250 Episodes Later: Our Biggest Teacher Takeaways [Episode 250]

Heidi 0:00
This is episode 250 of Teacher Approved.

Heidi 0:06
You’re listening to Teacher Approved, the podcast helping educators elevate what matters and simplify the rest. I’m Heidi.

Emily 0:13
And I’m Emily. We’re the creators behind Second Story Window, where we give research based and teacher approved strategies that make teaching less stressful and more effective. You can check out the show notes and resources from each episode at secondstorywindow.net.

Heidi 0:28
We’re so glad you’re tuning in today. Let’s get to the show.

Emily 0:36
Hey there. Thanks for joining us today for a very special episode. Today we are celebrating 250 episodes as well as our four year podcast anniversary. We will take a look back at our past favorites and talk about what we hope the next four years will hold.

Heidi 0:55
But first, let’s start with a try it tomorrow, where we share a quick win that you can try in your classroom right away. Emily, what is our suggestion for this week?

Emily 1:03
Well, this week, try boosting your mood with a two for one good deed. So think about one of your teacher friends and a problem that you know they’re struggling with in their classroom right now. Then you can send them a link to one of our podcast episodes that might have tips they need to manage the situation.

Heidi 1:21
So not only are you helping out a friend, but you are helping us out too. Recommendations from friends are one of the top ways that new listeners find podcasts. So every time you share our podcast, it really is such a lovely gift to us.

Emily 1:36
Yeah, and we don’t take it for granted when listeners enjoy our content enough to share it with others. We are truly so grateful every time you do.

Heidi 1:44
And if you do that and you find that you need an even bigger helpers high to just, you know, get through the day, after you recommend an episode to a friend, you could swing by the rating section on your podcast player and consider giving us five stars and maybe a review. It would be our favorite gift.

Emily 2:01
Yes, that is the traditional podcast anniversary gift is a rating and review. So as we’ve already mentioned, not only is today’s episode special because we made it to 250 episodes, but it also happens to be our four year podcast anniversary.

Heidi 2:18
I keep trying to make podcastiversary a thing. But so far, Hallmark has just refused to play the game.

Emily 2:24
Stop trying to make podcastiversary a thing. And if you were wondering about our math, you would probably be wondering four years, seems like it’d be closer to 200 episodes, but we do double episodes in the summer in recent years, so that’s what’s given us a boost in the numbers.

Heidi 2:40
And in honor of this milestone, we wanted to do something special with this episode. So we’re doing something that we just invented, called a podcast time capsule. We’re going to reflect on how far we’ve come, celebrate all of the good things happening now, and talk about what we hope the next 250 episodes bring.

Emily 2:58
And someday, when we get to 500 episodes, we can revisit today’s discussion and see how well we did on our goals.

Heidi 3:05
But before we can think about episode 500, let’s go back in time and look at how we got started in 2022. Emily and I had talked about doing a podcast for a long, long time before we actually jumped in. So Emily, how is having a podcast different than you imagined it would be?

Emily 3:24
This going back in time makes me feel like we need to be going, do do do, do do do. Is that from Wayne’s World?

Heidi 3:31
Flashback, flashback.

Emily 3:33
There we go. I would say that having a podcast is different than I imagined, because it is a lot more work than it seems like it should be. Because it seems like we’re just getting together to chat for half an hour every week. How hard could it be? But we care a lot about making sure that this is a valuable use of your time. So the prep is fairly involved.

Heidi 3:55
It really is. It takes so much time, and we love doing it. It just was not the commitment we thought we were signing up for.

Emily 4:02
No, it was a big commitment for sure, and sometimes it also feels a little remote from the listeners, like we know you’re out there, hello, and we hear from you sometimes, but we would love to hear from the listeners even more, so that we can make sure this podcast is as valuable to you as it can possibly be. What about you, Heidi, what are you thinking?

Heidi 4:21
Well, I just could not conceive of lasting this long when we started. Like, back in 2022, making it to 2023 seemed impossible.

