Episode 6.4: Tell the Truth and Cover Your Assets

“My students can’t” sounds like a fact, but it usually hides something else: we don’t yet have a clear way to see what students can do, name it, and build on it. We dig into that problem with two of our favorite educators, John Hayes and Victoria Holt, who bring their conference session “CYA: Cover Your Assets” to the mic and make it immediately usable for teachers, coaches, and administrators.

Link to the article that John mentions in the conversation.

If you want practical inclusive math classroom ideas that respect students’ abilities and raise the level of mathematical practice, this conversation is for you. Subscribe, share this with a colleague, and leave a review so more teachers can find it.

The More Math for More People Podcast is produced by CPM Educational Program.
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Transcript

Welcome And Summer Small Talk

Joel 0:17

Listening to the More Math for More People podcast, an outreach of CPM Educational Program. Boom

Misty 0:31

All right. July. July is an interesting month. I feel like,

Joel 0:36

Because?

Misty 0:37

well, it's just like, it's the, it's like the full month that's summer. feels like it's always, like, warm and and

Joel 0:49

In the northern hemisphere, yes. yeah.

Misty 0:52

sure, for sure, for sure, Yes. We are Northern Hemisphere centric, just to be

Joel 0:55

That's true.

Misty 0:56

Yeah, I don't know. It's, it's just, I just have this like, it's lazy, July feels like, in my mind. But it's, it's the 7th of

Tell The Truth Versus Being Rude

Misty 1:05

July. That's

Joel 1:07

Seven seven

Misty 1:08

seven 26. But seven seven. And what day is it today?

Joel 1:14

It is Tell the Truth Day

Misty 1:16

Nuh-uh

Joel 1:19

Uh-huh.

Misty 1:21

I don't, I don't know what to respond to that.

Joel 1:22

don't-- didn't know how to respond either.

Misty 1:26

Tell the Truth Day. Interesting. Okay, so it's like a day just set to, like, encourage people to tell the truth? About what? About everything? I'm convinced people should not tell the truth all the time

Joel 1:39

It's urging us to reflect on the power and importance of honesty.

Misty 1:43

Okay.

Joel 1:45

So it champions integrity in all interactions from personal relationships to public discourse

Misty 1:52

Mm-hmm. Okay. I'm not against honesty. I'm definitely not against integrity. Those are not exactly the same thing to me.

Joel 2:01

Mm-hmm

Misty 2:02

But I think that there's times when honesty is used as an excuse to actually be rude. Yeah. "I'm just being honest,"

Joel 2:11

Yeah.

Misty 2:12

you know?

Joel 2:13

Don't take this the wrong way.

Misty 2:14

Just being honest. Yeah. But, and I, and there are certainly many things that I think we think all the time. Like, I would not want to actually, like, know the thoughts in people's heads

Joel 2:23

Ooh, that'd be tough. That'd be a awful superpower

Misty 2:25

Mm-mm. No. No, thank you. But I do agree that we should in general be true and

Joel 2:33

Yeah

Misty 2:36

Tell The Truth Day

Joel 2:37

Tell the truth. They-- And I was just thinking of there's, there's like a, what would you call it? Like, in speech, something that you always say, like an "um" or a "like." I find that

Misty 2:48

fillers.

Joel 2:48

word fillers. So would this be a word filler? I hear it oftentimes when somebody will say, "Well, if I'm honest," and then they'll say what they're gonna say. Or to tell the truth. You're kinda like, "Well, I hope you always tell the truth."

Misty 3:03

Yeah. I think it's sort of like a, it's a segue. It's kind of like, "Hmm, now that I really think about it," or I'm just, it's the, again, it's the prefacing that like I might say something that's gonna upset someone

Joel 3:16

Mm-hmm. Like feelings? Yeah.

Misty 3:20

Yeah.

Joel 3:21

Or d- it might upset me

Misty 3:22

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joel 3:23

to have to say it.

Misty 3:25

Mm-hmm.

