Zach Diamond  0:03  
welcome to the modern classrooms project podcast. Each week we bring you discussions with educators on how they use blended, self paced and mastery based learning to better serve their students. We believe teachers learn best from each other, so this is our way of lifting up the voices of leaders and innovators in our community. This is the modern classrooms project podcast.

Toni Rose Deanon  0:28  
Hello and welcome to the modern classrooms project podcast. My name is Toni Rose Deanon they them pronouns a designated hype person here at MCP, and I'm joined by a distinguished modern classroom educator, veteran teacher, learning coach and education entrepreneur, Carlos Jose Canela, welcome Carlos.

Carlos Canela  0:46  
Well, thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. 

Toni Rose Deanon  0:49  
Yeah, it's so exciting to be in this space with you. And thank you so much for saying yes to the podcast. I feel like you and I have connected for maybe a couple of years now, and so it's really, it's really awesome that we get to capture this conversation this time around, because I feel like you do have a lot to say, especially as an educator in the space that you're in. So before we get started, what is bringing you joy currently? 

Carlos Canela  1:12  
Currently, it's spending time with the people that I love. Definitely like taking my kids and my wife out to eat, playing a video game with my best friend or with my brother, just those moments where I get to spend quality time and just talk to the people that I love the most has been really, really bringing me joy. 

Toni Rose Deanon  1:35  
This just reminds me of how beautiful community is, right? And being surrounded by loved ones, it makes everything that much more attainable, sustainable maybe is the word I'm looking for. Just makes everything a little bit better when, when we're surrounded by love,

Carlos Canela  1:49  
I feel like it's both attainable. Everything is more attainable and sustainable because of it. So definitely.

Toni Rose Deanon  1:53  
Okay, yes, thank you. Okay, so tell us more about who you are and how you started your MCP journey.

Carlos Canela  2:00  
Sure, yeah. So I'm a second generation Dominican American, born in the Bronx, born and raised, spent most of my life there, and I came into education later in life. When I was younger, I was blessed to go to really good schools, and I knew how to do school really well, so I was successful. And then 1919, life hit me kind of hard, and I had to change trajectories and kind of join the workforce full time. And I did that for a while, and it wasn't until I was about 2627 that I kind of got back on my track. And while I was a brand ambassador for Nintendo, as a matter of fact, I went back to school, started getting my degree, but now I had a lot more focus and vision with regards to what I wanted to do in my life, and that was education. Education was the thing I realized how disparate my educational experience was from my peers, from my cousins, from my cousins kids, and I had a real problem also with how literacy was treated in that whole experience, even mine, when I had a really good education, I didn't actually learn to love reading until I was about 2022, and I discovered it on my own by accident, picking up the Hobbit, right? So I wanted to give kids that opportunity to enjoy and learn that you could really love reading and grow because of it at an early age, as opposed to my experience and the experience of a lot of the people that I was around growing up. So that's what's driven me nine years in I started implementing MCP about two and a half years ago when I lost a really, really important mentor in my life who pushed me, more than anything, to follow my true self in my classroom. And I realized, after having stumbled across MCP and Instagram, that this was a model that worked with my love of technology, my love of literacy and my love of engaging students all together. So I started implementing I became a distinguished modern classroom educator, and I've loved collaborating with MCP ever since. 

Toni Rose Deanon  4:10  
Okay, so I feel like you and I have known each other for a couple of years now, Carlos and I still learned so much more about you, which is really dope. I think you and I connected in person. Was it at ISTE, or was it? No, it was at NCTE, right? Yeah, yeah, because I know that you had shown up in a lot of our virtual spaces, and there was an opportunity for folks to go and attend conferences, and you jumped right on, and you and I were able to connect that way. And it was such a filling experience to be in the space who kind of to be in a space with someone who has values that align with mine. Right? The conversations that we had were very fruitful, and I was able to, you know, go see you in action in New York as well. And y'all listeners, when I tell you I've never seen anyone so organized in my life going into a. Middle School, ela classroom, and seeing how the students function and how they moved and navigated in your space, because everything was so organized. There's routine and procedures for everything. It was very clear, transparent, and students just know what to do. I was really, really, really impressed and amazed. And so it was really just again, great seeing you in action, connecting with you in person, and then just continuing this accountability piece between me and you, of making sure that we both rest right, because as educators, we tend to not rest. And I love this whole concept that you brought up, of this love of reading that you found later on in life, and it was through a piece of literature and you wanted to mirror that, or at least create the same kind of experience for Teach, for students as well, that you work with, right? And so I know for me, that's always been my biggest goal in that in when I was in the classroom, is the love of reading. I don't care what you read. Reading is so much fun. And so I appreciate you naming this piece as well, and I think you're the first person that said you found, or at least the first person that I've heard say that you found MCP on Instagram. The power of social media, right? That's really cool.

Carlos Canela  6:11  
Absolutely no, for sure. I mean, I was surprised when I saw it, and I was like, hey, that seems really interesting. I ended up asking a colleague who was kind of experimenting with it a bit. And then after committing to my true version of teaching ELA, it was a no brainer, because it just fits. All the pieces just fit. It was a perfect storm.

Toni Rose Deanon  6:33  
And so, you know, we're not talking about ELA today, we're not talking about middle school today. We're actually going to talk about AI and the impact of AI in the classroom. And I know that you had presented at the black male educator conference, and you were so inspired that you had texted me and you said, Hey, I really want to talk about the impacts of AI in education. Just really AI, right in education, I want to have a conversation about that. And so I said, you know, great idea. I haven't had you on the podcast, we haven't had this conversation really so, so we're gonna shift to this topic of AI. Okay, so you know, we've talked about AI Artificial Intelligence, where it's supposed to personalize learn learning, right? Like it's supposed to help educators personalize learning. But how do we stop it from just making existing school problems worse for some students, because I know a lot of the times when we think about AI, there are all of the things of like, here's how to make it better. Here's how to make it, you know, a lot quicker. Here's all of these things. And I don't hear enough about things to look out for, right? So then and making sure that we don't continue to repeat the same mistakes. It's just that, hey, we have this tool now to make it easier for us to repeat the same mistakes. So yeah, tell us about that.

