Episode Description
In this episode, I chat with Dr. Michelle Ament, the co-founder of the Human Intelligence Movement. We discuss why it’s essential to move beyond content coverage and standardized testing to prioritize creativity, empathy, and critical thinking—skills that empower students to succeed in a rapidly advancing AI-driven world.
AI-Generated Audio Transcript
Catlin: Well, I’m excited for this conversation because I’ve had a lot of podcasts talking about AI. So this idea of kind of talking about the Human Intelligence Movement is very exciting. So before we dive in, Michelle, why don’t you tell everybody listening a little bit about your journey in education, where you began and kind of how did you get to the work that you’re doing today?
Michelle: Well, thanks for having me. I am so excited to be here. A little bit about myself is I have been a teacher and a building administrator and a district administrator in education for about 30 years. And I started as an elementary classroom teacher, love, love, love working with students and really getting to know who they are as individuals, what are they curious about, what are their strengths. And then what I loved about being a classroom teacher is how to design learning that was really responsive to what their interests were.
I had the opportunity to work in a magnet school where we wrote all of our own curriculum. And that way we could really kind of follow what students were interested in and what, again, what passions they had. It was a magnet school that was an international studies school. And so really what we were focused on doing is building real world problem solvers and giving kids experiences where they could really make a difference in the world. And so as a teacher, I had just this opportunity to really be creative and use what I call the art of teaching every day in my craft. And so I wanted to really find ways to help other teachers learn how to design curriculum and learning experiences.
So I went into leadership and worked at, like I said, a variety of different levels in the school district. And it just was thrilling to be an educational leader and be able to support teachers and worked at a district level to personalize learning and think about what does it mean to really ensure that learning is personal and relevant for kids each day. And after a while, I decided I wanted to have a larger impact than the classroom or the district.
So I stepped out of my role into the work I do today as the chief academic officer of ProSolve. And I’ve been able to, in that role, be someone who uses experiential learning to design impactful, relevant experiences for kids that build human skills. And then, that sparked for me this opportunity to start the Human Intelligence Movement alongside Travis Allen, as we really looked at how our AI world is changing and what does it mean to ensure that students have the human skills they need to succeed and thrive in our AI world. And so we started the Human Intelligence Movement to really focus in on bringing people together, creating awareness, this community, in order to ensure that students have the skills they need.
So a little bit about my journey. Again, I think at the heart of it, it’s always been about the impact that I can have for students and an impact that really is meaningful to students so that when they go home each night, they’re excited to come back to school the next day, they’re excited to continue learning. But most importantly, what they’re learning really makes a difference in their day-to-day lives.
Catlin: Yeah, I love that. You and I share a similar love of the design work involved in teaching. I think that was definitely beyond the interactions with the kids, which was hilarious most days and joyful and funny and sometimes frustrating. It was that design work that I really, really loved. How do we approach the design of lessons and things to really get kids excited and engaged? And to your point, wanting to come back into classrooms. I really love that as well.
So, for folks who have not heard of the Human Intelligence Movement. Can you tell us what it is? And obviously, you just kind of spoke to how it developed, but also maybe what it is and what are some of those skills that you guys are prioritizing or think are really important for students to be developing as we send them off into a world where AI will continue to kind of rapidly advance?
Michelle: Yeah. Well, the Human Intelligence Movement is a nonprofit grassroots organization. Our mission is really to help them to ensure that students have the human skills that they need to succeed and thrive in an AI world. And as we look ahead to our AI world, we know that the jobs in our world are changing and many jobs are going to be replaced by AI. But rather than be frightened by that, like I know some people might be, there’s really opportunity now to think differently about what work looks like. And there will be new jobs that are created as a result of AI. And it is true that these jobs will need more of a human focused, a human centered approach to our day-to-day work.
And so what the movement is really all about is identifying first and foremost, what are these human skills that we will need that won’t be replicated and cannot be replicated by AI. There will always be an element of human-ness that is needed in our day-to-day world. And so, we have a research team that is dedicated to really discovering and identifying what are the human intelligences. And from there, what we are really doing with that information is generating this awareness of the need to prioritize human skills.
