Valuable Ways To Empower Learners Through Tech Tools

Transcript

Kris (00:00)

Welcome everyone to the Learning Loop podcast, your best source for educational insights and trends. I’m Kris, your host. Today’s special guest is Denise. She is a junior kindergarten teacher in Ontario, Canada, and an expert in fostering student engagement through interactive personalized learning. During today’s interview, we will discuss what influenced her desire for excellence and her journey towards how she got there as an educator. Denise, welcome to the show.

Denise Mouton (00:37)

Thank you so much for having me.

Kris (00:38)

Super, super excited you’re here. We’re gonna start with just the foundation here. What inspired you to become an early childhood educator? How was that initial passion kind of found for yourself that brought you into this career?

Denise Mouton (00:52)

Thank you. So I grew up in a really small town and my mom ran a daycare out of my home. So I was surrounded by children. I’m the oldest grandchild, I’m the oldest daughter. So I took very naturally to that leadership role and then I fell in love with school. I was so eager on the first day of kindergarten in my small town, I told my mom I could walk to school by myself. I didn’t need any help. And I’ve been kind of the same way ever since, really independent and in love with education. And so I thought I was going to be a PE teacher actually.

leaving secondary school, I thought I’m going to be a PE teacher because I loved sports and I just wanted to continue in that world. And as I was working my way through university, I was reflecting back on my favorite teachers and my favorite subjects and what I really loved most out of school. I did love sports, but I could access that in many different ways in my life. And I really started to think about my kindergarten teacher, my grade one teacher and things that they instilled in me. And so then I made the change.

literally at the last moment to enter primary education. And I’ve loved it ever since. I’ve taught grade one, and then I started going younger and younger to being a junior kindergarten teacher. And I find it really powerful to learn through play. I find the children are so engaged. They’re so excited to be at school, and it’s a real honor to be a child’s first teacher. I think you have a big impact to play in both the child’s life and in the family’s life of welcoming them into lifelong learning.

So that’s kind of been my path.

Kris (02:21)

For sure, and they learned so much in that first year of school. They learned what school is like, what does it mean to come and go from school, what does it mean to really learn, and it’s so fun to set that foundation for them. That’s amazing. I want to ask you a question about yourself as a student. I know you talked about a couple teachers that might have been in mind, but was there anything from your experience as a student that really drew you to be the teacher you are today?

Denise Mouton (02:46)

Yeah, so I was definitely a busy student. Now as a teacher, I can see myself in some of the students. I was really curious. I asked almost too many questions and I needed to learn by doing as well. And so now I find myself looking at different children and seeing who are they as a learner and how can I reach them individually. And I also was really impacted by, I had a grade two teacher and she really took us outside. And that was

really impactful of being outside in nature in the real world and making those real world connections. And that’s kind of stuck with me as a teacher. Now I take my children outside, we’re connected to nature, and then we try and share that learning in the classroom as well. Like we bring the outside in and keep that curiosity going.

Kris (03:33)

that and I love too when you’re speaking of bringing the outside in you’re also finding a balance too with how you bring in Seesaw how you bring in other tools like that can you speak to kind of the balance that you’ve struck in your classroom between having time with technology and having time without technology how do you find that balance and how have you kind of molded those together into your specific teaching style

Denise Mouton (03:58)

Yeah, so we are very lucky at the school I’m at that we have a beautiful campus so we can spend lots of time outside. But I agree the children need to be able to interact with the technology. So we use it as a really purposeful tool. The iPad and Seesaw are not for playing, it’s a tool and they know and they’re actually really excited that it’s a tool that shares what they’re doing at school with their families. I think of it as like a digital bulletin board almost, right? It can…

give those parents a peek into our classroom every day and then it allows the children to share what they’re doing. So we use it mainly in our school as a digital portfolio where the students can capture their learning. In my JK class specifically they’re not using it as the activities because the parents want them off screen time. So I understand we need to develop fine motor skills and we need to develop our social emotional learning. So our time on the iPads is really just to capture those moments.

but we’ve set it up age and stage in our school because I’m the SeesawS certified educator. I’m helping my team who then it does translate into doing activities and doing the learning on the iPad a little bit more as it becomes more age appropriate as they grow up to like our grade six.

