SPEAKER_01 0:00

You're listening to the Support Ed Learning Podcast, where we challenge the status quo of education and reimagine what learning should be. I'm Dr. Joe Sebastian, and in every episode we dive into critical thinking, Bloom's Taxonomy, educational innovation, and how AI is shaping the future of learning. Whether you're a teacher, parent, policymaker, or lifelong learner, you're in the right place to rethink, reshape, and revive education. Welcome back to the Supported Learning Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Joe Sebastian. A really excited guest today to join us because he comes from my world, the history background, and he has built a pretty extensive YouTube channel celebrating that, giving resources and support to students in the history space. I'd like to welcome Jared Bruning to the podcast. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 0:52

All right, Dr. Joe. Thanks for uh letting me come on here today. I'm excited to talk to you a little bit about kind of some things I offer, but also excited to talk, maybe talk about some history here maybe today.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Oh, absolutely. I love the background too. So definitely good sell.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Cool. So well, currently I'm I'm I we'll go. No, I was gonna say I'm in the midst of making a lot of World War II content. So I've got a bunch of World War II stuff up behind me right now because that's kind of what I'm in the midst of creating right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Good. And it what perfect timing, too, as we're on the precipice of World War III. Well, hopefully not.

SPEAKER_00 1:24

Hopefully not. We'll see.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

Well, we'll see. Yeah, hopefully not. So anyway, hey, so you have the daily bell ringer. Um, and so just take us back before that even existed. Uh, what was broken and how history was being taught?

SPEAKER_00 1:37

And what made you decide to do something about well, I guess kind of to answer that question, I kind of have to, you know, again, give you a little bit of my own background. Uh, you know, I've I've got been teaching for over 18 years. Um, I've taught private school, public schools, and I've I've taught, you know, everything from geography, civics, world history, American history, all those different topics. And uh I think one of the things that a lot of teachers are looking for today is, you know, now that we have so much digital information we can find, and of course, YouTube is one of the big sources of a lot of that, you know, digital media that, you know, I ended up spending a lot of time trying to find content that I could use in my classroom that would uh emphasize or topics that I was covering. And the problem was it's like I would spend hours searching and searching, and I would find a great video that I was like, man, this is perfect. It covers everything I want to have it, I want to share with my students. And then all of a sudden, a third of the way into the move or into the video, they would put in some sort of inappropriate joke or they would use language that was just like, yeah, I can't, I can't really have that at school, you know, and everything. And so part of the reason why I kind of, you know, it's kind of like, yeah, I need to create, I'm gonna start creating my own stuff was that that was part of the motivation, was just simply that I wanted to create some stuff that was not bias, that was school appropriate, you know, for students, you know, upper elementary all the way through high school. I mean, I mean, I today I have students, you know, upper levels that are using a lot of my content. And uh, I just wanted to create something that I teachers could look at and be like, all right, I know this guy is going to give me something that is good for my class to see, that is going to be appropriate for the level of my students and everything. So that's kind of that's kind of one of the big motivations why I created it and everything. So that's kind of part of where it got started. I guess to really get specific of how I got started doing this was I was working with an English teacher at the time in my previous district who uh had taught English for like 20 years, and all of a sudden the district came to her and said, Okay, next year you're teaching U.S. history. And she literally was in tears. Like she was like, I, you know, some I mean, you've probably heard of this happen before in school districts, right? Where they just kind of like say, All right, you're you have a you have a teaching degree.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Cheers of joy, Jared, so you get to teach history instead of English.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

Yeah, yeah. And so the thing was, she was literally in tears about it, had no idea what to do. And so I was like, Well, I know how to make these little videos. What if I started creating some little videos for you just to show at the beginning of your class to get things going, and then you can take it a step further from there. You know, from there you can go into a primary source or have them do a reading or something like that. And so I started creating some videos for her class, and then it was my wife that came to me and said, Why don't you just put them on YouTube and see if anybody else might want to use it too? And that's kind of where it started taking off after that. It's once I started putting them on YouTube. Now I've got schools kind of all over the nation that are using a lot of the content.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

Well, it's it's such novel because you know, as a as a principal, not everyone starts with a bell ringer, not everyone starts with some kind of anticipation set prior to like getting into getting into what the lesson is. I did, that was kind of like my practice after year two. And it kind of sets the stage. So having something that teachers can actually use obviously is very meaningful. And now you said like you've actually built those into worksheets or something that teachers can supplement with. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 5:03