Joel 3:25

Can you think of any famous liars?

Misty 3:29

famous liars. Wasn't like, I don't know why this comes to my head, W.C. Fields

Joel 3:34

Oh

Misty 3:35

I don't know if he's a famous liar or not

Joel 3:37

Who's, who's-- Is that who did the "War of the Worlds"?

Misty 3:41

No, no, no, no. That's Orson Welles.

Joel 3:43

Oh, it was

Misty 3:44

W.C. Fields or Orson Welles? No, W.C.

Joel 3:47

Sounds like the same guy

Misty 3:48

was like a comedian

Joel 3:50

Ah.

Misty 3:51

back in the like, I don't know, '40s or something, and he had like a cigar and he just, he... I don't, like, I feel like he was one of those, he was an actor and comedian.

Joel 4:02

Hmm.

Misty 4:03

Oh, when he was younger, he, and he had like a, he wore like a, a top hat and oh, he was, uh, way back in the... He died in 1946, so he was... But he was famous. He had some like famous lines I, I think he was kind of famous for being, like, a drunk.

Joel 4:26

Okay

Misty 4:27

I don't know. Anyway, I, I don't know if he was famous for lying. So who's famous for lying? Oh, well, duh I felt like a, I felt like a,

Joel 4:40

That's a famous, uh, well, I didn't know you were going with W.C. Fields. I-

Misty 4:46

I was trying to think of a real person, not...

Joel 4:48

Orson Welles was a liar, right? With the whole...

Misty 4:51

think Orson Welles was a liar either. No, he just...

Joel 4:54

that he's a prankster then?

Misty 4:56

was that, think that was the guy that did the

Joel 4:59

is pranking somebody lying?

Misty 5:02

Pranking someone lying?

Joel 5:03

Yeah, if you're just pranking them

Misty 5:06

I, I don't know. Yeah, Orson Welles was the guy who did "The War of the Worlds" on the radio broadcast.

Joel 5:11

So he lied

Misty 5:13

Well, kind of, but he was performing. In that case, like all acting would be performing and acting and lying

Joel 5:22

When do you think the first polygraph machine was invented?

Misty 5:25

Hmm. Well, maybe in the like 1920s

Joel 5:36

1921.

Misty 5:37

Yes.

Joel 5:39

good at this game.

Misty 5:40

getting better at this game. Getting better at this game.

Joel 5:43

So there's some ways to celebrate.

Misty 5:46

Okay.

Joel 5:47

You could tell the... No, I haven't. Have you?

Misty 5:50

I kinda want to. I don't know why, but

Joel 5:52

Maybe that could be our next in-person learning situation.

Misty 5:56

Yeah. I mean, I think it would just be interesting how to, like, make it not wiggle when I'm really telling the truth. I, I mean, they're, they're not, they're not a science. They're definitely an art I mean, 'cause it's just based on, it's based on like, oh, well, when most people lie, this is what happens. It's statistics, right?

Joel 6:14

Yeah. Like heart rate

Misty 6:16

did you ask me?

Joel 6:17

Oh, I was, I was gonna give some examples of how to celebrate. Give you a choice.

Misty 6:21

Oh, okay, great

Joel 6:23

So you could tell the truth for the whole day.

Misty 6:26

Wow. No.

Joel 6:27

You could

Misty 6:28

have many thoughts I don't want to share

Joel 6:30

talk to children about the importance of honesty I don't know why, just children.

Misty 6:36

have to talk to children then, so... I'd have to find some. I'm just walking down the street, "Hello, children.

Joel 6:41

Let me, let me explain to you.

Misty 6:42

you shouldn't lie." "Don't ta- don't talk to that crazy lady."

Joel 6:46

And the third thing is if you've, if you have told a lie, it's time to come clean

Misty 6:52

Oh, wow

Joel 6:54

That, that's kinda... I don't know if any of these are celebrations.