Emily 4:30
Right.

Heidi 4:31
And 100% we have only made it this long because of Sara and her amazing team at Podcasting For Educators.

Emily 4:38
Yes.

Heidi 4:38
They are the ones that handle all of the technical work that comes with having a podcast. Like it is, there are so many steps that it takes to get, just to get it into the player, let alone edited and fine tuned and all of that. And without her help, and the pressure of knowing we have to get her the episodes in time, we would not have stuck with this for probably even six months.

Emily 4:58
Which is ironic, since we are recording this today a day later than it is due to her.

Heidi 5:03
She loves us anyway.

Emily 5:04
The pressure is what’s making it so that it’s not a week late.

Heidi 5:09
Yes, thank you, Sara.

Emily 5:11
Well, what would you keep exactly the same from what we did with the podcast?

Heidi 5:16
Well, I I really like our format. We wanted it to feel like chatting with your teacher besties after school, but not get so lost in like tangents and asides that you didn’t have anything to take away. And we never take it for granted that teachers have a limited amount of time. So we want to make sure that the time you’re giving us is meaningful, but, you know, also fun.

Emily 5:38
Yes. And I would say my favorite segment is the extra credit segment, and we’ve done that from the beginning, and I’m so glad that we’ve done it, because it’s just a nice way for us to share something that we’re loving, that usually has nothing to do with teaching.

Heidi 5:51
Yes.

Emily 5:52
What I like about that is, obviously it helps you all get to know us better, but more than that, I think it’s a good reminder that we’re more than just teachers, and all of you listeners are more than just teachers, too. So it’s a nice way to end the episode on a light note that just humanizes all of us.

Heidi 6:08
Yes.

Emily 6:09
Heidi, is there anything you wish we would have done sooner with the podcast?

Heidi 6:12
Well, I think it took us probably about six months to find the right tone. I remember, so we started in the spring, and I remember finally in the fall, feeling like, Okay, we figured this out. And at the beginning, bless our hearts, we basically wrote a blog post for each episode, and then we would just take turns reading like each paragraph.

Emily 6:30
Yeah. And we also tried times too, where we just had a super loose outline, and then we would just try and spit ball it. But that didn’t work well either. We need somewhere in the middle.

Heidi 6:41
Yes, yes. But once we got more comfortable with what we were doing, we could have more of that conversation flow without feeling like it was a lecture or, you know, wandering into the weeds. And if you have been with us since those early days, thank you for sticking around through the growing pains.

Emily 6:57
And if you didn’t listen to those early days, it’s okay. You don’t need to go back and listen to them. It’s fine.

Heidi 7:03
Okay, Emily, do you have a topic that we’ve covered that was a total flop that you thought would be a hit?

Emily 7:08
Well, I couldn’t think of anything that was necessarily a flop, but I do think one of our hidden gems is our three episode series on transitions.

Heidi 7:17
Yes, I love those.

Emily 7:18
We have so much good content packed in those episodes that I think if you haven’t listened to it, you definitely should. Putting some extra thought into how you handle transitions actually like will have a big impact in your day. So those episodes are nice hidden gems. What about you, Heidi?

Heidi 7:33
Well, I’m still really salty about this. I don’t know why I’m so mad, but back in episode 27, Emily and I talked about choosing a one word theme before the new school year. It’s something we had done in January, is at the start of the new year, and we thought this would just like, be such a good fit for the new school year. And I remember we spent so many days trying to find a format that we thought would fit with teachers and the start of the school year, and it was kind of a bust of an episode. And I thought, Okay, well, Everyone’s just really busy going back to school. It’s fine. And we tried it again the following January. Nope.

Emily 8:09
No, that just is not speaking to you all, apparently. And that’s okay.

Heidi 8:14
But it’s so weird, it seems like something our listeners would be into. Maybe we’ll try it again in the fall, or maybe, maybe we’ve been burned. We’re just gonna walk away.

