Helping New-to-CS Educators with Ashley Waring

In this interview with Ashley Waring, we discuss Ashley’s experiences with integrating CS in the classroom, lessons learned providing professional development for new-to-CS educators, what Ashley learned helping write Alabama’s CS standards and providing support after the rollout, language and oppression in standards development, why focusing on a college degree as an end goal might not be as important as focusing on lifelong learning, and more.

Welcome back to another episode of the
CSK8 podcast my name is jared o'leary
each week of this podcast is either a
solo episode where i unpack some
scholarship in relation to computer
science education or an episode with a
guest or multiple guests in this week's
particular episode i'm having a
conversation with a co-worker at boot up
and her name is ashley waring in this
discussion we chat about ashley's
experiences with integrating cs in the
classroom lessons learned providing
professional development for new to cs
educators well ashley learned helping
write alabama's cs standards and
providing support after the rollout
language and oppression in standards
development why focusing on college
degrees as an end goal might not be as
important as focusing on lifelong
learning and so much more as always
there are many links in the show notes
that you can find at jaredoliri.com
including a link to bootuppd.org which
is the non-profit that i work for where
i create 100 free coding curriculum so
if you want to dive deeper into any of
the resources that are mentioned in this
particular episode such as some of the
podcasts that i mentioned or even some
of the books like by jamie's paul g make
sure you check out the show notes and
with that we will now begin the
interview with ashley i'm ashley waring
i'm a boot up pd facilitator i also have
been working with a plus college ready
and code.org as a computer science
fundamentals facilitator in state of
alabama for a few years and i'm excited
to be here can you tell me the story of
how you got into computer science
education i'm really close to my family
and i've always kind of come from a
close-knit family and i've always been
the like techie of the group so whenever
my parents got a new sound system or you
know if somebody needed help fixing the
printer or couldn't figure out a program
i was always the one to kind of take the
lead on that because of that in high
school i took apcs for about three weeks
and realized that not only was i the
only girl in that class but i also
didn't have any background other than
like keyboarding and stuff like that in
middle school so it was just kind of a
disconnect there i ended up doing
biology but fast forward a few years and
i was in the classroom got to jump on
integrating chromebooks in the classroom
in a fourth grade general ed class and
with that came an opportunity to take a
code.org pd and that really sparked my
cs education interest i walked away from
that like why aren't we teaching this as
a common literacy to everybody my mom
was just blown from after that pd
learning about computational thinking
learning about you know the stats behind
jobs for my students that still aren't
even created yet you know and being able
to prepare them for that so not only do
they need to read and be able to do some
math and you know understand some
fundamentals of science but i also
walked away from that just really
thinking that fundamentals in computer
science was another thing that students
needed at an elementary level so from
that i started integrating code.org into
my
classroom so you know we might do like a
fun code friday or something like that
and then i started to get more and more
into
the technical side of cs i guess uh
instead of just kind of playing around
in puzzles really thinking about those
computational thinking concepts and
trying to pull them out in a way that
students can kind of solidify those
abstract concepts that they can be
sometimes but also had an hour of code
in my classroom which was an event that
code.org does and had really awesome
success with that bringing in volunteers
from the real world who work in cs and
then got more schools across the
district to start participating in hour
of code with us and then i got an
opportunity to apply to be on the
committee for alabama the technology
standards were up for
re-certification i got to be a part of
that and we actually ended up changing
the standards from being technology
standards to being digital literacy and
computer science standards to meet the
needs of our students and we were the
standards for kindergarten through 12th
grade so that's kind of my journey i've
been a stem teacher since then i've been
a csf facilitator with code.org for a
few years like i mentioned and was also
worked at the district level so i've
just kind of taken it and seeing what cs
can do in the classroom and run with it
which i didn't really mention but that
was a huge part of why i kept going with
integrating cs was i saw it as a great
equity tool in the classroom because
some of my students who
maybe you know caught on easily to
concepts in traditional
academia would struggle a little bit and
be able to taste the struggle that they
didn't taste in other areas which i
think is great learning some grit and
perseverance and then also students who
didn't have that traditional success got
success through those computational
thinking skills or through those coding
projects and that kind of trickled into
the rest of their education they got
that taste of success and it kind of
motivated them in other ways too so yeah
that's kind of how i got into cs
so one of the nice things about working
at boot up is we've had a lot of
conversations with other non-profits and
people within the space who are
especially doing like professional
development and curriculum and whatnot
one of the interesting things that we've
noted is that many providers have
difficulty with implementation rate like
a year or two after actually having done
the workshop and whatnot it sounded like
this really resonated for you and was
very positive experience for you and the
kids that you work with but i'm curious
like from your perspectives like either
as a teacher as like standards writer or
as a pd facilitator like why do you
