EdTech Loop Ep. 98: The Annual Gift Guide

There's no need to get into any Black Friday lines this year. EdTech Loop already has you covered with the best gifts for the holiday season!

Podcast Transcript

Larry Burden 0:03
No, that will not do.

Larry Burden 0:11
double check we're recording here.

Larry Burden 0:13
I'm very happy somebody prepped for this pod.

Stephie Luyt 0:15
I know.

Larry Burden 0:16
Not this guy.

Danelle Brostrom 0:16
Let's just scrap this one.

Stephie Luyt 0:18
Almost 40 is not old.

Larry Burden 0:19
Bada Boom Bada Bing

Larry Burden 0:26
It's Episode 98 of the EdTech Loop podcast My name is Larry Burden and she's planning to virtually camp out in Amazon's Black Friday line as soon as this podcast ends. it's Danelle Brostrom. And we are also joined by one of our favorite things Stephie Luyt. I've dug deep into the bargain bin for this week's moment of Zen.

Moment of Zen 0:46
Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love.

Larry Burden 0:51
This pod might be a little late, as we wait to thaw this week's meat the show: the Annual Loop Holiday Gift Giving Guide. So guys, it's almost that time of the year. Next week, this blew me away by the way, you know, you start to see some Black Friday stuff, you know, coming in the mail and here and there and I'm like oh my gosh. So early this year. And then it hit me, it's next week.

Danelle Brostrom 1:19
Crazy.

Stephie Luyt 1:19
Yeah,

Larry Burden 1:20
So, help, help me out. We were talking before the pod, I am completely unprepared for the holiday season this year so enlighten me as to what, what are some wonderful things we can get for our people that we love.

Danelle Brostrom 1:33
Do you want to go first?

Stephie Luyt 1:34
I will, and I have a major theme because all of what I brought are, I brought book ideas. And part of that is because I just came back from a conference. So I was at the American Association of School Librarians conference and there were many authors and illustrators there. And, you know, you can't go wrong with a book. And so what I have is a range of books from our, for our littles up to our high school kiddos. Some you may have heard about because some have gotten some press and some are, were new to me. Let me start with the littles, and this book, it's called "Another," by Christian Robinson, and it is a sci-fi fantasy picture book that is wordless. So that's a lot. If you think about all that in all of those elements in a picture book without words for littles, preschool. The art is beautiful and there's an alternate universe that the kiddo and the animal take a little journey in. And I just, I'm so intrigued by this concept, and already there are multiple accolades rolling in for this book. So as we're getting close to my favorite time with the Caldicot, Newbery awards, I think we'll hear a lot more about, "Another." But put that one on your list if you have littles.

Larry Burden 2:53
What a great way to introduce our littlest ones to narrative.

Stephie Luyt 2:58
Yes,

Larry Burden 2:59
Get them understanding the concept of storytelling and story. So that when we're introducing them to words and vocabulary and reading, they already have an understanding of the structure...

Stephie Luyt 3:13
Absolutely

Larry Burden 3:14
of the story. Did you bring it?

Stephie Luyt 3:16
I didn't bring that one.

Larry Burden 3:20
The ultimate picture book and it's not here.

Stephie Luyt 3:22
It's not here but,

Larry Burden 3:23
because you recognized it's an audio podcast so why would you bring it.

Stephie Luyt 3:27
Well, partially because it's so popular right now I don't have a copy available, but I also, you know I come here and then I hold it up and you guys make fun of me.

Larry Burden 3:36
I would, I'm hurt, I would never.

Stephie Luyt 3:39
In the nicest way possible. So, maybe I'll give you a couple more of the littles and then we can go back and forth.

Danelle Brostrom 3:45
Deal.

Stephie Luyt 3:45
Okay, there's a book called, "The Undefeated," by Kwame Alexander and illustrated by Kadir Nelson, and if you're familiar with those names you probably have seen them in a number of other books. But this is a love letter to the experience of African Americans, and it actually was connected to an ESPN special called, "The Undefeated." But it is a poem, and the artwork by Kadir Nelson is photorealistic so his, his illustrations are as gorgeous as you can imagine. And topic wise, you know that's, there's some heavy stuff in there, and it's tells just a beautiful narrative of the experience of African Americans, touching on a lot of issues. But there's a lot of meat in this book and it's just gorgeous. So, I don't have it, but I can, I can, I can picture it in my mind.

Larry Burden 4:37
We trust you. We trust you.

Stephie Luyt 4:39
I've seen it and have, I highly recommend it. We do have it in a couple of libraries.

