you would be so shocked. Like, that's what it's like in elementary. And I know, during COVID When we had to teach online, you actually got to see firsthand what it's like teaching elementary in high school, you would walk by my door, and I was teaching Kindergarten, you're like, What is going on in there? Like, my voice is all high. And I'm like reading a book or something like why in the world, but what would you think is the biggest difference between our teaching jobs so high school Spanish, verse K through five STEM?


Eric  11:29

I mean, it's not it's not even the same job. It's night and day. Like, they're so different. And to be honest, I don't know how elementary school teachers do it. i There's no way. I mean, I guess there are pluses and minuses like, they don't have to grade hundreds and hundreds of essays and tests. But to be with like, 25 little guys like that. All day, every day. I don't see how they do it is there's no there's no way I could you know, clean up bloody noses. 


Naomi Meredith  11:59

Or like tell them who was responsible the bathroom? You know, like, say, Go get your extra change of clothes. Let me wipe your face with a baby wipe. Oh,


Eric  12:09

No, you said kids trying to get high in the bathroom. Oh, that's good. Our bathroom issues are different. That's good. We do different stuff.


Naomi Meredith  12:18

Yeah, Well, elementary. Yeah, it is different. And you see a little bit too like with a neighbor, our neighbor, kids, I like to make them little STEM activities. And it's a lot more like even when I show you some of the STEM stuff. You're like that is way more than what I do for Spanish. Oh, yeah.


Eric  12:38

Yeah. So lessons you come up with are like way, way more creative. And like, they look way nicer than what I make.


Naomi Meredith  12:45

You've been stories like you write good stories. Yeah, I'm like, wow, you wrote,


Eric  12:49

But you make them all like, pretty? 


Naomi Meredith  12:52

Yes. Well, that's just how I am. We're sitting here at my table right now. And there's wedding stuff all over the table. And I've been making stuff on the computer for it. So Eric's a good fit for me because he if there's two of us in this relationship, like me, where I have, like all this creativity and all these ideas, Eric's very grounding for me, but you're very, very supportive. Thank you. Well, thank you. And here we are getting married. Okay. Okay, with that what has been the most surprising thing you've seen me do my business or something you're most proud of?


Eric  13:30

I just say like you built building, building like your little whatever we're gonna call this like, with your with Instagram and podcasts and your Teachers Pay Teachers and all they're like your business. It's not like one business. So it's like, so many different things that you do on like, from the ground up, like because you imagine you you know, money and you're ready to live the rest of your life buy or sell. Yeah, and you're you weren't gonna go to top golf because you didn't have any money. So like, you're Yeah, like, I can't even buy beer like it is. And so now you know, selling your townhome and making your business and then just not good enough where you you know, you're gonna retire from your teaching career and follow your business like to do that from like zero to nothing to where you're at now, which is like probably not even close to where you'll end up being you know, so I'm hoping so. So um, can we tie a very rich person, your business?


Naomi Meredith  14:34

Well, you're so supportive I made sale even when I first met you my business at the time. I don't know if you remember, but it was marvelous. Miss Meredith. And I gave you my business card is a really pretty picture of me and you would actually carry my business card with you do and then you had in your classroom still have in your closet? Somewhere? Yeah. And then I changed it because everyone kept calling me Veritas, which is confusing. Yeah, so that makes sense. So I just changed it to my name. But it was so sweet. Because ever since the beginning, you've actually I have always told your friends about me. And my business and your friends actually asked me about stuff too. And most of them are teachers. And I know that you're remember saying you're surprised like you had no idea. This was a whole thing like that, that you could actually do this. I had no idea about any of this. Yeah, like because high school teachers pay teacher's does it really?


Eric  15:30

Yeah. I've never heard of any of it before. So like a lot of it, too.


Naomi Meredith  15:34

I mean, I never knew I'd have a podcast either. Yeah. But all of this. Yeah, I had like inklings of it. But I like Thanks for noticing. Oh, that and even like, yeah, it's just really fun. And you know that I love doing it too. Like, I'm just very passionate about. Like, if I like if I really, really like something I really dive in if I really don't like doing something like cleaning the house. He never do. I know. He knows. So that's yes. That's really sad. Okay, so you've already mentioned we travel a lot, but and we have a very fun honeymoon planned. And we're going to Europe for a long time. And you're going through all that stuff before we started recording. So a lot of the time we like to go to zoos, aquariums and museums. And we both like to learn about the world and just learn about our surroundings. Learn just we are teachers at heart, we love to learn. We've done some really cool things that have influenced both our jobs and just help us be better people. So out of this list. So I've picked three places we've been to which one which STEM experience. Did you like them? No. So we have San Diego Zoo, we went there on Christmas Day, which is so funny, because we got engaged on a Christmas. So we have that one. So big, beautiful museum, it was raining. That one, we have the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, and we've been twice. So we went one time when it was really, really cold. And we spent the whole day there. And we did. We each took a class at the same time. So I took a 3D printing class with all these little kids. And I was the only adult in there. And I told the instructors like I just want to learn how adults teach children 3D printing, and then you were doing like a video or something.


Eric  17:30

Yeah, you did something. Oh, it was on?


Naomi Meredith  17:34

Yeah. But it's not. I think it's not like about Colombia.


Eric  17:36

More was Yeah. Yeah. Cuba, Cuba, Cuba.


Naomi Meredith  17:41

Yeah. So you did that. And then we spend the whole day there. And then we went back again, because they had the art of the brick LEGO experience. And I really, really wanted to see that. I'm going to post some pictures of this, you guys. And then Okay, those are your two options. And then one more the Smithsonian museums in Washington, DC. And there's so many of them. I just said General. So out of that list, which one of those three is your favorite STEM experience?


Eric  18:11

They're all good. I mean, the zoo zoo is unreal. You know, most people know of it. I've got one to a zoo my entire life as a kid like me. That's how my mom like, babysat. So one of the zoo every week. Again, I'm from Chicago. So the Museum of Science and Industry, I think is one of the best museums around. She couldn't believe it. Like, we literally spent like eight hours there. I mean, it's a whole day experience with a submarine exhibit. I mean, spend two hours does that they want to exhibit we probably did and we didn't go into it. But the Smithsonian museums, I mean, we it was three or four days just checking out museums. And we can we can go on to see for another week and see toy different stuff in Washington. Yeah. I mean, this is kinda like a loaded question while the Smithsonian so I mean, there's like 20 Some museums or whatever. So that's kind of beat out. Just you know, smaller. Yeah, museum or one zoo, you know, so I'd go Yeah, and Washington DC was the best.


Naomi Meredith  19:12

I know. He really really likes that trip. Oh, that was a Christmas trip to


Eric  19:16

Think so. Just because I have a small family center Zona near family is in Utah. We don't have any family out here. So we're just gonna travel.


Naomi Meredith  19:24

Yeah. And it's like, are we like quality time? We don't really buy gifts. Well, I buy you a little things here. But we don't like Nitro. Yeah, we try to gift. Yeah, we travel. So yeah, I liked that one. Yeah. Well, all those there.


Eric  19:40

They're all good. Yeah. But I mean, like, we can obviously go back to Washington and see a totally different experience. And that's the one one of the same things.


Naomi Meredith  19:49

It's been a whole week there. Yeah. I mean, it's good. And it's funny because he'll take a lot of pictures of things for your class or like, Oh, I could talk to my students about this. Or I even take care pictures like I go through my phone and you're like, don't upload these in our shared folder. But I like taking pictures of different exhibits or things that can inspire STEM projects or even when we went to meow wolf, the first that there was actually something a STEM thing in there. I don't know if you remember, but there was like this dinosaur thing and it had these ribs. And then you played the ribs like with a mallet and it made noise. Do you remember that? Yeah. And it was above your head. And that reminded me of this STEM thing called a Makey Makey. And you actually can connect it to things that are conducted and when you press it, it makes it sound. So reminded me of a STEM. So it's I'm always thinking about this stuff. Like Trust me, I relaxed, but it's always in the back of my mind when we're traveling. Especially zoos, aquariums, and what? Museums. So if you're ever stuck on ideas, head up to your local zoo. Okay, pop quiz. I hope you've had you too. What does STEM stand for?


Eric  21:06

That was easy. Science, technology, engineering and math


Naomi Meredith  21:10

Wrong. 


Eric  21:12

What? 


Naomi Meredith  21:12

It's right.


Eric  21:16

STEAM has art.


Naomi Meredith  21:22

Extra credit. Good job. Very good. He's smiling on that one. He's there fanning the whole time. And now he's smiling. Okay. Okay. Two more questions. Why do you think STEM is important for kids?


Eric  21:40

I mean, those are all areas that the world works on. But I think I think there's other stuff that's super important too. That's why, you know, I think STEM is awesome as like maybe a class but not just a school only focus on that I think the arts are important, or the performing arts, right? Fine Arts, I think PE is super important how to, like we are kids, in order to graduate have to learn how to swim, I'm going to talk about a life skill. So we I mean, there's so much more than just those four. But those four are obviously huge areas that you need to know, in most jobs, or just how how the world really functions with science and engineering and, and everything. You know, technology's obviously huge, and you need math to do most of those things. And even


Naomi Meredith  22:23

like those, like little skills that they work on, and you probably see this in your students they need to work on is being able to collaborate with each other. Critically, think through a problem not giving up the first time when it's hard, being able to persevere even thinking creatively through problems. Like even in your with your students, like Spanish assignments, even when they're creative with their writing assignments. It just like adds like another level of fun things.


Eric  22:51

The reason a lot of colleges want you to have high level math and high level world language is because it's that processing skill that you know, a lot of people have trouble with getting to the upper level math, and we're language because it's easy to pass, you know, algebra one, maybe geometry, Spanish one in Spanish, you are pretty easy to get through that to get through like Spanish four, and pre Calc and those upper level things. You have to be able to do a lot of problem solving and a lot of figuring out things even on a foreign language because there's so many things they don't know, but you can figure it out by the context and everything.


Naomi Meredith  23:27

I try to when we go get Mexican food, figure out the context. When we travel I do okay, do okay. I do okay. But by the end of the trip, I do better like you kind of pick up on a loss of just a week you can pick up a lot. Yeah. Which I mean, hence you studied abroad and learned a lot.. 


Eric  23:45

We try to go to places where they speak more Spanish and English. We try not to do the just to Cancun resort. We try to Costa Rica trips. A Spanish you know, Costa Rican resort? Yeah. Are they speak Spanish first English second.


Naomi Meredith  24:00

Let's go practice. test my skills can yours. Okay, so this is airing on our wedding day. So if people are listening to this, I'm putting out a pretty jazz so much fun. What is something you're most excited about?


Eric  24:20

Besides the actual marrying of you?


Naomi Meredith  24:24

Yes, you should be excited to marry me.


Eric  24:26

Oh, no, I think I think the food and wine is going to be unbelievable. We're at the winery. And so it's gonna get the food is so good there. And the wine is really good. I think that's gonna be great. You know? Having you know what not it's not a big one but having a lot of our friends there and family. It'll be it's gonna be a good day.


Naomi Meredith  24:46

Okay, you took mine so I'm so yeah, if you took mine away. We love this place because we've been going there every once a month every month since our wedding. Since a year ago yeah. Uh, what I'm also excited about is our video guestbook, and our DJ, our DJ, it's just so much fun and he has some fun games plans and different things for us to do. And we were talking with him and we have a video guestbook. And so instead of signing the globe that I originally had planned that will probably look horrible with people's signatures. I'm not doing that. Um, he his wife does a photo booth, and then we have a video guestbook, so people can leave messages throughout the night. So that we find the same people after Yeah, and to see their outfits and what they have to say, I'll probably be really cute at the beginning and then crazy towards the end. But I'll be really good. Yay. So finally, we're recording this we're fiance's. But then when this airs will be husband and wife. Excited exciting.


Eric  25:56

Kinda cheesy, but yeah,


Naomi Meredith  25:58

it's true, though. You've been engaged for a while? Yeah. Yeah. Sounds good. That's good. Yeah. Glad. Well, anything else you would like to share? I'm good. You did a good job. I got you to talk for about 30 minutes. So good job, Eric. Well, we probably won't ever hear from Eric again on this podcast to you guys. But he's always he's actually a big part of why this can happen. He was just very supportive and fast to record something after school or meet with the guest where it's later at night because the time zones and everything. He's a big supporter of why I can do all the things that I can do for you guys. He's just definitely, definitely believe in me and you. I appreciate everything that you do. Well, thank you so much. And yeah, you're good. You're good. You did a good job. Thank you. I will thank you so much, and I'll see you in the next episode as an official wife.

married to a STEM teacher

married to a STEM teacher

married to a STEM teacher

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

stem teacher struggle

3 Things I Struggled with Most as a STEM Teacher [ep.87]

3 Things I Struggled with Most as a STEM Teacher [ep.87]

stem teacher struggle

Check out the full episode on 3 Things I Struggled with Most as a STEM Teacher:  

 

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Episode Summary

I share a lot about the highs and some of the lows of being an elementary STEM teacher on my Instagram and here on the podcast.

In today’s episode, I’m sharing the three things I struggled with the most as a new STEM teacher. 

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • The three things I struggled with the most as a new STEM teacher
  • How I navigated those struggles
  • Ways I can support you with navigating similar struggles

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

I know on my Instagram, you often see the highlight reel of all the good things that happen in my STEM space. I love to share these things with you to help you be encouraged as to what STEM can look like at the elementary level. Likewise, I definitely still share the not so pretty things, too, especially on my Instagram Stories, you can definitely see what I look like without makeup, all the messy things in my classroom. And with that being said, I am here to share the not so pretty things and three things that I struggled with the most when I first started as a K through five STEM teacher. 


Naomi Meredith  01:09

After being a classroom teacher for six years and jumping into the K-5 STEM space, where I didn't know any of the students or teachers, it made me feel like a brand new teacher all over again. Now luckily, in this situation, I had some experience under my belt. But there are also those things whenever you go into a brand new building, like what's the Wi-Fi password? Where's the staff bathroom? And how do I connect to the printers in the building? It's all those things you don't know, and it gets a little bit frustrating. And with that being said, I was literally thrown into this role, where not only would I be teaching all the kids in the school as a specialist teacher, but also being the manager of all the school-wide technology and also all the teachers when it came to co-planning and teaching to help them implement STEM technology and innovative practices. So leaving the classroom and into this big role was completely a big feat, not impossible, but definitely a lot of challenges. And so, speaking of the STEM role, specifically, here are the three major things that I struggled with the most. I think that you're actually going to be able to relate to them too. I always tell my students that I wasn't born knowing how to teach STEM, they weren't born knowing all the STEM things. And they always laugh at that. But it's true. Like I'm learning with you, I have to research everything. So it's okay if you're going into this role, or you're in this role. And you still don't know everything, I don't still know everything. But here are those three biggest struggles. 