Carlos Canela  7:49  
So thank you. That's a really, really great question, and I appreciate diving deep into AI this way. And I guess at the heart of the biggest problems we see in education is one word for me, and it's connection, right? Connecting with content, connecting with educators, connecting with the students. Connection is the most important part of creating meaningful learning experiences for scholars, meaningful relationships between school leadership and teachers, all of it, and if it's used badly, AI can definitely sever or fray those connections, right? We become siloed and isolated. But the reality is, what I found in my uses for AI, and it's tied, actually, to the reason why I implemented the MCP model is that the way I've used and seen other educators use AI, along with the MCP model, facilitates more opportunities for connections with students, right? What does that mean? That means like you can use utilize AI to create more meaningful connections between the kids and the content. How do I I don't know the culture. I don't know what's going on with them. I don't know what they like, what they dislike. Okay, so let me go into this large language model, right? And start brainstorming ideas of how I can connect better with the cultures, right? So maybe I put out a survey to get to know them, and then I use that large language model to help me take that survey data and synthesize it into more meaningful connections with the stuff that I already have in my lessons plan planned out right so I can create those meaningful connections with teachers and their connections with the leadership in the building. How can I, as a leader in the building, utilize AI to both free up time for my teachers, right? Because they tend to be so overworked, and it can be really, really powerful for freeing up time, but also help the teachers more meaningfully, internalize and play around with best. Practices, new practices, and the things that are going to move the needle in that classroom forward, right? Because we always have to come from a place of recognizing that the teachers in those spaces, overwhelmingly, in my experience, want to do the best by those kids. Overwhelmingly, can they? Well? That That depends on a whole host and a range of things, and AI can be a really powerful tool for further enabling the teachers to be able to have the kind of impact that I know they want to have. For sure,

Toni Rose Deanon  10:34  
I you know the focus of connection is really important, and I love that you that's your priority, right? That was how you answered the question. And that is really the importance of making a learning environment that much more engaging, right? And so when we think about you know, you said, when AI is used badly, and maybe this is a horrible question, what are some, or maybe an example of how to utilize AI, quote, unquote, badly, because I'm so curious. 

Carlos Canela  11:03  
Yeah, so one of the ways that you can use AI badly is, let's say you stumble into a problem in your classroom, my students are struggling with theme, right? And you just go into the AI, you say, my students are struggling with theme. Can you just respond to like you create a chat bot? Can you just respond to them to help them understand theme? And then you post up that AI chat bot and in the classroom and you say, hey, when you request about theme, just go to the chat bot. It'll be fine. So this idea of AI is the solution. It's not it. There's no magic bullet, there's no magic pill, and when people treat it as such, is when they most often fall into those pitfalls, right? There's a rule that a lot of the people in the ed tech space and teachers, who are you to early adopters of AI talk about this 8020 rule when it comes to AI, right? You let 80% of the heavy lifting be taken care of by AI, but that 20% needs to be curated, dominated and facilitated by you, right? It's not just you just unleash it unto these children and hope something sticks. No, you have to curate it. You have to test that chat bot, right? Ask it the kinds of questions, act like a student, and then fine tune and tweak it so that yes, it will create a space where it can respond to the students in the way, without giving them the answer, while asking them meaningful questions to get them to do the right kind of thinking right, but only after you've put in that 20% to help refine it and make it more meaningful, but when you Just try to rely on it like a magic bullet. Magic Bullet, you are dooming yourself to a whole host of other issues and the pitfalls that you were kind of worried about. 

Toni Rose Deanon  12:50  
Okay, that's a really great question. That was a really great answer to my how to use it badly. I think a couple of things came up for me. Is that regardless of it being a robot, and making it that much easier for you to be able to create things, right? It still needs the eyes of a human so that we can take a look and see and make sure that it doesn't continue to utilize stereotypes that could be harmful, or creating a harmful piece of content, right, that could be jarring for for kids, especially in the marginalized groups, right? So I really like this, this thing of you saying, No, we have to play with it ourselves. We have to explore. We have to ask the questions. We have to pretend like it we are the students that we know exactly what it's kind it's, it's, it's creating for the students, right? What the responses are. And I again, this whole concept of AI is not the solution is worth repeating over and over and over and over again. And even before pre AI Carlos, I, I know in my own practice, when I was in the classroom, I struggled with doing the tasks that I asked my students to do. I created a writing prompt, and I just said, okay, good luck. Have fun. Never even thinking that I should answer that prompt as well. And then when I finally sat down, and then, you know, I see the students creating and answering the writing prompt, and it doesn't align with what I'm wanting to see, then I get frustrated, and I blame it on the students, like, How do y'all not get this? And then when I try to answer it, and I figure I couldn't, I was like, Oh, I'm the problem, actually. So I again, just love this concept that if you're gonna get your students to do something, please do it first yourself, like you have to do it yourself to see what kind of problems, challenges, questions, hiccups that you're asking students to do. So I really love that. I think I want to go back also to the fact that AI can help free up time, which, again, time is sacred for educators and all stakeholders, right? And then also. Creating that time to help teachers internalize all the things that we're getting teachers to internalize, right? Because I think that's the missing piece. Is like, here's another thing that you should do, here's another thing that you should do, and there's no pause and process time for teachers to really internalize what that could look like in their setting. So I really love this whole push too. Of Yeah, AI can free up that time, and we want to be intentional with the time as well that is now opened up, right? We don't want to just fill it up with more stuff that actually don't make sense or things that are not relevant, but we want to be able to create meaningful and intentional activities and and, you know, reflections, as opposed to just filling it in, like busy work, right? Because we're so good at filling in busy work, so, huh? Okay, thank you for answering that. I feel like you know what, we're just gonna bite the bullet and go straight to what are some things that AI is kind of limited to. And then what are some things that, you know, we want to reiterate to educators who are playing around with AI. And so, you know, we're talking about self pacing, right? Because MCP is really huge on on self pacing, and AI really does help with self pacing, because that is a chat that is the most challenging pillar of our pillar of our model, in my opinion, and so if AI is letting or inviting students to learn at their own pace, right, how do we make sure that they still talk to each other and learn together? Right? Because again, time and time again, I've heard educators say, Carlos, my students don't know how to collaborate. They don't know how to talk to each other. And with more technology and more tools available, it really does, like you said, kind of isolate human beings, right? Because we no longer feel the need to talk to other human beings. We have AI to talk to. We have, you know, all of these other outlets to utilize, instead of in person or even just collaborative moments with other human beings. So yeah, how do we make sure that our learners continue to learn together?

