S1E4. Increasing Learner Engagement During the Pandemic

Featuring Dr. Joelle Rodway - Associate Professor, Faculty of Education, Memorial University

The Learning Technology Coach Podcast is a CITL production.

Chapters

• 0:46 Episode Introduction
• 3:16 Guest Introduction
• 5:21 Students' engagement capacity since the pandemic
• 12:06 Relational infrastructure
• 17:31 Using different approaches and tools for teaching online
• 19:42 Collecting feedback from students
• 27:58 Summary - Big Learning Moment!

Transcript

Javad (00:08):

Hello everyone. My name is Javad, and

Timilehin (00:10):

My name is Timilehin.

Javad (00:11):

Welcome to the Learning Technology Coach podcast, where we talk to educators about adapting to the new normal.

Timilehin (00:21):

Here we talk to instructors about how Covid 19 affected their teaching styles, the challenges they have to overcome, the technologies they used

Javad (00:28):

Plus a whole lot more.

Javad (00:32):

Good day everyone! And welcome to the new episode of the LTC Podcast. Hi, Timilehin. How have you been?

Timilehin (00:37):

I'm fine, thank you, how about yourself?

Javad (00:39):

I'm doing great. I actually did a hike last weekend. It was wonderful.

Timilehin (00:43):

Really?

Javad (00:44):

Yes.

Timilehin (00:47):

Well, Javad, I'm just wondering how long does it take you to stay glued to a presentation without losing Interest?

Javad (00:54):

Mm, that depends on the topic. If I really, really like the topic, like the hike I did last weekend, I'd say 20 to 30 minutes.

Timilehin (01:01):

Well, that's fair. You know, I conducted a survey earlier in the year during an online, um, workshop that I facilitated, and it would surprise you what people's responses were when I asked them that, what do you guys do during an online presentation? You know, do you just stay glued? You know, do you give it your whole attention or you do some other things? Guess what? People said

Javad (01:26):

Yes. What did they say?

Timilehin (01:28):

You know, they said, you know, I was busy shopping. You know, some people said I was just eating. Some people said I rushed to the washroom. And, you know, some very funny responses. And I'm just wondering if we could just have like a conversation regarding that. Like, how do you keep people engaged?

Javad (01:48):

Definitely. Do you wanna teach us how to do that?

Timilehin (01:50):

Oh, well, I would have loved to, but since we have people who teach regularly, you know, who go to classes and teach students, it would be better to have them. And well, um, interestingly, we had the opportunity to interview Joelle Rodway an assistant professor in the Faculty of Education, who shared with us a lot, a lot from her experience regarding increasing learner engagement during the pandemic. And well so, if anybody is interested, you know, in learning more about keeping people engaged, whether in an online presentation or even in the classroom, please stay glued and you would definitely enjoy it.

Javad (02:28):

I can't wait.

Timilehin (02:44):

Welcome back to the studio. Well, student engagement has become a top priority for educators, especially now that the world of that has changed drastically. Well, thankfully, we had the owner of, um, hosting an important guest here who is, uh, willing to share her lived experiences with us. Uh, Javad . Do you want to do this?

Javad (03:10):

Of course.

Timilehin (03:11):

To welcome and then to introduce our guest,

Javad (03:14):

Of course. That'll be my pleasure. Joelle Rodway, she's a professor in the faculty of Education at the Memorial University of Newfoundland. She received her bachelor in University of Edmonton and masters and PhD in educational administration and educational leadership and policy respectively, both from University of Toronto, specifically Ontario Institute of Studies in Education, university of Toronto. Her research interest includes school and system improvement, professional learning and development, social network analysis, and so much more. Hi Joelle. How are you doing?

Joelle Rodway (03:48):

I'm great. How are you?

Javad (03:49):

I'm wonderful. It's nice to see you. it's nice to have you here. So, uh, when I was reading your bio, I found out you've been to in Edmonton, Toronto, and finally Newfoundland. How's your journey from all around the provinces? in Canada?

Joelle (04:05):

I mean, Canada's great. I think everybody should be traveling across the country to just to realize how diverse and different places are. Um, I know for me, uh, I also lived overseas. I lived in Singapore for a number of years, and all living in all of those different places definitely gives me an appreciation for my students in my class because I was just doing this this morning, actually looking at my new class list I teach in the summer and I was watching everybody's intros and, uh, this term, in one of my classes, we got Newfoundland, new Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, Alberta, BC. Last year I had Northwest Territories. So it's really important, I think to, to have a sense of where people are coming from.

