Better Teaching: Only Stuff That Works

Gene Tavernetti: Welcome to Better Teaching, Only Stuff That Works, a podcast for teachers, instructional coaches, administrators, and anyone else who supports teachers in the classroom.

This show is a proud member of the BE Podcast Network shows that help you go beyond education.

Find all our shows@bepodcastnetwork.com.

I Am Gene Tavernetti the host for this podcast.

And my goal for this episode, like all episodes, is that you laugh at least once and that you leave with an actionable idea for better teaching.

A quick reminder, no cliches, no buzzwords.

Only stuff that works.

My guest today is Raquel McGee.

Raquel is a doctoral student from Bolingbrook, Illinois and is majoring in educational policy, organization and leadership in the College of Education.

She's currently employed as an English teacher and instructional coach at Oak Park and River Forest High School.

She volunteers by leading her church's educational ministry department in order to support young people in her church community.

Her long-term goal is to become an instructional leader using evidence-informed instructional practices to achieve equitable student outcomes.

A literacy teacher and an instructional coach.

This was one of my dream guests.

I think you'll enjoy it.

Good morning, Raquel.

Thank you for being on better teaching.

Only stuff that works

Raquel McGee: Good morning, Jean.

Thank you so much for having me.

Gene Tavernetti: well.

It's I know it's your first day of spring vacation, so I appreciate you taking a little bit of time out of your spring vacation and hopefully this will be a great start for it.

So, a couple things that I wanted to chat with you about that was mentioned in your biography is that

You are a literacy coach and as well as teaching language arts at your school.

Is that correct?

Okay.

Raquel McGee: Well, I currently teach reading courses, but yes.

Gene Tavernetti: Me about the reading courses.

What are those, how are those different than what we might think of as language arts?

Raquel McGee: Yes.

So those courses are a part of our MTSS framework in that they are tier two and tier three interventions targeted at our high school students.

Who have not yet fully either, they have not yet fully acquired multi-syllabic decoding skills, or there are other skill and knowledge gaps.

So this is our way of attempting to intervene, attempting to remediate, and attempting to provide them with some pretty high dosage instruction.

Gene Tavernetti: Okay.

Just curious, how do they qualify?

What sort of an assessment is done?

Is it formal, informal teacher recommendation?

Raquel McGee: It's a mixture of all of those.

So we do get quite a bit of recommendations from our feeder schools, and then every single student, we do the star reading.

Assessments through the Renaissance, I think.

I think that's the name of the company.

Renaissance assessments, star Reading.

That's our primary sort of universal screening tool.

Following that, if we need more clarity, we have a number of.

Administrators in the building who will also administer both formal and informal reading batteries, like the Vader reading inventory or, you know, word lists or a spelling screener.

Or even more formalized like, wood Woodcock Johnson standardized achievement tests.

Our psychologists will administer that kind of thing.

Gene Tavernetti: So, what would you.

Estimate a percentage of your incoming students from the middle school into high school will be in your programS.

Raquel McGee: I would say somewhere between 13 to like.

16% probably qualify to be in the program.

On the basis of the ME metrics that we currently have it does feel almost every year that number seems to be increasing slightly.

And I'm not sure if that's that students are less prepared for the demands of high school reading or if there's something else amiss.

Gene Tavernetti: Okay, so, so, so it's increasing.

Not quite sure why.

And so those are kids who are identified coming in and how many would be identified?

Would there be additional students identified for tier two instruction as they begin at your site?

I.

Raquel McGee: Yes, definitely.

Now I will say.

Probably less than there was in the past.

Currently all of our freshman classes are detract, and so we have teachers who are pretty well equipped to give instruction to a wide range of students.

So.

Teachers are no longer, I think, as alarmed about a student with reading difficulties as they might have been in the past.

And to be honest, it might be just their instinct.

You know, I'm gonna provide strategies for this student right here in my classroom and I'm not gonna necessarily pursue like a referral.

And there are parts of that I think are maybe a positive move.

I think a lot of our teachers have really embraced.

Understanding more about reading for themselves versus, you know, reaching out to like our literacy specialists in the building.

Gene Tavernetti: So you the teachers, so you have your classes and you're doing, you're remediating, you're doing some remediation.

What's your focus?

Because one of the things that I always try to picture as we have students come into high school, you talk.

When I hear about some of the most successful remedial programs, they're in more homogeneous groups.

Are you able to do that?

Did your schedule allow that with your students?

