(upbeat music) ♪ Yeah the simple things in life ♪ - [Lillian] I'm Lillian Vasquez with Lifestyles on KVCR.

On today's show, we'll talk about the Learn With Me project, an educational collaboration with the San Bernardino County superintendent of Schools and KVCR TV.

- Why don't we pop into room 57 and see what book Ms. Sommer is reading aloud today.

I bet it's a good one.

- Hi, I'm Ms. Sommer and I'm so happy you could join us today.

- My guest is Assistant Superintendent of Innovation and Engagement branch for the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Stephanie Houston.

Welcome and thank you for joining us.

- Thank you, I'm so glad to be here.

- Share how this project, Learn With Me was created or came about.

- Sure, so here at the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools office, the innovation and engagement branch is really the outward facing partner engagement branch of the organization.

So we work with our partner agencies to ensure that we are supporting our countywide vision to really make San Bernardino County the place that people wanna work, play, and live, and with that we know education is such a huge piece and a huge component of that.

So when we look at the Learn With Me project and really what we endeavored to begin, it was really based on the urgent need that we had that was identified last March of 2020 and we were all in that kind of urgency mode of how can we best meet the needs of our communities and our students as we're in this pandemic.

And we knew, we know that KVCR and the PBS content is tried and true.

And we know that it's content that's solid for kids.

And we also knew that there were quite a few kids that were going to be accessing content through that broadcast.

We also wanted to provide additional supports to that content broadcast by doing some supplemental lessons and tasks and extended learning.

And so we started with that back in March.

And through that, we discovered that although we knew all of our students had access to devices and WiFi despite what some of our internet providers would tell us, we have some WiFi dead zones in our neighborhoods.

And with that, we knew that we needed to kinda double down on that focus associated with broadcast.

And we also wanted to increase and show our communities, our faces, our teachers, our lessons in that broadcast lineup.

There's a lot going on, a lot of moving parts, a lot of ambiguity and all along the way we were trying to find those common threads, those common themes that we could pull through to focus on something that would be doable, effective, and something that we could potentially use as a catalyst for more.

- Do you have any buttons on your shirt?

I have buttons on my shirt.

Will you help me count them?

One, two, three.

Hey, I've got three buttons, like we had three letters in the word cat.

Thank you for counting with me.

- [Lillian] My guest is Sommer Mendoza.

She was once a kindergarten teacher.

Now she's an instructional coach with the Fontana Unified School District and she's one of the hosts of the Learn With Me projects.

It's great to see you again.

- Thanks for having me, Lillian.

- Okay, so you have been very involved in this project.

I wanna know, first of all, how did you get involved?

- Well, so our former associate superintendent, Miki Inbody, recently got a promotion and she's working for the County Department of Education, and my name kind of came up as an option for a teacher to try something new and innovative.

And when I was approached by the project, I thought let's try it out and see how it goes.

- And you obviously killed it.

In fact, I'm gonna tell you about that in a little bit because I have four groovy buttons running in my head all the time and Rhyme Time.

What did you think of the experience?

From what they explained to you of what it was going to be to when you came into the studio and you sat on the set?

- You know, the whole process actually happened quite quickly, in my opinion, we had lots of time to develop and design the lesson, but I felt like from start to finish, it was like a whirlwind.

It was exciting, it was new, and I just loved being able to realize that I could connect to a wide audience of kiddos out there and not just be contained into a one little classroom.

So it was a great experience.

- What surprised you about working on the set?

- I had never been on a TV set before, so it was just really surreal to kinda see the behind the scenes.

I loved that aspect of it and then loved the green room set up, when I came in, I felt like, you know, a true TV star and the whole staff was super accommodating and really welcoming and it was a great experience.

- Rhyme Time.

I wanna share one of my favorite books with you today.

It's called, "Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons".

- [Lillian] Your part in this is more literacy and you chose to read the book, "Pete the Cat and his Four Groovy Buttons".

I can't say that without sing songing it that way now because I've heard you say it so many times and it's infectious, right?

So first of all, why did you choose this book?

And what are you wanting the children to learn in your lesson plan?

- Well, and so I'm a huge proponent of early literacy.

I think it's incredibly important to get books in kids' hands as early as possible and being a former kindergarten teacher, Pete the Cat was a huge portion of my kinder classroom and it just really incites the love of learning with music and math in this particular story.

So I just wanted to bring a book to life and really instill the love of reading for kiddos.

