Rethinking Learning Podcast

About Rethinking Learning Podcast

Join Barbara Bray in conversations with inspirational educators, leaders, and difference-makers as they talk about their passion, purpose, and their journey to define and grow their WHY.

Publisher

Barbara Bray

Category

society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

23 May 2019

Latest episode

3 Aug 2026

Latest episodes

132 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   3 Aug 2026

   Building a Culture of Collaboration with Jamie Meola Saponaro (EP186)

   Subscribe: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7vU17tTLdSFc92XloRBKGA) | TuneIn (https://tunein.com/podcasts/Education-Podcasts/Rethinking-Learning-Podcast-p1087044/) | RSS (https://barbarabray.net/feed/podcast/) Jamie Saponaro is the Senior Director of Community and Professional Learning at ClassLink. She leads thought leader initiatives that bring educational communities together through summits, webinars, and professional learning events. Jamie is the host of LinkedUp: Breaking Boundaries in Education, a podcast dedicated to spotlighting boundary-breaking educators. She just launched her new book: Transforming Classrooms: Building a Culture of Collaboration. I just had to share a picture of Jamie and me at one of the high teas I mentioned in the podcast. I always ask my guests to share their WHY. What is your WHY? My father taught for 37 years – drafting, architectural drawing, woodshop, technology education, video production – and whenever anyone asked him what he taught, his answer was never that he taught any of those subjects – he always said ‘I teach students.’ That shaped everything about how I think about teaching. Are we teaching the ‘curriculum’? Or are we teaching the ‘students’? Students learn through instructional best practices that allow for differentiation. It is not about teaching the ‘stuff.’ It is about teaching and reaching individual learners. It is about building a community of students and the conditions for unique learning opportunities from not only their teacher, but also from each other. Can you share an overview of your background? A Jersey girl coming from a family of educators – my father was a teacher, my mother was a teacher, my husband was a teacher and is now a superintendent – education became my path as well, and I’ve been in it for over 35 years. I taught for a dozen years and then became a technology director. I went on maternity leave to start my family, and during that time, I wrote a book called Creative Projects Using Popular Computer Applications. Then, I founded my own company, InTECHgration, as an instructional strategist and technology integration specialist, providing professional learning for teachers and administrators through coaching, mentoring, and hands-on workshops rooted in research-based strategies and high engagement. I also volunteered as the president and executive board member of an education foundation for 10 years. Lead of ClassLink’s Thought Leader Initiatives The industry side of education came knocking, so I gradually took that on full-time and now lead ClassLink’s thought-leader initiatives that promote community building and professional learning for educational leaders through in-person and virtual summit events in pursuit of “linking leaders.” I am also the co-host of the podcast, “LinkedUp: Breaking Boundaries in Education,” and produce the podcast, “Perspectives: Finding Common Ground,” and additionally produce and host 3 webinar series. As for the rest of my family, my sister was the only one not in education, and my older daughter, Bella, followed in her footsteps in the fashion world. My other daughter, Lauren Rose, is an avionics product designer who is also my graphic designer for my second book, Transforming Classrooms: Building a Culture of Collaboration. (https://www.amazon.com/Transforming-Classrooms-Collaboration-Cultivating-Community/dp/B0H5NHP7L9/ref=sr_1_2?crid=L55ZNUQN851X&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.NQ9H6T77JUKC8KIo9K_dTWt2Opf0Aqagwybmb40UX1nd2aRAoylgfCo1SQBtWwVMCCvmDQ7fC78gt5V7qtnGrrvI5vG3jRsGbR9AKcRR3RzL7HQEPmrEIE-0lScUIlA5kjDXEkPzLx3iEOLQ3d2yd_zn4_3Ult-ZmJ6HNd7n4geuADMqezbrabgCFv5RTa6lCxiygR64jSZvTGLg9oAiiYVL7xLTLqlz-zSe3DmPra4.u9iBe1XyzcqtjWl7RovE4EeiiQA6N6I39icmwju_VUE&dib_tag=se&keywords=Transforming+Classrooms&qid=1784212562&sprefix=transforming+classrooms,aps,204&sr=8-2) What Your Book Shares with Teachers and How it Transforms Classrooms Most educators I have worked with have tried group work, and it failed every time. One student does all the work. Another disappears. A third turns it into a fight. The rest just wait for it to be over What I want teachers to know is that it is not a flaw in their abilities. It’s actually a design flaw. Group work fails because it was never designed to work. There is no structure requiring every voice, no accountability that reaches every student, no reflection that builds the skill for next time. Without those elements, we are not doing cooperative learning. We are just putting children in proximity and hoping for the best. Cooperative learning is different. It is a research-backed structure with 70 years of evidence