Episode 50: How Will AI and Technology Shape the Future of Education? (with Rachelle Dene Poth)

Episode Transcript
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Alchemists, welcome to the Elemental Educator podcast.

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I'm your host, Tyler, and thank you so much for joining our community for anotherincredible connection.
If you're listening for the first time, welcome to a place where we redefine leadershipand challenge the status quo.
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share this platform with one other person today.

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I'm so thankful for your passion and dedication to being better together.
Now get ready to let the alchemy of education ignite your passion for learning.

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Today, I'm thrilled to connect with Dr.
Rachelle Dene Poth an EdTech consultant, presenter, attorney, author, and teacher ofSpanish and STEAM, Emerging Technology.
Rachelle has a Juris Doctor degree from Dequence University School of Law, a master's anda doctorate in instructional technology.

(01:11):
Rachelle specializes in artificial intelligence, AI and the law, AR, VR, cybersecurity,SEL and STEM.
She has more than seven years of teaching and presenting on AI in her classroom andworking with educators worldwide.
Rachelle is an ISTE certified educator and recipient of the ISTE Making It Happen Awardand several presidential gold and silver awards for volunteer service.

(01:36):
Rachelle presents regularly at conferences and provides professional development andcoaching for educators as well as keynotes with a strong focus on emerging technologies
such as AI, artificial intelligence, and the law, cybersecurity, SEL, and STEM.
She's the author of nine books, including her most recent book,
how to teach AI, weaving strategies and activities into any content area.

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She's a blogger for Czech IT learning, defined learning, edge-topia, and getting smart.
Rachelle is also a podcaster.
Contact Rachelle through www.rdinay915.com or I'll link her other contact for professionaldevelopment in our description.
Welcome to the Elemental Educator podcast, Rachelle.
It is a pleasure to have you here with us.

(02:19):
Yeah, well thank you so much and for the long introduction, but it's great to be here totalk with you as well.
Yeah, absolutely.
I love the long introduction.
You know, I hummed and hawed over whether or not we should do long introductions forpeople.
I love to establish who they are and give the listener really a chance to know who it isthat's on the other end of this and create that connection because the experience you're

(02:42):
bringing to this and the conversation we're going to have is built from who you are.
So that intro is so, so powerful for me.
And so is the first question, which is how did you get to where you are now?
gosh, how long do we have for this answer?
no, I'm kidding.
Yeah, no, it's, it's interesting.

(03:03):
Like if you would have said to me, and I tell my students this all the time as well, thefact that I'm teaching Spanish, first of all, when I took French in high school and
college, it's just mind boggling to me because I would have never thought that for myself.
And I think the way that I got to where I am is just by taking
opportunities where I would see them and taking some risks and just I don't know I'vealways been excited about learning.

(03:30):
My parents were very much into seeing that I learned and
taking classes, you know, I couldn't get a job when I first graduated from college, justteaching French.
So I went back and got the Spanish degree and I just continued to get different degrees.
And somehow when I look back on all of the things that I've done since all that time ago,graduating with my undergrad degree, I...

(03:56):
It's interesting how I ended up where I am today, but how all of the things that I've donekind of have come full circle together and I'm using everything, even though, like I said,
I would have never thought like when I was in high school, yeah, I'm going to be doingthis someday.
So I just, take chances with things and I really like to learn and share that learningwith others.

(04:18):
And it's just, it's fun.
I like being involved in a lot of different spaces and meeting people and sharing thatlearning with my students and hopefully,
inspiring some of them to enjoy Spanish because they might end up teaching French someday,like do the opposite of me.
yeah, I don't know.
It's just, I like to keep busy.
guess that's probably the shortest way to answer as to how I got to where I am today.

(04:44):
And that's a common theme among...
people in leadership, people that strive to be better is keeping busy and that idea of notgetting complacent in the situation you're in.
With that though, your work spans so many areas from AI to world languages and part of theelemental educators unpacking the earth, which is our core values and what's really rooted

(05:05):
us through all of these, because there's a constant theme no matter what you take on onwhy you're doing what you're doing.
So what core values have guided you throughout this multifaceted career?
Yeah, well, if you would have asked me this question probably 10 years ago, I probablywould not have been able to identify it, but...
Over the last couple of years, I've come up with an acronym, which is my Thrive.

(05:29):
And that is comprised of each letter of course stands for something.
And it was relevant to me.
And as I thought about the work that I was doing and things that I was doing in myclassroom with my students, I thought, yeah, I kind of do this.
And I'll tell you that in Thrive, it's tenacity, honesty, relatability, integrity,vulnerability, and empathy.

(05:52):
And so I think that
I mean, for me, I try to keep those in mind, but I also try to use those, whether I'mworking with my students or working with other educators, and think about how important
those characteristics and qualities are for us, not just in our work as educators, butjust in general as people in whatever we do.

(06:13):
Because, for example, whenever I'm vulnerable with my students, now 10 years ago, Iwouldn't have shared stories about my experiences as a student or anything more personal.
because that's not the way that I was taught.
But I read the book by Brene Brown and talked about like the power of vulnerability,referencing great speech by Teddy Roosevelt years ago.

(06:36):
And I thought, yeah, like that's how you connect with people.
Like when you're vulnerable, it's not a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength.
And then the tenacity, you know, to keep on going.
And all of those words that make up my Thrive acronym are things that I think
are important and I know are important not just on an everyday basis but in preparingstudents for what they need to be ready for the future.

