On this episode of the Innovative Schools podcast, Kevin sits down with Debbie Silver to talk about her life and education and what she would have told her younger self when she first started. Come on. Let's learn together. Hey, everybody. Welcome to this episode of the Innovative Schools podcast.
Jordan Bassett:This is a special episode that we have for you today. Kevin, who you haven't heard from yet, but you will be hearing from more, sat down with Debbie Silver at our Innovative Schools Summit in New York City back in February. So he sat down and, did this little interview with her to just talk about her journey. She's been an educator for a really long time. And so we got to hear a lot about, how she got started, kind of the pitfalls that she, ran into as she started her career and through her whole career.
Jordan Bassett:She's super funny, super, helpful, and just nice. And so this is just Kevin sitting down with Debbie Silver talking about all these types of things in education. So I hope you enjoy it, and we'll get to it.
Kevin Stewart:Welcome to the Innovative Schools podcast, and I am incredibly excited to have with us today Debbie Silver, doctor Debbie Silver.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Thank you. Thank you. And you can just call me your highness.
Kevin Stewart:Oh, well, you know. Alright. And welcome. We're we're in Times Square.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I'm on Broadway.
Kevin Stewart:You're on Broadway.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I am so excited.
Kevin Stewart:I'm here maybe. Time?
Dr. Debbie Silver:No. It's my second time to be here, but
Kevin Stewart:Alright. So we're gonna get into this. And for those that know you, know understand that you have been an incredible teacher for many years. You are an author. You're a world traveler, and you have done so many things in the education field.
Kevin Stewart:Now you're teaching and training, educating teachers and administrators. So my first question to you, and I kinda know some of it, but why teaching?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Such a great question because people always say, did you always wanna be a teacher? And I'm like, no, actually no. I wanted to be a comedian and I wanted to be a writer and maybe a missionary. To where? Well, Japan.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I don't know why that was in my head. It's weird because it's kind of come back to that now, but what happened was in my first marriage, I got kidnapped to a very rural town in Louisiana, and I'm calling that Logansport, Louisiana, because I love it now. But when I first got there, it was very culture shock because I'm from Fort Worth and big city girl, big city high school, they taught five foreign languages, three of those were three year programs, we had everything. And I end up in this little bitty rural town, I had
Kevin Stewart:two years of college, and they were absolutely desperate for teachers. Louisiana was the forty ninth in pay, Mississippi was below us, and
Dr. Debbie Silver:I was in a place called DeSoto Parish, and DeSoto Parish was at the bottom of the pay in And we were rural and we didn't have a tax base and we didn't have industry and nobody moved there. So the superintendent came and said, would you take a position as a temporary teacher? And I just started laughing because I said, I don't even have a degree. And he said, well, much college? I just have two years.
Kevin Stewart:What were you studying?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Drama. What did you think? Theater arts and speech communication. But yeah, I was a theater major. I was a hand, always have been.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And he said, Well, we really need teachers. And I was working in the family hardware store at that time, which I was really bad at. I was really terrible at, and didn't really like it. And it wasn't really assimilating into the community at all, because I'd married the most eligible bachelor in town and nobody wants to talk to me and they keep calling me city girl. I was really sad.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I thought, well, how hard could it be to teach? Duh. And I filled out all the paperwork right there in the hardware store where he came to see me.
Kevin Stewart:You made your own.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I did. And this is the crazy thing you guys, this is nuts. I knew nothing. I'd never been in future teachers, there's no teachers in my family. I said, okay, now what?
Dr. Debbie Silver:This was in the June. He said, well, takes in, that's a redneck for begins. School takes in on August 24, and out there
Kevin Stewart:at
Dr. Debbie Silver:Logosport Rosenwald, I believe they take in at 08:00, so you'll wanna get out there at least a quarter till eight I didn't know, I was like, okay. Another thing that was crazy was, besides there were no no books, there was no instruction, there was no PD, a lot of the teachers are going, Good. No, I had nothing, but I was so, let's just say ignorant, that I just thought, Oh, well, I'll just show up, but I want to be prepared. So I got there at 07:30 on the twenty fourth.
Kevin Stewart:Before 08:00.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Right, before eight Found out the kids are already there. They could not pay teachers any extra to come and work before the kids got there. And a lot of the teachers were coming down from Shreveport, Louisiana, which was an hour away, and they didn't show up until the first day, which is also when the kids showed up.
Kevin Stewart:Let's Clarify something real quick before you continue with it. So they gave you no curriculum. No. They gave you no books.
Dr. Debbie Silver:No, they told me I was teaching fourth grade.
Kevin Stewart:You were studying drama. Yes. Which you were really good at, and you still are. And so now they're throwing you into a classroom
Dr. Debbie Silver:A fourth grade classroom.
Kevin Stewart:Which you have nothing. You have no background of
Dr. Debbie Silver:anything. Nothing. Nothing. I just Good.
Kevin Stewart:That's a good situation.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I have my purse.
Kevin Stewart:And you're burnt.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So I'm in one of the outbuildings, and it's a rural school, it was poverty stricken. I mean, later I came to find out a lot of my students, and we were still segregated then, so we were the African American school, and a lot of my kids didn't even have indoor plumbing. We really, really were struggling, but they took me out to my room, and it's
Jordan Bassett:100
Dr. Debbie Silver:degrees, it's Louisiana, it's August, and it's 100% humidity. And there's no air conditioning, not in the whole school. I'm like, uh-oh. I get in my little room, there's paint peeling off the walls, and I'm walking around and the secretary said, I'm gonna bring you your students. And I'm thinking, oh God, and I don't know what to do.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I thought maybe I should put a poster up, but I forgot to bring a poster. I don't know what fourth graders like anyway, I don't even know how old they are, but when they walked in, they were little. I said, you're so short. And one of them, I said, what grade are you in? And one of the little girls said, first.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And so I said, oh no, honey, there's been a mistake. And then they started, and I'm like, no, no, it's fine, we're gonna take care of it. Just stay right here, we're gonna take care of it. And I thought, let me go to the intercom and alert the office.