And so a lot of speaking opportunities, a lot of work on social media, a lot of conversations just to really elevate the need for human centeredness in an AI world. Right now, it feels like, I don’t know about you, every time I look at social media or read an article, it’s all about the technical side of AI. And so what we are trying to do is find, help people see the balance that yes, it’s important to have AI literacy, it’s important to understand how to use tools, but we need to be really thinking about how are we elevating those human skills?
And when we think about our K-12 school system right now, I would argue that our schools are not prioritizing human skills. We have been prioritizing the same thing for the last 200 years, and that is really about knowledge acquisition. And I say that because you look at the accountability measures that we have in place across the country, we’re holding our schools accountable to what students are able to show that they know on standardized assessments.
And we believe as an organization that that really has to change. And so we are set out to focus on policy, policy shifts that need to happen so that we are measuring human intelligence or human skills and holding our systems accountable to prioritizing human skills as much as they are knowledge skills. We’ll always need a degree of knowledge and background information. Although I would argue that pretty much everything that you would want to learn about, you can find through technology, through AI, there still is a degree of knowledge that we will all need. But what we have to do is start balancing that with these human skills.
And so this community, Human Intelligence Movement, is a group of people dedicated to just that, coming together as researchers, thought leaders, innovators, to think about how do we design learning that looks and feels different to build human skills, and to start to shift our focus away from the standardized knowledge acquisition. So the Human Intelligence Movement is all about building awareness, creating this community, almost like a professional learning community and really focusing in on policy changes that need to happen.
Catlin: Wow. Well, in listening to you talk, obviously, a lot of the work that I do is really challenging this idea, not just that students are in classrooms to acquire information, but also that a teacher’s value in a classroom is to transfer information, right? Like, I don’t understand why it is so hard to break free from these two things, right? It’s like, there’s information everywhere.
To your point, a student can pick up their cell phone, open up, you know, Chat GPT app or some, you know, AI app and ask it like, hey, can you explain this concept in terms that I as a ninth grade student could understand? Or hey, can you explain this or like use a basketball analogy to explain this for me, because I love basketball and I’m struggling to stay focused on what this even means. And yet we have so many educators who, when I’m leading trainings and workshops and I’m talking about, hey, let’s shift some of the transfer of information to media or AI. And let’s really instead make time for the human side of this work, where educators can listen and observe, organically respond, they can empathize, build relationships.
It’s like, they’re so reticent to let go of that image of themselves or as the teacher at the front of the room transferring information. And as long as they still think that that’s their value in a classroom, it feels like it’s so hard to get students out of that role as just kind of consumers of the information, trying to acquire all of this new information. It’s such a hard change to make. And I feel like I’ve been pushing for this not because of AI, but just to kind of really maximize the impact that teachers have while also leveraging technology strategically.
Michelle: Yeah, I couldn’t agree with you more. And I think, two things I think of, one is around this idea that our teachers are replicating the school that they went to, you know, that they’re, they believe that the best practice is to be that disseminator of knowledge, partly because that’s how it has always been. And I think there’s a comfort there. I think change is hard. And I think that the other thing is, there is probably almost a bit of concern that they will not be able to meet the standards that are set ahead of them.
So if we think about it, school districts are held accountable to these standardized measures, and then schools are held accountable, and then teachers are held accountable. You know, it all kind of shifts downward that there’s this sense of if I don’t cover this content, if I don’t get through the scope and sequence, my kids won’t do as well on these standardized assessments, and then I’ll be held accountable to that, which that fear based accountability is not helping our system at all.
And so I think what I would offer is this, if we began to really shift away from being holding ourselves so accountable to what kids know, and more about what they’re able to do with that information, how they’re able to use human skills to collaborate and communicate with each other, how they’re show adaptability and flexibility in their thinking, if we were to really say those were the things that were most valuable, I think there’d be a sense of free freedom for teachers like this almost freeing sense that they’re able to do things that are maybe more project based or problem based in the classroom where they aren’t disseminating knowledge. But I think there’s just this fear of being held accountable to to the test score. And the only way we know how to get there is by disseminating knowledge.
And I think you and I would probably both agree that having experiences where students have to inquire and discover, that makes learning so much more sticky and you can still do really well on an accountability measure or standardized assessment if you have like personally connected with the learning and you have internalized it because you were motivated to do so versus passively taking in information. But I think that’s a complete shift from how our system has been structured and the approach that we’ve had for a number of years.
