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In Search of Catholic School Excellence
Exploring the programs, people, and practices making a difference in Catholic education. Join host Thomas Boles as we hear from principals, teachers, and innovators shaping the future of Catholic schools. Whether you're a leader looking for ideas or an advocate for Catholic education, this show is your guide to what’s working—and why it matters.
Be sure to check out the show notes, as each episode comes with a companion guide to help you implement the ideas discussed during the episodes.
**Audio automatically transcribed. Apologies for any errors.
Hello, folks. Welcome back. This week we are joined by Catherine Fuerte from Holy Angels School in Daly City, California. Catherine, thank you for joining us. Thank you for inviting me. It's always, it's always great to hear from you. I know you come to our, our tech meetings and you talk a lot about the things that you're doing in class.
And, you know, I honestly believe that you're one of the leaders in the whole Diocese of San Francisco in terms of technology. So we always like to pick your brain, see what you're doing with the kids, and hear all about your successes, uh, because I think that you're, you're really pushing the envelope for the diocese.
Thank you. Thank you for the kind words. Always. Uh, so what, what have you been working lately in, in class? What's, what's been the, the latest project? Right now I'm, um, doing a lot of STEM with the students. Um, because I kinda, like, divide my curriculum to the first semester more on digital citizenship, uh, media literacy, and then, uh, we move on to, uh, academic integrity, where we talk about plagiarism, and now we have to include, uh, artificial intelligence.
Mm-hmm. And then later on, 'cause there's some- only so much I can do with AI, um, I mean the lessons on AI I start doing, uh, STEM projects with them, which is what we were doing before, uh, open house. Yeah. So that's where I am right now. What is the, what is the breakup of those, like, sections? You mentioned you start off with, you know, kind of like a digital literacy and, um, and like the ethics- Oh, the me- yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. So- What, what's the breakdown of that? Uh, so we start off with, um, learning how, Well, the very basic. The, the beginning of the school is just the proper care of Chromebooks and other school devices. Um, we look at the responsible use of technology and how to become responsible digital citizens.
And I always like to tap on the creativity of the students. So, uh, you know, after our discussion, I would give them projects. Like, I have students I have students actually in sixth grade create posters showing a superhero version of themselves, and they use Canva for this. And because Canva has an AI feature, so what they had to do is they had to give a detailed description of this superhero who should look like them and have these s- uh, superpowers.
And so it's a practice of prompting for the students. And they come, came up with pretty good uh, images that, like, look like them, too. But they also have to give them- give themselves a superhero name. So some called themselves, uh, Captain Care, if they decide to talk about how to properly care for your devices.
And someone called themselves as, Privacy protector. Mm-hmm. And that a, a child did a poster about ways to keep your personal information private or secure. So we talk about online safety. My favorite resources for this section of the curriculum are, is Common Sense Media. Mm-hmm. Um, I love that they have ready-to-use lesson plans, and I just tweak it a little bit and, um, customize it to, uh, my students, uh, or sometimes the, um, use different tools.
You know, change the projects to something. Like this superhero project, I decided to use Canva with them because since we have a school Canva account, I might as well teach the students how to use the Canva and also start using the AI feature embedded in the Canva. Yeah. And then I also use Checkology.
Mm-hmm. They do have a lot of modules that teach students whether something is an ad or not. You know, what is the purpose of, um, the post? Is it propaganda? Is it news? So there's a lot of good modules for that. I also use some of the Uh, free slides that I get from the news literacy projects.
Mm-hmm. They have a lot of critical thinking slides that I share with students, and I make them answer some questions about it. So it's a, it's a way to start conversation with them about different issues that they may encounter when they go online. Yeah. So- And do you spend, like... Is that, like, that, that whole series of items, is that the first quarter- Yeah
you're focusing on that? Uh, about the first trimester. We are on a trimester basis. Oh, right, right, a trimester. Mm-hmm, yeah. And we don't cover everything. Usually what I do is I provide modules or lesson plans on Google Classroom. We cover some. The rest are for, you know, additional reading or, you know, lessons for students, uh, to read if they want to learn more about it, because we talk about it every year.