Emily 8:25
And what’s something about podcasting today that would have surprised you four years ago, Heidi?

Heidi 8:30
Well, I think what we focus on is not what we intended to focus on.

Emily 8:35
No, when we started this, we just assumed we would have a bunch of literacy episodes, a bunch of math episodes, just kind of like all through the different teaching things, and we just didn’t realize we were going to eventually, and not too far into it, land firmly in the classroom management, work life balance, that kind of an area, which was not at all what we thought we were going to talk about.

Heidi 8:59
Yeah, we just had no idea how much we enjoyed helping teachers figure out how to manage their classes. This was not something that was on our radar. And the funny thing is, like, I don’t think we have a single math episode. I also think we would be surprised that that pivot to like talking about classroom management would then springboard us into a book.

Emily 9:23
Right.

Heidi 9:23
So Emily and I had talked about writing a book someday, but we definitely did not have any plans in the works. We didn’t even have a topic. And then after recording episode 165, I just remember saying to her, I think this might be a book, but that was kind of it. But a couple months later…

Emily 9:39
No but that wasn’t kind of it, because you immediately wrote an outline for the book.

Heidi 9:43
Oh that’s true.

Emily 9:43
Because you were like, I got to do it now, while it’s fresh, I don’t know why, I’m just going to do it. And then a few months later, we randomly, like, heard from a publisher.

Heidi 9:53
Yeah, they’re like, Hey, do you have any book ideas? And we said, as a matter of fact, we do. And it was so nice to have an outline, because the turnaround time was pretty tight, so we could just be like, Here you go. Now our book’s coming out in July. It’s crazy.

Emily 10:05
We just got the edits back two days, so we’ve got work to do.

Heidi 10:10
Okay, Emily, let’s shift gears here and move into the present moment. What is one thing that you wish every teacher listening right now could really hear?

Emily 10:21
Oh, I would just want to tell them that you are doing so much better than you think you are. Teachers are often so hard on themselves, but I just want you to know that you are doing a job that is so incredibly hard. You have to be on all day. You have so many students that you have to keep track of, all of them with their individual needs. And you really are doing so much, right? It’s it’s really easy to dwell on where we fall short, but the fact that you are spending your free time listening to a teacher podcast right now is all the evidence that I need for me to tell you with confidence that you are doing a great job. Any teacher who desires to keep improving every day is already knocking it out of the park, so give yourself a pat on the back, please. I’m certain you deserve it.

Heidi 11:06
Oh, absolutely.

Emily 11:08
And what do you know now, Heidi, about teachers or teaching that you didn’t fully understand when you started?

Heidi 11:14
Well, when we started the podcast, I hadn’t really considered how hard teaching is, like going off what Emily was just saying. When you’re in it, you know you feel like you’re being pulled in a million directions, but you don’t really have the time to stop and think about all of the layers of intention that have to go into every single minute of the school day and just to have every student have a sharpened pencil at the right moment.

Emily 11:40
Yeah.

Heidi 11:41
That is, it requires so much thought and work, and doing this podcast has made me really stop and reflect on how insane this job is. It’s like trying to play 3d chess in the middle of a dodgeball game, and teachers do not get anywhere near enough credit.

Emily 12:00
No, they don’t, and I do think that while we were in it, we knew it was hard, but I actually am so much more protective of teachers now that we’re not in the classroom, because we’re still so involved with everything that’s going on with teachers as we continue to serve them, and now it’s not about me, it’s about you guys. I’m just so protective of you that when I ever hear anyone say anything that is slightly disrespectful to a teacher. I was getting in someone’s comments last week because they said something about screen time and what are the teachers even doing? And I was ready to throw hands, like first of all, the amount of screen time that happens at a school has so little to do with the teacher deciding what’s going to be done on a device and what’s not going to be done on a device. They got a whole earful, and they were like, oh, no, no, that was not a dig at a teacher. I’m like, Yeah, but you were! So I will always be there to elbow someone in your behalf if they are ever talking bad about a teacher, because we know how hard this is and how hard you’re all working.