Catlin: Yeah, absolutely. And I often acknowledge that like 25, 20 years ago, it really was the teacher who was the sole source of information in a classroom. You might’ve had books and other resources, but really the teacher, it made more sense for them to be the ones explaining complex concepts and breaking things down and modeling because students didn’t have access unending number of resources that they now have access to. And I know there’s a lot of kind of resistance or fear around, well, but how can I make sure that like students are getting the right information the right way, which is a challenge in and of itself.
And to your point, they’re under bombastic pressure. So part of what’s exciting about the work you’re doing is some of that policy work that we as educators in classrooms we don’t have a lot of control over. Instead, we get kind of mandates and directives from our school leadership. And it can, I see a lot of teachers who are going into classrooms and they’re teaching the way they’ve been asked to teach and covering the content, but I can tell they know it’s not for them, for their students, it is not yielding the results that they came into this profession hoping for. And so I just wish there was more flexibility for educators to slow it down and let kids do that messy work that is learning. Learning is not tidy and quick. It just isn’t.
Michelle: Absolutely. I just I think about learning is messy. I love that quote. And I think that I think you’re right. It is slowing down and it’s going deep with something. It’s taking taking time to really absorb it, make meaning of it, but also follow the learning path. I don’t know about you, but I’ll learn something which prompts a new question, which then I want to go discover that, which prompts the newest question. And so there’s almost this journey of discovery that I take naturally as a learner in my day-to-day work when I’m learning how to do something new, that we just don’t afford kids the opportunity to have that experience.
Every day is we’re on this page, covering this subject. And again, moving through that scope and sequence or that curriculum to cover content versus having a learning journey that really does spark all of those things that are important in the learning process, this idea of discovery, this idea of trying something and failing, this idea of making connections or connecting the dots, reflecting on learning, all of those pieces that come naturally to learning aren’t really naturally part of our day-to-day work as teachers.
Catlin: No. And you know, one of the things I observe going into and out of classrooms as a coach is there isn’t, because you use the phrase, meaning making, which anybody who listens to this podcast is like, oh my gosh, Catlin talks about that all the time. Or I’ve written tons of blogs about it because what I observe in classrooms is, you know, kids come in, there might be like a little welcome activity to kick things off. And then it’s transfer of information, either like a lecture or a mini lesson. And then it’s like, OK, take what you just learned and do something with it, like practice problems, answer questions, whatever. And I’m like, where is the window for the meaning making part, right? They just got this new information. How are we asking them to interpret it, make connections, kind of wrestle with it, and Velcro it to something that already exists in their knowledge framework. So hopefully they’ll remember it.
Like, do they get to get have a discussion with a small group? Do they get to do a concept map? Do they get to do something to kind of make sense of what they just heard? It’s like that step in classrooms because of the quick pace that these lessons are set up. It’s so often we skip right over it. And I’m like, if they don’t have that then there is none of that connecting it to their existing contextual or their framework. And how on earth are they going to remember or even value what they just learned?
Michelle: I love that statement you made about Velcroing it. I often talk about making learning sticky. And you’re so right. If there isn’t an application of the new information, it’s not going anywhere. And I think the real answer to me lies in really bringing simulated real world problem solving into those experiences. So I learn a new concept like fractions. How am I, where do I use that in my real world? And how can we simulate that in the classroom so that there is like direct practice and application of a new concept immediately? I think that’s also what creates the meaningful, that relevant sense for kids in that they can take that new information and apply it.
And that of course starts to build agency and feel like, okay, I’ve learned about equivalent fractions and being able to compare fractions with one another so that I can compare prices of different items in a grocery store so that I can find the best value. Really making it be purposeful. I think oftentimes we answer the question of why do I have to learn that for kids? I don’t know about you, but I got asked that all the time. Why do we have to learn this? And often the answer was, well, so that you have the information to do good on the end of the unit test, so you can pass this. Or it was just a really indirect, why do you have to learn this? Well, you’ll have to have fractions in your life.
Well, instead, how about we create an immersive experience where there is this application of learning immediately? One of the best things that I did in my classroom was, we were learning about Egyptian history, and instead of reading the chapter and answering the questions, we created an Egyptian museum. And every student picked an area of study and they worked to research this, whether it was art, whether it was sports, whether it was fashion, and put together, created a artifact and put together a speech as a docent of how they would speak about their artifact.