Kevin Stewart:You hollering that hole. Know you Hey.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So I wrote a note, I didn't know what else to do, and I just said, dear office, there are first graders in my room, what should I do with them? Love, Debbie Pace. And that was my name then, was Ms. Pace. And so I'm trying to calm the kids down, they were so adorable, and I was like, please, y'all don't cry.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Mean, I'm working to take care of you. And the note came back and it said, Dear Mrs. Pace, you're the first grade teacher. Teach them, Love the Office. I don't know what happened, but I know a lot of teachers are going, That happened to me.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Because they hire you for one thing and then they switch it. Because you'd have no guarantee that it's gonna be what they tell you it's gonna be.
Kevin Stewart:So you're thinking fourth grade and you got first I got
Dr. Debbie Silver:first grade.
Kevin Stewart:And they were all crying and you were crying.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I was crying. They had no they didn't have kindergarten back then. So this is their first day at school in their entire lives. And they're upset, I'm upset. There's weeping, there's wailing, there's gnashing of teeth, and those little kids were upset too.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So I'm trying to get permanent records done because our parents didn't have cars and they couldn't pre register because that was in a different I say parish, know, Louisiana, it's like a county, a district, but our district was like 40 miles away, the central office. So they just put them on a bus with a birth certificate and a shot record. It was my job to translate all that. Wow. And there were a lot of names that were foreign to me, I'm trying to learn their names, I'm trying to get this stuff straight.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And finally, just, about halfway through the morning, I just lost it. And I just have never felt, I don't think in my whole life I've ever felt that out of place, because I had moved to a new state, I'm in a small town, I'm in a community that it's just not clicking yet, and I've just been given 24 of the most beautiful children I've ever seen, and they're crying, I have no idea what to do. So I started crying, and I ended up on the floor of this dirty old building shack I was in, this wooden floor, and I know the people that teach littles will get this, because the minute I started crying, they stopped, and they're like, what's wrong with you? And so they got on the floor, and now they're trying to comfort me, And they're stroking my hair, they're patting my cheek, going breathe, breathe, it's okay. And I mean, we're just all in a pile.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I said, guys, I have to tell you something. I said, I'm not from here. I'm not doing very well. And they said, that's okay, don't cry. I said, don't see, I'm not even a real teacher.
Dr. Debbie Silver:One little smart aleck said, no kidding. I said, well, it's okay because at lunch I'm gonna quit. And then they started crying again. And I told them, I said, guys, I'll come visit you all the time. I mean, I just lived a block away.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I will come. No stay, be our teacher. I said, I can't be your teacher. I don't know how to teach. And truer words were never spoken, but one of the little girls said, if you'll stay, we'll show you.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Okay, I'm now 20, what did I know? All right. But you know what? That was the greatest gift I was ever given. And I think it's because, and I'm not recommended that path for but the way it happened for me, I learned along with the kids and they told me what they really needed.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I didn't have any preconceived ideas. And the things I didn't understand about the African American culture, the things I didn't understand about rural, the kids taught me. I go, why did they do this? And then they tell me, I go, oh, that makes sense.
Kevin Stewart:And they probably taught you some things you didn't understand about Oh
Dr. Debbie Silver:my gosh, absolutely. And I really did at that point, I said, this is it, I'll always do this. And I went, I started back in college. I was driving to Stephen F. Austin, which is in Nacogdoches, Texas, which is an hour away.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I just changed to elementary ed. I thought, I'll always teach first grade. And then by the end of first grade, I realized something, and I always talk to teachers and say, You have to be you. You don't need to be anybody else when they go, Well, we need this great teacher model. No, we need lots of models.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yeah. Because there are people, you know, there are people out there that are just wackos, and they're doing a great job. They wear their roller skates. You know, they come in with their magic wands. I got the music going, but that works for them.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I always tell teachers, if that's the way that you connect with other people, and you can communicate essential ideas, because that's absolutely important, then you do it, you be you, don't worry about being me. And if you're quiet and you're not at all like I am, you're gonna reach kids more easily than I do, because I'm so random, whoop squirrel. I go off and leave people sometimes, so it takes all of us. But what I realized is people think I have ADHD, but that's not what I have. What I have is ADDOS, attention deficit, sparkly.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I just get really distracted.
Kevin Stewart:Get really messed up, Bob.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I get really messed up. And littles need a very more linear, more concrete, more sequential, they just need that order. So I ended up, I started getting promoted, and I ended up in middle school. And when I got there, I just thought, my people. I mean, they laughed at my jokes, because when I taught elementary, I'm doing voices, I'm doing all I'm just entertaining myself.
Dr. Debbie Silver:The kids would just look at me like, the languages. I love journalism, love drama, I love English, but when I was teaching, it was very hard for me to understand what they didn't understand, because that was just always a part of who I was. And you're from North Carolina, you know what I'm talking about. There's a vernacular there that
Kevin Stewart:What are you saying? Know. Is Just
Dr. Debbie Silver:put it out there. Boy, what are you trying to say? Who are you people? And I wasn't that great. And also reading is such an important thing that needs to happen.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I wasn't trained in that. I started getting trained because I was going to school by night, but they needed a science teacher, and nobody wanted to teach science. Nobody wanted that. I said, Well, I started thinking, Well, if you're in science, you can go outside and you can do different stuff and you can watch movies. So I said, I'll do it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And so I took the job and I taught fifth and sixth grade science, and started going to our Louisiana Science Teacher Association, going to conferences, studying about it, doing hands on. This is when hands on first started catching on, and minds on, and all that, and just loved it.