Heidi 13:02
Yeah, you worry about the kids, and we’ll do what we can to worry about you.

Emily 13:05
That’s right. So Heidi, if a brand new teacher discovered the podcast today, what episode would you tell them to start with?

Heidi 13:13
I think I would choose episode 158, I’m sure you all remember exactly what one that is.

Emily 13:17
Oh, I do definitely.

Heidi 13:18
Yeah, I had to look it up. So don’t feel bad. Obviously, I didn’t expect anyone to remember that. But this is about making sure your management system is not making your job harder. I think it’s such a good encapsulation of how Emily and I approach most things. Think about what you want to have happen, consider what it will take to get there and then invite your students into the process. I wish that was a framework I had understood back in my early days. It really would have saved me from so many headaches, because I think it’s something that new teachers could really benefit from. What about you, Emily, what would you recommend to a new teacher?

Emily 13:52
Well, I totally cheated, because I said episode 200 which was like a very special episode that we did for, you know, celebrating 200 episodes. And so we shared five of the best tips from the first 200 episodes of the podcast. So I’m sort of cheating, but I already know those are, like five really good tips. And so that’s the episode that I would tell people to start with. And if you’re new to our podcast and you haven’t listened to Episode 200 yet, go start there, and then it’s a good place too, to then you can go on some rabbit holes after that, after you hear those tips, you might be like, oh, I want to go hear more about that, or listen to that whole episode. So episode 200 would be my choice.

Heidi 14:30
It’s a little bit of a choose your own adventure. Like start here and then, figure out which path you need to go.

Emily 14:35
Definitely. Well, what makes you most hopeful about education right now, Heidi?

Heidi 14:39
I am so proud of how teachers are starting to push back against the extra demands that are put on them. For so so long, there was this sense that if you were not murdering yourself for your job, you weren’t a good teacher. It’s for the kids, right? Remember your why.

Emily 14:58
You’re not here for the money.

Heidi 15:00
Yeah, like, why are you expecting to be compensated? But that attitude is how we burned out a lot of really, really good teachers. Now we are still so far, far away from having a system that respects teachers like the qualified professionals they are. But every time a teacher says no to an unreasonable expectation, I think we get a little bit closer.

Emily 15:22
Yeah, for sure. And one of my friends was saying the other day, like, are you worried about, you know, the future of education because of everything that’s going on? And I was like, no, because yes, there are policies right now that don’t align with best practices, and there are demands being put on teachers right now that are not fair and that don’t have the best, students’ best interests in mind, and yet, I am so inspired by the way that teachers are able to make the most of those difficult situations, because they don’t just throw up their hands and say there’s nothing they can do. They find ways to work within their constraints, to give their students the best education they can. And so I am confident that as long as we have smart, caring, hard working teachers, like we do, education is always going to improve, and I could never lose faith in education, because I know teachers and I know how much they care. I may not always have faith in policymakers, but I do always have faith in teachers.

Heidi 16:15
Oh, absolutely. Like they’re going to show up with a roll of tape and some pencils and paper, and they’re going to make miracles happen, because that’s just what teachers do.

Emily 16:26
And they’ll keep advocating for their students, and hopefully, like you said, advocating for themselves and for the way that they deserve to be treated.

Heidi 16:34
Yeah, I hope, before too long, we see, like, such a huge shift in the way we treat teachers so that we can give students everything that they deserve.

Emily 16:45
So now let’s shift to looking forward into the next future episodes of the podcast, Heidi. So what do you want to do with the podcast in the next 250 episodes?

Heidi 16:55
Like you mentioned, Emily, sometimes being on the podcast feels a little one sided, because like we’re doing all the talking. I don’t always get to hear from our listeners, and I would really love to expand the sense of our community that we have. We want to make sure that what we’re doing is what is most valuable to our listeners and what meets your needs right now. And so I hope that as we go into the next few years, that’s something that we can continue building. What about you, Emily, what do you see happening for us in the next 250 episodes?

