Student Performance Feedback with Jeff Przybylo and Thomas Fisher

With the advent of easy-to-use generative AI like ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot, many instructors have been looking into alternatives to traditional written essays, which are often easy to write with AI assistance. Last fall, I led a webinar on authentic assignments for GoReact, an educational technology company that provides video feedback tool that can be really useful for certain authentic assignments, particularly ones that are performance-based. I asked GoReact if they could connect me with faculty who they knew to be using their platform intentionally, and they were happy to oblige.

On today’s episode, I talk with Jeff Przybylo, chair of communications arts and head coach of the speech and debate team at Harper College in Illinois, and Thomas Fisher, clinical associate professor of education and university supervisor for student teachers at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Both of these faculty have incorporated GoReact into their teaching in really thoughtful ways, and I think you’ll get some ideas for using more video in your teaching, whether or not you teach in a performance field like Jeff and Tom.

Episode Resources

Jeff Przybylo on LinkedIn, https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-przybylo-1a500a90/
Thomas Fisher’s faculty page, https://oscp.charlotte.edu/directory/thomas-fisher/
GoReact, https://get.goreact.com/
Swivl, https://www.swivl.com/

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Transcript

Derek Bruff: 0:05

Welcome to Intentional Teaching, a podcast aimed at educators to help them develop foundational teaching skills and explore new ideas and teaching. I'm your host, Derek Bruff. I hope this podcast helps you be more intentional in how you teach and in how you develop as a teacher over time. Last fall, I was invited to lead a webinar on authentic assignments in the age of AI by a company called Go React. Go React is an educational technology company that provides a tool that they call a, quote, skill, mastery and assessment platform. I would describe GoReact as a video annotation tool and a typical use case is having a student upload a video of themselves doing some performance task like giving a presentation and then using the annotation tools on the platform to provide time coded feedback to the student. Back in 2020, I knew of Go react from some colleagues in education who used it regularly to provide feedback to student teachers who filmed themselves in their practice contexts. When my provost asked me to recommend some educational technologies the university should adopt to help with teaching during the pandemic. Go React was on my short list. Flash forward to 2023 and the advent of easy to use generative AI like ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot and lots of faculty start looking into alternatives to traditional written essays, which are often easy to write with AI assistance. My webinar on authentic assignments for Go React was part of that shift in higher ed, and I was reminded that Go React is a really useful tool for certain authentic assignments, particularly ones that are performance based. I asked Go react if they could connect me with a couple of faculty who they knew to be using their platform intentionally and they were happy to oblige. On today's podcast, I talk with Jeff Brzybylo, Chair of Communication Arts and head coach of the Speech and Debate team at Harper College in Illinois, and Thomas Fisher, clinical associate Professor of education and university supervisor for student teachers at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Both of these faculty have incorporated GoReact into their teaching in really thoughtful ways, and I think you'll get some ideas for using more video in your teaching. Whether or not you teach in a performance field like Jeff and Tom, before we jump into the interview, I wanted to share a new feature here on the podcast. Thanks to my podcast hosted BuzzSprout. You can now easily send me a text message with a question or comment or reaction to the show at the top of the shownotes or episode description. Depending on how your podcast player labels it, you'll find a link to use this new feature. Tapping that link on your phone will bring up a new text message with my show's ID number Prefilled. Don't delete that number. Just start typing your message to me. And don't forget to include your name since all I will get from the system is the last four digits of your phone number. I can't text back. It's a one way system, but I will read your message and potentially respond in a future episode. Now on to the interview with Jeff Przybylo and Thomas Fisher. Jeff and Tom, I'm glad to have you on the podcast. Thanks for being here today. I'm excited to talk to you.

Jeff Przybylo: 3:06

You're welcome. Yeah, absolutely.

Derek Bruff: 3:08

I'm going to start with my usual opening question. And Tom, maybe I'll ask you to go first. Can you tell us about a time when you realized you wanted to be an educator?

Thomas Fisher: 3:22

That's a tough one because I've been doing this for 25 years this year, so it's tough to go back to that, although since we're on Zoom, I see. I seem to think Jeff's probably got me by a couple of years in the education realm, but probably just looking back and saying that my high school education was just terrifying type of thing and that I wanted to be that high school teacher that didn't terrify kids and that you did want to actually learn. So that, you know, I had some of those, you know, instructors when I was in college and I was like, oh, you know, I was a history major. And then I was like, well, maybe I'll be a history teacher and not be a teacher. That terrifies kids.