Raquel McGee: I would say for the most part, so, in, I teach a tier two class in many of our tier three programs, they utilize quite a bit of small group instruction that's, that is really tailored to students' current needs.

So they might use something like the rewards program for multi syllabic decoding.

We also have some courses that I know use the Read 180 program.

Our tier three courses, or sorry, tier two courses like mine are a little bit more unique, so we might use something computer based like achieve 3000 at the sophomore level.

My particular course, I use a curriculum called.

Code X that we follow.

And it basically takes them through a series of close reading workshops where they acquire or their it, the intention is for them to acquire increasing mastery over being able to find the main idea in a text or create a, a.

A proper summary of a text.

We do a lot of work with vocabulary instruction.

I have done quite a bit with morphology instruction.

So I would say the curriculum is a mixture of something that's mandated by the district.

But as I have sought out more knowledge about reading instruction, I love to take the practices that I learn about and.

Get them right in there as soon as possible.

I'll never forget, I read Bringing Words to Life.

It's an excellent book about vocabulary instruction.

I read that and literally stayed up all night, like, let me overhaul the way that I teach vocabulary because I'm doing everything wrong.

So I do use my classrooms often as a sort of a like action research.

So you know, I've learned about this particular approach that is evidence informed.

Let me see how much of that I can implement right away.

Gene Tavernetti: So many times I will hear.

You know, talk to teachers or you read ab on social media or something that, you know, they've got, you're in the secondary school and my kids can't read.

My kids can't read.

And then when you ask them about it, well, they're not reading at grade level.

So, so when your kids come in what might be an entry point and what's a goal for them to exit?

Exit your program.

Raquel McGee: So there are, there's a mixed bag of feelings on this.

Some folks.

In the building.

They're not that hung up on grade level.

So that's not really a metric for them.

For me though, I do approach it from, I want you to be able to read grade level text with the appropriate complexity because I am a very big fan of Dr.

Timothy Shanahan.

And one of the things that he emphasizes is that we've got to put weight on the bar.

He uses a weightlifting analogy, so he really tries to drive home the point that if they're not going to get into that ninth grade text, when they're in ninth grade, when are they gonna get into that ninth grade text?

And so this is not something that is.

That's not a universally shared view.

We've got some viewpoints that believe, well, if they're practicing the skill of summarizing, they can practice that with anything.

They could practice that with the text that we might consider seventh grade level or sixth grade level.

I don't agree with that view.

I'll just be blunt.

I think that is doing the students a disservice.

I wanna get them into complex grade level text as much as possible.

And then I will do the instruction, I'll do the scaffolding that allows them to actually read that text.

Gene Tavernetti: So, so you you work in the you work as a reading specialist.

You didn't say reading specialist.

I just said that.

But you work as a okay.

But you, so

Raquel McGee: say reading teacher.

Reading

Gene Tavernetti: Reading.

Teacher.

How are the kids?

How are the kids' attitudes coming and going?

Are they aware that their skills are low?

Are they, have they been defeated by the time they're in high school that they have to do more remedial?

Or how do you address, how do you address that?

Raquel McGee: They're pretty well aware.

They're pretty savvy.

They understand why they're in the class.

They know that some of their friends aren't in the class, and so.

Unfortunately, I sometimes I'll start off with quite a bit of resistance where students will, you know, not buy into the instruction.

They will just do little things that shows me, oh, you, you're not interested in being here.

And sometimes the parents feel the same way.

They'll be convinced that this is not a class that their student needs.

So I try to win them over slowly by just.

Being very intentional about my instructional choices, I explain a lot of my choices to my students, so I'll let them know.

Here's why we do fluency.

Here's why I insist that you know, decode unfamiliar words, that you don't just try to guess at them, that you actually, you know, are strengthening that letter sound correspondence, and you're decoding that word.

Here's why we do our vocabulary every week, and I like to think I have a decent teacher persona, a decent teacher personality, I treat them with, I treat them with respect.

I think that's really important that we ensure that our materials, when we're teaching our adolescent readers, I. Our materials are respectful, that we're not presenting things that come across as juvenile or baby-ish.

So my students, you know, when we're reading, for example, about geopolitics or the other day we were reading about Brazil's social welfare policy of Bolsa Familia, they don't feel insulted by that material.

They actually feel like, oh, okay.

I'm reading about things that are definitely appropriate for a high school reader.

And so I'm really intentional about those choices, like making sure that they feel that they're doing sophisticated, complex work.

Gene Tavernetti: I think that's important and I think that is how, um.

Like you said you're respecting them.