Kris (05:05)

Absolutely, scaffolding that up as you go, so important. And it’s great that you’re the model for these teachers too. You get to be there as a resource. You get to be there to just help them to move forward and helping you to push forward that whole building. I want to lean into what you just shared here about families. I know being a teacher, we always have families. They come and go every single year and they’re usually new families as you continue to go through. Can you share a time when maybe your teaching style and or Seesaw had an impact on your families? Can you just share a little testimony about

what happened with that and really what that impact meant to those families.

Denise Mouton (05:40)

Yeah, so I love that Seesaw allows the families to see who their child is at school. Sometimes who they are at school is very different than they are at home. And last year I had a child who was very, very hesitant to speak at school. She was nonverbal the entire school day, but she would go home and tell her family about everything that she did. And having Seesaw the window into the classroom allowed them to have that experience and build up her confidence. Then we slowly started to use the voice recording notes.

at home in the comment section that she, where she felt comfortable at home with her family, could record her voice with her family talking about what she was doing. So maybe there was a drawing she had made connected to a little book we were reading, but she wasn’t ready to tell me what it is. She was ready to draw it. So I took a picture and I write in the caption to the family, if she’s feeling comfortable at home, we’d love to know more about this story. And so then she started recording her voice at home. And slowly, now that she’s an SK, I can sit.

proudly say she is whispering in the classroom and they’ve made great progress because they continued using CISA in that way. And then now we’re actually recording her voice at school in little whispers, using headphones, so her family can hear her at home now and we’re building that trust. And that was through the tool of CISA of us being able to support this child who wasn’t ready yet to speak at school.

Kris (06:54)

I love that testimony. love that story too of just the empowerment that this child has felt and how they continue to grow into the tool as they get older and as they get more comfortable and confident as themselves as a learner. I absolutely love that.

You kind of spoke a little bit indirectly to kind of how you design your learning, how you design your classroom, how you really support your students in that classroom. Can you just share a little bit more of like how you design things inside of SeesawR, how you design your classroom to really just allow students to have all these supports necessary so that they can go from like this specific student you mentioned, they can go from somebody who’s maybe too shy to be able to speak to the point when they’re actually flourished.

and they’re growing as they continue to go throughout the years.

Denise Mouton (07:42)

Yeah, so in our classroom, I’m lucky enough to have two teachers. So the children are familiar with asking one of us as we start the year to help document their learning. We also set up routines to document our small group learning activities so the parents can see their progress. I’ve been using activities so that I can see who I have documented and who I haven’t. So we have an afternoon of free play called Chill Time. called child-initiated learning. They’re allowed to do as they’d like. I want to make sure that I’m capturing enough of all the children. So I’ve set it up as a weekly activity.

The activity comes up and I can see if I display it on my smart board, the little gray box of who’s missing, who have I not captured that week? And it really helps me be accountable on capturing all the children. And then for their independence, we set up a Seesaw station that first is with a teacher at first during the chill time so they can bring over things that they would like to document or share. And then we can teach them individually one-on-one how to do that. And then it becomes a free center in the afternoon. If there’s a building that they’re done building and they’d like to capture, they know how to use that tool now on their own.

and they know it’s just to take it over capture it or they bring things over and you can hear them, hey mom and dad, I just wanted to say hi, here’s a picture I colored and it gives context to that coloring page that gets shoved in the backpack at the end of the day. You really can hear why it was important to them. So we have teacher led capturing moments. I have moments that I’m capturing to document their learning because we also use it as a digital portfolio and we have building those individual skills. So as they get older, because I see it in the hallway, you know, the grade one popping into the hallway after his 3D shapes activity.

reflecting on it using his voice, reflecting on the activity. I can see those skills as they grow up and how they’ve become so independent.

Kris (09:17)

Wow.

I that. I love the scaffolding that you’re building into that. And I also love the chill, like that specific block of time. I think that’s such a great opportunity for students to lead their own learning and to really drive themselves forward on their own and just gain that independence even at a super young age, it’s still possible to do. have two more questions that I wanna ask you here before we close up. And this first one has to do with your specific age group of students. I know some teachers struggle potentially with giving students

and giving them the power to do something on these devices. How have you found SeesawW become a partner in you so that you can allow your students to really have that independence with this tool? What kind of things have kind of reassured you or what impact has Seesaw had with your specific age group of students?