Derek Bruff: 4:15

Do you think you've met that goal in your life?

Thomas Fisher: 4:17

I think I do. I think I do. I think one of the things that I try to do with the students when building those relationships is I create sort of that low risk environment early and I try to make sure that I am it's a safe space and that I am making sure they're good. And I have intentional sense. The name of the podcast. I use intentionality when I circulate and monitor, whether it's digitally or physically. I know who I want to talk to and I know who's not ready to talk, and I'll wait to bring them into the conversation. And I don't believe that's how everybody was taught and I don't think that's the way everybody's being taught today.

Derek Bruff: 5:02

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Maybe some more on that in a minute. But, Jeff, what about you? What's the time when you realized you wanted to be an educator?

Jeff Przybylo: 5:10

You know, I grew up in a divorced family. My mom had two kids and was divorced by 19 years old. So we moved around a lot. We went to a lot of different schools. I didn't have a lot of friends, and we moved to a school my freshman year in Mount Prospect Illinois, and we had to take oral communication. And my teacher's name, ironically, was Mr. Good. And we had to we had to read a stories. And my favorite story was Tales of a fourth Grade, Nothing by a Judy Blume. And so I took a paragraph or two from that, and I read it for the class, and I guess I knocked it out of the park. And on my critique it said, See me? And I thought I was in trouble. And actually Mr. Good recruited me for the speech and debate team, which I ended up. That's how I made all my friends. It's how I've met my wife. That's how I got scholarships. In college. I met my college debate coach, Judy Santa Catarina at NIU, and it was in the middle of that when I started to see my life going and really positive directions that I said, You know what? I want to do that for other people. So I looked at one of my main jobs is to write, see me on people's critiques and see see if I could change their lives also.

Derek Bruff: 6:19

I love it. I love it. So so perhaps some a negative example that motivated certain choices and a positive example that motivated similar choices. Well, so I want to talk about go react and the ways that each of you use that in your courses and what kind of start with that and kind of see where the conversation goes. Jeff, maybe I'll start with you. What tell us a little bit about the kind of course context in which you use go react so that we can kind of get a sense of of why that tool might be useful for, for that kind of course.

Jeff Przybylo: 6:52

Yeah. I teach in the communication arts department so I teach public speaking, interpersonal communication, small group communication, intercultural communication. And I also coached the speech and debate team and I use it in all of those contexts. I would if you asked what the main use would be, it's in the basic speech course. Ever since COVID students have wanted to be online. So we do teach public speaking online, and I don't know how we would do it without the tools that we get in go react. That's really made it doable. But we also use it for some different kinds of assignments, not just uploading speeches in some of my other courses, which maybe we can get to a little later. But we've also been coaching our debate team with it. The students have been uploading debates and performances and then all our coaching staff can give comments from the comfort of their own home. And the great thing is, is that those comments just don't go in one ear and out the other. If we're coaching face to face, they might hear things, but they forget them. With GoReact, it's there. We could type it, we can record stuff. So it's been really great and all, all parts of my job at Harper.

Thomas Fisher: 8:03

Wow. Well, I would say absolutely. The he mentioned the pandemic. And prior to the pandemic, our distance ed program was growing at such a large pace that we really needed to look into some sort of platform to do this, to do our distance ed with our student teachers, because, quite frankly, the at the time we weren't even using Zoom yet. Zoom sort of exploded during the pandemic there. But we are using like WebEx or sometimes we were having to use like face time with student teachers that were, you know, several hours away from campus. And we were trying to capture live footage of that. Or sometimes they would capture video for that of us and put it on YouTube. But then, of course, those those candidates needed to be technologically, you know, adapt to do those things. And that isn't always the case in our program, especially with our distance ed in our nontraditional candidates having real struggles. Whereas, you know, the Go React platform is pretty simple and it does have those other features where you could actually upload if you wanted to capture, you could do a live go react, and the the instructor like myself could just come into that one way portal. Or of course you could just put your laptop up just like the three of us do right now and capture the go react live right through your camera into the app. So it did make it a lot easier. I noticed that and we were just piloting it. And then of course, the pandemic hit. So we piloted in fall of 19 and then all of a sudden, here comes spring 20. I'll never forget, right? Friday the 13th in in North Carolina, everything shut down, Friday the 13th. Couldn't have been a more apropos day. Right.

