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
Building Connections in Literacy Classrooms with Kheshana Woods
In today's episode, Kheshana Woods, National Director at Curriculum Associates, shares her profound insights on creating a true "home away from home" for students in literacy classrooms.
Drawing from her experience as a classroom teacher, Kheshana paints a vivid picture of what belonging looks like. "When children know you love them, when you take the time to create an environment that's centered around their needs, they'll walk through fire for you," she explains.
Kheshana goes on to dive into the practical application of the VABB framework, Validating, Affirming, Building, and Bridging, and how this can be used in your own classrooms. She also emphasizes that this work isn't just "feel-good fluff" but is backed by research showing that students who experience belonging demonstrate stronger academic growth even years after leaving school.
Whether you're struggling with classroom management, looking to enhance student engagement, or simply wanting to create a more joyful learning environment, Kheshana's wisdom offers actionable strategies that honor both the heart and science of teaching.
Read Kheshana's blog: CurriculumAssociates.com/blog/creating-a-home-away-from-home-in-your-literacy-classroom
Follow us on Twitter: @CurriculumAssoc
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Have feedback, questions, or want to be a guest? Email ExtraordinaryEducators@cainc.com to connect with us!
Curriculum Associates, an education technology company, and the makers of iReady, presents the Extraordinary Educators podcast. Join host Haley Browning to hear tips, best practices and successes to improve your teaching and leadership and drive student growth and learning. We believe all educators are extraordinary and we are here to support you. Hi everyone, welcome to today's episode of the Extraordinary Educators podcast. Today I am joined by the incredible Kishana Woods. Kishana is a national director here at Curriculum Associates and she specializes in literacy advocacy. In today's episode, kishana talks to us all about this idea of creating a home away from home and building a culture of belonging for your students, specifically in thinking about a literacy classroom. So Kishana dives into some really great strategies, things like this VABing framework and also taking a look at the inspiration behind why she really cares about this culture of belonging for her students. So with that, we hope you enjoy today's episode with Kishana. Hi, kishana, welcome to today's episode of the Extraordinary Educators podcast.
Speaker 2:Hi Haley, Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, we're so excited to have you and Kishana. You wrote an incredible blog that we will make sure to link in the show notes for everybody, Highly recommend that you take a look and give it a good read. But with this blog, Kishana, you talk about this idea of creating a home away from home and building this sense of culture and belonging for your students, especially in this idea of a literacy classroom, which I think is a really good angle to think about things. Literacy, as we know, is so incredibly important for all of our students, and so today I would love to kind of take a deep dive into some of the topics that you talk about in your blog and just pick some things apart.
Speaker 1:Does that sound good? Oh yeah, let's get into it. Absolutely All right. Thanks so much, All right. Question number one I'm curious what inspired you to write about creating this culture of belonging? Was it something that stood out to you when you were your own classroom teacher, or is this something that has kind of come to you as you've taken a step away from being in the classroom?
Speaker 2:I had the opportunity when I when I first created this whole concept and a presentation, that around belonging to speak to a group of leaders, in fact, fact in the Pacific Northwest, and it took me all the way back to one of the moments when I was teaching first grade. I've taught many grades, probably like anywhere elementary all the way through middle school, right. But I very specifically remember one time when I looked up and a couple of my students were reading at their desks, first rate, and they had their shoes off and they're comfortable. The first thing I thought, if someone walks in my room, because people were, it was a turnaround school, so people were constantly like in and out of the room and all the things. But Haley, I used to.