Naomi Meredith  02:55

The first thing that I struggled with the most was understanding what each grade level knew and needed to learn. So like I said, this was a brand new school to me, I didn't know any of the students or the teachers. And I was really trying to figure out what they knew and didn't know, the students and also the teachers too when it comes down to it. So this is really, I mean, when it comes down to teaching, when you have a brand new class, you don't always know what everybody knows. That's just getting to know your students. This was definitely brought out at a bigger scale, having 500 plus kids, and even the fact to learning their names. I've never learned that many people's names at one time. So that was a huge thing. But even just being new to a building, I didn't even know what curriculum they were using. What practices are done in the classroom? I came from a school that was really big on training us as teachers to be better with our instruction and have high-level learning and teaching with the workshop model. I came into a building, I found out later that wasn't the case. So completely different. So that was a huge thing, just how students were learning in general. And also, my students had never had STEM before. And so, like, pretty much every single thing that I was doing with them was brand new. So I found out pretty quickly that everything was taking 10 times longer. And I couldn't get done with everything that I wanted. I have this big vision in my mind. I'm a big picture thinker. I can definitely work up to the details, but I can envision things very, very well. And then I can get it done to get up there. So I really had to understand the kids' starting point and really had to gradually build up to the program that I had dreamed of and created. I think in the episode, I can't remember when we recorded this, or we talked about it on the side, but when I did the interview with Jennifer Mahin when we were talking about grant writing, she saw the same thing that when she got first started, she had to start everybody kind of at the same spot when it came to materials because they didn't have any background in STEM. And I definitely had to do the same thing. Everyone was pretty much at that same level, I didn't have a need or have the money, necessarily, to buy everything I wanted. But also, the kids weren't ready for all of those things I wanted to buy. And we'll talk about that too because that was also a challenge as well. But I really had to gradually build up to the program that I had dreamed up and created. And this is something that my principal at the time, when I first got started, definitely talked about that. And she was super supportive in my program, at least my first principal was. If you really want to hear about how I built up to this program, just finished a grade level STEM series, and that's episodes 81 through 86, where I give you a snapshot of every grade level K through five and what I teach with them, and then a breakdown of their week and what we do. So definitely, through this time, I was nervous, I didn't know if things would work. I still feel that way when I teach brand new things. But when everything's brand new, I was not sure if it was going to work. How would we do this? How would we do that? I'm okay with failing. But it was just really, really stressful. But I can definitely say now that I am very confident that my lessons will work, even new ones. For the most part, I have that same structure, where I only have to do some adjustments. But the way that I plan and the way that I think things through now through my learning process is that I'm very confident that my lessons are going to work and also be adapted to each grade level. And in turn, has built up a whole year of lessons and curriculum that are planned out. So as students are going through my program, they have that progression of learning. And it's not discussed jointed and random things where oh my gosh, like, okay, we're doing this, we're doing that, everything has a nice flow to it, there's some organization, and they can definitely learn all of those skills. 


Naomi Meredith  07:19

The second thing that I really struggled with the most when stepping into this STEM teacher role was I didn't know what content themes to teach. So this goes along with the first one as well. But it is a little different, too. So I was a classroom teacher before, and I took every free training that I could, I didn't have a master's degree in STEM education I do now instead leadership. But at the time, I was taking as many trainings as I could for your paid, trying to piecemeal everything together, watching videos, when I could didn't have a mentor, just kind of figuring stuff out. Reading books, I had a little bit of background, but not really. I really knew enough, but not really. I don't know how they hired me. Maybe because I was willing to learn, you can listen to that story in episode one. But I really was trying to piece this all together. And luckily, there were other STEM teachers in my district that I could reach out to and connect with and just hear them talk about their experiences. And they had been doing this for a couple of years more than me was really, really helpful to wrap my mind around things. And I know that this is super fortunate for me, not everybody has another STEM teacher, another them that they can connect with. Maybe it's only a middle school teacher, which is similar but different. That could be helpful, too. But what was really, really helpful with my growth was connecting with other teachers who were in a similar role to me because, as I said, I didn't have a mentor. I didn't have anybody I could really ask besides a few teachers, which I was really thankful that I wish that I had somebody who was on the outside and could really guide me. And my district doesn't even have leadership like that they didn't really have that before. So just kind of figuring stuff out. And the leader in me had to figure it out. At the time, my district was providing training, so not necessarily a mentor, but they were getting some trainings and with some of the materials that we had in our classrooms or some things that they would give us and that happened all before COVID. So my first three years had some of that support. It was kind of inconsistent, but it was better than nothing. And then after COVID there was nothing so not really any support or anything like that. So really, I would say felt like an island, even within the five years have felt that still but I know that my lessons work and I'm confident. I've had even a middle school teacher, I chatted with her and after having my kids for five years, she can tell actually, she told me this: they know, the teachers know, especially the science and technology teachers know when there are kids who come from my school compared to the other schools in the theater, because my kids are able to critically think and they're creative. They're excited about doing projects, they have the stamina to do projects. And they try to rope in the other kids because they know what this can be. And she says it's super apparent because not actually all the schools in my district have STEM, it's actually the first thing to be cut in our elementary schools. But knowing that it took a while from going from, I don't know, anything to really researching and reading and finding out those best practices. So through this time, I definitely can say that I have a community of teachers that I can bounce ideas off of, and feel like that I'm a part of a group that understands exactly what I'm going through. And that's definitely huge. Because, think about it, you're the only adult in your room all day, I mean, you might have a pair of TAs here and there to help you with those students. But you're kind of in your own head, like everybody's there, all the kids are there, but you're kind of alone. So definitely through this whole time in this position, I've definitely been documenting everything, really thinking through and evaluating how things are going with students, and my lessons and how they're learning and even making connections with our classroom teachers. Classroom teachers tell me, Oh, they were like, so excited that their kids had some background knowledge about a topic. So when they're going into science, they could further that, which is really exciting. So learning those big content themes throughout the year. So thinking about robotics, Makerspace, coding, and all of that, it really helps having that community. So I could bounce ideas off of them and hearing what they're doing in their classroom or things that I definitely wanted to grow with. 


Naomi Meredith  12:09

The last thing that I really struggled with when I came into this K-5 STEM space, and this is a very common one, is I didn't know what to buy. So this was actually a huge shift in itself that as a classroom teacher, I had a very, very, very limited budget. And I mean, oftentimes you're given those materials, right? So you have those math manipulatives, or you have some books that you can read with the kids, there's not always a whole ton to buy. Of course there is, as a classroom teacher, I bought a whole lot. But it was so different being a K through five STEM teacher where I actually had to buy like really expensive stuff, and things that could be used over and over and over again. And that was like, Whoa, I did have actually a pretty decent budget my first year, and then it really dwindled after that. But I did not know where to start and what to buy and what would work. So when I came into my room, like I said, it wasn't STEM before it was technology, there was a few buckets of LEGO bricks and an old 3D printer. And there were some random materials that were better suited for middle school, which I ended up testing out with elementary, found out was better for the older kids, not impossible, just they weren't there yet, actually gave them to our middle school teachers. And they were really grateful for that. But like I said, I was given a decent budget. And I knew that I had to be strategic in my purchasing. So thinking about, yes, I have all this students in the school, but how can I really be strategic and what I buy? So I actually made a spreadsheet and took inventory of my whole space, and was really thinking about what are the consumable things that I needed in to replace the things that would get used up? What are some of those non-consumables that can be used over and over and over again, also, there's a huge shift with the primary and secondary. I didn't have anything for the little kids. And you've heard me talk about the little kids a lot. I love Kindergarten, they need a lot more when it comes to different types of activities. I didn't have anything for them at all, I didn't have crayons. So definitely thinking about what are those primary things that I needed, and also the secondary things. And from there, I definitely needed a mix of that high tech type of things. And also the low tech both have different importance. So really being strategic, I would spend so many hours researching and figuring this out, and really being thoughtful about how I would spend my money and also what did I really need now and what I need in the future. So I was able to create a budget plan for my current situation and for my future supplies, like my wish list for things in a five year timeframe. Of course, there's always things to buy, there's always that new thing or some updates or pieces that needed to be fixed. But I was able to find those resources. Even though my budget was small, after those five years, I was creative with my money. Often getting donations in various ways or grants were definitely a source of abundance in my classroom, and also connecting with other teachers in my building. So definitely not impossible, but definitely a strategic plan I really had to be thoughtful about and think about what the long-term could be instead of the day to day supplies. 


Naomi Meredith  15:41

As a recap, here are those main things that really were the biggest struggles for me when I came into the K-5 STEM classroom. First was understanding what each grade level knew and needed to learn. Next was also I didn't know what content themes to teach. So connecting that with what they need to know and what they need to learn. But also what are those big things and STEM I should be teaching. And then also, I didn't know what to pie. But like I said, these weren't things that kept me stuck. These are things that I was able to work through, and document and really come to a place where this is something whole thing with this podcast. The reason why this podcast is saved the elephant tree STEM coach is to be your coach and your guide. So you're not feeling alone, you might be listening to me in the car, or walking your dog or on your lunch break, maybe after school when you're cleaning up all of the cardboard scraps. So that is definitely the whole thing with this podcast is just making sense of all of this. So that you're not feeling and stuck in this place. Now, the podcast is definitely a great source. And I am so we are almost to 100 episodes, you guys, which is so insane to me. And we're not even quite a year old yet. But definitely just taking this podcast and bringing it to life where definitely I'm here to actually be your coach. And I am so excited about this new opportunity to really serve you even better. Because I don't want you to feel alone anymore, I definitely want you to feel successful. And in turn, your students can be successful too. So I am so excited to start my STEM into summer group coaching program, where we will have a awesome 16 weeks together where the first month will really be focused on your lesson plan and supply auditing, where I'll give you those templates to do that, and also provide you some feedback. And then from there, those next 12 weeks we'll have some live group coaching calls where you do get to have that community of teachers where we are talking about things to help us be successful, also have those replays in the form of video and a private podcast. So over those times throughout those live calls, you'll also get that audio connection with me one on one, where we get to chit chat through audio, and I get to guide you and really get to be your coach and literally be in your back pocket. So you're hearing this recording, but we actually all get to chat back and forth with each other. And the whole purpose of this time together is to create your customized and scaffolded STEM curriculum that works best for your unique situation, and also provides that engagement that you're looking for adaptable lesson plans for multi grades, some of you teach pre K to eighth grade. That's a huge span. To really think through a different type of unit for every single part of the year by yourself. It's definitely not impossible. But that's a whole lot to do on your own. And I would love to help you through that. And of course, creating those templates and outlines and resources that will support your planning. This is something that when I was co teaching in my building that teachers thoroughly enjoyed is they would have this idea they didn't know how to bring it to life. And I would sketch some some things out and be able to create something that they were envisioning. So having that support and having somebody to talk through those things is something that I thrive in and absolutely love. Also, when through this time you will also get some bonuses so you will get a free 30 minute one on one live coaching call with me so we can see each other face to face and set up that foundation so we can create something that works best for you. And that I know a lot of you have been waiting for this summer to sign up because I know readings the best time reading by the poles of us but you'll also get a free three months from June through August of the STEM teacher bookshelf. So you'll get access to those three new guides and also the past months that are in there. So This is definitely something I have envisioned, like I said, the big picture person that I am even envisioning just with the name of this podcast, the elementary sim coach and bringing the coaching to, which is so much fun, so exciting. So I only have 10 spots available. I wish I could serve all of you at once, but I only have 10 spots. So you definitely want to grab your spot now so that you don't miss out. And we will get started in June 2023. So you have until May 31, 2023, to sign up, which is not very much time you only have like a handful a couple of weeks to do that. So check it out at naomimeredith.com slash STEM into summer to claim your spot. And if you have any questions or if you are concerned about is this right for me, what what else does this entail? All those types of questions, definitely send me a DM at Naomi Meredith underscore on Instagram. Or you can also send me an email at contactnaomimeredith@gmail.com. And I would love to chat with you, but definitely bringing this podcast to life, the actual real life coaching that, yes, you can get all the ideas and tips and tricks for me, but it's different when it is specialized to you. So thank you so much again for being here, and I will chat with you soon.

stem teacher struggle

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

5th grade STEM curriculum

5th Grade STEM Curriculum, Tips & Ideas [K-5 STEM Series] [ep.86]

5th Grade STEM Curriculum, Tips & Ideas [K-5 STEM Series] [ep.86]

5th grade STEM curriculum

Check out the full episode on 5th Grade STEM Curriculum, Tips & Ideas [K-5 STEM Series]:  

 

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Episode Summary

Today’s episode is the final episode in the K-5 STEM series. In this episode, I give an overview of my 5th grade STEM curriculum. I share an overview of the 5th grade STEM curriculum, a breakdown of a week of 5th grade STEM curriculum, and the top three skills I believe every 5th grader should leave the STEM classroom with.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • An overview of my year long 5th grade STEM curriculum
  • A breakdown of how I structure a week of 5th grade STEM curriculum
  • The top 3 skills every 5th grader should leave the STEM classroom with

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

What should a fifth grade STEM curriculum look like? In this episode, I am breaking down exactly how to plan for your year when it comes to fifth grade, an example of what a week and a project can look like, and also, in my opinion, the top three things that a fifth grader should walk away from my STEM class knowing. This is part six of the six part series where I am doing this whole system for all the grade levels K through five. So you definitely want to make sure you go and check out all those episodes, because you can see the whole wide spectrum of things when it comes to planning STEM and K through five. Whether you are a STEM teacher, a classroom teacher who's implementing STEM, or any type of specialist who is also implementing STEM in their spaces, you're gonna walk away with a ton of useful information. 


Naomi Meredith  01:22

Like I mentioned in the intro, this is the last part of this series. I do love recording series, because I can get in the mindset and the zone when it comes to talking about this topic. So this has been a really great series when it comes to your planning. And this is actually by request. So I had a lot of you fill out my audience podcast survey way back in February of 2023. And there was so much interest when it comes to planning and what that actually looks like in K through five. So I heard you and I answered on this series. So when you guys respond to me, sometimes it takes me a while just based on what I have planned for the year. But I hear you and I love saying what you need, and how I can fill those needs for you whether it's me talking, or finding the right guests to talk about it. Now, when it comes to your needs, I just hosted a free live training, when it comes to actually planning out your full year. And what that looks like. If you missed out on the live training, have no fear, it was all recorded for you. And you can still jump in on that. So not only can you rewatch the video recording and see my lovely face, but a lot of you are here and listen to the audio of this podcast. So there's also a private podcast option that you will get once you sign up. So you can access this at Naomi meredith.com/maytraining. And I am here to support you along the way. And it's so exciting. This training was so much fun. And there was a lot of success in this. So you definitely don't want to miss out. So you if you're listening to this live, you only have until May 31, 2023, to access this training, and then it's going to disappear. So I would love for you to jump in on that. So you can feel successful when it comes to planning out your whole year and STEM a great time ending the school year or going into summer. So you can have some time to think through everything and how it will work best for you. I can safely say after teaching all the grades K through five, there are some that are my favorites when it comes to ages and some that are not my favorite. I love children. Regardless, don't get me wrong. There are some grades that are not my fave. And I would say for me personally fifth grade is pretty much up there next to first grade. I told you in the first grade episode, my thoughts about that. So go back and listen to that. Fifth grade, I love the content. I love being able to dive deeper with the kids. Their stamina on projects is incredible, especially when they are invested in things. But there's just some things about fifth grade again, the attitudes. Maybe I don't like the attitudes because I was one of those fifth graders with an attitude. I was very nice at school, just a little sassy at home. But there's just submit about that. And I don't do Well with that, because I'll give it right back to them. So maybe I would be a really good fifth grade teacher because I don't deal with that kind of stuff.