Misty 6:57

like these. They feel kind of puni- I don't know, like punitive and penance

Joel 7:02

Yeah

Misty 7:02

Hmm, interesting. Maybe I just won't tell any, I won't tell any new lies today. That's different than having to tell the truth. Like, I just, like there are things I think that you just shouldn't say, right? Like wasn't it in Bambi with Thumper and like, you know, he came up and, and his mom had said like, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all." Like that, that's, you know, I think that is also socially appropriate at times to

Joel 7:30

I think that's true too.

Misty 7:31

thing

Joel 7:31

But is a omission a lie?

Misty 7:34

Well, it, I think if it, it like, this is the eth- we're getting a lot of ethics now. I think if there's, if I keep something back that could harm someone, then that is perhaps unethical. But like, I don't think there's a good reason to just go out and like, "Oh, by the way, that shirt doesn't look very good on you."

Joel 7:51

Oh, I just got it though. Well,

Misty 7:54

I know. See? That's why I wouldn't say it, 'cause I know you like it and it's, you know. So like, I think there's like social,

Joel 8:01

I gotcha

Misty 8:02

niceties as well and things where you don't have to tell the person. If you asked me what do I think of that shirt, then I can decide, it's our friendship, like I could say, "Yeah, it, it looks good on you. I don't, I wouldn't, I wouldn't buy it myself, but I just, I don't really like, you know, bright blue things." Whatever, right? That's okay. So anyway, this always, always telling the truth thing. I don't know. Got a lot of thoughts that I don't need to share.

Joel 8:30

Okay. They, we could do a special midway episode next week where Misty shares all, 'cause she's gonna come clean.

Misty 8:35

No, will not be happening.

Joel 8:38

All right?

Misty 8:38

But tune in and find out

Joel 8:40

Yeah.

Meet John And Victoria

Misty 8:57

Hey, Joel.

Joel 8:58

Hey

Misty 8:59

Hey. We have two great guests here today. They're, I, I would even say they're amongst my favorite people. have, we have John Hayes and Victoria Holt here today. They're members of the PL team. I believe, like, technically, like, you know, John's a professional learning specialist, and Victoria, like, I think s- falls into some category of classroom teacher specialist, but she's, like, a coach in a, in a district. She'll probably tell us some more. But I'm excited they're here to tell us some things about a session they did at the teacher conference, and I'm gonna admit, I picked this just because the name is cool.

Joel 9:38

It is a good name.

Misty 9:39

It is a good name.

John 9:40

It's attention getter. It's an attention getter

Misty 9:43

Exactly. So I was like, "We need to find out more about that session." So, welcome to the podcast, John and Victoria

Joel 9:49

Yes,

John 9:50

Thank you for

Victoria 9:50

having us

Joel 9:51

and just to be clear, I have a group of my favorite people, and you guys are in a group above my favorite people.

John 9:58

Oh, wow.

Misty 9:59

Wow. So they're like 11 out of 10 kind of thing?

Joel 10:03

Definitely. Definitely

Misty 10:06

Oof.

Joel 10:07

That is a good question.

Victoria 10:10

she think about that?

Misty 10:11

people? Favoritest? Yeah. Awesome. Well, you just had to one-up me. I know what you're up to.

Joel 10:17

I did. I was going for it.

Misty 10:19

Totally. Well, welcome to the podcast. We want to hear about your session at the teacher conference. I remember it was, like, the title was "CYA: Cover Your Assets," right? So I wanna hear more about, like, what... Tell us more about what this c- this session was about, what kinds of things you were helping people figure out

Victoria 10:43

Okay.

CYA And Seeing Student Assets

Victoria 10:44

Um, so we determined Well, let's talk about how we first got started. So like you said, I am a coach. And actual title is math instructional specialist, um, in a district in Ohio. And one of my biggest pet peeves is when teachers tell me that students can't.

Misty 11:04

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Victoria 11:06

It gets under my skin. So I was talking to John about it, and he was like: "Yeah, every student has assets." And I'm like: "Yeah, how do we get teachers to see the assets that are already in their classroom?" And just through this conversation, the session organically developed

Misty 11:25

Cool

John 11:26

we started with, I think, um, one of the strategies we use is a pick three, which gives a list of assets, and then teachers have to pick three of their assets from that list, and then they try to use them.