Larry Burden 4:44
What age group would that be?

Stephie Luyt 4:45
Well, you know I would call it for mid to upper elementary. I think the, the depth of some of the history would be more meaningful to older elementary and up, and older even kiddos. But in terms of the story, kids will understand it.

Larry Burden 5:02
And as we said before picture books aren't just for our,

Stephie Luyt 5:06
Correct.

Larry Burden 5:07
Lower El.,

Stephie Luyt 5:08
The book, "Another," by Christian Robinson, could be used at all levels. A wordless picture book, I mean kids of all ages and adults would tell a different story as they're looking through it, as you know all ages, it would, it appeals for everyone.

Larry Burden 5:20
It'd be perfect for a podcast studio. Oh that's right.

Stephie Luyt 5:25
Oh sorry guys.

Danelle Brostrom 5:26
Love it.

Stephie Luyt 5:26
And then another book that is, it was written by Sonia Sotomayor, from the Supreme Court, you may have heard of her, and Raphael Lopez is the illustrator. And it's called, "Just Ask." And it's all about kids who have any kind of, I would say, lack of a better word, difference. So kids who, it was written because Sonia Sotomayor was diagnosed with diabetes when she was a child, and she always felt like when she'd be having medication, or getting a shot, that kids were always curious and wondering, but people wouldn't ask. And so the book is all about how everybody has something that is on their plate that they're dealing with. And so it touches on ADHD, allergies, learning differences of all types, different types of disabilities, and the whole focus is, everybody has differences, let's, let's ask, let's be curious and it's, l et's talk about, and embrace, and celebrate these things that are, everybody has that are different. So beautiful illustrations again. Raphael Lopez has done a number of books and it's, it's a really neat partnership.

Danelle Brostrom 6:34
Amazing books. Thank you.

Stephie Luyt 6:36
You're welcome.

Danelle Brostrom 6:36
Well, I feel like I'm struggling to follow those because I brought all, like, fun tech things.

Stephie Luyt 6:44
I think that sounds perfect.

Danelle Brostrom 6:45
I feel like you need the balance which is why you should do both,

Stephie Luyt 6:47
Absolutely.

Danelle Brostrom 6:48
So talking about the things for the littles. I'll talk about my stuff for littles first. I want to remind everyone about Kiwi Crate. That is one of my favorite things. I think it's a great, holiday season is a great time to think about starting a Kiwi Crate because it's a gift that would last the entire year. It is either a simple, single kit, or you can set up with a subscription. So they would get one every single month. And they have crates all the way down to 0 to 2, 2 to 4, all the way up to 14 and up. And the crates are focused on making, they're focused on creativity, there's one that's focused on art, one is focused on tinkering. And it gives the kids all the things that they need to do this project. And it's pretty cool because when it comes, the kids, they smile, my own kids they make the project that's there. And it's pretty cool and it keeps us intrigued and entertained for a little while. And then I watch it kind of evolve, like I watch that project will change into something else and they'll try to figure out how they can change it and make it better. So I see them playing with it longer than just that first session, and I like that it brings new ideas into my house every month.

Stephie Luyt 7:55
Yep. And I think they've expanded one that's for, as you mentioned older kids and that that's newer. That is on my list of possibilities for my kiddos because we've never had it but my niece's do and they've loved it. And I always think to myself, you know I could gather all these materials and do this project.

Danelle Brostrom 8:13
But I won't.

Stephie Luyt 8:15
So, it's really nice that Kiwi Crate does that for you, if you might be like me and have plans but they might not always pan out.

Danelle Brostrom 8:24
I also hate buying all of this stuff. Like you know, my kid wanted to take this little basketball thing with pom poms, okay but we needed 2 pom poms. Pom Poms come in a bag

Stephie Luyt 8:33
Of 100.

Danelle Brostrom 8:33
Yes. So now I have 400 pom poms around my house that are ridiculous.

Larry Burden 8:39
You mocked me years ago, when I, when I was, we were talking about Makers, Makerspace and, and collecting the stuff and I pointed out, like, I get that, it's really cool, but the organize, organizing of it can be a little bit cumbersome so you really want to be thinking about that when you're getting all that stuff. and look how look how it comes back around.

Danelle Brostrom 8:59
It does come back around.

Stephie Luyt 9:01
The Wise One.

Danelle Brostrom 9:03
Thanks, Larry.

Larry Burden 9:04
Though, I will say, with that, I'm listening to these suggestions and my kids are a little bit older and I'm like, I wonder if that'd be appropriate for me? Maybe I can ask them to give that to me? Maybe I want a Kiwi Crate.