think it is that so many people
end up dabbling in cs and then
ultimately drop it after a while i think
it could be multiple reasons so
i think that having a community when
you're a first-time cs teacher is huge
so like other teachers you can go to and
be like i don't know what this is about
can you help me figure out what this is
about so kind of being a
lead learner in that way you know
connecting with other people keeping
your mind open to having that support
and learning so you know as your
students are learning you're continuing
to build your own learning and your
connections with others
in certain scenarios i could see where
teachers you know the first year
students get the basics get the
foundations and that's what the teacher
has a great understanding of but then
when the second year comes around and
there's more
you know deeper problems or deeper
projects deeper coding concepts involved
teachers can be intimidated by that and
if they don't have that support that
team then maybe they just kind of drop
off or it just doesn't become a priority
and another thing could be you know
do they have
support from their admin is there an
interest in the community you know do
they have that external support in
continuing that learning as well so i
spent weekends weeknights so-called
breaks and holidays learning several
different languages and just diving
deeper into programming and computer
science but i'm wondering because there
wasn't opportunities for me to spend
class time or school time to do
professional development basically i had
to do it on my own and i know most
teachers don't have that luxury did you
have the luxury of being able to learn
it on school clock hours or did you have
to kind of teach yourself outside of it
i think it was a little bit of both i
definitely had that
support and interest from admin from you
know we had a district initiative well
it was stem based but ces was a part of
that so i definitely had that support
but i feel like my professional learning
was
through the school and like i was able
to have that like during school hours
like you know i would have a sub in my
classroom and i would be able to go to a
pd that kind of thing but i feel like
the community building was very much
outside of my school's realm or support
or capabilities i guess so i kind of
feel like it was two pockets to make it
a success so one of the things that i
really like to ask us is asking about
like kind of something that they
believed when they first started in
education or cs education that they no
longer actually believe in so kind of
having that change in thought over time
because i myself have like had many
things where i'm like oh yeah this is
awesome the greatest thing ever and then
i look back on that go yeah i would have
done that differently and i do that
differently right now i'm wondering for
you like what's something that you first
believe when you first started working
in education or cs education that you no
longer believe now one that sticks out
to me is that i used to think you know
like i became a new teacher and new
teacher i'm getting my kids ready for
college so i feel like i used to think
that every kid needed to be prepared to
go to college and i really don't believe
that at all anymore like some students
are going to go to college and do that
kind of thing but other students can
graduate from high school and have cs
endorsements and get a 60 000 a year job
you know when i think about that
question i think about like
new little teacher ashley you know
over at her little school what did she
used to think and
i think about what my perception of
equality was then and how i've kind of
transitioned into understanding the
difference between equality and equity
and
like seeing those like start problems
across districts just because of where
they're located has helped me with that
because i've kind of gone from one end
of the spectrum to the other in my
public ed background and it's not fair
you know it's not fair so i think that
was a big thing i just kind of thought
that everybody got the same thing
because that's what i was taught you
know but it didn't you know i've noticed
it's not
it's not so yeah i think once people
actually start teaching in multiple
different schools and communities and it
makes it easier to see just how
drastically different one person's
education can be from another yeah just
because of where you grew up you know or
where you're born or
yeah i'm curious about this question i
haven't asked in a while but i like
asking guests as questions so what's
something related to education that
you're really good at are really
knowledgeable app that most people don't
know about you i love biology i've
always been fascinated by you know
genetics or osmosis like anything
broadly under biology i
kind of got a
spark again for biology when i was a
stem teacher and i did this virtual
reality google expedition with my
students and it was looking through the
eyes of different animals and like you
know on one side you could see
what we as humans see on the other side
you can see what animals see i mean i
probably taught that lesson
like more excited were you always
interested in that subject area and if
not how did you develop that interest so
remember i took ap cs for a minute
i when i did drop that i
picked up ap biology instead so i feel
like that's like i've always been
interested or fascinated by you know how
things work inside especially things
that are not mechanical you know like i
understand how the computer makes itself
work or you know we make the computer
make itself work but it's fascinating to
me that ourselves work without being
programmed i guess
so those like natural programs natural
algorithms natural builds it's really
cool to me so if i'm wondering could you
paint a picture of what an ideal cs
and learning environment would look like
for you yes do you have a paint brush uh
in the other room
so to me an ideal cs learning
environment would be
not a quiet place i mean you could
definitely i feel like you could sense
some you know focus and collaboration
but not a quiet place you know i think
that students
in that kind of environment are
talking to each other talking to the
teacher and i feel like the teacher in
that environment is a lead learner so
maybe not the person who knows all the