Naomi Meredith  04:22

But no, fifth grade is good, especially when I've had him for so long. We have a good relationship. And there's some things like hey, you know me, I know you were not doing this in here. So fifth grade is very interesting for me. Like I said, I like the content, the age is not one of my faves. So let's talk about what an overview of fifth grade can actually look like. Like I said, fifth grade lessons are actually really, really fun. So when I actually do my planning, I always start when I plan out my unit K through five. I actually start with third grade. I start in the middle because I know third grade really well. And then oftentimes I will flex all the way to get up to fifth grade. So a lot of times, I'll do third, fifth, fourth, and then do second K and one. So that's a lot of times what happens. So not always, sometimes I might think of a fifth grade lesson first. And then I have to pare things down. So here's how this actual year looks like for fifth grade. If you've been listening along to this whole series, it's fun that you can actually hear the progression of learning how it's gotten up to this point. So we first start off the year. And this actually is one of my favorite STEM survival camp lessons. And it is build the shelter challenge, because that is the number one thing that they do in the show alone. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go back and listen to episode four, because I talked all about STEM survival camp. So students are tasked with building a shelter that will withstand the elements that are different stations for them to test. And they have a little small prototype of what their shelter could look like. After that, we get into digital citizenship, and we talk about a topic that you might not think that you should talk to students about. But it's super important. And it's all about information privacy, how websites might be trying to trick you to get your information. So when you're thinking about the past lessons is digital citizenship, when we're talking about private and personal information. This is really about what our websites doing to try to get that information and how we can't fall for fake. This can be websites. But this can also be humans, different types of scams, and they're getting trickier and trickier, even text messages, I tell them about things that happen to me. But this is a really good topic that aligns with Google's Be Internet Awesome curriculum, which is free, or you might have also heard as Interland, but they actually have lessons that I like to teach in this unit. And students design a digital sticker that will be cut on cut out on our class Cricut machines that will represent how to stay safe online. So they have to get really thoughtful in their design. So it can be cut out Well and be used as an actual sticker. Then we go into our Maker month and all of our Earth Systems, K through five, and we get into that Makerspace. What's interesting about this fifth grade lesson is yes, they have Makerspace items, but a lot of the things that they are using in this project are things that can be reused over and over again. So think about that. When your projects, yes, you have Makerspace. But there are things that students can use and actually put back. So that's a little twist on this lesson. So we talk about chain reactions, and Rube Goldberg ecosystems where students research about different ecosystems. They're provided those resources, and then they have to create a Rube Goldberg machine to show the chain reaction when it comes to all of the living things in that environment. And their pathways can get super complicated depending on how many steps that they add. Then after that, we get into our sensational space, our video and audio production unit, which is a fun one. And this one also intrigues the fifth graders a whole lot because we talk about podcasting. Now there are a couple episodes that I really go into depth when it comes to podcasting with kids. In Episode 80, I actually interviewed Jerry Colbert, who is from the who's smarted podcast, and he gives his perspective on why podcasting is important. And then this lesson, specifically that I'm talking about is in Episode 65. So you can actually go back and listen to that one. Of course, it'll be linked in the show notes for you to check out. But for this unit, students actually designed their own short podcast, it's one to three minutes long, not very long when it comes to actual podcast. And you know, me, I like doing short projects, they can get all the things done, but jam packed in that tiny little project. So we actually go through the whole process of podcasting, which I'm also going to talk about when it comes to the breakdown of the week, then we end the year with our Hour of Code month. And by now students have had a lot of different experience when it comes to coding and feeling very proficient in their block coding. Now it depends on the grade, I will get into more of that JavaScript typing. So bitsbox is a great example of this. Or if it was my students need more practice, we will stick to that block coding and connect it using the Makey Makey, which is a system that there are little alligator clips that you clip on and it connects electricity. And when you touch the Eclipse or, or when you touch the item, it will then send the message to the computer and perform the code depending on it. So it's making that more interactive. So like I said, it will switch off with a year depending on my kids knowledge and experience and also the time that we have. But you can see from there that progression of learning when it comes to the coding. After that we dive into our winter robotics in January. And the lesson that we are jumping into is all about the identity Right now here in Colorado, my students really haven't heard about it yet are out. And you probably also sign out, have seen a theme with my lessons, I tried to make them more obscure because then they can't tell me they know everything about the lesson, they have to listen to me and learn because we're in school. So we learn about the idea to Rod and students are given a path of the identified race. And then they have to design a sled that their robot will pull through that pathway, and successfully complete the race through coding. After that, we will get into a 3D printing. And this is a more open ended design, when it comes to what they are creating. What has been really cool with my fifth graders, especially when it comes to their 3D printing is that their designs have really progressed over the years. So we are using that same platform when it comes to creation Tinkercad. So they're used to the platform by this point, if they've been with me, but the way that they are manipulating the shapes and putting things together or deconstructing things, so that they will print better is pretty amazing. So their challenge is how can they create an invention that will help the environment to either protect the resources, prevent the resources from being harmed, or even stop a problem all together. So this is really helping them bring that awareness and that empathy, which I even talked about in that fifth grade episode, why your fifth graders might not be engaged in STEM, but really thinking about others that are not themselves, whether it's their world around them, like their school world, or even bigger than that, and showing them all these problems out there. And what's pretty amazing in this project is they actually do care. They are, they do care of what's happening. So there's some pretty cool things that come out of that. After that, I jump into LEGO builds, and there is some state testing tagged during that spring season. And I talked about it in the third grade episode. But it's the LEGO spike essential kit, which is an excellent kit that I highly recommend. And it really differentiates first, first second through fifth grade. And we like I like to do the carnival games lessons in there. So students will build and actually code their design. And their code can get really sophisticated, again, re emphasizing having that circle, having that review of the skill and they can actually practice coding and figuring it out. So actually don't do a whole lot of pre teaching when it comes to coding. It's more of that. What are you now how are we going to apply it to this program. You can also fill in, of course, what LEGO education kits that you have, if you have your students for a while, I would actually say that the LEGO we do to point out when it comes to the actual building instructions, is quite simple. Now students can build and design on their own. But also the coding is pretty simple, too. So if you are able to level up your LEGO education kids, I would recommend that now in my opinion, the LEGO Mindstorms a little bit too complicated for fifth grade during a class time, I tried it three years in a row, even with a class that had a gifted and talented cluster. And just during that amount of time, it would just eating more time than what you have in a week. So you could do it as an after school club. But that's just based on my experience, just how complicated not too hard, but just how it's more involved when you're using that tool. If we have time, we then will get into stop motion animation, whether students are building physically or doing things digitally. And they are talking about all of Earth's spheres, sort of the hydrosphere, the biosphere, all of those spheres and what they are, how they connect together, and also how much water is on earth. So they create an animation to teach others about that. Then we end the year with our STEM-musement Park. And we talk about the different types of force and motion when it comes to also that potential and kinetic energy and students design their own roller coaster that a marble can travel through. And you might think that this is too simple, but these designs get very, very intricate and so much fun to see their creativity shine. And with me their last project that they end the year with. 


Naomi Meredith  14:08

Now you have an overall picture of what the year looks like. What does it look like when you break down that structure of the week? So I'm going to be breaking down that podcasting lesson if you want to hear more about it. There's an episode that is more in depth about this lesson because I think podcasting is a great skill to teach students. It's an awesome, awesome skill and it's not as hard as you think even recording this podcast. I don't think it's too hard. Now I do have somebody who helps me. Thanks, Andria. But I could do it on my own if I had to. So if you need more help when it comes to planning, I actually do have a workshop a three to five step planning workshop that is pre recorded. You can jump on in everything's there for you as soon as you sign up. So you can grab that at Naomimeredith.com/secondaryworkshop. Just like fourth grade fifth fifth grade. We can hit the ground running with these projects. And because the topics are so obscure, they really want to know what we're going to do and how we're going to get it done. So with this projects, we're learning all about light pollution, which is a type of pollution that they don't know about, and haven't heard about. I hadn't even heard about until my master's program, maybe you have, but that's where I'm at. So we actually before we even get into that learn actually more about what podcasts are some kids have an inkling of that not so much. I even show them my podcasts a little bit. And they're super amazed. And then also a lot of podcasts that are made for kids to give them inspiration. So we do that ask and imagining for that first day getting ideas of what a podcast is, and what it could be, then the second day, we move into the plan. And it's a little bit different, because they are planning out what their script is actually going to be like. So they take specific notes that are aligned to the standards. And then they take these notes to put it into their script and what they're actually going to say and who's going to say what, now a little bit different than my podcast, I do have an outline when I'm talking that I'm not typically reading word for word, what I'm saying, I'm looking at the camera the whole time. And so I look a little bit of a notes, but then I just start talking. But for kids, they need more guidance. So it's not taking away their creativity. It's setting up a base of what a podcast could be. And trust me, a lot of kids after this project end up creating their own podcasts on their own, but then they have a structure of having producing a really good podcast. So from there, the third, fourth and a little bit of the fifth students are recording and editing their podcasts. The podcasts are pretty short one to three minutes. Like I said, I like smaller projects because they can get everything done. But once they record, they can take out the parts they don't like they can rerecord the introduction, maybe they want a little bit of a song for intro music. So they really start experimenting of what a podcast could be. And the best part their favorite part, especially for a fifth grader, because they care about what other people think about them. Other kids their age, so they get about them is they post their podcast on our class seesaw. And then they listen to each other's work and give meaningful feedback, which again, we reiterate from what they've done in fourth grade. 


Naomi Meredith  17:24

So finally, when it comes to a fifth grader, what are the three things that I would want them to walk away my STEM class knowing. So in no particular order, here is what I have observed. And here's what I would hope for. So first is really being thoughtful and not rushing through their work, I see a lot of trends when it comes to first and fifth graders, that's probably why they're kind of my least favorite ages of kids. But they kind of do a lot of the same things. So I noticed that they like to rush through their work and just get it done to be done so they can sit and chat with their friends. So of course I need not giving a more work, but more thoughtful work. How can you modify this, you're not just checking the box off your list? How are you really thinking through this project and making it better. So that is something I'm always pushing to do with my first fifth graders, and they don't like it, but then they really secretly do and their projects turn out so much better. So that is something that I want my fifth graders to walk away with knowing next, this is actually a fun one for the upper grades is having projects that will show off their skills, and using things that they have learned throughout the years, not just here years. And having some of that choice, it is pretty neat saying kids will talk kids will actually bring up past projects, they'll say, remember when we did this, and I did this, and now I'm adding it to this project. That's actually pretty cool. As a STEM teacher, if you teach multiple grades, you don't always get that as a classroom teacher unless you've looped with them. So they're taking those skills that we learned. I even gave the example of the 3D printing projects, how they are using those skills along the years. So giving them opportunities to keep practicing those skills, and showing what they know is pretty awesome for these fifth graders. It's cool for them, but cool for me as a teacher. And the last thing that I would want my fifth graders walking away with is being able to share with a greater audience. And so yes, they have their classmates which are so important to them. But what are ways that we can share with the outside world? Maybe not for every project, but could we share a podcast with a another classroom? Could we share it with our book buddies who are in a younger grade and teach them about it? Can we have a STEM Maker Faire where we're sharing our projects, so just other ways where they're actually sharing with that greater world? This might even be in the form of an after school club or a competition that can also happen too, but Just really sharing getting out of their comfort zone and sharing their audience with the bigger world, which of course is great for any age, but they really start understanding it more when they are in fifth grade and beyond. 


Naomi Meredith  20:12

As a recap, here's what we talked about when it comes to your fifth grade STEM curriculum. First, we talked about the overview of the year and what your lessons could look like. Then we broke down the structure of the week of how it actually plans out for a typical project. Then I shared with you my top three things that I would hope a fifth grader could walk away from my STEM class knowing, of course, I'm always here to support you. So jump in on that live training when we talk about planning out your year more in detail. So by this point, it is recorded, but definitely still meaningful, you can watch the video or get the private podcast link, it'll just pop up in your podcast player, which is super cool. So that's pretty fun. But you can grab that at Naomi meredith.com/may, training all one word, no spaces. And also I have all of these lessons in my TPT shop already done for you. So if you don't want to spend all the time planning and researching and finding out all the things, I love this kind of stuff. And I love talking about it. And I love making them. So you can grab the whole year K through five all done for you. And there's a lot more things that are going to be updated in this next year, including how I can actually be teaching the lessons. So you definitely want to jump in on that now at the lowest price because that will definitely go up with all the updates. So you can grab that in my TPT shop, I have the full K through five STEM bundle, you can buy just fifth grade, you can even buy just three through five. So that's all in there for you. So if you want to save some time planning and start the year knowing everything's all done for you, then jump in on that. Of course I am here for you. That is the end of this series when not the end of this podcast. There's a lot more to talk about. So I can't wait for those other episodes and how I can help support you with your STEM planning.

5th grade STEM curriculum

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

STEM teacher interview

3 STEM Teacher Interview Tips [ep.79]

3 STEM Teacher Interview Tips [ep.79]

STEM teacher interview

Check out the full episode on 3 STEM Teacher Interview Tips:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Are you hoping to land a STEM position at your school? Maybe you’re wondering what are some important things that you need to consider when interviewing for a STEM position. In today's episode, I share three STEM teacher interview tips to keep in mind when you are preparing for a STEM teacher interview.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • 3 tips for preparing for a STEM teacher interview
  • How to stand out in your interview
  • How my STEM teacher interview went

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Are you hoping to land a STEM position at your school? What are some important things that you need to keep in mind when interviewing for a STEM type position in our elementary schools? In today's episode, I'll be sharing with you three tips to keep in mind when you are prepping for that STEM teacher interview. Take it from me, I have been in your position before. I interviewed for a K through Five STEM job, and I got it. So let's jump into these STEM teacher interview tips. 