Derek Bruff: 9:58

And there are so many dates you could name. And I would not be able to tell you what I was doing that day. But March 13th, 2020, I know exactly what that day was like.

Thomas Fisher: 10:07

You know, I remember it well. And I remember that within a week my phone was ringing off the hook. Not that I have like a regular phone anymore, but I would my email was blowing up, my phone was blowing up. Everybody needed me. Everybody needed me. It's like, Hey, we know you're using this program. Can you help us? Because we have a you know, you and I talked before, Derek. We have a very large program at Charlotte. And, you know, we're we're at like 225 to 250 student teachers a semester. So there's a lot of people that had to be supervised. And of course, the schools had that little lull, but then they got back to it and they said, we're going to be online. And then, of course, we're not going into the schools. How are we going to see them online? How are we really going to give them feedback? And from that point on, I was in and then I just started tinkering with it to not just use it for my student teaching observations, but also to use it for my classes, because then, you know, all my classes went online. So then I had to figure out, Hey, how can I do some of this performance based stuff that we would do in class like rehearsal? So, you know, to Jeff's point about doing the debate stuff, you know, I have the same type of thing. I have them rehearse giving directions and teaching routines to the class and how to how to, you know, do those kind of things. So I wanted to see how they manage small groups. So we do a lot of that rehearsal stuff anyway. And capturing on video just made it so much easier.

Derek Bruff: 11:38

Mm hmm. Jeff I think I have in my head probably something of a caricature of a speech class, but what would one of your assignments actually look like that that took advantage of go react? What what, what would the students be asked to do? How does the feedback work? Walk us through one of those assignments.

Jeff Przybylo: 11:58

You know, the major assignment is the speeches in the public speaking class. We're in a traditional classroom. We do have 26 people in a room with me in the back at my table with a pen and a rubric and maybe a computer in the later years typing some stuff. But it doesn't look like that when you use go react. I mean, they are in some cases home alone doing similar what you might do in a Zoom meeting. We have some pretty strict regulations here in Illinois. So all all speeches in an online course must be presented in front of six audience members in a professional setting outside of the home. So I and I spent my morning watching these. So the students have to go find and we help them with this. We have all kinds of ways to facilitate them finding a library, a classroom, a place at their business, a conference space, and they invite six of their friends. Or sometimes we use small groups and they bring each other like six people who are in that online class might show up to the library on campus and people put their phone or their laptop at the back of the room. The audience waves at the camera. We record the speech. No cuts, no edits. You must go from start to finish. So you record that speech and then when it's done and sometimes they do it more than once or twice. Some students tell me which is an advantage. You don't get to do that in a face to face class, but they could do it. If their audience is willing to stay there. They'll do it until they get it right and then they upload it to go react. That's where I watch it from the comfort of my man cave here, and I give them not just a feedback through a rubric, but I can give them written feedback pre written comments for some of the common stuff. And then typically at the end of each speech, I'll actually do some oral coaching. So I'll turn on the camera and the microphone and I'll say, I've taken some notes and you know, you do enough of these, you get good at it. And they say, you know, here's what I saw, here's what I would like to see you be working. So they're actually getting me. I've had tons of students say, through those videos. At the end of my speech, it felt like we were together, that we had met each other once in a while to see one of these kids on campus, and they'll recognize me just from those videos, even though it was an online class. And there are that's the the main way we use it in the public speaking. And we have all kinds of other little tricky things that are beyond that that maybe we can get into later. But that's the that's the main way. And it's been working great.

Derek Bruff: 14:28

And you mentioned written feedback. So is that feedback attached to particular time codes in the video?

Jeff Przybylo: 14:37

Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure Tom does the same thing, like when you're watching a student teacher or you're watching a speech, so you just start typing, it stops and you can just get the thoughts together. And if I got something, someti I use talk to text, if I've got a little more to say, you know, I just hit my microphone and put it in there. And then when you hit return, it just continues in. The students are using that too. We do a lot of peer feedback, so they have to go in and watch each other's speeches and they're doing the same exact thing.

Derek Bruff: 15:05

Okay. Now, so Tom, does that look a little bit, I guess, for your rehearsals? It might look that it might be a similar structure, right?

