kelly_episode_48 and sean_episode_48 Sean Tibor: [00:00:15] and Welcome to Teaching Python. This is episode 48. What we are using in 2020 to teach Python. My name's Sean Tiber. I'm a coder who teaches. Kelly Paredes: [00:00:24] and my name's Kelly Schuster Perez, and I'm a teacher who codes, Sean Tibor: [00:00:28] So Kelly, Kelly Paredes: [00:00:29] how to think about Sean Tibor: [00:00:30] well, you have been doing so much of both these days. I mean, I think it's funny, the first year we started doing this, it was our, I think our roles were really separate, but I feel very experienced now in my third year of teaching. Kelly Paredes: [00:00:42] Hmm, and I as well in my third year of Sean Tibor: [00:00:44] Well, you have been making a lot of progress, on your coding skills and your Python knowledge. It's pretty cool to see how far you've come over the past three years of coding. Kelly Paredes: [00:00:53] and you as well, you're, you're starting to get away from that business side of yourself. And more of a teacher side. Is that a compliment? Sean Tibor: [00:01:01] not sure. Well, I'll take it as one. So, so Kelly, this week, we're going to get together and talk about the things that we're using this year for teaching Python. Everything changes from year to year. New tools emerge, old tools, get sunsetted and put away. And this is a great opportunity for us to look at what we're using now. And we're also going to make some callbacks to old episodes. If you want to learn more about some of the things that we've done in the past or some of the tools that we've covered, maybe a little bit more detail, this would be a great chance for you to get a little bit of a survey of the things that we're using right now in our classroom and in our zoom rooms. Kelly Paredes: [00:01:39] Yeah. And I'm really excited about this as a teacher experienced teacher, bringing in some ideas and lessons and watching you transform them and have your own spin on how to do you know what some teachers may call the typical teaching lesson. it's been a great learning experience for me over the past three years, just watching you teach and how you, Go through the lesson plans that we Wins of the Week [00:02:02] make. Sean Tibor: [00:02:02] Yeah. So before we get into that, we'll start at the same place we always do, which is with the win of the week. So Kelly, we're looking for something good that has happened inside or outside of the classroom. And I think I've made you go first, the last couple of times. So I'm going to try to venture forth and give my one of the week first and give you a moment to think about it. For me the one this week was really just getting through the week. This was our first week with some students on campus. Our school is just starting to bring back students into live in person learning. There's been a tremendous amount of effort and investment that has gone into transforming our campus and our policies and procedures for allowing students to be on campus learners. Again, in the midst of all of the COVID that is going around the world right now. So. I think this was just as exhausting, if not more so than my very first week of teaching. I remember about Wednesday this week. I could not believe that it was only Wednesday. the day, the week started off really hard. There was a lot going on. I don't think I sat down for the entire day, just running around, helping teachers, teaching my own classes, solving issues that had come up, helping to adjust things on the fly as needed. And so it really started off with a very intense day on Monday, and then it did get better, but it was still a pretty long week of, of teaching with the students, even though, I guess, technically we've been teaching them at a distance for a couple of weeks Kelly Paredes: [00:03:30] Yeah. I was very optimistic on Tuesday and Wednesday and I had heels on and I was already to go into my normal teaching style. By Friday, I was wearing a, a pine crest t-shirt and trainers just to make it through walking around. It was definitely a, a huge win to get through our first week back. It was fun to see the kids, but definitely a tiring week. Sean Tibor: [00:03:54] So, and I agree that the best part of it was definitely seeing the students again in person and, and then blending that experience with the students at home as well. So it's been a little bit of a juggling act, but I think we've gotten through quite a bit of Kelly Paredes: [00:04:07] Yeah. Now we're experienced high pred hybrid flex teachers. That's what they're calling Sean Tibor: [00:04:12] Hi. Hi, flex hybrid, flex Kelly Paredes: [00:04:14] hi flags, something like that. We do it all. That's very cool. So I guess my win was the fact that I got all the sixth graders through, a successful download through their Mac computers after, A little bit of time trying to get the students on zoom, to download and go through security, privacy issues with Mac downloads from the internet. I finally got all the kids on and they realized to not click on the DMG files and to move and click on the application. It's interesting watching these sixth graders who just got their first real computer and not a Chromebook. They're really not used to using computers. We tend to forget that. So not only are we teaching them how to use a computer, we're teaching them how to code with a computer. So that first week with the kids and, and talking them through it without having to share a screen or do it virtually has, was a, was a huge one. Sean Tibor: [00:05:13] for sure. And I felt a little bit of that this week with my seventh graders who were working with file systems. So we had some, actually my eighth graders were working with file systems, so they are a little bit more experienced with moving around files and folders on their computer. But I. Gave them a real Python article about how to manipulate files and folders using Python, and were kind of struggling with it. So I think we take for uh, students that grow up in the modern era often don't have to deal with files and folders and file systems. The way that some of us did back when we were first learning about computers. Kelly Paredes: [00:05:49] I blame Google, Google drive Sean Tibor: [00:05:51] Yeah. The fact that everything is just a search away has really made us not think about how files that are actually stored Kelly Paredes: [00:05:57] and saved all that automatically. Right. Sean Tibor: [00:05:59] right. right. What do you mean it doesn't save, Fails of the Week [00:06:02] Kelly Paredes: [00:06:02] So Epic fail any fails this week. Sean Tibor: [00:06:05] you know, Kelly Paredes: [00:06:07] I don't think we have. Maybe Sean Tibor: [00:06:09] too numerous to count. know, it was, it was definitely one of those weeks where we just had to fail forward. So if something wasn't working, find a solution for it, find effects, keep Um, so we just tried to put them behind us as quickly as possible. Nothing that really stood out to me this week as a, as a major Um, but there are still some things that are maybe fails in progress. Just, just. Programs that aren't quite working right. Or teachers that still need a little bit of help with their specific configuration or setup. But it's been a, I think it's just been a fail forward sort of week for me. So I can't really pull out any one thing in particular. Kelly Paredes: [00:06:46] Yeah, I think, my biggest. Fail. And I learned the vocabulary word on Twitter was that toxic positivity. I was having this moment where I thought I had to be positive for everyone, and we got this and this going to be great. And everything's going to work well. And by Wednesday I was just like, listen. It's okay. It's okay that it's not working. Okay. It's okay. That we've made mistakes. And, I, I. How to turn off my toxic positivity and just sit there and allow the emotions to happen for me and for our, for our faculty and just let them, let them feel. We have to remind ourselves that it's okay, that everything isn't positive at these times in our lives. So that was a huge fail and a learning experience, I guess, for me. Sean Tibor: [00:07:32] Yeah. And I think that the thing that was kind of interesting about when you and I were talking about it and you sent me some things to about it that were kind of interesting, I think on Twitter, It acceptance is not thing as satisfied being Right. So it's okay to not be satisfied with the way things are and wanting to make them better and improve them. But you should also accept right? It's it's that ability to say this is happening. I acknowledge that it's happening. It's okay. That it's happening right now. We expected this to be this way, or maybe we didn't, but we're here now and we're going to move forward from this point. Kelly Paredes: [00:08:07] Yep. And that's what we're doing. We're moving forward. 