Catlin: Oh, I love that.
Michelle: Yeah. And that was like real world learning, like how, how was following something they were really passionate about, but also having to work together as a team, having to think about how they were going to communicate about their area of study. And it really did like model this real world application in a simulated way.
Catlin: Oh my gosh. And I can imagine how fun if they like recorded their little dose and speech and they had the recordings out with their artifact and you almost create this little like museum in your classroom.
Michelle: We did. We did.
Catlin: That’s so fun!
Michelle: And people came, like we had the younger grades come and their parents came. They were so proud of themselves. You can just see them. Like they had so much agency and they were experts in that content and they were able to communicate what they knew about it. That is how we balance both the knowledge of Egyptian history with the human skills that we need in order to put them together to really make learning be impactful and be meaningful and create skills beyond the knowledge of the topic.
Catlin: Right, because at the end of the day, if I think back to certain classes growing up, I certainly didn’t retain hardly any of that information. It’s like, what is gonna be most useful to students moving out into the world? And so I know you said your team is doing research to kind of identify skills. Are there specific skills that you all have identified as being kind of essential for students to thrive in an AI world and how, you know, through the design of lessons, through policy, are there any other ways that you’re really trying to support kind of the focus on these skills, the development of these skills?
Michelle: Well, we’re finding more and more the skills that we know to be essential, like the four C’s. So if we take communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity, when we think about those four C’s, that has been a timeless focus when we think about human skills. Now it’s really about how, in what ways will this not be replicated by AI. So if we take creativity, for example, we know AI can generate a creative image. It can generate a creative poem, but what is it that is missing from that creativity?
And what we continue to find is that it’s that emotion, that human heart and soul behind the creative output. And so how might we use AI to help ourselves be more creative and be able to infuse more of that human side of creativity into the output? So we’re just getting started on the research. Really, again, the four Cs are an area that we’re focused on, but also some other things have emerged.
One is really adaptability, this idea about being able to be flexible in our thinking, being able to learn and unlearn different things with a rapid pace of technology. It’s just essential that what we knew today is going to look very different tomorrow or a year later. And so that willingness to be able to learn new things and unlearn past ideas.
Another area that of course is that emotional intelligence and what does it mean to relate to people in an AI world to have those, to be able to know how to build human connection, how to be self-aware of yourself, but also socially aware. And so our research team is just beginning to really dig into doing a literature and literature review and a meta analysis of the findings to be able to really establish what does the Human Intelligence Movement say are the skills that can’t be replicated.
And I have done a series of research myself and forget how long and how deep of a process that is. So as much as I say to them, can you give me something? People are asking, what can we tell them? And they remind me that this isn’t just a quick process. And I think, so at this point, we’re going with kind of what we’ve skimmed the surface to understand, but know that we’re working towards really putting out a body of evidence allows us as we look at policy change to really bring credibility to the space around the need for human skills. Because I think we all talk about that, but there hasn’t been sort of this, this, this need to really establish the evidence behind it is something that we’re, you know, we’re focused in on.
Catlin: Yeah. And I heard you kind of talking about the way in which AI can almost help to elevate some of these human skills and that interplays really interesting. Because when I hear about this focus on human skills, I’m feeling like I’m glad this is happening, that AI was kind of the catalyst in some ways for this conversation, maybe, about the Human Intelligence Movement.
But for every teacher listening, especially those on a campus where kids still carry their small devices around, I think a lot of us have shared some unease about the lack of interpersonal kind of skills that we’re seeing on campuses. And some of it was post COVID, but some of it’s just, they’re so locked into their small devices. And I think those devices are safe and almost a nice way to hide maybe on a campus, but they’re not doing as much of the conversations and like hanging out and face to FaceTime that some of us were used to seeing in our classrooms and on the playgrounds and in the common spaces in schools prior to small devices. So I can see this being appealing to teachers who have seen that piece of it and been concerned as well.
Michelle: Right, it’s, you know, I’m not going to say, like I’m anti saying we shouldn’t have technology in the classroom or banning these small devices, but I do think there is this opportunity to put them to the side and really be in collaborative structures be interacting with each other, and then use the device when appropriate. And I think we need to be finding those experiences and those opportunities for small, like I said, small group, team-based instruction, solving a real-world problem together. While we use the technology to assist us or use AI to help us, it isn’t the focal point.