Danelle Brostrom 9:17
The ones for older kids are really, really cool. For 14 and up they offer two options. One is a Maker kit. And then this eureka kit, which is all about engineering and science. And, like the one example that they make, you make a desk lamp. They show you how to make a desk lamp that uses pulleys and springs to make an adjustable lamp with an LED bulb. It's so cool. I know, we should get them here for the, the pod. Ukulele, and electric pencil sharpener, like. Okay, my next option is going to be for like that elementary school age kiddo. I have a Fitbit, and I love my fitness tracker and my child wanted one, and I started looking online and I was kind of frustrated with the options that were available. They were all from other countries. I didn't know about the tracking. You know I'm a little crazy about privacy, I'm just sayin'.

Larry Burden 10:10
Thank you for that actually. Somebody needs to.

Stephie Luyt 10:12
Obsesively intentional.

Danelle Brostrom 10:13
I do, I do worry about things like that, but I know that she really wanted a fitness tracker. So I was so excited to,

Larry Burden 10:20
Not the worst thing for a child to be obsessed about,

Danelle Brostrom 10:22
I know, she wants to count her steps. Fitbit came out with a new one recently called the ACE2. And it's made specifically for kids so it has special swim proof protection. It has some kid friendly graphics that you can put on the front, some kid friendly stats and goals celebrations. But it also has a parent component. I like that you can set it up under a family sharing plan and then your kids because they're under 13 they're given the special protections with their data that should happen for an under 13 year old. And it also, you get to kind of decide what features they get. Like if they want to have step challenges with their friends, they can only do with people you approve. Like, it kind of helps give me some of the control back which I really, really like. And they're running about $70 which doesn't feel crazy expensive for this kind of a fitness tracker. But there are some other features that I think are really, really smart that are on here. There is a timer, which the kids can set from the device. Why do I love that? Because I think of ADHD kids when they're sitting in classroom, and they need things broken up, and they need to be able to stand and go walk around, they need to be able to set themselves a timer. So, in a classroom setting, having a timer go off, well all of a sudden that makes you the one that everyone's looking at. But to have it on your watch that just vibrates a little bit, that you can set yourself, I think, gives a little bit of independence. It just recognizes that kids like, kids might need that. So, I'm a huge fan of the Fitbit Ace2.

Stephie Luyt 11:49
Sounds like a really thoughtful tool to. Well designed with kids in mind.

Larry Burden 11:52
Awesome. Like I said, my kids are,

Danelle Brostrom 11:55
I'm looking at you waiting for your gifts Larry. What do you have?

Larry Burden 11:57
I have a piece of paper with some stuff on it, and some really, really, really, smart friends.

Stephie Luyt 12:02
I have this book with me. Now our listeners cannot see it but, "Astronaut, Aquanaut," so it is a nonfiction National Geographic Kids book by Jennifer Swanson and she had consultation by Fabian Cousteau. So Jacque Cousteau's, I believe, grandson. if you've, if you have a kiddo who, our you have ever wondered like what would it really be like to be an astronaut, and what would it be like to be an aquanaut, and all those questions that might be forming in your mind right now are answered in this book. And the kid kind of questions, like the nitty gritty of what you do when you are living under water or in space. How does, how did the basic things happen? And I love the amount of research that went into the book, and the detail. And just really providing like a typical day in space, a typical day in the deep sea. Really well researched, lots of primary sources. And this is for kind of your, again, upper elementary, just with the reading level and the amount of information. But if you have a kid who's curious about any of these areas, I would highly recommend this one. And then I have two graphic novels. Ridley Pearson is writing a series about the Super Sons. So it's the sons of Batman, and the sons of Superman, and their backstory and their narrative. So, looking at a whole 'nother part of the superheroes, from the point of view of their sons. And I love, love, love this. Meg Cabot, who wrote The Princess Diaries as well as another, a number of other books is also jumping into graphic novels. They actually, at a session I attended at the conference, a group of writers and illustrators were talking about how, you know as we've talked about on the pod, the graphic novels are very popular in comics. And so a number of kid lit authors and illustrators went to basically, comic boot camp. They brought a bunch of popular authors and illustrators together to learn more about the genre. So Meg Cabot's jumped into writing, this is more of a comic format. But it's a character, Black Canary, and this is called, "Ignite." And Black Canary is a teenager who wants to follow in her dad's footsteps, and be a detective in Gotham City, and doesn't have, doesn't believe she has any superpowers, but then discovers that she does. And, great coming of age story, great female empowerment, what she can do, what she can't do by, what society's letting her do. Loved it, it's going to be, there'll be a sequel, if not more. So, and this I have to say out of all the books, all the new books I brought back from the conference, two of my three kids have read this multiple times and loved it. So this one got high recommendations from my small sample at home, and I loved it too, and Black Canary's power is that she can,

Larry Burden 14:49
Do we want to

Stephie Luyt 14:50
Okay, maybe not.