Well, yeah, you know, I mean, I know the title of the uh the whole channel is the daily bell ringer. And I think I have a lot of teachers that do use them as a, you know, introductory activity in their class. But actually now, you know, I'm finding more people are actually using them as, you know, maybe they're inserting them as part of a class lecture or something. Like maybe it's to break up their lecture so they can put in this video that reinforces an idea, or they end up using it like as a homework assignment or some sort of, you know, an assessment of some sort because they can basically assign that, say, okay, go home, watch this video, do this worksheet, and then you'll kind of have the basic information before you come into class. I mean, in a way, you know, like, yeah, I know a few years ago, you know, flipping the classroom was kind of like the big uh movement and everything in uh educational technology and stuff. And honestly, when I kind of started this, it I think a lot of teachers are kind of, if they're trying to flip their classrooms, they've been able to use some of my content uh to be able to do that. So it isn't necessarily just simply for an introductory, I know and again, that's that's where I called it that because that was a regular routine in my class. And I still think that is a you know, a very good teaching strategy is to have some sort of introductory activity where as soon as the students come in the room, they know what they're doing and have uh have something that they're supposed to be working on. So uh it's an easy thing you could use for that. Because again, every question, even though yes, there are worksheets that go with it, if you go get on YouTube, you can see I have questions that go along with each video that are just, you know, you can just simply scroll down into the description and get some questions that you can have students answer as they're watching uh the video.

SPEAKER_01 6:37

So, and your stuff now integrates with Edpuzzle to create some interactive assignments. And so just kind of talk to me about how with that technology and the way technology is just changing in general, that's leading more students to engage in the content with versus just passively watching.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah, well, I mean, Ed Ed Puzzle is definitely a very cool, a cool platform. And it always amazes me, and maybe you've had the same experience, how many educators I still encounter that still have never heard of Ed Puzzle and never even like thought about something like that or anything. And they're they're amazed when they find out about this. And I'm like, wow, I feel like this has been around for like 10 or 12 years now. I feel like, you know, this Ed Puzzle. But yeah, Ed Puzzle's a great platform to be able to, and again, you know, with Ed Puzzle, the great thing is it gives you that opportunity to kind of, I guess, hold some accountability for the students that they actually do go through and and and listen to the content and actually answer the questions. So, so yeah, I mean that that that's another great platform that I I've seen it that I've seen a lot of my videos are getting viewed through Ed Puzzle as well. So so yeah, if you if you're an educator and you've not used Ed Puzzle yet, you need to go and check that out and kind of see what's there.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

So someone who serves as both a teacher and a technology coordinator, how do you think about balancing ed tech tools with the human side of teaching? Because, you know, not sure if you you're aware with AI, there are so many more ed tech startups now trying to get into schools, but you know, there's still a human side of it as well. So how do you balance that and how do you weigh what is actually meaningful and what is just kind of noise?

SPEAKER_00 8:07

Well, what, but well, before I start getting into your to answer that question, one thing I guess actually, I've kind of stepped back from doing technology coordination at my school district. I'm actually more just in the classroom now, but but again, yeah, I do have that background of uh, you know, working in technology and everything. And, you know, AI, I know we, you know, there's book after book after book being written out right now in the educational world about you know the impact of AI and how do we properly use AI and everything. And, you know, I I still feel like we're so much in the middle of seeing how to implement this. I keep on thinking back to like, you know, when we first went one-to-one years ago, when we first introduced uh, you know, Chromebooks or tablets or whatever into the classroom. I mean, it took us, I would say, a good, what, two, three years before we kind of had a handle on it, you know, that we were like, okay, this is and I think even to this day, we're still trying to answer that question, how much our students should be doing stuff one-to-one. And I think AI, you know, it's it's still going to be several years before we really kind of get a grasp on like, you know, and of course, by the time we get a grasp on it, it's going to have completely changed by then, you know. So I don't know, maybe we'll be constantly chasing our tail on this whole thing. But I feel like, you know, AI is just it, it's such an amazing tool. And I just think that we as teachers have to, and I I'm sure I know I'm going to sound sound very cliched when I say this, but we just have to constantly realize every year that we come in the classroom that those students who are in front of us learn differently than the students that we had the year before. That it's not necessarily all about like the rope memorization of learning dates and the people that were involved in all this stuff. In fact, you know, I've kind of changed my approach in my classroom just because realizing the amount of information that students have at hand now. And again, I think it's going to be us as teachers to kind of make them recognize what is information you can trust and what is information you can't trust. And I can't necessarily say I really have a good grasp on it myself right now with the way AI is progressing. I mean, sometimes I see AI stuff and I'm like, wow, this is amazing. But then at the same time, you know, of course, being a YouTube creator and seeing the amount of AI, and I forget what they call it now, AI, and I guess I'll just call it AI garbage, you know, that's being pushed out there on the platforms. And unfortunately, you have students now that are all clicking on these things and seeing these videos, and then they'll come in my class and be like, Well, I just saw this video about ancient Greece that said this and this and this happened. It's like, well, no, that isn't really, you know, what exactly happened. And there's just, oh, it's AI slop. I think that's the word for it that we're seeing kind of. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Just like fake information, just like with these automated voices and images that are all AI created. And I forget what the statistic was I saw on YouTube, but I mean, it's just ridiculous. The numbers of videos that are being posted now that are just purely, completely AI created. Like there's nothing that goes into it that has any thought whatsoever. And I hope that's something that like hopefully like my channel offers a little something different that I am a real human being that's sitting in front of you, and I have looked at this information that I'm going to present to you before I you know put it out there that I'm kind of confirming some of these things. And I know I'm not perfect all the time. I mean, everybody makes mistakes here and there, but man, it's like some of that AI stuff that's coming out is just, I think, misleading a lot of a lot of students. And I, and again, I hope teachers are kind of carefully curating what they're being put in front of their students.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