The focal point is really being in solving a real-world problem together. And how do we do that in a face-to-face way and build those communication skills, those collaboration skills? But also connect the dots to what AI gives us so we can take what the technology is providing us and connect it to background information that we already have and also discern outputs to ensure that at times they are incorrect and how do we make sure that they’re giving us the correct information. So I think there’s a lot of opportunities for the use of technology, just like we always have had, but it’s making sure that that isn’t the first and foremost focus, that it isn’t about the tool or what the technology is producing, but really what the student, the learner is able to do and how they use technology to augment that.
Catlin: Yeah, no, I think one of the saddest, because I also, obviously, as a blended learning, like as expert and advocate, like technology is a really important piece of this puzzle. But the thing that like always surprises me is that so many teachers just talk about technology in the classroom as, oh, it’s just one more distraction. You know, it’s like one more thing making my job harder. And it’s, I think at the heart of it, my concern is like how we’re using it, right? We’re not using it in dynamic ways, necessarily we’re using it to kind of substitute for tools we would have used in the past and it makes it just streamlines our workflows and things.
Um, but I can imagine if tools, if technology was just a tool to enrich this very human focused exploration of a real world problem, I don’t know if we’d be seeing the same issues or encountering the same issues with technology. I think the, the challenges that we’re not using it the way we could to really enhance and elevate the learning experience. Instead, kids are doing things on the computer that they don’t really find super meaningful or exciting. So of course they’d rather be on YouTube or whatever game they’ve found online. It’s such a, it seems like such a waste to have all this technology in classrooms and under utilize it.
Michelle: Absolutely, you remind me of, when I was a technology director, we went one-to-one in our school district. And that was what was going to really change learning. We were going to give every student a device. They were going to have an iPad, a MacBook. We filled it with all these apps. And this was going to change what the learning experience looked like. And we did it. And what we found was that the same worksheets that we were trying to replace with technology, the same low-level tasks that we thought we were going to replace were now just being used through a technology device.
I would go in classrooms and I would see students on apps, math apps, let’s say, and all they were doing was like flashcard type activities, which is no different than 30 multiplication problems on a worksheet that we were trying to get away from. And it was at that moment that I realized we were really pushing the wrong lever. The lever of change that we needed to focus on was the approach to teaching, the pedagogy behind it. And so, you know, experiential learning is a focus that I have, and I think learning by doing is what is the most powerful. And so really pushing on that lever of how do we change the learning experience, and then we come in with technology behind to support that and augment that thinking we’re going to move away from outdated practices with new technology tools.
And I am really afraid of this AI kind of boom, if you will, for lack of a better term, that we’re gonna do the same thing, is we’re going to start using these lesson plan tools that are out there, and now I can write a lesson plan in 30 seconds, which is just inconceivable. But it will produce the output of the same thing we’ve been doing and we won’t change anything. We will just make it more efficient, more easily accessible to kind of continue these outdated practices because we’re not focused in on the right thing. And that is really changing what our approach is. And it goes back to what you said at the beginning, the approach from being disseminators of information to really being those facilitators of learning.
Catlin: Oh my gosh. I just want you to say it again for the people in the back because I feel like you just said what I have said in a previous episode, which was, I remember going to ISTE. This is, gosh, early in the ed tech boom. And I remember like my eye getting caught by this room. There were literally people just spilling out of this room. And I abandoned the session I was gonna go to because it was like, well, clearly amazing things are happening in this room. I have to get into this room. So I like wedged my way through, I find a spot like crammed against the back wall. And it turns out it’s 50 tools in 50 minutes. And it was again, this like rapid fire, here’s a tool, here’s what it does. And they were going through one every minute and people are like writing it down.
And I just stood in the back of the room because now, you know, it’s rude to leave, but I’m like, I’m not gonna, like, is this gonna move the needle for anybody? Or you might walk away with one you try, but like we haven’t talked about why you would use it, what this would look like, the pedagogical kind of grounding for this particular tool and its use in a classroom. And I remember feeling that way the whole ed tech boom of like, there’s all these things popping up, but there’s no like real intentional discussion around the usage. A lot of the best kind of blogs I read were actually teachers figuring that piece out and sharing out about how they were using tools.