Right. So we- I kind of, like, add onto it, so. Yeah. I want students to feel like, "Oh, we just talk- we talked about this last year already." But, you know, there are things, there are new things that we can talk about. And I think some of the new things that we start talking about will, is fake news. Mm-hmm. Um, so I...
There was this interactive online activity. It's actually a game called Bad News. Mm-hmm. And it is a game that I had the seventh graders play, and the students actually take on the role of a fake news maker. So- Wow ... what, the, the purpose of the activity is for the students to to learn to spot, um, manipulative techniques used by people who create fake news.
So when students see how it's created, they'll probably more be able to figure out that something is real or, or not, so. And they liked it. They actually liked that game. Um, they, it... I would use it for seventh, eighth grader, be- eighth graders because some of the activities or some of the things that they put in their, uh, re- use, they kinda use not really bad words, not really banned words, but words that might be hard to explain to lower, uh, grade- Mm-hmm
levels, like so. Yeah. I would do it only with my seventh or eighth graders. So it's not only, you know, you're not only just playing with cool tools, but you're also teaching them about, you know, the bigger life lessons like, you know, take care of yourself online and, you know, be careful what you're reading, um- Uh, yes
question what you're reading, right? Yes. And I really, uh, focus on that. I even, uh, teach them how to do lateral reading. And first they said, "What? What's lateral reading?" And I tell them, "It's just opening multiple tabs. And the lat- lateral reading is, like, checking information by looking at more than one place," I tell them.
Mm-hmm. And it's a way for you to determine whether something is fake or not. And if you see something go check another website and see if this, um, if this really happened, and so on. So I, you know, I do digital citizenship just to equip them with tools or knowledge to help them as they, you know, do things online or read things online, because, um, that's where they get a lot of their information from.
Right. Yeah. I can go back to tapping on the creativity of students, because one of the things that I was very proud of, um, my eighth graders actually did, the assignment was to create short videos, one-minute PSA vi- type videos. So, and they had to choose one of the topics that we have discussed.
So anything about s- uh, s- digital citizenship, media literacy, you are to make a very short, uh, one-minute video, no more than one minute, because I don't like watching long videos. And it has to be, you know, you have to keep the attention of the people watching the video. Mm-hmm. So, and I asked them to use Google Video.
Google Vid- Video just became available as a what is it? As a, um, a basic you know, to add to Google Slides and so on. Right. Became available in Google Workspace for everybody. So at that time, I didn't really know how to use it, but I told my students, "You can use Google Vids." And I never taught them how to to use the program, and they just did it on their own.
And the videos they came up with, I was really surprised. It was, it, they were really good. So, one of the things that I can tell about students nowadays is that they're really wired to understand how everything in online or on a c- on a computer works. Mm-hmm. And I don't really need to teach them how to do this.
"In order for you to do this, do this. Go do this, this." I don't. Which is, you know, going back to your PD last Monday, when you- Mm-hmm ... talked about, uh, cross-curricular integration. Mm. Yes. And when I first started at Holy Angels, I, my principal actually told me that, "I don't want you to teach computer class per se.
I don't want you to be telling students like this, this, that. I want you to integrate technology into the learning that's happening in the classroom." Mm-hmm. And that's why I was telling myself, "That's exactly what my principal was telling me to do-" "... what Thomas is talking about." And, and then so I spend a lot of time talking to teachers about what we can do during computer time.
And for the most part, the students were given an assignment, and when they complete an assignment, they're given a tool, let's say Google Slides, and for the most part, it is the first time that they're using Google Slides. Mm. And they would learn how to complete their Google Slides project by actually completing their projects.
So I, I think that, I, I, I feel like it's easier for them to retain the skills that they learned versus me just telling them, "To do this, you have to go to this and this," because they will forget, because that's h- what happens to me. I mean, I try to learn something and I never really un- uh, retain whatever I, this, I learn.
It's the same thing with the teachers, actually, in our school. Mm. You know, "How do I use PowerPoint?" And then I will, like, tell them this, but then they come back to me later, "No, I forgot. I don't know how to do it." But when they actually work on a project, they, they, uh, keep, they return the, they retain the skill or the knowledge that they learned, so.