Kevin Stewart:So let me ask you, because you're going from first grade where you knew nothing, and y'all are crying on the floor. We are on the floor. And they're crying, and you're trying to figure it out, sending pigeons out the window to the office. And then you're with them, they're teaching you, you go to middle school. And what was the hardest transition?
Kevin Stewart:Because we have people that listen, we have teachers that are doing that now today. Right. And they're trying to make a transition and they're trying to figure out all the things that are difficult with the transition. Right. So what was the hardest thing that you faced in transitioning from elementary, from first grade to middle school?
Kevin Stewart:But the second part of that, besides what was the hardest part about that transition, what caused you to wanna stay?
Dr. Debbie Silver:The transition for me was a little easier because I went up gradually. We were such a small district and I was last hired, so I'd get put in wherever there was a spot. And I had taught fourth grade for a couple of years, and fifth grade a couple of years. When we got to sixth grade, just clicked. It was like, get these kids.
Dr. Debbie Silver:For one thing, my personality's a lot like a middle school person, and so is my humor, unfortunately. But I kind of found my place, and that's what I urge teachers to do. I'd say, Don't give up on the profession. Maybe you're in the wrong building, or maybe you're in the wrong discipline, like I was. I was a great science teacher, because when the kids would say, I don't get it, I don't know what's the difference between mass and weight, I'd go, I know, right?
Dr. Debbie Silver:And then I'm like, okay, here's how I figured it out. And we just did it. And it just meshed. And there were so many fun things to do in science, and I'm learning right along with them, just reading three pages ahead and go, woah, I didn't know that. But it was an adventure.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But I would say when you're making that transition, because I've taught every grade from first grade up, I never taught the little littles, but I've taught every other grade all the way through college. The first thing is, and everybody says this and it sounds so trite, but it's absolutely true, get to know your students, get to know them. But you also, if you're gonna teach middle school, you have to have a very good sense of self. I'm so glad I didn't start out in middle school because I was an idiot and I knew it. But by the time I got middle school kids, I knew I knew what I was doing.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I also knew I was a good teacher and I knew I could connect with kids. Now I wasn't giving up on anybody. So I had that because there at that period, I love you, I hate you, I love you, I hate you. And you just have to not take yourself too seriously. The job is a very serious thing that we do.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I am dead serious about teaching. It is so important what we do. I mean, we are molding the next generation. This is huge. But when we take ourselves too seriously and decide that, you know, my way is the only way or they're out to get me or I got slotted, you're asking for trouble.
Kevin Stewart:Why do you think that people do that? What's the biggest thing that you think is going on when teachers do that?
Dr. Debbie Silver:I think teachers have lost I mean, people have lost their trust in teachers, the public, but I think teachers have lost their trust in the system. And I just posted a meme that said, was talking about all the things that are wrong with the system, but I said, teachers are not your enemies. They're fighting the same thing you are. Understand that. And I think a lot of people don't get that.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But when somebody starts We wrote a book, Deliberate Optimism, where we talk about I mean, we're kind of programmed to be negative because that's the way we survived. Early man, you couldn't take anything for granted, the saber tooth tiger may be right around the cave, that interest, and that was early programming. So it takes work to overcome that predisposition to be negative. But when you say, okay, and I love Martin Seligman, father of positive psychology, because he talks about dispositional theory and he has you analyzed, is that a real argument? Are you just globalizing?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Oh, this always happens. Or are you being realistic? Are you basing on something that really is irrelevant? But he gets you to the point, what we're saying now, and this is very much stoic philosophy is, okay, let's look at this. What are the things I can control?
Dr. Debbie Silver:And what are the things I can't control? For me, in my system and most of the systems with whom I work, you don't get to control what you're teaching. I mean, to some extent, it's what were you scored on your practice and all But if they decide they need you in kindergarten and you have a kindergarten certification, you're going. And so if you can't control that, there's no sense tilted at windmills, no, no, no. So you start looking at things that will work.
Dr. Debbie Silver:What are some things that might be better? And oh my gosh, I love my dinosaur unit, now I'm teaching at this point, and they're not gonna let me teach dinosaurs. And I always tell teachers, I say, give me your curriculum, tell me what you wanna teach, I will find it in your curriculum. I promise you, I can find you a way that you can get that in there. Because when we're passionate about something, when we love it, it just translates.
Kevin Stewart:So that's the key, Yes. Is passion.
Dr. Debbie Silver:It is passion.
Kevin Stewart:And I mean, obviously, you've got a lot of passion, but I think maybe the system has confined teachers to trying to figure out, hey, you gotta teach this curriculum, you gotta teach what the state is mandated, you gotta teach what the national
Dr. Debbie Silver:Wait, wait, pacing guides.
Kevin Stewart:There you go.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Oh my God. And there are places where, I'm serious, superintendents will come in and they have a pacing guide, and all they're looking at is, are you on this page on this day and doing these essential ideas? And I'm going, okay, there was a bus wreck last week and kids are still upset about that. You can't just keep moving. We're in New York and I'm thinking about 09:11.