Carlos Canela  17:05  
Yeah, that's that's an awesome question, and I think that's tied to the reason why AI won't ever replace a teacher. It's tied to we as humans are social creatures, right? We've been built over generations to learn socially, right? And nothing will substitute that social interaction between a caring adult and a curious child. Nothing can substitute that right. But in order to keep our kids from falling into those traps of just technology right, and we see it all the time, my daughter struggles with it now, where she we I call them phone zombies, right? Where they're walking in the street, and they're just a slave to the technology. And the way to combat that, though, is intentionally curating and cultivating community spaces, right? That's and that's something that AI can be really powerful for helping you create, right? But it's also something that you can create outside of the AI because of the time that AI has freed for you, right? So you can be really intentional about creating these spaces, like in my class, I always had a Padlet where the kids would put up memes, GIFs, right, an interactive space where they could connect with one another, even if they weren't reading the same thing at the same time, right? But that did not take away from because of the space that was created for us through AI taking care of individual learning needs that kept up popping up for students and project, right? Ai took care of those so it freed up spaces. On Fridays, I had very intentionally dedicated to creating a space where we do a whole class read aloud. I would do some prosaic reading, talk through how expert readers think through, but also engage them in conversations about a high interest text, right? And those community conversations were some of the things that the kids looked forward to the most. When Friday came around, they were like, yes, yes, children of blood and bonus coming out, or whatever the text was, right? And it was tied directly to there is no substitute for that social interaction, especially when you are intentional about finding, like a high interest text in ELA or high interest topic for them to discuss and engage with one another. They're always looking for that social and I think school is really good at trying to minimize the social interactions kids have with one another for the sake of learning, right? When, as if social interaction isn't one of the most important things that they'll learn to be successful later in life, networking, marketing, right? All the all of the ways that social interaction is so valuable later in life, school tends to like, try to sacrifice that those hard skills for the learning, the specific learning that needs to happen. But the reality is that through the use of the intentional, right, curated use of cultivating these spaces, you can actually facilitate these social interactions that are so important for their learning along. With making sure that the most important learning is happening and targeted skills, targeted interventions are happening, and all of that, which can feel really overwhelming to try to do when it's just one teacher with one planner and 164 students, as the case may be, all in one spot, right? So, but you have to be really intentional about it. If you're not intentional about it, the same way, you have to be intentional with your planning and teaching kids how to talk to one another in small groups. When you put them in those small groups, right in the middle school, I know, if you don't teach them how to do it, those conversations will go six ways from sideways, and there's no coming back from it, right? So you have to be really intentional about building those hard skills, but also creating the space for those, for those social interactions to happen in meaningful ways that are going to help them grow, the ways they that, ways that they want to grow, and the ways that we want them to grow. 

Toni Rose Deanon  20:55  
Yeah, and that's something that I noticed in your classroom to Carlos, is just the fact that everything was so laid out in a way that students could have access to it and enter in any level that they're at, right? So you provided those scaffolds. You provided sentence starters. You provided different opportunities for students to be to show up as themselves and participate in the community conversation that you're talking about, right? And you know, when you said the social interactions, I was just chuckling in my head, because it's especially relevant, especially important in middle school, right? Middle schoolers want to interact with their peers, and they want to, they want to interact in the most positive way, and sometimes they don't know how to do that in the most positive way because of all the hormonal changes. And so as educators, we want to make the time to teach our students how to collaborate and how to talk to each other. And this doesn't just go with middle schoolers. It goes with any grade level, any age, all the way up to 98 100 years old, honestly, because you know, different social situations require different expectations, right? And so when the host or the facilitator or the teacher, creates a learning environment where it is clear, then the stress is lower, in my opinion, to have those conversations with people, right? And I'm also something that you said that stuck out to me is that school is so good at minimizing these social interactions. And I never thought of it that way before, Carlos, you are so right with my experience also. And it is all about, hey, you have to comply to these rules. You have to do what I say. We have to learn the way that we need to learn, which is my pace and my pace only then it really it scares students away from the actual learning that's happening. And so when we're talking about self pacing, typically people always assume you just release students and there's no check ins. Students can't collaborate with each other, and it's like, no, no, like you said on Fridays, students have something to look forward to. They're doing the community check in the community conversations. That was also something that I did as well on Fridays. We didn't self pace. It was actually like, Hey, we're going to review together, we're going to play together, we're going to explore together, we're going to be in a whole group together. And some teachers start off on Mondays being like that, or Wednesdays, wherever, right? But I think the the whole thing with AI helping with self pacing is that it just not just it helps and provides support for for our students, right? More support and more guidance in case they can't ask a peer, or they don't want to ask a peer, then they have that AI bot to help them think through their thoughts before sharing it out loud, right? But it's also building in that step of like, okay, cool, use AI, right? Go through and have your thought partner with AI, and then you go and talk to a peer in that classroom, and then talk through that thought that you had, right, or the idea that you had, so really just, there's a balance that's needed here. We don't want to just rely on AI. We want to make sure that it is balanced with all types of interactions in the classroom. And so thank you for naming all of that too.