(07:02):
And so when you talk about things like lifelong learning and adaptability and beingflexible and all of that I feel like those are all wrapped up in each of those words and
so for me that's kind of what guides me is even when I get stressed out about something Itry to push through so I'm like all right I could do this you know I have the tenacity to

(07:23):
do it or if I make
mistakes in my classroom or wherever.
I'm honest and I share that with people and I make myself vulnerable but I think those arefor me personally that's what I tend to focus on the most in all areas of the work that I
do.
Now with that, how did you come to pick these six that create what Thrive is?

(07:49):
That's another interesting question.
There's always a story.
Off script a little bit.
The words, I was trying to think of something that just resonated.
I was doing some writing a couple of years ago on one of my books, and it was aboutlessons that we learned from students.

(08:11):
And the whole concept around it was like, if you've ever said, no, that's a true story,like that really happened.
And people were like, no way, no way.
And I decided to write a book about lessons that these kids taught us.
And as the stories were coming in, I started to see some comments
themes through them.
And it was also at the time where I was trying to come up with a name for like my LLC andjust a lot of different things.

(08:36):
And I just sat down one day and I looked through the stories and then I thought about myown experiences and the word thrive kind of stuck with me.
And I tried to think about what did those letters stand for?
And some of them came to me very easily.
Like the V for vulnerability was like a given.
Honesty, the empathy really stuck out.
And then I looked back through the stories because

(08:57):
because I had 50 educators, 49 others, one being myself, I looked at the stories throughthat lens of some of those words and I could see those coming through their stories.
And so when I had actually written that book...
I divided it into like those themes, but it was hard sometimes because some of them werehad all of them wrapped up in one and it just it stuck with me and that's been probably

(09:22):
about five or six years now.
I think thrive as a word itself is something that I've always kind of been drawn to liketrying to thrive in everything I do.
So I don't know.
Maybe it's been a long standing thing.
I just didn't really understand or see so clearly until I actually sat down to thinkthrough it and what I was doing in my classroom.

(09:42):
and then of course like listening and learning from the other stories.
You know one of the things my my letters to numbers might not be great here But I thinkthrive has six letters in it which correlates to six values and one of the things that I
push is values When they're rooted deeply within you should range somewhere between threeto five So I'm gonna put you on the spot and challenge you here within your thrive model

(10:07):
What would be the top three that you lean on the most?
goodness, when I have to pick, let's see, definitely, for me, it is the vulnerability isone of the three.
I wouldn't say that that's necessarily the first one.
The empathy is big with me as well.

(10:27):
because as I've changed as an educator since going through law school and everything, I'vereally been able to build relationships and see the importance of that and understanding
others and what their experiences are, really getting to know them.
And the relatability also, at least in my classroom, my experience, I think those are theones that stand out for me.

(10:49):
Not the other three are not important because they really are.
that's, know, honesty is important.
Integrity is important.
Tenacity, of
But I think when we're looking at the work that we do as educators or just anyone, it'sthe human skills and understanding each other.
We always hear about the building relationships and how important that is.

(11:10):
And I think that those values, the three that I picked...
align with that more because you're going to get to know somebody by sharing yourexperiences and being vulnerable and that's going to in turn help them.
you know, empathy of course is another one that's huge and so yeah, you did a little biton the spot, but that's okay.
I like that.

(11:31):
you know what, vulnerability is not what I would say in my top five, but it's definitelysomething that I work on as well.
You know, I've often been told you're a robot where you are because you're so structuredin the things that you do.
And I've taken some time to really work on being vulnerable and opening up and lettingpeople see that, you know, we are human too in whatever position we're in and it's okay to

(11:53):
make mistakes and fail forward and learn from that process.
With all of that, a vulnerable moment from you is probably the collaboration
with educators worldwide in your in one of your books, Things I Wish New.
So how has the process of amplifying other voices influenced your own professionalgrounding?
Yeah, taking on several of the things that I've written, I've gotten stories from othereducators and that one was by far the biggest and it did pull in educators from around the

(12:23):
world and
so many stories and one, the impact is kind of like reading it and knowing like, yeah, orfeeling I went through that too.
You know, there's somebody else out there.
It's not just me that has experienced something and it helps me realize that it's okay tomake mistakes or it's okay to not know all the things or be an expert.

(12:47):
And so I've done, I definitely learned a lot from reading their stories, but it also mademe more mindful of, or
even more aware and tuned in to the needs of my students, being to the importance of beingconnected with colleagues and making time for others because reading these stories, I mean
there were times and I read the stories multiple times each, but there were times that Iwas like nodding my head in agreement like yes I've been there and it's not just me and

(13:16):
times where I was laughing like yep happened in my classroom too and then there were timesI was crying because some of the stories are they're sad.
But there are things that you go through and the dot dot dot is because when I was goingto write the book it was going to be things I wish I knew when I started teaching.
But I thought that's just personal to me.

(13:39):
So I opened it up and the dot dot dot is filled in by things I wish parents, families,administrators, students, whoever.
And even some stories of when I started teaching.
For people to fill in what came naturally to them to write about that they could share.
to help others.
I learned a lot from the 49 other educators' stories that are in there that have reallyhelped me to improve in my practice and be more mindful of things that I wasn't

(14:07):
necessarily aware of before having read their stories.
I love that.
just like the show I'm writing here and connecting with people, I'm learning so much alongthe way, just in things people do in their own worlds that I should consider doing in mine
too.
And so thank you so much for sharing the process of how that book came to be and theinfluence it's had on you as well.