Speaker 2:I don't like harsh lights so I would always have my lights out. I loved when I had rooms with windows right, had the lamps on, had smell like the vanilla, lavender, things like that, like all the things. Right, I was probably a fire hazard, but it always impacted me to look up and see how comfortable my students felt. And I will say I was often that classroom that people would take children out of other classrooms and put them in mine because maybe they were having challenges with behavior and all the things, and people will often say, like, how do you get your kids to whatever, whatever? But at the end of the day, when children know you love them, when you take the time to create an environment that's centered around their needs, they'll walk through fire for you. You know they'll do anything, and so I just think it's really important. I know that teachers and educators and leaders we have so many things pulling at us and all these reports and all these like oh my gosh, we got to get the nation reading. We have to remember to focus on kids.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's so powerful, they'll walk through fire for you, mic drop. It's so true. Once you have that connection and the solid basis of a relationship with your students, they're backing you, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And in my classroom I also used to be a teacher I had a similar experience. My students enjoyed sitting on their desks, not at their desks on their desks. Okay, okay and yeah. So I'm right there with you. But yeah, it was a moment of like are you know, looking around, are they engaged? Yeah, Are they learning? Yeah, and they're doing what they need to do. And so the fact that you were able to provide that, and other teachers knew and recognized too that you were providing that for those students applause all around.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you. I feel like education is one of those fields that chooses you and when you walk in, the needs of your kids kind of pull on you and cause you to create and become innovative in ways that you might not have in another situation.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, being innovative. Being creative is what a teacher does every single day, and I'm sure all of our listeners are sitting here thinking, oh yeah, you know, every day I'm having to change lesson plans on the fly. I am making these quick decisions.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's just built in you know all the times. Oh, we had an assembly that was canceled today, great Um, pivot, yep, yep Right, like all the things are happening are happening.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, my students learned that word pivot pretty quickly early on in the school year. What, what grade level did you? Oh, I taught a fifth, sixth split class and I also taught a fifth grade class and I taught a fourth grade class. So I kind of stuck around upper elementary but, um, wiggled my way around that area, depending on the year. It was a small little school so depending on where I was needed, I went.
Speaker 2:That's where you went and people probably, if they've never taught those grades, they don't know. But there's a significant difference between a fourth and a fifth grader.
Speaker 1:There is, there is, but I loved them all. Yeah, yeah, it was a really great experience overall. Kishana, I'm curious. So in your blog you had talked about this framework. It is the VABB framework and for those listening, like I said, this will all be in the show notes, so feel free to take a look at it and learn a little bit more about the VABB framework. But, knowing this framework, do you have any recommendations for how it can be implemented in a classroom, or just an overall explanation, quickly, maybe, high level of the VABB framework.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. The first word that comes to mind when it comes to VABB or, as we say, like BAB or BABB yes, so it's intentionality. We just have to be super intentional. I listen to a lot of people all the time. I'm constantly doing research, but I remember hearing a motivational speaker say one time that wherever you find yourself in life right now, at this moment, at some point in time you made an appointment to be here, right. And so if we want our students to have that academic success, we have to be intentional about doing these four things validating, affirming, building and bridging. And another one of the authors that I just love and lean into his work a lot is Sharaki Holly, and so, to let you know, this framework comes from his book Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching and Learning. So highly recommend, check that, check it out, highly recommend it. But I'll just kind of break down those four things for you. Real quick, high level. So validating we might think, oh yeah, I validate my kids all the time. I say atta girl, atta boy, or all the things like great job, friend. They feel good when you say that, but they don't feel like they belong, right. Belonging takes a little more Belonging when you validate a student, it often might take you seeing them, and especially if they are from ethnicities or cultures or people groups that are typically like underserved or disenfranchised. What you want to do is often present narratives that are counter to what people stereotypically might think of them as right, in order to let your students know that I don't see you as monolithic, I see you Right. And so just validating who a student is, when it comes to their culture, when it comes to their language, when it comes to their ethnicity, when it comes to their race, like all of these are different things their age, their gender, you know, all these things are a part of who a child is, any person, and so we want to make sure that we affirm their identity, which leads to the second one affirmation Right. And so when you affirm, you know you, especially in a. I will speak to this from a literacy classroom perspective.
Speaker 2:One of the ways to affirm students is not just to use texts that are leaning towards your worldview or like your way of thinking or one way of thinking right. We know that texts are designed to be windows and mirrors, so they can be windows into the lives of others and mirrors into our own lives. And so it's important for the texts you use to represent the students that are sitting in your classroom and not just have them be a character in the book or a character in the text, but actually centers around who they are and who their culture is. And that might take, you know, reading non-fictional texts to support building background knowledge and all the things right. And so once you go through the validating, where you let students know, like I see you, I see who you are affirming, letting them know, hey, I recognize the value that you bring to this world, then you go over into the building.