Listener Question  01:03

Hello, I hope you're having a good day. I'm actually just sending you a message because I have an interview on Monday for a STEM job. And I'm just wondering if you have any suggestions for me. I have been a teacher for 18 years. And I've always wanted to be a STEM teacher. And they just recently had a position that's coming open next year at my school first time we've ever had STEM. So I'm not really sure what kind of questions they are going to ask me. And I was just wondering if you could give me some advice.


Naomi Meredith  01:31

Great question from a fellow teacher. She must have been reading my mind because I actually had this episode planned for a while. I pushed it up on my content calendar because I'm sure she's not the only one who was wondering the same question. Before I landed my K through five STEM role, I taught second grade for two years at a title one school, which was actually the school that I student taught at, so then I landed a job the following year. Then I moved and needed a job that was a bit closer to where I was then living. So I interviewed and applied for a job in another district and ended up teaching third grade for four years. During that time, I was attending conferences, every free and paid training where I could learn innovative and creative practices that can enhance my teaching. From there, I would apply those things with my students. I had so much fun being a classroom teacher for six years, but I had that feeling in me that I wanted to make an even bigger impact. So I was looking at a neighboring district, and there was a K through Five STEM position that popped up at the time. I didn't really know anybody at this school. Later on, I applied and then ended up having a connection, which is pretty funny, because that actually happened when I got my third-grade job. But anyway, I applied for this position, and I interviewed for it. Long story short, I got the job. If you want to hear actually how the interview went, go back and listen all the way to Episode One. It might not be what you expect. Yes, I got the job, but my feelings about it are not what you expect. Anyway, I landed the job in this new to me district new to me position and a school with zero curriculum and limited supplies. So, of course, that is another story for another podcast episode, in which there are tons about lesson planning. 


Naomi Meredith  03:34

But you are here for those interview tips. So what should you keep in mind when you are prepping to be a STEM teacher and interviewing? More likely than not, a lot of you are probably coming from the classroom, you've been teaching for a while, and you're interested in this type of role. You think you're ready for it. So how do you interview for a position you haven't done before? So here are my top three tips when you're going into this type of interview. My first tip when prepping for a STEM teacher interview is to showcase your creativity. This is a highly creative role. I'm not saying to not apply if you're not creative, but it is super up in the air. Pretty much, I would say for most teachers I've talked to when they're in a STEM role for what you teach. So you have to be comfortable with being creative and trying new things. So definitely showcase that in your interview. It kind of makes sense to me with my journey with teaching over the years and even when I was in my undergrad getting my teaching degree. I love being creative, even if it's not STEM related. I am a very, very creative person, and so this is something I definitely showcased in my interview. Think about the lessons that you will teach as a STEM teacher. All lessons are creative, even the lessons when it comes to coding and robotics, every single lesson that is taught in my classroom is creative. So you definitely want to highlight that. Now a good thing to keep in mind is to think about the creative lessons that you have taught your students. So you probably are interested in this world because you probably are doing this type of stuff with your students anyway. So before an interview, just sit down and write down some of those creative things that you have done with kids. If you have taught a multitude of grades and just thinking about primary and secondary, think about projects that you have done with both of those grade levels. In a position like this one, it's very common, where you're going to be teaching a huge span of students, and you need to have those capabilities to be able to teach them all. So I taught second grade and third grade. But then I did a lot of afterschool clubs with older students, I did a Math Olympiad, a Battle of the Books, club science clubs. So if you haven't specifically taught that grade, maybe think about other ways that you have been involved with them. Or even think about the types of lessons that you would do with that age of students if you don't have any specific experience to talk about. 


Naomi Meredith  06:14

Next, to think about in your STEM teacher interview is to showcase your technology skills. I think I've mentioned this before, but not only am I our K through five STEM teacher, but I am our technology person full-time. So, I also had to showcase what are some ways that I am able to troubleshoot and problem-solve with technology, which, even if you're not the technology person, and that's not going to be part of your role, you need to know how to do this with technology. I didn't have somebody come in every single day that I've taught my students and say, “Hello, here's the technology you're going to teach as a STEM teacher. Here's exactly how to use it.” That's where I come in. That's why I'm doing this podcast and doing what I do. But for me, I didn't have that. So you might not have that either in your building at all times. Again, I'm here for you. But you need to showcase in your interview how you can problem solve, be creative with technology, and be willing to try new things. You're not going to know everything, and technology is always changing. Like I didn't know how to do 3D printing at all. I had a couple of 3D printers I troubleshooted. I did a lot of Googling, that is your best friend. So you definitely want to showcase that and think about, again, specific lessons that you have taught in your classroom when you have been using meaningful technology. I'm not talking about things like oh, my students typed on a Google Doc, oh, we use Google Classroom. Sure, great. But that's not very innovative. What is going to actually make you stand out? What are some cross-curricular lessons that you have taught when it comes to using technology? Bonus points if you are being creative. 


Naomi Meredith  07:57

Finally, the third thing to think about in your STEM teacher interview is to showcase your lesson planning skills. Back in episode 11, I talk about all the ways that I think classroom teachers make great STEM teachers. So definitely go back and listen to that because I think that's really going to help you when you're prepping for this interview or hopefully pitching yourself to have this type of job in your school or district. As I said before, most of you might not have interviewed for a job like this before or even have had this type of job, so it is scary. You don't really know what's going to be expected of you, and that's the creative part. It's really fun. But you do have the skills when it comes to lesson planning. If I wasn't a classroom teacher before becoming a K through five STEM teacher, I think I actually would have drowned when it comes to lesson planning. As I said, there was zero curriculum. Over the years, I have built a full K through five STEM year-long plan that is differentiated and leveled based on the ages of my students, you can grab the whole year-long plan at Naomimeredith.com/yearlongplan. But you coming into this interview, you don't need to have all of your STEM lessons figured out. You can have them, but you don't need them necessarily for this interview. So think about how you creatively lesson plan. See how all of this kind of goes together. Creativity, technology, the lesson planning standards are still important in STEM. There is a huge misconception out there that STEM is just throwing out cool toys and letting kids play with them. There is a ton of exploration in my class, but everything is very purposeful, and everything is aligned with standards. There is a big goal in mind. So yes, we do robots. Yes, we do that. But what is the purpose behind the robots? What is the task that we are going to complete? How are we integrating Common Core ELA and math standards? How are we adding in Mathematical Practices, the ISTE standards for students, the Engineering Design Process, your science standards? Don't just listen as I did. But really think about a lesson that you have done when you are integrating standards. Again, think about primary and secondary, but you have the skills of lesson planning, you're just going to be shifting to how to merge that all together for multiple grade levels. Also, how can you implement some tools that aren't always super common in the elementary classroom yet? 


Naomi Meredith  10:32

So as a recap, here are the three things that you need to keep in mind when you are tackling that STEM teacher interview. First, showcase your creativity. Next, showcase your technology skills. Third, showcase your lesson planning skills. Now, you might be wondering, what was the end result of that voice message that that teacher sent me? Here is what she emailed me back. So I actually sent her some interview questions, something that I had in my Google Drive. I sent them to her, and she emailed me back. I got the job, thanks for checking out your stuff. And just so you know, she has checked out my stuff. And she is actually a member of our STEM teacher bookshelf community and is collaborating with like-minded teachers like us. So a great place to join. Now, if you want to get in on these questions, I have them for you inside my STEM Teacher 101 Course. I have added a new module where there are 10 sample questions that, if I were interviewing people to be a STEM teacher, is probably what I would ask. These are probably some most common questions, or ones that are similar, that you would be asked. Not only are the questions inside of this STEM teacher 101 course, you actually will be able to hear me answer the questions. So I am taking on the role of a classroom teacher, so looking at my past self and how would I answer them coming into this type of interview. So you can get some ideas, hearing me talk, you might even have similar experiences, of course, make it personal to you. Let your personality shine, but I want to help you on this journey. That's why I do what I do. And definitely check that out. It's a great way for you to feel confident about this STEM teacher interview, and I am here right by your side. You can grab that at Naomi meredith.com/stemteacher101. And, of course, that is all linked in the show notes. Thank you so much. And let me know if you get that STEM interview. I can't wait to hear and have you as part of my big STEM community.

STEM teacher interview

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

STEM online community

3 Ways to Build Your STEM Online Community [ep.74]

3 Ways to Build Your STEM Online Community [ep.74]

STEM online community

Check out the full episode on 3 Ways to Build Your STEM Online Community:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Being a STEM teacher can sometimes feel lonely if you’re the only one in your building implementing and teaching STEM. It’s a lot of fun thinking of and implementing new STEM ideas in the classroom, but it would be nice to have a community of like-minded teachers to share these ideas with and who get what you experience as a STEM teacher. If you’re feeling alone as a STEM teacher, a STEM online community is what you need. In today’s episode, I share three ways to build your STEM online community.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • 3 ways to build your STEM online community
  • My personal experience with these online communities 
  • Tips for creating and joining a STEM online community

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Part of the fun of teaching elementary STEM is you have a lot of autonomy within your position, especially if you are the only teacher in you're building teaching STEM. It's a lot of fun to think of new ideas and implement them in your classroom. However, it can get quite isolating and lonely being the only person who is implementing all these cool ideas in your building. Likewise, maybe you're a classroom teacher who is implementing STEM and innovative ideas, and you might feel a bit alone because you're the only one who's ready to jump in and try all of these new ideas. I totally understand, and I have been in both of those positions. So you might be wondering, how can I connect with like-minded teachers who get what you are doing and keep that momentum going? In this episode, I will be sharing with you three ways to build your STEM online community that are easy to implement but also that will bring you a lot of value. 


Naomi Meredith  01:04

At the time of this episode that it's being released, it is this springtime, and you might be thinking, “Well, it's too late to start a community.” I actually don't think so. I know that springtime can be very overwhelming, but spring is actually an awesome time of year to actually try new things. Instead of just kicking back and relaxing for the end of the year, it's actually really fun to try new things, not only with your students but for yourself. Then in the summer, you can relax, you can refresh, and think of how you can keep that going into the new school year. So when it comes to building your STEM online community and connecting with teachers who are like-minded like you, these are things that I have definitely done, and they have brought so much value to me and made me feel less alone in the STEM space. 


Naomi Meredith  01:04

The first way to build your STEM online community is to build a virtual PLC. My definition of PLC is a professional learning community. You may even have heard it as PLM, your professional learning network, or other names that are very similar. When I first got started in this K through five STEM position, I was brand new to the district, brand new to the building, and brand new to the position with a limited amount of materials and zero curriculum. I was the only actual STEM teacher in my building, so I needed to reach out to people who had similar positions to me in my district. Luckily, there were a few others, and I got connected with them. They were other STEM teachers whose students would feed into our neighboring middle school or one that was nearby or the neighboring high school. So it was really good to connect with teachers who are in similar positions. We had similar schedules, and we could talk about different things, whether it was lesson planning or behavior management ideas. We would talk about how we can have our student learning outcomes and do some grading, which I do have a past episode about that, and how to create student learning outcomes for your students in STEM. But this has been so powerful in my growth as a STEM teacher and just having teachers that I can rely on. We meet about twice a month, and we have a day during, luckily, our planned time. We all have the same planned time. But you can even think about how you could do this after school or even just once a month. We just meet over zoom or Microsoft Teams or whatever we are using that year. But we meet virtually, and it's just been really awesome. Being able to connect with these teachers and, again, have these conversations that you probably would have if you had an actual team, but just not feeling so alone, especially since we are in the same district. Now if you don't have that luxury of being in the same district, this next tip might actually help you out in how you can build your professional learning community, and if you don't have anybody else who's doing the same thing as you. 


Naomi Meredith  02:59

And finally, the third way to build your STEM teacher community, to wrap it all up nicely, I would say in a pretty little bow, is my new upcoming STEM teacher bookshelf. Now, if you are not an avid reader, don't just shut off this podcast like don't worry about it. The whole goal of this is that we will have a book to base our conversations on each month. I'm very picky about the books that I have chosen, and for the time of year, I have picked them. Most of the ones during the school year have an audiobook companion, or they are very short, so it's not a big deal reading them. But if you are an avid reader during the school year, or that's just not where you're at yet, or you want to wait till this summer, you can definitely join this community. A big part of it is there's actually a private community of teachers where you will get to interact and talk about these topics that are discussed in the books. Again, if you read the book, it's really helpful. But if you don't, that's okay too because they're topics that we should be talking about anyway. It's a great chance for you to post questions, chat with each other, and even maybe connect with teachers where you could meet virtually. But not only that, but inside this community, we will have monthly live zoom calls, where you can see each other's faces, and I will be in their hosting. We, of course, will chat about the books, the themes, and the topics and get to know each other that way. So think of it like your virtual happy hour. I know that it's hard to meet up with teachers, but this will be a really fun time where we can chat and interact together. And, of course, there are prizes throughout the month. I love giving away presents and prizes. So there are some fun incentives, especially if you are among the first 50 people to join the membership. I have the prizes sitting at my back table you can see behind me in the video version of this, but I have some fun things I will be sending in the mail if you're a part of the first 50 who sign up. So it's a really great community. It'll constantly be growing and is just a great way for you to jump in and read a book together and have a guide that can guide your thinking and help you think about ways that you can grow in your STEM practice. Even when I was getting my masters in STEM leadership, that was something that I wish I had was more books to read. We had a lot of articles but not a lot of books. But just more of a real authentic community. Yes, I had to comment on people's posts, but I just wanted to have a community to chat with people and to connect and have these nerdy conversations about elementary STEM. So I thought I just wanted to create my own bookshelf. Have a membership and create my own community where people really want to be there. The cool thing is it's only nine bucks a month. So cheaper than what two coffees that you're already going to get on your way to work. My days are Mondays and Fridays. I like to start my week with little coffee treats, but super cheap, and you can jump on in and then, again, build up that STEM teacher community that you have been hoping for. You can have a safe space to build and bounce ideas off of one another. So if you are listening to this live, you can still get in on the waitlist, and that is Naomimeredith.com/bookclubwaitlist. If you're listening to this after April 1, so April 1 is when it opens, definitely jump in on that, and you can join in on this membership at Naomimeredith.com/stemteacherbookshelf. 