Dr. Debbie Silver:The teachers that came in the next day and taught, well, we still need to have the spelling test. I'm like, you're nuts. This is reality. And so what we're doing is we're hearing kids, we're giving them a voice. And if it's something you're not comfortable with leading a discussion yet, or you haven't gotten the mandate from central office how we're gonna handle this, you can always say kids, open up your journals and just tell me what you're thinking, write it out.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But give them the I think what kids like about me is I'm very reality based. And I know when I taught at the university, I had students that said, well, Doctor. Silber, I was teaching elementary science methods. And they said, you require more than any other teacher. I said, I know.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I said, but I'm gonna tell you guys, last year I was teaching in the school, so I'm coming to you fresh, and these are the things that I know are going to help you when you walk in. I don't want them walking in like I did. You need this file, you need these things, and this is what I believe are critical to your teaching. If you can think of any other way to get you there that's easier or shorter, we'll do it. Because I do not believe in busy work, I do not believe in wasting your time.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I think we owe it to kids to say, this is why you're learning this. And if we can't give them a reason, then maybe we shouldn't be asking them. Same with administrators. When they come in and say to a teacher who's saying, could I just get a little mini fridge and keep it in my room? Because that would be great.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I'm on a special diet and I could keep my stuff there and blah, blah, blah. And they're, no, the mandate says, we have to curb electricity. Well, I'll chip on the electric bill, or I used to tell teachers, just buy one and hide it. Make friends with the home ec teacher or whatever. But you don't just go, oh, they're just killing me.
Dr. Debbie Silver:They're not gonna let me. Get an ice chest, get an igloo. But if that's something you need to do your job, figure it out. I've always said teachers are the most resourceful, creative people on the planet. And know why?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Because we have to be. Because we have always, what did we do during COVID? Flip the whole script overnight. And for our digital natives, not a big problem. But for the dinosaurs like me, that are like, wait, wait, what is Zoom?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Wait, wait, what is that? What's a Google page? I mean, and it was literally overnight. No training, no goals, no anything, just threw us in. And what did teachers do?
Dr. Debbie Silver:They rose to the occasion. They did it. And we learned along the way, we made a lot of mistakes, but who wouldn't? But we also learned some really good things to take back when we were face to face, like the need for knowing SEL, the social emotional And I was thankfully glad about that because you know, Jensen and people out there have been telling us for years, this is essential and it's not a soft skill. That implies it's not important.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So I won't call them soft skills. They are absolutely essential. Teaching kids responsibility and resilience and humility and good manners, that's all part of it. And if you're gonna get them to your academic goals, which we keep bringing up, up, up, up. The only way we're going to do that is to reach those kids first.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But you tie it all together, because teachers, I did have teachers when I started working with that, oh, another add on, now we have to stop and have advisory, now we have to stop. I'm like, you don't need to stop and do anything, you need to integrate it. And a good friend of mine, another middle school teacher, Deidre Stafford and I wrote Teaching Kids to Thrive. And that whole book is about integrating SEL skills in a natural course of curriculum, through different subject matter, through your classroom management, through everything you do, every choice you make, echoes how you feel about kids. Do you trust them?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Do you not trust them? Are they safe? And I tell teachers, your class starts long before that first day of school.
Kevin Stewart:So for those that SEL is a dirty word, what's another word they can use?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Can call it yeah. Skills? Life skills. Yeah.
Kevin Stewart:Teaching life skills.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Alright. You should call
Kevin Stewart:because we wanna we wanna help all you
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I get get it. People tied it to, we won't even go there. I don't wanna get political. But it was tied to certain things. I'm like, God, that's not what it is.
Dr. Debbie Silver:It's not that at You're not telling kids what to feel. You're telling kids how to recognize their feelings, but how to deal
Kevin Stewart:with Basic life.
Dr. Debbie Silver:It's life. We used to call it character education.
Kevin Stewart:Yes, yeah.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And then people got upset about that. Of course, get upset about everything we do. But you're basically saying, I wanna teach you the self skills you need to be successful the rest of your life, and I wanna teach you the social skills you need to deal with other people. How do you collaborate? How do you cooperate?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Because we all have to. And when you get into the workforce, you don't get to pick your team. Your boss expects you to go in there and make it work. And a lot of our students have no experience with that.
Kevin Stewart:So let me ask this, because I think it'll be helpful for our audience to to know. And I think it's good for for educators to understand that we gotta be different. Yes. I mean, you gotta I think that's what we're leading up to. And you're teaching you're teaching in college now, teaching students who are wanting to be teachers.
Kevin Stewart:And the only way let me preface my question by saying that when was in high school, I took Spanish because I thought I want to learn the love language. I wanna be smooth with this and me and more. I have have I'm more.
Dr. Debbie Silver:You need some girls.
Kevin Stewart:That's right. But I remember three days after Spanish class, my Spanish teacher called me to the front and she said, listen. She said, Kevin, I I don't think you're ever gonna speak Spanish in your life. So it's probably best you find another class and and you still got a couple days that you can switch classes. So I went and took home ec so I could get out and get on early release.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And then you really get
Kevin Stewart:on Yeah. I worked at TCBY.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Nirvana.
Kevin Stewart:There you go. But I fast forward a number of years, and I went to language school in Costa Rica
Dr. Debbie Silver:Cool.
Kevin Stewart:To learn Spanish. And as I'm there, they did the coolest thing because there were three of us that were in a group, probably about 30 of us that were entering in at the same time. And there are three of us that could not learn a normal way of learning.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Right.
Kevin Stewart:So we're visual. Yes. Show show me what I need to
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yes.