And I felt the same way to your point going on, like on Instagram and on X and TikTok and seeing teachers be like, oh my gosh, you can put a standard or an objective into this tool and it’ll spit out a lesson or entire unit. And I was like, no. Like the thing that all of these teachers I work with are so scared of when it comes to AI is that AI will do the thinking for students. It won’t be authentic. It won’t be original to them. And I’m like, but we’re thinking about doing the exact same thing when it comes to lesson design.
Like we know our students. We’re the subject area. We have a subject area expertise. Like, oh my gosh, let’s not just hand over the design of these learning experiences to AI. And that’s not to say we can’t use AI, but like let’s use AI to elevate the design, to make it more accessible, equitable, hands-on, inclusive, whatever your goal is, AI can help. But you have to bring a high level of intentionality to your design work.
Michelle: Absolutely. I think about how time consuming it can be to design a really amazing unit that is hands-on, that brings in project-based learning, that has authentic assessment with a rubric paired to it. You know, I mean, I would work with curriculum teams and we’d spend a day working on something like that with deep intentionality, deep thought.
And now, you know, you now using AI to help you brainstorm, to help you think of different ideas, that all of that is really valuable if you’re starting with the core, which is how are we going to design this learning experience to really get at both the standards we are looking to cover, but build those human skills? And then how does AI help me to do that more efficient? But at the heart of it, the teacher, what we as professionals bring to the table is what needs to be first and foremost driving the development and the design.
Catlin:No, totally. And I think your point is so spot on and one of the things I think I wish more teachers knew, which is if you also think that hands-on, like real-world application of this learning is critical to make, as you said, it kind of sticky, then take your lesson objective, your standard, and put in the lesson and say, hey, I wanna reimagine this in these specific ways, right? Like I’ll take a whole group lesson spit out by like a magic school AI when I’m in a coaching session and like use a chat bot to say, okay, I don’t want this to be a whole group. I want it to be like a station rotation. I wanna have a differentiated teacher led station. I wanna have a hands-on station, an online station. And it helps you just reimagine it.
And it’s not perfect, but then that’s where our expertise as educators comes in. That’s what our knowledge of the specific student population we’re designing for is incredibly important. So I feel like AI is really exciting as a design thought partner, but I certainly don’t want it doing the thinking for us as educators.
Michelle: Absolutely. I think a lot about the 80-20 rule when I use AI is that I will give it all of those examples you said were brilliant. And it would give me kind of 80% of the work. And then I’m doing the 20% to refine it. And I think that’s where what I’m able to do is really capture my human potential then with that last 20%. I often think with writing, for example, by the time I get to the 80% of just brainstorming and giving writing ideas, I am a bit fatigued and I’m ready to move on, where now I can kind of get that base level and then take it to the next level, that baseline and take it to the next level.
And I think that’s where my critical thinking can really come in. And I can really change the writing to make it reflect my voice, add those ideas that are missing. But I think that giving us sort of that base baseline of work is really is really helpful. And as we think about teacher burnout, that is one of the ways that AI can help is just giving sort of that basis. But it’s just so important to remember that that last 20% is where the art of teaching the craft that we have really needs to come into play.
Catlin: I love that. I love having kind of a concrete number to be thinking about because I do think there is just this wonderful ability for AI to like save us some of that cognitive lift, but allow us to be more intentional and more creative to your point and like infuse our lessons with that human-ness that is uniquely our own, which I love. And there are so many conversations happening right now about AI and a lot of fears and like threats to the educational system and then like excitement about possibilities and benefits. Do you wanna weigh in on anything that, besides the design stuff that you’re concerned about or the stuff you’re really excited about in terms of AI and education?
Michelle: I think the degree of bias that comes into AI is something to be really mindful of. We have to remember that AI is trained by humans. And so we often, you know, people will often say AI is very biased. Well, as a society, we have biases that all of us carry. And so I think not to make sure that we are really examining what those biases are, how we view people and situations and make sure that we are recognizing that in outputs as well and not just taking that at face value. I think that’s important as us, as educators, and important to teach students as well. I think that idea about AI literacy is going to be really important for just as we’ve talked about digital citizenship and technology, literacy, it’s nothing brand new, but it’s a new kind of layer to that entire conversation.