showing it outperforms individual learning at a statistically significant rate — but only when all the components are present. When we implement it with fidelity, students do not just complete tasks together. They think together. They teach each other. They learn how to belong. (https://transformingclassrooms.com) Cooperative learning is different. It is a research-backed structure with 70 years of evidence showing it outperforms individual learning at a statistically significant rate — but only when all the components are present. When we implement it with fidelity, students do not just complete tasks together. They think together. They teach each other. They learn how to belong. That distinction is the entire foundation of my book Transforming Classrooms: Building a Culture of Collaboration (http://transformingclassrooms.com). I have seen it work so beautifully for students and seen classrooms flourish because of it, so I wrote the book to share the tips and simple tweaks to turn group work into true cooperative learning. _________________ The Foundation: Five Pillars of Cooperative Learning (TEAMS) To make cooperative learning stick — and to help educators remember what makes it work — I anchor the five research-backed pillars in the acronym TEAMS. T — Together (Positive Interdependence): We succeed together. No one coasts, no one carries everyone. E — Each Accountable (Individual Accountability): Every student has a real role. Coasting becomes impossible. A — Actively Supporting (Promotive Interaction): Students help each other succeed — not just sit near each other. M — Making Connections (Social Skill Development): students use active, listening, and productive talk to build the skills needed to properly communicate. S — Self-Reflecting (Team Processing): Teams pause and ask what is working and what needs to change. Each intentional design component is needed for the structure to work. Remove any one letter, and it becomes flawed group work. _________________ The Practice: Cooperative Learning Strategies The book includes over 40 cooperative learning strategies that are organized by usage of convergent vs divergent thinking as well as where each would fit within a lesson. They are grouped in a matrix and act as a menu to choose the right structure for the right moment. Technology in the classroom has become synonymous with cheating, shortcuts, and students outsourcing their thinking to a chatbot instead of doing it themselves. That worry is valid. But the answer is not to ban the tool. It’s to design the structure around it. An additional specialized framework that considers the integration of technology that I developed is called QUEST. _________________ QUEST is a five-stage framework for collaborative inquiry, design-thinking, and purposeful technology use within problem-based learning. Q — Question Generation — where students generate their own questions first, individually, then as a team, from their own curiosity and prior knowledge. Human thinking has to come before any tool or research. U — Unpack and Explore — where teams research using multiple sources, and yes, AI tools are now a part of this phase. There are roles involved that are part of the structured cooperative learning. E — Evaluate and Verify — and this is the AI literacy component. Teams apply what I call the ABCD Check to every source they find, including AI-generated content: Is it Accurate? Is there Bias? Is it Complete? Is it directly relevant? This phase is not consumption of information – it is an interrogation of it. S —Synthesize and Create — where teams take everything they have gathered, evaluated, and debated, and build something new together through genuine consensus and individual accountability ( the skills developed through ongoing cooperative learning). The PBL end product has to reflect every team member’s thinking — not just whoever talks the most. T —Think About Thinking – metacognition. Teams reflect on how they collaborated, not just what they produced. The whole model is built on the belief that technology should be a collaborative thinking partner, never a replacement for thinking. This framework gives teams of students the structure to use design-thinking and critical thinking to go on a problem-based learning “QUEST” collaboratively without losing their own voice in the process. The most important element in any classroom has always been the human beings in it. TEAMS and QUEST are structures, but the goal underneath them is about helping students think, connect, and grow collaboratively to prepare them for the future ahead. transformingclassrooms.com (http://transformingclassrooms.com) _________________ Jamie Saponaro‘s Contact Information LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamiesaponaro/ (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamiesaponaro/) Emails: intechgrationed@gmail.com (mailto:intechgrationed@gmail.com) jsaponaro@classlink.com (mailto:jamie@classlink.com) ***** The post Building a Culture of Collaboration with Jamie Meola Saponaro (EP186) (https://barbarabray.net/building-a-culture-of-collaboration-with-jamie-meola-saponaro-ep186/) appeared first on Barbara Bray (https://barbarabray.net).