So, you know, your entire approach is built around the bell ringer, although you said some teachers now are using it kind of as a piece of direct instruction, but obviously the bell ringer, like I've mentioned before, short structured warm-ups that's at the toe for the whole classroom. Tell me, just, you know, you've been in teaching 18 years. Why is that first five to 10 minutes so critical? And what happens when teachers waste that?

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Oh man. You know, I've I've often thought to myself, I should write a book or something on not even just the first five minutes of class. I feel like the first five minutes students meet their teacher that very first day of school, that is the time where you've got to like establish your entire class for the whole year. And I mean, I realize bell ringers each day, yes, they're they're crucial, but sometimes I feel like teachers need to almost focus on that first day of school and how much are they setting their tone for their whole class? You know, are you immediately going into rules and into procedures, or are you like basically forming a relationship with those students? Because, you know, getting back to the whole AI thing, you know, that's the big difference of a teacher in the classroom and all this AI slop that's being put out there, is like, you know, we build relationships with students and we, you know, know what they can do. We, we, we push them, you know, all that and everything. And I feel like even the first five minutes of the first day of class is crucial. But as far as like each individual class period, it's like, yeah, those first five minutes, as far as uh simply, you know, the the bell ringer, I think if you look at some of my descriptions of the bell ringer, one thing is all of us as teachers knowing that first five minutes of class, we have so many like administrative things we have to do, right? You know, taking attendance, doing lunch counts, catching up with kids who are gone the day before, uh, you know, going around and checking on kids that might have special needs and stuff and all that stuff. And it's like you honestly just need that five minutes when they first come in the room just to have them working on an activity so that way you can go around and kind of get all these little different things done that you need to get done. So, I mean, that's one major reason why you need to have some sort of a form of a bell ringer. But beyond that, the bell ringer, and I'm not even just simply talking about my videos. The bell ringer, honestly, if you come into my classroom, a lot of times my bell ringers are like a one-page reading that I'm asking the students to do as we're just first coming in the classroom. And basically what that one-page reading is doing, it's either giving them some background information on what we're going to cover for that day, or else it's reviewing something that we did before. Or sometimes for me as a history nerd, and it sounds like you know you're a history nerd as well, there's just all these little interesting things about history that you just wish you could spend so much more time on. But yet sometimes like it's during those bell ringers when it's like you can give them that little piece of information that maybe they had no idea about that it's just like, wow, that's kind of cool. That's kind of an interesting, you know, detail. And I think for us history nerds, we know that like the love of history, at least for me, it's in those details. It's in those little crazy things. You're just like, oh, that was just kind of a neat little thing, you know, a little twist in history and all that stuff, you know, that just kind of, you know, piques your interest. And to me, it's like I hadn't, I guess I had enough of those peaks of interest that eventually I turned it into my career of just simply talking about history in front of students and everything. But yeah, I can't over-emphasize the importance of that first five minutes of class. Like you really should be have some sort of activity for when students first come in the room because I mean it helps with you know classroom management, helps with learning. I mean, there's just there's so many reasons to do something there at the beginning of class. And again, I don't want to spend our whole time here just simply harping on uh pedagogy and stuff like that. But uh that yeah, if if you're a teacher watching this, yeah, you really need to think about those first few minutes of class. Because even you said, you know, you you adopted a bell ringer or some sort of introductory activity in your own classroom, right?