2020. Here we Sean Tibor: [00:08:11] In 2020, here we come. We've still got, we've still got, I think what three and a half months to go four months ago where we're almost Kelly Paredes: [00:08:16] All right. So let's introduce this Main Topic: Tools We Are Using in 2020 [00:08:18] topic. Sean Tibor: [00:08:18] Yeah, I think this really came up because it has been a couple of years since the early podcast. I think our first episode that was about the technology that we're using was actually episode four. And we're now on episode 48. So we've come a long way with all the different topics that we have. And you brought up a really good point about how. We are at this point, we have enough tools and resources and approaches in our repertoire that we can employ them in a variety of different ways. And that variety is actually very helpful for our students. And there's a number of ways that they benefit from having a variety in their learning. So what we wanted to do today was talk about those tools and resources and approaches that we're using to keep things interesting, challenging, and motivating for our Kelly Paredes: [00:09:08] absolutely. I think in the beginning we were just trying to figure out how to hack out the Python. And now we're applying the quality lesson planning that comes from experience and we're applying what, what I've known over the years and what you've known from Python and mashing them together. And I think they're turning out really great. Sean Tibor: [00:09:27] yep. For sure. And so let's talk about why that's important, right? Like why it's important to have this variety at our fingertips to be able to use it with our students. So, , Kelly, what's the, what's the first thing that you highlighted for our students? How do they initially Kelly Paredes: [00:09:41] so I think most importantly, it's this motivation with a variety of lessons right now, we're working on a block schedule and sitting there for 78 minutes, just coding and hacking around with a code along or, you know, Sean Tibor: [00:09:55] Oh, sorry. I want to just define that for a second. Cause we've actually, we've changed the way that we're teaching this year. Normally we teach, students five days a week for about 39 minutes a right at about Python. And this year in order to minimize switching, we've from a, an everyday schedule to what we call an alternating block schedule. So. We teach students every other day for twice as long. So over the course of two weeks, they have the same amount of instructional time. But our time in the classroom is doubled now in any given session. So that's what we mean when we say a block Kelly Paredes: [00:10:27] Yeah. Sorry about that. Thank you. So it's sitting of 10 and 11 year olds in front of a computer for 78 minutes. You definitely need to have a variety in your lessons to keep that motivation going and finding ways for them to stay engaged and utilize the time wisely, because we don't want to miss out on. That teaching time. Cause then we'll get behind on our goals for the quarter. Sean Tibor: [00:10:51] Yeah. And I recognize that I had that happen. I think on Thursday this week I had students that had too much of the same thing for too long, and some of them were able to get through it, but others, they were ready to go with 20 minutes left on the clock. Right. So just that variety would have helped them stay engaged for the full time of the lesson and be productive and motivated and curious for that whole time. Kelly Paredes: [00:11:12] Yeah. it just increases that focus like you were saying, it, it keeps that classroom alive and active and that changing up and the variety of the lesson activities within that period just keeps them focused on what's coming in. Even if some kids can code for 78 minutes, like Shawn typers can code for some eight minutes without stop. Kelly Schuster Pratt is, is that's beautiful. they can't get that much, coding done in a, in one setting. So it's good to keep focused. Sean Tibor: [00:11:40] Everyone has their limits. I mean, I have my limits with how much I can code. It took me a long time to get to the point where I could focus for, more than an hour, hour and a half on a problem. it's the rare occasions where I can sit for three or four hours without taking a break that is actually not healthy. So I've, I've forced myself to take breaks too. So the variety and the ability to stop and pause and do something else for a little bit and then returned to what you're. Doing is really important. It's that switching time that that helps keep us motivated and curious, the trick is to make it so that the switching isn't happening every two to three minutes, where you can never actually get into a problem or get into a solution. Kelly Paredes: [00:12:16] Exactly and as good teachers, we all know that routine is really critical in a, in a classroom, but at the same time, there's a fine line between a boredom and this a dullness effect where we do the same thing every day. And so we add in a variety and do a little bit of fun things, to change it up. Sean Tibor: [00:12:34] Yup. sometimes you'll see students getting bored. Sometimes they'll tell you they're bored. Sometimes you just have to guess and observe and, and feel the pulse of the room to see what's happening. I, this week I had a student who I was helping on their screen and then student from another class sent them an I message that popped up and said, I'm so bored right now. And I said, you know, I can see her screen, so sometimes they'll be very explicit and say that they're bored. and other times you have to kind of read it and see that they're just starting to lose steam and lose that motivation. Kelly Paredes: [00:13:05] absolutely. And that comes with practice. another thing is we know from experience that. Showing concepts in multiple settings helps to reinforce learning and the students to really stick on those concepts by doing them different ways. Sean Tibor: [00:13:20] Right. So the example that I use with this is I can demonstrate how to use a loop in CoLab to iterate over a list of items. I can use the same loop on a. Microbit to show how I can iterate over the lights on the led matrix. And because they see the application in different areas, um, concept of the loop is reinforced. So it really does help them get the idea and be able to know that the next time they go do it in a different setting, that they understand the basic concept. And we'll be able to figure out that new application of it. Kelly Paredes: [00:13:54] Absolutely. that takes us into the importance of just to refresh if you're not a teacher or if you're starting to teach, or if you are tutoring, it's this idea of the importance of , lesson planning. we're gonna met this on air, Sean and I do not have written specifically. Quality lesson plans, but we do have a great outlines cause we work well with outlines. That's how Sean and I work. if we ever had to go to a district school where we had to write lesson plans, I'm not sure Sean and I would be able to do it. Sean Tibor: [00:14:26] Well, we definitely start with an outline before we had to write that Kelly Paredes: [00:14:29] We work really well with the outline, but we always have our objectives in mind. we were just talking about what we're gonna do next week and the next two weeks and three weeks. So we have our basic objectives. We know our path where we want to be at the end of the nine weeks at the end of the three years. So it's very important to pull out that lesson planning. Sean Tibor: [00:14:49] yup. And that even just the process of going through the Western plant helps give structure to what you're going to do. It helps it reinforce the routine. It helps you think of gaps in the lesson plan. So what am I missing? So we use the lesson planning process pretty extensively, and I think. The biggest thing that I think we're missing this year from our classroom, besides the bean bags that we can't use anymore is the just vast amounts of whiteboard space that we have on the tables to be able to sketch out ideas and outlines and think about how we're going to sequence the lesson and the learning to be able to get the right. Content delivered at the right time for the students. So, we find ways to make it work, now we're doing more Google docs and more digital lesson planning just to be able to have that same sort of structure, even if we don't have the same sort of whiteboard expanse that we can work with as we have in past years. Kelly Paredes: [00:15:41] from our lesson planning, no, the activities because Sean and I both, teach the