EP290 The surprising research about how talent is developed (with Dr. Rishi Sriram)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Release Date: 11/12/2023
EP301 5 ways to make an old lesson feel fresh and interesting again (with Betsy Potash of Spark Creativity)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Bored with your curriculum or instructional routines? I’m talking with Betsy Potash of the Spark Creativity Podcast about easy ways to make things feel fresh and interesting again. Often we switch things up in our teaching to keep ourselves from getting bored. But, too much change can create unnecessary work for us. It can also waste class time for students as they spend more energy on figuring out how to complete an assignment than on practicing the skills we want them to learn. So, Betsy’s identified 5 open-ended activities that you can add to your rotation of go-to strategies, and...
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EP300 Teaching through hormonal changes: post-partum, perimenopause, and beyond (with Dr. Jen Gunter)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
This topic is definitely new territory for my Truth for Teachers podcast, and I was initially hesitant to include it because I didn’t want to overshare. However, as I began to talk to other women about this, I realized how many of us really didn’t have a good grasp on the way hormones impact our daily function. The experience is so individualistic, and no two bodies are alike. I realized that the more folks talk about this, the better informed we'll be. So in this episode, I’m sharing my own journey with perimenopause and brain fog. It took me many months to recognize what was...
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EP299 A spring cleaning classroom guide: what if you didn’t need all that STUFF to teach well?
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Do you refuse to throw anything out because you MIGHT need it one day, or find yourself holding on to worthless stuff “just in case” you need it? In this episode, I’ll share 10 things you can get rid of in your classroom this spring to make space for what you actually need and use. And, I’ll help you establish a mindset of abundance rather than scarcity, so you can approach spring cleaning with a perspective that will help you feel good rather than apprehensive about getting rid of the things you worked so hard to accumulate: I like to streamline and simplify how my classroom runs. I...
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EP298 Clock out confidently: 5 tips to get out the door at contract time (with June Link)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
This episode features a sneak peek from one of the upcoming sessions. You’ll hear from a teacher named June Link, whose session is called, “Clock out confidently: 5 tips to get out the door at contract time.” In this episode, June shares some helpful principles and mindset shifts, along with the exact process she used to carve out time for a new demand in her workload. June and her colleagues were supposed to implement a new socio-emotional learning curriculum, but needed to find time to explore it, write lesson plans, and figure out how to integrate the new materials into everything...
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Join us for the FREE 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Online Summit in April
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
It's the only event focused entirely on saving teachers TIME! Learn from current K-12 teachers as they share their best tips for working more effectively, efficiently, and enjoyably. is an online course I first created in 2015 (with a total update in 2020), and we’ve now had tens of thousands of teachers complete the course. With so many different personality types and teaching contexts, the amount of new ideas to spring out of the course was inevitable. I’ve always been impressed by the tweaks, offshoots, extensions, and transformations teachers have done as they’d made my ideas their...
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EP297 Feedback first: How 2 different teachers help students focus on learning, not grades
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Teachers spend so much time giving feedback to students, but often kids don’t internalize it. They tune out the carefully-crafted written comments on their work, briefly register the grade they earned, and move on. So how can we help students care about improving their skills and take time to reflect deeply on their learning? In this episode, you’ll hear how two different teachers have reimagined their instruction to make that possible. It’s a sneak peek at two sessions from the upcoming 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Online Summit, a FREE event that is focused entirely on saving teachers...
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EP296 Thinking creatively about tough problems: the power of diffuse thinking for you and your students
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Have you ever noticed how breakthroughs often come when you're not actively trying to find a solution? That's diffuse thinking at work: a relaxed state in which creativity flourishes. On today’s episode of Truth for Teachers, I’ll share how stepping back can lead us forward. It turns out that intense concentration isn't always the best approach to problem solving, and we can instead let our minds wander through the meandering paths of diffuse thinking. Focused thinking is a bit like a flashlight—intense & concentrated. Diffuse thinking is like ambient room lighting—gentle &...
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EP295 Can banning phones in school help solve the youth mental health crisis? (with Dr. Jean Twenge)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
There has been a significant increase in mental health issues among young people in America since 2012, including anxiety, depression, self-harm, suicide attempts, and suicide. Contrary to popular belief, these trends started before the pandemic, with rates of major depression among teens doubling between 2011 and 2019. Girls and young women are more likely to experience these issues, and the gender gap has been widening. The introduction of smartphones and social media around 2012 is believed to be a major factor in the decline of mental wellbeing, as it has led to less face-to-face...
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EP294 What does it mean to “teach like yourself’ in 2024? (with Dr. Gravity Goldberg)
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
“Making a conscious and intentional effort to tap into your own personal power and being courageous” is the way today’s guest defines “teaching like yourself.” I’m talking with Dr. Gravity Goldberg, whom you might remember from a 2019 interview I did, which ended up being one of the most downloaded Truth for Teachers episodes ever. It’s Episode 171, called “Teach like yourself: Why YOU are the person your students need most.” Gravity has over 20 years of teaching experience, including positions as a science teacher, reading specialist, third grade teacher, special educator,...
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EP293 When students don’t want to think for themselves or put in effort, try this.
Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers
Do you feel like self-advocacy among students is a pervasive problem? As in, if students don’t know what to do, they won’t ask questions or seek out more information … they’ll just sit there and do nothing. If something is challenging, they don’t seem to be interested in improving their skills, or learning for the sake of learning. They just give up. In response to this, many teachers feel like they have to work harder than their students are working. They have to keep going the extra mile to make lessons personalized and engaging and put all these additional supports and...
info_outlineWhat if there was no such thing as innate talent? That’s the argument my guest today is making: that talent is not a cause, but an outcome. It is cultivated, developed, and learned.
I’m talking with Dr. Rishi Sriram, who serves as Associate Professor of Higher Education & Student Affairs for the Department of Educational Leadership at Baylor University. His research interests include the development of talent and college student retention, engagement, achievement, and learning, and he is currently working on a book about the development of talent.
Rishi has identified what he calls “The 5 Ms to Becoming Great” which we unpack in detail together:
- Mindset (what you believe)
- Myelin (how you learn)
- Mastery (what you do)
- Motivation (how much you care)
- Mentorship (how you are taught)
We also discuss the benefits of productive struggle and its impact on the brain, and how teachers can support students who resist tasks that require a lot of effort and concentration.
Additionally, Rishi offers advice for working with students who don’t appear to be interested in becoming great at anything or have tangible goals for themselves. He shares important information that educators can use to help students pursue greatness and be willing to put forth the effort to increase their talents.
Rishi is a fascinating guest who explains the research around talent in such an engaging, clear, practical way. Listen in to learn more about how to develop your own talents, and support students in becoming great at the things they want to do in life, too.
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