Larry Burden 14:50
No spoilers. No spoilers.

Danelle Brostrom 14:52
Um, let me do one and then I'll bump it back to you. So thinking about your middle and high school students, or even your adults because I'm thinking I might want one of these to. I'm really excited by the Dribble Up Ball. Dribble up.com, they're offering three different options: a smart soccer ball, a smart basketball and a smart medicine ball. Now what I think is kind of interesting is that it started as Kickstarter in 2017, but really mainstream within the last couple months. I've seen a lot of people talking about them. And essentially, there's a little stand a little tripod that you put your smartphone in, and then you stand back with your smart ball, like your soccer ball, and you can practice toe tapping drills and it will show you exactly where the ball needs to be, and you get points when it hits there. The medicine ball one is kind of for adults. There's a six pound and a 10 pound and you can do the workout. And when you lift the ball up and you get it in the right spot, the smartphone can sense where it is and it gives you a point for that. So you get points by being accurate, you get points by doing it faster. There's a lot of professional soccer teams that are actually using this to improve their accuracy and speed with some of these drills to build muscle memory. I think it's really, really cool to think of how you could improve your ball control skills with these virtual coaches. I think it's really, really cool for kids. I think that this is going to be big this Christmas. Check out DribbleUp.com.

Larry Burden 16:16
I love that, that's so cool.

Danelle Brostrom 16:16
I know, I want one.

Danelle Brostrom 16:18
There's a REMC person downstate, her name is Ann Smart, and she is bringing this PD using the dribble a ball and math. And she's going and talking to teachers about how they can use this in the classroom to help kids build their math skills. I'm really intrigued with the work that she's doing around it, so keep an eye out for them.

Larry Burden 16:39
You know some of our physical education teachers in elementary have used, or incorporated literature and some language arts into their, their classes and their lessons. What a great way to incorporate math for some cross curricular activities. I mean so, so cool.

Danelle Brostrom 16:57
Yeah, and it gets kids moving

Stephie Luyt 16:57
Really cool.

Danelle Brostrom 16:59
Yeah.

Stephie Luyt 16:59
A couple for middle school in particular. "Song for a Whale," so this book is about a deaf student who learns about a whale who's unable to communicate with other whales, and feels that she wants to help this whale. So she goes on this journey with the support of some characters. One thing I found really interesting is the author, Lynn Kelly, is a sign language interpreter herself. So she has a lot of experience working with people with hearing differences. And this is, you know, a kiddo who isn't feeling like she fits in and wants to reach out and help another creature that isn't fitting in. And it's this really exciting journey. And so kiddos, middle grade readers who love animals would be really drawn to this book and the power of this story is what recommends it to. A book called, "Other Words for Home," by Jasmine Warga, is a book told in verse, a novel in verse. And this is the story of a family who comes into Cincinnati from Syria and their experiences. They assimilate, and then as other relatives join her family seeing how she's come and changed, and her experiences and in her new area. What home means, what family means. I love that its in verse. It's another form for kids to really enjoy, and similar to "The Undefeated," being told as a poem form. So, "Other Words for Home," it's that one.

Danelle Brostrom 18:24
I only have one more. The last thing I'm going to mention is, so thinking about the holidays, it's a great time to add board games into your collection. Board games are great way to get the family together, and get them talking. One of my all time favorite board games is called Prime Climb.

Larry Burden 18:41
We've seen this, yeah.

Danelle Brostrom 18:42
I feel like I need to mention it every time because it's so good. Math for Love is the company that makes it, and it makes some other games for kids. Little Pok-a-Dot it out is another good one. But Prime Climb is, it's beautiful first of all, but then the mathematics involved, it's funny because I play it with my older child, and we change the rules a little bit because typically what you have to do, you roll the dice and then you can choose either to add, subtract, multiply or divide the number on your pawn by the number you roll. Like there's a lot of different computational thinking that's happening when kids are playing this game. But we changed the rules a little bit because division is still tricky for her, so I told her you can either add or multiply, we just kind of changed that a little bit. And then it was funny because then she played with my husband and he made a play by the rules which was a very different game for her. But then he came to me afterward, and he's a grown adult, and he was like that game was really fun. Like yeah it is, though it's really fun for adults, it's really fun for kids. There's a lot of thinking, and I kind of like that you get to control what you do. You have two pawns you can choose to move which one, you can choose which one you want to move, you can choose whether you want to bump somebody, there's just a lot of different choices you can make, and a lot of computational thinking and math that happens, and a lot of talking and fun. So, I would put Prime Climb on the list every time.