seventh grade. Sean, can't go and teach, Some crazy idea without at least telling me, Hey, I'm going to teach this crazy idea. And then I say, no, I don't. Sean Tibor: [00:15:56] Well, I, I can go off and teach something crazy, but then Kelly just yells at me. So nobody wants that. but no staying coordinated really helps this way. Our students are learning the same things, even if we're teaching it in slightly different ways, we might be a day or two ahead or behind, but just making sure that we stay coordinated and in sync on what we're doing with our T our students is really important for the students and for us to make sure that we're teaching the right things at the appropriate. A level four, the grade Kelly Paredes: [00:16:22] Yeah. and part of our lesson planning, we do have our assessments, some things that, we want to check besides the quality. Formative assessments that we do daily and putting aside the fact that Sean wants to make point systems out of 10,000 points instead of 10. Sean Tibor: [00:16:38] gamification, it's just gamification. Kelly Paredes: [00:16:41] we, we have a little argument with that of like, I have to type more numbers if we do 10,000. Sean Tibor: [00:16:46] Yeah, but it's more fun when kids can tell their parents. I got 10,000 points on that assignment. Kelly Paredes: [00:16:52] Yeah. But we have these assessments and we like to, we like to have. Short timely, and frequent assessments throughout the week throughout the lesson so that we can take a pulse because every year, every quarter, every class, it seems it's so different, even though we're teaching technically the same stuff. We do have to vary up our assessments sometimes just to make sure that we are getting that pulse on the Sean Tibor: [00:17:20] Yup. And then that also helps us with our time management too. So once we know what we're teaching, what we expect them to wear and how we're going to measure it, or how we're going to assess it, we can look and see, well, do we actually have enough time to do this? Or we may, or we do, we need to add more back. So it helps us gauge the amount of content and the amount of time that's going to take us to complete the lesson and make sure that that fits with the time that we have. Which this year has been a little bit challenging because it's new it's we haven't taught this longer format class period before. So it we've really been leaning heavily on our lesson plans to help us make sure that we're getting the right content there. Kelly Paredes: [00:17:55] and I think I'm going to share the secret for everyone. I think the difference for us in how we. change up what we do. It's based on our results where we are result oriented, but we're not necessarily result oriented in the fact that, Oh, we're going to make rock paper scissors. We're going to do this specific project. Yes, we do the specific projects, but those aren't the results we're looking for. we're taking those kids and we're, even if we put a little wrench in that wheel, we want to see if they can solve a problem. So we try to always put a little bit of a spin on the normal activities that are out there. Sean Tibor: [00:18:33] that same backwards by design that we use at the top level for the overall curriculum. What are the things we want them to know by the end, we can break that down into smaller parts and cover. Here are the things we want them to know for this lesson. that really helps us. as we do this, we also need to make sure that we're creating good environments, right? It's not just enough to have the plan. We need to create the structure and the framework that surround the plan, the context for that learning. That makes sense. So we use the tools that we have available to us, and there's some really great stuff that's out there, especially with, , the ability for us to share content easily with our students. We want to make sure that we're being. Predictable with that so that they know what to expect and when to expect it. And we also want to make sure that we're being clear with everything that we're delivering to them. So yeah, this week that maybe that was actually my fail. I had a few things this week where I had, I guess, forgotten how to set up an assignment in the LMS and I had to go back and it, we make some adjustments, but those are the things that as we get. Good at creating that environment for our students. They know where to find what they need. They know how to comprehend it, what they need to, to do in order to be successful. And then they go do it. I think a good example of this is before. Coronavirus hit before we went to distance learning. It's not like we were using a lot of paper documents. We weren't handing out assignments on paper. Maybe we'd hand out print outs of graph paper for coordinate planes or something like that. But really we tried to avoid paper documents, but we would also communicate. A lot verbally in class, and now we've switched almost everything over to being posted digitally on our LMS. So we start everything with a weekly overview. So the students know exactly what they're going to see for the week, what they're expected to do, what they're expected to turn in. We have them, we have that in our LMS, but we also put in. The assignments that are due this week, we have them submit the assignments with screenshots. They share their CoLab documents with us for, to look at it. So we really have tried to make it so that they, by say the second or third week of school really have a solid understanding of how to start work, how to complete it, how to turn it in, how to get it assessed and how to get the feedback from the teachers on what's working in their code. Kelly Paredes: [00:20:44] So on top of sharing and getting all our resources out on the LMS and the weekly overview, we also like to filter in and create that environment for learning through our SEL, core skills that we, we like to teach throughout the Sean Tibor: [00:20:59] So those social and emotional learning opportunities that really help our students develop beyond just the technical and into the things that help them be in tune with their own social, emotional behaviors. Social & Emotional Learning with Padlets [00:21:09] Kelly Paredes: [00:21:09] So, yeah, I know. I always talk about these emotional sides of coding, but I think this is one of the important things that also just pulls us together and allows us to, to expand our lessons. And, these things like reflections. We use, some Padlets. For the kids to share out their ideas. I did a great Padlet just at the beginning of the school year about perseverance and what things that the street students use in order to keep motivated, because I wanted to share with them the fact that. It's it's hard and that other people have the same kind of fears and lack of resilience or perseverance for a project. So things that allow the students to, share their ideas in one location is great to put onto our LMS or, even just to put a snippet of a code onto it. I also like to really focus on this self awareness, self management, and we use a lot of Pomodora method, which I'm starting to use more. So within this 78 minute time block, I'm finding out though that six year old six, six year olds, sixth graders can not work for 25 minutes straight. So , we're reducing that don't have time to about 15 to 20 minutes and adding a two minute or three minute break and on. Thursday and Friday actually took the kids out for a walk and they're like, where are we going to sit around the building real quick? And we went around the building and that's just a really good way to show them like, listen, we're aware of ourselves where we are aware of our management ability and our ability to refocus, and I'm going to help them with those tools. Sean Tibor: [00:22:49] Yeah, I think that's really important because. we all have had coworkers in the past who were maybe technically brilliant, but emotionally stunted. And that is that right. Is a really tough situation to be in for everyone, not just the people around that person, but that person as well, to be able to recognize and see that. You know that the emotional part of coding and the emotional part of problem solving and engineering is valid, right? We want it to be logical and rational and black and white, and really concrete if L statements, but what really helps and what helps you be productive are those skills that help you collaborate with others, the self awareness of your own, feelings and motivations and shortcomings when you're trying to figure things out and then. Importantly, the tools, the coping strategies, the mechanisms, the things that you learn to help you move beyond those. we know that we have limitations, but