Carlos Canela  24:17  
Yeah. Sorry, yeah, no. And to that right, one of the things that I was also really intentional about is whenever I created some kind of tool that was supporting students independently using AI, I also weaned them out of it, right? Because what kids are really good at also is an over reliance on technology to solve the problem in the situation that they're going through, right? That productive struggle that we want them to we want them to go through. Kind of gets bypassed when, you know, we always keep the scaffold all the scaffold is supposed to be slowly removed, right? That's the idea behind scaffolding. You create the initial supports that are needed, and then slowly but surely, the students become autonomous, right? And they can incorporate what they had in the scaffolding into. Permanently. So with AI, it also becomes like, if you're going to use it that way, which is really powerful, you also have to teach them the skills of how to come off of it and still incorporate what they learned when they were using it right. Because again, then it just becomes another, like, another thing that they rely on all the time without having to feel like they have to do the thinking right, that that productive struggle that's actually going to push them to the next level.

Toni Rose Deanon  25:27  
Oh, and now you got me thinking about learned helplessness. It's not just from the teacher at this point. It's also from these, you know, tools, AI, of you know what, I don't have to think about it, so I will just put it on AI to figure it out for me, and so I the over reliance is so real, that is so real, and the productive struggle is definitely needed. And I think this is another thing too, that I'm constantly hammering down, is the fact that we need more critical, analytical thinking skills, right? Like we need to be able to critically think of things. And if we're continuing to rely on AI for that, then that does, does not help. That's not helpful, like we talked about in the beginning. That's enhancing the problems that we already have, right? So again, just being mindful of how we use AI in our classrooms. Oh my gosh. This is so great. Carlos, I love this. Okay, so you know, we have bots, right? We have the chat box, we have Gemini, we have, you know, chat, GPT, all of that. And students, some students have access. Some students don't. Or like teachers, you know, ed tech tools are all creating AI and have AI, right? How do we ensure, actually, that a student really gets something right? Like, can AI truly understand or realize that the student is getting something or is it just another test? You do? You understand what I'm asking here? Like, how do we how do we keep Yeah, I'm that's, that's it. 

Carlos Canela  26:56  
So it sounds to me like you're asking kind of like, how do we make sure students are learning the skill, not learning how to gain the system, right, and then the system is new, right, because the system is curated or manned or controlled, monitored by AI. So how do we know that they're learning the actual skill, not learning how to work the AI to get the to get the outcome that they want. 

Toni Rose Deanon  27:22  
That's it, yes, Carlos, that's it. That's definitely it, yes.

Carlos Canela  27:27  
And at the end of the day, it comes down to the work that we put into learning the tools and the systems, right? It's like any good support that you create in the classroom, though, the more intentional you are about how you utilize the tool, the better, the better information and data you'll get right. So for example, you can set up the chat bot to or whatever the AI tools to ask specific types of questions right, and then based off of the question that the students get wrong, you can see where the breakdown and understanding was right. So you're using the data you're not getting. You're not letting the AI prescribe something. Ai, in that sense, is a tool for identifying areas, for supporting learners, right? And then maybe you create small groups that address those the next day, the learning needs that you saw, right? And AI can literally help you do that in five minutes, as opposed to 50, right, taking your whole planning period. So it can be really powerful for that, but it's all about what we put into it and how we put it in, right? And you have to be really intentional about the tools that you create or put in front of the kids, right? Because, again, it's not a put unleash them into the tool and hope for the best, right? That's where, that's where things go astray. Whereas, when you're really intentional, you're saying, okay, my students are really struggling with the development of a theme over the course of a text, right? So let me see, where is it breaking down? Is it breaking down because of sequencing? Is it breaking down because of vocabulary, right? And I create a tool to ask them the questions that will get to the heart of it that way. Well, if this group, I have four students who are struggling with the vocabulary, and it's really just that content specific vocabulary I have to address with that. But I have this group of students who sequencing. They can't follow the order or maintain the order in their minds, so let me create something to help them with sequencing. And then the other students who just are struggling with theme in general, right? And you can be really intentional about targeting those individual needs through the data, but you have to be the one saying, Okay, this is my need. This is what I need to figure out in the classroom. So let me use this tool that's really good for that, but it's not going to answer the question for me. It's going to help me identify where I need to sweep in with the expertise, because the teacher is always the expert, right? The teacher is that's why. It won't replace teachers. What's actually going to replace teachers are educators who know how to utilize AI, right? And there's a principal out of Compton, Eamon ra who, he's the CEO of a ed tech company called knowledge, right now, knowledge with a J, who's the first person I heard say that, right? Teachers will not be replaced by AI bots, but they will be replaced by teachers who know how to utilize AI to leverage it and improve learning. And that's where the difference is going to happen, making yourself an expert in the tool, so that you are utilizing it the way. Because, yeah, if you just give, if you just give a kid who is learning how to play guitar, a $2,000 guitar, you already know what's going to happen to that guitar, right? It doesn't matter how good the guitar is, you already know what's going to happen to it, whereas, when it's in the hands of an expert, right? Matt, that's where magic happens. So we need to make ourselves experts in these tools so that we can make sure it's actually being used to improve learning, not as a as a way of just eliminating work for me that doesn't actually support student learning. 