Thomas Fisher: 15:14

Yeah, because obviously I'm going to I'm going to set the tone. So let me be clear. Like one of the features, the markers, which I love the markers because then I sort of create, in a sense, exactly what I want to see. So it's almost like it's the rubric, right? So this week they have two rehearsal videos. One video will just be delivering something called Fisher's top ten routines to start the school year. So that might be entering and exiting the classroom. And they have to use the proper direction, focus, right? They have to give the goal. They have to use clear, concise directions. They have to have a time expectation and they have to have a behavior expectation. And then the other two things I'm measuring during the video is did they use economy a language? Right? Did they say it with less? And then I want to hear their teacher voice. I want to hear how they project right through the video. So I'm going to score them on those six categories so they know going in they got to nail it. Now that's they got to deliver the routine and then they have the second video where they give the directions for a content activity. So I let them use their focus content and they also deliver those directions and they have to mark and comment themselves. And then I go in behind them and I will give them that feedback. And I like to do this before I have them have to do this with their classmates. So it's the beginning stages of them. Then coming in to a live class and delivering it in a small group, then perhaps delivering it in front of the larger group and then as their clinical, as their clinical experiences progress, they get to be in front of real kids and get to do it again. So I'm giving them multiple opportunities to practice these nuances before they have to get in front of real kids and do it.

Derek Bruff: 17:16

Jeff, do you do you do a version of that where they they do a little bit of self-reflection or self-critique in that process.

Jeff Przybylo: 17:23

In every speech, they do self-critique. And I think, as Tom said, I have them do that before they ever see anything I've said about them. And there's buttons in there where you can turn this stuff on and off. They do really well. I think it's a clever assignment based on some of the markers at times talking about. So you can set these markers ahead of time and you can write comments in there. So as you're watching, you're just clicking right. It's a really efficient way to give them fast, like gobs of feedback.

Derek Bruff: 17:51

It's almost like a preset tag, you can you can add that has a whole description with it.

Jeff Przybylo: 17:56

Yeah time stamped. But I know that's the obvious way to use it. The less obvious way, you know, we teach citing your sources, right? They've got a site, so many sources in the speech. The best way to do that is to show them other students doing it so you can give them a video and say, watch this. Here's a great student citing their sources. They won't watch it. But if you make it an assignment, upload it to go react and say, watch this speech. And every time the student cites a source, click the source marker. Every time they say um, click the um marker. So they have it and it's all stamped. So you can tell if they're scrubbing through there. It's really puts their feet to the fire. When I started doing this assignment, the the citing of sources skyrocketed.

Derek Bruff: 18:41

Oh, wow. Just because they got to see how other students did it.

Jeff Przybylo: 18:46

Yeah, and I've always known that's the way. Show them how to do it. But in an online class, how do you make them pay attention? And there is so much you can do with go react to hold their feet to the fire on some of this stuff that in early online classes they were just, you know, they just want to skip past things and just do the work, so to speak, and not do the learning. Go react kind of forces them to do some of that learning.

Thomas Fisher: 19:09

Yeah, yeah, I agree. The one I'm sorry, Derek, I had to jump in on that because when he said that when Jeff said that, I just thought of the jump in the number of views because obviously we can we can see the views on, on the videos and the videos that I have of students that came before the particular students I have now that are in canvas the week that the assignments due. Oh my gosh, watch the views go way up of previous candidates because they're watching it and they're like, Oh, what am I supposed to? But in the end they still have to do it. So to me, I always say to them, I don't care how many times you watch the video. I don't care if you do the same thing that's in one of their videos, because at the end of the day, you're the one that has to carry it out as that individual on camera.

Derek Bruff: 20:00

Yeah, Yeah. Well, and there's also sometimes I find that students get a little overwhelmed when you give them something to watch or something to read. Right. They're not quite sure. What should I be looking for? What should I be attending to? There's a lot here, right? And so if you give them a defined task, watch this sample. But here's a one thing I want you to do. I want you to find the citations and click the markers at those moments. Right. And it's a much more focused activity. And I think you end up with students who are more capable of complying with that activity and getting something out of it.

Jeff Przybylo: 20:31

The trick is grading.