- Now, I know we had a script there for you but it felt like you've read this book before and you've must have read it to kindergartners before, right?

So when you were in the classroom and you were reading this book, what kinda feedback did you get from the students that you thought maybe it would be great with a bigger audience as you just described watching it, would probably have the same emotion either in the classroom or at home?

- Well, I love the musical aspect of it.

It's very catchy and kids can join in with the fun.

They feel like they're a part of the read aloud with you.

I also love the fact that it accessing mathematics as well as literature.

So it's kind of blending the two and then who doesn't love an adorable cat with a coat and buttons on a skateboard.

I mean, that's like it sells itself.

- You really brought a lot of emotion to it and fun to it.

When the project was over, did you feel like you accomplish what you wanted for the kiddos that we'll see it either on television or if the County shows it to all the school districts as well?

- You know, when I approached the project of just being myself and just, I get into a kind of teaching mode when I'm in front of kids or when I know that I'm speaking to children out there regardless if it's a camera or they're sitting right on the carpet right in front of me, I get into this mode of I just know I need to be dynamic so that I can encapsulate them in the learning process with me and it just brings them in and wants them to get more.

So I kind of got into that mode and hopefully my passion for learning and for reading really came across through the camera.

Now, before I even show you the book, let's make a prediction.

What do you think the story will be about?

I'll say the title again, "Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons".

You're so smart, kiss your brain scholars.

Yes, it's about a cat and his buttons.

- We talked about predictions, teaching that at the kindergarten level.

What do we that is?

You talked about the author, the settings, the illustrator, all those words.

And you're really talking to a group of maybe kindergarten or first grades.

Are those too big of words or are they something that's too great time to instill it in their minds right now?

- Oh, no, I think the more that we can use academic vocabulary and really for, use them ahead of time, you teach them what it is and they begin to use it in their everyday vocabulary, I think it's something spectacular when someone walks in and they hear your kindergartners, your five-year-olds, you know, using words like prediction, mathematicians, author, and illustrator.

And I think it's incredibly important for us to continue to use those academic words.

So then they do just become a part of their everyday speech and, you know, they can as the years go on it's not something that they have to learn, they know it, they have that foundational skill.

- Okay, and some of the comments, the kids where do they typically come in?

What question would you ask where they would typically come in and give you an answer?

- You know, I think any student, any child is a reader because you don't have to know how to necessarily read the words to read a story.

And so we just start with, let's take a look at the picture.

Where do you think the setting is?

Who are the characters?

Really getting them involved in just taking a look at the pictures, which, sometimes even as older kids or adults we'll turn the page and just we wanna get to the story instead of really looking at the hard work that the illustrator put into it and just taking a look at those aspects before we even get into the actual story.

- Well, I think personally, especially when I was young, the pictures really worked for me.

If I didn't really like the pictures or they didn't look friendly or inviting to me I moved on to another book.

I probably also looked at the size of the letter, if they were pretty big, I would take it, if they were pretty small, I would dump it, you know, but the pictures are really important, in "Pete the Cat and his Four Groovy Buttons", it's pretty simple.

Now, moving forward, do you have a book in mind or will you do this again?

How do you feel about this?

- You know, if I am given the opportunity I would absolutely love to do this again.

And I would bring another one of my books to the forefront.

I'm a huge, I've got lots of books that you can imagine as a primary school teacher that I'd love to bring out in the open and really get the kids involved in reading.

And I love series of books.

So Pete the Cat, there's a lot of books in that series, and I think once you get a kid hooked on a series then there it's just, they roll with it and wanna read all the books about Pete the Cat or elephant and Piggie.

- Right, and before we end, can I put you on the spot and say can you sing the song for me?

- Oh, I don't mind singing the song for you.

So Pete the Cat says, my buttons, my buttons, my four groovy buttons, my buttons, my buttons, my four groovy buttons.

I wish we had some music.

- Hi, Ms. Sommer.

- Hey, it's Eddie - You wanna sing it?

One, two, three, - My buttons, my buttons, my four groovy buttons, my buttons, my buttons, my four groovy buttons.

- My favorite computer science teachers from Cucamonga School District, Ms. Lindsay and Mr. Darren are in computer lab 11 today.

So come on and learn with me.

- Welcome to the computer lab, I'm Mr. Darren and I'm here with Ms. Lindsay.

- Hi, we are so excited to have you here in the lab with us today.

- My guests are Lindsay Munoz and Darren Alcala.

