Supporting Students in the Aftermath of the 2020 Election with Youth In Front

This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined in a live webinar by members of the Youth in Front team. They answer questions and share reflections and resources that they believe can help educators process this moment themselves and with their students.

“So I've been doing a 10 minute election update every day...but again, really thinking about dosage and trying to just think about what is the right amount to not sort of overwhelm you or drown you in this, but also to make sure you feel like you have space to engage. And if it takes more than 10 minutes, then we take more than 10 minutes. But trying to just plan in doses, as opposed to entire lessons about the election or the electoral college, which is how I would have taught it in person. In person, there would have been a whole voting unit and we would have gone through every element of it. I didn't feel like that was the right move in this context, and so I didn't. So I've done these sort of 10 minute doses.”
- Neema Avashia

Show Notes

This week on TeachLab, host Justin Reich is joined in a live webinar by members of the Youth in Front team. They answer questions and share reflections and resources that we believe can help educators process this moment themselves and with their students.

“So I've been doing a 10 minute election update every day...but again, really thinking about dosage and trying to just think about what is the right amount to not sort of overwhelm you or drown you in this, but also to make sure you feel like you have space to engage. And if it takes more than 10 minutes, then we take more than 10 minutes. But trying to just plan in doses, as opposed to entire lessons about the election or the electoral college, which is how I would have taught it in person. In person, there would have been a whole voting unit and we would have gone through every element of it. I didn't feel like that was the right move in this context, and so I didn't. So I've done these sort of 10 minute doses.” - Neema Avashia

In this episode we’ll talk about:

Introductions
How post-election has looked in K-12 school community
How COVID affects election education
The multiple views of student activists
Civic education opportunities with high student awareness
Teacher transparency on personal political views
Grounding conversations in specific texts
Teaching Challenging Issues in Uncertain Times: Strategies for Online and Hybrid Teaching online course

Our Guests

Neema Avashia from Boston Public Schools

Kevin Dua from the Cambridge Public Schools

Joshua S Littenberg-Tobias from the MIT Teaching Systems Lab

Sara O'Brien from Youth In Front

Resources and Links

Watch the full webinar

Check out Conversations Across Differences with Meira Levinson

Check out Teaching Challenging Issues in Uncertain Times: Strategies for Online and Hybrid Teaching

Check out Youth in Front: Understanding and Supporting Student-led Activism

Check out Justin Reich’s new book!

Transcript