(14:29):
With all of this, you're a strong advocate for SEL and essential skills.
How do these areas intersect with your belief in fostering meaningful connections ineducation?
Yeah, this is an interesting one too because I talking about vulnerability and beinghonest about making mistakes and things or the things I wish I knew over the years, there

(14:50):
have been so many things that I've done in my classroom and I thought I was doing them theright way.
And then I'm like, yep, no, no clue.
I was totally way off on that one.
And with SEL, somebody had asked me probably six or seven.
potentially years ago now, hey, what are you doing in your classroom for SEL?

(15:11):
And I just looked at them and I said, what are you doing?
And they gave me some answers.
And the reason I did that was because when they said SEL, I really didn't know what theywere talking about.
And when they gave me the response, some of those things that they mentioned, I was alsodoing my classroom.
So I said, yeah, I'm doing that too.
And then I started to do some research and I found castle.org and I learned about it.

(15:33):
know, granted, when I went to college,
and have my teacher preparation program that was many, many years ago and they didn't havethen the types of programs they have now.
And so I didn't learn about a lot of the things that are talked about in education.
And so that example for me became an area of focus because I knew I was doing some thingsin my classroom, but I wanted to do more.

(15:59):
And so what I did was what really started for me to see the benefit and how
you can really connect in a meaningful way with your students.
And the importance of that is I looked at my classroom one day all those years ago and thedesks lined up in rows and I had larger classes and I looked at it and I thought the

(16:20):
students are not getting to interact if they feel uncomfortable asking a question becausethey're in the back of the room or if they have a question they want me to come to them I
can't easily get there so I moved the desks into stations not having a clue at whatever Iwas going to do after that but then I started to
and when I use stations and some different methods I had students coming to me that weresaying I like Spanish so much better this year and I'm the only Spanish teacher so I said

(16:46):
okay I don't know how I feel about that and I said well why they said because I feel likeI'm part of a learning community like a family where I can access you I'm not doing the
same thing as the other students at the same time I'm getting to know my classmates andhearing that from them
I thought, wow, like I need to do more of this.

(17:08):
And being realistic as a language educator, I know that not all of my students are goingto go on to major or minor in Spanish.
I hear so often, and you've probably heard this too, or if you even took a language oranybody listening that, I took X amount of years of whatever language and they don't
remember anything.
So I started to look at my classroom through a little bit of a different lens and Ithought, okay, I want them to know Spanish and love it because I love teaching it.

(17:35):
What else can I do that's going to prepare them for the future?
And looking at, for example, the World Economic Forum and their Job Schools Outlook, somany of the top 10 fall into alignment with the five core competencies of SEL.
And so I shifted the way that I was teaching to try to, yes, teach them Spanish, ofcourse, but to bring in opportunities where they could build those essential skills

(18:00):
because of the importance of having them ready for whatever it is they're going to do whenthey leave my class.
and leave the schools and go out into the world of work.
And so that has become really important for me and something that I've really enjoyedlearning more about because like when I was first asked, I didn't really know that much,
but I made it a point to learn a lot more because I saw the importance of bringing thatinto the classroom more.

(18:26):
And it's cool to see how you brought your values of thrive into that decision makingprocess.
And in the back of my head, as you're walking me through these explanations, I'm thinkingabout which parts of thrive factored into some of those decisions you made.
And you were quite vulnerable as well in wanting to recognize that a shift needed tohappen.
And that kind of brings us to the air element, which is the facing of adversity and how weovercome it, kind of getting into the tenacity and the perseverance behind these things.

(18:52):
Gonna shift topics a little bit though, and I wanna ask, balancing law and education, it'sa bold ask.
So what challenges did you face along the way in balancing the two, and how have theyshaped your journey?
Yeah, so I was teaching for, I think in the school where I still am, I've been there, Isubstitute taught for three years and then I started teaching in the current school where

(19:14):
I've been for many years and had taught for about five years and I developed an interestin law when I was getting my Spanish degree because I took courses in translation.
I also was a huge fan of John Grisham novels and anything related to the law and justthought about law school.
didn't really think about applying because I was teaching full-time and I enjoyed teachingand I decided to just take the test and see.

(19:41):
I got the scores and like I don't know what these mean.
Let it go.
Wait a couple years and then applied because in Pittsburgh where I got my degree they havean evening program and so that was that was challenging because it was for four years four
nights a week and teaching during the day.
So I was basically living in school and that balance

(20:04):
was kind of tough, but I think I developed a really good work ethic and a workflow fromit, from having to shift from being the teacher.
But I've said that had I not had that experience, I...
do not believe that I would still be in the classroom or doing any of the things or manyof the things I'm doing today because it put me back in the position of being a student.

(20:25):
I got to see the importance of relationships and being a mentor for students.
And that's where the vulnerability came in.
Making mistakes and learning and seeing that, my students, I get now why they feeluncomfortable because I felt uncomfortable.
And so when I took the bar exam and passed, I didn't leave the classroom.

(20:46):
I stayed.
because I had this like, I felt like I've had two beginning years of teaching, like thatvery first year when I started at the school I'm in, and then the year after I graduated
law school because I shifted the mindset.
I saw all of those different values.
And that's why, I mean, it's been 18 years since I graduated from law school at thispoint, which is a while, but I have used them.