Toni Rose Deanon  31:12  
Oh, you're giving me shivers. Carlos, oh, my goodness, that is also the first time I've ever heard of that, right? That AI is not replacing or AI bots are not replacing teachers, but educators who know how to use AI will and that, I think, for me, is a little bit scarier, especially as someone who may not know what AI is about, because, you know, there's still educators out there that are hesitant. To to play around with AI, right? Because it is a big scary thing, because we have a lot of we have a lot of narratives that we create in our heads about AI. And so I think my follow up question for that Carlos is, how do we then, what is the first small step that that teachers who have never played with AI before could do, or someone who's not an expert just yet, but can get easily overwhelmed. What do you think is a chunkable Bite Size? You know, action that teachers could take when it comes to learning more about AI?

Carlos Canela  32:18  
So I think the easiest thing to do is to look to social media, right? Look to your Tiktok, look to your Instagram, look to your Facebook communities, and just search right? AI in the classroom. And you could just blindly search it right, just AI in the classroom, see what teachers doing, or you can say you have, like, pick a problem you're having in your classroom, right? So let's say you're struggling with small groups. Go into social media, type in education, small group AI and see how other teachers are. Are experimenting with it, because there is no substitute for mentorship and having some kind of guidance, right? There's no substitute, and that's one of the powerful things that the internet has done in made it much more easier for us to access a wealth of knowledge from experts, no matter where they are in the world, right? So dipping your toe that way, looking to social media, and, you know, starting to search, see what people are doing, see what you might be okay with, comfortable with. And then from there, there are organizations like AI and education is a big one, AI edu that are releasing content specific for supporting teachers. So they'll they'll have like, one pagers and PDFs that say, Hey, use these prompts. Or hey, use this and create resources like that for people who are, like, trying to experiment more and more, and then once you start getting comfortable, like for me, what I did is I started going on YouTube and looking up YouTube videos, and, oh, this is a program. I would look at the program, I would try the free trial, right? And in the free trial, I would see how this could serve my individual needs. And then boom, if the free trial ended, and it didn't really seem like it fit my classroom. No harm, no far. I didn't spend any money, right? Whereas, if it did, I would have to make a decision about, is it valuable enough that I might pay the free trial, or ask my direct report, my teacher leader, if they can reimburse me for it somehow, because of how I plan to use it in the classroom, so on and so forth. Really important, though, when you do that and you bring those things to the classroom, to make sure you're clear about what your district policy is on the use of that kind of technology in the classroom, because that can vary widely, right? I was at one point in a charter school where I kind of could experiment a bit more as long as I ran it through my boss. But then I went to a public school, and the guidelines were a lot more stringent about what could go pass through to students, right? So I had to be a little bit more creative about what I did or didn't do with AI to make sure it still supported my students learning while helping me grow as a teacher as well.

Toni Rose Deanon  34:58  
Yeah, and you listed a good amount of. Resources as well. And so listeners will put that in the show notes. You don't have to do any googling. And I think, again, like you said, it's pretty powerful. Social media has been really powerful to be able to see examples and clip its of how different educators are using the tools. And I think one more thing, you know, you did say, I love the reminder of, hey, look through your school policies right to determine whether or not this is something that's feasible for you, before you spend all this time doing the thing right and spending all the money. And I think another thing that comes up to me, to comes up for me to Carlos, is the different ed tech tools that that teachers are already utilizing, it's becoming more and more common that they have aI within their platform. And so I would even suggest, like, Hey, if you're really comfortable with Padlet, let's say, for example, right? Padlet utilizes AI a lot nowadays, currently, lately. And so I would highly suggest, if you're really comfortable with Padlet, go play with their AI features and see what that can do for you. And that's you expanding your brain in a very small way, but it's still something that you're utilizing every day in your classroom, right? I mean, Canva is another really good one that I know a lot of educators are utilizing, and AI has also just enhanced that whole tool as well. So it doesn't have to be a brand new AI tool, right? It could just be within a tool that you're already utilizing in the classroom. So thank you for those reminders. And that was something that just came up for me as well. Oh, man, this is just processing. I'm processing a lot, and I really, I'm really appreciating this perspective on AI as well, because I am, I don't want to say, I mean, I'm pro AI, right, because it does help a lot. And then I'm also anti AI because of the quote, unquote bad usage of AI. And also, you know, there's a lot of environmental implications on AI as well that people are not aware of as well. So I really do try to be super mindful when I'm utilizing AI, because again, like you said, I want to have this productive struggle, and I also want to make sure that I'm not so overwhelmed that I am frozen and not moving right. So again, balance is really important. You've also repeated intentionality multiple times, making sure that the things that we create, making sure that how we utilize AI is intentional and meaningful, and so I really appreciate that as well.

Zach Diamond  37:32  
Hey, there listeners. This is Zach. I've got some announcements and reminders for you for the week of April 20, 2025 you can join educator and implementer Joanna Schindel for a live webinar where she'll share her expertise in transforming an ELL classroom into a dynamic, personalized learning environment on Tuesday, April 22 at 7pm Eastern, we've partnered with wavio to design a unique Progress Tracker just for you get hands on experience, setting up your Wavio tracker and organizing your course effectively. You can learn best practices from ELA teachers already using wavio and get all your questions answered in this interactive session on Wednesday, April 23 at 7pm eastern Lindsay Armbruster, MCP, implementer and DMCE is presenting at NERIC model schools, 2025 on April, 22 of 2025. If you're attending, make sure to check out her presentation and say hi. And finally, if you want to start building your own modern classroom, you can sign up for our summer virtual mentorship program from either may 19 to June, 22 or June. 23 to June, 27 you can work with one of our expert educators to build materials for your own classroom. And we have scholarships all over the country, so you can enroll for free in places like LA Oakland, Chicago, Minnesota, Alabama and more. Check out modern classrooms.org/apply-now to see if there's an opportunity for you, I'll have that link in the show notes, of course, but again, it's modern classrooms.org/apply-now. To see if there's an opportunity for you. And now let's go ahead and get back into it with Toni Rose and Carlos.