Lindsay is a third grade teacher and Darren is the District Technology Coach.

They are both with Cucamonga School District and they are the teachers and the hosts of the lab portion of Learn With Me how did you get involved if each of you get involved in the project?

- Our tech department head, Bobby Applegate, has a connection with Dr. Stephanie Houston who works at the County.

And in conversation about this project, he said, I have two people in my district that I think would be amazing for this project and quickly sent the email to Darren and I and immediately we were both like, did you get that email?

It's yes, let's do this.

- Well, I always, you know, take an opportunity, especially like in the role I'm in to make contact and connections like with people and stuff.

And we just saw this project as an opportunity to really connect with a lot much larger audience than we would've ever had been able to do without it.

- What did you think of the experience having been in the classroom, been technically involved and then coming into this TV studio, what was the experience like for you?

- Well, I, you know, we've done a little bit of like video stuff within our district and stuff, so but getting the opportunity to really work on like a professional stage and everything was just like awesome and fantastic and stuff.

And to get to see some of the things that we talked about like in theory and in practice and get to see it implemented at the professional level was really great to see and the crew and everybody was really nice and it was just a whole great experience all around.

- Yeah, I agree.

It was really a fantastic experience.

You know, you see, you know, models of that on TV.

And we have described it to our students many times when we're doing our own little green screen movies here you know, within our classrooms.

So to see it come to life with all the professional equipment, with all of the amazing team that you guys have there in the studio, it was a fantastic experience.

- And what are hoping the students and the whoever views it learn from the project from your portion of the lab?

- Well, computer science is like a big like issue for us.

There's a lot of like inequity in computer science right now and looking the demographics within our area, especially those under-representative which is a lot of Latin X students a lot of African-American students and stuff.

And so we've kind of started really kinda pushing it within our district 'cause a lot of our students within our district make up that demographic.

And so I'm hoping, you know some students early on get access and get interested in computer science and kinda see that as an option as a pathway for them later on.

So using this as a vehicle to kind of connect with students to kind of start introducing some concepts and really kinda show some educators too that you don't have to be like a total like master of computer science to start doing some computer science concepts stuff within your classroom - Yeah, I totally agree.

And being a female, you know it's historically been a male dominated field and it's something that I really love and enjoy.

So to me to bring that content to our young ladies is also a huge motivator for me.

I truly, it was a great experience to be able to take like this content, computer science that we love so much and enjoy so much and bring it to life for all these little guys.

- Here's, what's a little different in that we were in the studio and you were out remotely where you did your robot dance - Right step, left step, do the robot dance.

- That was fun.

- You did a great job following directions.

- Yeah we followed our programming.

Now let's do some more programming using block coding.

- Robot dance.

- What Do you leave with, what experiences do you leave with of what did you learn along the way that maybe you didn't know before you started the project?

- I think I had like a general idea of the amount of equipment and time and considerations that go into like shooting in an outdoor setting versus shooting inside of a studio, but to see actually all the equipment that the crew had to lug out for such a short snippet of the show and the time and attention that gets put into where the microphone is, so that the sound is just right.

It really, it really was amazing.

- And Darren?

- Yeah, I think the amount of detail work and that kind of goes into it 'cause there's little nuances of stuff, you know, it's like don't look over here, Darren, you're supposed to eyes over here.

Making sure you're staying focused.

That's tough you know, you get used to presenting and doing stuff for like a certain way.

But you know, working in front of the camera is a little bit different experience.

You did a great job coding today.

As you get older, the problems you will solve will get more challenging to code but if you keep working hard and don't give up you can figure it out.

- What do you think the students are looking for?

'Cause I know Lindsay, you are in the classroom you're third grade teacher, Darren, you, I don't know if you have as much contact with students every day, but I know your students are looking forward to seeing Ms. Munoz or Ms. Lindsay on TV or whatever it is.

Tell me what they're thinking about.

- Yes, they were so excited.

They are telling me that their teacher is gonna be famous and my heart just could burst with how excited they are that their teacher could potentially be on TV and be on a YouTube channel and all of these things just their excitement about it.

And then when I told them what the topic was, they were like, that's your favorite thing?

You got to do your favorite thing, and you got to be on TV.

- So what age group were you shooting for?

What age group are you talking to Darren?

- You know, we start to see kinda coding or computer science stuff start to kinda trickle about in like the upper grade area but really kind of help show like both students and teachers that is accessible at a much younger kinda grade level span and stuff into it.