Denise Mouton (10:08)

So, Seesaw has been really helpful, specifically with reflection. So, in our program, we do the primary years program in the IB curriculum, and reflection is a huge part of that. But at three and four years old, reflecting on what you did that day, let alone that week or that unit before can be really difficult. So, using Seesaw, we teach them that this is also a reflection tool. They can take time to look back through their journal and think about the activities that they’ve done. How much have they grown and changed throughout the years?

the way that they could color then versus how they can color now, the words that they could write, even the friendships that they had or they were playing. So we use it as a reflection tool for the students and then we capture in CSO their voice reflecting on those things. So I might make an activity using Google Slides, import images of the children from the unit and then they can sit and we just have genuine conversations where they’re reflecting, then we can capture that moment in time for their families to hear, but also for.

me working on reporting and things like that. So it’s just become such an intricate tool to capture our data, to build up student skills, and also to help with my own workflow as a teacher.

Kris (11:13)

I love the example you shared there too. That’s like a, if people are listening, that’s like a super hack too to have here is like you can have a picture of something with your students, set down the iPad in between you, just hit the recording button and have a conversation around what was this? What happened? What does this mean to you? I love capturing that little interview, that little moment like that. What a super awesome way to use Seesaw to really just help your even three and four year olds access this technology and become a contributor into their journal as well.

Final question here, I just really want to end with kind of this reflective component of the impact that Seesaw has really had. I know that Seesaw impacts every classroom and every teacher in a little bit different way, but I want to really ask you, how has Seesaw impacted you, whether it’s part of your career growth, whether it’s part of the way that you teach, whether it’s your leadership abilities, how has Seesaw really been an impact for you personally?

Denise Mouton (12:10)

Well, thank you. That’s a really great question. Because SeesawS had a significant impact on my career. I brought SeesawS to my school in 2018 when I joined because another school I had been in had it and I was actually in Thailand. I thought, this is great. Like we need to be using this. Families are going to love this. So I brought it to our school and then the pandemic hit. And I officially overnight in one day became our online learning expert and SeesawS was going to be how we did this because SeesawS pivoted so quickly in that time.

Kris (12:12)

Yeah.

Denise Mouton (12:40)

We relied on the activities, creating our own activities. I immediately took every PD that you had available. was like PD in your pajamas, PD, everything. Anything that I could find online, I did to upskill because I needed to support my team. And it really thrust me into this leadership role I kind of had been waiting for. I didn’t know what exactly I wanted my leadership role to be in my school. Did I want to be leading early years? Did I want to move into administration? I wasn’t sure. And through technology and learning,

with Seesaw and all the other pieces that I started to learn to video editing and importing slides and different skills that came from Seesaw. I’m now studying my Masters of Educational Technology at UBC. It’s pushed me to want to learn more. I talk about Seesaw a lot in my course because we talk about digital portfolios and different things and it’s just ignited something in me. I’m now the Seesaw Certified Educator at my school. I run PD for my staff. I’ve had opportunities like this to be on the podcast so I’m super grateful.

that I saw this app in Thailand and thought, I should learn a little bit more about it. And then just kept following those opportunities that have been provided by Seesaw as well. And just taking those things that get offered, it’s really been a big change for me and I’m super excited for what else could happen.

Kris (13:58)

I love to hear how Seesaw has been so positive in your life and you know Seesaw wouldn’t have be what it is without teachers also like yourself who are really just trying to push the boundaries of what students are capable of, what classrooms are capable of, and how we really are connecting families together too. So Seesaw definitely has a big thank you back to all teachers, especially teachers like yourself.

We are at a time, I know we could sit here and chat about just these young learners all day long because that’s where my passion truly lies, but we are gonna close up the episode. Denise, I wanna say thank you so much for being here. Thanks for taking time to just share about your journey, about how SeesawW’s really been impactful for yourself, for your families, and for your students. It’s just been such an honor to talk quickly.

Denise Mouton (14:40)

Thank you so much for having me. Bye.

Kris (14:42)

Bye bye!