Toni Rose Deanon  39:21  
Okay, one of the things that I've heard time and time again is that our educators love the fact that there are some AI tools out there that help make lessons, which I think is really awesome, right? So how do teachers make sure it's not just, you know, this robot thing that's spitting out different types of lessons only for certain students. I guess my question is, how do we make sure it's not biased? How do we make sure that it so represents the demographics of our classroom? And I think you know, you already said we want to look at it with our own eyes. And also, sometimes we don't know what we don't know Carlos, right? Because I could say, I could say, oh, this is great. And then cause harm, unintentionally for a group of students. So how do we check? Check all of those?

Carlos Canela  40:08  
So checking all of those comes back to the best analog teacher practices, right? Where you put in the work to get to know your students, you have to put in some work, and it could be a survey, right? And you could even have a large language model help you create, a general student survey that will help you understand what's going on with their home life, what the likes, dislikes, cultural things that are significant to them, moments or holidays, right? So you could have the large language model help you create, but it comes down to the nitty gritty work of getting to know your students, which, again, can feel overwhelming when you have like over 100 plus, 120 plus, but putting in that work leads to long at long term dividends, right? The payoff is long term. Now that's only part of the work, right? You get to know them, be it through survey, be it through individual conferencing, whatever method works best for you to get to know them, but then you have to be, again, really intentional about where you use the tools and how you practice them. Right? This quote pops up in my head, and I don't know who said it. Maybe I just said it, but if you aren't in the kitchen, you don't get to decide what's for dinner, right? If you aren't a part of the process, then how do you identify and shut down the bias if you aren't helping either through creation, what you like, intentionally crafting the experiences your students are going to go through with how you use the tool, then there's, there's definitely no way to mitigate the bias, eliminate the bias, or any of those parts, right? You have to be part of the process. You can't just pass it off to someone else and hope for the best. You need to put in the work. And that part of that is, you know, as a teacher, it might mean playing around with it, seeing how it responds to different things after you put in certain data. Right as someone in the educational technology space, right, getting a wider range of voices and experiences to help train these models. Right in the ed tech space, getting a more broad range of voices, experiences and perspectives to work on training these models and these tools so that we mitigate and eliminate bias as much as we can. But at the end of the day, let's also be very clear, the tools are only replicating the bias that already exists within the systems, right and the people that create them, right? So we all have bias, all of us as as human beings. It's part of how we try to construct meaning in a world that can be at times, chaotic and frustrating and terrifying. So we all carry bias with us, and the systems are only a replication of the biases that already exist within us, so if we don't bring in that range of voice to help with that, then we will continue to replicate the biases that have existed and will persist regardless of what tool we use.

Toni Rose Deanon  43:18  
Yeah, and I think something that's coming up for me too, Carlos, is that open up the space, right? To ask students, Hey, what are we missing here? Because that is how I know I've been called in multiple times by students saying, MS, D, you actually missed this, or you didn't have any representation of this, right? And so this feedback is really important, because these are your learners experiences, so go ahead and invite them in in this process, right? And I also love the whole concept that you said, that tools are only replicating the biases that already exist within the people who are creating these tools. That's so important. It's so important. And I think bias, there's a lot of shame behind the word bias, and I think bias is, it's, it's a natural thing that we just all have. I think what makes it negative is that if we are aware of it and continue to not make a change, that's where it's really infuriating. And is, you know, kind awful, essentially. So I love that you pointed this out too, that we all have our biases. It doesn't mean that we are good or bad people. I think it's what we do with those biases that make the decisions that we make and the behavior that we have inherently, quote, unquote bad, right? And so again, thank you for continuing to expand my brain. I really love this this conversation, because I feel like I have talked to multiple folks about AI, and I continue to learn from the different folks that I have conversations with, because it's all different perspectives, right? So again, just like, Thank you, thank you. Thank you. So how do. We keep teachers up to date on all this AI stuff, right? Because I know, for me, I'm neuro divergent Carlos. I get really overwhelmed. And if it's too much information, I don't even click on anything, so then I don't know it. And so how do, how do teachers keep up to date? And then how do they know that they're using it fairly

Carlos Canela  45:21  
Yeah, so to the first half of that question, it's almost impossible to stay up to date. It's changing so fast every literally, every week, I follow a couple of different social media people who like every week they have 20 to 30 an hour, hour and a half long talk about the way that AI has changed, right? It's like the early stages of the.com boom, right, when we first got the internet, and everyone was making web pages all over the place and trying all these different things. This, it's expanding rapidly, and insane amounts of money are being invested in it consistently, at a regular pace, so the rate at which it's going to change is impossible to keep up with. That's why it needs to be about what are yours and your specific students needs, right? What are like doing a needs assessment where you figure out, okay, right now, planning is my struggle, right? I'm really struggling with planning, and it's taking up. It's consuming an insane amount of time, and I'm not differentiating the way that I like. So which one of these is going to help me, right? So you look at two, three different tools, and then something like magic school, AI or DFID or something, right, that would specifically meet that need. And then you try it, work through it, and they will, I guarantee you, they will be consistently updating it, because the only way any of these ed tech companies are staying relevant is by making sure they are constantly, consistently adjusting to the needs of teachers. That's how they make it through their funding rounds, right? And get, continue to get ingestions of millions upon millions of dollars through those changes that they're consistently making. So work with, work with the mindset of, I'm going based off of what my need is, not like I'm going to try a little bit of everything, because when you try a little bit of everything, you don't really end up doing anything particularly well, right? And you might experiment every once in a while with one one separate tool or a second separate tool, but making sure you pick a high quality tool at the beginning that specifically serves a need that you consistently come back to is going to be the best way. And when something better comes along, you'll usually hear it because other people in your spaces, online, in your class, in your building, a teacher leader, will be like, Hey, have you tried? And then you'll be like, no, why. And that conversation, right? That community will help you, lead you towards something if something better comes along most often, that's been my experience. 