Timilehin (04:47):

Huge. Yeah. That's awesome. Um, as a teacher, how would you describe your journey at mun? I, I think it's been from 2018, right?

Joelle (04:57):

Mm-hmm...<Affirmative>, I've been at Memorial for since 2018 in a faculty position. Prior to that, um, prior to graduate school I was at middle school and high school English and French teacher. So I've got about 20 years of teaching experience, um, to draw upon.

Timilehin (05:12):

Beautiful. So comparing all of this experiences, you know, pre Covid era mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, in the heat of the pandemic. And now that we are just getting back to normal, how would you describe your students engagement capacity? You know, how it has evolved over time?

Joelle (05:28):

I think what I'm finding, uh, well first of all, I think it's really important to talk about the context in which I teach. So I teach, I was thinking about this today. Um, I teach in a variety of different contexts, so sometimes I'm teaching face-to-face, primarily my undergraduate programs,

Timilehin (05:45):

Right.

Joelle (05:46):

Sometimes of course now that has led in pandemic times to remote teaching, which is, you know, trying to recreate a face-to-face type experience. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> meeting with students synchronously online, I'm sure you're familiar with that.

Timilehin (06:00):

Sure.

Joelle (06:00):

And then I also teach online asynchronously, um, which is a lot of my graduate teaching. And that's another totally different teaching and learning space altogether too. So when we're thinking about learner engagement, um, the first thing I'm thinking about is, well, what's the learning environment looking like?

Timilehin (06:19):

Sure.

Joelle (06:19):

Is it predominantly asynchronous? Is it synchronous online? Are we blending things?

Joelle (06:25):

And what are the tools I have available to me to be able to do that? So I think that matters, um, in terms of student engagement. I mean, people are out of gas. That's the truth. I'm sure hmmm did you say I was like the fifth interview? I'm sure that I'm the fifth interview where people have said that I would be surprised otherwise. But the truth is, is as we are in the third academic year of the pandemic, I find I have to be really thoughtful, even more thoughtful and deliberate on focusing on ways to engage students because they're coming to me with less fuel in the tank. And so I need to make sure that I'm providing a space that gives them access, given the resources that they have. So it has totally changed the way that I'm thinking about creating teaching and learning environments,.... That they want to engage in. Because I know I'm asking them to give me some of a very limited resource at this time. So that's, that's been something I think that's changed. Um, over time. There's like less freewheeling for lack of a better Yeah... Do you know what I mean?

Timilehin (07:35):

Yeah, that makes sense. <laugh>.

Joelle (07:37):

Yeah.

Javad (07:39):

You said that people are going out of gas mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, with this price of oil, I guess. Like it's not just people, cars are also going out of gas

Joelle (07:46):

<laugh>. Right.

Javad (07:47):

And also you mentioned that you were kind of like doing, um, hybrid or online teaching even before Covid happened. So I guess it didn't affect you much, but what about your colleagues or like, um, your students? Like were they suffering when you went to Covid lockdown?

Joelle (08:02):

Yeah, I think some were. I think it, I mean, I think you're absolutely right. Um, so 2019, I think I taught my first online course. I said to my dean afterwards, you should probably give those students a refund. It was horrible because I went into that trying to recreate a face-to-face teaching and learning environment in an asynchronous online setting. So I mean, my skills weren't matching what I needed to be doing. So, you know, that just set me on an, uh, on a learning journey of like, oh, okay, I need to kind of up my game here. And, um, and in lots of ways, the skills that I've been, uh, gaining from like just informal professional learning, you know, I don't know. I go on the internet and I find there's lots of resources out there. Um, people who do this work, what are the best practices?

Joelle (08:52):

I bring that into my class and I'll say that actually I've used a lot of what I've learned, um, in developing my capacity for online teaching and learning in my face-to-face classes with, and when we're talking about engagement with success, because the difference is when, when, um, you know, when you're face-to-face and everybody's in a room, you can play off of each other and, and depending on people's personalities mm-hmm. <affirmative>, certain people are going to kind of dominate the room. Right. Whereas if we are building in digital tools and building in, um, other ways for people to participate, you're capturing different voices then, which, I mean, I never really thought about that before because I present as a very extroverted person. I mean, I'm a participator, I'm a head nodder at a conference. Like, you know, I drive right in. But what I learned from starting to experiment with those tools, whether it's in an online class or like you said, I always use my brightspace shell, even in my face-to-face class, I flipped my classroom before I've done all these different things, is different people enter into the space and it's like, oh, I never would've probably learned that about this person if I didn't do that.