Yeah, so if you're then not focusing so much on the skill itself how are you guiding the expectations for the project? Because it could be easy for kids to go off, uh, or the teachers for that matter, to go off on tangents and g- kind of get lost in the, in the minutiae of the program, right? But you, you must set some boundaries in terms of, "Here are the expectations for this project.
This is what I want you to be able to do." So explain a little bit of your philosophy on that. So there is a rubric coming from the teacher. So the rubric is created by the teacher and me. So we, uh, there's an expectation from the teacher assigning the project- Mm ... and there's the technology, uh, component.
So, and these are really very basic ones, and unless, you know, we're talking about, uh, eighth graders who already know more about, uh, PowerPoint. So there's a list of things that there shou- that should be included in their, in their project. And those are minimum. Mm-hmm. And for the most part, they would also add more.
Mm. And we always tell them that if you want to add more, it should be relevant to your, your presentation or for your, to your project. And because sometimes, uh, kids can go overboard, and they get carried away- Mm ... and they forget about the purpose of the project. Right. And, yes, that's very creative, yes, that's very funny, but that's not what we want, so.
Yeah, so there's, there's always a clear rubric or guidelines for them to to follow. Yeah. I know that the, uh, especially in the early days of, of PowerPoint and things, the transitions and the noises and the images flopping all over the place, all of those things were very exciting. And I, and I think, uh, one of my mentors back in the day, Vince Weeters, who would, he would have the kids go ahead and play with all that, so you know how it works.
Mm-hmm. But, you know, we're gonna limit that. We don't need that. That's not good for a presentation. Uh, so it's, it's good to have those kind of guidelines. Uh, and I think it's important to be able to put the rubric out in front, right? So this is what success looks like. And even if you haven't showed them an example, just to be able to do that rubric, and I love that it's with the classroom teacher.
Yes, because I don't want to grade the content. Because I think the teacher should grade the content of the, uh- Yeah ... of the project. I, I tell them, "I will, you know, um, do the technical part, but not the content. I think you are in a better position to, uh, grade that one," so. So then with like a, a project like the superhero in Canva, is, does that get linked to a particular project in, in another class, or is that one of those technology pieces that you kinda wanna inch them forward with?
Uh, this one was a, uh, a technology project, because I was, uh, going over, uh, digital citizenship. So one of the things that is actually still learning to, um, get integrated with other, um, subjects is digital citizenship. Mm-hmm. I, I, I always feel like it is my responsibility to talk about digital citi- citizenship with all the students in the school.
Okay. And I keep telling the teachers that it's not my job. It's not just my job. We all have to teach them how to be responsible digital citizens. So, the superhero, uh, project was actually a, uh, something from Common Sense Media. Oh, cool. Yeah. So, and then I just use, uh, Canva, versus just, um, I think the activity required them to draw on a piece of paper.
Mm-hmm. And so I just added the Canva component to that one. Yeah. Oh, that's great. Well, I think, I think it's important that to, um, you know, that you're, you're looking at those things and w- we're talking about plagiarism, or we're talking about you know- Uh, other forms of, of stealing in terms of just y- n- non-original ideas, et cetera where AI can play a big role into that.
So that conversation happens in every class, right? Mm-hmm. You know, this has to be your own work. We wanna see you as a student shine through, uh, not, not some other persons or another person online's version of that, right? So yeah, that... it has to be a conversation that happens across the board, and I think most teachers would probably be up for that.
I imagine you don't get too much pushback from them.
There was one thing else that I did that that I really enjoyed, uh, doing, and this was, uh, a topic on technology and values. Mm-hmm. This was another Common Sense Media project or a s- a lesson plan, and w- what the lesson is for students to identify the values that are important to them- Mm-hmm
and reflect on how technology makes it easier or harder for them to live out those values that are important to them. And so I asked them, "What are your values, and how are these values impacted by today's technology?" So I created a Padlet, and I got all these 14 values from the Common Sense Media lesson plan.
I put all the values in the, uh, Padlet, and then the students were to choose five of the most important values to them. And in the Padlet, they either gave a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Thumbs up if technology is making it easier for them to live, live out those values. Mm-hmm. And thumbs down if they think technology is making it harder for them to live out the values.