Toni Rose Deanon  48:04  
Anyway, okay, so I needed that reminder, slash permission, that I don't need to look at all of the things. And I think again, that has everything to do with my neuro divergence. And I just want to get on. I just want to do all the things right? So I think again, your focus on needs assessment, what is it exactly that you need for you and your learners, and sometimes it's just for you period, right? And that's okay, instead of being able, instead of looking at all the things in front of you and then getting overwhelmed. So I really like that reminder. Thank you. Thank you for that. And okay, so you dropped a couple of resources, again, as you were talking, right, like magic school and DFID. So you shared, you also shared a Padlet with us, with different types of AI resources, which I'm really excited to share with our listeners. Tell us more about that.

Carlos Canela  48:54  
Yeah, so speaking to exactly what you were saying, right, there's so many different things that you could be using. I found it really helpful to just kind of condense like turn to the people who are playing around with it, because they're people who have plenty of time to play around with all these tools and dive deep into them, dive at the surface. So what I found is when you organize the information in ways that people can access right they will more likely use it in a way that helps push, helps them grow in the ways that they want to grow. So I created this Padlet basically to kind of separate the types of AI you'll encounter, because AI tends to fall into three different buckets. It's either a tool you've already used, like Canva that integrated AI into it, right, a tool specifically created with AI in mind, right, that does like a jack of all trades kind of a thing, or a tool that is a. Specific use case, right? So general, so embedded would be like Canva, right? General purpose use would be like something like magic school that will help you with lesson planning, IPS, writing up, IPS, a whole host of things. And then specific use case would be something like text FX, right? That was created in collaboration between Google and Lupe Fiasco to help with aspiring rappers or rhymers or people who want to create music, and it gives you a bunch of tools for creating music, right? Specific use cases. Now, outside of that, there are the big, large language models like chat, GPT, Claude and Google's Gemini llama, all of those big models that you kind of have to know what to put into them to get the best product right. And again, there's resources for that, but the other three buckets tend to be where most teachers fall, and I wanted to create a resource that would help them navigating that right? So in the resource, it'll take you to a link. It'll talk to you a bit about what it can and what it can do, and I'm trying to keep it as updated as possible. It won't have every AI tool, but it will have some of the most popular ones that teachers are using to help make meaningful differences in their classroom. And in there, I also squeezed in a resource from AI and education, who's doing a lot of work with this, and they have a prompt library. So if you really do want to dive into the chat, gpts Claude and make it your own, they have this resource where it teaches you how to create a prompt, because the idea of creating the best prompt is also kind of its own art and a skill we need to be teaching our students. For the record, let me be very clear, to get the best outputs, you need to know how to prompt Right. Like tell it what kind of expert you want it to be. Then tell it what the specific problem you have, and then have it question you to help dive deeper into what specifically you need. Then iterate as it produces things. Right? That's going to be some of the best practices when it comes to using the larger language, language models like chat, GPT and Claude. So building those skills right is also important as you get more and more comfortable and want to do more with the AI world.

Toni Rose Deanon  52:16  
Yeah, I was also thinking about this, the prompt library, right? That could be a step that folks that teachers have never really played around with AI, or have not played around with AI. Much could start with is that prompt library, because it is really fascinating. Another thing too that I would love to to push for slash challenge, especially if you are a department chair or a an instructional coach is making time for people to explore the AI tools that are provided for them by the school district, or, you know, something that the instructional coach for technology is also brought up. So I would say, really look at how your department meetings are being used, and then providing that time and space for people to play, because assuming and expecting for educators to do this on their own is laughable. So just a heads up on that, y'all make time in the classroom, especially, you know, in the school day, not even the classroom, but in the school day, even if it's just, you know what for the do now, five minutes. Play with the prompting of this AI tool, right? And then talk about what you found. Talk about, you know, what could be helpful in your own classroom. Talk about how you plan to utilize it, right? Quick, easy. Five minutes doesn't necessarily have to take the entire planning time or the meeting, right? So who Thanks for, thanks for providing that resource, Carlos, because I know that that's definitely going to be super useful for a lot of our listeners and just educators in general. So Carlos, is there anything else that you wanted to cover that we haven't had a chance to cover, or something that you want to say, that you haven't had a chance to say? 

Carlos Canela  53:58  
I feel like we've covered most of what I wanted to talk about, but I can't emphasize enough that, like, AI is not the answer. Sounds crazy coming from someone who is heavy into AI. And sorry, Alan Iverson, fans, but AI is not the answer. It's a tool. It's a tool and a really, really powerful one at that that's going to give teachers so much access to insight, insight into student thinking, insight into best practices and research, insight into what the world in our classrooms could be, right? But it really makes me think of like this really fun video with Dave Grohl in it, the lead singer of the Foo Fighters, and the former drummer for Nirvana, and it had him in this, like, tiny office space, and he was autographing this toy drum set that somebody had brought to him. And then they just give him some drumsticks and have him rock out on it. And he does an amazing, I mean, he's, he's a phenomenal drummer, right? He kills it. Absolutely kills it. I. Yeah, well, it makes me think of that because of how educators have learned to make magic with so little, right? Dave, in that moment, he could make magic with those tiny drums. It didn't matter. He was just that, like, he's just that good at it, right? And for so long, educators have had to make that kind of magic with so little, with these toy drum sets, right? And moving minds with low resources, little support, all of these things, right? But AI creates a real opportunity and an accessible opportunity for educators to have a much higher quality drum set right, have a much more powerful experience at a larger scale, for creating the best learning opportunities for our students, right? And AI can be the thing that creates that. It absolutely can, but it only happens when leaders are really intentional about what you talked about, right, creating spaces for the teachers to interact with it in ways that are meaningful to them, and actually giving them the time and the space to do that right. Teachers are intentional about how they use it right, both for getting better insight into their students, for creating a greater classroom culture, for great getting greater insight into where their learning is breaking down and how to support them, right, and for creating time and space for them to build community with those students, right? It's really powerful for all those things, and it can be that opportunity if we utilize it the way it should be, to empower, as opposed to obfuscate and kick the can down the road or pass the problem to someone else, which it can a tool like that can easily fall into that trap.