You're respecting their intellect.

Yeah.

They might have one area where we're gonna work on it together but you expect them to be successful.

And I think so much, so many times when we think about high expectations, we think about, well, I'm gonna give them work they can't do, but, well, no, I'm gonna give them work they can do.

And my expectation is they're gonna, they're gonna be able to do it.

It's gonna be, you're gonna put a little bit of weight on the bar, but no you're gonna be able to do it.

I know you can't.

I'm not gonna let you, I'm not gonna let you fail.

Raquel McGee: I do a lot of pep talks, a whole lot of pep talks.

I have a student who's like, Ms. McGee, you're like a cheerleader.

I'm like yes I am.

And it's slowly but surely works.

Right now in quarter four, I'm kind of seeing the fruits of my labor.

Like the kids are really, they're really bought in.

Honestly, I could, I can move really quickly with instruction now because they're bought into the routines.

They're familiar with all of it.

When a visitor or a new student comes, they love to like teach that person what they're doing.

They're like, oh, this is how we do our fluency.

I'm making my vocabulary flashcards now.

And so things are going.

Very well, and it's a really nice feeling, but it took a lot of hard work.

Gene Tavernetti: So it's it takes some hard work to get that together to get the students on board.

How much coordination is there between the work that you do and the other language arts teachers?

Or.

Other content area teachers is there time to share what you do so that they can reinforce that?

Because at one time, and we may have talked about this before, at one time, the the big saying, the big thing was we're all reading teachers.

Raquel McGee: Yeah.

Gene Tavernetti: That's what everybody said.

But there wasn't anything going on.

And to be fair, there wasn't a lot of instruction about for the teachers.

There wasn't a lot of training for the teachers about how to do that.

One of the things that I think can do that, so you don't have to be an expert, is you go to the people who are experts like you and to find out how you can support.

So, so is there.

That going on within the within the site.

Boy, I'm really putting you on the spot there.

Raquel McGee: Well, I like to speak authentically.

Not to the extent that would be beneficial for our students.

No, there is not enough coordination.

I will sometimes, because I'm familiar with the language arts curriculum, I will definitely reinforce things.

So like, I will let my students know, oh, okay.

I know that you learned about, for example, ethos, pathos, logos.

So, when we read our next nonfiction speech, we're gonna utilize and apply those same concepts.

So that's an example, but that's not institutionalized.

That is simply just.

I know the curriculum, so I'm just going to make sure that they can see those concepts carried across their classes.

But no, we could do a better job of coordinating those efforts.

As for content area teachers learning more about literacy instruction.

That sometimes happens through my role as a, as an instructional coach.

So for example our freshman history teachers were really interested in improving their students' writing.

So I introduced them to the concepts of the writing revolution.

I can really use sentence level writing to advance student thinking and organize student thinking.

And it's a tool that both.

Enhances their ability to process the historical material and then also checks for their understanding.

But again, that's not institutionalized.

That is just, you know, history teachers who decided, Hey, we need this thing, and reached out to me to make it happen.

Gene Tavernetti: Well, let's talk about your coaching a little bit because you had your part-time.

Doing all the instruction that you were just describing and then you were a literacy coach.

Is that what your title was or were you instructional coach or what was the expectations of what your role was?

Raquel McGee: Yeah.

So they, the, I guess the job listing was instructional coach literacy.

So yeah, there was the explicit understanding that I'm there to support literacy instruction, although I make myself available to teachers for anything.

So I've done my fair share of like classroom management coaching.

So the long story short, I think the role was intended to further the district's instructional goals around literacy to provide teachers with the tools and the knowledge that they needed to support our students in terms of literacy growth.

I think I'll leave it there for now.

I'll let you draw out more through my

Gene Tavernetti: Okay.

Well, let me let, okay, so, so, so you were the job listing was instructional coach literacy.

The implication being that there would be other instructional coaches slash math or instructional coach in other content.

Were there or was literacy the only area?

Raquel McGee: So there were two literacy coaches two special education coaches, one coach that you would probably describe as like classroom management or classroom climate, and then one educational technology coach.

So that is a critique that we have received from our math instructors.

They have pointed out that, you know, they feel a little.

Not included our science and math teachers.

So that, that is one thing that we should probably consider.

Gene Tavernetti: That's so interesting.

Well, it's not, it's interesting and it's exciting that you have a group of teachers asking for coaching, which I think must say a little bit about the job that, that y'all are doing, you know, in that the teachers must see benefit because I'm not sure if you know this, but teachers will talk.

About their experiences with their coaches.

Raquel McGee: They certainly will.

They

Gene Tavernetti: Good or good or bad.

Good or bad.

So, so, so you said you have a, you are the literacy coach.

There was a coach for,

Raquel McGee: I'm one of two.

One of two

Gene Tavernetti: one of, one of two literacy coaches a tech coach, a like a classroom management climate.

Was that it?

Those, so there were four.

Raquel McGee: And our

Gene Tavernetti: Oh, it's special ed.

Special ed.

So, so how was, and did they all have a teaching load as well?

Were they all coaching part-time?

Raquel McGee: Yes.

So yes, we all teach either one to two.

Well, we started teaching one class and then it increased.

They increased our teaching load to two classes.

So two classes teaching and then the rest of your time to be spent with teachers.

Gene Tavernetti: Okay, so just before we move on, was that difficult for you having that split like logistically I. Working with folks or how did that work out?

Were you able to accomplish what you wanted to over the, or?

Raquel McGee: Yeah, so I think it's important for coaches to remain in the classroom, to be honest.

I know it's not always feasible, but I think there's something really helpful about, I. Being in the trenches so that when you

Gene Tavernetti: Wait.

You can't say trenches.

You can't say trenches on.

Raquel McGee: maybe that's too loaded.

Gene Tavernetti: You can't say trenches.

That is so close to a buzzword that, that I have to call you.

Okay.

So they're still in the classroom teaching.

Okay.

Let's go with that.

Okay.

Raquel McGee: Yes, I think it's important.

I think it reminds you of the realities of the classroom.

It puts things into perspective.

It allows you to kind of field test instructional practices.

So for example, when I first started embracing Puja Agaral and Patrice Bain's book, powerful Teaching and just really being intentional about retrieval practice.

You know, I was so happy to have a classroom to kind of immediately put those techniques in action and then my coaching benefited from that because I could say, oh, I tried this with my third period last week, and you know, here are the things that worked well.

Here are the things that I'm gonna continue to improve in my own practice.

I think that it gives a bit of credibility for teachers hearing from a coach who is actually teaching a class.

And in some ways I think teaching or reading class is also beneficial because right or wrong, the perception is that those are more difficult classes with more difficult students.

And so people are able to see, oh, you know, you're not teaching an AP class over there.

You know, you're actually having to put in some elbow grease when you're teaching.

So anyway, I think I'm rambling now, but

Gene Tavernetti: Oh, that's a, that's a. Okay.

That's

Raquel McGee: I love doing both.

I

Gene Tavernetti: Okay.

Okay.

So, one of the things that I think is important that has been, another one of these things in education that we use the phrase professional learning communities, PLC is usually shortened and
if people can't see you, but you're making a face and that's usually the response where the idea of a professional learning community was not the idea that we are going to meet once a month.

And do this thing with this, you know, this structured thing, the idea of the professional learning community was a community of learners and they would be sharing, we would constantly be sharing, but it has come down to this.

So having said that, do, how did you coordinate?

How did you learn from your other coaches?

Did you have a formal or informal PLC type of.

Type of thing going on.

Raquel McGee: we kind of just created some structures just amongst ourselves because we felt it would be beneficial.

So we established collaboration time.

We attempted to establish some sort of collaborative goals and.

We tried to get into the habit and I think that successfully of sharing, constantly sharing information that we were engaging with about coaching.

So for example, I attend a monthly, it's like a regional, it's like a regional coaching.

Coaching think tank, if you will.

Just all the coaches in the like west suburban district or west suburban region get together on Zoom and share out coaching practices.

So I make sure to attend that so that I can share that with my colleagues.

I've just kind of assigned that to myself, like, okay, you're gonna be the one to attend.

You're going to find the resources that are shared and take back whatever it is we can learn.

We also requested a number of like books.

So we've spent some time reading Diane Sweeney, for example, to learn more about her approach to instructional coaching.

Last year they attended an instructional coaching conference.

I was on maternity leave, but they attended that.

So we've done some pretty intentional work on keeping ourselves engaged in the field.

Again, a lot of that is just sheer determination and what we wanted to do.

It was not like mandated to do.

Gene Tavernetti: Okay, so you're maybe when you're done with education, you can be a diplomat.

So I'm taking I'm trying to read between the lines here.

One of the, one of the things that that I have found you know, when I've worked with coaches and trained coaches in districts, is that there really is no guidance per se.

It's like one of the things that, you know, I talked to a coach, oh, who was doing a training in a district and the coach said.