Misty 11:39

Mm-hmm.

John 11:40

and then they can do that same strategy with their students. They can say, "Oh, here's a list of assets. What do you have?" And then the students can try to use them when they're doing something like maybe a team assessment or something like along those lines.

Misty 11:52

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm

John 11:53

but we kind of migrated to what do we really want students to do in a math classroom? And, um, bo-both of us decided that it was just coming back to the standards for math practice. So tho-those are the things that we really want. That's how we want students to practice in the classroom. That's what they want-- we want them to do. So that became part of it. And then also, um, Dr. Jason and I put out a paper about disability, um, which was in the NCSM journal in 2021. And it talked about not only what is disability and how, how inclusion could work or how it should work, but it also had some stories in there about, um, students that when they felt included and the teacher was using their assets they had an entirely different learning experience than when they did not. Um, and so we, part of the session is we steal bits and pieces of that paper and, um, we implement them during the session, so

Misty 12:59

Cool. So what kind of people do you have that are, like, coming into this session? Are they-- Do you feel like they're teachers who are struggling to see their students' assets? Like the, the student, you know, like you're talking about Victoria, the teachers that, like, are always like, "Oh, my students can't." Or are you-- Or is it like, do you end up getting people who already see this and are already doing it? I'm curious.

Victoria 13:21

I feel like we've had a combination.

Misty 13:23

Mm-hmm.

Victoria 13:23

There have been some teachers who are like, "Oh my goodness, this was so helpful, um, to especially focus on the standards of mathematical practice."

Misty 13:33

Mm-hmm.

Victoria 13:33

Um, but then we've also had, we've had coaches, we've had administrators, and we've had teachers who were like, "I just needed a, a process to do what I've already been doing."

Misty 13:45

Mm-hmm.

Joel 13:45

I, I wonder if you have had any participants who came in thinking, uh, "I always use my students' assets," and then, "Aha, I guess I don't," if that's happened?

Victoria 13:58

Probably the assets that they don't-- that they didn't think about.

Misty 14:02

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Victoria 14:04

so there might be students who, you know, your class clown, so you tap into that. Um, but especially with this push in America for literacy in all disciplines, it's like, what is literacy in a math class? It's students acting like a mathematician. So how do we get students to act like a mathematician? We tap into the SMPs

Misty 14:25

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm

John 14:26

Exactly. I think the first year we did it we really focused on just teachers-- getting teachers to have a, a common language where they could name an asset. And so the SMPs became something easy to do that with. Like, "Oh, you're modeling. You're good at modeling," right? Then, uh, the second year we did it, we kinda took it up a notch, and we tried to get we tried to get teachers to think about, okay, here's the assets that I want, i.e., I want to see the SMPs. Now, what do I do? How do I get it to happen? So that was, that was this past iteration in 2026 in February. We, we really focused in on that and had teachers kinda say, "Oh, um, if I want this asset, which I just modeled in a problem, then here's some teacher moves that I can use to make that happen."

Misty 15:17

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joel 15:21

Have you had any feedback from those teachers? Like, have you heard from anybody who, who tried it out?

Co-Teaching With Math Practices

John 15:32

We've had teachers come multiple years.

Joel 15:34

Yeah.