Catlin:I love the focus on bias. I think so often when I’m thinking about the kind of skills students need to interact with AI responsibly, I’m reminded of all the things that we kind of talked about when we were having students start researching online and like, okay, how do you know if this is credible? What is the bias? Are you gonna cross check? Like some of those classic research skills, I feel like are still very similar to the ones we need to be teaching when students are utilizing like an AI chat bot for sure.
Michelle: Absolutely. I think we need to not be afraid and feel like this is so brand new. Many of the things that we have done as best practices around technology now maybe are just more elevated or more important, but they’re not, it’s not a whole new thing that we have to discover.
Catlin: Yeah, no, I totally agree. So I end the show the same way with all of my guests, which is to ask if there’s any tips or strategies that you use to create, obviously it’s called the balance, a balance in your own life. And it’s so interesting, because we talk about AI and technology, it feels like all these things are kind of like rapidly speeding up the pace of the work that we do, like our interactions, our lives. And so this idea of trying to help educators or people find a little bit more balance work, life, personal, professional, all of those things is definitely top of mind for me. So anything that you do that works for you?
Michelle: Well, this is really simple and I’m not great at it all the time, but it’s really just putting down my phone. And I know that does not, this is not revolutionary, but I walk my dog every day and I always have my phone with me. And so the notification dings and I check the message or I or I think to myself, oh, I’m going on a walk, I could listen to a podcast, because information is always so available on my cell phone.
And so I’ve really tried to just leave, I don’t need my cell phone for safety reasons when I walk my dog and where I live and in my in my area. So I just leave it in the house and allow myself to be mindful during that time. And so I use that as an example. I have really tried to be cognizant of the times in which I’m tethered to my phone, whether it is for notifications, whether it is trying to take in information and where are the places and spaces where I may be used to not be so dependent on that device and how do I just leave it, leave it so that I can even have 10 minutes of not taking in information.
Because I feel like I can get consumed and then there’s this information overload, but then I also have this sense of like, oh my gosh, I’m not doing anything right now. I should check something. I should respond to an email. I have 10 minutes right now where I could do something. And so there’s just this constant pressure to always be efficient maybe. And so just giving myself permission to not use every minute of the day. And my cell phone is where I tend to find those shortcuts for efficiency. And so for me, it works to just kind of leave it in a place and give myself space.
Catlin: No, I love that. I think you and I are cut from the same cloth because I don’t think of it as efficiency as much as I’m like, wait, I’m not being productive. I have so many things that I could be doing or da da da da da that I need to do, that I need to check. And I have started doing something very similar and I actually did it more as a modeling exercise for my kids, but to keep myself accountable to their devices at 15, 17 years old. And so when I sometimes feel like I can’t turn off notifications when I’m like, quote unquote on duty and I don’t know where they are, they’re out and about in the world doing their stuff.
And so when we’re home and I’m cooking dinner or we’re home and we’re about to sit down on the table, it’s always like, my phone is screened down on this like table behind our sofa, just get away from it. Like put it down, try to be present with your kids and just model that you don’t have your phone with you and you’re not checking it constantly. Cause I’m very aware that like they are taking my cues in. And I do find to your point after having just like a couple minutes without my phone, I feel like my whole body kind of relaxes a little bit.
Michelle: Yeah. I really, that productivity, that is probably more what I’m speaking of than being efficient is feeling like I need to be productive every minute of the day to maximize my time. And I don’t think that gives us work-life balance to feel like every moment we have to be productive. And I attribute it to the phone because, you know, I’ve been like, I didn’t feel like that five years ago, 10 years ago, where I had to be productive every minute of the day.
Catlin: Yeah. I feel like I’ve always had a productivity bent, but I agree. The phone has like taken it to new heights, unfortunately. Well, thank you so much for spending this time chatting with me, Michelle. It was wonderful to kind of get your perspective. I love this idea of this movement. I am excited about policy change to shift focus to some of these things. So really appreciate you being here. I appreciate your work on this.
Michelle: Yeah, thank you so much. It was a joy being with you, and I can see how we have parallel ideas and focuses. So, welcome any of your listeners to join us at the Human Intelligence Movement. And you can find us at humanintelligencemovement.org.
Catlin: Yeah. And I will have that link in the show notes.
Michelle: Great.
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