(21:12):
And people often ask me, are you using your degree or why aren't you an attorney?
And I say, it comes in handy when you're teaching.
It opens your mind to seeing different perspectives and viewpoints.
It's really good for, I took a couple of courses in forensics and things.
So when somebody says they didn't do something, you're like, well, I could tell by theangle of where that landed, like where it came from.

(21:35):
Like it does add some humor into the classroom.
But in the work that I do as a consultant and writing agreements, doing things like that,I use both, I use all of that.
And now,
with doing presentations.
Well for the past seven years with AI in the past year I've started to focus onresearching AI and the law because there is so much to unpack there.

(21:57):
And so like I had said earlier things coming full circle now it's kind of like wrappingaround so now I'm doing the attorney part with like the educator part and I enjoy it
because my whole motivation is if I can take time to learn something or have informationto provide to somebody else that's going to
take that burden off to reduce that feeling of overwhelm, anything like that.

(22:22):
Like that's why I do what I do.
And so finding balance is tough.
I don't know that you can ever really achieve balance.
So maybe you just have to kind of like mix everything together and just put it all intoone.
But it's just, it's pacing.
I don't know.
I don't know.
it's important to note that balance doesn't necessarily mean that 50-50 split.

(22:42):
could be leaning more towards the education side at days, more towards the law side atdays, be non-existent on certain times of the year as well.
can come and go.
Speaking of AI and being well-versed in the law, you're probably well in tune with thedebates that are happening right now on the use of AI with
everything around us.

(23:02):
so advocating for emerging technologies like AI, you know, it comes with skepticism andresistance.
How have you worked through these hurdles to actually utilize it to inspire some change?
Yeah, well, when we're...
two years plus when Chat GPT came available to the public and so many changes ineducation.

(23:23):
But I remember that the January of 2023, I guess it was, I had some people reach out to mefrom school districts.
I had a couple of reporters or journalists say, what do you think?
Even other colleagues both in or out of my school, like, what are we gonna do?
We have to shut everything down, lock it down.

(23:44):
And I said, we can't do that.
Like that's not the answer.
because as educators in our schools, we're in the best position to help our studentsfigure out how to use it.
And to do that, we have to dive in and embrace it as well.
There are concerns, but we've all heard the calculator and Google and all these things.

(24:04):
And I say, even when I went to high school, like you could copy somebody's homework, youcould get the answers, you could cheat.
Plagiarism is not anything new.
And even when digital tools started coming to the classrooms too,
I think some of it is just there are so many things that we're doing as educators andwe're responsible for that take up a lot of time and it's another big kind of like here's

(24:28):
this other thing now that I have to focus on and so the work that I've done anytime I talkwith somebody I'm like look it's just one other thing we've had a lot of things it seems
like every couple of years there's something new something different that's going topresent a challenge but
we have to model for our students or if you're in an administrative role, whatever therole is for those that you work with.

(24:52):
I like to say that you lead and learn with or learn and lead with, but giving examples,sharing stories, but being receptive to what people's concerns are because that's
important too.
I think when somebody says, and I've had teachers say to me, I'm not using any AI in myclassroom.
And I say, have you ever done a Google search?

(25:15):
avoid it at this point, but trying to help people see what some of the benefits are, butkeeping in mind that there are tons of possibilities, but there's also a lot of
responsibilities.
listening, not judging, all of these different things.
I mean, it's really helped me and that's kind of why I'm doing more with the AI and thelaw too, is learning about what are the legal implications and the ethical considerations

(25:42):
that teachers need to be, well, anybody needs to be aware of.
But the biggest part going back to storytelling and sharing stories is just listening,reading a lot, and then having stories and examples to share with others because, and
because I'm in the classroom too, like I understand
I hear a lot from other educators, not just from my school, but from different networksI'm involved in.

(26:04):
And so the more that I listen, it helps me to think through of what is something, evenjust some small piece of advice that I can offer or pose a question that makes them like,
okay, let me think about that for a little bit.
Because it's not about, I don't want to say I'm right, you're wrong.
It's not about that at all.
It's can we see this in a different way, like baby steps, I guess.

(26:29):
Absolutely, and it probably connects so well with those ISTE standards.
It's an important thing to teach the responsible use of it.
It's a really powerful tool.
And you do have to be careful along the lines of, it pulling from public domain sources?
Is it pulling from things that you're now plagiarizing?
You have to do some background check when using it to make sure that you're not pulling itfrom information.

(26:52):
It's not word for word information that's been grabbed from somewhere else.
It's giving you something unique.
recognizing what it gives you, also have no right to copyright because it wasn't createdby a human.
So there's so many factors to unpack with AI.
And that kind of brings us to the water element here, which talks a little bit aboutchange and change dynamics and how to bring that about.
And you've mentioned the struggling teacher that might be resistant to the AI and you'vebeen at the forefront of AI and emerging technologies.