Misty 15:35

Wow

Joel 15:36

That's good

John 15:37

I, I don't know, I don't know if I've had any-- we've had any feedback. Somebody is telling me that, "Yes I use this in my classroom." But I use it when I'm coaching teachers, specifically in co-teaching situations. Particularly because, uh, sometimes in co-teaching situations, when you have a, um, a general education teacher and a special education teacher the special education teacher isn't able to go plan every single lesson with the general education teacher. They just don't have time. They have to be in, uh, 10 different classes as-- and there's only six classes in a day, you know, so that kind of situation. So, uh, what I ask the co-teachers to do is, you know, like the special education teacher, if I can give them-- provide them a way that they can engage with all of the students in the class, then they feel like, "Oh, I have a, I have a purpose in this class, and I, like-- it can be more of a team teaching type model when I'm in the classroom." And one way to do that is to just decide that I'm gonna focus not on the math content, but on the math practices. And so, um, it gives them, you know, there's only eight of them, so every day they can come in, and they can focus on a different one, or they can focus on the same one. And, um, those teachers feel more comfortable saying things like "Well, you know, math practice number three is critiquing the reasoning of others. So what can you tell me about what your teammate just said?" You know, so, so language like that.

Misty 17:12

Yeah, I'm curious... Go ahead. Oh, sorry. Go ahead, Victoria

Victoria 17:15

No, I was just gonna say, I think it's been helpful for, um, like my t- new teachers. You know, when you're new to CPM, it can feel overwhelming and sometimes you feel like, well, that lesson didn't go well. But when we focus on the SMPs, it's like, okay, yeah, students were critiquing the reasoning of others. Students were problem-solving. So it makes them feel better about the math that occurred or the learning that occurred in class today

Classroom Moves And Scaffold Pitfalls

Misty 17:44

Yeah, I was gonna, I was gonna ask if you had some more, like, concrete examples of some of the strategies that you were giving to teachers since they, you know, can't go to your session now. They could go next year if you ran it again, but like some like tips or some other pieces that like peop- listeners could like, uh, begin to implement in their classroom that would help them focus on their students' assets more in this area.

John 18:10

So just maybe I should start with the structure of the session.

Misty 18:14

Mm-hmm.

Joel 18:15

Sure

John 18:17

I really love running the session with Victoria because we do very little talking. So it's, so it's the, the teachers are pretty much discovering almost everything in the session and then using it and then going, "Oh, uh, here's how I can make it happen." Um, so one of the things that we do is, um, we send them to a corner, and they're-- they have to choose their, their so... They're given an SMP. They go to a corner. So it's a jigsaw, so one person from each team goes to a corner. And they discuss what, uh, what that looks like. So if I have a, a corner that's focused on students are critiquing the reasoning of others, then they go in that corner, and they think about, what does that sound like in my classroom? What might the students be doing? Uh, what would I notice? And then, um, they grab that, those actions basically that they would recognize, and we send them back, and we do a problem.

Misty 19:16

Mm-hmm.

John 19:16

And, and so they go in their team and picture I have four different people using four different practices now, and they go, and they do this problem, and then we ask them to discuss when they're done with the problem, how did using your asset change the way that you did that problem? So that's kind of where we start, and then once they've, once they've kind of made that recognition, and then we can ask them to all of these different ways, these teacher actions that you can use to support assets in the classroom. And we use the tables and the-- on the bottom of that paper that we said. So there's four tables, for example that, um, teachers can select particular actions and report out to their team. So, for example, one of the tables might be, they might be thinking about scaffolds for problem-solving and what those look like and how, how they are n- they can be used and not be a pitfall. Okay, so w-we get them to kind of recognize that there's three pitfalls to to students productively struggling. And the, the thing about the pitfalls is the pitfalls are, um, are genuine strategies that special education teachers in particular might use because they support students completing the task. But they don't support students thinking deeply about the task, right? So the pitfalls are things like hinting, backgrounding, um, giving them formulas. Those are the pitfalls that they can- they often give out so that the students can complete the task. So, if I, if we think about a strategy such as now I'm gonna think about a scaffold, m- um, so that my students use this asset, but I want to avoid those pitfalls, like that would be a s- a strategy they would come up with. Another strategy might be maybe they implement a consistent routine with students in the classroom to dig into the assets more often. Um, another strategy might be s- for example, maybe I put students in pairs more often so I can hear those, um, assets more often because there's only two people having a conversation rather than four.

Misty 21:37

Mm-hmm.

