Spotlight 4 Success

Welcome to the Future of Learning with Nearpod

• American Book Company • Season 1

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Discover how technology is revolutionizing education with our special guest, Julie Cobb, Director of Professional Services at Nearpod. Julie takes us on a journey through her impressive career, from her roots in deaf education to becoming an instructional coach. Her transition from public education to the tech world was inspired by her experience in a one-to-one school district, where she discovered the power of Nearpod. Her passion for bridging the gap between technology and education is evident as she shares her excitement about Nearpod's recent developments, including the integration of AI for creating engaging multiple-choice questions.

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Devin Pintozzi:

Welcome to Spotlight for Success by American Book Company. I am Devin Pintozzi, your host. I am here with Julie Cobb, Director of Professional Services with Nearpod. Hello, Julie,

Julie Cobb:

Good morning.

Devin Pintozzi:

So tell us a little bit about what brings you to LACUE.

Julie Cobb:

I am here with Nearpod and Flocabulary and we are doing several sessions. We've got a booth but we have a flocabulary session today on how you can use it to support science of reading and we have a session tomorrow on how it can support differentiation through choice sports.

Devin Pintozzi:

Wow, that is great. So you're doing two sessions.

Julie Cobb:

Yes, two sessions.

Devin Pintozzi:

Oh, that's wonderful. Can you tell us a bit about your career or what brought you into the education space initially?

Julie Cobb:

So I came into the education space. 26 years no, 30 years ago. I spent 26 years in public education. I started out as a deaf education teacher and a special ed teacher, and I finished the last five years of my education space career as an instructional coach.

Devin Pintozzi:

Oh wow. What school systems did you work with?

Julie Cobb:

I worked in Lubbock Independent School District in Texas and in Fort Smith Independent School District in Fort Smith, Arkansas.

Devin Pintozzi:

Wow. Can you share with us maybe an aha moment you've had associated with education?

Julie Cobb:

My aha moment came really quite early. I worked with deaf students my first class was kindergartners and when a student was able to initiate a conversation or initiate a question with their language, I knew that we were building that language, and that was just so exciting for me, and so I had to keep doing it.

Devin Pintozzi:

That is wonderful. And so you moved from education into technology. What was that process like?

Julie Cobb:

So when I was in Fort Smith, we were a one-to-one school district, so we had just purchased computers for every student, and so Nearpod was one of the first tools that we used. It was one of the first tools that we purchased. During that time, I really got to know the people at the company and I got to know the product and just loved the product, and an opportunity came up in 2019 for a job where I got to continue to teach teachers how to use technology appropriately with their students with an amazing tool, and I applied and five years later, I'm still here.

Devin Pintozzi:

That is awesome, Julie. You know my own children. They used Nearpod in their school experience, especially during COVID. And it was an amazing tool for them.

Julie Cobb:

Yes, yes, we were not really designed for distance learning. We were designed for in the classroom, but during COVID we found out that it worked really well for distance learning as well.

Devin Pintozzi:

Yeah, that is wonderful

Julie Cobb:

we were glad to provide that for teachers.

Devin Pintozzi:

That's great. Can you share with us some things you're hoping to get out of this conference that you'll be bringing to other places?

Julie Cobb:

I really enjoy coming to conferences because I continue to learn from educators that are still in the classroom. I continue to learn from other presenters. I'm always looking for new ways and new ideas, and education changes every day, and so I try and learn from every conversation.

Devin Pintozzi:

Oh, that's wonderful. Is there anything you'd like to share with the LACUE community about things that you are doing or things that you want them to know about? Nearpod

Julie Cobb:

Sure sure.

Julie Cobb:

So, nearpod, if you've used it in the past, it has changed quite a bit over the last couple of years. One of our newest things that I'm excited to share with people and that I think teachers are going to be excited about, is our use of AI, and so we came to the AI game a little later than everybody else, because we were very deliberate about what we wanted it to do, and so what we've done is we've built into the program where it can help you develop multiple choice questions. We all know that multiple choice questions the hardest part is the three wrong answers, and so this can help you develop those and it really saves some time, and then it automatically goes right into the program as multiple choice questions or as a gamified quiz. So I am so excited to get to share that with everybody.

Devin Pintozzi:

Oh, that's wonderful, Julie. Well, thank you so much, julie. Julie Cobb with Nearpod, thank you so much for being on Spotlight for Success.

Julie Cobb:

Thank you very much.