Category Archives: Presentation

Dave and Dave podcast 28

7 Parenting Tips During Covid-19 – Video Version

I recently revived my podcast. I’ve had conversations with Kelly Christopherson, Jonathan Sclater, Joe Truss, and Dave Sands. Because of COVID-19, I can’t sit next to people to interview them for my podcast. I couldn’t do that for Kelly in Saskatchewan or Joe in California anyway, but for sure that would have been the preferred approach to interview Jonathan and Dave. For all 4 of these interviews I used Zoom, and Dave and I were talking last week about the idea of also putting the podcast out on video. So, here it is, my podcast with Dave Sands in video form.

Description: This is the video version of Podcasting Pair-a-Dimes #28 with David Truss. My guest is Principal Dave Sands. We discuss 7 tips to help parents, who are supporting their kids learning at home (as a result of remote learning due to COVID-19). The 7 tips are:

    1. Manage Expectations
    2. Make a Schedule
    3. Minimize Distractions
    4. Learning occurs everywhere
    5. Set daily and weekly goals
    6. All screen time is not created equal
    7. Model learning.

I think this topic is relevant almost everywhere in the world right now, and I believe that we discussed some great tips for parent, not only when dealing with their kids learning at home, but also in general to support their kids success at school.

The tightrope balance of parenting

Yesterday I recorded a podcast with Dave Sands and we discussed 7 PARENTING TIPS to help navigate the challenges of students LEARNING AT HOME during the Covid-19 pandemic. This got me thinking about how different kids are, and how hard it is to be the perfect parent for a kid.

Parents hold an imbalance of power over kids, who are in a constant state of growth. With growing up comes both more responsibility and more expectation of freedom. These things do not develop at the same speed, and our expectations will often be mismatched with our kids expectations. When it comes to how much choice and freedom kids are given versus how much of that choice and freedom they feel they deserve, parents will often think of the child they were dealing with a few months ago, while kids feel like they’ve grown up since then.

Some parents navigate this well, but many struggle. Some hold on to power over their kids to keep them safe. In doing so, they can create resentment because they are being too strict. Some parents give too much power to kids too soon, and kids tend to take advantage of that power and make poor decisions. Some parents get it right with respect to some expectations, and totally wrong with others. This can relate to chores, use of money, curfews and bedtimes, use of technology, eating habits, manners, homework, and all sorts of household rules and expectations.

The thing is, that some kids need more structure and more guidelines, and some kids need more freedom and choice, an it’s a tightrope balancing act not just to figure this out for a kid, but also to recognize that what works for one kid might not work for another… even in the same household with the same parents! To give a concrete example, one kid might need parameters around getting homework done, because without that support they won’t get it done, while an older or younger sibling might be able to do homework completely independently, without any parent supervision or support. Having different rules for these kids can create tension and so can having the same rules and not providing the freedom and responsibility that the more responsible kid deserves (especially if the one that deserves more freedom is the younger of the two).

So parenting tips are something that will always be tricky to give. What works for some, doesn’t work for all. That said, I really think Dave Sands and go over some ideas that are not prescriptive, but rather they are things to think about when trying to deal with kids learning at home… no matter how you currently parent or how good or challenging your kids might be. Here are the tips:

1. Manage Expectations
2. Make a Schedule
3. Minimize Distractions
4. Learning occurs everywhere
5. Set daily and weekly goals
6. All screen time is not created equal
7. Model learning.

I think there is something of value here for every parent. Please check the podcast out, and let me know what you think.

Restorative Practices

Notes from a presentation by Bruce Schenk:

Restorative Practices

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Restorative Practices… A model for community relationships:

“Learning is enhanced by challenge and is impeded by threat.” Bruce Schenk – Restorative practices #SD43

Relationships are about sharing:

-Reduce negaitve -listen & acknowledge.

-Promote positive -be affirming.

-Encourage expressing of emotions.

SHAME – An emotion we want to reduce… How do we deal with it:
Withdrawal
Avoidance
Attack others (lash out or blame)
Attack self
– defense mechanisms that we can talk through if there is trust and students can open up.

“The gift of shame is spirituality” Roy Henry Vickers (a podcast – The 7 emotions and their gifts).

imageChallenge AND Support… Need both when dealing with shame & negative behaviour.
– Separate behaviour from value of the person.

Student Presentations

Today I got to watch 3 teams from the YELL class, Coquitlam Open Learning‘s Entrepreneurship 12 Course, practice their presentations for the YELL finals happening this Saturday.

Students from Coquitlam, Richmond and West Vancouver will compete again this year, at YELL Canada’s 3rd Annual Venture Challenge – “A Dialogue in Youth Entrepreneurship”.

Emily Naing, one of last year’s students from the Coquitlam team, that went to the finals (and came a close second to the overall winner), started us off with a little motivation and she answered questions about her experience last year. Emily is continuing the development of the pitch her team gave… with the help of a $300,000 grant that her team got after the finals. She spoke about how 2nd place actually pushed her team to prove themselves even more than if they got the 1st place spot. I still remember the email her team sent the night of the finals:

Hi,

This is SWAVE from the venture challenge. We were so impacted by the connections made today that we are determined to keep moving forward with our idea. We hope to enter more business competitions and ventures and hope to actually develop a prototype with adequate research. If there are any connections you can refer us to, or if you (the founders) would like to support us in our journey with this product, please reply to our email.

Thank you so much,

Founders of Swave

Daily-Ink-Emily-YELL

Watching the presentations, I realize how important it is for us to give students authentic opportunities to first develop, then present their ideas. Although all the groups had things to work on, there was obvious passion and interest in doing a great presentation.

I think the competition is healthy. I also think the idea of presenting to real investors and/or business school profs, increases the stakes. And I think that we need to proved authentic avenues for students to present beyond the walls of our schools.

Good luck to all the teams on Saturday!