we can push past them if we collaborate with others. it really does help to have some awareness of your own emotional state, your social skills, how you can best work with yourself and with others to get things done. So an important part of our education is not just teaching the coding, but giving opportunities to practice the social, emotional side as well. Maintaining Focus [00:24:05] Kelly Paredes: [00:24:05] Yeah. And I have to give a shout out to some of my former colleagues in Lima, where they took on a challenge. And, I got this from them. We did a lot of research on brain brain studies and how the brain and learning happens and they set a clock. A specific clock in every 25 minutes, went out for a five minutes, a 10 minute break, and they played games and they walked around and I started using the strict workflow extension, which is a love, hate relationship with strict workflow because you pick the things that you want to block. And one of my downfalls is going to Twitter and YouTube. So I blocked those. And when I click on the extension, it. Locks out that page. And even though I see Twitter up on the tab, if I click on it, there's like a big red Apple that says you've been blocked for 25 more minutes or 22 more minutes. So , these things that you learn as a teacher, they really helped develop young coders and adult quarter coders as well. And lastly, I just want to add in another competency is I think something that we both believe in wholeheartedly is that curiosity is the main driver of learning. And I don't know who quoted that, but I put it in quotes, but that's self learning opportunities. If a kid says, you know what, I already know what you're doing. I will give them, an opportunity to do something that they want to look at. So if they want to look at arcade, do they want to look at something else? I will point them in that direction and let them go with it. And you do that really nice. A lot of the times. Sean Tibor: [00:25:43] I find that the most important thing I can do for students is help them find something that they are interested in, that they want to learn more about. And I will. Be ruthless about taking things away that are clearly not helping them, that they don't care about. I'd rather have them learn from things that are interesting to them. And I truly believe that every student has something that they're excited about or interested in when it comes to coding and Python, we just haven't found it yet. Kelly Paredes: [00:26:11] Yeah, you've ruthless about it for me to keep constantly trying to get me to do a project, to do something. And it's definitely something that, you have instilled in me about that curiosity as a main driver. So let's jump into our, our actual, some of our techniques before we get into the tools Teaching Techniques for Distance and Hybrid Learning [00:26:28] Sean Tibor: [00:26:28] Yeah. So I think we want to make a distinction here between the technology tools that we use while we're teaching Python. So IDs, visualization tools, the things that are actually directly related to the code and some of these techniques and communication tools that we use in addition to the platforms and everything. So when we say tools, we're thinking more broadly than specific libraries, packages, IDs, things like that. Kelly Paredes: [00:26:53] Yeah. And there's a, the techniques and the communication tools. Definitely a lot different than what normally your coders and the programmers think of. So I think that's that distinction between the teaching, the actual teaching and the actual. Programming coding. So one of the things that I have loved, loved, loved out of this whole yeah. Zoom thing. And here's my positive outlook on this virtual, teaching is the ability to screenshare so easily and to have a student flash up their code, And for us to look at their code and try to find out where the air is, why it's not working. And a lot of the times when I'm sitting there trying to look through a student scrolling, all of a sudden, one of my other students were like, Oh, I see it. They forgot this. And Oh, you know, that's, what's missing. And it has become such a great teaching technique for me that I am on the search for how to. Besides casting this, the code up on our smart board. How else am I going to do this? And we may lose the zoom. Sean Tibor: [00:27:59] Yeah, that's a really good question. I mean, the thing is when we lose zoom, we're not really losing it. We're just losing the constant need for it. So one of the things that I, I really admire about this process is we've established this common language or common skillset for collaborating and sharing. Over distance. So at this point, every student in our school knows how to join the zoom. They know how to screen share. They know how to, , highlight things on the screen. Some of them know how to annotate also, but every student has basic skills for being able to share their screen from zoom, with another person. And every teacher does too. when we started this process, six months ago, we would have had to train everyone, , teach them step by step or at least a good chunk of the students and teachers about how to get to the point where I can actually see what they're seeing. And now every student has that skill. So it means that even once we're through with distance learning or we're away from it for the most part. We can still use that tool and it's still valuable for everyone. So why not have a zoom session available, even if we're not using it for the video collaboration and the audio, just to be able to do screen sharing with one another. Kelly Paredes: [00:29:10] Yeah, that's a good point. I still think they're going to be looking out for some more those whiteboards and definitely how we're going to get some coding platforms. And there so that we can actively, I guess it's going to be that. Get, get Sean Tibor: [00:29:25] Maybe maybe, maybe, maybe it's a lot. That's a lot to learn. I mean, you could teach an entire nine week course on just how to use get hub. So, you know, I, I want to make sure that we're using it. Appropriately and that we've given students enough space to warn it, rather than just trying to shoe horn it in to an existing course. Using Videos [00:29:44] Kelly Paredes: [00:29:44] Absolutely. So one of the other things that I have, really fall in love with during this whole zoom, virtual learning are the use of videos. and I like to alternate between loom and Screencastify just because my picture can move around and loom, it's a circle, a picture where in Screencastify it's a square and on the right only. So I like to change it up. Cause I just like having a different look and I just liked the ability to give the students some short videos and to have that as a homework assignment or a choice board assignment, and, learn at their own pace. I love that idea. That's come out from it. So those are good techniques that I think I'm going to take on with me. past 20, 20, 21. Sean Tibor: [00:30:25] Well, and you've also mentioned using those short videos as feedback tools also. So the ability to show a student some feedback on their code or on your, on your own editor about some ideas or things that they could try. so it works on both the initial, upfront teaching, as well as the feedback at the end as well. Kelly Paredes: [00:30:43] absolutely. And I have been getting actually videos from some kids as well. They like to show the video of it. Them typing in, especially if we're doing user-friendly inputs, or interaction with our code. They like to film it as they're running it through. So it's a great, it's a great technique and a communication tool for teaching. another technique that's pretty much a steadfast been around forever, but, or just little bit, little things that we do on a daily basis that. Aren't necessarily planned into the lesson, but our, our go tos. And I think we do that a lot. Both of us naturally. It's a time to talk it out. The little think allows the kids having to talk through their code , and tell us what's happening in it. Sean Tibor: [00:31:28] I also like talking through a problem before we start writing code. So we talk it out as we're writing it. We also talk about before we even get there. So I'm, I'm really working this quarter on getting students to think and. Plan and design before they start writing code, because I think it helps them really make sure they understand it. So I ask them, okay, so we have this, this code challenge, or we have this problem that we're doing. What's the first thing we should do. And they're like, well, we're going to start with an F statement. I'm like, no, no, no. The first thing we're going to do is we're going to draw