Kevin Stewart:Kinda act it out, do the acting thing, help me understand it. And they literally got together as a staff. The director of the school and the whole staff came together and said, hey, we've got to create something so that these three can learn. And they transformed, put us in the same class and taught us three totally different than they taught anybody else. So people would come by our class, and we're sitting under the desk and hollering out things so we could learn Doing a play.
Kevin Stewart:Doing whatever it What are five things that you would tell teachers to say, Hey, here's how you can do that for your student? Because ultimately, we want to make a difference. Ultimately, we want people making a difference in the lives of students who are growing up to become the next teachers, become the next president, whatever they're going to be. In their strength areas. In their strength areas.
Kevin Stewart:Or the next carpenter, whatever that is.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Exactly.
Kevin Stewart:And so what are some ways, five things maybe, give five things that teachers could do to help build their classrooms in that kind of style.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Well, first thing, I always when I'm doing classroom management, and I taught that at the university too when I was still there, but I said, do an inventory. Ask questions, and what's hardest for me to learn and why, my favorite subject and why, I learn best through, and again, you can do just the modalities, which are easy, but you get all that, and I also have some little icebreakers I pass out, and the kids walk around and ask each other questions and fill those out. So it gives them, we start talking about it. I don't want to put anybody in just a group, like the teacher that told you, see that rubs me wrong, that
Kevin Stewart:she said I can see it, I
Dr. Debbie Silver:know my eyes were like, what? And I think what she was saying, the way I teach it, you're probably not gonna get it. Doesn't mean you're not gonna get it. But you also pay attention to your kids, especially those that pull back, those kids that have been kind of floating along the bottom, maybe even causing some problems because they don't wanna look dumb. So they'd rather look like they're causing you a problem than being dumb.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But if you walk by and you're talking and they're drawing, look at what they're drawing, because it could be about what you're talking about. That's how they make sense of And if it's not, then teach them, you know, how to use graphic organizers, how to use toolbox, how to use some of these programs that we have on YouTube now that teach kids how to do that. Add a lot of music, whether they're musically inclined or not, music can actually change the ambience of the room. And that's a great way to do it. But give kids options.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Okay, here, and I have no problem going, these are the essential ideas, the district, the state, okay, that's our responsibility as teachers. But we can give them different ways to meet those, and we can say, all right, I need to know that you know these things. You put it on the board, we call it a rubric, but everybody's sick of hearing about rubrics. So just these are the things. So take your choice.
Dr. Debbie Silver:You can develop a PowerPoint, you can write a song, you can do a rap, you can have a debate, you can do It is amazing what they come up with, things I've never seen before, like a diorama. I'm like, oh my God, because I'm so not spatial. I'm just like, how did you even do But you also pay attention because I know in science, I had a little kid that was, I guess autistic, but high end functioning. And he would never say anything, but he liked our room and he liked the ambiance there. And one day we got on resistors and and I was having trouble explaining it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And Anthony finally just got fed up. He said, let me show. And he came to the board and he drew it and they were all like, woah. And I mean, he knew.
Kevin Stewart:But how cool that you let him do it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I'm like, please. He ended up winning, when we did science fairs, this is kind of along what you're asking, I got away from the traditional science fair, with the rules and very strict, and it is to teach scientific method, but I did a science expo. So you could just come in and do a demonstration of something that you were really interested in, and you could do it with other people, or you could do it with your parents, or you could team up with an expert. But we had this big expo and the kids all chose their own way to participate. It was also volunteer, I didn't make them do it, but Lord, we had loads of kids.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Anthony did something on electricity that wowed the judges so much. He won a trip to space camp. And yeah, in Alabama, he got to be a space camp.
Kevin Stewart:That's awesome.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And his mother wrote me the sweetest letter and she said, you know, Anthony, just, duh, he loves you. And I'm going, Anthony saved my butt. Because I really wasn't under Electricity's hard.
Kevin Stewart:Yeah, yeah.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I mean, really try to get somebody to explain it, explain it. But you watch for that. Okay, that's two, three things. The four things, give them the choice of the way they show you. All right, now this is the one that's hard for some people.
Dr. Debbie Silver:If you're random, it's not hard for you. But if you're not random, it's gonna be harder. You vary the way that you teach. So you don't always do it the same way. Like, I'm going to assume that your Spanish teacher had a way that she presented, then you responded, then I do, we do, you do.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And that's not all bad. For some kids, that's the best way they learn. There are kids that love workbooks. There are kids that love PowerPoints where they can take notes. But you start teaching in different ways.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And if you can't, then you invite an Anthony to come up and show the class. You also put them in small groups a lot, because they need a chance to talk to each other. Kids can explain to each other better than I can a lot of times. So I just, I want them, and for the kids that are reluctant learners, or they might have Asperger's, they don't want to be thrown in a large group, that's very, very intimidating. But usually with one or two, they're okay.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And you build that community there and it builds a safe environment within your room. And that's, I love it. And you can call it cooperative learning or you can call it think pair share, whatever you wanna call it, but you also give kids an opportunity to respond. And teachers are getting really good about that now. And a lot of us have technology,
Kevin Stewart:and
Dr. Debbie Silver:you have clickers, which is great for your introverts, because they can click without ever saying anything out loud. But you automatically have a poll that shows everybody votes. And once you vote, you have a vested interest. But if you don't have that, you can get a piece of whiteboard and you can buy them at a You don't have to go buy the little whiteboards, you can go to Lowe's and get them to cut you pieces and get a dry erase and kids just hold up their board. And just write your answer to that, hold it up, and you do that.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But we're learning a lot about retrieval now, which I wasn't really good about. I didn't even know that was that important, but we're gonna have to give kids, in order to build those synapses, we constantly retrieve information. We teach them how to do that. So we don't just go, go, go, go and then here's your major test. No, it's little tests, or do a brain dump.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Okay, write down all the major points we just covered in this class today. Everything you can remember. Now get with a partner and see if they got something you didn't get, or if you didn't understand it, ask them.