answers but the person who can help
find other people who might know the
answers and also modeling you know
failure is
a first attempt in learning and that the
classroom community would also you know
support that i think you know students
are in that environment are hopefully
investigating like real world
issues that are
are interesting to them
and
working through an iterative process in
building out a solution for that through
programming and development for that
yeah i think that just about covers it
collaborative not quiet interest-based
project-based but interest-led i guess
interest driven so how do you help
teachers realize that through
professional development and not just
speaking of like boot up this isn't like
an advertisement for like the nonprofit
we work for but i mean just broadly
speaking professional development in cs
for me as a facilitator i really like to
make sure that teachers know that i used
to be in their shoes if not in a
less knowledgeable place than they're in
you know like and i also like to model
being a lead learner maybe i'm the
expert in the room but i'm not the
expert period but i can help you find
the answer if i don't know it you know
and then i also think getting teachers
connected to
other teachers whether it's in their
school in their grade in their district
or just who have experienced the same
thing in a context that's relatable to
them getting them connected so they can
feel that support within an actual
professional development setting norms
of everybody is here learning we're all
going to be vulnerable together and you
know nobody it's a no judgment zone
right
nobody's going to judge you for not
knowing all the answers even i don't
know all the answers we're going to
learn together so you know modeling that
community i think is important yeah i
like that so i want to zoom in even
further so we were just kind of talking
about like the structure of support or
the framework that you might provide if
we zoom in further and talk about the
content so like if somebody is an
educator maybe they've been teaching it
for a while but they've never done cs in
particular what advice would you give to
them to kind of help them learn more
about the subject area or get started
one idea that comes to mind is like
maybe having a conversation with that
teacher about like tell me about
something that is one of your favorite
things to teach and seeing if we can tie
in like a basic you know computational
thinking concept to that you know like
oh you love to teach fractions let's
talk about how fractions are a form of
decomposition you know and get into that
a little bit i think that's one approach
that could kind of help cs be more
approachable to that teacher all right
so i'm wondering if we can now zoom back
out thinking really big pictures so the
entire state of alabama so you had the
opportunity to assist with the standards
development there i'm wondering what's
something that you learned through that
experience it's a very very technical
process
it takes a lot of time it takes
a lot of people but i learned when the
state does a course of study the state
is giving districts the what and the
districts get to determine how they do
it right so we give them the what which
is the standards these are the bare
minimum that you have to teach
and then the district gets to determine
you know the curriculum or how they're
going to actually teach the standards i
also learned like implementation rollout
is interesting so
it started with high school for one
school year and then the next school
year middle school was required and the
next school year elementary school is
required and they did that to help
districts train teachers right so they
have to have you know a cs trained
teacher at that middle at that high
school to be able to offer that course
to students and same with middle and
elementary so it's divided out to make
it easier for the districts to digest
and implement properly i guess
after the standards got adopted and
everything there's the whole committee
like created professional development
for districts to use to actually learn
about the standards what they mean
because they were so brand new
going from technology to being computer
science yeah lots of
jargon and concepts that used to
intimidate me you know so just trying to
make that something that is attainable
to everybody so modeling that equitable
access yeah that was smart of the state
to do that because it's one thing to
just like publish a document on your
website and say here you go figure it
out it's another thing to actually go
and provide some kind of support
something else that was cool that we did
with this course of study that's unique
we decided since it's you know computer
science and resources are always
changing for that we wanted to create a
living resource hub for the teachers in
the state and i was able to
co-create that with one of the other
committee members and so it was like a
one-stop shop of oh you're teaching this
standard or you're trying to you know
look for ideas for how to start
integrating into your language arts
block here's where you can go for that
and then you know professional
development
opportunities and professional learning
communities so all of that in a one-stop
page it's maintained by the state now
but i love that that's a resource that
was created for that so i helped write
the wyoming curriculum so i was like
working with the three five band and
it was an interesting process that
created a ton of resources that they
ended up sharing after the fact like to
try and help support teachers and
whatnot one of the things that i was
constantly thinking through
and discussing with my group was like
the importance of language so you had
mentioned like that you decided the what
and the teachers decide the how like the
districts figure out how they want to
implement something the way that you
craft the standards can also have that
kind of impact so if you use language
like
identify x computer science concept or
explain x computer science concept that
gets into the how of doing something
rather than explore x computer science
concept and whatnot and you get to
choose how you end up doing that but if
you get too granular with the verbiage
then it can be a form of colonization