this out or we're going to talk about it. Do we really understand the problem? So before we go solve the problem, or before we create the solution, we want to make sure we're solving the right problem and that we understand it thoroughly before we go. Often start writing code because there's nothing that waste time like solving the wrong problem. Kelly Paredes: [00:32:14] Absolutely. and another thing that we do is the, pre-teaching the vocabulary, as I'm thinking back to my first quarter or second quarter and third quarter of teaching, I was like, yeah, the, the eye is the eye thingy and you were like iterator. And I was like, yeah, yeah, that too. and. I'm starting to use more of this pre-teaching vocabulary and you do it a lot. And I think I got that technique from you. I saw you just on what Friday? Telling kids what the a w amp, what was it called? What were you Sean Tibor: [00:32:42] Oh, the ampersand, right? Kelly Paredes: [00:32:44] Like who knows and percent you do. Sean Tibor: [00:32:47] They're like, Oh, you mean the Ansible? I'm like, well, it does have a name, right? That's I said, and if you see someone say the ampersand, when they're writing an article about Python or something like that, you want to know what they're talking about. You know, it, it should become something that is part of your vocabulary. And it's just one small thing, but there's so much to learn. And so many words that are being used in this domain of computer science and. There's a, a double edged sword to jargon and technical jargon. And one of the positives of jargon is that it what's us be specific and precise about what we're saying. The downside of it. The part that is negative is that it can be very exclusive, so jargon can exclude people from the conversation. Right? And so I'm very mindful of the fact that there is a lot of jargon to be used a lot of technical vocabulary. And it's important to me to use both and also to welcome students into using that vocabulary by taking the time to explain what it means so that they feel like they are empowered to participate. Kelly Paredes: [00:33:49] Yeah. And I think that, opportunity to pre-teach vocabulary, even at the most basic level, here's a, here's the list. And what does an equal equivalency or assigning. To mean or look like, at the basic level of sixth graders, I just try to read out what a simple L statement means in English and just pre-teaching that vocabulary so that when they see a problem, or when they're trying to solve something, they can use the right vocabulary to help explain to us what they want to do. And it's very important. It's a great use of the class time. Pause, ask questions, pause and review. We do that a lot, Sean Tibor: [00:34:30] I didn't actually know what that was called. I think I was just doing it, , or emulating you. but, but this definitely works. Kelly Paredes: [00:34:38] And I think you do the pause really well. You can wait and wait and I'm like, Oh my God, just call somebody else. But there's a great, fine line between waiting too long and making that student, nervous. And I think great teachers have that ability to pause long enough and to know when, to help and, and ask the questions to pull out that information. Sean Tibor: [00:35:00] I, I can see that I can see them, having that moment of panic, , Oh my, Oh, he's calling on me and I don't know the answer and everything. And so the ability to be positive and reassuring as well to say it's okay. Take a moment to think about it. and it's okay to guess wrong. You're not gonna get penalized for it. Just take a moment and try and I'd rather have them try and be wrong than panic over this fear of being wrong. So I try it and it's okay to make a wrong guess. Kelly Paredes: [00:35:29] Yeah, absolutely. And one of the things that I've been using since the. The startup of my teaching and coding career are those these 15 minute challenges. I'm trying to get them down to 10 minutes. When I first started teaching, someone was like, how do you teach that? Do those in 15 minutes? And I was like, yeah, well, they normally take about 35 minutes, but I have been getting them down and I do set a timer and I do make them submit. Yeah. Something, even if it's wrong or even if it's in a comment form, or even if it's just the rewriting of what I'm challenging them on. But I do think it's a quality use of time with those class challenges. Just that quick struggle that, they get held accountable for, but it's like four points. It doesn't hurt them. They could probably fail every class challenge and still, result in a, a good grade for the Sean Tibor: [00:36:19] well, especially if we start doing 10,000 point assignments, I think we could really, we could really solve that for you. what I've seen when I use the class challenge is that everyone searches for a way to solve the problem. And that is something that's really important to me. And something that I wanted to change about my own education was that I felt too often when I was. When I was in school, the emphasis was on getting the right answer or the one answer that was correct. Not, they're not taking a variety of paths to achieve a result. And so one of the things that I find amazing about math as an adult, that I didn't think about when I was a kid, was that there are so many different ways to arrive at an answer or a correct solution. And not all of them are. Always precise, but they can always be effective. And that variety of approaches is what's really fascinating to me. And one of the things I love about grading, those is because I have kids that like come up with something that definitely should not work. And yet they found a way to make it work. And it's pretty cool to see because it's basically a window into their own thought process. The Main Tools Section [00:37:26] Kelly Paredes: [00:37:26] Okay, so let's jump right in and let's, let's just talk about the main tools. One of the things that we are very cognizant of is not introducing too many tools at different grade levels. And it's something that we have shared through the sixth, seventh, and eighth grade classes, a set type of tool, I should say. And, we just want to show you or talk about how we use them in the classroom. Sean Tibor: [00:37:48] yes, we, we do blend these together quite a bit. So our students that are in the sixth grade that are about 11, 12 years old, will often start with a immu editor, it's a great ID for beginners and it, it comes with Python, bill 10. So it's one download. You have Python already in included and it, and it works for writing pure Python. You can use it with hardware, like the microbit circuit Python boards. It has a web development engine in there. So I think you can do flask with it. It also has pie game in there. So there's a lot of different things that you can do with, with one IDE but it is intentionally limited. To encourage students to move beyond it. So students are expected to outgrow mew at some point, and it makes it a little bit easier. I think for them to see that when there are some hard Gates in place. Kelly Paredes: [00:38:38] I just love, the way that Nick took the time to design it for kids, for me, it's one of those things that it's, it's not scary. terminal still scares me, pie chart, even though I'm getting more used to that every day, sort of, it's still a little bit scary. And I think with working with move for the younger grades, with the big buttons and clearly defined, use of those tools. It really helps. And he's actually started to put in a few new features that I've noticed pop up and, explanations, which is pretty neat. And I'll try to find some of those later in tweet out. I forgot to take screenshots of them, but it's just a really nice, easy tool and they can move from the microbits easily. And it's not something that I have to teach them how to get into Sean Tibor: [00:39:24] Yeah, I think this works really well when you're working with physical computing devices, like the microbit for teaching introductory Python. it also works really well if you want to transition into other things or if you're starting without the hardware and you just want to do some game development or something, that's pretty simple. It works very, very well for that. this year you're using it primarily with the sixth graders because every sixth grader has a microbit with them, whether they're at home or at school, Kelly Paredes: [00:39:50] absolutely. And I think that's the only thing I really introduced them. two and replica, just if I can't get someone on Mo. Sean Tibor: [00:39:57] Yeah. And I think, you know, the other audience that this is really great for is if you need an ID that just hooks into a. Microbit or a circuit