Joelle (10:06):

So when we're thinking about student engagement, I think what part of what we need to be thinking about is what counts as student engagement and the hierarchy of student engagement that oftentimes instructors having their own mental model, right? Like, what do, what does student engagement look like and who are the most engaged students? Like, I mean, so I, I know I've done this, so I'm gonna speak from experience. I've shown up for classes only having read the abstract intro and conclusion for the articles that I'm reading, but I can pass because I can participate, ask questions. Like, I would always come in with like, my three questions I was gonna ask because then that would throw the prof off the game, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> like, it's like, oh, Joel's done the reading, da da da da da. But in truth, I hadn't. And, and it may look like I was engaged in participating and I was, but I would consider that to be pretty low level.

Joelle (10:59):

But I was very good at being a chameleon. And I think that that happens a lot in face-to-face learning environments. And I think that by experimenting with these different tools, experimenting with definitions of what engagement means, um, experimenting with all of these ideas, I'm learning a lot about that. And it's like, well, maybe actually it wasn't that people didn't want to engage, it was that my structure put up unintended barriers to their learning. And that's sort of like where I am now. Like this is always a work in progress, right? Um, I actually am experiencing lots of trouble with student engagement <laugh>, but this is what I'm learning along the way.

Timilehin (11:40):

Yeah. That's, that's nice. Uh, still on student engagement. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, do you want to explain the concept of, um, the concept of um, relational infrastructure?

Joelle (11:52):

Huh? Relational infrastructure? Did I say that somewhere? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So, okay. I'm happy to talk about relational infrastructure.

Timilehin (12:01):

Sweet.

Joelle (12:02):

Hello! You just like walked right on into my research area.

Timilehin (12:05):

Let's do it.

Joelle (12:05):

Um, so what do I mean by relational infrastructure? Alright, so if you're gonna be like experimenting with stuff yeah. You better let 'em know that that's what you're doing. Right? Because sometimes when you walk into a class, um, and rightfully so, there's like this dynamic, right? There's this power dynamic, there's this expectation. I mean, I felt it coming in here today. I'm like, oh man, I don't know. Like am I, they're not, I hope they're not thinking I'm the expert. I mean, I'm the expert at trying things out and failing and learning, but I wouldn't say I'm the expert at student engagement.

Timilehin (12:37):

Right?

Joelle (12:38):

Um, the relational infrastructure, though, this is probably my greatest strength as an educator, is taking the time to build relationships with students ahead of time. Um, uh, telling them straight up, Hey, so here's what I'm doing right now. In one of my classes, my grad classes were experimenting with like contract grading. And I'm like, I've never done this before. What do you think? Are you game for trying it out? Or would you rather do it this way? I never like impose what I wanna be tinkering around with on them. I offer them options. And by creating a learning environment where the learner has agency, like it's kind of like, choose your own adventure in my class as much as I can make it. That way you're actually building positive relationships with your students, which then pays off in dividends. Hmm. The other thing is, is when I screw up, I say I screw up. And I do that on purpose because my students are often, I most often teach at the graduate level, but even at the undergraduate level, I am teaching people who are either about to become, uh, classroom teachers or educators in some sort of educational environment, or I'm teaching, um, K212 teachers, principals, all of those sorts of folks who oftentimes come into my class.

Joelle (13:59):

Uh, they can be very perfectionistic, many of them in the way that they engage. And they're afraid. They're afraid to take the risk. They're afraid that they're gonna be wrong, they're afraid they're gonna get in trouble, they're afraid they're not gonna get a good grade. So by building the relationships, I try to take all of that part of a, in a way so that we're just focusing on their learning. Right. And allowing them different pathways into the space. Increases student engagement.

Timilehin (14:23):

Beautiful.

Javad (14:24):

Is that a trick that why your students like you a lot? Because, you know, people make mistakes and the fact that you say that, you know, if I make a mistake, I just say it loud, that makes it easier for a student to see you first as a friend, as a human, and then as a, as a instructor.

Joelle (14:38):

Well, as friendly. Right. So that's, so you can get yourself in hot water sometimes in this space. So I end up saying to students a lot, it's like, don't misunderstand my friendliness as a lack of expectation. And I, if I guarantee you, cuz we've talked about this in my research group. Um, and most of the people in my research group came to me after having taken a course with me. They, they, they wanna try out education research, they come into my lab, we, we do work together. And so I've asked them, um, and you know, they'll all say, well no, you're friendly and you're very accommodating, but I think your standards are higher <laugh>. And I'm like, is that a good thing or a bad thing? And they're like, well no, it was a good thing because it really pushed me to learn in a certain way.