Emily 17:23
Well, I just hope that in those episodes we keep unlocking ways that teachers can elevate what matters and simplify the rest. So that’s the tagline for the show, right? And I think it sounds cute, but it actually is really everything that we stand for here. It’s the most accurate representation of what we’re trying to do, and it’s because we care so much about making your teaching life easier. We know there are too many demands on you, and we want to help free you from some of that weight that you’re under, but we also know that there are some things that matter a lot, and we’re never going to tell you to just phone stuff in.

Emily 17:56
So while we want to help you simplify everything you can, we also want to help you put the appropriate amount of emphasis on those parts of your teaching that really move the needle, and that might be classroom management strategies that help you have more time for teaching, or instructional strategies that help students retain what they learn, or even just ideas to make your day more fun, so that you can still enjoy your job when it’s really hard. So I hope that our next 250 episodes delivers on that promise.

Heidi 18:26
I love that.

Emily 18:28
Well, what do you hope listeners say about Teacher Approved in another four years?

Heidi 18:32
I want it to be something like, Oh, I knew you gals would have just the tip I needed. Obviously, after 250 episodes, we have a pretty robust library of content. So hopefully, with 250 more episodes, we can cover every possible question anyone might have. It’s just always so nice when someone asks us a question, and we’d be like, oh yeah, we have a whole deep dive on that in this episode here.

Emily 18:56
Why yes, we have a three part series about that. I just hope that they will say that the ideas we have shared have helped them remember why they love teaching. So I just hope that we’ve somehow helped reduce even a little bit of the burden that’s been placed on them as a teacher, and that really that we’ve always made it worth your time to listen to our episodes, that we never waste your time here.

Heidi 19:20
Yes, absolutely. So as we look ahead to the next four years, Emily, what do you hope that we could say about the podcast by episode 500?

Emily 19:29
I mean, is it too much to say that I hope we’re the number one podcast in education by episode 500?

Heidi 19:34
No, let’s do it. Do you know what my goal is?

Emily 19:37
Let’s hear it.

Heidi 19:38
I want to hit a million downloads.

Emily 19:43
I mean, obviously, like, those things would be so exciting to say, because they would be such a fun achievement for us. But like, more than anything, I know that we both hope for those things because we want to reach more teachers, that like, we’re passionate about what we’re doing here, and we really want to help as many teachers as we can with the ideas that we’re sharing here.

Heidi 20:00
Yes, that’s always what it comes down to for us is, like, yeah, that’s fun to see the growth. But we really, really want to have that sense of, you know, just being the teacher bestie that you can turn to in a rough moment and like, we get it and we can help you through the next steps. It’s what makes all of the hard work worth it every week, because we just we can picture you listening in your cars on your way to work or while you’re walking your dog, or, you know, packing up your classroom at the end of the school day, and we want to be there for you, cheering you on and helping make this job a little more manageable.

Emily 20:39
Okay, so we always end the episode with a teacher approved tip and some extra credit. So we’re going to revisit some of our favorites. Which tip from the past four years is your favorite, and why, Heidi?

Heidi 20:50
Okay, well, I’m picking a tip that we discussed in episode 26 because I don’t think enough people believe us when we say it’s one of the best management hacks that we’ve discovered, and that is to turn your students’ desks backwards.

Emily 21:04
Yes.

Heidi 21:06
The most efficient problem solving is preventing problems from starting in the first place. And if the desks are turned around, kids can’t play around in there during lessons, nothing is getting lost. You never have to take class time to clean out desks. And if you’re like, Okay, that sounds so impractical, like, where do they keep everything? Well, Emily and I did it. We gave each student a pencil box for their basic supplies, and then notebooks and folders were kept in stacking Sterilite drawers, specifically Sterilite because they’re sturdy.

Emily 21:35
Right.