Stephie Luyt 20:00
I just added that to my shopping list. I have just one more book that I want to talk about, it's called, "Beauty Queens," by Libba Bray, it's a read alike for Lord of the Flies. So, there's an airplane crash with a group of girls who are headed to a beauty pageant. It is a story of what they do and the society that they form, and how they survive. And knocking out stereotypes, and looking at societal expectations. A fast moving, very creative take if you remember how the Lord of the Flies plays out. I highly recommend this one.

Larry Burden 20:38
In my attempts, my vain attempts to do some research I came across the Harry Potter Kano Coding Kit.

Danelle Brostrom 20:46
Oh Kano.

Stephie Luyt 20:47
Oh yeah.

Larry Burden 20:48
And you actually get a wand

Danelle Brostrom 20:49
There's a Harry Potter one now?

Larry Burden 20:51
You get a wand and you actually cast spells in code.

Danelle Brostrom 20:56
Larry.

Larry Burden 20:57
So, I don't know if it's good. I don't know if it's, you know, it's Harry Potter so like, kids aren't going to like it. Everybody's all over...I got one!

Danelle Brostrom 21:06
Well it's the Kano Kit to which has a good reputation.

Larry Burden 21:11
I was just kind of going through like Harry Potter and coding? That sounds okay.

Stephie Luyt 21:15
Yeah! Build a wand, learn to code, make magic.

Larry Burden 21:18
If somebody has that, please let us know what they think of it. What age groups would be appropriate for that. It's six and up, I saw but, right, it's Harry Potter so.

Danelle Brostrom 21:28
I would play it. Yet another thing we need to get for the Loop.

Stephie Luyt 21:33
We might need to test that on the pod.

Danelle Brostrom 21:34
I think we should.

Larry Burden 21:35
Are we all set.

Danelle Brostrom 21:36
We're set.

Techtool of the Week 21:36
TechTool of the Week.

Danelle Brostrom 21:41
TechTool of the Week. Purdue University, this is where I get my ideas from frankly. Every single year they put out an Engineering Gift Guide, and their gifts that they choose are tested by their engineering students, and they're looking for things that have good gameplay, that are quality, that have those open ended experiences that families can play together. And the quality of items that come out of there are just fantastic. They do include some books Stephie, but the books are things like, "Baby Learns to be a Structural Engineer." It sounds fantastic! But there are things for littles that they can do, all the way up to things that you would really be buying for your high school or older students. So the Purdue Engineering Gift Guide is phenomenal every single year. So check that out. It's great books, there's great stuff on there to. They also talked about Kiwi, they also talked about the Osmo which we talked about before that offers some hands on things with the, with the device. The Sphero, I think made that as well, which is a little coding robot. There's some good stuff on there.

Stephie Luyt 22:44
This is going to be very helpful for shopping at my house.

Larry Burden 22:48
And she's just basically gonna go down that list, check, check. Somebody already made my list, fabulous.

Stephie Luyt 22:54
Thank you.

Larry Burden 22:55
Tutorials and updates, I was just gonna say that, look for some new stuff, some additional content that's going to be on our podcast site upcoming. Danelle, and David, send out these great emails, tech resource emails, throughout the week and asked them, I didn't here back from Danelle...

Danelle Brostrom 23:13
You'd like to steal them.

Larry Burden 23:14
I want to steal them.

Danelle Brostrom 23:15
You may.

Larry Burden 23:15
Well you know, great, it's great content, and it'd be nice to get more people looking at that. More people can look at it, the more successful they will be with technology in the classroom. So, in closing, follow us on Facebook and Twitter @TCAPSLoop,

Danelle Brostrom 23:29
@brostromda.

Stephie Luyt 23:31
@StephieLuyt

Larry Burden 23:32
Subscribe to the podcast on podbean, iTunes, Stitcher, Tune-in, Downcast, Overcast, Spotify, the Google Play Store or wherever else you get your ear candy, leave a review, we love the feedback. Thanks for listening, and inspiring.

Stephie Luyt 23:47
Is the downcast, up... like all those things, are those real?

Transcribed by https://otter.ai