Toni Rose Deanon  56:49  
You know, I had so many thoughts in my head as you were talking, but I just really wanted to listen, and that was just, yes, we are magical. That's it. We are full of magic. Our students are also just as magical, if not more, and we are able to do so much with so little. So that's, again, such a nice reminder to hear, and I love that I'm hearing it from you, and super appreciative again, of you continuing to expand my brain. So okay, Carlos, what do you hope to see in the future? What goals do you have?

Carlos Canela  57:28  
So for me, my number one goal is to help as many educators and children both grow in ways that are meaningful to them, particularly with literacy and technology, right? I, I plan to expand beyond just the classroom, my classroom, I should say, to try and support teachers and students in any way that I can, in growing both a fostering a love of literacy and supporting them in be it Teachers in support, in fostering that level of literacy, while pushing student learning or ways to utilize technology, just helping others, being of service to others in these things that I have been blessed to be able to be successful in.

Toni Rose Deanon  58:18  
Are you planning on going to any other conferences? Carlos, because I know you really love going to conferences. 

Carlos Canela  58:22  
I do. I do. My favorite conference is always the hip hop in education conference in New York City at Teachers College. So I always plan to go there. I the BM, BM, EC, black male educators convening was such an amazing, amazing experience. And that one was in Philadelphia. Is the is always one I missed South by Southwest edu this year, but I'm really hoping to go next year, because that's always one that is seemed really powerful for the use of technology in the classroom. So South by Southwest edu, those are the main ones right now. I'm definitely open to some born to teach, teach, gym and some of the others that I've heard about, but the big ones on my radar right now are definitely the hip hop and Education Conference. Is the bmec and South by Southwest next year. 

Toni Rose Deanon  59:12  
Yeah, you put me on the hip hop in education one I do hope to attend that one year. Because again, I think it is Christopher Emdin, right. Dr, Christopher Emdin who hosts that so, and I love all of his work. So thank you for putting me on with that conference. So, okay, well, Carlos, how can our listeners connect with you?

Carlos Canela  59:35  
Yeah, so you can connect with me via email at Carlos dot Canela at LTS consult.com I'm also on Instagram, Tiktok. I'll be posting regularly on ways that I use, or I could imagine using, AI in the classroom and technology in general, both for literacy purposes and non literacy purposes. I've helped even math teachers with this kind of. Of So social media, tick tock, Instagram, mostly my email and on my web page, LTS consult.com also would be a great place to find me. Please feel free to reach out. And I'm creating a newsletter that I'm hoping to get out soon to find finding as many ways as I can to be of service to others. 

Toni Rose Deanon  1:00:22  
What was your social media handle? I don't think you said

Carlos Canela  1:00:26  
techie Mr. C. Is Instagram and Tiktok. So techie, T, E, C, H, y, M, R, C, techie Mr. C,

Toni Rose Deanon  1:00:34  
okay, beautiful. And we'll put that in the show notes as well, so you don't have to do your own googling for it. So, oh, Carlos, I love the time that we spend together. Honestly, it's so filling, like I said earlier, every single time we talk. Thank you so much for sharing your experience and expertise with us and continuing again to expand my brain. I love your perspective. I love your brain, and I'm just really grateful for your presence in my life. So thank you.

Carlos Canela  1:01:03  
No, thank you. Thank you. It's been an actual blessing, getting to know you, having you in my life, learning MCP, incorporating it, the opportunities you've all created for me and the conversations with you are always amazing, because you're expanding my brain. You're pushing me in important ways, every bit as much as I try to support you. So I absolutely love it, and I look forward to the next time we get to speak, yeah,

Toni Rose Deanon  1:01:28  
and y'all, Carlos is the person that calls me in all the time about my lack of rest. So I feel like, Carlos, you need to rest. And he'd be like, are you resting? And there we go. So thank you, Carlos. I appreciate you.

Carlos Canela  1:01:44  
I appreciate you too. 

Toni Rose Deanon  1:01:47  
Listeners, remember, you can always email us at podcast at modern classrooms.org and you can find the show notes for this episode@podcast.modernclassrooms.org We'll have this episode's video uploaded on modern classrooms YouTube channel and transcript uploaded by Friday, so be sure to check back to access those. Also, we are asking our listeners to leave a review. If this podcast has been helpful in supporting you to create a human, centered learning environment through a blended, self paced and mastery based model, it does help other folks find it. Thank you all for listening. Have a great week, and we'll be back next Sunday. 

Zach Diamond  1:02:23  
music. Thank you so much for listening. You can find links to topics and tools we discussed in our show notes for this episode, and remember. You can learn more about our work at www.modernclassrooms.org and you can learn the essentials of our model through our free course at learn.modernclassrooms.org you you can follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. At modernclassproj, that's P, R, O, J, we are so appreciative of all you do for students in schools. Have a great week, and we'll be back next Sunday with another episode of the modern classrooms project podcast.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai