I'm educational justice coach Lindsay Lyons. And here on the time for teacher podcast, we learn how to inspire educational innovation for racial and gender justice design curricula grounded in student voice and build capacity for shared leadership. I'm a former teacher leader turned instructional coach. I'm striving to live a life full of learning, running, baking, traveling, and parenting because we can be rockstar educators and be full human beings if you're a principal, assistant superintendent, curriculum director, instructional coach or teacher who enjoys nerdy out about co creating curriculum with students. I made this show for you. Here we go. In this episode. We are talking about what to expect in season four. I cannot believe it's season four already and I am so excited to talk to you about what will stay the same, what we'll do a little bit more of and what might shift a little bit. Welcome to the season four premiere. We are talking about new ideas, talking about how to do more of the good stuff and I am just gonna get right to it. I say this will be a short episode, but I sometimes ramble after I've said that and that makes that untrue. So let's, let's see how it goes.

So, more things, I really just want a lot of, a lot of more. So first I wanna do more unit dreaming episodes. This started as a series for the summer and it generated a ton of energy, excitement, enthusiasm, both from the guests themselves who are like, wow, this was such an incredible experience. And now I have this really cool thing, but also from people who have been listening, people who have had early previews of the episode before they've gone live. Additionally, the department teams that I've worked with in my curriculum, boot camp events, they always crave more examples of people going through this process. So we go through it as a department. But they're like, I want to see either sample copies of unit outlines or I wanna see people kind of grapple with these important questions that we're grappling with. I wanna be able to trust the process, but I'm not sure that I can come in and do that like right away same day. So maybe give us some pre work and share an episode with us, um share a variety to choose from that kind of thing. So I think this really will both support you as listeners will support. I say both three ways. Here we go, both of you as listeners support the guests who come on and actually get to develop a unit with me and the the paying clients just get like an extra boost, an extra bonus.

So I think this is like a three a win here. And so unit dreaming episodes, I think will now be a regular feature of the show. I plan to start with about one per month and we can always expand them from there. But I think having at least one per month gives us that consistent example or case study of what this could look like. If you are a fan of what this could look like in action kind of things, you can definitely look at my youtube channel which has a new playlist that I'm calling unit planning in action. This is really dedicated to me going through the process of designing sample units and parts of units. So let's say part of the backwards planning approach is like rubric development from standard. So how do I take a standard to develop a really cool rubric? OK. Then from there, um maybe I get to a unit arc and so I'm like, OK, well, I talk about the phrase build the base. What does a build the base part of a unit arc even mean? And how is it different from the hook or the case studies? Like what do you mean Lindsay? Show me how you do that or I know what I want to do for the lesson. But then how do I find a resource for the lesson? All of that stuff is in there and it spans a variety of content areas.

So if you were coaching a teacher in a particular department and you're like, oh, this is a social studies one I need, you know, I need a math one. I try to span a lot of different departments to just kind of scroll through and look at the different subjects. I also do think that the process is content agnostic. So even if you see an example of one that is not your subject area or you have someone you coach totally still relevant in terms of the process. So if you are a person who are like, yeah, I listen to this podcast sometimes or I like the podcast, but I just don't have time for it all the time. I am more of like a five minute video tutorial person. Definitely check out the youtube channel. If five minute walk through videos are your thing like, absolutely, go ahead and check it out. Another thing that I think you might like that is related to this. This is kind of like podcast plus. Um if you like a good challenge or want some interactivity where we can kind of get into the weeds with like, what might this look like? Let's do a little mini practice. I have been sharing on linkedin under the hashtag unit dreaming all one word, little sparks of inspiration.

Maybe it's a podcast. I listen to an article, I read an image a quote, something like that. And I'm like, hey, I think this, I think a great unit, someone go for it, like, tell me what it is and a lot of people have told me they are a little shy, they just want to like it or maybe do a private journaling with themselves. Like, how, what would I might, I do? The spark is helpful for me in thinking about it. But what I want to comment so far and that is totally OK. So if you are a person who wants to comment, please tell me how you would build the spark into a unit or how you might coach a teacher to build the unit around the spark that I've shared or you can totally use it as like a private journal prompt and kind of think to yourself. Um What could this look like in my dimension or my role? And really what you're doing there is you're developing what Dr Goldie Mohammad calls curriculum fluency and I'll link in the blog post to this episode to the episode we did with her, which is just she's so brilliant and fantastic. If you are a person who has a little bit of fear missing out and you're like, what this has been going on, I need to go scroll through all of the previous posts. You can absolutely do that. I will link to that as well in the blog post or you can go to linkedin and search for the hashtag unit dreaming.