Derek Bruff: 20:33

Yeah, I was wondering about that. I'm not familiar with GoReact's tools, but I assume it has ways to kind of quantify everything that the students are doing so that you can come up with some sort of grade.

Jeff Przybylo: 20:43

There's a like a dashboard that'll give you a I'd like the dashboard to be a little more complex, but you could see how many they clicked. And then I usually just pick three or four that I'm particularly looking for, and I could scan my eyes down the video and make sure they hit the big ones.

Thomas Fisher: 21:02

Yeah. And of course, for my classes I create the markers. And so I expect you heard me say those six markers that I gave for that one particular assignment. They've got to use all six of those, right? They have to use all six. They don't have to use them multiple times, but they are going to refer to those markers when they do them. And then, of course, the you know, really the teacher voice or economy of language are more summative at the end of their rehearsal video. But for instance, I have you can also build rubrics into this as well. Derek So it's not just markers, but there's a rubric that you can put in there.

Derek Bruff: 21:36

Just one practical note I think you both refer to this, but there in terms of capturing the video footage, especially if I'm not at my laptop, right. Is it just a matter of kind of propping your phone up somewhere useful and turning on the app?

Jeff Przybylo: 21:53

Yeah, you could. It has multiple ways of getting the video. You can record, you can a live recording and there's some utility in that for public speaking, but you can upload, you could put it on YouTube and then YouTube because the setting where it grabs it, you can do a zoom. But most of my students just recorded on their phone and then they open the website on their phone and upload it and.

Thomas Fisher: 22:15

Well, you can use a Swivl robot. I have I have my own Swivl and I loan it out to students.

Derek Bruff: 22:22

I had forgotten about Swivls.

Thomas Fisher: 22:24

Well, I love I love the wireless mic, so I'll I'll give it to them and you can as long as it's recording too, to Jeff's point to a phone or iPad or something like that, that you can then upload it to the app, which works through whatever LMS you use the learning management system and.

Derek Bruff: 22:44

Just using their swivel. My understanding is there's a wireless mic and I can it's like a tripod looking thing, but it'll actually kind of turn the phone around and track the speaker. Is that right?

Thomas Fisher: 22:57

Right. Because it's following the mic, right? So it's following the mic. The mic is connected to the swivel and therefore it will track you wherever you go within reason, right? You don't want to, you know, go behind it because it can't, you know, it'll get all turned around or whatever. You don't want to move too fast for the swivel, but it captures normal movement around the classroom. But like I said, the beauty of it is picking up the the sound, right? That that's probably I don't know about you, Jeff, but that's usually my biggest thing with students is making sure they test whatever they're using because I really see, especially as a EDTPA scorer, I want to hear more than I want to see, right? I'm never going to judge somebody on the quality of their video because I don't know what their using. You know, I don't know what device they have access to. But I will judge sound right if I can't hear it, how can I score it?

Jeff Przybylo: 23:49

Yeah, I usually do a couple of low stakes assignments where they if they screw that up, it doesn't matter. And then by time they get to the big ones, they've they've experimented with the technology.

Derek Bruff: 23:59

I want to circle back to something you said earlier. How if if a student were to do a speech and then you were to sit down with them for 5 minutes and give them some verbal feedback, they might not actually retain all that feedback. It's what I heard. Yeah. Whereas do you feel like something happens a little differently when you're giving that that your written feedback, anchored in the time codes of the speech? Do the students kind of receive that kind of feedback differently?

Jeff Przybylo: 24:26

I think so. I think more than that, it's the combination of the types of feedback. So on a seven minute speech, they're getting a very detailed rubric. Speaking of rubrics, Tom, mine's mine's a killer, it's got everything on there. They're getting markers, they'r getting written, cut feedback, timestamped, and then they're getting that video of me afterwards. And depending on the type of learner the student is, I think some respond better to the video, some respond better than written, some are you know, they're just taking the class to get it over with. They maybe look at the markers. It gives you a little chart, too, of where all your feedback was. And don't forget, you're also getting feedback from the members of your team and yourself. So just that's, I don't know, another way to give them feedback then and all of that. So something will land with everyone. I think.

Derek Bruff: 25:16

Jeff I'm curious because you mentioned having the the listeners right, the students peers provide feedback as well. What do you do to try to encourage students to give useful feedback on their peers speeches? I feel like that that doesn't happen by default.