Mm-hmm. And you know, I was surprised with all the reflection that's coming from the students because they were so honest. Like for example, I have, uh, one of the values that had a lot of thumbs down, but chil- a student's value most is, uh, hard work. Okay. So everyone w- l- values hard work, but they said the technology makes it harder for them to do hard work because, and these are some sample responses from students, "I don't think technology helps me with hard work because there is AI, and you are not working hard with AI."
And, uh, another student said that, "Technology doesn't really assist with hard work since other can just cheat, and other apps online like math apps, uh, can help you finish your lessons, and then communicating with classmates for answers or something similar." So, it, it was just a a wonderful time for students to be able to reflect on- The, the fact, the effect of technology to some of, of some of the values that they they or some of the values that are so important to them.
Mm-hmm. And in this particular lesson, they... I hope they've noticed that tech either helps or hinders something that they care about, and that these small observations will hopefully help them take control of their digital life rather than letting it control them. Yeah. So you value hard work, but then, then, and you know that AI will m- make you not value that hard work anymore, so maybe don't use AI in a way that will take out the hard work.
So in other words, they have choices. Yeah. And so it's, the key is being intentional about the technology use. And when you know what matters to you most, then you can make better choices about how you engage in engage with technology. So I really like that lesson, and they were very honest with their responses.
But I hope that they are actually doing something about it. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, no, that's great. I mean, especially when you put it back in their hands and say, "Okay, you know, you get to make the decision. We, we've now discussed all this information. It's up to you to make the right choice." And, you know, that, that's where they can say, "Well, you know, I'm, I'm gonna make the right choice," or, "I'm not," right?
And they always have that decision. But it wasn't like they didn't know, right? Yeah. 'Cause you spent so much time talking about it. I think it's- But that's all we can do, uh, actually. That's all we can do. We can just, uh, guide them, and then they still have to make their decisions, right? Yeah, definitely.
Yeah, I think that, uh, it's a great project in that you can also then extend that. Um, or perhaps, you know, you know, a classroom teacher can help extend it because they, they can then argue for, you know, their values, right? And maybe, maybe that's something they can present to, uh, another class or the school as a whole.
You know, there's so many more layers to that. It's such a great path to set them on. Not to mention, makes your job easier as you do try to in- you know, show them AI and all these other cool things that can be used for good that they- Mm-hmm ... they know what to do with them. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And then we moved on to talking about, uh, academic integrity.
We started talking about plagiarism. Mm-hmm. And there's now more to talk about plagiarism because now we have to clu- include AI. That was actually, so I started talking about AI when I finished digital citizenship. Mm-hmm. And, um, I I s- actually, I, I like actually enjoy, uh, talking about AI with, uh, students, and I try to teach a little bit of AI from first grade to eighth grade this year.
Mm. And with the younger students when I ask if they have ever heard of the term AI they would eagerly say yes, and they start sharing what they know. They mention Waymo, Siri, Alexa. And however, when I ask, uh, them, "What does AI stand for?" And only a few can say artificial intelligence. And- Mm-hmm
when I ask them to explain what it means, even fewer would be able to describe it clearly. So but the one thing that I notice or realize is that students recognize that AI exists and can point to where they see it in their lives. Mm. But they don't fully understand what it actually is. So, and- The, the, the challenge is how do I explain artificial intelligence to the little kids?
Right, okay. And I found these resources from dayofai.org. Okay. And they had these slides that were ready for me to use, and it made it easier for me to explain to first grade, second, third grade what AI is. Because what- in the slides to understand artificial intelligence, they break down the two words.
So you, um, talk about the meaning of artificial, and then you talk about the meaning of intelligence. So for the younger kids, there's a slide that tells them, you know, identify which one is artificial and which one's natural, and then which one is made by humans and which one is, uh, grows naturally. So, and then we combine the definition of intelligence, and then we combine both, and until we come to a conclusion, like in first grade, we say that it's a machine that sometimes behave like humans or, you know, or it can act like a human.