My position was created from a grant.

The grant said you had to have a coach,

And so I asked my principal what am I supposed to do?

And he didn't have an answer.

So I spent a whole semester in my office reading books on coaching and an instruction, and never once left.

Okay.

So I'm guessing that yours was a little bit more structured but I. How much did you and your colleagues get?

Or how, I don't know.

I'm trying to think how to say it.

What would be, if you were gonna design a program for coaches, what would you like to see in your next coaching position?

Let's say you go someplace else.

Raquel McGee: Yeah, a number of things.

I do think there has to be some element of required coaching, particularly for novice teachers.

That is not an idea that I'm not sure that would be very welcome in my current school, but I really benefited from being required to engage in coaching as a newbie teacher.

I would not be the teacher I am today without having been required to meet with a coach weekly.

So I believe that should be a part of a coaching program.

Novice teachers, maybe years one through three.

You've gotta have some involvement with coaching, and we make it worth your while.

Maybe we say, okay, so you're involved with coaching.

You don't have to attend.

Whatever whole group professional development session there might be 'cause you're involved in intensive coaching.

But we've gotta, we've gotta carve out the time and space for particularly our new teachers to develop their craft.

We've gotta be intentional about it.

We have to kind of have a curriculum for them.

Like what are the things that we want?

A teacher by the time they get to their third year of teaching at our school, what are the skills, what's the knowledge that we want them to have and design it.

So task the coaches with coming up with a curriculum and you're going to engage in.

Stained long-term professional learning with these folks.

There's gonna be specific topics.

There are specific learning outcomes from these topics.

We're not just going to say explore small group instruction, for example.

We're gonna have specific.

Like competencies that you need to acquire as it pertains to that topic.

So I guess I would take a bit of a heavy handed approach.

If I'm investing the resources into coaching, which really is quite an investment to take teachers away from full-time teaching, I need a return on my investment.

So I've gotta build in the structures that, that make it possible.

Gene Tavernetti: So what you're saying.

Is that you are going to be sure if you have a new teacher, new newbies, whatever that definition is for you.

They're gonna have a curriculum and you're gonna make sure that it happens.

The coaches are gonna make sure that.

That, that this happens.

Now that sort of begs the question that the coaches are really good, the coaches are competent.

Which begs the further question is what training do you think coaches should get?

What training did you get?

I know that you took it upon yourself to do these monthly, to do these monthly things to, to improve, and some of the books you've read, you didn't mention my book.

That's okay.

That I will, maximizing the impact of coaching cycles.

But so, so what do you, did you receive any formalized training within the district and were there expectations for your education and training?

I.

Raquel McGee: Yeah, it seemed that the district really wanted to embrace Jim Knight as the sort of practitioner.

So we were given a Jim Knight book to read, I believe it was the one impact.

I think it's that one.

And then eventually we did also have a trainer, a Gym Knight coaching network trainer, come out and provide us with that coaching.

I'm trying to decide how candid I want to be, I guess for me.

I think that there are things about that model that, that leave some money on the table, if you will.

I want a little bit more specificity when I'm discussing my coaching.

I appreciate the relational aspect.

I really do.

I don't know that I would spend so much of my coaching learning time though on emphasizing those relational aspects of coaching.

Gene Tavernetti: Okay.

Now I'm, searching my myself about how candid I wanna be

Raquel McGee: Yeah.

Gene Tavernetti: about, you know, there are let's go back to your newbie teachers.

I think one of the things that.

I agree with you that that they can benefit a lot from coaching.

And one of the reasons that they can benefit a lot from coaching is there's so much they don't know and they don't know what they don't know.

Raquel McGee: Yeah.

Gene Tavernetti: it's very difficult with a novice not to be directive.

And there are things that, that just work that you need to learn how to do 'em.

If you go into all successful classrooms, and when I say successful, you could define that however you want, but you're gonna see teachers, they may have their personality, but they're still doing very similar things structurally.

They have routines when they come in the room, they have, you know, all of those things.

Now I kind of.

And I'm not demeaning, I mean, I absolutely respect teachers, but I think of giving choice many times is like what I used to do when my daughter was two, and we'd have to bring her to daycare, break my heart every day, you know, but say, oh, honey, choose whatever you wanna wear.

Here are your two choices.

Raquel McGee: Disaster.

Gene Tavernetti: You, you know, so, so, so, because yeah, if you don't know, it's just too much.

You know?