And so hopefully, you know, kind of as both students and teachers kinda watch the videos, they start to see how some of these concepts can be implemented at that young age in there.

- And I think I'm just gonna take the ants on a log example because that was more about following directions, right?

You have to do this.

If you skip a step, something's gonna go wrong right?

And so it was following directions, not necessarily how Lindsay makes ants on a log but that you follow directions because you have the point where you told her to scoop out the peanut butter.

Well, she used her hands.

You didn't say use a spoon, right?

Or the put the raisins on the log.

So she did, she put the raisins on the log, very literal.

And so I think that's kind of what it was explaining and sharing it.

- Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of like connection between that kinda rule following that you kinda see, you know just in normal in life and stuff but then also in computer science and with the computer science in particular you have to be like precise and when you're not, you know that's when the bugs occur, you know, things go wrong and you have to go back and like, oh, I forgot to add this line in or this coding block in there and to kind of fix that.

So yeah, it's kind of getting to that area.

- I feel that is probably when doing any type of coding computer science activity with students that tends to be the area where, when it doesn't work right the first time, it doesn't go their way, trying to really instill that sense of perseverance and that troubleshooting and problem solving and critical thinking versus just the oh, it didn't work, I'm done.

And for the little guys, you know, that gives them that a like real life example, you forgot to tell me to use the utensil, so I just used what I had - Yeah, really good.

So are you ready for, you know, the second show are you ready to come back and do you have plans of what you would like to do or teach if you were asked to do it again?

- Would absolutely love to come back and do it again.

And, you know, creating the content for this show, thinking about time restrictions there were things that we were hoping to present about in our time span that just didn't make it this time.

So I feel we would have some more kind of specific computer science standards we could address should we be asked to come back and do another episode and kind of take the kiddos even farther into the content area.

- Well, very good.

Lindsay Munoz and Darren Alcala are with the Cucamonga School District.

They are two of the teachers that are in the computer lab with this new project, Learn With Me.

Thank you so much for joining us.

- Thank you for having us.

- Don't forget, we got to enjoy some of Mr. Darren's great jokes too.

- Whatever.

- We hope that you take what you learned with us today, and you go make an impact on the world.

- You were the catalyst behind this, and when I've talked to the teachers, you know, they said that you talk to other districts and you you brought this project together.

What did you envision with Learn With Me?

- The vision was to show the voice how the voice of our communities, of our teachers, the teachers that our kids are familiar with, the schools that our kids know and recognize and can point to and see themselves in like that's my school, that's my teacher.

That was my brother's teacher my cousin's teacher, you know, whatever.

So that there was a connection that there was a relevance to the project that's different from the simple yet complex relevance of content specific.

We, again know the content that's available through PBS is solid.

And it was about more than that.

The goal I think is that this is the beginning.

We've got some lessons learned.

How can we use this to scale up and do more?

Is this, hopefully this is the beginning of a content library that is representative of our communities representative of what we are in San Bernardino County?.

What we look like what we sound like in San Bernardino County.

And there are other sort of large bodies of work that could fit into this type of a model, this type of a pilot that we've developed.

And so the hope is to be able to continue it and take those lessons learned, get better at it and create a system that can be a little bit more automated a little bit quicker to respond just in general.

I mean, my goodness sakes, we had no idea how much prep went into development of this kinda content.

So there was a lot to learn.

And so just taking that and moving it forward.

- This sounds like it's the beginning of a beautiful relationship, at least with the school district and KVCR and with the hopes that we can produce more.

Terrific, well, I'm excited about the project.

- I'm over the moon.

- I'm grateful to, to share it with the public to share the finished version with you for you to see everything and to share it with our community.

So Dr. Houston, thank you so much for allowing us to be a part of the project and to better support our community in the field of education.

- Thank you so much.

And I really appreciate the partnership and the commitment and the passion that was just so instantaneously.

Like, you know, you grab hold of it, as if it were yours and I can't thank you enough for that.

Thank you so much.

- Thank you for learning with me today.

And remember, every day is a new chance to make an impact.

Learning with you has been lots of fun.

- Did you hear that?

It sounds like our adventure is over for today.

Remember your next adventure is just a book away.

- Get out there and become producers of the newest game or helpful app.

- Until next time.

- [Lillian] This program was originally produced for 91.9 KVCR Radio.

(upbeat music) ♪ Yeah the simple things in life ♪