Heidi 21:35
On the counter. And then the day’s table captain would bring the drawer to the table with the materials for that lesson, and then it was just all put away. Nothing got lost. Everything held up all year long, because things weren’t getting crammed into the desk. Now, we did have to sacrifice some counter space for the drawers, but honestly, it was so worth it.

Emily 21:55
Oh so worth it.

Heidi 21:57
And then I’d always start the school year with my kids in tables, but I rarely ended that way, because I usually had to spread them out some more. So when that would happen, I would start to let them keep stuff inside their desks, but the desks were still turned around.

Emily 22:09
Right. So, yeah, if their desk is, like, not pushed up against another one, it can still be backwards, and then they just have to walk around to get stuff out of it, but then it prevents them from playing in it.

Heidi 22:19
Yeah, or they get really good at, like, reaching over, you know, and be like, I know what my morning workbook feels like, and they just pull that out. Or, you know, it just solves so many problems. And yes, it is unconventional, but it saved me from having to monitor everything that was happening in everyone’s desks all day long for nine months. It was worth it. I will take that every single time.

Emily 22:39
Yeah, and I had something at least one year that I needed them to keep in their desk because I didn’t have enough drawers for it, or something like that, and it was something that we only needed, like once a day at the most, maybe not even every day. And so we just would slide the desks apart and reach in from the middle, like there are ways to make it work. Where there is a will, there is a way, and it’s worth it for all of the management headaches that you avoid.

Emily 23:02
My fourth grader was just telling me that she got in trouble because she was messing around in her desk, because they were moving desks later in the day, and she knew that her desk was a mess, and so she was like, trying to, like, organize stuff in there during a lesson. And I thought, well, you know, the desk didn’t have anything in it and was turned around. The teacher wouldn’t even have to deal with that. Which is not a criticism of the teacher, by the way, like that’s just a, I just wish that teachers had this idea and would give it a try to avoid that extra stress and time waster.

Heidi 23:32
Well and even if it’s not something you feel like you can take on all year long, maybe in the last quarter of the school year, it might be worth it, just to eliminate some of those spring headaches when everything’s just a little rougher this time of year. Like, okay, I’m not gonna fight this battle anymore. We’re turning the desks around, and we’ll just make it work for the last few weeks.

Emily 23:52
Yeah, for sure.

Heidi 23:53
Okay, Emily, which tip did you pick and why?

Emily 23:56
Well, I picked, it’s from episode 88 and it’s having a class handshake. So, this is one of my favorite little traditions that I did with my students, and they loved being involved in making up the handshake at the beginning of the year. So that was good for building our community. Sometimes they were a little long, but then it just felt like our own little insider secret for the rest of the year. And sometimes we would do it as our greeting during morning meeting, and then at the end of the day, I always stood by the door and on their way out, they could do a hug, a handshake or a high five on the way out the door, and many of them would want to do our secret handshake on the way out. So I got good at doing it fast. It’s just a really small way to build classroom community, but it’s so simple to do.

Heidi 24:36
And while we’re talking about preventative behavior management, a strong student teacher relationship is one of the easiest, most reliable ways to prevent classroom management problems, because when students feel like their teacher sees them and values them as an individual, they’re more willing to cooperate with what you’re asking of them. And so something like that. Yeah, it’s a hassle to have to set up and manage, but it buys you so much goodwill and so much buy in that you almost couldn’t pay for that kind of benefit.

Emily 25:10
Yeah, for sure.

Heidi 25:12
All right, Emily, what is an extra credit that you still stand by after all these years?

Emily 25:17
All right. In episode 124 I shared about my new puzzle table, and it is my favorite thing that I own. I use it all the time. I was just using it this afternoon working on a puzzle, and I guarantee I have done so many more puzzles since I got this table, because everything’s contained on the table. I can just take that off of my kitchen table easily when we need to use the table and then put it back on.