Joelle (15:22):

Like not in a particular way defined by me, but, but for them it helped them not just jump the hoops. You know, like sometimes when you teach in a professional school, it can be jumping the hoops to get a raise or you know, doing it to get the promotion or whatever. I mean we all do those kinds of things and truth, that's how I started grad school. I wanted to become a principal. I mean I never did. I became a professor instead. But that's how I started out. Um, but but, I think like when you're in that space, and what I mean by being friendly is so like sometimes I was joking around earlier just with us, right? And I said, well I was wearing jeans and my MUN hoodie earlier and I was thinking I should come in with that. And then I changed my clothes cause I thought, well no, maybe I should like look more like a professor kind of.

Joelle (16:11):

Um, but like I'll post videos in my course shell even like, whether it's a face-to-face class where I'm using digital tools or if it's an online class and I'll show up in my hoodie with my hair, looking nine ways from Sunday sometimes, which would be like, so off-putting to some of my colleagues, they're like, you're doing what? And I'm like, yeah, because they're afraid to use the video tool because they think they need to look good all the time. Hmm. They think they need to be like present, present in like a, a certain way. I mean like, I don't want you showing up in your pajamas. We don't, we don't do that. But um, I want you to focus on your learning, not what you look like. Hmm. And I find that if I do that and I just say, oh my gosh, I'm just having like a really challenging day managing all the things, then that opens up a space for them to say, Hey Joelle, I'm having a really challenging day managing all the things. Um, can you support my learning in this way? And I mean they tell me it works.

Timilehin (17:10):

Yeah, That makes sense. And then you mentioned digital tools, you know, maybe technological tools. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> or you know, it could just be anything or any kind of technology. Do you want to mention, uh, specific ones that worked for you, you know, to enhance student engagement?

Joelle (17:28):

Um, again, it depends on the context you're in. So flipping my undergraduate class was a win. I did not do that. Um, this past term just as a, I didn't do it on purpose cuz I wanted to compare. Right. Um, student engagement, I think flipping the classroom. So do you know what I mean by that? Like, so I would like post the, the video of my lecture ahead of time mm-hmm. <affirmative> so that when we're together we're just talking about making sense of what I was presenting. Right. Um, through that, uh, what I've learned from that don't p post 45 minute videos. If it's longer than a TED Talk, they're not gonna watch it. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So just break it up. Um, other digital tools and asynchronous is like the video note tool in Brightspace. Good. Um, a lot of Google stuff, I don't know if I'm allowed to say this, but I'd use a lot of outside the MUN infrastructure tools too.

Joelle (18:22):

Because sometimes Brightspace is really constraining mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, I've used the video assignment tool and Brightspace and the students hate it. I've let them do, you know, film their themselves on Zoom or WebEx or Google whatever the Google version of it is. Um, and post the videos that way and then they love it. You gotta keep it easy for people. Mm. Um, and let them use the tools that they want to use, which means I have to become then a dabbler in all the tools. <laugh>, which freaks people out. But here's the thing, they're all pretty much the same once you get going. Mm-hmm.

Timilehin (18:56):

<affirmative>. So have you been in touch with the CITL, you know, maybe for support

Joelle (19:01):

All the time!

Timilehin (19:02):

Hmm mm-hmm <affirmative> and you can tell they have been so supportive and then,

Joelle (19:06):

Yeah. What I love about CITL folks is that they're always willing to support me in my experimentation.

Timilehin (19:13):

Right. Right. That's good.

Joelle (19:13):

So I need a team. So this is like really important. This is the difference. This is what I say to my, my, uh, colleagues who teach in K to 12. Right. They don't have a team. Like I have a team mm-hmm <affirmative>. And that's the difference. So if you're gonna be doing this, you need to have people who can support you in learning what you're doing. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so when I'm stuck I can go to CITL lots of times thinking about when I taught K to 12 experience would be me at my kitchen table, then who is I gonna call?

Javad (19:42):

We talk a lot about the feedbacks that you got from your students and you keep saying that, you know, they helped you to, uh, get rid of the, I dunno the not-so-good parts and improve the good parts. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, I was told by some of your students that you have a very interesting mechanism for students to give you feedbacks.

