Only Connect: Stories from the DPS MyTech Digital Coaches STEVEN HOLZ-RUSSELL

This episode features Luke Mund, the digital coach for Hamilton Middle School, and Emily Walton, a 7th grade English teacher at the school, and Victoria, a 7th grade student at the school. Luke, Emily and Victoria join me to talk about Hamilton’s innovative badging system. Using Schoology, Hamilton’s learning management system, teachers reward students with badges for their positive behaviors. Students can then use their badges to buy items from the school store, from swag to school supplies to snacks! Theme music is from the song “Joker” by Six Umbrellas (freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbr…rellas_-_Joker). Copyright info is here: creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

High schoolers have big feelings. When it came to teaching Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Manual High School English teacher Brian Jackson tapped into those feelings with the help of technology. Working with Digital Coach Rebecca Carr, Jackson learned to use Schoology discussion boards as a simple “Do Now” to ask students questions about love and heartbreak. This simple, quick-to-implement technique of leveraging technology in the English classroom has ignited the in-class discussion of the play’s themes in powerful ways. Read more. Theme music is from the song “Joker” by Six Umbrellas (freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbr…rellas_-_Joker). Copyright info is here: creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Weightlifting class might be the place where you'd least expect to find technology use, even in a MyTech school. But at South High School, students are leveraging their Chromebooks, Schoology and the power of video feedback to help themselves and their peers at George Washington High School get the most out of their workouts. Veteran Physical Education Teacher Shawn Feldman has been working with Digital Coach Alexa Schlechter on this ambitious collaboration project that crosses two schools. Theme music is from the song “Joker” by Six Umbrellas (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbrellas/Ad_Astra/09_Six_Umbrellas_-_Joker). Copyright info is here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

It's really important for middle school students to find ways to express themselves in safe, creative ways. At Skinner Middle School, Meghan McKeown's creative writing students have found ways to do just that, with a little help from Digital Coach Robbi Makely and the technology that comes with being a DPS MyTech school. Host is Steve Holz-Russell, lead digital coach for the MyTech Program. Theme music is from the song “Joker” by Six Umbrellas (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbrellas/Ad_Astra/09_Six_Umbrellas_-_Joker). Copyright info is here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

The first ever episode of the Denver Public Schools’ MyTech Digital Coach Podcast! Join hosts Steve Holz-Russell and Mattea Garcia as they discuss Mattea’s work with two math teachers at North High School. “I’m not good at math.” You can hear this a lot from students in high school math classes. There are a lot of formulas and a lot of processes to learn, and the steps can be hard to follow. Enter two innovative math teachers at North High School, Megan Fischbach and Anna Holm, who’ve figured out a way to lower students’ defenses by leveraging technology to teach tricky subjects, even the Quadratic Formula! Theme music is from the song “Joker” by Six Umbrellas (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Six_Umbrellas/Ad_Astra/09_Six_Umbrellas_-_Joker). Copyright info for the song is here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/