Naomi Meredith  03:00

The second way to build your STEM online community is to try jumping in on social media. Now if you're not a huge social media person, that's totally okay. You don't have to be posting all the time and doing all the things, but there are so many cool opportunities out there for you to connect with other teachers. So again, if you don't have other people who are in your district, maybe consider reaching out to other people on social media and see if you guys could connect that way. I do have a free Facebook community that you can jump in on. It's called the elementary STEM coach community, where you can connect with other teachers. I know that there are a ton of other Facebook groups that you can join that I am a part of as well. It's really awesome to hear from other people who have the same problems that I have faced, or the same successes, or just interesting questions I might not have ever thought of. So this is a really great way to connect. Maybe you've been doing this for a while, maybe you are a classroom teacher, or maybe you are going to be a STEM teacher this upcoming school year, so you definitely want to have some sort of community. You can also reach out to people on Instagram. My Instagram is @NaomiMeredith_, and I'm very active over there. I love it. I love chatting with teachers in my Instagram stories, my DMs, and my comments. You can reach out to me and other STEM teachers as well. Again, what I really love about Instagram, you don't have to be a huge poster yourself. But there are people who do post and share things that they're doing in their classroom. It's almost like having an interactive Pinterest board. So it's really fun to meet teachers that way. I've met a lot of teachers there, and a lot of them have actually been guests on this podcast because of Instagram, which is so awesome. So it just makes the whole world a lot smaller. Likewise, in other areas that are not as active, you can definitely check out Twitter. I know Twitter is a huge thing when it comes to STEM in tech, especially a lot of those ad tech companies. They're really active, usually on Twitter. Maybe even think about YouTube, or there are some YouTubers that you enjoy watching. You can comment and interact with them there. I do have a YouTube channel, and these podcast episodes are slowly being posted there. My channel also has helpful video tutorials to help you out in your classroom. So you could just check that out. It's Naomi Meredith_, the same handle as my Instagram, @NaomiMeredith_. So social media is so awesome, though it can be, of course, detrimental to our students. That's a whole other conversation. But when it comes to building up your teacher connections, it is an awesome place to go. 


Naomi Meredith  10:53

As a recap, here are the three ways that you can build your STEM online community. The first is building a virtual PLC. Next is to connect on social media and choose the platform that works best for you or try one you haven't tried before. And finally, join in on this brand new STEM teacher bookshelf membership that is made for you to connect, read and chat together every single day and meet live every month. Thank you so much again for being here. I am so happy with how this podcast has been going and just being able to connect with all of you and build my own network and also create something for you and other future things to help you feel successful and not alone. I totally understand where you are coming from, and that is why exactly why I am doing what I am doing to help you feel confident in your role and to be able to navigate this STEM space, not feeling alone but feeling excited and invigorated in a super fun role. I am definitely here to support you. So again, thank you so much for being here. Wherever you are listening and whenever you are listening, I am so proud of you and excited for you. I hope that I get to see you inside the STEM teacher bookshelf membership.

STEM online community

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

stem teacher boundaries

3 STEM Teacher Boundaries You Need Now [ep.56]

3 STEM Teacher Boundaries You Need Now [ep.56]

STEM teacher boundaries

Check out the full episode on 3 STEM Teacher Boundaries You Need Now:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Stepping into a K through five STEM role is equally exciting and overwhelming. If you were a classroom teacher before, like I was, you were thrown into a whole bunch of new teacher responsibilities.

Without systems and boundaries, you can quickly drown in everything you have to do, and you might not get anything done. In this episode, I will share with you three STEM teacher boundaries that you need to start now to be productive and not overwhelmed.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • 3 STEM teacher boundaries
  • Why each boundary is important
  • Tips for implementing each boundary

Resources Mentioned: 

 

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Stepping into a K through five STEM role is equal parts exciting and overwhelming. If you were a classroom teacher before, like I was, you were definitely thrown into a whole bunch of new teacher responsibilities. Without systems and  boundaries set in place, you can quickly drown in all of the things that you have to do, and you might not get anything done. In this episode, I will be sharing with you three STEM teacher boundaries that you need to start now, so you can be productive and not overwhelmed. 


Naomi Meredith  01:08

Before we jump in, I have a couple quick announcements for you. So the doors are open for my K-2 virtual STEM planning workshop where you can join me and other teachers live to create a unit plan for one of your primary student grades while also building up, like we're talking about in this episode, systems and routines to help you with your K-2 STEM planning. It can be very overwhelming planning for the younger students. But within this two-hour timeframe, you are going to be productive and be filled with so many ideas that you might have more than what the school year even has for you. So definitely check in the shownotes for the link. As I said, you can join live, and it will be recorded. So if you can't be there live, still join in that recording, which will be sent to you and you can work on it in your own time. So definitely worth a two-hour investment where you can set this up for you to be productive for the whole rest of the school year. Likewise, I have an upcoming STEM virtual book club that I would love for you to join. I know it can be a lot reading books as a teacher throughout the school year. But there's lots of ways that you can implement it throughout your day. I will even have pacing guides for the book that we will read that month. I'm not picking anything super huge anyway. But as a STEM teacher, you always need to continue to learn and promote a growth mindset in your own life and for your students. So what better way to do that with this book club. So the doors aren't open yet on that one. But make sure to check out the waitlist so you will be notified as soon as it's open. And we can start reading together or just join for the community part because we know in clubs you don't always read the book anyway. But it's good to have those discussions. So definitely want you to be a part of that this year. 


Naomi Meredith  03:02

I've talked a little bit here and there on this podcast about my role as a K through five STEM teacher. But as my first year in this role, it was a new position and district, so I had a lot of hats that I had to wear. On Mondays I would teach GT science. Yep, gifted and talented science to students who are identified in science. And then Mondays and Tuesdays the times I wasn't meeting with my group of students, then I would co-plan and co-teach with teachers in my building to help them implement STEM innovation into their regular instruction. Wednesday through Friday, I was part of the STEM specials rotation where I would see students K through five, my same six classes for those three days in a row. And then it would start all over again. On top of that I was, and I still am, the point of contact and technology person in the building. So there's no other person in her building, who's the tech person for troubleshooting. That's all me. And yes, all of these things I don't get paid extra for. So with the funding and who we have in our building, how I split the week with the specials rotation, I now teach K through five STEM and I am still the tech person. So with all of these different things, and I know as a teacher you have a whole lot of things going on too, so setting boundaries is super, super, super important no matter what your role is, because you really need to protect your time. I've said this before, teaching K through five STEM is like throwing a birthday party six times. It is a very high energy position, and you need to make every moment special and exciting for all the classes because STEM is important and you love it. I know you do, you're in this position. But you definitely need to have these boundaries in place so you can actually plan during your plan time. I hardly take work home and that is because I have a lot of boundaries and I use my plan time to plan. Now, if there's something I need to research and learn more about, sure, I'll do it over the weekend. But that's pretty rare. I'm not doing that very often. So when it comes to actual planning and work, I don't do it outside of school, I do things like this for you. And I gave you a thumbs up. This might sound really strict with the things I'm going to be sharing about. But just a little bit of insight about me, I grew up as being a yes person. I didn't have any boundaries. I just always said yes to things and then it just made me very anxious. I just thought, that's what nice people do. That's what a nice girl does. Well, I have been really growing in this area as a person. I'm being vulnerable on here. But setting boundaries is a good thing. It's taken me a long time to realize that, and not just in your job, but in life in general boundaries are okay. It's okay to say no, I'm not perfect at this. But I'm definitely going to be sharing these strategies that have really helped me, as a STEM teacher. Even as a teacher in the classroom, this is very helpful as well, where my boundaries in the workspace as a STEM teacher helped me to be successful, but also the people around me, it helps them be successful as well. I can't be in 10 million places at once, even though I tried to be in a lot of different ways. But setting these things up can really maximize your time and your space overall, and even just make this STEM teaching more enjoyable, which is the thing that we love the most. So here are the three boundaries that I use that I think you can do as well. 


Naomi Meredith  06:46

The first boundary to set in place is starting and ending your class on time. This one's hard and easy. There's a lot of tricks that I have for this one. But my reasoning for this is that you need to build respect for yourself. If you're not starting or ending on time, how can you expect the classroom teachers to bring their students to start and end on time? I of course make mistakes. There's times that I'm like, oh, no, I didn't realize it was a different schedule today. But overall, I'm pretty good at starting and ending on time. And yes, it does take time being in your space to understand the flow of the classroom and how you're going to set that up, which we talked about a lot in past episodes, specifically check out episode eight and 12, where I talked about management, behavior management and classroom management. Even thinking about the structure of your lessons that's going to help you with the time management in general, if your classroom feels like a hurricane every single day. Since there's no system, it will be hard to start and end on time. So really get that in place. Here are a few tricks that I do that for the students. I like them to visually see how much time they have to actually work. Just setting up a timer on the screen is extremely helpful. This will help them in the long run to to set up their own boundaries. So see how we're helping each other. I like to use classroom screen.com, my absolute favorite free online tool. You can buy the paid version, and I think it'll save all your screens. I don't 100% know, but I absolutely love it. And a fun new background pops up every day. For myself, even in conjunction with that classroom screen, I will set timers on my watch all day. I am always talking to my watch, like a spy kid, where I'm like, Hey, I'm not going to say it out loud, because my watch actually might do it, I'm wearing it. But I will tell my watch to set a certain number timers and it does on my hand. So that's really helpful for my class time. Also, for my transition time, I have five to 10 minutes and between classes, which I know is very lucky not everybody gets. But even for that transition time. As soon as the class leaves, I set a timer on my watch, which is going to help me with starting the next class on time. Likewise, I have set up in my Google Calendar. That is my preference. I think you can do this in Outlook, if that's the calendar you use. But I have set up a recurring event for my whole STEM schedule of when my plan time is when I see each class when my lunchtime is. So I have that set up in my calendar as a recurring event. So when you look at my calendar, it always looks like I have a lot going on. But I have it all set up connected to my watch where I have all the times pop up on my watch and I know my schedule for the day. I will even go in if we have a delayed start and change the time so the correct times will pop up so I'm not referring to an email and all of that. So this sounds very type A I have been type A in the past or qualities of either type A but I'm actually more of a B-plus kind of person. But there are some things that really help with that time management when it comes to the end. have class when students are all cleaned up and ready to go, I'm very thankful for this setup where my classroom is, but I actually have students line up in my hallway, this may or may not be an option for you. But the students are in the hallway and they are ready to go for their teacher. The classroom teachers don't like it when they're in the hallway very long, because they get start getting loud and noisy. I'm not I'm not going to manage that. So the classroom teachers will actually almost always show up on time, because they know I'm going to end on time and their kids are going to be in the hallway ready for them. So this has actually helped teachers finish up their playing time. I know playing time is precious, I was a classroom teacher to my time is equally as precious as well. Those in between times, I will have to use the restroom, get water be an actual human, set up something really quick for a transition, I might even need to talk to a student privately, or a teacher might have a question for me privately. So that little bit of time and not just sitting there with my feet up on the table will not be nice. But that's really important. I've worked at schools where specialist teachers who don't end on time, the classroom teachers will end up showing up late and it just creates this whole cycle. So build that trustworthiness, really starting to end on time. It's such a good boundary, it can be really hard, you will mess up, I still mess that. But overall, it's just a really good thing to set in place. 


Naomi Meredith  11:24

The next STEM teacher boundary is to own your email. I'm awesome. At my work email, I'm trying to get away better with my work email. I'm just figuring out how the common themes and everything. But with work email, I'm so good at it. This has always been a good hack for me. And I know email can be overwhelming, but own it, you can definitely own it and make it work for you. I really try to have at least 15 or less emails in my inbox. That means I'm constantly reading my emails when they pop up on my phone. I am hardly ever sitting down and answering emails during my plan time or when I get to school. I feel like that is a big waste of time. And a lot of the emails are things that are quick and that can be answered or just need like a one or two sentence reply. So I am reading my email all day. I know as a classroom teacher, that can be hard when you have parents who are emailing you. So that is definitely up to you. Maybe your school policy, you're not allowed to check your phone. But I am looking at my email all day I have a popup on my watch. I can't respond on my watch at this time. But I'm always reading it. And I'm always deleting emails, replying back and sorting them in folders. So I have a ton of different folders set up where I am organizing things constantly, so I can refer back to them when I need them. It is such a big pet peeve of mine when people don't read their emails, even if I don't answer right away. I read it. I read things right away. That also includes my work email, I'm reading it right away. Sometimes I need to think about the answer or do some research about it. But I read it all the way. And so that can be really frustrating to when I email and people ask me the same question. So oftentimes, I will reformat things that I have said before, in just a nice way. It's like kind of like will read your email. So be an adult on your email, read it. But definitely checking it throughout the day helps a time, it will give you back a lot of your plan time. Likewise, with that, I told you that I am the tech person. And so I will have teachers email me if they have a specific technology issue, I actually can answer them a lot quicker. And then if they come into my room and interrupt me when I'm teaching, I'm teaching just like they're teaching, I don't want to go and interrupt them. So an email can be way quicker, I can oftentimes take a screenshot of the solution. 


Naomi Meredith  13:44

Before reading an email I sent to another teacher who had a similar issue, I can type it out pretty fast. And so it's not as disturbing. Trust me, I'm not on my phone all day, I don't get that many emails. So don't picture I'm in my classroom. I'm on my phone constantly. But I'm just saying just answer them as they come. And it will help you with that technology management. I also like to send calendar invites, I have Outlook for my work email, but you can do this any Google calendar as well. But I like to send invites, if I am meeting with teachers one on one, because that way it will pop up in their calendar as well. I don't have to send a reminder email, it will do that for them. And also for me, I have it in my calendar as well. So then it can definitely keep me organized. So that's a nice hack as well. Finally, when it comes to emails that you are sending all the time, you're like, Ah, I send this all the time. I'm always saying the same thing like bring your devices to STEM in my classroom actually don't have a computer lab, the students actually bring their classroom devices and bring them to STEM. I've done that for the whole five years. I've been in this position and it's good for student responsibility of their devices. But if I know they're going to bring their devices for a unit I will actually set add up my emails to pre send for that unit the day before at 3pm. So if a teacher does happen to see it on a weekend, I don't expect them to, but it'll be in their inbox in the morning when they come into work. So they know students need to bring their devices. So it's nice to have these all set up and pre scheduled. So I'm not scrambling, oh, no, they need their computers or the classroom teacher is not scrambling. So that's really helpful as well. I will also do this for my after school clubs, I have a whole bunch of clubs that are going on and multiple groups. So I will sit down, yes, this takes some time. But then I don't have to go and think about it later. I will schedule reminder emails of when they are meeting that day, what time they need to be picked up. And so that is all set up for my whole rest of school year, I have my email scheduled all the way till the end of the school year. So that way, that's not an email, I have to think about, like I said, and it is all ready to go. Finally, with the email also set up notification timers. This is something that I have played around with on my phone, but I have my email setup on my phone where it will turn on notifications during the workday. And it will also turn off when the workday is over. It won't turn on during weekends, I will also manually turn it off when I have a day off of work, or if it's a holiday, because you'd want me to answering email outside of school. Yes, I'll answer during the day. But there's usually nothing that important that I need to be looking at and reading when I'm not at school. And if I'm staying on top of it, there's not much that's happening outside of school anyway. So that's just really protecting my time, you could even delete the app during holiday breaks if you want to. But that is your time. And I think that's super important. So play around with your notification settings, that can be really helpful. 