which standards as a whole are still a
form of colonization which is something
that i talked about in like the pedagogy
the press podcast that i did and it was
something that i was like constantly
grappling with like while i see the
value in like setting a direction and
like highlighting some things it was
still a form of colonizing ways of
knowing or ways of being within the
classroom and it wasn't until i had some
conversations with john stapleton and
some others like who pointed out like
it's a beacon or a location that you can
choose to go to or not like you don't
necessarily have to if they are not
mandated but i don't know if you had any
like similar thoughts or concerns about
like the standard process in general in
relation to like is this a form of
colonizing i think that's a great point
i've never thought about it like that i
mean that resonates with me and what you
said about the verbiage i instantly got
a flashback of the multiple
conversations we had about you know
blooms and what we can use to say we use
construct here am i allowed to say
create you know
right lots of those and you can't have
any repeat in the same grade band you
know and i mean i would love to talk
about that i just don't i don't really
have any insight on you know
colonization and standards yeah it can
be depending on how things are
implemented like if it was here's a
guide not a mandate then that's very
different than here's the thing that you
have to do
and you have to spend like equal time
on each one of these standards etc like
there's many different approaches to it
and i've worked in districts where there
were lesson plans that were mandated and
you had to teach the same lesson as the
other like 50 summit elementary schools
on the same week and if you weren't
you'd get written up etc but then i've
also been in districts where it's like
yeah create whatever you want just as
long as kids are learning cool go for it
so like the first one was definitely a
form of colonization my expertise was
not valued but then the second one like
i thrived in that situation whereas
other teachers were like i have no idea
what to do i've never done programming
i've never taught it i'm interested but
i don't know what to do so trying to
find that balance or at least having
those options for specific
teachers and communities and students
and whatnot i think that's the key in my
opinion how to provide support without
mandating a form of colonization yeah i
remember a conversation about you know
mandating versus just having the
standards is how are you going to
mandate it are you going to fund it too
yeah you know that's an equity issue as
well what about the poor
school district but then you have the
super wealthy school district they're
going to have their teachers trained and
you know by whoever right they can get
to come in but then what about the rural
place that doesn't even have good wifi
you know or how are they going to
successfully implement in the same way
that other people are what's interesting
to me you said that about lesson plans
like being scripted versus you know you
go to another school district and you
kind of just get here's what we want you
to teach do it that is also something
that i've noticed in my teaching journey
across the spectrum i feel like the
school where i started teaching was
inner city and
title one and we had to write our own
scripted lesson plans but we had to like
here's what i'm going to say here's what
the kids are going to say you know and
turn them in every week for every single
subject all of that
and
then i go
to
a more affluent area and i'm trusted
more as a professional to figure out
what my kids need it's like that's
another huge equity gap too because for
me as a teacher i don't want to stay in
an environment where i'm going to have
to write a script every week for every
subject you know right so i'm going to
look for
another environment that i am not
required to do that but the reason that
school was required to do that is
because of failing test scores and they
have failing test scores because they're
not funded properly and they're not
funded prop you know it just keeps it
keeps going i kind of see it as like
this unbreakable cycle or wheel i guess
a wheel that doesn't break and i want to
break it
yeah that first district that i was
describing they'd hand us like the
curriculum that was a scripted lesson
plan and what we were supposed to do was
add in our transition sentences and
highlight those like it was literally a
script of everything that we had to say
and what we were going to do and
the pe department they literally had a i
forget i think it was actually a
cassette at the time but they had a
recording audio recording that they'd
hit play on their boom box and it would
be the same delivery for everyone in the
district and the pe's teacher's role was
to just walk around and like assist with
technique and whatnot but like the
lesson was basically taught by an audio
recording so like they even took it one
step further in the direction of
colonizing or oppression on it so you
had mentioned an equity gap i'm
wondering if we could like zoom in on
the equity gap and specifically talk
about
what kind of recommendations do you have
for teachers who are interested in
improving equity and inclusion in cs
education i think that you know for it
to be equitable every kid has to be able
to have the chance to explore it and i
kind of think of it like dr jeff gray
who taught me
my very first computer science
professional development he is part of
the reason why i've you know got the
computer science bug or bug bite i don't
know he made this analogy about how
we all know how to drive a car
not everybody knows exactly how
everything works under the hood but we
have a special person who gets trained
to do that a mechanic right but we all
drive for the most part or know how a
car works in general but maybe not the
technicalities of it so i kind of feel
like getting our students the option to
be a driver or a mechanic you know but
they have to be informed or have to have
the option to explore cs to know if they
like it enough to become a mechanic or
if they just want to drive technology
they consume so giving students that
option to be not just a consumer of
technology but a creator a producer and