John 21:39

all of those are strategies that, um, are not only supporting students with exceptionalities but also, um, supporting asset-based thinking in the classroom also.

Victoria 21:50

And during the session, um, teachers were doing a math problem. And so while this was happening, we are also circulating. So in our midst of our circulating, we might be asking teams certain questions. We might be suggesting maybe a graphic organizer. So we're doing things also that help bring out those assets, and then at the end, we ask, "Was there any teacher move that you witnessed that helped move your thinking forward?"

Misty 22:18

Hmm. Nice. Nice. Cool. Anything else you wanna tell us about this? What else, what else should we know?

Victoria 22:28

Well, that's a good question.

John 22:30

I just want to backtrack on maybe those, um, those three pitfalls.

Misty 22:37

Mm-hmm.

John 22:38

I, I don't want to say that it is never appropriate to hint and it's never appropriate to background and it's never appropriate to, to do those things. But it's, um, but it's often like if, if I think about those pitfalls and I have them in my mind when I'm teaching, then I know that they won't become a-- like the first thing I grab when I'm trying to, um, support students with their learning because they might destroy the productive struggle that I want to happen. Um, and so that is often like a, a co-teaching woe I guess is that, um, the, general education teacher might say something like, "I s- I set up all these strategies and I have team roles and I'm trying to share authority so that there is productive struggle in my classroom, and the other teacher is coming in the room and they're giving hints and they're scaffolding in ways that removes all the productive struggle." So it's like they're kind of fighting because their pedagogy is different. But

Running It Again And Closing

John 23:43

certainly they are like those things can be appropriate at particular times.

Misty 23:48

Mm-hmm. Yeah, it sounds to me like it's more becomes one of, one of the tools as opposed to the go-to thing that they're doing.

Joel 23:58

Do you think you'll put, uh, in to run the session again?

Victoria 24:04

Yeah.

Joel 24:04

the 2027 CPM Teacher

Misty 24:07

much enthusiasm.

Joel 24:10

It's

Misty 24:16

All

John 24:16

Our Victoria.

Victoria 24:17

thought that far yet.

John 24:18

Yeah

Misty 24:20

well get

Joel 24:21

due on, uh, July,

Misty 24:23

June,

Joel 24:24

June 30th.

Victoria 24:26

June, but this, this is the last day of school, so I'm like, "Let's get through that," and then

Misty 24:31

Oh my goodness.

John 24:33

Poor Victoria has to work with me and I often have like, "Oh, hey, what if we did this?" And then she'll be like, "Okay, what does that look like?" And I'll say, "I don't know yet, but..." And then

Victoria 24:47

then I, then I get to figure it out.

Joel 24:50

You're as- you're using your assets.

Victoria 24:53

And I'm like, "This is how I interpret it. Is it correct?"

Misty 24:58

That's awesome. Oh, well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today and telling us about this session and just helping us each, you know, think about different ways. I think that we often think about like, "Oh, we should look at the positive. We should, you know, emphasize assets." But having some strategies and some, like, tangible, like, names for those assets and some of those other pieces I think are really helpful for people. So thanks for coming in and talking about it

Joel 25:22

Yeah. Thank

Victoria 25:23

Thanks for having

Joel 25:24

Yes

John 25:25

fun

Misty 25:26

Of course. So that is all we have time for on this episode of the More Math For More People podcast. If you are interested in connecting with us on social media, find our links in the podcast description. And the music for the podcast was created by Julius H. and can be found on pixabay.com. So thank you very much, Join us in two weeks for the next episode of More Math For More People. What day will that be, Joel?

Joel 26:00

It'll be July 21st, Take a Monkey to Lunch Day. So I guess we're gonna take a monkey to lunch on that day, or at least talk about taking a monkey to lunch. I've actually never taken a monkey to lunch, so it'll be interesting to hear Misty's take. has Misty taken a monkey to lunch? To find out why people are taking monkeys to lunches, learn all about ways to celebrate Take a Monkey to Lunch Day. So we'll see you on July 21st. See you then