(27:18):
What advice would you give to teachers that are just starting to implement these tools intheir classroom?
Yeah, so I usually, anytime I've done, and this has been for seven years, I've done thesame thing.
I've always used a survey to find out where, you using it, are you not?
What are your concerns?
And the best advice that I've come up with over at least the last year and a half or so istelling teachers to get a post-it note, piece of paper, whatever, and jot down things that

(27:49):
they...
need to do, whether it's a clerical task or if it's that thing that you have to teachagain that you've tried 15 different ways and nothing has worked really well or whatever.
Just make a list of the things that take up a ton of time, take you away from yourstudents or whatever it is and then after you have your list then

(28:10):
pick one of the tools that are out there.
Maybe you heard about one from a colleague, maybe your school is using one and you'regoing to go in and then see for yourself how many of those things on that list that you
wrote that you can check off.
the one thing is assume that you're going to use ChatGPT or one of the other largelanguage models because that's a given.

(28:30):
They're available, you can use them.
But in terms of education, having something that's a platform that you know is incompliance and data privacy
and all of that is super important.
So schools may already have something in place and teachers are going to be apprehensive.
It's not something new because we get used to and I say we because I'm like that.

(28:53):
We get used to doing things the way maybe we've always done them or things that haveworked and there's never enough time.
That's the number one thing that I hear from teachers is that when do I find the time?
And that's the best part about AI is when it's used in a way that's going to help you tosave time that can be then spent with
with your students.
So going back to that list, picking a tool and maybe it's chat GBT, although being carefulnot to put in personally identifiable information of any sort, no matter how insignificant

(29:23):
it might seem.
But that might be the tool to start with if you haven't tried it.
And there are still some educators that I've spoken with that as of, you know, middle ofthe summer of 2024 had not tried any, I mean, not just chat GBT, but any of them.
And I found that
a little bit surprising, but in some cases, you know, there's not training, don't knowwhere to start, and just didn't dive in.

(29:47):
So that's my best advice.
I love that.
One of the places I start with with my teachers is take a plan and think of the diversekids in your classroom and without having to differentiate your plan, throw that into your
open AI source and ask it, hey, can you differentiate this to one or two grade levelsbelow one grade level above?

(30:08):
And now you're going to get a plan made that spans.
all the diverse learners in your classroom.
You're not going to disclose the names of your learners.
You're not going to disclose the ages, the location.
You're just going to put your plan in and ask it to differentiate for you.
Great starting piece.
It stops you from having to think about how can I differentiate this?
You as the professional need to still vet it and make sure it's accurate, still aligned tocurriculum.

(30:29):
Things are going to work, but you'll find that usually it's pretty on par.
It might need a tweak here or there.
And if you get the right prompts in, it can give you exactly what you're looking for quitequickly.
And as you mentioned, save a ton of time on just those
tasks that seem to take so long to do.
Now, with that, your workshops and books emphasize strategies for engaging studentsthrough innovative practices and we're encouraging teachers to use this AI source and to

(30:56):
use technology to try to create these engaging practices to help save time on the thelogistics side of things.
What's one change that you've seen that's had the biggest impact on student engagement?
Well, in my classroom, when I use, there are a couple of different tools that I use thatput the AI in the hands of the students.

(31:18):
I mean, students for years, you know, they love playing games and all those things arealways on the phones.
But for as a language educator, I want my students to build their speaking skills andthey're hesitant to speak out in class for fear of making mistakes.
And, you know, I tell them like we make mistakes in English all the time.
I mean,
Nobody's perfect.

(31:38):
It's fine.
And with AI, especially, we want them to understand how to use it safely, ethically, andresponsibly.
so with my students in all my levels of Spanish and the STEAM course that I teach, thereare two different tools that I use that one of them got them to respond and recorded.
gave them AI generated feedback right on their phone instantly because I had prompted itbecause everything comes down to the prompting.

(32:03):
No matter what tool you're using, I mean, you can actually
spend double the time or more if you if you don't get the right prompt so you want to workon prompting.
So that was something that really got the students engaged and then the other one was theuse of a chat bot and I created different chat bots and they each had their own experience
answering questions typing in and I tried I worked with it before I set it free for themto use to break the system because you know the students are going to try to get around

(32:32):
whatever the focus of it is because that's what they do that's what I would do.
And that really was, they came in the next day like, are we doing that again?
Can we do that again?
Asking for that.
And they've done that before for different games, all the different games that are outthere that we're all, you know, probably all use and have been using for probably almost

(32:53):
10 years now.
But as a language teacher for me, and student engagement is something else that I wascompletely wrong about years ago.
I thought just because they were smiling and laughing and having a great time playing thatgame, they were engaged in learning.
And then I'm like,
yeah, that's not it.
So then figured that one out.
But those those activities that we did really did make a difference.

(33:14):
And I even had some students give me some quotes to share in conferences and things aboutwhat their take was, where they felt like the AI was working with them, which it was.
And one student who always would say, Nope, calling somebody else, I'm not going to do it,not going to speak out in Spanish, said it helped me to get to where I need to be.

(33:37):
and I felt more comfortable.
interacting and responding with this chatbot.
And then in class, I pay attention more because I understood it.
Like it helped me and it tutored me and it gave me the practice that I needed.
So then they were from then on, it was like the wow.
And I think too, a lot of times they think that the educators don't know about AI orcertain things.

(33:58):
Like they don't have a clue that we're using Chaggpt.
We know, you know, people ask all the time about, you know, AI detectors and things.
And I said, when you know your students,
You can tell, embracing it and letting them use it in class and just seeing the benefitsand learning with them too because we'll see what their reaction is.