i also think including as much diversity
as possible
in
cs content or in cs education so you
know having women having people of color
having lgbtq included into
you know the videos you're showing your
students about a computer scientist or
you know researching different pioneers
or having volunteers come in and then
the you know teachers themselves can we
be diverse in that too another thing i
think is making sure that as much as
possible the content is relative so you
know i like to try to
include
real world scenarios or real world
issues that you know real world computer
engineers might be looking at to solve
and letting students kind of take it and
run with it it really gets them
interested or you know a problem they
might be having at home or with school
or something like that like what can we
do to troubleshoot that so you mentioned
getting computer science to every grade
level do you mean every grade level k
through 12 or are you specifically
focusing on like the elementary space in
that answer i don't think it's
unreasonable that csv in every grade
level i think that might be something
that is holding us back as a collective
whole is we're not starting young enough
right not only solidifying their
concepts of computational thinking of
computer science but also of themselves
and how they perceive themselves you
know i was trying to find before we got
on here i was trying to find the article
about how students like by the age of
four i think start to
understand who they are and like their
strengths like i am a mathematician i am
not a writer you know so they start to
think about those things and then by the
time they're in fourth grade those start
to solidify so if we're waiting until
middle school to introduce students to
cs that might be too late for some of
them to even have a even give themselves
an opportunity to dig deep into
see us and see if it's for them getting
it down into kindergarten i think is
just as important as having options for
high schoolers yeah i like that i
definitely agree that
cs should be available to everyone k
through 12. where i kind of tend to
diverge from the field is i don't think
any subject area should be mandatory
like ever going back to a colonization
standpoint it's again colonizing
certain ways of knowing and to say you
have to have x number of credits or a
number of years in a subject area is
imposing a way of thinking and being on
people and valuing that i just disagree
with and i know that's not a popular
opinion but i mean i'm just sharing this
is my honest thought if somebody wants
to learn something and they don't have
the knowledge of it but they have the
desire to learn it they're going to
figure it out they're going to learn how
to do that thing just because they
didn't have the prereqs to do it they'll
invest the time if they're actually
interested in wanting to figure
something out with the subject area so
from that like when people say yeah but
what about reading what about
mathematics if they really want to learn
something there's a lot of studies that
show that kids are going to learn it
like kids are learning scientific
knowledge and learning how to read by
playing the pokemon card game because
they needed to know what is super
effective mean what are those terms
when looking at a game and being able to
read other opponents cards and stuff so
there's a lot of interesting research on
that and i try and point towards it but
i don't know it's not a popular opinion
among most people well i also think you
know
looking at how we do things out in the
you know quote unquote real world versus
how we do them in school
you know i'm not taking english classes
right now to be a computer science
facilitator you know so
this is what i'm interested in i'm going
to keep digging into that and learning
about myself i don't have somebody
mandating to me here's what you should
be learning right now other than the
state making you you know do your
ceus for to keep your license as a
teacher but yeah like so i'm recording
instructional videos for drumming since
like that's my background and part of
the process that i've been engaging in
for more than a year has been like
improving my editing by learning from
other people and that didn't involve
taking a course on it i never took a
course on video editing i'm learning how
to do it through a bunch of resources
and
if i had that opportunity to learn in
school i probably would have done it
that would have been cool but what you
were saying like james paul g talks
about this idea of like the portfolio
selves and how everybody is getting to a
point where individualized expertise in
an area is so valued but we are forcing
this generalized
understanding across like generic
degrees and whatnot and so a lot of
people are graduating from high school
or from university and they have a
similar understanding as their peers
because they weren't encouraged to
develop this expertise but what
employers are really looking for is the
specific expertise hey we want somebody
who is the best at social media not
somebody who has a general understanding
of communications we specifically want
this thing
not just basics yeah while we're not
getting our kids ready for the jobs that
are out there because they need more
concentrated specific skill set i guess
right and for him like having taken a
class with him it's all about the
lifelong learning it's the most
important thing that you can learn in
school is how to learn so like that's
the thing that you absolutely need more
than any required subject area because
then you can learn anything as long as
you have the motivation to do it i think
you and i have had the conversation
before about like why i don't have a
master's degree you know
what i wanted to do and become an expert
and i never felt like i needed the
to meet the criterion of getting a
master's and i always worried that that
would keep me from getting
opportunities that my peers would get
because they have a master's and i don't
but i have
the same experience if not more you know
yeah i think i spoke with you about it
but just to kind of share this with
podcast listeners i
think that
college degrees in particular are tend
to be overrated and i know that sounds
weird coming from somebody who does have
a phd like it did
enable me to do a lot of cool things