Hmm. And then we, uh, s- I- we started talking about, "So what would your AI machine look like?" And then they said, "Oh, I, it would look like a robot." Hmm. And this is when I made them get a piece of paper and they drew, uh, their own robot, and I told them, "Draw a robot, draw your own AI." And then on the s- no, actually not, not the side yet.
So I made them draw it, and then after drawing, we uploaded these, uh, drawings in animated, uh, drawings. I don't know if you've heard of animated drawings. No. So once you upload animated drawings they, their drawings start, um, moving. Oh, wow. So it converts their their, their drawings on paper into like, uh, animated, uh, objects.
So it starts dancing and moving around, jumping around on the screen, and they were so, fascinated. They were so excited. Yeah. And then it says, "Oh, this is magic. How come my, my, my robot is dancing and moving?" And then that's when we start talking about, okay, how did the AI in this program do it? Mm-hmm.
And we talked about, you know- The first thing it does is it finds the character in your paper- Mm-hmm ... that, that you drew, and then it imagines it or assigns it, like, um, converts it into something like a stick figure. And then, so, uh, it uses those pretend bones, the stick figures, to start making them bend, jump, or dance.
So that's when we start talking about what the AI is actually doing behind, behind the scene. And then at the end, I downloaded those those videos of their robots moving, and I put them in a slideshow for the parents to see. I shared it with the parents, and then I also had them write down on a piece of paper Actually, not on a piece of paper.
I think they wrote it on their slide. They wrote on their slide what their AI robot can do. So, and then right next to it, I embedded the movie that I downloaded from animated drawings. So that was really, that was really cool. Yeah. That's a lot of fun. Yeah. I know, I know from last year you, you talked about that you were just starting to get the kids to play with some of that AI, and so, like, that Canva project, you know, is a little bit of a, a starting to get them prompting.
And you're, here you're having them upload images. It's like they're, they're once again taking advantage of, uh, the AI to be able to do that for them. How else have you started to integrate AI with the kids themselves? Okay, one of the most important things I think I have done right here is prompt engineering with seventh and eighth graders, because I, I, I thought that, you know, it's, it's a very important skill right now.
I, I know the teachers should learn how to do prompt engineering, but I think the students also need to learn how to write prompts in order for them to be able to use AI responsibly. Um, so, I first, uh, gave them some frameworks that they can use to write their prompts. So I use PARTS from Google, which is P-A-R-T-S.
I told them, "You have to give your prompt a persona. You have to give its aim, it, the recipients, the theme, and the structure. How do you want all of this?" So we, I, I tried to explain all of these in simple terms. So what we did is I gave them examples of, uh, weak prompts. So prompts like, okay, explain photosynthesis, or write me a story, or something like that.
And so I made them, uh, write prompts using the framework. So give this, uh, make this prompt more detailed by providing a persona. And what is a persona? I tell them like, "Okay, okay, you are an eighth grade student," so that would be a persona. And then the aim, "You are an eighth grade student who wants to teach photosynthesis to an eighth grader."
And so- Explain photosynthesis in, you know, they can specify a tone or style or the parameters that they want. Okay. And then the structure, the desired format. It just, when they do this activity, they realize that they can actually customize the output of, uh, the output that they get from AI. And, uh, to be honest they were, like, they didn't know that you could do it.
Mm-hmm. So, I was telling them that with this with the working on, uh, the framework, using the framework parts, you are actually able to customize response that you get to AI to suit the needs that will best help you learn whatever it is you are trying to learn. Mm-hmm. So, if they were into basketball, they can tell the, um, the AI to, uh, get, "Pretend you're a basketball, uh, coach, and you're teaching me about this topic," you know, and so on.
So, that activity actually was very helpful, I- Mm-hmm ... I hope, because, um, I gave them different, uh, week prompts to work on, and they came up with very good responses. I even provided them a comparison chart. Mm-hmm. So, with the comparison chart, uh, what they do is they, uh, change the AI voice and tone.
So, students learn how changing the wording of a prompt can make AI respond with different tone styles and, and, uh, voices. So, I made them write responses from AI as a rap artist, as a pirate, as a five-year-old, as a teacher, and then I made them choose which one was the most effective for you and which one- Mm-hmm
uh, and what do you notice about the responses. How did the tone and voice change, and what words or phrases made it sound like a pirate, or made it sound like a rap artist or a teacher and so on. So, yeah. So, that was fun for them. And the other thing that I did was, um, we work on, learning how to use AI to help them do their work rather than doing all the work for them.