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Yeah, it usually was like um a war, like it was a I we call it a warm-up. Uh it was basically a silent writing task for the same thing. Like the five minutes, the first five minutes of class is my time where I am doing administrative tasks, I'm taking attendance, I'm passing back papers or whatever. And I want you to like transition into the class and get ready to learn history and learn and learn how to think critically. So trying to find something current event usually related, something topical that had to do what we would do just to have them start writing and have their opinions. And oftentimes I said, listen, if we can actually get into thoughtful meaning discussion and it takes away from what the lesson is, I'm okay with that as long as we're connected into what we're learning is the most important thing.

SPEAKER_00 15:59

But yeah, I'm like, yeah, so many, so many times those bell ringers do lead to like good discussions and good questions that the kids will bring up and everything. And you brought up one of the key elements there of students are going from class to class to class class in a lot of schools. And it's like trying to shift your mind from being in science to them coming into history class, you know, it takes a little bit of time. It's like our minds need some time to reset, and that bell ringer definitely is kind of a good reset button to say, okay, now you're in history class, let's focus on this now.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

This episode is brought to you by supported tutoring, where we don't just help students get better grades, we help them become critical thinkers. Whether it's mastering AP exams, maximizing college applications, or building lifelong learning habits, our expert tutors focused on critical thinking, confidence, and real growth. Head to supported tutoring.com to find the support your student deserves. And you deliberately teach history flat, no political spin, no editorial commentary, and let students just build the foundational narrative first. Tell us why is that approach so important before layering on analysis and opinion, especially in today's world.

SPEAKER_00 17:13

Well, yeah, you know, and I think, you know, uh, I think we were having this discussion before we got into the podcast here. Your level, I suppose your level, you know, you're doing, you know, AP history. My my experience and all of my my uh history teaching has been at junior high level. So again, a lot of I feel like a lot of what I'm doing is just simply skimming the surface and giving them the basic information. And then, you know, my hope is when they get to higher level, they're going to, you know, at least have that basic information that they can get do deeper analysis and everything. But yeah, I'm one that I I mean, I I'm very a strong believer that in my class, I'm going to teach history as fair and balanced as unbiased as I possibly can. And the good news is for me, you know, basically my class, I only go up through about reconstruction. And there's not too much that is, I suppose, really, really, really, you know, controversial today in terms of a lot of the stuff I cover. You know, it's like it's pretty much we've all agreed, you know, this was good, this was bad. You know, there were there are things that I feel like aren't too controversial, but you know, I it's really my hope that all teachers, you know, even if they're going to voice their opinion in class, they allow all opinions to be brought in and for everybody to be able to kind of have a voice of what they believe is right and wrong, because all of us have different opinions. And and I think that's one of the great things about our nation is that we have the chance to be able to voice those different opinions, whether or not we agree with all of them or not, you know. So so yeah, I I think as a teacher, we need to set that example of not just standing up there and spraying our own thoughts in front of the class.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

What do you think about what is the biggest mistake you see maybe your fellow history teachers or other history teachers making in the way they teach history? And there's like things that just overall make you cringe being like a history teacher.

SPEAKER_00 19:01

Well, probably that is the biggest thing that makes me cringe is when I see teachers kind of just simply teaching everything from only one perspective and teaching everything that like this this is the absolute and that's the that's the thing about history too. And I I've I've said this to my students several times. You go into a math class, and it's pretty much, you know, two plus two equals four. That is a you know, you pretty much fact. History class, you know, I can't necessarily say this event plus this event equals this event. It's like, yes, you know, it leads to those things, but was this necessarily the cause? It's like there's a lot of gray area in there, and it's and it's a tough thing to do to be able to go in the classroom and not not give what you think is the correct answer to everything. You kind of have to like allow the students to just get the basic information and come to their own conclusions on some of these things. And so uh so yeah, I think that's why it's kind of a challenge, and that's probably one of the biggest cringe things that I see is that I see teachers that are just like simply saying, well, this is what is absolutely right, and this is, you know, and it's like, well, you know, we we as history teachers need to leave leave it open for people to make their own make up their own minds.

SPEAKER_01 20:11

And you know, you've proven that the best educational resources often come from practitioners, from practicing teachers, not necessarily big curriculum publishers. Why is that and what does it mean for families when they're choosing resources?