Jeff Przybylo: 25:35

Yeah, I guess the simple answer is model it after after a couple of assignments, they're seeing the kinds of things I'm writing and they eventually start writing the same types of things. You remember this is freshman level, basic public speaking class. I do talk to them in my instructional videos about going a little bit beyond Good job, right? Most of my directions will say that your comments need to be ten words long that usually do it and by go react is it'll tell you the average length of their comments that they made in in the dashboard. So okay, that works there. And I also do I put them into teams of seven or eight students. You get your team and that's you're it's a longitudinal team. So it goes from the beginning of the class to the end. So they're getting to know each other by the end, they're getting more comfortable with each other. And I make it a competition of sorts. So they're they're, they're average. The team's average is compared to the other teams averages. And I give extra credit points. So they're actually starting to coach each other. And, you know, sometimes I feel like I'm not doing anything. It's just a set it, forget it and let it let them come to each other with this stuff. So I really like the peer stuff is great and I allow them to do the videos and stuff and at first they won't do it, but then they'll start seeing mine. And I tell them, You can either make ten comments of ten words each or you can make a video at the end. By the last couple of assignments, they're doing videos.

Derek Bruff: 27:03

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and you say you're not doing anything, but, you know, I feel like if if the students are doing some good self-assessment, if they're getting good feedback from their peers. Right. A lot of the learning is happening there. And then you kind of come in with the hard stuff, right? The stuff that the peers can't help with. I'm curious if you think about kind of how you use your time as an instructor. Would you consider these strategies time saving or do they take more time or is it is it kind of neutral? Are you just are you spending your time differently?

Jeff Przybylo: 27:38

I am giving the most comprehensive feedback of my career. It is. It is when we were doing this with pen and paper in the back of the classroom, you got from me what I could write on that piece of paper. And then then the students were writing and I'd go to my office and I'm on the floor sorting them out and stapling them and handing them back. This is this is made things not just more efficient, but but much more comprehensive. I'm telling them things that my hand cramps wouldn't allow me to tell them in the past. Now you know you're getting it. I think it's just a shift in time overall, I think.

Derek Bruff: 28:18

Yeah, I haven't used go react, but I have used perusal which is an annotation tool and you can have students and yourself annotate text or or video or audio. And I had the same kind of experience where every time I went back to it, I would find something a new way to use it, right? A different, a different small change in my approach that because it's it's kind of it's this kind of complex landscape of interaction and kind of figuring out what are your tools, what are your options, what's going to be most effective as a students? I think a little trial and error is entirely appropriate. Jeff, you had mentioned using GoReact in some of your other courses as well. Do those what are those assignments or active activities?

Jeff Przybylo: 29:02

You mentioned earlier this authentic nature of things. And in the light of AI and everything which we're seeing a lot of all of a sudden student writing has gotten really good. You know, I'm still I'm jury's still out with me. I don't know what to do about it. I usually just kind of I'll always be overly confident or overly compliment them hoping that they see that I know what they're doing. But to to combat that, I've been doing something. My my colleague Margaret Bilos invented something called a go reaction, she calls them. Okay. So where you might give them a prompt and have them write an essay, which now they take that prompt and they put it somewhere else and that gives them the essay. They have to just kind of jot down some notes. No reading, jot down some notes, and then they turn their camera on and they do an oral essay where they're, you know, just kind of going through it. So you can see that they're being authentic, that these are their thoughts.I do a lot of that with in my intercultural class, with videos or short films. I'll put a film up there and you could upload a film into it and then ask them, What are your thoughts? I'll give them some prompts ahead of time. Look for this and this and this. So what do you think? They watch it and then you can put I put like markers in there too. So, you know, put a marker every time you see this theory in practice. So it's really give instead of just watch this film and write me a little essay. Now they're interacting it with with it. Now they're talking about it afterwards and it kind of relates back to your time. It does take more time to to watch a student's three or four minute video than it does to read their paragraph essays. So the little bit of a trade off. But I can I can sit here for 20 minutes and give you all kinds of assignments we've done. I mean, that's such a creative tool and it's you just start thinking outside of the box and you'll come up with all kinds of stuff.