So an example was I, I got an algebra problem, and I told them, "Okay, let's pretend you're doing this algebra problem at home, and you want AI to help you but not give you the answer." Mm-hmm. "So how will you write your prompt?" So, and that's when we started, like, talking about, like, uh, the persona. So you are an eighth grade student who is helping blah, blah, blah, me, and I need help with this problem, and so on.
And, "But don't give me the answer," is what they would put at the end of the, um, the prompt, "and then give me step-by-step directions." And then they would run the, the, the prompt, and then I would ask them, "How did it come out? Did it give you tips on how to solve the problem?" And then they would say, "No, it gave me the answer," and then, or, "No, it didn't help me."
So maybe you need to go back to your prompt and fix it a little bit or add, change it. So as they were revising their prompt, they realized that, you know, uh, the responses come out differently. So the bottom line is, what I'm trying to do here is I am trying to help them use AI to help them learn versus just making AI do all the work for them.
And even though I know that when they come back home, they would probably, uh, just go to AI and plug in their homework and make them, make the AI do the work for them, there will be a few, maybe a few who- students who really are, you know, who really want to learn. Mm-hmm. Who will actually do this with the AI prompt the AI to help them learn versus just giving them the answers, so.
Yeah, and we don't wanna assume that all kids are gonna be bad. So it's, it's wonderful to show them the right way and then hold them to that expectation. And, uh, hopefully we get more of those than, than, uh, than the others. Um- Yeah. I hope so, too. As, as we finish up here, um, I wanna ask one final question.
So, uh, imagine there's a handful of teachers out there who have not played with AI with their students yet. Could you give a couple pointers for them as they get started with that? What are some gotchas? How should they go about that? You know, that's one of the things that I am not that I actually don't feel good about because I feel like, and I, and not to, not to put my, my teachers, you know, on the spot.
But I feel like a lot of them are scared to use AI with the students. Of course. To be honest, they don't use AI with the students. But even though they know that the students use AI at home, they don't use it in school. So what I'm, what I want teachers to do is that use AI. You have a discussion to work on or to do in the classroom, have the AI be part of it.
I had this session where we had the AI open and it was, they're listening to our conversation, and then when a student ask a question to AI, the AI would respond to it.
Oh, yeah. So that could be done too in the classroom. You know, you're talking about something in the class, bring AI with you, or they're doing their, their writing. Don't be scared to have them open whatever AI you choose. If it's, uh, School AI or Magic School, you're there. You can supervise what they're doing, especially if you have GoGuardian, Then you can see what they're doing.
And, um, at least you can monitor their AI use, and hopefully whatever they learn in using AI in the classroom, they can carry over, you know, at home too. So, I mean, it's a tool and, and they should learn how to use it. And I know the teachers are scared because they don't know. They're, they're, they just think that the students will just copy and paste whatever, uh, they get from the AI.
But, Well, if we, if we are able to model for them how it should be used, then I think that's probably a good first step, right? And, uh, show, uh, what simple ways, and also I think you mentioned before, when n- when to pause, right? When to say, "Hey, don't give me the whole answer, just lead me to the next step," right?
Yes, yes. Uh, and you can build that into the prompt too so that AI doesn't finish the job, Create gems. I forgot about gems. Yeah. Yeah, you can create gems for your students. , So that,, they will be guided with the activity and not just, like, giving out the, uh, the answer to the activity.
Yeah. Yeah. So it's not like a full, a full-blown search. It's, it's within some parameters, almost like bowling with, uh, with the, uh, bumpers up. Well, I think you've given us a ton of resources today. We'll have to go back and look through the show notes to get all the resources you talked about. Um, but I think there's a lot that we, we can play with, and I appreciate that you're always trying new stuff and you're sharing it.
You're one of the few people who, uh, who jumps in and shares everything they're doing, so we always appreciate you, Catherine. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Thanks for joining us today and we'll see you next time. Thank you.