Kevin Stewart:Oh, great concept.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yeah. Oh, I didn't make it up.
Kevin Stewart:No, but I'm just thinking how many people don't use that. They've gotta be dot dot dot dot.
Dr. Debbie Silver:One of the best teachers I ever observed, and this is before retrieval even came out, but I was watching her, she was a high school science teacher, and she walked in and she said, all right, get out a piece of paper, it could be anything, no grade, I just need to know, and gave them a real quick little oral exam. And it had like five answers. And they're all looking and she goes, okay, now we're gonna talk about it and I want you to be your own person, did you really know that? Because many of the times we're letting that one kid talk all the time, and so the kids in the back are going, Oh yeah, I knew that. But they don't know if they really knew it, or they only knew it because that kid said it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So they think they know, but then they get on their own and they don't. So we have to give them a chance to individually, can I retrieve this? And all y'all that went to college, you probably did that, before you had a major test. It was like, okay, wait a minute. Then we had little acronyms or whatever you did to help you, well, give those tools to kids.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Because some of these kids think that other kids are smarter than they are, and I'm like, they're not. Now people are turned more a certain way by birth. I believe you have a certain amount of inheritance that just come out of the womb with an artistic ability or musical ability or writing, but everybody can get better. Everybody can get better. And that's our goal for you.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I'm tired of telling kids by the end of the year, I'm just going, you know what?
Kevin Stewart:Just get better at the-
Dr. Debbie Silver:Just keep moving forward. Just keep moving forward. Let's get rid of the pacing guides. Let's get rid of all of that and say, this kid made this much gain during this year. So you want me to really get some people going here?
Dr. Debbie Silver:This is what I think we should do. When you're gonna do a test-
Kevin Stewart:Go ahead, go ahead, tell them.
Dr. Debbie Silver:All right. You don't do this crud that we do now. Where you go in at the end of the year and take the test and then tell a teacher how she failed. She's never gonna see those kids again. And kids are different.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So why don't we go at the beginning of the year and we just do a pretest for the essential ideas, give it back as quickly as possible so that we see where they are starting in our route. This is what they are able to know and do right now, not listen to what happened last year, whatever, this is what we're seeing. And then we find, and we have computers, we have AI that can do this now, find a comparable school, what you might call a sister school, maybe two or three. And then from those schools, take data and say, this is what we can reasonably, reasonably expect in growth from that kid during the school year, given their economic background, how many parents are in the home, what kind of reading, the greatest level, those things that are influencers, we factor all that in. Then at the end of the year, when they take a test, it is compared to their particular factors, given that a rural school in Logansport, Louisiana, with this much population, this average income, this is what you could expect your kids, the gains to make.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And then if a teacher doesn't have kids making those kinds of gains, we have to say, okay, why not? And then we go in with some prescriptive things for that particular teacher. And I don't think we do enough of that. I think we're in a punishment. I've gotcha, you're out.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Or, Well, she's terrible, but she's got tenure. I'm like, Are you kidding me? You know, are you
Kevin Stewart:kidding me?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Daryl, they're terrible. Tell them.
Kevin Stewart:Tell them they're
Dr. Debbie Silver:terrible. Yeah. That's you're at
Kevin Stewart:the door. You earned it from Debbie Silver, not not from me. Debbie Silver said You
Dr. Debbie Silver:have my permission to tell teachers, you know, I just don't think this is a good fit. Only now human resources is kids. You can't use that word anymore.
Kevin Stewart:Don't tell HR.
Dr. Debbie Silver:No, don't tell HR. But there are just people that don't a strong leader, and speed of the leader, speed of the pack, it is the leader. And I've never seen a great school that didn't have a great leader. And I've seen a lot of schools.
Kevin Stewart:That's the key.
Dr. Debbie Silver:It is the key. And just because you're a great teacher doesn't mean you're gonna be a great leader. And we've always assumed that, because after I was teacher of the year for the state, they're going, Oh, we need to make her a principal. No, no, I don't have those skills.
Kevin Stewart:Terrible president.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I would be a terrible principal, I don't want that, I don't like it. But let me teach other teachers? Oh yeah, I'm there all day long. I loved it. I love teaching pre service teachers, because they're still idealistic.
Kevin Stewart:And you're good at it. Well, really good. I mean, watching you do your thing is amazing and your passion for it. I'm gonna remind I
Dr. Debbie Silver:just happen to be obviously an extrovert, and I feel like I am a voice for teachers. I don't feel that differently than other teachers, I just know how to get it across because I'm such a ham. But like when I was teacher of the year, they're going, oh, the best teacher in Louisiana. I said, don't ever say that again, because that is so not true.
Kevin Stewart:I just fooled a lot of them. No, no, I'm
Dr. Debbie Silver:kidding.
Kevin Stewart:You didn't.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I'm a voice for the great teachers of Louisiana, of which there were many.
Kevin Stewart:And other states.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And other states. And I'm really glad we recognize teachers, but I do I don't like teachers competing with each other. And I think sometimes we're put into a dogfight with each other, not just among ourselves, but the community and other people are joining in. And my thing is, and I'm gonna deliver this message tomorrow, my keynote is, we have got to take our profession back. And one of the things that we do is we shoot ourselves in the foot because we are so guilty about going into the community and telling tales out of school.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And there's this teacher that's just a waste of clothes, and you're out there going, all right, we represent the school. And when we go out and say things like that, people hear us and they repeat it. You don't hear doctors ever throwing off on other doctors or lawyers. Most people of integrity, real estate, whatever, they don't do that. My husband's a former insurance person.