(34:20):
And then if you have that list and one of the things is student engagement, like tryingone of those and seeing if it works for you.
those were the biggest in the last year and a half or so is like really putting it in thehands of the students and letting them have their own individualized experience and then
getting feedback from them because that's really important as well.

(34:41):
And you're so right on the plagiarism checkers and the prompting and the importance behindthat.
know, I recently worked with somebody who was using OpenAI as a plagiarism checker andthey were saying, hey, read this and let me know what elements of it could be plagiarized.
And it's going to tell you what could be.
now I said, well, give it the prompt now and ask it to make an argument on how it wasauthentically written.

(35:02):
And the reverse is done, right?
It'll make an argument on how this was authentically written.
It will do what you prompt it to do.
So you have to be cautious in what you're asking your AI to do.
And I hope people listening, if you're not in the education world, AI has so many toolsthat could be used in whatever workplace you're in.
You know, we used the example of writing down those managerial tasks that take time anddraw you away from what you really want to be doing in whatever place you're in.

(35:27):
Just make note of writing those down and outside of education.
Think of those prompts.
Think of leveraging that use of AI to reduce your times.
Now,
With all of that, there is so much opportunity to continue learning about what thisbrings, what this does, how to create engaging and emerging practices through the use of
technology.
How do you approach the professional development you offer to ensure that not justeducators, but leaders and people in other organizations, they feel confident and

(35:54):
supported in implementing these new practices?
Yeah, one thing that I started to do and I mentioned before is the use of surveys because,know, conferences or anything, it's a little bit different when you're doing like a PD
session for a school because you go into that knowing what they want, what they're using,what they need, but that's, you know, as a school.

(36:16):
And I still use surveys in those.
So I find out what the teachers, you know, on a scale of one to five, what's your comfortin this case with AI.
And I have a list of different tools that are, I mean,
besides chat GPT, have you used any of these and the questions that I ask and I, if I can,I share that ahead of time, but I look at it.
always have a second device.

(36:37):
I look at it in real time to see so I can anticipate.
And then that helps me to better prepare for the people that are in the room or if it's avirtual in the virtual space or wherever, if it's a recording, same thing, I still use it,
but it helps me to learn too, which is important because I want to keep learning and knowwhat are some of the challenges and
concerns that I might not be aware of.

(36:59):
And so that's the first step.
And then the second step is kind of acknowledging that because I understand because I amin the classroom and then trying to find things that will be beneficial for educators,
regardless of content area, grade level, years of experience in teaching, knowledge aboutthe use of technology, any of those things, and try to kind of talk them through and not

(37:24):
so much like it's funny.
There's the word balance.
It doesn't have be 50-50 like you said, which I loved, but finding something that, or likea middle ground kind of where if you have people and you know in all the PD sessions, you
have some people who may have never used the technology, then you have people that havebeen, you know, they're at the forefront, they're doing it and everything in between.

(37:44):
And so being able to offer something for everybody is sometimes difficult, but at the endof the day, the main thing that I focus on
is looking at where they are now.
And then I try to think about tools, methods, strategies, because for years doingpresentations, it was always about here's this tool, here's this tool.

(38:04):
And we all know that they disappear, the features change, they become paid, whatever.
And so you can't always rely on the different tools.
So I started to focus on methods and strategies.
But of course, now with AI, I mean, you can still do that same thing, but giving them sometangible steps, resources,
have.
understanding where they're coming from and then if I have the opportunity you knowworking with and I'm always available I always say like you can if you have a question

(38:31):
today tomorrow next month next year whatever just send me a message and I will support youif I don't know the answer because I always say I don't know all the answers I'm not an
expert.
If I the answer now I will find an answer or I'll find somebody that has an answer for youbut I try to really make it something that's interactive and that the educators know that

(38:55):
if they need some help, have some questions.
I mean if it's from me, of course, or I provide the school or whoever with some resourcesbecause we've all been through PD and so often the one thing that I've heard when I did
some research was that teachers are often trained on a new tool or a whole system orsomething and the follow-up after that like it's not there.

(39:20):
And with something like AI especially and you mentioned
earlier too, vetting.
know, don't just take for granted and say, the company is totally in compliance and peopleare, everybody's using this.
Always look to make sure that they are in compliance.
But the training, that part of it needs to be consistent so the teachers continue to feelsupported.

(39:42):
And I know not every school has a tech coach or somebody in some similar, you know,position because there's so many different names for people that do that type of work.
And so you want to make sure you have support there.
And so I, on my end, offer my support as much as I can.
And people do reach out to me.
But also, I recommend, you know, finding somebody within your school that is like yourpartner that you can work with because that's important as well.

(40:08):
Although that's another thing it's hard to find the time for.
Yeah.
And Rachelle, it's so well spoken, but I'll push back on one thing you said, and that'ssaying you're not an expert in claiming that.
And I would say that you are.
And it's OK for experts to say, I also don't know that, but we'll source it to anotherexpert for an answer.
So hold yourself to high standards there as well, because I think you're doing incrediblethings with the work around technology, AI, and the infusion you're bringing in your

(40:33):
professional development that you're offering.
With that, though, we are going to shift a little bit to the fire element, which is ourlast element we'll talk about today.
And that's
the decision making, the risk taking and being bold.
And for a lot of people getting into new technology is a risk.
It is a bold decision for them to do because it's a scary thing.
As we mentioned earlier here, Richelle, that when you try something, you often get shownit once and then it doesn't get revisited.