Speaker 2:I call it the B to the B, right. So building and bridging what you want to do is bridge to situational appropriateness. So we take that and we say, hey, like I'm going to use the foundation of who you are and what you bring to this classroom to build Right context for what you're learning. And then bridging, of course we're going to take that and these can be interchangeable, right, this isn't linear, as it's happening, but just bridging that to that academic learning.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's so sorry no, that's okay that it doesn't have to be concise because it is such a an important, you know framework that can really help guide your literacy curriculum and your thinking as you're building out your literacy classroom.
Speaker 1:And I really like how you made sure that building and bridging is linear and it can be kind of this back and forth it's not a one and done kind of thing and it seems like overall and correct me if I'm wrong but from what I'm hearing it seems like this whole framework is able to kind of bend and flex. As you're giving your students what you need, you're looking and realizing and connecting with your students, maybe things change, maybe things shift, and you're able to kind of just hear and again solidify those relationships that you've been building since the beginning of the year, whether that be, you know, taking off your shoes and listening to your teacher or sitting on a table haley, absolutely I'm not in my head as you're speaking, right, because and I love how you point out like one of the whole points is to build a relationship.
Speaker 2:I think for me and I mentioned that I'm from Atlanta like I'm totally from the south, so we talk to strangers for a living, like that's just what we do. I don't know what a stranger danger is, I don't know, right, you can't say I'm gonna talk to you like I've been doing you all my life, right? So and and so I feel like sometimes I think for me it's just intuitive to build a relationship because that connection and that feeling of belonging and community is so important and all of these validating, affirming, building and bridging are in service to that building that relationship with your students for the purpose of seeing them, but then also for the purpose of engaging them in their learning. This can feel a little like fluffy and like, oh, this is great pie in the sky stuff, tashana, but like in the real world, we have to teach and get results and like get them quickly for our students. But this is actually backed by research, right?
Speaker 2:So, in fact, tntp, one of their latest studies they talk about they studied a group of schools for what they call trajectory changing, schools that were able to get results over a course of 10 years and show consistent growth for students. And this is in the Opportunity Makers highly recommend another read, can you tell? I like to read, but one of the things that they found was these weren't like silver bullets, these weren't things to do that were unachievable. One of the three main things was creating a sense of belonging for students, for having each individual child have someone in that building that knew them, someone that made them feel loved and seen and heard and just all the things we've been talking about and that positively impacted their academic growth, not just while they were in school, but even years after they left that, whether it was elementary or middle right, they consistently showed growth because of one of the things being belonging.
Speaker 1:So, and that says so much, too, about the lasting impact that teachers and building admin even like if a principal, vice principal wants to get involved in these connections that you're fostering with students like that says so much about how strong and the impact that they're leaving. Like if a student leaves a school and they're still seeing this have an impact in the future. Wow, that's incredible, always leaving impacts and to all of our listeners, we're talking to you too. You all are, are doing incredible things in in your day to day and we appreciate you. Um and with that, kishana, I think we're going to wrap up for today, but thank you so much for your time and we are so appreciative of having you on today's episode.
Speaker 2:Thank you, haley, and my hat's off again to everyone listening. I love you and I appreciate you.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Get inspired by following us on social and please tag us in your posts on X at Curriculum Asoce, and on Instagram at MyEyeready. If you have feedback about the podcast, a topic of interest or want to be a guest, email extraordinaryeducators at cainccom. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and if you'd like to help more educators like you, join the conversation, please leave us a review. Remember, be you be true, be extraordinary. The Extraordinary Educators podcast is produced by Curriculum Associates. Curriculum Associates believes that with the right supports, all children can reach grade level. We provide evidence-based, high-quality instructional materials and world-class implementation services to classrooms across the United States. Editing completed by Shane Lowe, social media by Atsiti Hannon, guest booking and production by Haley Browning. This podcast is copyrighted. Materials and intellectual property of Curriculum Associates.