SPEAKER_00 20:26

Well, I I guess, you know, again, I I have I I just want to try to think of that question a little bit. You know, I think it's so many times when I let me phrase it this way.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

So sorry to interrupt. I like oftentimes, you know, as a at a district office level or a county office level, we're purchasing curriculum, right? What really we're just purchasing resources. And so we're like we're dropping it, it's like a plug-and-play model or like whatever, but you bring a different level of authenticity to practitioners in the field developing resources that might have more meaning. Well, I guess which do you think is better or more meaningful and connected to how students actually learn best?

SPEAKER_00 21:08

Well, again, I I feel like students learn best from those who have experience being in the classroom and and have have seen what, you know, the seen the content and know what like questions are going to come up. And like, you know, there's been several videos that I've ended up creating just simply based on a question that a student has brought up in my classroom. And I thought to myself, well, yeah, that's a great question. Like, why why why has nobody like created some content on that? Like, I I think I remember I had one student that like basically asked me, like, why did they wear wigs back then? And I was like, Well, you know, that's probably a question some other students have asked in the past when we're studying the Constitution. Like, why in the world were all these guys wearing wigs back then? And so I made a whole video about like, why did they wear wigs back then? Or I had a student ask, like, why is it called America? And so I made a whole video like, Why is it called America? Where'd we get that name from? And everything. So the thing is, I guess some of my content, I suppose, is more driven directly from what I've heard from students. And what, you know, I teach specifically in my classroom. And I suppose for me, it just kind of lucks out. I mean, yes, there are standards I'm looking at as well, but it seems like to me, a lot of the stuff I'm covering, of course, are the same things that, you know, even though I may be in Illinois, there's some other teachers in Texas and Florida and California that are covering the exact same thing and they're looking for the same type of information that I'm looking for, or but that I'm putting out there. So so yeah, but as far as your question about like, you know, making decisions about curriculum and stuff, and I think anybody who's gone through teacher education and then become a teacher can speak to this. That when you were in school going through all your teacher education classes, how many theory upon theory upon theory upon theory were you given about education? And then once you got into your student teaching experience, all that went out the window because it was like, okay, now I'm in the real world. This is how things work in the real world. And the sad thing is that I feel like sometimes I see, and I'm not going to say this about every administrator or everybody who makes these decisions, but a lot of times you have administrators who are maybe in the real world in the classroom for a couple years, and then they stepped into a different role as an administrator, and sometimes they lose touch with like, okay, here's what's actually happening in the classroom, and how students are learning. And so I feel like, you know, maybe that's something I offer that's a little bit different. That I am a teacher who's actually in the classroom that knows what in my own little bubble of my own little classroom, this is what's going on. And I think I see a lot of other teachers having those same experience as I am. So sorry, that's a long answer to your question.

SPEAKER_01 23:32

No, no, no, it's okay. It's okay. Um, you know, it kind of leads us to the next question of so you're obviously said you cater a little bit more to the middle levels, uh, but for students or parents that are thinking of AP courses coming up. I've seen a lot of schools jump into social studies, usually AP human geography or AP government as a ninth grade entry-level AP course, uh, or in 10th grade as AP world history. Uh, but for the parents that are thinking about those down the road, what is the foundation that students need to build now so their kid is ready when they get to high school?

SPEAKER_00 24:05

Well, I suppose the foundation is just like I said, you know, that basic level of understanding of history. And I feel like so many times I have students that just sequentially cannot place things in order of like when, like, for instance, you were just talking about world history, like, you know, the ancient Mesopotamians, you know, how does that, you know, correlate to when the Egyptians and Greeks and all of them were establishing their, you know, empires and everything? So I would say like the basis is you know, try to get a little bit more of sequential thinking because I think so many students they can recite and be like, oh, well, here's how the modification process worked, or here's all of the Greek gods and all that. But it's like, but can you tell me like where did that fall into sequentially of these different uh civilizations growing and everything? And a lot of times they can't answer those questions. So I guess my suggestion would be, you know, try to be a little more sequential in your your your get your student to understand sequentially where things fell uh in history, might be something that I think would be a good basis uh to go from. Because once you have that sequential understanding, I think it does make things a little bit a little bit easier. Are you primarily US history? Do you do some world as well? I do like I I teach like a sixth grade world history class. Okay, and then basically then my seventh and eighth grade years, we do like a whole semester just on the constitution, and then and then my eighth grade year is just purely American history, basically from Native American history through Reconstruction, pretty much, is my eighth grade year and everything. But you were talking about like those AP government classes. I've had a lot of teachers and parents contact me about like I've got a whole series that just goes article by article and section by section through the U.S. Constitution and just basically gives this generally what this says. You know, I'm not giving a political lean on it or anything, it's just simply here's what the Constitution says here in Article One, Section One. This is what it says, this is what it basically means. And so uh I've had I've had a lot of teachers that are using a lot of those uh U.S. Constitution resources that I put out there.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Nice. So not getting too controversial or conspiratorial. There's no way the Egyptians built the pyramids, right? I mean, there's no way. I've gone down this rabbit hole even before the Egyptians.