Naomi Meredith  16:50

The final boundary I have is for technology management. So if you are like me, you are the tech person or you collaborate with a tech person in your building. These are some strategies and boundaries that I have set up in my space and in my building, because there weren't any before. So this took a lot of work and growth mindset for me and for the classroom teachers as well, to make sure that we can be successful. So if you don't manage to type technology also listen in this might also actually help you with your classroom as well and how things are managed. Even though I am the designated technology person, STEM isn't and shouldn't be the only class in the building where students use technology. So there might be mixed opinions of this in your building. But this shouldn't be the only time they're using devices. We are living in a digital age and students should be interacting and using technology in different ways throughout the day. We do as teachers, we don't just use it to type a word document, althoughwe're hopefully using it as a creation tool and a teaching tool. And we have to teach our students that. So likewise, if teachers are using this in their classroom, they also have to learn how to troubleshoot and do all that this goes back to growth mindset. I didn't know any of this stuff, I knew little things here and there coming into this role, but I didn't even know the Wi Fi password for two weeks in this role. So there definitely is needs to be a growth mindset. I know you can't tell people that but also giving teachers the opportunity to troubleshoot on their own and try it and giving them the tools to be successful, will also help you out as well with the boundaries. 


Naomi Meredith  18:32

A couple of ways that I do this is I will talk to the staff at the beginning of the year of what my role is and ways that they can get support with technology help. So a lot of teachers who are new in the building don't even know what STEM is. So I'll even explain that and how that's different than a technology class. You might be lucky and work in a building where you have STEM and technology I know of teachers who've had that even to showing the difference between the two and how tools will be used in your space. So that will help teachers with their lesson planning. Also, I provide them a back to school technology checklist. I will link this in the show notes. It'll be completely free. So you can check it out, modify how you need it. But it is a digital checklists I'll send out a couple weeks before school starts. They can look at it when they need. But I will not only have a checklist of things they need to set up in their room on their teacher device for student accounts during that work week. But I will also link videos and helpful guides that will help them through that process if they don't know how to do it. Likewise, they really encourage us for you before me for the teachers to really help each other out. Often I will see teachers asked me a question but then their teammate just asked me the day before the same question I went in and help them so it really helps encourage them to talk to each other to problem solve the problem. Also, if you're in a similar position and even think about the technology that you have in your classroom, if there is not a system in place, set one up, out was in charge of assigning all of the devices in my school and when we became a one to one district, so that meant every student in our district would have a device that was assigned to them like a library book. And this change came maybe a few weeks before school started. And I was in charge of assigning all of them to 500 plus units by myself. So there was no system set in place. So that is something that I set up that is repeatable by me. Or if there was anybody else who was in my position or helping me with that would be so lovely if I had help, but that way that it could be repeatable as well. 


Naomi Meredith  20:35

So setting up this system for any tool that you're using in your classroom is really helpful so that others can understand the process as well. And it will help you wrap your mind around it. Also, any way that you can get students and teachers involved in the process. For us students will use the same device every year for four years, and then they'll get a new device. And so that means students end the school year their devices are in their cart, and then they have to go with them to the next grade. Well, that's a lot on one person to assign out. So what I'll do is, I'll put all of the carts in our library, and then teachers will come bring their classroom to the library to get their last year's device, after they've talked about digital citizenship and handling their device. And then they'll bring it back to the room and then I'll deliver the classroom cart. So that's a good incentive as well, because if they don't pick up their device, they won't have a cart that I can reassign. So it also gets that buy in as well, where it's also not all on me, but it's helping with that responsibility too. As a recap, here are the three STEM teacher boundaries that you can set up to really help maximize your time and your productivity. First, we talked about starting and ending your class on time. Next is owning your email. And finally setting up systems and routines when it comes to your technology management. Like I said before, setting up boundaries is okay and it can be hard at first finding things that will work for you. But in the long run if you are being consistent with yourself and consistent with others. It will really help preserve your time and get you to the part where you are teaching the kids doing what you love and making a big impact in your classroom. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of the elementary STEM coach podcast. I would love to connect with you over on Instagram at Naomi Meredith underscore or send me an email to elementary STEM Coach podcast@gmail.com. Also make sure to check out my website Naomi meredith.com To see all the show notes from today's episode, and Chapman K through five STEM resources. Any questions you have needs for resources or ideas for episodes, get in touch. I'll talk to you soon.

stem teacher boundaries

 

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Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

stem teacher do

What Does a K-6 STEM Teacher Do? with Kristin Kinner [ep.52]

What Does a K-6 STEM Teacher Do? with Kristin Kinner [ep.52]

stem teacher do

Check out the full episode on What Does a K-6 STEM Teacher Do? with Kristin Kinner:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

In today's episode, I interview Kristin Kenner, who is a K through sixth STEM teacher who taught in a regular classroom for over 25 years. I know many of you will relate to Kristin’s experience since many of you were also in the classroom before your STEM role. Kristin and I were talking over the summer before her role in STEM, and she was super nervous and asking for advice.

I knew that the experience she already had would be so helpful in her STEM role. In this episode, Kristin shares her journey as a classroom teacher turned STEM teacher, how she’s received grants to purchase materials for her STEM classroom, lessons from my TpT shop that Kristin has implemented in her classroom, and much more!

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Kristin’s journey as a first-year STEM teacher
  • How she used grants to fund materials for her STEM classroom
  • Her process for getting approved for grants
  • STEM lessons from Naomi’s TpT shop that Kristin's students enjoy

Meet Kristin Kinner:

Kristin Kinner is an elementary STEM teacher in her first year in STEM. She has taught for over 25 years in first, second, and fourth grades and has been a learning specialist and reading specialist in K-12. She currently inspires over 725 students to follow their passions in K-6 STEM. Kristin loves meeting and collaborating with other innovative educators and exploring new learning with her students.

Connect with Kristin:

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

In today's episode, I am interviewing Kristin Kinner who is a K through five STEM teacher who taught in the regular classroom for over 25 years. I thought her experience was super relatable to many of you who are listening. Most of you were also in the classroom before this role, and I thought that this would be a perfect fit for a guest on this show. Kristin and I have connected over the years through different ways and platforms. More recently, the InnEdCO Conference, which is a local conference in Colorado that is all about innovation. So definitely recommend it if you want to take a trip to Colorado or you live in the area. It's a really awesome conference. We were talking over the summer before her role in STEM, and she was super nervous and asking for advice. I knew that her experience that she already had would be so helpful in her STEM role, and you're going to hear the passion in her voice. She loves teaching K through six STEM, and I'm sure a lot of you can relate to her story. Before teaching in K through six STEM she taught in first, second, and fourth grades, and was also a learning specialist and reading specialist in Kindergarten. She teaches over 725 students, which is a lot of kids. Kristin loves meeting and collaborating with other innovative educators and exploring new learning with her students. I am so excited for you to listen to this interview. She is so much fun, and I can't wait for you to listen. 


Naomi Meredith  02:04

All right, Kristin. Well, thank you so much for being here today. I was so excited you said yes to me. We were emailing back and forth and like, “Hey, do you want to be on the podcast?” So I'm so glad you said yes to me because I think your experience and your background and teaching is super valuable. I think that your story of where you've been in education and how you got to STEM can really resonate with a lot of teachers here on the podcast. Because like me, and I'm pretty sure like you, we just kind of got thrown into it with a passion that we had. So if you wouldn't mind telling us more about yourself and your teaching background and how you became a STEM teacher.


Kristin Kinner  02:41

Well, Hi, Naomi. Thank you so much for having me on your podcast. As you know, I'm an elementary to STEM teacher. This is my first year in STEM. I've taught for over 25 years in first, second, and fourth grades mostly. I've been a learning specialist and a reading specialist, so I have a background in special education. Currently I inspire over 725 students to follow their passion in STEM. I love meeting and collaborating with other innovative educators and just exploring new learning with my students.


Naomi Meredith  03:16

You have a lot of kids? 


Kristin Kinner  03:18

Yes. 


Naomi Meredith  03:20

Wait, did you say sixth grade you have or is it just K through five?


Kristin Kinner  03:24

It's K through six, and then we have a discovery program at my school, which has four self contained GT classrooms. So I have those classes as well. So I teach teach eight classes a day. 


Naomi Meredith  03:40

Wait, how does your schedule work with eight classes? I thought six was a lot. I have six. How does your schedule work?


Kristin Kinner  03:47

So I start in the morning and I teach sixth, fifth and fourth. Then I have lunch and we have two buildings. So then I take my stuff over to the primary building and I teach K-3. Then I teach the discovery class at the very end. Yeah, it's busy.


Naomi Meredith  04:06

Do you have two separate classrooms then, or are you teaching in their classrooms?


Kristin Kinner  04:11

I do. I have two separate rooms. I have an innovative lab at the intermediate building and I have a STEM lab that's particularly primary in a primary building.


Naomi Meredith  04:22

I did not know this. I need to go visit your school. I did not know you did that. That's a lot.


Kristin Kinner  04:33

It's a lot of fun though. And it keeps me moving and motivated.


Naomi Meredith  04:37

So what has been your favorite part about teaching STEM? Because you you have so much background in teaching and you're, I mean, I don't know when you can retire by but you could be like “Hey, see ya,” but now look at you. You're in STEM. So what have been your favorite parts about it so far?


Kristin Kinner  04:52

I really love robotics. So we're doing a lot of robotics right now. Bee bots are being used with Kindergarten and first grade. Then I've got Dash robots for second, third and fourth. Then we're going to get into using the Vex Go Systems with fifth and sixth grade as the year progresses. Yeah, so it should be fun.


Naomi Meredith  05:16

Yeah. Have you even opened up those Vex Go Sustems? Yeah, I haven't used those, but I've heard really good things about them.


Kristin Kinner  05:22

I have opened them up. I haven't done a lot with them. I'm gonna do some exploring over Christmas break to see what we can find.


Naomi Meredith  05:34

Yeah, cuz are those the kits where they actually build the robot? Or am I thinking of something else?


Kristin Kinner  05:39

Yeah, they will actually build the robot. Yes.


Naomi Meredith  05:44

That is so cool. Wow. So you have that many classes a day. So you love robotics? Has there been anything that like surprised you? Because I know coming from the classroom is a lot. You and I were talking at the InnEdCO conference, and you're so sweet. Like, I'm so nervous. I don't know where it to start. I'm like, “Well, you've been a teacher for a long time. I think it'll be okay.” But has there been anything that has surprised you where you're like, “Whoa, I did not expect this?”


Kristin Kinner  06:16

No, I think the hardest thing is going from teaching primary for so long to working with some of the older students. But a lot of the things that we've done, I tried to plan something that kind of fits with each grade level. So sixth grade, we use the global goals. They created PSAs to kind of talk about what they might do to work toward a global goal. Fifth grade, we have hydroponic gardens. So they are doing a whole hydroponic gardening unit, that's just for their grade. With fourth grade, I'm working with otter cares and doing Project HEART, which is a service or a philanthropy unit. So they're going to be creating some service projects that we carry out through STEM, just to keep some things going for each of them.


Naomi Meredith  07:08

Yeah, so how often do you see the kids then? Because those sound like really big projects? I haven't heard of global goal or otter cares. Do you do these projects in five days? Or is this something that would carry on for multiple rotations? How does that work with your timing?


Kristin Kinner  07:26

So I see each class for a full week, Monday through Friday, and we have a four week rotation. So we have four classes on each grade level. So I repeat my lessons four times with sixth grade, the global goals, or the 2030 sustainable goals. So like, no poverty, free freshwater, those kinds of things. All people have proper nutrition. They worked on researching, and that took, like, a week. Then the second week was putting together what they wanted to put on their public service announcement. Some of them did Google Slides, because they were familiar with that. But once we introduced the green screen and actually recording using iPads, they were able to record. A lot of them recorded, and had and made videos and stuff.


Naomi Meredith  08:22

So is this more like project based learning? Or do you use the Engineering Design Process or kind of both? Because that's super interesting. I haven't talked to anybody who's done long term projects like this, that I'm so curious how you set that all up.


Kristin Kinner  08:38

I can share it with you. It was just basically I had like a doc that they filled in, and I shared through Google Classroom. That kind of was the framework for what I wanted them to find out, and for what I wanted them to share in their public service announcement, and they just went from there. They're on my website, so you can see what some of the kids did.


Naomi Meredith  09:04

Oh, yeah, we'll definitely have to link that. That is super interesting. It's funny you say that. I'm with you on having a harder time with the older kids. I mean, I think your lessons are really good. But a lot of people are the opposite of you. A lot of people struggle with the little kids more than the older kids. So are there any strategies you would say for the little kids that people should try? Because a lot of people I get have a lot of questions about little kids.


Kristin Kinner  09:30

I tried to connect the younger ones to stories. So a lot of the k one might be more just build oriented and creating that way. This week, we did your lesson on 10 on the sled, so they had to decide what they wanted to build for their sleds and came up with some really cute ideas. Those books are like kind of the vehicle to launch a lot of my lessons. First, second, and third, we did Tacky the Penguin. It was Tacky in the Winter Games. So they had to do a direct drawing of the penguin. Then they had some clothing that they had to either design or there was a copy page they could color them in. But I took it a step further with the second and third graders. They had to create a coding path for Dash Robot to dress Tacky, say to put the pieces all around the coding mat and collect them using the robot. So kind of integrating a few different things.


Naomi Meredith  10:40

 Oh, that's a great way to start. I know I've talked about this in past episodes, like if you can integrate books, that is the best way to get started, or are just busy times of year engaging younger students, and even for sub plans. I don't know if you've left books for subs, that's something I definitely have done. It's super, like everybody loves reading. But a lot of us in elementary love reading books anyway, we have a lot of our favorites. So you might as well integrate that. Do you ever do like STEM stations with the little kids or other types of projects?


Kristin Kinner  11:15

Yes, I do. I have some trays that are set up just for that purpose. So I have like six different trays. So when projects are finished, there's different things that they can go to. If I'm ever out, I usually leave STEM stations for a set, because the directions are there on the card, and the materials are ready to go. So I just put them on the table and read the directions and have the kids go like four to a table. Then you rotate after 15 minutes, and it keeps it easy for the sub and it keeps the kids engaged.


Naomi Meredith  11:51

Yeah, what types of things are on the trays? I'm trying to visualize these trays, I'm so curious.


Kristin Kinner  11:58

One is just a whole collection of pipe cleaners. They have to make a net to collect a ball, which is like a paper ball. One, I have Legos set up in this large tray that my daughter made. She's a student at CU. I put LEGO platforms in there. They're building a whole hockey station in there. So kids can work on it continually. Then others can add to it. One of them is using Keva blocks to build a bridge. So there's different supplies. I just take out the container and put them on tables and explain what's what. Tthen they're easy to pack up to.