that i could not do without that degree
but it doesn't mean that everyone should
do it yes i think everyone should engage
in lifelong learning but you don't need
to go back and get multiple degrees and
stuff like for a while i was debating
should i get a cs degree because all my
degrees in music education and then i
was like i don't i don't need one i can
learn all the things that i need to know
about cs on my own or i can take like a
course if i really want to dive deeper
into something but it's mostly not
as useful the hard part is okay well how
do you assess the understanding of
somebody in a field and again it goes
back to like understanding the portfolio
of what they bring to the table and
really being able to zoom in rather than
saying oh they have a degree in computer
science or in music education or
whenever so therefore they're qualified
to do this thing well maybe i mean maybe
not yeah no i love it like i remember
like the focus on gpa you know like when
was the last time somebody asked you
what your gpa was in college like yeah
you know or like when was the last time
somebody was like hey what criteria did
you meet in high school to graduate like
tell me your courses that you had you
know yep so it's kind of like we're
putting all this pressure on our you
know kids to oh you have to have all
these things this is what people are
gonna look for nobody cares about that
stuff like show me your skill set
i've had a couple of conversations with
different middle school kids who were
like really stressed out and they were
like i'm getting a lot of pressure
because
i'm not doing as great in this class and
i'm afraid i won't get into college
because of it and i'm like here's a
secret they're not going to look at your
middle school transcripts like yes try
hard learn as much as you can do as much
as you can to learn everything you want
to get out of this class and get the
grade that you want to get but they're
not going to look at your transcript so
just breathe a little bit
yeah nobody's looking at your sixth
grade
yeah i know some undergrads that i've
seen they'll sometimes share their
resumes like for when applying for jobs
they share like the university
supervisors like hey can you provide
feedback on this and sometimes they
would include like stuff like here's my
gpa and middle schoolers like yeah the
employers aren't going to ask for that
it's nice that you have that information
might be able to call and it's going to
be like hey you remember back in the day
yeah but yeah that's wild so
one of the questions that i like to ask
what do you feel is holding back
educators and what can we do about this
i think i kind of touched on one of them
about assuming that kindergarten's too
young assuming that fourth grade's too
young to start ncs which i feel like
there's a huge push we're starting to
shift that perception i just want it to
happen faster
so getting those opportunities to
students you know as young as
kindergarten and not assuming that
they're too young i mean podcast
listeners probably know this too but you
know you hand a two-year-old an ipad and
they're probably gonna know what to do
with it let's let them take it and run
but also make them go play outside
right i'm not saying give everybody a
ton of screen time i just think that
they should have that exposure to see us
i did an interview with gail lovely who
has done cs with pre-k and
so if anyone hasn't listened to that yet
i'll include that in the show notes so
you can dive deeper into that area but
yeah that definitely resonates i agree
with it how do you practice or iterate
on your own abilities either as like as
an educator or in your own understanding
of computer science one way i like to
iterate on my abilities is to watch
other people in the field so you know
other professional development
facilitators and you know kind of you
know like i might hear somebody else
explain abstraction in a way that i'm
like ooh maybe that's more attainable
than the example that i'm using you know
and then having discussions with plc's
even if it's my pocket of facilitators
like having those discussions about how
can we you know make this better or make
this more equitable or make this
different and then something that's
hugely important to me is becoming more
and more aware
you know initially my perception of the
gap in computer science was really
limited i thought you know it's like oh
it's just we need to get more women
there's just more and more nuances to
inclusion that i'm passionate about
learning you know so
every day is learning you know something
you should say to be respectful or
something you shouldn't to be inclusive
so just trying to navigate that and keep
that in the forefront is huge too yeah
on the first thing that you mentioned
with watching somebody else teach and
learning from them it's one of the
reasons why i started posting videos of
my classes on my youtube channel because
i'd present at conferences and talk
about oh here's what it's like to
facilitate multiple programming
languages simultaneously and they'd be
like yeah but what does it look like and
so teachers would like literally come to
my class just to observe oh that's what
the space looks like and i realized oh i
can start recording it and so youtube
has like an auto blur feature for faces
and so i'd use that function and admin
was okay with that and i would share it
so like hey here's a playlist of what
like four different classes look like of
me facilitating this just so that people
can see oh this is how you can do more
than one language in the same class at
the same time i wish more teachers in
the field will do that to share their
practices like we have people who've won
like the teaching excellence and
computer science award from csta and
infosys foundation but like what does
that look like it's great that these
people are awesome educators but i want
to see them teach so i can learn from
them and seeing it is much more powerful
than trying to like read about it you
know yeah i had people who won those
awards and things like that and they
have to like describe their classroom
it's like how do i put that into words
you know how do i yeah make sure that
i'm not leaving anything out there i
forget if it was that award or a
different one that i won but i didn't