(40:57):
And then you're kind of left in the dark around that.
What risks do you see educators needing to take to truly unlock AI's potential?
And how can they make sure they're doing it responsibly?
Yeah, so I mean, the first thing is if you are somebody who has not yet used Chanchi PT orsome or any of the tools, you have to because it's it's not going away.

(41:21):
It's been around since the middle of the 1900s.
And I mentioned the World Economic Forum, like the Job Skills Outlook for 2027.
AI is listed at number three.
And so if we are preparing our students for future success, it's going to be
involving a lot of AI and it's the number one skill that's in demand.

(41:44):
And I forget the percentage, but it was somewhere around 74, 75 % of employers were sayingthat over the next five years, they're going to continue to increasingly look for
potential employees that are skilled or understand AI and many areas, especially in thelaw.
I see news reports all the time about how the legal interns, paralegals are being asked touse the AI.

(42:08):
and that's great, but they still need to understand how to make sure that information isaccurate because it does hallucinate and it makes up some ridiculous things.
And so when it comes to, mean, in teaching, we have to take risks or, and this is comingfrom somebody that didn't take risks for a very long time, but I see there's so many

(42:31):
benefits in it.
And with AI, you have to try something and bring it into your classroom.
And more importantly,
depending on the grade level you work with, because there is a concern about kids that areyoung getting on the technology so much and the over reliance on it, but bringing in
activities where you're learning with your students and continuing to learn.

(42:54):
And like you said, when you push back on me a little bit about being an expert, like evenin the language that I teach, would often know students would ask a question and I don't
know all the words in English, let alone Spanish, which is my third language.
And they say, but you're a Spanish teacher, you should know everything.
We can't possibly know everything.

(43:15):
And if we only teach our students the knowledge that we have, like our own knowledge base,we're limiting their growth as well.
And so you really have to just dive in and say, and I've said to my students, like, Idon't know if it's going to go well or not.
Or I'll say, I think that was the worst idea I've had.
And sometimes they'll be like, yeah, it really wasn't that good.
I laugh.

(43:35):
Like 10, 15 years ago, I won, I would have never.
said something like that but if I did and I got the response I did I probably would havebeen offended by it but but it's good for them to see that we're taking risks and we don't
know how it's going to go and also bringing it in and taking a risk of using it and yousee well you know what it didn't really work well in my classroom with my students or this

(44:00):
actually took me triple the time it would have taken me to do it without the AI like youyou have to just try something different and see how it goes so that you know.
and not be afraid of it because like it's all around us.
I presented a conference earlier, well it was months ago and it was a room full of peopleand my question I always ask is what's the first thing you think of when you hear AI?

(44:24):
And that answer has changed over the last two years as opposed to the first five years.
In the first five years, number one answer was Terminator.
And now it's more chat GPT but this particular conference
There was a woman in the middle of the room and she threw up both hands and she said,danger, danger, danger.
And I laughed so hard because I thought of a very old TV show where that's what the robotsaid, but she was really nervous about it.

(44:54):
And the problem was that she didn't know where to begin and just was afraid to do thewrong thing.
Not sure about what information to put in, how to use it.
And at the end of the session, I said, how are you feeling?
So danger, danger, danger.
She's like, danger, danger.
So she came down.
So she said I said what made the difference?
She said well you explain some things I get it more she said and while while you weretalking and I tried some things and I saw What I could do with it.

(45:22):
She said I just didn't understand it and That's what you have to do.
So you just have to die dive in see what happens.
So I don't know.
That's the best I that's I've
you have to recognize that you're going to start incompetent at using AI.
And the only way to get better and to learn from it is to go from that incompetence tocompetence.
And then once you become a little competent, guess what?

(45:43):
There's a whole nother part of it to unlock and you're going to become incompetent again.
Speaking of the hallucinations, you know, I even tried my own little experiments with it.
I've asked AI to find me five scholarly peer reviewed articles on something and it willspit out five articles.
And then I ask it for DOI links to them.
and one of them is a legitimate article, right?
And the other four that it's given me are fabricated articles from real researchers, butyou cannot find the titles, you can't find the journal it's used, so you really have to

(46:10):
vet them and make sure you're working.
So I don't use it to find myself scholarly articles and I stick to public inventorysearches.
And if I am using it, I am asking it for its DOI source, I am asking it for its websitelink, and I am going to it and I'm fact checking.
I know...
Aside from ChatGPT, this is a little bit off script here, but I know aside from ChatGPT, Ithink Gemini is another one that you can use.

(46:31):
And usually when you ask it for things, that one provides you the citations.
And I've noticed that with OpenAI, ChatGPT is starting to provide some citations on whereit's pulling information from, which tells you that it's also something that's learning
too, right?
It's growing, it's developing, it's getting better.
And we keep talking about this idea of being an expert in something.

(46:52):
And ChatGPT is the expert in being a language model system, and so is Gemini in being alanguage model system.
But just like anybody with a PhD or a doctorate, you're an expert in a very, very specificfield of a broader general category.
And so when people ask these experts questions, it will not know sometimes because it isvery specific into what it does know.

(47:14):
But what we're really good at is if you are somebody trained in being a leader, being anexpert, being an open AI sources, you go and learn and find that information to make
yourself better at it, but also to help make others better at it too.
So with that, I have to ask, what's next for you?
You
Well, note, I have to tell you something funny because you mentioned about thehallucinations and I'm going off script.