Emily 25:43
And being able to have, like an easy, contained place for it makes it easy to just always have a puzzle out. And I especially like mine, because it swivels, but not just swivels, it also tilts, so I can tilt it up, which was especially helpful. Last year, I was working on a puzzle, like, I think it was like a Rifle Paper Co one that was like a New York Street in spring, and so the whole top third was, like, pink blossoms on trees, and they were, this was so hard, like, it was all the same. It was so hard to do. And I was just like ready to just quit this stupid puzzle.

Emily 26:22
But the fact that I could tilt it up to work on it saved me, because it was the hunching over trying to reach the top part of the puzzle, because I don’t really like to work upside down if I don’t have to. Tilting it up saved my back and made it so I could finally finish this stupid puzzle that I will never do again because those blossoms almost ruined my life. But puzzle table, it’s worth it and and there are a lot of swivel ones out there, but I actually think having the tilt feature is worth the upgrade, so I will link to it in the show notes.

Heidi 26:51
And yours has like, little cool drawers, so if you want to start sorting pieces by color, you can have them out of the way, but still organized. It’s really a handy dandy little device.

Emily 27:02
So good. And I got one that has, like, some of them are just plain wood, but I got one that has, like, a little bit of a felt, doesn’t feel like the right word, like a textured lining, and I find that so much more pleasant. It kind of holds the pieces together, especially since you’re if you’re going to tilt it up, that keeps it kind of in place. Yes, the only thing is, after every puzzle, I have to get out the lint roller and run it all over to get all the puzzle dust off, because any hardcore puzzler like myself knows what a trial puzzle dust is, and some puzzles are worse than others.

Heidi 27:34
Interesting.

Emily 27:35
If you redo a puzzle, it’s a lot better because you usually have gotten all the dust out of it. But the first time you do a new puzzle depending on the brand, sometimes they are so dusty.

Heidi 27:44
I had no idea, whole new world.

Emily 27:45
Yep. What’s your extra credit you stand by?

Heidi 27:49
I’ve got a two for one, because these two things together have saved my life. Only kind of exaggerating. So these are the Luminette 3 light therapy glasses, and magnesium L-threonate. So they have saved my sleep. I was having such a hard time falling asleep at night, and one of the reasons behind that is that you need early morning light into your eyeballs to reset your circadian rhythms, but it’s really hard to go outside for a half an hour in the morning.

Emily 28:22
Especially as, like, a non morning person, and you don’t have to run any kids anywhere. So there’s not, like, a reason that you’re out and about in the sun in the morning, like I am.

Heidi 28:31
Or you know, if you’re driving, you want to have sunglasses on so you don’t hit anyone on the road. And that defeats that. Or if you’re, you know, different times a year, sometimes the morning might be sunny when you’re out, sometimes it’s not. These glasses just make it so convenient. Put them on, I get up in the morning, put them on right away. I can get ready in the morning with them on. I look ridiculous, but it’s fine. It just shines like a little light in your eyeballs. It’s not bad at all.

Heidi 28:54
And then I also started taking magnesium L-threonate, specifically that form of magnesium, and now I can actually stay asleep. So the glasses let me fall asleep. Magnesium keeps me asleep because it stopped my restless legs, like I would be up for hours and hours every night, trying to, like, stop doing Irish jigs in my bed. But with the magnesium, I have hardly had any problems. So those two things together have saved my life. And if you have sleep issues, definitely worth checking out. I put links to both of them in the show notes.

Emily 29:27
And if you didn’t know before now, now you know that we are perimenopausal aged, with our puzzles and our magnesium.

Heidi 29:38
Well, that is it for today’s episode. Whether you have been here since day one or today was your first episode, we are so grateful to you for joining us, and hopefully you’re ready to keep with us in seeing what the next four years hold.

Heidi 29:53
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Teacher Approved. I’m Heidi.

Emily 29:57
And I’m Emily. Thank you for listening. Be sure to follow or subscribe in your podcast app so that you never miss an episode.

Heidi 30:04
You can connect with us and other teachers in the Teacher Approved Facebook group. We’ll see you here next week. Bye for now.

Emily 30:10
Bye.