SPEAKER_00 26:14

I'm not gonna lie, like in my world history class, we do kind of look like, well, there's ziggurats over here in Mesopotamia looking awful lot like pyramids in Egypt, looking awful lot like, you know, the ancient, you know, Aztecs who may, you know, made whatever, you know, over here. And it's kind of like, yeah, why did they all make pyramids? You know, so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

I just I'm like, I'm down. I mean, this is it's gone. It's like the the the stuff that came out about it. I'm like, they're okay. So how why is it the Egyptians wrote nothing down on how do they build the pyramids? If they're the most one of the most advanced civilizations and they were building these things, the precision, I mean, the precision of how they built them, like alignment to the stars, all like those. So what are they where like 20,000 pounds, the stones that they're built? How did they do that without advanced machinery? I just I I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Still this day, historians can't, you know, we have like we have like I think there's like five or six different theories of how in the world did they get those stones up there at the top, and we still don't know for sure. So yeah, I don't I don't want to be a conspiracy theorist for the I don't want to be a conspiracy theorist either, but man, you know, when you look at that stuff, you're like, gosh, this does seem a little bit like how in the world they do that.

SPEAKER_01 27:23

Well, did you have you gone down the rabbit hole if they're just a giant tuning instrument? They're able to harness the power of the earth's vibrations, and there was some other there was there's an advanced civilization that was wiped out by a cataclysmic event and all that stuff was lost, and then it they were just there when the Egyptians were there. I haven't gone down that rabbit hole. Yeah, don't go down that rabbit hole. It's it's dark. It's I mean, like, because you know, I feel really bad because like the history channel is now like ancient aliens and stuff, but I'm like, but you start questioning it, and you're like, oh, this is I know it's not trying not to sound like a Joe Rogan podcast, but like it's I do want to know. I'm like, it is very interesting. I'm like, I don't I see the I see the work that contractors do on houses today and how you can't even find a straight wall. And I'm like, they did it that good 5,000 years ago. I don't know. But anyway, that was a little joke today.

SPEAKER_00 28:14

I don't know. Whenever I talk about that, and I apologize, I know I'm I'm getting onto my and putting on my teacher hat here, but it's like, you know, we we we we focus so much on the steps to civilization and everything at the beginning of the school year that I just basically use that as evidence to be like, look at how far beyond these early steps they've gone that they've been able to create these amazing, you know, structures. And so I don't necessarily get into the whole conspiracy aspect. I'm just like, look at what how amazing and the other thing is too, I think, you know, and I again I apologize if I'm getting off on a side tangent here, but just making, you know, especially I feel like, you know, here in the United States, letting you know, students see it's like these civilizations overseas were, I mean, they that's unbelievable the stuff they were doing, you know. Like so many times I think a lot of our students get kind of very isolated in their thinking about the United States and about like this is our whole world and everything. And it's like, no, man, these people over there, they were the ones that were really doing these amazing stuff. We just built upon that later on, you know, they were the ones that originally came up with it. So, you know, that's kind of you know one of the things I kind of harp on in my class quite a bit.

SPEAKER_01 29:15

So okay, well, that's gonna bring us to our rapid fire part of the podcast. So you do not need to offer any explanations unless you absolutely want to, but it'll just be five questions. First, first thing that comes to your mind, answer, and we can move on or not if you want to elaborate. Does that sound good? Okay, I'll try not to elaborate. You are allowed, I break my own rules. You're allowed to. I just it's just recalled rapid fire. All right, cool. Ready, Jeremy? Yep. So, most underrated moment in American history that everyone should know.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

I think one of the most I'm gonna say a person instead. And I realize for us history people, you might be like, heck, I already know a bunch about this guy. But Henry Clay, if you don't study Henry Clay, you don't really understand how like the American Civil War took place. And a lot of times I have students that come to my class, they're like, Who the heck is Henry Clay? So if you don't know, look up who Henry Clay is. The great compromiser.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

Yep. Jackson Jackson wanted to hang him or shoot him. I forget. Who did Jackson not want to hang or shoot? When he died, when Jackson died, was my two regrets. I didn't hang Henry C. Clay and shoot John C. Calhoun. Yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_00 30:20

Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

So all right. One thing parents overthink about their kids' history education.