(47:40):
There's no script, but I'm going off script and I say I asked it to write a bio about me ayear before I got my doctorate and I was on a call with my professor, my program director,
and he said, Did you ever have it write your bio?
And I said, No.
And he said, Well, it didn't come up with anything for me.
And I said, that's kind of odd.
So I had it write one for me and everything was

(48:02):
spot-on except it said that I had a PhD in curriculum and instruction and I was anassociate professor at some university and I said well I guess my work's done here because
everything on the internet is true and it's like it's you're curious where it got thatinformation from and before we were talking here today I typed in a couple months ago I
did the prompt based on everything that you know about me what is something I might notknow about myself and it gave me all the I was like that's really interesting but today I

(48:29):
did based on what you know
about me generate an image and it generated an image and it had like AI and had the lawand had a classroom full of students, but I was a man teaching in the front of the room.
anyway, so what's next for me is.
there's actually a pun in that because the course that I teach in steam I named it what'snext in emerging technology and so because I was teaching about coding hummingbird robots

(49:00):
when I first started the steam class probably 10 years ago nine or ten years ago and I wasterrible at it but that didn't matter because the kids were great at it and so the third
year in when I was a little bit better they said they were moving that to a differentgrade and what did I want to teach and that's when I named AI AR VR coding all of those
topics
and they said pick just one of my I can't I can't do it so I said I want to teach all thethings so I made up that course and so the thing that's next is my next book comes out in

(49:30):
April and I had just finished the final round of edits and it's called I made up the titleon the way home from work one day it's called what the tech
about a year and a half ago.
it's about, has AI, has augmented virtual reality, metaverse, web three, blockchain andcybersecurity.
So that's next for me and some just training and conferences.

(49:54):
And I don't know if I write another book, but just continued learning for sure.
Everybody says, you're gonna take a break.
I'm like, why?
There's so many things to do and so many things to learn and it's fun.
So that's kind of what's next for me is just using
and hopefully helping other educators and trying some new things in my classroom,especially with the cyber security.

(50:17):
That's been an area that I've wanted to learn even more about.
So that's probably what's next.
Very cool, and congratulations on the upcoming book.
That's another exciting moment.
Now, I asked, well, I kind of mentioned this a bit earlier in the show, but how can peoplelistening get in touch with you?

(50:38):
I am very consistent when it comes to contacting me because when I made my first emailaddress, it was with AOL, so I followed what my parents did and I used part of my name.
So it's R-D-E-N-E-915, which is my birth date.
So it's Ardenne915 and that's on X or Twitter.

(51:02):
It's on Blue Sky, Instagram, all of those.
If you want to send me an email, just add the Gmail to it and my blog.
site.
Just put the www and the dot com around it.
And also on that site if anybody wants to have me work with them as like a one-on-onecoach or anything like that.
I have all the information and I am always seeking guest bloggers.

(51:22):
So if anybody listening has something you're doing in your classroom, please share yourstory with me because everybody can learn from like our own story.
And somebody years ago said, but why would I write something?
I said even if you help just one person, it might just be the one person that needed that.
at that time.
yeah, and on LinkedIn.
So I'm in all the spaces and if I can answer questions or if you can teach me something,please reach out.

(51:48):
I love that.
And one final thought here for anybody listening, if you can give one piece of advice onwhere to go, what to start, what to consider, what would that be?
geez.
When it comes to AI, anything.
I would say, gosh, that's a that's a big question.

(52:10):
The best advice I would give would be you have to connect.
And I come back to that because, and that's very broad, and that can be taken in lot ofdifferent ways, like connect online, connect an account, connect with people.
But teaching can be so isolating.

(52:32):
And for years, I kind of kept to myself.
When I first started teaching, I was struggling with a lot of things like newer teachersstruggle with, but I was afraid to ask for help.
I didn't have, we didn't have the PLNs that we have now, all these different communities.
There's great organizations.
And maybe that's the best answer is there are whatever state you're in, you probably havea state organization, ISTE you mentioned, I've been a member of ISTE for probably 10 years

(52:58):
now as well.
And I've gotten to meet so many people over the years that I've learned so much from andwhat's more important than my own professional growth and personal growth from all of that
is what I've been able to bring into my classroom and share with my students, with otherteachers.
so connect is the word that came to mind first because
Like you can't do it alone.

(53:20):
And that's even with students.
Like don't be afraid to learn.
Like when they teach us something, they get so excited.
And I love that.
So make a connection today.
I love that.
And alchemists, as we wrap up our episode with Dr.
Rachelle Denae-Poth, I want to take a moment and share my appreciation for yourlistenership.

(53:40):
You're the reason we're here.
You're the inspiration for the show.
And I hope our journey today sparked some points of interest for you.
To dive deeper, make sure you subscribe to our monthly newsletter for scholarly insights,actionable strategies, and an in-depth analysis of each episode.
Reach out to our Instagram, check out our YouTube, DM me for any links that you want toget.
And Rachelle, thank you so very much for taking the time out of your schedule to connect,collaborate, and empower us all through your lived experiences.

(54:04):
Yeah, well thank you for the time to talk with you and share stories.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 50: How Will AI and Technology Shape the Future of Education? (with Rachelle Dene Poth)

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Episode 50: How Will AI and Technology Shape the Future of Education? (with Rachelle Dene Poth)

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