Teacher Feature: A Coach to the Core

Bobby Evers (@NotDaFakeCoachE) is a Pro Plan user of Deck.Toys from Texas and is passionate about coaching and making a difference to his students’ lives! He has taught 7th grade Texas history (his favorite subject to teach!) and is currently teaching 6th Grade Science. He also coaches Football, Basketball and Track.

Deck.Toys: Hi Bobby! We are so happy to have you on our feature! Tell us more about yourself.

Bobby: Interesting fact: I didn’t start my career as an educator. I worked five years for Child Protective Services (CPS), and the question I always asked my clients, “If you could go back in time and change a time in your life, when would that be?” The majority of them would say around the middle school to 10th grade years. They didn’t take school seriously then, and many said they didn’t do so because they didn’t have a teacher that really cared about them. 

That moment, I decided I needed to become an educator to make a difference in kids’ lives and prepare them for post-secondary life. Me being an All-American track athlete in college, I figured I could get into coaching to reach more lives along the way. 

Deck.Toys: How long have you been using Deck.Toys?

Bobby: Coming up to a year now! Here’s one of the decks that I recently made on Plate Tectonics to show you how I use Deck.Toys to organize my kids throughout the week and yet not overwhelm them with all the tasks!  https://deck.toys/a/Qyw4zBljc

Deck.Toys: What are the features that you find particularly useful with Deck.Toys?

Bobby: I love the Lock, Checkpoint, and Upload Slide Apps. I feel that these features allow the students to be accountable for their learning. I also love to app-smash by integrating other platforms such as; EdPuzzle, Wordwall, Blooket, and Flipgrid.

This is a great example of an Activity Entry Lock that I used in the example deck. My students would have to have gone through the previous Flashcards activity in order to unlock the next Lines game by answering this correctly. Once they unlock the activity, they can even challenge their classmates to the game.

Deck.Toys: How have your students taken to learning on Deck.Toys?

Bobby: My students love Deck.Toys! They love the ability to be self-paced and the gamification aspects of the platform!

Due to Covid-19 requiring many of my students being virtual, it was hard to see my students’ faces because I didn’t require them to keep their camera on, and our face-to-face students were required to have face coverings. It made it hard to connect with them without seeing their faces, or even connect with me because my amazing face is covered (tons of LOL’’s there!). So I like to have a warm-up or exit ticket of taking a selfie to show your smile for everyone to see. They love it, and it is great seeing their little faces without face coverings. The virtual students love it too because they include their pets or food they are eating.

Deck.Toys: Bobby, we really do appreciate your time taken to share your experiences for this blog, especially with all that has happened in Texas during the cold freeze!

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