Naomi Meredith  12:39

Oh, yeah, I love that organization. I'm thinking too like, what about the space, but you said you had two buildings you go to? So that's nice too where you have, oh, here's more of the primary supplies in the secondary because having those, you need a lot of stuff. I feel like for the little kids, I don't know, that's something that I have found. When I came into my classroom, I didn't have any of that building stuff. So I asked classroom teachers if they have any extra math manipulatives. I used most of my budget that year on just simple building supplies that you mentioned. But I know that you had to gather, well, I mean, you had to gather a lot of supplies for two rooms. How did you get all the supplies for your classroom? Because that's a lot of stuff you need.


Kristin Kinner  13:21

So I was very lucky to step into a well equipped, innovative lab and that was at the intermediate building. So fourth, fifth and sixth. We had a lot of tools for the students to learn and a lot of the consumables. I just set up another room in the primary building, which was a little more challenging, but I write a lot of grants and get a lot of funding from different companies. So all robotics last year, we're funded through different brands. Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  13:53

Wait, so do you write directly to the companies? This isn't Donors Choose? How do you do this? This is amazing.


Kristin Kinner  14:00

So there are some companies like one grant I got was through Toshiba America. It was $1,000, and I received funding for six Dash robots, and some other supplies for the robotics like chargers and stuff, so I can charge six of them at a time. Yeah. Then this year, I got a grant through Westera, and they funded the lights for my hydroponic gardens. Because like a true engineer, designer, I had gardens, but I didn't have grow lights. So I was like, Oh, they're not growing. I had to come up with a way to problem solve and come up with lights because nothing was growing. This whole project was flopping. So I wrote a grant and Westera and my principal both bought a set of lights for our gardens. So now they're growing like there's no tomorrow.


Naomi Meredith  15:01

Oh yeah, well, this is like kind of off topic, but it's similar. So when my family moved out of Colorado, like you take stuff to Goodwill, so my mom's like, take all this stuff to Goodwill. I'm like, okay, so she loaded all this stuff in my trunk. While I'm unloading it, all the people at Goodwill were laughing at me. Then I realized she put a bunch of grow lights and growing things in my trunk. So I really set somebody up for their home garden, whatever that may be like in Colorado, you guys can connect the dots. But yeah, you definitely need the lights for sure. Growing herbs, like legit herbs, my mom, like grew herbs on my counter, like, that's it not illegal. But um, yeah, that's a good point. So how did you find these grants? I've never heard of this. I'm thinking of Darrell. Darrell, if you're listening, you've asked me about grants. So you need to listen to this part. How did you find these?


Kristin Kinner  15:53

I searched for educational grants, we can search by state. I found Toshiba that way. That was actually the second grant that I'd gotten from Toshiba. I'd got one a few years back. It was mostly for a collaboration station just for like furniture, and some other games and tools in my first grade class probably about six or seven years ago. I still have the table. But yeah, it's just a nice way, especially if you need some of those, like, the Keva blocks. I have zoob tubes and extra Legos, if you need any of that stuff. Just a small grant, aside from Donors Choose, they will fund a few different things.


Naomi Meredith  16:35

Oh, yeah, that's great advice because I know that can be really inhibiting in our position, like you have found where you need stuff. I mean, you can definitely teach them with having cardboard, and a Makerspace. But I feel like Makerspace is just one unit, which if that's all you can afford, it's better than nothing to be honest. But we really want to provide these experiences for kids and buying high quality materials that are going to last more than one time. So having the Bee Bots or Blue Bots are definitely worth your investment. More so than those Code and Go Mice do the same thing. They're not very good. But that is so smart. I did not know you could do that. That's really helpful for people. If you guys don't know where to get started, I have a free guide for just a spreadsheet of different things that you can buy with different budgets. So that can help with your pricing and has a lot of the stuff that you mentioned Kristin with all of those really hands on materials, because you need you need all that cool stuff. I mean, it really helps like their imaginations and thinking of the world in new ways. So you said that the 10 on the sled was super fun with your kids? Has there been anything else of mine that you've used in your classroom that you've seen success with your kids?


Kristin Kinner  17:53

I've used a lot of your resources. 


Naomi Meredith  17:56

Oh, okay. I did not know this. 


Kristin Kinner  17:58

I did. Your marble maze, and the kids went bananas. They loved it. One kid made a really tiny one that was probably like four inches by four inches. They use cocktail straws around the edge. We even made marbles out of pieces of clay with one of the groups.


Naomi Meredith  18:18

Oh, yeah.


Kristin Kinner  18:21

Yeah, they did some amazing things. We did your spider pulley in October and they got to keep the spider ring.


Naomi Meredith  18:30

Oh, look at you go. I don't. I take them back. I think I said that on my episode too. I'm like, I don't let them keep them. Well, you are the nice STEM teacher, and I'm like give them back.


Kristin Kinner  18:40

That's because I ordered a bag of about 500 of them. I'm not gonna get rid of these in just a year. What else did we do? Oh, I used your cardboard maker tree. We created a wish tree. We did a wish tree for all the specials teachers. We put little ornaments on them, and we asked for some donations like markers, glue sticks, masking tape and scotch tape because I do not have a lot of those at all.


Naomi Meredith  19:11

Yeah, I run out of masking tape like it's water. Yeah, I ran into that so is such a cute idea. Have you gotten any donations? We are recording this in December. Have you gotten anything yet?


Kristin Kinner  19:23

I have I got some markers, and I think there's a few more that'll be coming in through the week. But just very excited.


Naomi Meredith  19:32

Oh I love that and you could definitely do that. You can make it like a palm tree I don't know for summertime or if you have parent teacher conferences. What a cute idea on how to use that one. I didn't even think of that.


Kristin Kinner  19:47

We did you're all about me brick build. I did it with six during the first week of school and they loved that. They keep asking for more Legos and I think just picking the colors and giving them a little, you know, they could pick what they wanted. But I don't know, it was kind of cool. It really worked out well. I used your Rube Goldberg lesson to show how matter travels through the ecosystem. 


Naomi Meredith  20:12

Oh, how did that one go? I'm always curious to see how that one goes in classrooms.


Kristin Kinner  20:17

So that was with fifth grade, and it was toward the beginning of the year. They kind of wanted to get it really involved with different animals. I was like, you only need three, have three, one to try to three. Like and if you want more than that, once you get to three, let's add on. But they enjoyed that. We saw some videos about different Rube Goldberg systems. There are some cool ones out there and gave them some inspiration. Then they created some amazing things. Yeah, I use a lot of your stuff. 


Naomi Meredith  20:49

Oh, you're so sweet. You sent me pictures of the posters. I didn't know like, I don't know. I'm like, Hey, I'm doing this in my own classroom. But the Rube Goldberg one is so fun. I don't know if you showed this. But kids like that's in Home Alone. I'm all Oh, yeah. Is it? Right? Yeah, like go watch it on Disney plus, like, it's just a good movie. I'm like, also a little sad. He's by himself. When we showed the part the part I could find on YouTube, where he was setting up the trap where it's actually really dangerous if you rewatch it, but then we didn't watch it actually go it like being launched, like hurting the robbers. I don't know if we can show that at school. But he's like pouring water on the steps. Then he has like, the fan with the feathers are like, Oh my gosh, but yeah, we were showing that when I did that with fifth grade, too. They were talking about him like, oh, yeah, let's watch that part. So super fun. I don't know if you had this happen. A lot of the kids didn't know what a Rube Goldberg machine was. But they kind of knew the concept. Did you see that too? When you were teaching it.


Naomi Meredith  20:49

A little bit. But again, I shared videos to kind of say this is who Rube Goldberg was, this is why it was famous, and this is what we're doing to try to find a difficult way to solve an easy problem was kind of how. 


Naomi Meredith  22:15

Yeah, totally. Again, it's so fun. I have told kids like you should make them at home over break and send me videos. It's a great at home activity on a cold day.


Kristin Kinner  22:30

It's a good idea.


Naomi Meredith  22:32

Oh, yeah, I'm not patient enough for that. But I would love to see the kids videos.


Kristin Kinner  22:38

I would bet they do it too.


Naomi Meredith  22:40

Oh, yeah, I think so. So if there's anyone else, I didn't send you this question before so I'm getting you on the fly. But if there is a teacher, and who is thinking about a similar role as you, they've been teaching for a while, do you have any advice for them? Because I know you love your position. You're just so sweet and modest about it. But I know you love it. 


Kristin Kinner  23:04

I do love it.


Naomi Meredith  23:05

Yeah, I know you. So what would you say to someone who is like you even six months ago, what would you say?


Kristin Kinner  23:13

I would say try them out in your classroom, like have your current kids pick a day, maybe it's like, fun Friday, but pick a day and have like different challenges where the kids are trying them out because you know your audience and you can tell them, hey, I want you to test the sound I try. I want to try something new with you. I used to do that with my first graders all the time. Now I have all those first graders because they were in my class over the past five years. So now they're in second through sixth. So I've got like robotics experts in the classroom, and I've got kids in every room that kind of know, what are some things that we did together. So they can now be the experts and lead others. That's kind of what you want to do. You want to find what they're good at, and you want them to feel like “Hey, I know this stuff.” So I'm gonna help you out and feel good about what they're doing.


Naomi Meredith  24:08

I think that's such good advice. I think that's so good because it is a lot teaching all the kids in the school. But I know like some teachers who listen to this are interested in STEM who are a classroom teacher, they don't know where to get started, or maybe they only teach a few grade levels. So I think that's really good to hear because it can be a lot at first. Like it is, it's a lot and even for me still starting new units it can be like super overwhelming sometimes but I think that's really good just to jump in. You're showing them to you have a growth mindset, and that's like really important in STEM like you're demonstrating what a growth mindset is because I think sometimes as teachers we don't always do that. But I think that's really good advice to give them. So you mentioned you had a website, are there any other? So how can teachers connect with you and get in touch if they have more questions?


Kristin Kinner  25:07

So I am on Twitter @kinnerswinners and I have a WordPress blog, but it's been a while since I've added it's called Innovationinfirst.wordpress.com. Then I'm trying to get better at Instagram, and that's where I'm k_kinnerteaches


Naomi Meredith  25:34

Yeah, I think they'll love that and definitely reach out. I think you have a lot of great nuggets that teachers can connect with and reach out to you and just fill up their STEM network. So I appreciate your time. Thank you for using my lessons. I had no idea that I never know I don't know who gets the things all the time. So it's just pretty cool, like hearing what you're doing in your classroom and how you're inspiring kids. I can't wait to talk to you at the end of the school year and just like how it all worked out for you.


Kristin Kinner  26:06

Oh, you're awesome. Yeah, your lessons are amazing. They're pretty clear, pretty straightforward and really easy to follow. So that's what I really liked about them.


Naomi Meredith  26:16

Good. Well, thank you. Well, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you.


Kristin Kinner  26:21

Anytime! I will see you soon.

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

Ask me Anything! Q&A Time with Naomi [ep.46]

Ask me Anything! Q&A Time with Naomi [ep.46]

Check out the full episode on Ask me Anything! Q&A with Naomi:  

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Episode Summary

Today is a special episode that you helped me plan. I told you to ask me anything.

You sent me questions on Instagram and via email. I’m answering those questions in today’s episode.

Some of these questions are STEM-related, but some are personal, and I’m answering them all.

 

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Today is a special episode that you helped me plan. Ask me anything. You sent me questions over on Instagram and by way of email and I will be answering those in today's episode. Some of these questions are STEM-related, but some are personal, and I am answering them all. So let's jump in. 


Naomi Meredith  00:21

Thank you so much for submitting your questions. It was so much to read what you wanted to know. There was quite a variety of things, and they were so much fun to answer. I always take notes before I record this podcast. So it's very reflective for me. A few of them had me stumped for a minute. So I'm definitely excited to talk about these and answer the things that you wanted to know. Also, I hope you enjoy it. So we could definitely do another one like this. Again, I'm sure you will have more questions after I answer all of them. So let me know if that's something that you're interested in. Also, don't forget to join the waitlist for my virtual workshops coming in 2023, it will be a good time to learn and connect with other STEM teachers. I definitely don't want you to miss out on this new opportunity. So jump in on that waitlist at Naomimeredith.com/workshopwaitlist. 


Naomi Meredith  01:48

Now let's get started on these questions. I'm going to read the question out loud. I'm not going to name names. I didn't ask if I could read your name. So if you asked it, you know who you are. If you wanted to ask it, you know who you are. So let's jump in to these questions. Question number one is, what is your absolute favorite thing about teaching STEM and what is your least favorite compared to being a classroom teacher? So most of you know by now that I am a former classroom teacher turned current K through five STEM teacher and coach. I taught in the classroom for six years at two different schools by choice. So second grade for two years at a title one school. Then third grade for four years at the district I actually grew up in. So I taught in the classroom for six years, and I wanted more of a challenge. So I took on this role as being a K through five STEM teacher with zero curriculum, and minimal tools. So here I am five years later in this K through five STEM position. I will say my most favorite thing of all is being able to teach all of the kids in the school. I'm not surprised by this because that's actually the main reason why I got into teaching K through five STEM, I wanted to impact more kids than just my classroom of 20 for which that is actually something I really do miss is having your own little group of kids that you see every day. But I do love seeing all the kids in the school. I love seeing them year after year, because as a classroom teacher, you don't get that opportunity all the time to teach all the kids and have that relationship with them. Sure you see them in the hallway. But it's really cool that my fourth graders now I've known them since Kindergarten. So I've really gotten to get to know them throughout the years, have them in my after school clubs, just all of those really cool things that we have been able to build upon every year. My least favorite thing and it also is dependent on the day, my energy levels is when you are a K through five specials teacher, especially if you're teaching in that position all day, there were years that I would co-teach. So that was a really nice mix up. But the thing of being in the specials rotation is that you always have to be on and that can be very exhausting. Some days, especially when the days are like sunlight is getting shorter, and I need some coffee when I get home. Like for real. I actually drink coffee when I get home from work. But always being on is a lot. It's like being the cool aunt, hosting sixth birthday parties at a time. I have five to 10 minutes transition time depending on what class that's in between. I covet those 10 minute times. Sometimes I just need to sit there and decompress for a minute, because I don't even know what just happened. So it can definitely be a lot being on and you have to be excited and pumped up for all of the classes. Even if it's your fourth time teaching that group of kids I always say that the first rotation, “Poor kids,” especially if I've never taught it before they get the kind of like the worst version. Then I would say, the third group of kids, the third time I teach the lesson get like the best version of the whole lesson. When we get to the fourth, I'm so over it and I want to move on. So you might be feeling the same thing. But I'm the kind of person you probably know by now, I will dive in and do everything to the best of my ability. So I am definitely drained at the end of each day, but those are my favorite and least favorite things. 