SPEAKER_00 30:26

I think it comes back to that thing that I said is kind of like my pet peeve. I think sometimes, especially in today's culture, parents get so wrapped up in like, is my is my history teacher and indoctrinating my kid. I don't think so. You know, I think you need to give the teacher the benefit of the doubt that we're just simply giving them the flat history, which is what they should be getting. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 30:46

How about one thing parents underthink? One thing parents underthink about their history. I think that so many times history is put on the back burner. I mean, again, you know, admittedly, when you look at, you know, standardized tests and everything, it's always math and science and you know, language arts that's being really, really pushed. And so many times history is the one that gets on the back burner. So I suppose overall it's just simply I think it's the one that the one that most parents and I think a lot of educators overlook is the history component. Best free resource for history that most people don't know about. Can I name two? Sure. Or just one. Okay, my number one would be the American Battlefield Trust. Uh they have just, I mean, and especially for the time period that I teach leading up to Civil War history and everything, American Battlefield Trust is unequaled. I mean, they have so much stuff that it's unbelievable. But also, if you're looking for another YouTube channel, maybe not geared necessarily just for teachers and students, but there's a channel called History Underground, which is just one of the best. I don't know if you've ever seen that one, but man, that guy, I mean, I think it's JD Ewitt is the who puts it together, and he does just a masterful job of uh putting together some of these videos. And again, he's very much a lot of times World War II history focused, but uh he kind of covers all parts of like American history, especially. And so those would be my two American Battlefield Trust and History Underground on YouTube.

SPEAKER_01 32:07

Yeah, Battlefield Trust, that was that came they started developing the like animated battle videos right when I was still in the classroom, and it they're fantastic. Just actually explain what happened because like we could talk about it, but like when you visually see it, it's it's really, really good.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

So yeah, and I was gonna say for you, I don't know if you've ever if you've ever reached out to Gary Edelman there at Battlefield Trust. He's a great guy. I've talked to him a couple times. Okay, and uh yeah, he's somebody that I think would probably be benefit to a lot of your uh viewers and everything. I would love for him to come on.

SPEAKER_01 32:36

We have Heimler lined up, but he was he got real busy, so I think he's gonna come on the fall. But we have the we have the equivalent of Heimler in the English world. We talked to two big English lang people on the podcast, but uh we're looking forward to Heimler coming on because I know it's a lot of he's really good. Yeah, his is great. Yeah, so um okay. Yeah, no, I I know well the Battlefield Trust, that's not the Gilder Learning Instant Institute, but are you familiar with that?

SPEAKER_00 33:04

No. So Guilder Learning Institute. But I mean they they have a lot of good resources there too at Gilder as well.

SPEAKER_01 33:09

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're based, I think they're based out of Louisiana, where um the uh the boats uh what are the what were the landing boats called in um I can't, it's escaping me now. The landing boats in uh World War II, the Higgins boats. Is that what that is that right?

SPEAKER_00 33:23

I can't remember, I can't remember off the top of my head. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_01 33:26

But it was something that like an obscured fact that like the I think either Eisenhower or one of the generals cited for winning the war was the ability for the the troops to be able to land so close to the beachheads and not have to like so one of the successes of World War II, but the the Institute's there. So all right, last one. One book that changed how you think about teaching.

SPEAKER_00 33:47

One book that changed how I think about teaching. I know it's kind of cliche as the history teacher, but that you know, the the lies my teacher taught me, you know, that is just full of a lot of just different little things that are kind of like, well, you know, we we heard this story, but yet this is really the true story of what really happened, you know. So, you know, and I, you know, like I I was like I was harping on before with history, it's it's so difficult finding good, unbiased information. And I think, you know, even though we try our best to try to not have anything that's biased, I mean, we're just a product of our educational system that we went through that a lot of times had bias to it. And I think that book kind of exposes a lot of those biases that we that we grew up with.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Yeah, I mean, you know, it's uh there are some of those key books that kind of shape your view of the world, and um but yeah, it's it it's interesting in terms of how they shape their view of education as well. So um what's it like, man? You got you got 400 short form history videos on YouTube, you have 40,000 subscribers, and you've had over nine million views. What's it like being from a I assume a small town in Illinois, correct? If I I don't I'm not familiar with it, you know, this is funny.

