[ED]ssential Podcast

EDssential Podcast

We are an educational podcast focused on reframing important topics in Language Arts and High School English through a social justice lens. We are so excited to be part of your classroom; offering informative content to help foster open minds and critical thinking with our mini-lesson podcast series.

Episodes

  1. 10/02/2020

    Mental Health [PART ONE]

    Welcome back to the [ED]ssential Podcast! We are back with a new mini series and this time we are talking all about mental health! So welcome to [PART ONE] of mental health. We believe that this topic is very important and even more so now with the impact of Covid-19. In today's episode we really want to open the discussion by creating a safe space. Our goal for today is to have everyone understand that mental health does not have a face and is 100% non-gender conforming and 100% non-discriminatory. We are hoping to help demolish the undeniable stigma that surrounds mental health through sharing voices and experiences on the topic. Today we dive into anxiety and Chrystal and Grace both share their respective and unique perspective on how anxiety looks for them.  We have a great video for students to watch called We All Have Mental Health (approximately five minutes long). You can find the link to this video on our website at www.edssentialpodcast.com . You will have to pull this video up as we believe it is important that students have the visuals to go along with the message.  We walk students through a grounding technique they can use if they are faced with a panic or anxiety attack or if they are with someone who is experiencing an attack. We leave our students with a task that will really help them introspect and consider their own mental health. It is also important that students have access to resources and so we will be providing them with the Kids Help Phone phone number and a Crisis Hotline text number every episode.  We would both like to thank you for joining on this new journey- hopefully this mini series helps you welcome the topic of mental health into your classroom. Please leave us a comment - we can't wait to hear your thoughts! Also, to see what we're diving into next week head over to our Instagram and give us a follow @edssentialpodcast Here is the breakdown of this episode in case you would like to jump around to different parts or skip right to the lesson! Introduction and Teacher Talk- 0:00-9:00 Student Talk- 9:00-33:49 (approx. 23 minutes +5 minutes for the video)

  2. 09/19/2020

    Anti-Black Racism [PART FOUR]

    Welcome to [PART FOUR] of our Anti-Black Racism mini-series! This is the last episode of ABR and with that we are focusing on the second half of the 4 P’S. Last week we discussed privilege and power. Today we are focusing on positionality and purpose. In this episode we go full circle- tying it all the way back to our first episode and recognizing our identity. We explain why exploring our positionality is so important and therefore we can better understand how we are able to make positive changes and work towards being an anti-racist. We have a great audio clip for students to listen to; Sebastian is a leadership coach and shares his perspective of his identity and how he is exploring his own positionality. We then ask that teachers show an amazing video titled “My Teenage Life Being Black In Canada” by Cameron Davis (approx. 8 minutes long). You can find the link to this video on our website at www.edssentialpodcast.com You will have to pull this video up as we believe it is important that students not only hear this brilliant young man speak but also see him. Students are not being assigned a task this week, but rather they are being provided with realistic options that they can access to further their being anti-racist individuals in society. We hope that all of these episodes have helped you to feel empowered as an educator when bringing in topics such as Anti-Black Racism into the classroom. We would like to thank you for being on this journey with us! Stay tuned next week as our next mini-series is starting and we are tackling mental health! Please leave us a comment - we can't wait to hear your thoughts! Also, to see what we're diving into next week head over to our Instagram and give us a follow @edssentialpodcast Here is the breakdown of this episode in case you would like to jump around to different parts or skip right to the lesson! Introduction and Teacher Talk- 0:00-11:12 Student Talk- 11:13-43:15 (approx. 32 minutes +8 minutes for the Cameron Davis video)

  3. 09/11/2020

    Anti-Black Racism [PART THREE]

    Welcome to [PART THREE] of our Anti-Black Racism mini-series! This is the second last episode of ABR and with that we are focusing on 4 P’S with the first two being discussed in this episode; privilege and power. We focus on explaining the systems that exist within society rather than the individual. Students are able to understand how white privilege and white supremacy are systems by visually drawing out an equity walk; this is lead by a fantastic audio clip. Students are then asked to watch a video called “The Unequal Opportunity Race” (approx. 4 minutes long). You can find the link to this video on our website at www.edssentialpodcast.com You will have to pull this video up as there is no audio. Students are then assigned a task which asks them to reflect on the systems that are in place around them. On our website under the ‘resources’ tab you will find additional teacher resources such as a video from NBA Coach Gregg Popovich [who] delivers remarks on race and anthem protesting, as well as an article entitled "MODERN RACISM IN “THE MOST MULTICULTURAL CITY IN THE WORLD”" and a phenomenal video which thoroughly explains systemic racism. We hope that all of these resources will help you to feel empowered as an educator when bringing in topics such as Anti-Black Racism into the classroom. We would like to thank you for being on this journey with us! Please leave us a comment - we can't wait to hear your thoughts! Also, to see what we're diving into next week head over to our Instagram and give us a follow @edssentialpodcast Here is the breakdown of this episode in case you would like to jump around to different parts or skip right to the lesson! Introduction and Teacher Talk- 0:00- 12:19 Student Talk- 12:20-34:00 (approx. 22 minute lesson) + 4 minutes for “The Unequal Opportunity Race”.

  4. 08/28/2020

    Anti-Black Racism [PART TWO]

    Welcome to [PART TWO] of our Anti-Black Racism mini-series! We listened to your feedback and we are going back to one very important term from last week’s episode. We are deep diving into bias and microaggressions. Today’s lesson allows for our students to have a better understanding as to how important of a role bias plays and that there are different subheadings for bias as well. We have a very powerful video for our students to watch today and it’s called “The Look” (approx. 2 minutes long). We are going to ask them to watch this video twice- both times with a different component for them to reflect on. You can find the link to this video on our website at www.edssentialpodcast.com You will have to pull this video up as there is no audio. There is a part two and it’s a social experiment based on “The Look”. We invite you to watch this yourself, as an educator, and we invite you to play segments of it for your class as well. On our website under the ‘resources’ tab you will find articles about bias which we used as a basis for this episode, as well as a pdf on microaggressions and the messages behind those statements/actions. Another very important video we’re putting up on our website is a TEDtalk about ’The Danger of a Single Story’. We hope that all of these resources will help you to feel empowered as an educator when bringing in topics such as Anti-Black Racism into the classroom. We would like to thank you for being on this journey with us! Please leave us a comment - we can't wait to hear your thoughts! Also, to see what we're diving into next week head over to our Instagram and give us a follow @edssentialpodcast Here is the breakdown of this episode in case you would like to jump around to different parts or skip right to the lesson! Introduction and feedback- 0:00- 6:50 Teacher Talk-  6:50- 18:30 Student Talk- 18:30-44:25 (approx. 25 minute lesson) + 4 minutes for “The Look”.

About

We are an educational podcast focused on reframing important topics in Language Arts and High School English through a social justice lens. We are so excited to be part of your classroom; offering informative content to help foster open minds and critical thinking with our mini-lesson podcast series.