Thomas Fisher: 30:58

I think. I mean, it's been more time consuming for them, but I've increased the weight of those assignments because they will. And I always say this to them. So I may I do sort of like a go reaction type of assignment that Jeff referred to where I make a video that they have to watch. And in the video I'm describing what I want them to get out of, Get Better Faster, a book that we use. And they have to watch the video. And then from the chapter, they have to tell me some strategies that resonated with them and why. And they have to do it in 90 seconds or less. Because, again, I'm I they don't know this, but I'm teaching them economy of language. And so they have to do these videos. And I will say to them the first night of class that they come back and I've given everybody feedback and I'll say, how many people did it in one take and not a single hand goes up. And I said, You know who did it in one take? this guy one take. And they're like, You already knew what the assignment was going to be. And I was like, That's right. I said, And that goes back to that point, that intentionality, right? I knew exactly what I wanted and I was able to get it in my my videos one minute and 28 seconds. And so I got everything I wanted to get into that. And then they have to do it as well. But again, I'm testing things that they haven't even heard yet from me. Teacher voice, economy of language. I'm just trying to get them to read the chapters right and and to see how long it took. But the fact that they had to make multiple videos to do it, that's more time with the content, really. It's like, Oh, I don't like my video, but they in the video, they're still talking about the content from the book. So again, they're having to spend more time with the content and at the end they like the assignment. They're fine with it, you know what I mean? They loved that they didn't have to write something out, but they probably could have written something out to just me they probably could have written something out faster than all the takes they did. But eventually, though, they'll get a better feel for again. Now it becomes their routine because I'm expecting them to perform not in front of a camera anymore anymore, but in front of that live studio audience, as it were. Their their students, you know.

Jeff Przybylo: 33:21

And the more we do with video, it's it's meeting them where they are.

Thomas Fisher: 33:26

It's their lifestyle. Yeah. Yeah.

Jeff Przybylo: 33:28

It kills my heart that people don't want to write anymore, but at least they're thinking, you know, we're getting them there. They love video in 90 seconds. They love the short video.

Thomas Fisher: 33:37

Yeah. And to that point about the AI, I don't care, Derek. I don't care where they if they get lesson plans that are completely AI, I don't care because one of those activities one of those pedagogical activities they personally have to perform it for me on video. Nobody's doing that for them. So they may have gotten the lesson plans from somewhere, but they better understand and the content of the lesson, the purpose of the lesson. Right. What is the assessment that they're giving? Because they're going to have to perform it on camera for me and you can't fake that.

Derek Bruff: 34:17

Well. And I think also, you know, there's authentic can mean lots of different things. But I do feel like what I'm also hearing from you is it's the process that the students are going through, whether it's creating something, performing something, producing something, giving feedback, receiving feedback. Right. It's not it's not sterile. It's it's it's lively. It's engaged, right? It's with the people in your course community. I think there's a form of authenticity there with the students. It takes it away from busy work. And once you know you're doing it with people that you know matter to some degree, then it's less busy work and more authentic. Thank you both. It's been delightful. I appreciate having you on the podcast and getting to explore this tool and this space a little bit. I know some of our listeners are in more performance oriented films, but I know some are not, and I hope they got some good ideas from this team. So thanks for sharing. Appreciate it. And you're very, very welcome.

Jeff Przybylo: 35:11

It's been fun.

Thomas Fisher: 35:12

Yeah, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Derek Bruff: 35:17

That was Jeff Przybylo, chair of communication arts and head coach of the speech and debate team at Harper College and Thomas Fisher, clinical associate professor of education and university supervisor for student teachers at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Thanks to both of them for coming on the show and sharing their experiences with Go React. Hope you got some ideas for using go react, or similar tools in your teaching. I know this episode sounded a bit like an advertisement for GoReact, but (A), they didn't sponsor this episode or any other of the podcast and B, I'd love to hear about other tools out there for video feedback. If you know of any that you find useful, just let me know. You can click the link in the show notes to send me a text message or just email me at derek@derekbruff. org. Intentional teaching is sponsored by UPCEA. The online and Professional Education Association, In the show notes. You'll find a link to the UPCEA website where you can find out about their research, networking opportunities and professional development offerings. This episode of Intentional Teaching was produced and edited by me, Derek Bruff. See the show notes for links to my website, the Intentional teaching newsletter, and my Patreon and where you can help support the show for just a few bucks a month. If you found this or any episode of intentional teaching useful, would you consider sharing it with a colleague? That would mean a lot. As always, thanks for listening.