Joelle (20:00):

I do?

Javad (20:00):

You do!

Joelle (20:01):

Who have you been talking to?

Javad (20:03):

Uh, the one who, who shall not be named mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Ooh. So I, I wonder like if these type of feedbacks that, um, students are very, very interested in mm-hmm. <affirmative>, is it something that you started to do that after the pandemic? Or you've always had open doors to your students?

Joelle (20:17):

No, I always do it, but you know, here's the thing with students, you gotta keep opening the door like all the time cuz they don't walk through all the time. And it takes a while. I think this goes to the relational infrastructure. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, right? And so I, I ask like I do a stop start, continue all the time. Like regularly, I'm about to do one next week at the end of the first month. I don't wait till the end. I tell them all the time, if your feedback at the end isn't helping you in your learning, it helps me in my learning, but it doesn't help me assess and adjust what we're doing in our course right now to help you. So I just keep it simple. I used to do like these survey things, you know, with all the numbers and stuff like that.

Joelle (20:55):

And that they're not into that, they won't do it. But if I just throw up an open thing, open block, like, what do you want me to stop? What am I doing every week that's driving youLike berserk? Makes you not want to log into the class, tell me so I can stop doing it. Um, what do you want me to continue? What am I doing that they want? They always love the videos by the way. It makes them feel like they have a connection to me. Um, they can hear my voice when they're doing stuff or, you know, it, it creates a relational space that's hard online. Uh, and then of course this is a benefit. I mean, I do teach teachers. I get lots of good tips from them in the start section.

Javad (21:34):

Okay. That's wonderful. Uh, when I was doing some background research, just like what you mentioned that you were doing to your instructors mm-hmm. <affirmative> recently you published a paper about the power of the school conditioning on educator wellbeing. And that's something that, uh, mostly like people don't care about. Uh, I mean, or maybe they don't think that way because like, um, usually the focus is on students, but also like teachers and instructors, they're under high amount of stresses and pressure, um. Going through pandemic. Like, um, as a prof, like did it make it worse? Like did it put more pressure to you and your colleagues?

Joelle (22:11):

Yep. <laugh> you want me to explain? Uh, yeah, for sure it did. I mean, I think if you're an educator, you're a carer, you know, um, I mean there's always exceptions like everything in life, but I think, you know, people who go in to teaching and learning environments are there because they care about the other people who are in that space. And I think it opts the caring factor. I mean, I've always cared, but I'm such an empathetic person. And of course I'm living the life too. So I am, you know, let's go back March, 2020. I'm teaching synchronously remote teaching while my own two kids are sitting at the other end of the dining room table in their remote teach, uh, remote learning environment, doing all the things. So I know what that feels like. So that's why I think when I'm talking about people running outta gas, I'm like, man, we've been doing this for three years. It's, it's, it's emotionally draining if because you care and you, and you can see that people are are struggling and because we're not together in a room or, you know, you don't have the physical proximity to be addressing some of these needs, it makes it harder. Which, you know, sort of opposite the cognitive load of everything you're doing. But I mean, I'm still doing it.

Timilehin (23:32):

Yeah. Yeah. Relatively though. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, what can you say about the use of social media?

Joelle (23:39):

Hmm. For what?

Timilehin (23:41):

So regarding student engagement, answers to engagement.

Joelle (23:46):

Yeah. I mean, I've never played with social media. I have a quite a few colleagues who will use Twitter in their classes. Like say in especially like courses around, uh, school improvement or school development, that kind of thing. You know, um, they tweet stuff out. I'm afraid of social media in the class. I, I think it has, it's a valuable learning tool. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I actually am studying, I study how educators use social media to support their professional Learning

Timilehin (24:14):

And that's it. That was where the question came from.

Joelle (24:17):

Oh That's where the question came from. Ah, yeah. So I mean, I do look at that and I mean, I use it for myself. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I use it to inform my, I mean, I use it. I'm a prospector. I'm like a Twitter prospector. I don't create a ton of content. I guess I'm a lurker, but I do go on Twitter trying to find different, um, resources. Like, especially around things like Universal Design for Learning. Right. You know, so I'll like, look, look at that. And then it usually links to a website where I can find resources and then I'll like go to people I know and I'll be like, is is this a quality resource or not? You know, like those kinds of things. So for me, I, for me, I see it as a support. I haven't used it as a learning tool in the classroom, but I think there's potential there for that too.