Python board, the plotter they have in you is really, really cool. And the builtin rappel to be able to read serial information back from the board is pretty nice. So if you're just looking at doing some basic hardware, hacking mew is a great solution. Also, no matter how beginner or advanced you are with your Python knowledge. Kelly Paredes: [00:40:25] And I'm, I'm assuming, because I'm not as experienced with other IDs or editors. But the way that move works for me and working with the sixth graders, I can show them in red, in quotes. These are the strings and look how the answer is a different color. And as you click on a variable, you can see it highlighted throughout the code. And it's just a nice feature for newbies in order to get in there and see how it works and, and see that there is difference within the code and the types of data that's in Sean Tibor: [00:40:57] yeah, most IDs probably have some sort of. code highlighting so that you can see different types of, of code, but it's all very configurable, right? Like I can have it be whatever color scheme I want. And I can say, I want to highlight variables, but not methods or whatever I want to do. This is you get what it is, right? Like it is one thing you get what you get. And there there's something really important about that for beginners, we keep it super simple and it's the same way on everybody's computer. So the kids who are on windows have the same exact experience as the kids on Mac. So if we're walking a class of, you know, 15, 20, 30 students through the code, they're always going to be seeing the same thing. And that, that is really powerful for us to be able to help at those early stages. Colab Notebooks [00:41:41] Kelly Paredes: [00:41:41] Yeah. And as we get into seventh grade, you've found this for us a couple of years ago was the CoLab Jupiter notebooks. Sean Tibor: [00:41:47] Yeah, this one's, this one's really great. And it works really well because students already have a, an understanding of Google docs. So I always explained to them that a Google CoLab. Notebook is like a Google doc that you can write code in. So they have the ability to run code, just like it's a Jupiter notebook. It's hosted on Google as platform. So you all get those rich sharing and commenting and collaborative features. With it, which are fantastic. You can store your documents in Google drive. So it goes with you everywhere and you can run it on just about anything. If you can get to a Google doc, you can get to a Google CoLab and run code on it. So we have students that have, you know, three, four year old. You know, Mac books with, you know, pretty limited processors on it. And they're running into the same as the kid sitting next to them with a, you know, late model gaming laptops that they have spent a lot of money on and it just works. So we use this probably for, you know, we probably only use a few percent of what it can actually do because. Cola behind the scenes is actually hooked up to Google's data centers and some of their virtual machines there that have access to high end GPS. And you can do machine learning and AI I on those platforms as well. And it's pretty fast. So you basically get a free tool thousand dollar computer hooked up to a Jupiter notebook in the cloud. And the only real limit on it is Uh, the runtime, the runtime will only run for 10 or 12 hours, which is far more than enough for our purposes, but maybe people who want to do, you know, modeling or machine learning might um, more long running instances. And in that case, they have CoLab pronouns. Kelly Paredes: [00:43:26] That's it's an awesome program. And I think the one thing that has stuck through with the seventh grade course for us is that Python review sheet. I think I made it up when you showed me about it, because it was difficult for me to remember all the concepts that were taught in sixth grade. And I wanted to have my own little cheat sheet and we. Put in those topics at the beginning of the seventh grade year, and we put some videos for reference and then we do some code alongs and the students have that Python review. we cover in like one and a half weeks, two weeks, all the stuff that they did in sixth grade to just refresh their memory. And it's been great with sharing on our LMS. I know a lot of teachers we've had a person ask us, what do we use to share code? Well, that's the benefit of having CoLab. We can put a link into our LMS. The kids can submit a link back and we can access their code right then and Sean Tibor: [00:44:21] And run it. So it's even better than taking a screenshot of their code or copying and pasting it. I can go straight from, let me click the link that they sent me to I'm in their notebook and I can execute the code that they created and see how it does or does not work. Kelly Paredes: [00:44:36] Yeah, that's a great Sean Tibor: [00:44:37] Um, so I, I think it, it really leads us into uh, the next platform. We also use a lot of replica in the classroom. So CoLab works really well for kind of code snippets, short codes, testing concepts, things like that. I like to use replica for writing more full featured programs. I know that seems a little bit strange, but it. The rapid environment is more like running a program on your computer where it's not cell-based, it doesn't have an interactive environment. So students have to practice writing code that that runs all the way through. So kind of like CoLab and then it's all web based and you don't need to have anything installed on your computer to write the Python code. It gives you an editor. It gives you a file system. It gives you some packages that you can install and some output windows. But then what it also does, that's pretty cool is that you can have assignment submissions, so you can create an assignment. Have students finished code that you've already started, so you can write some stub code for them. They can complete it. And then it actually has automated testing, with it as well. So it uses a unit test. To test their code submissions and make sure that it works. So it gives the students the instance feedback on whether their program is working or not. it also has something that I think might be one of my favorite things I've seen done in online coding. It has multiplayer mode. Where more than one student. In fact, I think it's two or three or even four or five students can all be in the same code at the same time. And you can see their cursor is moving around and writing code and everything, and it's kind of fun. So I have this idea for a lesson plan, but I'm still not sure how I'm going to pull it off, where we all just collaboratively write code together and see what happens. Right. So seven or eight people like multiplayer, I'm envisioning it's like Pac-Man with little cursors running around the screen writing code. Kelly Paredes: [00:46:23] idea. I have the idea, I love this. You're going to do like that one sentence story builder. Everyone starts with a sentence and then they have to add Sean Tibor: [00:46:33] I love that. Okay. So there's our Kelly Paredes: [00:46:35] There's your new Sean Tibor: [00:46:36] There's our new lesson, right? Kelly Paredes: [00:46:38] I, I have, I have not been using a rappel. I, the way that you do, I use it as my backup when you know, kids computer's broken or when they have a new computer and I just don't have the time right away to install Mo at the sixth grade level or, , For whatever reason. I love it as well. Default program it's clean, it's easy to use. Sixth grader can pick it up and start going on it. they don't have to log in. They can just cut copy and paste their code. It copies in cause sometimes and move you can't copy paste code in, but in rebel you can. And it just works really well. So Sean Tibor: [00:47:13] Yeah, it is really great. , we haven't used the classroom environment that much, but I could see where using it with more adult learners, either high school students or college students could be really powerful, especially once you've created all your assignments. It could be something that is a fully self paced course. Kelly Paredes: [00:47:30] Yeah. So we always get this question, I think. And I've seen this question a couple of times on our Twitter feed and in our, off our website about what do we do with our kids that are higher level. And I know I always was just point them to pie charm. I'm like, here's a book here's pie chart. Sean Tibor: [00:47:48] I think you had a sixth grader come in this year and say, so are we using vs code this year? Or what should I be downloading here? And he was like, ready to roll with some of, yeah. Kelly Paredes: [00:47:58] whole face Palm. I'm like, Oh God. But yes. Sean