The Extraordinary Educators Podcast
Best practices, tips, and stories to help you be extraordinary in your classroom and beyond, featuring Curriculum Associates' Manager, Voice of the Customer, Hayley Browning.
The Extraordinary Educators Podcast
Empowering Students through Neuroscience, Advocacy, and Innovative Teaching with Brianna Lugibihl
We're thrilled to welcome back Extraordinary Educator, Brianna Lugibihl, for another episode! Her unique approach to empowering students to advocate for themselves in academic spaces has sparked a wave of excitement, and we're diving deep into the topic. Brianna's exploration of neuroscience's role in education is another rabbit hole we're eager to explore. Her innovative thoughts on incorporating play into teaching, respecting the learning process's time, and tailoring lesson plans based on students' requirements are truly insightful.
In our vibrant chat with Brianna, we traverse a range of topics – from creating a safe and supportive space for students to voice their concerns, to building constructive dialogues with stakeholders, to forming meaningful relationships in the academic sphere. We explore the role of educators in fostering student advocacy and the positive ripple effect it can have on the entire school community. Whether you're a middle school teacher or passionate about the intersection of education and neuroscience, this conversation is bound to leave you inspired and brimming with new understandings. Time to buckle in for a fascinating journey with Brianna!
Visit the Blog: CurriculumAssociates.com/blog
Follow us on Twitter: @CurriculumAssoc
Follow us on Instagram: @MyiReady
Have feedback, questions, or want to be a guest? Email ExtraordinaryEducators@cainc.com to connect with us!
Curriculum Associates presents the Extraordinary Educators podcast with hosts Danielle Sullivan and Sari Laberis your tips, best practices and successes to improve your teaching and leadership and drive student growth and learning. We're here for you.
Danielle Sullivan:Hello everyone, I'm Danielle. Welcome to the Extraordinary Educator podcast.
Sari Laberis:And I'm Sari. This week we are joined by Brianna, Extraordinary Educator in Ohio, who has been on the podcast before, and we were pumped to welcome her back. She recently wrote a blog that we will link in the show notes about teaching her students to advocate for themselves in academic settings, and we spoke to her about that and also just what she's thinking about as she understands more and learns more throughout her career and my favorite topic, neuroscience and she's giving some really interesting ideas for middle school educators.
Danielle Sullivan:So if you're a middle school educator, or even just a human, I think you'll really find a lot of what Brianna has to share really interesting. So let's dig into Brianna's podcast. Welcome back, brianna. We're so excited for you to be here. How are you?
Brianna Lugibihl:I am doing well and excited for the school year.
Danielle Sullivan:So, Brianna, tell us, what have you been thinking about since we last spoke to you? What's been going on in your world?
Brianna Lugibihl:Well, as every teacher knows, every group of students that you have is completely different from the group that you have before and I think teachers that are extremely excellent at their job they learn to adapt from that information and I have watched mentors teachers in my life do that almost flawlessly, which has been really fun to watch. But as we're adapting to students who have gone through COVID and now adjusting to new regulations in our states and the changing focus on like mental health in the classroom and students learning to advocate for their own needs, I think that over time my focus and my approach to the classroom has also changed for the positive and, I hope, for the better with each day as I grow as a teacher. So I'm really excited as we enter this school year to try out things that I'm learning from new research that I'm studying, finishing up my master's this summer.
Danielle Sullivan:I love a good, good bit of research. So what are some things that you are leaning into as you approach individualizing for students?
Brianna Lugibihl:This summer I was able to take a neuroscience and education course by a professor who studied like neuroscience in relation to education a John Hopkins University, and it was really interesting to see the juxtaposition between neuroscience and how students learn in the classroom and how those two things can relate and help each other, and I found a lot of ties with how I approach classroom management and relationships with students as it's framed with the neuroscience and how students brains work during that time.
Danielle Sullivan:Yes, I mean if you've ever listened to this podcast or ever seen anything I've ever talked about. I agree it is so important to understand how brains learn. Are there three different ideas that really stand out to you as you're starting to think about, like you said, classroom management, just learning, like the way brains learn, like what are the top three that you've learned that you are excited to apply?
Brianna Lugibihl:Ooh, that's a fantastic question. So I would say, as an individual, I've always been really interested in the neuroscience and I hope with time I gain more knowledge. So choosing just three is difficult. That's a difficult task, but I think that something that really sticks out to me, that is through all of the research, is that, like, play is a trauma disruptor in your brain with how you respond to things. So how you approach your either your classroom management and your conversations and how you approach students is extremely important. Integrating play into that the past couple of years I think teachers can agree that how we approach education has changed because the needs of our students have changed a lot.
Brianna Lugibihl:No-transcript Often, when we get in the grind of focusing on the content and getting into everything, students have, for whatever reason, in some areas gotten the message that play is not as important and it's not necessary, when in fact it is. So. Integrating play into what I'm doing in the classroom and how I approach students, or even small things, like I noticed partway through last year, my students were a little lethargic in the morning and weren't really looking forward to being in the building. It was like hitting that like snow. I just walked through 10 minutes of slush to get here and we started doing just fun things, like the one day I had bubbles and we blew bubbles on each other all home and morning before they left for their classes, like little things like that. Or as we're reading stories like integrating movement and play into that and it like attaches to their muscle memory and it's a really important fun interaction and also the relationship skills so much better with that.
Brianna Lugibihl:The second thing I would say that I've learned is that it's really important to take into consideration how much time it takes for someone to learn new information and integrate it into their long-term memory, and that requires so many gaps. So looking over it and reviewing it and spending time in between downtime doing different things, instead of spending an entire class period focusing on something which I already knew. But I think the emphasis on it reminds me, as I'm structuring this next year, how I want it to look in our classroom, as students are transitioning from so many things they're learning throughout the day.
Sari Laberis:How do you incorporate that into your planning? Started to interrupt you there. I'm just curious, like for those listening, I'm sure that really resonates with them because I'm getting flashbacks of being in the classroom and it's like you have this very comprehensive I guess you could call it school and sequence, where you have to get to X, y and Z, and these standards are for the state test. So I'm just curious what your thoughts are there.
Brianna Lugibihl:So something that I found helpful is I think about where are students in this space, so like if I take a lesson plan, that I have any of them and I set it down right now.
Brianna Lugibihl:I think about where are students in this space when we are doing this lesson and nine times out of ten.
Brianna Lugibihl:If you talk to teachers, they're in the same place the majority of the time that you take a lesson or think about what are students doing during that lesson, and if you look at a comprehensive lesson plan and you find the ones that are most successful, a lot of times you'll notice that students are either moving or engaging or playing in some way or have breaks in between what they're learning and that's found to be effective, even if it's just like moving to a different space in the classroom multiple times throughout the class period. I know with middle school students there can be a fear, especially with new teachers, if I move them the transitions are going to struggle, but routine really does matter. So if you have a set routine in your classroom, I guess that could be my number three that students can predict, then the unpredictability of moving around and engaging with play and giving them the opportunity to ask for what they need and giving them that space is more available because there is already a routine in place that they're used to living in guidelines with.
Danielle Sullivan:And I love that you just said that, because sometimes when you say the word play in middle school, teachers think chaos, destruction, out of control, and that is not the case. Like there's a lot of wonderful ways to structure play. Like I love the bubbles I often share with educators dancing the alphabet with your butt. So I would love for if you want to take that on, please send me a video. If you do that with your students, it's a minute. You put on any music, you literally write the alphabet with your butt. It's a really great laughter, music, movement, play, combination of a lot of those trauma interruptors, as you said. So it's it kind of brings it together in one activity too. But if you have the right systems, anything is possible.
Danielle Sullivan:Brianna, you are an inspiration. Every time we talk to you you give you light us up, you give us ideas, so we're about at time. But it just what's. One more nugget, as teachers are listening to this and digging in and and who? She wrote a blog. You also will link that in the show notes to check out more from Brianna. What's something that you really wish you knew that. Now you know that maybe educators listening to this could start.
Brianna Lugibihl:Wow, I feel like there's so much knowledge that I wish I had known that. I'm so glad that I know now and I'm excited to be in the position to share with other educators in my building through some of our mentorship programs. But something that really stands out to me is that students need to be taught how to ask for what they need, and they need to be taught that it's okay to ask for what they need. And I think when you put systems in place like some of the advocacy strategies I've divided into like time in and time out needs in the classroom, and students are able to ask for that, they not only develop into students who have better relationships with each other, but they have a better relationship with learning and they have a better relationship with advocating for their own learning needs in the classroom.
Brianna Lugibihl:Because, just like when we're learning to read, we first learn to identify with like our own name and where we live and the people that we know and the things that we care about.
Brianna Lugibihl:When students are learning to advocate for their own education, like I need this support or I need extra time, or I would like to take this deeper than we have currently, or I'm interested in this topic. The step before that that I think is extremely important with educators is being able to identify your own emotions and what you need when it comes to social emotional level and the step that we are thinking that we want students to be able to achieve. They cannot achieve until we've taught them and supported that need first. And if I could go back to my early teaching self, I would spend some time developing something in my classroom for especially since I started with eighth graders for them to tell me what they needed so we could move forward and have great relationships on our classroom structure and also be able to do so many more fun things with play and learning because of the trust that's built through that.
Sari Laberis:Thank you so much for sharing that, brianna. I think you're not only teaching students this skill that's gonna help them be successful in school, but this is like truly going to be life changing. I think there's a lot of adults who don't do this well or don't understand how and when to ask for help. Or, like you said, I need more time First of all identifying what you need, cause I think oftentimes we struggle and it kind of just ends there. I'm feeling frustrated, done right, but just the coping mechanisms and advocacy and all the things you mentioned are just so helpful for us to hear and for our listeners, hopefully too. So thank you for being back on the podcast. We absolutely love speaking with you and hearing all of your wisdom and insights, so really appreciate it.
Brianna Lugibihl:Same to you. It is so much fun talking to the two of you. I always look forward to it.
Sari Laberis:Get inspired by following us on social media and please tag us in your posts on Twitter, at curriculumassoch, and on Instagram at myirety. If you have feedback about the podcast topic of interest or want to be a guest, email extraordinaryeducatorsatcainccom. Subscribe where you listen to podcasts and if you'd like to help more educators like you, join the conversation. Please leave a review.
Danielle Sullivan:Remember, be you be true, be extraordinary. The Extraordinary Educator Podcast is produced by Curriculum Associates. Editing by Whiteboard Geeks, social media by Atzady Hannan, guest booking by Ceri Liberis, production by Hailey Browning. This podcast is copyrighted. Materials and intellectual property of Curriculum Associates. Band United FILM Aimu D.