Dr. Debbie Silver:He said, When I get somebody, they're going, That person was bad. He goes, All I knew is next year they'll be in somebody else's office talking about me. They said, I wouldn't entertain that. And I think we as teachers have to start, like when we see something come on a TikTok, could you believe they did this at this school? And we're all, oh man, why don't we say, you know what, I don't know of a school where that would happen.
Dr. Debbie Silver:That doesn't even sound real. And if it is real, we need to get the other side of that story. But we're pretty bad about not giving people the benefit. You hear about that teacher or that school or that superintendent, and we just jump on that bandwagon because we're angry about what's happened with us. And I think less said, better done.
Dr. Debbie Silver:We need to get together and just go, you know what, before you make that judgment, you really need to talk to that teacher, because that's not the norm. And if you need some words for your questions, I'll help you with that. But I got really good about when people would come to me to complain about another teacher in our school. Can you believe that guy's doing that? I said, I'm not in his class.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I have no knowledge of that. But if you have a problem, you really need to be talking to him. I'm gonna assume He's
Kevin Stewart:the one who stopped the gossip.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Right. And I'm gonna assume he has best intent. But if you don't feel that's right, then you go ask them. You have every right as a parent to make sure that your child is being handled in a reasonable manner with reasonable goals.
Kevin Stewart:That's so good because think about the students that you're impacting and the difference that you make in your school as a culture as a culture for the school, as a culture for the classroom when your students see that, hey. You as adults, you as teachers know how to actually communicate with each other and stop backstabbing each other. Stop talking bad about the other teachers.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And the kids figure it out that quick. They know how to go get Ms. So and so to talk to them, they know how to, especially middle school, they told me one time, Ms. Bagley said so and so about you. Of Of course, I've known Ms.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Beckley, she's one of my best friends, she was joking, said, yeah. I said, when she gets off her meds, you can't go back, and she says, And the kid's like, oh, Ms. Pace. I said, guys, stop. Just stop.
Dr. Debbie Silver:You know? Just
Kevin Stewart:So let's do a speed round.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Alright.
Kevin Stewart:Alright. Because I want people to know Debbie Silver.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Okay.
Kevin Stewart:So they know the teaching stuff. They know all but I want them to know Debbie Silver.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Okay.
Kevin Stewart:So who's the one person in your life that's made the greatest impact and
Dr. Debbie Silver:why? Wow.
Kevin Stewart:You feel like you're on Oprah, don't you?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yeah, I do. I'm gonna say my husband now, my next ex husband, Lawrence. Lawrence met me when things were not good in my life and not good with a lot of things, and he always believed in me. And he's the one that told me when I got offered the principalship, I was just gonna take it because it was like the next step. And he said, I think you could do it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I think you'd be good, but I don't see that as your passion. I don't hear you talking about that. Maybe you should look at another thing. So I waited and then another opportunity came in that changed everything. But there's so many people, I have a bunch of boys, my children, my grandchildren, educators that my English teacher in high school, all my best teachers were English and speech.
Dr. Debbie Silver:But I'm a science teacher.
Kevin Stewart:But your husband?
Dr. Debbie Silver:My husband, yeah.
Kevin Stewart:Your husband now?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yeah, my husband now.
Kevin Stewart:This one's now, for now. For for For
Dr. Debbie Silver:now,
Kevin Stewart:Second question.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yes.
Kevin Stewart:Who is the student that made the greatest impact on your life and why?
Dr. Debbie Silver:Lots of students, but I'm going have
Kevin Stewart:to tell them. You don't have to tell the name either.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Oh, she wouldn't mind. It's Terrily Waddles, who was one of my students at Rosenwald when we were still segregated. And she was real quiet, real shy, real sweet. And I'm embarrassed to say this because I didn't know it at the time, but she was in charge of her Her mother and dad had both absconded, and she was in charge of her four younger siblings, her grandmother, much older woman, and Tara, and they didn't have indoor plumbing. But I remember her as a second grader just being this sweet, precious child.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I'm just, I loved her, but I my kids. And then I got her back in middle school and again, very shy, never wanted to do, she had a gap between her teeth and I think she didn't want to smile, but very, very sweet and a good student, just an average student, and went to high school and then she graduated. And when that particular class that had graduated, they called and said, how much would it cost to have you come be our speaker at our reunion? And I said, well, don't know, how much do y'all have? No, I didn't.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I said, no, I'll come. And so we got there and they said, well, Terralene's in charge. And I thought, oh. So I was looking at Lawrence and I said, okay, now look, these are my kids. These are country kids.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Just don't say anything. I don't know what you're going to be expecting, but just He goes, damn. I'm like, just And so when Tara's in charge, I thought, well, because she's so shy, know, just so oh my God. This woman walks out, shoulders back, head up, this military posture, giving orders like a colonel. I said, Tara Lane?