have to submit any video of myself
teaching and so it was all how well can
you write about
how you teach and
i don't remember if it's that one or a
different award but it is just
interesting it's kind of telling of some
teaching awards like that where it's
like okay but what are you assessing
because it's not teaching if you don't
actually see them teach yeah well i
thought of something for what kind of is
holding us back i think that it's hard
for teachers especially people who are
not maybe brand new teachers fresh out
of college because i feel like the
pedagogy is shifting a little bit where
we're getting our teachers to be more
facilitators in learning instead of
standing up at the front of the
classroom like here's what we're doing
here's what we're learning
that kind of teaching where we're
becoming facilitators and i feel like
that's a huge part of being successful
in computer science it's kind of like
allowing organized chaos and that's not
always a comfortable place for teachers
right and allowing yourself to
not have every single answer so i do
think that kind of holds us back yeah i
like that i think teachers need to get
more comfortable with being
uncomfortable and not knowing when i was
in
it was probably elementary school
my parents had asked oh have you ever
thought about being a teacher and i was
like no like it seems like a boring job
because all you do is like you have all
the answers in your book and all you're
doing is just like reading off the
questions like i had this very
simplified understanding of what it
meant to teach as an elementary kid but
yeah it's
moving away from that idea and just
going oh i don't know how to solve that
bug let me try and figure it out with
you or let me get back to you tomorrow
or something yeah and i think that's
huge for students to see modeled too you
know like yeah like i said like lead
learner you know you're still learning
too with them and right you're the adult
and you know they all think that their
teachers are like 80 years old so it's
like oh my god you're still learning at
yeah so you've gone above and beyond in
terms of you're not just doing classroom
teaching you've done a lot of
professional development you've done a
lot of standards work so you've added to
your load of just working in the
classroom which is already hard enough
in education i'm curious how have you
tried to stave off the burnout that can
come with doing so much in a difficult
field the community is huge i mean
staying around people that are
passionate about the same thing that you
are is huge because then when your
passion is kind of like
there's maybe is the opposite and they
can pull you back up again so i think
you know having people that share the
same jam as you is important i also
think it's huge like for me i
love computer science i also love nature
so like getting away from screens and
putting my eyeballs on
things that are not made out of metal or
or plastic and digital that's been huge
for me as far as avoiding burnout i also
feel like trying to find something
different or new
fun to investigate i remember a couple
years ago i was kind of like
i mean i've never been like no about
computer science but i was just kind of
like eh i'm not feeling the huge gung-ho
passion that i was feeling and i
discovered a new accessibility tool for
students who are visually impaired
to be able to experience colors and that
kind of sparked my interest again you
know so just finding things that are
interesting but also allowing yourself
to take a freaking break yeah get off
twitter for a month or
however long you know like i mean
sometimes it's okay to just walk away
and it's not an easy thing to come
across especially because i feel like in
our society productivity is you know
godly almost and
breast is
revolutionary you know and so finding
that balance i think is important yeah
i'm still working on that yeah
it's a process
so what do you wish there's more
research on that could inform your own
practices i would love to know more
about like the psychology of why our
girls are not as innately interested as
boys seem to be and that kind of thing
like i would love to hone in more on
that because i feel like i've dabbled in
that and i kind of know about it but i
want to get deeper in on that that kind
of thing well and why is it different in
other locations like there's a paper
that i did i think it was in malaysia
and the
numbers were flipped for male and female
in the cs and i.t space yeah so
it's cultural yeah like i would love to
like study like societal trends cultural
acceptance you know that kind of thing i
think that's fascinating not only in our
you know computer science field but just
in general yeah why we do the things we
do what's programmed in us and what's
actually us you know yeah even you look
at other areas that we're also in like
education well why is it that like 80
plus percent of teachers are white women
right yeah i also like looking at that
so that definitely resonates but then i
also wonder like why is it that some get
more attention than others like we don't
talk about the gender issues in
elementary teaching but we talk about it
in computer science it's like well why
right so then where might people go to
connect with you and the organizations
that you work with yeah join me on
twitter i'm at wearing whiz kid i used
to be wearing wiz kids when i had a
classroom with students in it and then i
just decided to be the one whiz kid
but it's w-a-r-i-n-g so come join me on
there and you know dm me if you have
questions i'm happy to be a resource or
be a resource to connect you with other
resources i used to be a cs for all
teachers community ambassador and that's
another great little virtual community
that you can join into so and with that
that concludes this week's episode of
the csk8 podcast thank you so much for
listening if you enjoyed this episode i
hope you consider sharing this with
somebody else or leaving a review on
whatever platform you're listening to
this on stay tuned next week for another
episode and until then i hope you're all
staying safe and are having a wonderful
week

Guest Bio

Ashley joins the team at BootUp with 12+ years of experience in public education as a STEM educator, CS standards developer, and creator of professional learning.