Tibor: [00:48:01] Yep. So, yeah, I mean, we do have those students that are more advanced and they want to do more and, you know, sometimes the tools don't really matter. They're in a CoLab with everyone else and kind of doing their own thing, but I really like to give those more advanced students, some additional. Courses, some materials and things like that. So, you know, like I might point them towards an ebook version or the online version of automate the boring stuff or invent your own computer games with Python from Al swagger. Like, I can give that to them and say, okay, go write this. And you know what, try using vs code to do it, or download pie charm and try it and get them to start learning these more advanced tools as something that just challenges them a little bit more. They may not have that challenge with CoLab or with mew or something like that. But yeah. Giving them, the ability to learn the IDE is kind of a cool thing. and it really works best when they're self paced, when they, they want to learn it themselves. So I'm just there to really encourage them and help them overcome obstacles when they encounter them. Kelly Paredes: [00:49:02] well, that's pretty much on our IDs. going back into our teaching tools and variety of lessons and activities. You know, I think people automatically assume that all we do is sit there and code and do code alongs. And to be honest, our life would be really easy. If every day I just said, open up your computer, we're going to code you. Code ICO. We, you know, this is a we code and we don't do that. We have still, like, we talked about a lot of our variety of tools. Including your SEL and everything else, but we also so do a lot of visual tools to help things stick. And, and I know you were using the Python tutor a lot, and we're going to cover that later at another episode, but will you tell us a little bit, cause I've only, I only used it a little bit. I I've clicked through the buttons and watch it go, but I don't use it at the extent that you Sean Tibor: [00:49:48] Yeah, I think really it's a visual. Bugger. And I've seen this with a lot of other. programs that I've used in the past, for software development, the idea of the debugger to me has always been at a certain break point at a point where the program has paused, it's running and you're looking at what's currently going on. You can see the current state of variables of objects, of the function stack. So you can see where you are. And Python tutor does a really great job of. Of making that a really simple visualization for students. So I will often say, okay, take this code, go to Python, tutor, paste it in, and then they can run it step by step, just like in a debugger line by line next, next, next, until, and watch as the variables change as they go through it. And it's a really great way for them to be able to see what's going on. You know, mew does the same thing and they're debugger. You can see this in visual studio code, but there's something that's useful about having all kind of trained if you will, on how to use Python tutor to do it. So no matter what tool they're in, they can put their code into Python tutor and see what's going to happen there and then be able to step through it. So I use it. One is a way to visualize things, but. Too, as a way to slow things down, to be able to slow down the execution of the program that we've written, the code that we've created, to be able to look at it line by line and watch how the program state changes as we go from line to line. So you can do that in the new debugger also vs code has a good debugger. You know, all these IDs have great debuggers. What I found for students that are still new to this, or still learning is that Python tutor makes it really. Clear and easy to understand, because the way it charts and graphs, those, those variables for you. Kelly Paredes: [00:51:29] So I also love this little feature in the new editor and I have. Taken and had the kids take it snippet of their current code. because it's, you know, I talked about this in our last episode about ugly code and just the way that they're thinking through things. And I don't really get into the whole eight or here's the rules a lot. And I don't, you know, double space, single space, et cetera, et cetera, white space. And mu has that great opportunity where it shows the debugger and the white space. But what I like to do is have them take a screenshot of their current code and in the alpha version of mu if you click on tidy, It cleans up the whole code and then have them look side by side of what it looked like before and what changed when we put it into the proper, forms so that they get an idea. And I like to relate that to, essay writing or something. If they submit a, an essay to their English teacher without indentation or double spacing or certain type of format, then they're going to have a bad grade. And although you won't get a bad grade in code, you just don't have pretty code. And those are the things that you can do to show the difference between what good code looks like even at the simplistic form. But, that's a great feature of Mo. Sean Tibor: [00:52:40] Yeah. And there's, that's all based on the black project. So black is a code for matter. and it, what it does is it just gives you a, here's a formatted, really heavy handed version of, of the formatting of your code. but it's deterministic. Like if I take any sort of code and I run it through a, through black, it's always going to put the same code. Out again. So it gives you Kelly Paredes: [00:53:03] new every time. Sean Tibor: [00:53:05] but we have that, we get such a great implementation of mew because it doesn't say, format my code with black. It just says tidy. So like, I want to make my code neat and tidy. I just click the button Kelly Paredes: [00:53:15] I think it's that brand it's that British term would make it Sean Tibor: [00:53:17] make it tidy. Right. Make it Kelly Paredes: [00:53:19] hear Nick saying it right now. Alright. Sean Tibor: [00:53:23] For sure. And, and then you, you know, that also gets into sort of the linting right? So a little squiggly lines underneath things, kids often just completely overlook it, but it's like your code's trying to tell you something, that maybe, maybe this could be changed. Maybe this could be fixed and we don't go too much in to Python style. I will definitely emphasize getting something, working and making sure that they understand the steps of it. Before I started introducing things like, well, let's go back and, , rename some of your variables so that they're more Python, right. Or that they're actually using snake case. So we, we go through that, with them, but we're always trying to juggle and manage for them. How many things are trying to do, or remember at the same time, Kelly Paredes: [00:54:05] I'm trying to remember the name of the variable that my one student had this week. And I was like, why blue? She named blue? But it was, tell me the costume you're wearing insert the custom name. I was like, why blue? Oh, I just pick up words and I'm like, Oh no, dear. Oh, gosh, no, no, we're not doing that. No, you need to tell me what that is. Cause I have no idea what you're coding blue for. So one more thing about moving that I noticed, and I love, for sixth graders and I think this is part of the alpha version that came out. If you forget a quote, if you forget a parentheses on the end moves got that really bright. Pink not bright, but it looks bright on against the white screen pink highlighting, showing the students that there's something wrong with this line of code. You need to fix Sean Tibor: [00:54:51] Right, right, right. Kelly Paredes: [00:54:52] So that visual Sean Tibor: [00:54:53] Yeah. The, the, those linting features where it will tell you what's going Um, I think the students, once they recognize that it's, there are really excited about it because it gives them hints as to what's happening. Um, the last visualization tool that we, that we'll put up here, or is the turtle module in Python, which isn't necessarily like a code visualization, but we have to mention turtle has such a valuable teaching tool for thinking through processes and problems and how to get the flow of a program working. So. It just works well for every student that has always wanted to see their actual output. And they don't just want text on the screen or some words that are printed out. They want to be able to see their code, make something, or create something. And we have seen that turtle is probably one of the areas where kids just want to extend their learning and extend their project beyond what's required. So we'll say, okay, make a. You know, make