2. 

   7 Jul 2026

   Sparking Curiosity, Building Confidence, and Moving PD Into Action with Olivia Odileke (EP185)

   Subscribe: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7vU17tTLdSFc92XloRBKGA) | TuneIn (https://tunein.com/podcasts/Education-Podcasts/Rethinking-Learning-Podcast-p1087044/) | RSS (https://barbarabray.net/feed/podcast/) Olivia Odileke is the founder of Kampus Insights Inc. and the creator of Lead Spark Team, a platform designed to help schools move professional development beyond inspiration and into measurable instructional change. Olivia also created the Spark Curiosity AI Coach, which helps educators spark student curiosity through short, inquiry-based learning experiences at the beginning of a unit. Your WHY My why is simple, but it runs deep: I want every student, teacher, and leader to love to wonder again. I want them to fall in love with growing their mind, discovering their potential, and nurturing the natural gifts already inside of them. Education has always been more than content delivery to me. At its best, learning should awaken something in us. It should invite students, teachers, and leaders to wonder, question, grow, and see new possibilities in themselves. That is the heart of my work. I believe curiosity is one of the most powerful things we can protect in education. When students are curious, they lean in. When teachers are curious, they become designers of learning instead of simply deliverers of content. And when leaders are curious, they create the conditions for people to grow. Through Kampus Insights CC, Lead Spark Team, the Spark Curiosity AI Coach, Spark Curiosity EDU, and Fearless Educator Radio, my work centers on one big idea: helping educators move from inspiration to action, and from action to meaningful instructional change. What challenged you to start Kampus Insights? What were the problems you saw that you knew you could make a difference? I started Kampus Insights CC because I kept seeing the same disconnect in schools. Teachers were attending professional development, getting inspired for the day, but then returning to classrooms where the actual shift in practice was hard to sustain. I understood that because I was a teacher. I worked in Title I schools for many years. I know what it feels like to care deeply about students while also feeling overwhelmed by pacing guides, testing pressure, behavior challenges, and the daily responsibility of trying to meet every learner’s needs. The problem I saw was that teachers did not need more information thrown at them. They needed practical tools, meaningful support, and small instructional shifts they could actually use. They needed professional development that did more than motivate them for a moment. They needed support that helped them change what happens in the classroom. That is what challenged me to build Kampus Insights and eventually Lead Spark Team. I wanted to help schools move beyond, “That was a great workshop,” into, “We can actually see this changing teacher practice and student engagement.” Lead Spark Team was created to help schools turn professional development into measurable instructional change. It gives leaders and teachers a way to focus on a specific instructional practice, reflect on implementation, gather evidence of growth, and build momentum over time. You can learn more about Kampus Insights here: https://kampusinsights.com (https://kampusinsights.com) Being curious is all about wonder and magic. How do you spark curiosity? I spark curiosity by helping teachers create moments where students get to wonder before they are told what to know. A lot of times in education, we start with the answer. We introduce the vocabulary, explain the concept, model the process, and then ask students to respond. But curiosity often happens before the explanation. It happens when students notice something, question something, make a prediction, compare ideas, or realize there is a gap between what they know and what they want to understand. That is where Micro Inquiry comes in. A Micro Inquiry Task is a short learning experience that gives students something to observe, discuss, sort, compare, predict, or figure out before the lesson begins. The teacher then uses guiding questions to help students make meaning together. It is like lighting a small spark before building the fire. The goal is not to teach the entire lesson in that moment. The goal is to create the reason students want to learn the lesson. To support teachers in creating these moments more easily, I created the Spark Curiosity AI Coach. The coach helps educators design short, curiosity-based learning experiences that can be used at the beginning of a unit or around challenging concepts. You can explore the Spark Curiosity AI Coach here: https://ai.sparkcuriosityedu.com (https://ai.sparkcuriosityedu.com) What does it look like when curiosity is sparked? What are some results and outcomes from this work? Some of the most meaningful outcomes from my work have come through the messages teachers send after they experience a Spark Curiosity session, use a Micro Inquiry Task, or try the Spark Curiosity AI Coach. I have had teachers share that they felt a difference in their classroom almost immediately. They noticed students talking more, wondering more, and participating in ways they had not seen before. Some teachers have shared that the approach helped them rethink how they start a lesson because they saw how powerful it can be to give students space to think before they are given information. Those moments matter to me because they show that instructional change does not always have to begin with something massive. Sometimes it begins with one small shift. One teacher might begin a unit with a question instead of a definition. Another might allow students to compare images, patterns, or scenarios before introducing vocabulary. Another might use the Spark Curiosity AI Coach to create a quick inquiry experience that gives students a reason to care