In the elementary classroom, Ashley was able to witness STEM and CS integration act as an equalizer for K-5th graders. Students who did not experience success in the traditional subjects or environments of academia soared through computational thinking activities and programming projects. Seeing the positive impacts of creating an equitable classroom environment has led her to start researching and advocating for CS access in every classroom. As the District Technology Integration Specialist for Trussville City School District, she designed and implemented professional development for teachers in the district and beyond. Ashley was one of the first Google for Education Certified Coaches and draws on that training to be an effective instructional coach and leader across disciplines. As a member of the 2018 Alabama Digital Literacy and Computer Science Course of Study (DLCS COS) Committee and Task Force, Ashley composed and delivered a presentation for the adoption of these standards to the Alabama State Board of Education. These standards were adopted in March 2018 and are being fully implemented state-wide, ensuring all students K-12 have opportunities to explore computer science. To meet the needs of teachers and provide ongoing resources for implementation, Ashley co-created a companion site for the DLCS COS that serves as a living resource for educators to find everything from professional development opportunities to classroom activities and tutorials. As a Code.org Computer Science Fundamentals Facilitator, Ashley’s had the opportunity to breach the topics of diversity and equity through the foundations of computational thinking with teachers across the state of Alabama and across the nation. She was selected to be an inaugural CS for All Teachers Community Ambassador. She organized, promoted, and facilitated international webinars on various computer science education topics ranging from access to technology to how to integrate CS in other content areas. At SAM Labs, she coordinated with district and state leaders to effectively implement solutions to meet the STEAM and coding goals of the stakeholders.

Ashley is passionate about connecting with and empowering educators to create a more engaging and equitable education journey for all students.

In the wild you can find Ashley advocating for intersectional environmentalism, sweating through a spin class or yoga session, getting messy with some abstract painting or cooking, or wrangling her cat and dog on excursions!

Resources/Links Relevant to This Episode

Podcast episodes relevant to (or mentioned in) this episode
- CS Educator as Dungeon Master with Jon Stapleton
  - In this interview with Jon Stapleton, we discuss metaphors for education and facilitating, the importance of community and navigating inappropriate content online, how programming languages and platforms influence learning, theories and philosophies that inform Jon’s practice, critical code studies, and much more.
- Exploring CS and CT in Pre-K with Gail Lovely
  - In this interview with Gail Lovely, we discuss navigating appropriate behavior with digital technologies, some considerations for early and pre readers, how to respond to concerns about screen time, metaphors of education as playpens and playgrounds, learning CS/coding through literacy, and much more.
- How to Get Started with Computer Science Education
  - In this episode I provide a framework for how districts and educators can get started with computer science education for free.
- Listen to the episodes on Read Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire
- Rhizomatic Learning with Catherine Bornhorst, Jon Stapleton, and Katie Henry
  - In this panel discussion with Catherine Bornhorst, Jon Stapleton, and Katie Henry, we discuss what rhizomatic learning is and looks like in formalized educational spaces, affordances and constraints of rhizomatic learning, how to support individual students within a group setting, standards and rhizomatic learning, why few people know and use rhizomatic learning approaches, how to advocate for and learn more about rhizomatic learning, and much more.
- The Centrality of Curriculum and the Function of Standards: The Curriculum is a Mind-altering Device
  - In this episode I unpack Eisner’s (2002) publication titled “The centrality of curriculum and the function of standards: The curriculum is a mind-altering device,” which problematizes curricula and standards by discussing how both can deprofessionalize the field of education.
- The Intersection of Gender, Race and Cultural Boundaries, or Why is Computer Science in Malaysia Dominated by Women?
  - In this episode I unpack Mellström’s (2009) publication titled “The intersection of gender, race and cultural boundaries, or why is computer science in Malaysia dominated by women?,” which “points to a western bias of gender and technology studies, and argues for cross-cultural work and intersectional understandings including race, class, age and sexuality” (p. 885).
- The Subservient, Co-equal, Affective, and Social Integration Styles and Their Implications for [Computer Science]
  - In this episode I unpack Bresler’s (1995) publication titled “The subservient, co-equal, affective, and social integration styles and their implications for the arts,” which “examines the different manifestations of arts integration in the operational, day-to-day curriculum in ordinary schools, focusing on the how, the what, and the toward what” (p. 33).
- More episodes related to integration
- More episodes related to professional development
- More episodes related to standards
- All other episodes
Find professional development offered by code.org that Ashley mentioned
Link to the article that Ashley mentioned on gender stereotypes
Read Situated Language and Learning: A Critique of Traditional Schooling by James Paul Gee to learn more about shape-shifting portfolios and situating learning
Connect with Ashley on Twitter
Find other CS educators and resources by using the #CSK8 hashtag on Twitter