Timilehin (25:00):

Right. And I think that's pretty much it because we, what we were looking at was, okay, professors also look at social media for resources, you know?

Joelle (25:12):

Yeah. For sure.

Timilehin (25:13):

Yep. They look up to it sometimes isn't it is not just about literature review all the time.

Joelle (25:18):

No, and I mean, some things there's not, it's not easy to find mm-hmm. <affirmative> literature on. So like, Hmm, what am I thinking about? Uh, like decolonizaying or decolonization. Right. And really that's an area of learning for me, right? Yeah. Like, I want, I I'm very interested in that schools are places, schools are harmful places. Mm-hmm. Um, people are regularly harmed in learning environments. Um, so I wanna make sure that I'm minimizing that in in mind. So that means I have to always enter my teaching and learning space as a learner. So sometimes the hot off the press is gonna be linked on Twitter. It's not gonna be showing up in MUN libraries or Google Scholar right off the bat. So that's what, you know, I follow particular people that I know who are working in decolonizing education spaces. I'm like, oh, okay. I'm gonna go read that.

Timilehin (26:10):

Right. That's it.

Javad (26:11):

And for the last question, we're not gonna take too much time of you, just like what you said and your students said that, you know, 45 minutes, no one is gonna listen to that.

Joelle (26:18):

Yeah, that's right.

Javad (26:19):

Yeah. Uh, for the last question, like, covid happened, you know, it was horrible. We've been through mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, we are slowing, you know, back to the normal, the way we used to. Uh, is there any addition, any good, uh, feedback, any good addition, uh, to your schemes, your, uh, teaching style that you wouldn't have it if it was not because of Covid?

Joelle (26:40):

First of all, I have to say, oh my God, I hope we don't go, go back to normal. Like, we, we should not be going back there. Like, that's what I would say is the impact of Covid. I think Covid put pressure on people to start evolving their teaching and learning practices in ways that I think ultimately are beneficial. We've had to do it at a pace that makes it unmanageable at times. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But that's my greatest fear in the whole sort of like pandemic post pandemic thing, is that people are just gonna go back to what we used to be doing and forget the lessons of what I call the covid silver linings.

Timilehin (27:17):

That's spot on. Thank you so much for your time today, and this is the end of the interview. We want to appreciate you, Dr. Joelle for joining us today. Thank you. And have a great day.

Joelle (27:28):

Thanks for having me.

Timilehin (27:43):

Welcome back to the studio. Wow. What a wonderful conversation. Javad, what do you think about the interview?

Javad (27:50):

It was really, really nice. I like the tone. I like the energy and I like the information that she was telling us about.

Timilehin (27:57):

Right. You know, there were, there were things I actually, I lighted from our responses. Yeah. The first one was the fact that she was really original, you know, the way she took on the questions and then the energy, the positive vibes, you know, they were kind of exceptional. And another thing for me is a technical preparedness, even before the, uh, pandemic. So when the pandemic happened, it just sh she was just flowing smoothly, you know, into her schemes, into her teaching styles. And, you know, there wasn't too much of a change for her, even though it could have impacted her students kind of more negatively. But, you know, she did quite well. And lastly, she mentioned that, you know, COVID didn't go, you know, or did not even come without some positive things. You know, that even though many people got rushed into the process, But at the end of the day, there were things to learn. There are new ways of doing things, and that's really, really important to me.

Javad (28:58):

What inspired me the most was great relationship that she had with her students. Uh, while getting to know your teachers can be somehow intimidating at first. Uh, but the simple truth is that most props admire when students take that initiative. Joelle was a really, really good example here. And I guess, uh, this has benefits for both sides, for both students and profs. Uh, for profs, for example. It helps them to have continuous improvement through the whole semester. Uh, just like what she said, she said that she doesn't wait until the end of the semester to get feedback. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> like every week, every month. Like, she constantly ask for, continuously ask for feedback from her students so she can improve her, like teaching style. And on the other side also for her students, like one good benefit could be they maybe feel less intimidating mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, to ask questions in the classroom or even like schedule office hours.

Timilehin (29:48):

Right, right, right. That's true. And, you know, uh, listeners, I want to believe that you enjoyed the interview as much as we did, and this is just saying a very big thank you to all of you, um, for joining us in this episode of the Learning Technology Coach Podcast. And we hope to see you the next time. Until then, I am Timilehin,

Javad (30:08):

And my name is Javad.

Timilehin (30:10):

Bye-bye.

Javad (30:11):

Have a wonderful day.