SPEAKER_00 34:54

Like, actually, okay, no, actually, uh I guess I won't give up too too much details of where exactly I'm located. I am in western Illinois, I'm not in Chicago, so everybody assumes you're from Illinois, you're automatically from Chicago. I'm not from Chicago, I'm the opposite side of the state from Chicago. I live in a town of about 30,000, 33,000 people, but I teach in a town of only about 700 people. So the school I teach in is extremely rural uh and everything. And so it it is funny coming into class, and you know, I'll get these students that come up to me and they're like, Well, I've got a friend over at this little school, and they just said they watched you on video the other day, you know, and I'm like, okay, and like, yeah, and the thing is like, you know, my my own son who's in at school with me, uh, I have a couple sons that are at school with me. He's on a he's on Scholastic Bowl team. And there's been a couple times we've gone to these scholastic bowl meets that all the all of a sudden the other team will realize who I am. And I think basically it freaks them out during the Scholastic Bowl. And like then, my my own I feel like I'm kind of an advantage for my son's team because they see me and think like, oh my gosh, that's the bell ringer guy, you know.

SPEAKER_01 35:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:57

And that's cool though.

SPEAKER_01 35:59

That's I know that's why I said YouTubers, man, they're huge between like the the demographics that we get six to like sixteen, you're like you're like a celebrity.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

Well, but the thing is, though, but the thing is too, like even with my channel, you know, I'm very niche. It's kind of like, you know, yes, there's the bigger history channels that are basically very much catering to just everybody that loves history. Right. And I feel like you know, you see those channels with you know million subscribers or whatever, and then my little time, and again, I don't feel like I'm really that big of a a channel and everything, but my channel's kind of more focused. Like this is specifically made for teachers to use in the classroom or you know, parents at home uh to use with their kids at home. So uh admittedly, when I first started making the videos, I I was shocked when I had a hundred people that subscribe to the channel, and then now you know it's going beyond that. So so yeah, it's it's it's it's it is funny because yeah, I I have students that come in my classroom, and and you know, that's what's kind of funny too. And I I know I'm getting back to like pedagogy and classroom management. I feel like I have a whole lot easier job with classroom management because when kids come in my room, and of course I've got these six, seventh graders, right? They think that like, oh my gosh, he's got over a thousand subscribers, he's monetized, he's all this stuff. They think that I'm literally like Mr. Beast, you know, or something like that. And it's like, no, you know, I'm just a history teacher, I'm nothing special, you know. Yeah, I gotcha. I don't have all the problems I that other teachers have, I think, because they think, oh, this guy's like cool because he's on YouTube and stuff. He's like, well, watch my videos. You're gonna realize I'm not cool. I'm just a history teacher.

SPEAKER_01 37:30

History teachers are cool, Jared. They're very cool and they're very impactful, just like you. I know. I was giving you I was gonna give you a comment. I was gonna say you've had a large, it's cool having that big of an impact. Nine million views um outside of where you taught from. So that's awesome. Congratulations on that.

SPEAKER_00 37:46

Yeah, yeah, it it it isn't, it's just it is cool to see how it reaches so far and everything. But so yeah. So thanks for the thanks for the compliment.

SPEAKER_01 37:55

Yeah, no, absolutely. I appreciate you coming on, Jared. Um it's been great getting to know you for those listening or want to learn more. Where should people be able to find you?

SPEAKER_00 38:03

Oh, well, of course, you know, just go on YouTube and search up the Daily Bell Ringer. That way, you know, you'll you'll find my channel pretty quick that way. But I also do have uh dailybellringer.com. That's where you can find a lot of the other resources that go along with videos. Uh so yeah, dailybellringer.com uh is the best place to kind of find some more information and find some more resources and everything uh that that that I have. So so yeah, that's that's that's pretty much it, you know.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

All right. We'll drop all those links in the notes and uh on linked on the YouTube description as well. Jared, again, thank you so much for being here and uh for your contribution to the education space and uh appreciate your time.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

Well, thanks so much for for inviting me on here. It was really cool to get and I'm I'm excited about what you guys are doing there too. It sounds like you're you're offers and are offering a really great service for you know students to get ready for, you know, tests and everything. So uh thanks again for letting me come on here. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 38:57

All right, we'll see you next time.

SPEAKER_00 38:58

All right, thanks.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

Thanks for joining us on the supported learning podcast. If today's conversation inspired you, challenged you, or sparked a new perspective, be sure to subscribe and share with a fellow change maker. We'll be back soon with more voices, more insight, and more ways to elevate the future of learning together. Until then, keep learning and keep pushing the conversation forward.