a tree and, and turtle. And then before you know, it, like two days later, it comes back and it's like, so I made a tree. Then I made a house. Here's my son. I've got a dog in the yard. Here's the white picket fence that I made. They've created an entire scene from turtle because they just love that visualization of. That they've created with code. So I know that there's some great tools out there. I really want to learn how to do the processing app, which will take Python code and do some really cool artistic visualizations with it. but there are so many different ways that we can use turtle to teach everything from art to geography, to geometry, to math graphing. Like there's so many different things that you can do with the. The simple turtle module. It's pretty amazing to see. Kelly Paredes: [00:56:37] Yeah. And I'll start that next week after I've gone through variables list F strings, print outs, comment. what else? Lists methods. I've done all that already in sixth grade. So we'll throw out turtle and then I have to cut them off and I cut them off with the microbit, so that sometimes gets them away, but I still had a kid showed me, Just the other day. Look, this I made last year, look at all the pretty colors and the iterations of this concentric circle. I'm like, yes. I've seen the concentric circle a lot of times, Right, Sean Tibor: [00:57:06] right. Kelly Paredes: [00:57:06] so many times. Okay. Real quick. Cause we're wrapping this up a little bit we started code challenges this year Sean Tibor: [00:57:12] the website. Yeah. The website code challenges Kelly Paredes: [00:57:15] code, challenged dot S from Bob and Julian and. I just want to make the distinction of those are two activities between the class challenge that we do, the 15 minute challenges versus the code challenge. Those are two things that we really like to use and tools that we'd like to use in our classroom. Sean Tibor: [00:57:34] those both work very well for different reasons. . I find code challenges to be very internal individualized. Whereas the class challenges turns into more of like a. a race against the clock, if, for, for lack of a better word. And so it's a different kind of pressure to succeed and make it right. So I guess this is a bonus mention is the arcade library from Paul Craven is the lead contributor on that one. We've had them on the show in the past. So we won't go into a lot of details, you might hear a familiar voice if you go in and listen to and watch some of the tutorials there. Kelly, you did one of the voiceovers for the chapters for him. Kelly Paredes: [00:58:10] I did. I did it on the attributes, classes and constructors. I think it's chapter 11. I have to go back and. Put it on there, but I did read for it. That was fun. I told Paul that I am very bad at classes. Yeah. And I needed to learn and he goes, I have the, the chapter for you to read and I read that and that was fun. And just what he does with the graphics in order to pull my voice together with his book is really great. And if you haven't seen it, those are one of our tools that we use to differentiate. And I actually stuck a sixth grader on arcade. yesterday, because she was just way ahead of where we are and she's already been working in Java script. So I said, I have the library for you. Sean Tibor: [00:58:51] Nice. Nice. And that's that I think works really well. One of the things I've seen as a, maybe a misconception is that all kids like games, especially when it comes to programming and it's just simply not true. Many students do like games, but many students, it just doesn't motivate them at all. It's not something that they particularly care about. So one of the things that we do with our, classes that we. Create a variety options for students. We allow them to make a game. We allow them to do something with data. We allow them to do something with drawing and art or music, or hardware. So giving students choice in what they do is really important. And one of the choices that we always like to offer as the arcade library, because it really does get students writing their own games pretty quickly. Kelly Paredes: [00:59:34] Absolutely. And I think, I think it's a great fault. I don't want to say fall back, but it is a great alternative to differentiating and pushing those kids to a different level. And we did it last year. On, in the seventh grade, we took a chapter and had some kids growing and making some like Mario brothers looking games and it was fun. Sean Tibor: [00:59:54] Yeah, they really got into it. And I, I haven't really seen too many of the students come back to me yet with here's more that they've done with it. but I'm not surprised either. A lot of our students are very heavily scheduled. So, you know, the only time that they actually got that was unstructured was in the middle of a global pandemic. So. I'm looking forward to now that they're back on campus, reconnecting with them and learning more about it. So I know we've covered a lot here. let's just recap. for the moment we, we started the conversation by talking about. why Western planning is important and why the variety in the tools is important as part of that lesson plan, to make sure that students are motivated, that they can focus that they're not getting bored and it also helps them learn better. So we talked about, how lesson planning can help us get there. We talk about the environment that we need to create, and some of the tools that you and I use to make that environment. really structured and predictable and clear for students to be successful. We also went through and talked SEL skills and what's what helps students build their emotional and social, , knowledge and awareness as well. Kelly Paredes: [01:00:59] we brought in the specific tools that we use and in order to teach and to code within Python in our classroom from visualization to class challenges, to our little homework, or extra coding activities and our manipulatives, there's a lot of variety going on and. I hope that gives you a bigger idea or a better picture of what we do with our lessons. Sean Tibor: [01:01:23] Yeah. I'd like to also thank some of the listeners that sent in questions and thoughts for this on Twitter. Eric Mathis asked some great questions. Kelly Paredes: [01:01:29] Yes. An Eric always likes to, give me some great suggestions. If I ever have a question, I asked him last year about dictionary. So hopefully we're going to go into a lesson about dictionaries Clark Scholten. He also, gives us a lot of great questions and ideas for our episodes. Sean Tibor: [01:01:46] Clark Scholten also asked us about, , the LMS integrations and how we use that. And we're really doing a lot of that with CoLab and , creating assignments that. Lead to a link. and then Jeff Hightower asked us some questions about, , how we teach. And I think we covered some of it that we're in a little bit different, different situation this year. So it's good to ask those questions. and then, lastly, I think, have your own questions that you want to share with us or ask or contribute to a future show. You can always contact us through our website@teachingpython.fm. , you can also follow us and engage with us on Twitter at teaching Python. Sean is SM Tibor on Twitter and Peloton. So if you want to ride with me at some point. Kelly Paredes: [01:02:26] believe you just have to be bragging about that. Peloton. Sean Tibor: [01:02:32] I would have put it in my MySpace page link also, but I think they shut that down like seven or eight years ago. Kelly Paredes: [01:02:37] I had one to show our Sean Tibor: [01:02:40] How, how else would you know how to embed a middy file into a webpage? So, Kelly is at Kelly Perez on Twitter. you can always sponsor us on Patrion, if you would like to support the show, the sponsorships that we're getting from Patriots and help us edit the podcast and take care of things like our virtual recording software and things like that. So, yeah. We are. Not going to retire from our Patrion income any time soon, but it definitely makes it a little bit easier for us to get the shows out to you in a timely fashion. we're going to be publishing our episodes every week on Tuesday at midnight Eastern time. So you will be able to look forward to that. We are now one for one on that schedule, so we're gonna try to make it two for two. I think that's pretty much it, we're well over the time that we planned for this, but I think there were so many things to cover and it's always such a great conversation with you, Kelly. Kelly Paredes: [01:03:29] equally as well with Sean Tibor: [01:03:30] so for teaching Python, this is Sean. Kelly Paredes: [01:03:33] And this is Kelly signing off.