Naomi Meredith  02:32

Next question is would you ever record yourself teaching the STEM K through five curriculum. As you now I have built up my whole K through five STEM curriculum from scratch, which you can actually see the whole year long plan at Naomi meredith.com/year long plan, there's still several lessons on the way where I am perfecting those for you. But you know, I have created those things. And they are very detailed when it comes to the Engineering Design Process. And it's a yes or no for me when it comes to teaching those and recording myself. No, I'm not going to record myself teaching every single lesson while in the classroom, I just want to make sure that I am protecting my students privacy. And when I'm teaching, of course, I'm saying their names and all of that, that would take a lot of editing. I feel like that's just a lot of pressure on me and also for those students as well, knowing that we are being recorded. So for me personally, I'm not going to record myself in my actual classroom. However, I am planning forward and we'll be doing this for like kind of like a 2.0 version of the year long plan where I want to create something where I am actually talking about the behind the scenes, and how to set up each stage of the Engineering Design Process materials, differentiation opportunities, and even how to set up some specific things. So I want to have that but also I would teach where I would be teaching and you could even use the lessons with your students or you could watch me and give you some ideas of how to relay that information to your kids. So it's a yes or no for me so not completely now. But that is definitely something I have. Of course thought about. I am making notes when I am teaching so I can help create that opportunity for you. 


Naomi Meredith  02:32

The next question is, how much time do you put into your job outside of contract hours. My first year teaching K through five STEM was obviously a lot of work. And in a lot of ways, I felt like being a first year teacher. So not only was I new to the position, I was in a brand new to me district. And I had to get to know the people get to know the kids learn how the school ran. So that was a lot in itself. So it really humbled me to learn reading and relearn some new things. So I would say my first year in the position, I spent a lot more time outside of work, preparing and researching and teaching myself how to use even some of the basic tools, and even get to know my students what will work best for them. That first year, I was doing things with kids that I definitely don't do now I had to build up simple things like learning how to log in how to use Google Slides and Google Docs, just basic, basic things. And we are definitely in a different place now. So likewise, I was spending a lot more time out of work to get all of those things ready. And make sure that I was prepared K through five because oftentimes, my plan time was not enough time, or is it really ever enough time. But it wasn't enough time for me to really have thoughtful plan that lessons. Of course, over the years I have built upon those lessons, I have modified things, I have streamline things. You even hear on this podcast, how I live for systems and routines and structure. And everything I teach even that first year is very purposeful. And I have a lot of meaning behind it, I am still testing out things and seeing what works and doesn't work. And that might even change class till class. So that it self reflection is super important to me to always be a better teacher, even a better teacher than the hour before. So the time I do spend outside of work is mainly business related, which is STEM related, which also impacts my job in a good way. But I will say I don't spend a whole lot of time outside of work working on actual school things. But when I do work on school things, it's often related to my after school clubs, mainly my school, my news that I run where we record five days out, and we have an episode come out every single day. Last year, I actually was editing majority of the videos on my own, I figured out how to have kids helped me edit a lot more. So the time I spent outside of work is usually when it comes to a brand new unit that I need to revamp or when it comes to after school clubs. 


Naomi Meredith  08:11

Okay, the third question is what is my top or favorite STEM activity your students have tried. This is my most favorite one. I love talking about it because this is definitely born out of absolutely nothing. And it was my whole unit that I love to start off the school year STEM survival camp. I talk all about this in episode four. So if you want to hear it all in detail, I go through the whole thing and how I set it up. But basically, at the time, I was going into the fall of 2020, I needed a set of lessons that if my students were to go remote at any moment, we were starting off in person, I needed something where they could have materials at home and I wasn't sending home about love of supplies. So at the time, I was watching a lot of alone with my teacher, honey. And it's about these people who are sent off to the wilderness their extreme survivalist. And they have to literally survive alone. But if you keep watching the show, there's a lot of patterns of things that people have to do to survive. So from there, I created a whole K through five STEM unit of different challenges that are based off of the show, and things that they could do to learn that Engineering Design Process and start off the year in a fun way. So definitely one of my top favorites. I love that unit. The kids still talk about it. They love that unit as well. They always beg for it they always ask if we're gonna do it again. So that was a really great challenge to start off the year with all of my kids. 


Naomi Meredith  09:45

Okay, along with that there's a similar question but different and this one is What do you think is one of the best Engineering Design Process activities to do with Kindergarten in first grade. So aside from STEM survival camp, when it comes to the Engineering Design Process with these younger grades, I love doing things that are quick. So things that you can do within two to three days is a perfect amount of time. And they can actually go pretty deep within that timeframe. What I will say is my favorite is doing things that involve Makerspace with Kindergarten and first grade. They are so creative and imaginative, they are willing to try anything. And I love how they believe in themselves. And they are so excited about what they build, and they still have that magic in them. So that is definitely my favorite type of project when it comes to Engineering Design Process to do with those younger kids. And a specific lesson that I really have loved with my first graders you could do with Kinder is where we talk about bioluminescence, where we talk about how living things give off their own light, and they love they're so amazed they cannot believe and I'm like, Oh my gosh, these things do not plug in into an outlet on the wall. They don't have rechargeable batteries, they glow on their own. They're super amazed. And so like, oh my gosh, I can't believe that. So we talk about that. And then students think of a living thing that they wish had bioluminescence and then they have to create that item, and then explain what that bio element what that bioluminescent part helps them so Makerspace definitely a winner, it can get crazy. But if you have systems and routines in place, it's totally a lot of fun with those younger students. 


Naomi Meredith  15:02

This question made me laugh and there was emojis on this one. So this question was, Do you have any kind of class reward for behaviors asking because my kinders are, they had some emojis on here, and I'm going to just say cray cray. Yeah, I kind of do. Kinder is crazy. And I feel like for some reason this year, they're even crazier. So at my school, we have a PBIS system where whole classes can earn a tiger paw. So they can earn this through specific behaviors that they represent and as the class, so I talked about this in a past episode when it comes to behavior management. So I list all of those factors. So when they are crazy coming in, we reveal all those factors. Sometimes I'll even practice them coming into the room, we will do a lot of hand signals, like if you can hear me point to the ceiling, if you can hear me hands on your shoulders, point to miss Meredith point to your ear segment. Listen really well. Fun fact, I worked at Build A Bear in college for a few months. And I was that person who would be at the little like fluffers station, where they have their heart. So if you haven't been available bear, it's a little creepy at first, where they have these shells of bears, you pick out your shell, you could pick out a heart to put in your bear and you go to the station, they fluff up the bear, they literally put the fluff in. So I was the person at the fluffing station. And I had to talk to the kids, a lot of them even Kindergarten, where oh, put the heart to your heart. So it's extra loving, like you put it to your brain. So it can be as smart as you. So I kind of do those things with Kindergarten and pay, it works well. So those little things are helpful, giving them our behavior, incentive stickers, or even any stickers in general. I don't give kids candy. That's not for me, but I am not against bribery. So if they're having a hard time, like if you're good, if you're doing what you're supposed to do, I have a special surprise. Sometimes a special surprise is the story bots. He's singing some songs and they have some really great songs about space. So if you're doing a space unit, check it out. Highly recommend. I have most of the words memorized by now. Another time The surprise was I'll show you the hole in my tooth. So one day, I was eating oatmeal for breakfast. And I thought I had oatmeal on my teeth. But it was a filling from when I was a kid it fell out. And I had a hole in my tooth that day. So the kids are in Kindergarten a little crazy. And they clean up really really fast because they wanted to see the hole in my tooth. So I let them. They all sat around me and I showed them the hole in my tooth. And they were actually pretty good that day. So I'm not against that bribery, if you can make it a surprise. Super helpful. 


Naomi Meredith  17:43

All right, next question is how can I grow my STEM page? So this person reached out to me on Instagram, I just started this year and want to connect so much love here. I totally agree. I love me some teacher guy um, and I've met a lot of really cool people on there, including Kelly Hogan, who I recently had as a guest. And I also have future guests who I've also connected to on Instagram. So it's a really cool way to reach out especially since most of us are the only STEM teacher in our building. So I love having that teacher gram aspect, Instagram, it's been so awesome. I started my Instagram when I was a third grade teacher, I had another username, and I just posted random stuff. And it was super ugly scroll back to the bottom of my page. They're still there, you could see what I was doing as a third grade teacher, which I've always been all about hands on learning and technology. So you'll see some trends in there. But definitely if you're looking to connect with other STEM teachers, go to some of your favorite accounts. You can go to mine and see who is following them and also who they're following. That's a great way to find other people in the STEM community. And you can comment on people's pages you can send them a DM most of us teachers one thing gets creepy unless you are being creepy. So don't be creepy. I appreciate some good DMS and answering your questions. So like this podcast, but that's a good way to get started and get connected and definitely share what you're doing in your classroom. That's a great way to connect as well and give help to other teachers and inspire them along the way. Also, I have so many things for you guys coming out you're just super inspiring and I love creating for you and just bringing us together that coming up soon I'm thinking of ways how we can meet virtually and chat with each other. So obviously you could tell I have a lot of things coming up in the future. So keep an eye out for that as well. Just join the waitlist you'll be notified about everything. 


Naomi Meredith  19:46

All right, next question is the fun one and not stimulated, which is totally cool. When and where is your wedding? Because there's so many you know, I got engaged on Christmas Day of 2021 and you didn't ask for this story but I'm Gotta tell you. So we were on a cruise, I had no idea I was getting proposed to, I knew he had a ring, but I didn't know I was gonna get proposed to. I didn't think he wanted to travel with a ring. And that's a whole other story. So somebody asked me that question. I'll do another Ask me anything. And I'll tell you the non engagement story. So anyway, he proposed we were on a cruise with a couple of friends. And we had a great time we went to a show. And then we got a phone call that we were in close contact with COVID, there was still covered protocols going on. And it was my friend, she had COVID, she was texting me, she and Phil while and then got tested. So they told us, we had to be in a room for about 24 hours, they'll come back and test us. So when they called us it was midnight, and we're like, Okay, we'll come back at midnight the next day, like, No, it's too late for us. We'll come back the next next day. So it was 36 hours. But you know, when you can engage to have fun and you're celebrating and kind of don't really remember the whole conversation. So the next day, we went out and got breakfast. And then we heard our names over on the intercom at the boat and we had to go back to our rooms. And there were security at the door. And we were locked up in a room for a while. So I learned how to make towel animals we still do all you can eat all the food and drinks and made the most of it. And here we are. We're going on a cruise again pretty soon. So that's how we got engaged. But our wedding is June in June in Colorado of 2023. So super excited about that. It's a winery that we really enjoy. So that will be a fun and beautiful time. I'm super excited. 


Naomi Meredith  21:36

Next question, what is your favorite pen and marker? This is such a T Trick question and I am here for it. Okay, my favorite marker 100 per million percent are the Mr. Sketch smelly markers. I love how all they smell. But I always wanted to be a teacher when I grew up and all my teachers use the Mr. Sketch smelly markers. I would ask for them for Christmas. I just thought that's what real teachers use and write with. So when I got the call of my first teaching job teaching second grade, I ran over to Lakeshore learning and bought myself a pack of Mr. Sketch smelly markers, because that's what real teachers write with. So hands down, still my absolute fave. When it comes to pens, I'm not super biased. I leave kind of like some bad pens on my desk because people leave me notes all the time for about computers or whatever. So I do love a good flare pan. My handwriting looks really good in a flare pen. But I'm always open to other options so you can hit me up with your ideas. I try the other day this really cool ink joy 300 T pen. I was like, Oh my gosh, this is beautiful. So not quite a gel pen is like in between. So love me a good pen. I don't like pencils at all. I actually don't even like sharpening pencils. I don't leave a pencil sharpener out in my classroom because I don't like the sound. So I'll sharpen pencils, like once a month. So yeah, that's where I'm at with the marker and pen situation. 


Naomi Meredith  23:10

Alright, a couple more. This was a good one. If you weren't a STEM teacher, what other career would you love to have? You might not be surprised by this that I am definitely an entrepreneur at heart. I've always wanted to be a teacher. But even as a kid, I've always had this entrepreneurial side to me. I was the kid where oh no, no, we're not hosting a lemonade stand. We're gonna upgrade this to a snow cone Stan and have 30 different flavors. And the sign is going to match all the names of the flavors. I made a lot of money doing that as a kid I even had the kids I nanny do a snow cone stand and we made a lot of money. So I love me making some good side hustles I even was set up garage sales for my family and wait all day to make a couple of bucks. I was the person in college I paid my way through college so I worked three full time jobs went to school full time paid my way through college was debt free when I graduated in four years, but I always had a lot of different side hustles to make ends meet and I just love meeting new people and I love learning new things. So not surprising that I have my own teacher business and I love supporting you because STEM there's so much to learn. And just even running a business there's so much so when it comes to a specific job if I wasn't a STEM teacher, I think I've needed to be a STEM teacher first but I would love to be some sort of STEM coach like being able to reach out to schools across the world and or either being a STEM consultant so using my knowledge when it comes to being in the classroom, and just having those opportunities to meet teachers like you in person and really merging those two things together my passion for education and also entrepreneurship. So I think I would always be a STEM teacher at heart I I always thought I wanted to work for a magazine, which I thought would be really cool, but I think everyone wanted to work for a magazine. But I think that's what I would definitely do if I wasn't a STEM teacher. 


Naomi Meredith  25:11

All right, last question. It's all about my little Freddy boys. So Frederick is my 10 going on 12 pounds chihuahua mix. And I think he was so freaking cute. I'm so in love. And so these questions are about him. What's Frederick story? When did you get him and how did you pick his name? So Frederick is my first ever dog as an adult. And I got him in September of 2020. And he actually came with that name Fredrik, and we loved it so much. He's looking at me right now, because I keep saying his name. He sits and listens to me podcast. But we thought it was such a good big boy name for such a tiny little boy who was seven pounds when we got him. And he lived on the streets for a week. He ran away from his family, and they didn't want him back. So now he is our little fur baby and are his forever home. And so this leads into the next question that was asked, Does Frederick have any brand deals yet? Okay, so Freddy, Fred is the perfect dog for me. He does pose for pictures and he is super photogenic. He doesn't have any brand deals. But if you want to reach out you definitely can. Well, you can go follow him on Instagram. It's at little Frederick the dog. And he's I think he's cute. It's just a way for me to spam his account with pictures and not always spam you guys on my Instagram for him? Because I know not everybody is a dog person, but you might become one when you see him. So no brand deals yet but if you know of any or if you want to connect, hit me up. All right, well, thank you so much for playing along with me and this episode, totally different vibe. But hopefully you got some good nuggets in there and had a good laugh. While you are listening to this, you kind of get to see a another side of me always a good time. It's always a little awkward. Sometimes. I'm just standing here in my office at home, looking at my camera and talking into the microphone. So I hope that you had a fun time listening. I had a lot of fun with these questions. We definitely should do this again sometime. If you liked it. Let me know if you didn't like it. Let me know I don't ever have to do it again. So thank you so much again and we will chat soon.

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!