How can a teacher, a newbie teacher think about what's the most important thing to do Now if they just don't know, they don't have the experience, and that's what the, that's what the coach, that's what the coach is gonna bring, so that you don't, you know, you can get out of there with.

Fewer scars because you know, of what the coach, of what the coach provided.

So, yeah, so, okay.

Let me think.

Oh, you know what else?

It was interesting.

I wanted to ask you about this because, you know, being a teacher, it's hard not.

To be a teacher based on what, you know, especially like you, you're doing a doctoral program, you've done a lot of, you know, you're doing a lot of research and science of learning, and you are leading your church's education ministry.

How do you bring what you've learned in, in, into that how does that impact

Raquel McGee: Yeah.

So, I try my best really to.

First and foremost, probably promote phonics to a lot of the parents to promote them really getting a very clear understanding of how their child is able to read.

I've actually done a few, like informal reading assessments with some of our young people.

If their parents asked me to.

I've even tutored at least.

Or two young people in the summer with like, you know, their pa upon their parents' request.

They were worried about their reading and I was like, I'll tutor them.

So a lot of promoting, phonics, a lot of even just promoting simple things like read to your kids every night or creating like a challenge out of it.

Those are the kinds of things really I'm just limited by my capacity.

The one one project that I want to do, I wanna create like a monthly newsletter for parents.

But I just am limited by my capacity.

But I, I. My, my pastor has a whole lot of confidence in me, so he is like, you can do as much as you'd like to do.

Yeah.

And I also, it's also about coordinating, like fundraising.

So we provide some scholarships to attend Christian schools in our area.

So it's about making sure that we, you know, are able to provide those.

Also checking up on the students who we provide them to make sure that they're doing well.

You know, just with some gentle nudges.

But it's been a pleasure to be in that role to kind of get a different lens on education from the parent perspective.

And sometimes it gives me pause like, okay, am I communicating this in a way that is like I. Full of Ed, you speak full of teacher term or I sometimes have my mom read over it.

Like, can you, do you know what this is saying or am I using one too many?

I don't know, gradual release of responsibility.

Am I tossing those things in there and people?

So, but I really enjoy it.

Gene Tavernetti: Well, you saw what happened to Milli check in severance, right?

Using

Raquel McGee: see, I have not, I have,

I do not have,

Gene Tavernetti: Okay.

I don't, okay.

No.

Spoiler alerts then.

I don't want any, but I'll just say he used some big words.

Okay.

Do you have, this was wonderful.

I have really enjoyed this.

Raquel, do you have any questions for me?

Raquel McGee: Yeah, I think one of my first questions is that, besides, of course, your own podcast, what would you, what are like two podcasts you might recommend for the casual listener?

I'm gonna give an example.

My sister is also in education and she is like, you consume a whole lot of content.

So I'm an avid listener, but she's a casual listener.

So what are like two podcasts?

For someone like her that doesn't have a whole lot of time or doesn't really want to spend a whole lot of time engaging.

Gene Tavernetti: Yeah.

Well, I have to recommend Zach's progressively incorrect because he has you know, I talked to him and he's encyclopedic.

You know, I'll ask him about research on something and he'll say, well, you're talking about the 2007 study or the 2010 study and, you know, holy cow.

But, so he's great for that.

And he gets the guests that have done the research and they are able to talk about it in a way that is very comprehensible.

And I think I like Anna Stock's chalk and talk and I like that she is.

Such, she is so passionate and such an advocate for the things that, that she believes and.

Every time I listen to that there is a granular idea that I get, you know, that, yeah.

Yeah.

I, that, that makes sense.

You know, I can use that.

I can share it or, you know, I, that's a different way, that's a better way to express it than I've been expressing it.

But I listened to, to always listen to those guys.

I like Bill Davidson.

I don't know if you've listened to Bill Davidson centering the pendulum, which is to me the greatest title for an educational podcast.

But he is I would recommend those three and like you said, mine of course.

And, uh, and hey.

Alright, well, Raquel again, it's been a pleasure.

Hopefully I will talk to you soon.

We'll see you soon.

Raquel McGee: Okay.

Absolutely.

Thank you so very much, Jean.

I really enjoyed this.

Gene Tavernetti: Alright.

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You can follow me on BlueSky at gTabernetti, on Twitter, x at gTabernetti, and you can learn more about me and the work I do at my website, BlueSky.

Tesscg.

com, that's T E S S C G dot com, where you will also find information about ordering my books, Teach Fast, Focus Adaptable Structure Teaching, and Maximizing the Impact of Coaching Cycles.

Talk to you soon