about the content. The result is not just engagement for the sake of engagement. The deeper outcome is that students begin to see themselves as thinkers. Teachers begin to see themselves as designers of learning. And schools begin to see that professional development can lead to real classroom practice when teachers are supported with tools, structure, and follow-up. That is the kind of change I care about: practical, visible, and rooted in the everyday realities of teaching. What is Fearless Educator Radio? Fearless Educator Radio is music for teacher wellness and empowerment. I created it because so many educators are not just looking for another strategy or tool. They are looking for renewal. They need something that helps them breathe, reflect, reset, and remember that their work still matters. Fearless Educator Radio features original songs created for educators around the real emotional journey of teaching: stress, doubt, purpose, courage, joy, resilience, and healing. The broader platform is Fearless Educator Radio. One creative project within that platform is Fearless: Soundtrack of a Fearless Educator. The soundtrack tells the story of an educator moving from burnout to boldness—rediscovering her spark, reclaiming her voice, and stepping into confidence, purpose, and power. For me, music is another way to reach the heart of educators. Professional learning speaks to practice, but music can speak to the part of the educator that is tired, hopeful, discouraged, brave, and still showing up. You can listen and learn more here: https://fearlesseducator.com (https://fearlesseducator.com/) What’s next for you? What’s next is Spark Curiosity EDU: The Experience 2026, happening July 31 and August 1 in Austin, Texas. This is not a traditional sit-and-get conference. It is an immersive professional learning experience designed for educators who want to bring curiosity, creativity, and deeper student thinking back into learning. The experience brings together teachers, leaders, instructional coaches, and education innovators for two days of powerful conversations, hands-on learning, and practical strategies. We will focus on how to spark student curiosity, how to use AI in meaningful and responsible ways, and how to help educators reconnect with the joy and purpose of teaching. For me, Spark Curiosity EDU is more than an event. It is a space where educators can breathe, imagine, learn, and leave with something they can actually use. My hope is that people do not just leave inspired. I want them to leave equipped, connected, and ready to spark change in their own schools. Learn more about Spark Curiosity EDU: https://sparkcuriosityedu.com (https://sparkcuriosityedu.com/) About Olivia Odileke Olivia Odileke is the founder of Kampus Insights Inc. and the creator of LeadSpark Team, a platform designed to help schools move professional development beyond inspiration and into measurable instructional change. She is also the creator of the Spark Curiosity AI Coach, a tool that helps educators design short, inquiry-based learning experiences that spark student curiosity at the beginning of a unit or around challenging concepts. Olivia has over 15 years of experience as an educator, instructional coach, edtech trainer, and professional learning facilitator. She has worked extensively with Title I schools and has trained thousands of educators across the country. Her work focuses on curiosity-driven learning, instructional practice, AI-supported lesson design, teacher wellness, and helping schools create learning environments where students, teachers, and leaders grow with purpose. She is also the creator of Fearless Educator Radio, a music-for-teacher-wellness platform featuring original songs written to help educators reduce stress, restore clarity, and reconnect with why they started. Connect with Olivia Kampus Insights CC:https://kampusinsights.com (https://kampusinsights.com) Lead Spark Team:https://app.leadsparkteam.com (https://app.leadsparkteam.com) Spark Curiosity EDU: https://sparkcuriosityedu.com (https://sparkcuriosityedu.com) Spark Curiosity AI Coach:https://ai.sparkcuriosityedu.com (https://ai.sparkcuriosityedu.com) Fearless Educator Radio:https://fearlesseducator.com (https://fearlesseducator.com) Email: (mailto:olivia@kampusinsights.com) olivia@kampusinsights.com (mailto:olivia@kampusinsights.com) LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/oliviaodileke (https://www.linkedin.com/in/oliviaodileke) ***** “I want every student, teacher, and leader to love to wonder again. The future belongs to the curious.” The post Sparking Curiosity, Building Confidence, and Moving PD Into Action with Olivia Odileke (EP185) (https://barbarabray.net/sparking-curiosity-building-confidence-and-moving-pd-into-action-with-olivia-odileke-ep185/) appeared first on Barbara Bray (https://barbarabray.net).

3. 

   3 Mar 2026

   Learning Experiences Worth Savoring with Kat Crawford (EP184)

   Kat Crawford, an Instructional Designer and Justice and Accessibility Advocate, specializes in designing innovative digital solutions, facilitating professional learning, and supporting the transformation of school systems to enhance student engagement. The post Learning Experiences Worth Savoring with Kat Crawford (EP184) (https://barbarabray.net/2026/03/02/learning-experiences-worth-savoring-with-kat-crawford-ep184/) first appeared on Grow Your WHY (https://barbarabray.net).

Who has been a guest on Rethinking Learning Podcast

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Jerri Kemble
• Patrick Cerria
• Michael Wesely

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

YouTube views

6,949

Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

11 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 65 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

67

Social presence

0

YouTube

74

Engagement

81

Contact Rethinking Learning Podcast

Guest appearances

Books guests

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