Dr. Debbie Silver:And she said, Tara? And I said, Tara? And she said, Hey Ms. Pace. And she looked at Lawrence and she put her arm around, she said, this is the woman that changed my life.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I'm like, I don't know what she's talking about. So long and short of it, we sat with her at dinner and she was toying with the idea of she had been in the Navy and she told me, she said, I can't even swim. I'd never been out of Logan's Port. I got on a plane, I joined the Army Navy, and then I got in the Navy and I got promoted up. And now I'm in the Air Force Reserves, and I don't know if I want to be Lieutenant Colonel.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And Lawrence, who was Navy and just big military, he said, Oh no, you have to, you have to. So he, by the time it was over, he said, All right, I will, if y'all will come to Barksdale, see me get my pen. I said, We will. And she did that, And then we're talking back and forth and she's a single mom, three boys, two of whom had gone to college, another in junior college. And she said, Beth Pace, I'm going for full colonel.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I said, oh my God, Tara. And she eventually got Full Colonel, but here's what happened. I said, Tara, you know, I tell so many stories, but they're almost always about boys. Because I have boys and I'm kind of a boy person. I would love to tell your story.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I said, But teachers are gonna say, she said, well, you can tell them you changed my life. I said, no, I can't because I don't know what I did. Mean, there's no, I don't know. And she said, you saw me. Wow.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And she said, You saw me, and you made me believe in myself, and you gave me courage. But those three words, You saw me.
Kevin Stewart:You did the thing that every student wants.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Just see me. Yeah. I'm gonna start crying. Don't do that.
Kevin Stewart:Don't do that. But that's real. Because how many students and I got one more question before we finish. By how many students we were talking someone was talking to me about, you know, giving giving prizes and things out for their behavior. But the truth is how many students just want you to see them and just just hang out with me in the cafeteria, make a difference, a personal difference in my life because you saw me.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Yeah, come see me at lunch. That's your prize. I'm going by McDonald's. We're gonna eat in my room. I've got a whole chapter in my book Drumming to the Beat about pros and cons.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And it depends on where the kid is mentally, initially. But for the most part, that is. They just wanna be heard. They want your undivided attention. And that's not always possible when you've got, like, I have 37 It's
Kevin Stewart:not at that time, but it is in the cafeteria when you don't have any Exactly. At the end of the day Or
Dr. Debbie Silver:they're walking in the room, you'd look them in the eyes. I tell my management people, You can stop a lot of stuff before it ever starts by looking them in the eye and making some kind of contact when they come in. And you may be a back slapper, a high five, you may be a hugger, whatever works for you, you be you, but you let those kids know, I'm glad to see you. And I was, I was like such a little kid. If I had a science experiment, I'm like, Come on, y'all hurry up.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I thought y'all never get here. And they're like, Okay, okay. We'll do it.
Kevin Stewart:So last question. What would the Debbie today, what's one thing that if you could go back and tell the Debbie who was sitting on that floor with all the first graders, tears in her eyes, feeling like, what in the world am I doing? What's the one thing that Debbie today would go back and tell Debbie then?
Dr. Debbie Silver:I would say you have found your calling. Just you need to see the kids. That really touched me, what she said. You need to connect with the kids. You need to be firm.
Dr. Debbie Silver:You need to, you know, absolutely you are the boss of the room. The kids need to know that. And I am the boss of the room. But I explained as best I can to kids why we're doing things, the way we do things. And I really do try to get to know them as best I can.
Dr. Debbie Silver:And I think you've heard me say this before, but I would write letters to all my
Kevin Stewart:kids. And
Dr. Debbie Silver:it was more for me than them. I mean, it really helped me with some that I was struggling with, because they're getting on my last term. And then when I've made myself sit down and go, here's what I really because I wanted to be sincere, here's what I really believe about you. Then I'm going, you know what? And it's called reframing and it's part of stoicism.
Dr. Debbie Silver:It's it's the same, but look at it differently. If you look at it differently, then that thing changes. And everybody really knows that. But give yourself some grace. I want teachers, I want us to give each other grace.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I want us to give each other more support. I want us to be able to assume best intent by especially our peers and our superiors, but I want us to learn about the parents and the kids. Let's go with best intent first and not just jump to something else. Yeah. I also want to say that, you know, when I used to say, I want to be a missionary in it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Well, somebody asked me years ago when I first married Lawrence and they said, Did you always want to be a teacher? And I told him that answer, and Lawrence looked at me and said, Deb, that's what you do. I went, I never thought about it, but I write books.
Kevin Stewart:You're an author, you're a missionary, you're
Dr. Debbie Silver:a teacher.
Kevin Stewart:All of it.
Dr. Debbie Silver:So that's what I would tell Debbie, just be patient, be patient, and go this path that you weren't expecting.
Kevin Stewart:And I can truly say, having gotten to know you, go back and tell Debbie back then that, Debbie, you're gonna be amazing. Okay. And you are. You're an amazing person. You're a gift to education, to educators.
Kevin Stewart:And thank you. Thank you You are
Dr. Debbie Silver:so sweet.
Kevin Stewart:Thank you for choosing to be on here with us and share with-
Dr. Debbie Silver:I love Accu All
Kevin Stewart:of our community.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I love the staff at Accutrain. Woo. Going through.
Kevin Stewart:So awesome. Thank you, Kevin.
Dr. Debbie Silver:I love I
Kevin Stewart:love Thanks.
Dr. Debbie Silver:Bye, guys.
Jordan Bassett:I hope you enjoyed listening to that conversation between Kevin and Debbie Silver. We do this podcast just to help educators, and we help educators by more people knowing about this podcast. So I wanna ask you to like or subscribe and rate, leave a comment, all those different things. It just helps us to be seen more. It helps us to help more educators.
Jordan Bassett:We said on this podcast before that we acknowledge that being an educator is difficult, that there's a lot of challenging things, and we just wanna encourage you to keep on going. All your hard work is rewarded with the success of your students. So I hope you found some inspiration today. I hope you learned something new, and we'll see you on the next episode.