Now, another thing that I want to do in season four is have more guests. Now that I do have the space on youtube for the walkthrough mini tutorial style stuff for the unit development. I think I want to use the podcast space to just interview more brilliant guests because people bring their brilliance to this. I mean, I learned so much selfishly from, from all my guests and many guests honestly record like 4 to 6 months, sometimes even more in advance of when the episode airs and sometimes that's really inconvenient for them. Um And the reason is because there's so many awesome people to interview, but I've been using this kind of every other cadence and so we can only record so many. Furthermore, I have had to decline or have chosen to, I should say decline to interview prospective guests or people who get pitched to me as guests because I want to preserve my focus on what's going to be most helpful for you. I will continue to focus on what I really think is going to move the needle for you and within the topics that I've historically covered, right? The the topics that are kind of in my wheelhouse and that I specialize in has for season three, it has been really curriculum design and, and that focus will continue.

But I do want to expand a bit back to my research background which is in student voice and co creation. So specifically, we've talked about this a little bit in terms of the realm of unit design and unit planning protocols and how do we plan to really core the ultimate unit with the students? But how do we plan in advance so that we can have that space for co creation? We've kind of done that. But what I've done in earlier seasons of the podcast, like 12 early on and I want to bring back and I also want to bring back honestly in my professional practice as well. I'm really looking forward to working with some districts on amplifying voice in in class discussions. For example, as an instructional practice, like what does it look like to do a, you know, have a pedagogy of student voice as Shane Zaia and Jamila do can talk about in their book Street Data where 75% of the class time is students talking in a very deep meaningful way, right? The learning is deep, the sense of belonging is present where everyone feels like they can participate all that kind of good stuff. Um As well as what my my research background in in terms of my dissertation, research was co creating school policies and participating in school governance alongside it all.

So how do we get that for youth? And I, I would love to kind of expand that back out a little bit. Finally, I just really want to be more flexible, I think in, in all parts of my life. But in terms of the scheduling of the podcast, I used to do that alternating solo show, guest episode every other week cadence. This season, I want to create solo shows when I have something important to share. And I don't wanna feel like I need to record a solo show or come up with something just to kind of fit the schedule that I myself made. Um, I, I think sometimes, you know, this might mean that I have a lot to say or, or a lot of questions have come up with the people that I've coached and I want to share that with you. And, and I think that is honestly where the best episode ideas come from is when it's like, ok, this is generated by people who are doing this work and it has been authentic and I want to just kind of bring the learning and extend the learning hour and, and bring it to the show. So some months may have like three solo shows and others might have none. Right? And we'll, we'll just kind of see how it goes and, and I just wanna let go of that like rigidity. And so I'm hoping that listeners, you will be ok with the fact that it might not alternate every other.

I'm sure very few people other than me even care. But I also, I think at the last point, I want to really, I want to hear from you because I want to know what you think of the plan. So nothing is set in stone, right? As, as we just talked about. And ultimately, I want this podcast to be as helpful as possible to you. I listen to a lot of different podcasts and some of them I have been like, man, I just want to hear more from the host. Like I love their solo shows and I get so much from them and I think they're trying to balance, you know, the solo with the gas and they just, they, I sometimes think their brilliance is just more in the solo shows and others. It's like, no, you have great gas and you have great conversations with the guest and that generative conversation where you build off of each other is the thing I want. And so like, it just depends, right? It depends, I think on the listener it and so everyone might be different, but it also depends on the, the host and the type of show and the content and, and all of that. So I want you to tell me you can email me hello at Lindsay beth lions dot com. You can drop a note in the comments section of this blog post at Lindsey Beth lions dot com slash 131.

And as a final note as you're listening in your little podcast platform right now, if you could just hit that follow button on your podcast platform that will make sure that you never miss an episode. Thank you so much for continuing on this beautiful ride with me here is to season four. Let's do this. If you like this episode, I bet you'll be just as jazz as I am about my coaching program for increasing student led discussions in your school, Shane, Sa and Jamila Dugan, talk about a pedagogy of student voice in their book Street data. They say students should be talking for 75% of class time. Do students in your school talk for 75% of each class period. I would love for you to walk into any classroom in your community and see this in action. If you're smiling yourself as you listen right now, grab 20 minutes on my calendar to brainstorm. How I can help you make this big dream of reality? I'll help you build a comprehensive plan from full day trainings and discussion protocols like circle and Z Socratic seminar to follow up classroom visits where I can plan witness and debrief discussion based lessons with your teachers. Sign up for a nerdy no strings attached to brainstorm, call it Lindsay clients dot com slash contact. Until next time. Leaders think big act brave and be your best self.

This podcast is a proud member of the Teach better podcast network, better today, better tomorrow and the podcast to get you there. Explore more podcasts at teach better dot com slash podcasts and we'll see you at the next episode.