Aug. 14, 2025

The Continuous Learning Mindset

The Continuous Learning Mindset
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Season 1

What keeps teachers motivated when the days get long? How does teacher enthusiasm directly impact student engagement? These questions take center stage as we sit down with Caitlin Alonso, a passionate educator from St. John Birchman School in the San Antonio Archdiocese.

Website: spotlight4success.com

00:00 - Welcome to Spotlight for Success

00:35 - Caitlin's Teaching Journey

01:28 - About American Book Company

02:16 - Teaching Money Through Games

02:47 - Teacher Motivation and Continuous Learning

WEBVTT

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Welcome to Spotlight for Success by American Book Company.

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I'm Devin Pintosi, your host.

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We are here in San Antonio, texas, at the ASCD-ISTE conference, the biggest national K-12 conference in the United States.

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We are so excited to be here and we have someone here, kaitlyn Alzo, that joins us and she's right here in San Antonio's backyard.

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She's at the San Antonio Archdiocese, at St John Birchman School, and we're so excited to have you on today, caitlin.

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I'm very excited to be here, sir.

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That's wonderful, Caitlin.

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Tell me about your journey.

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What brings you to ISTE and ASTCD today?

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you to ISTE and ASTCD today.

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You know it's a conference that my principal wanted us all to go to, just to get more resources about AI and technology and just fun ways to get the students motivated, but also extra support for the teachers, you know, for us to stay motivated too, because if we're not motivated, the kids definitely are not going to be motivated.

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So you know, I love learning new tools and just gaining technology and different resources that I can bring back to the classroom for my students.

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That's wonderful and I understand.

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What grade level did you teach this last year?

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So I had first grade and it was actually my first year teaching, and now I'm moving to second grade.

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Wow, Do you have any special experiences in first grade?

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You're like, wow, this is why I got into teaching.

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Wow, Do you have any special experiences in first grade?

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You're like, wow, this is why I got into teaching.

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Thank you for watching Spotlight for Success.

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I am Devin Pintosi, Chief Operating Officer of American Book Company.

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We are located here in our headquarters in Woodstock, Georgia.

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All of our materials are printed in USA.

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We have course books, e-books and online testing in grades K through 12 in mathematics, ELA, science and social studies.

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These materials are all designed to help students achieve higher scores on their state-specific high-stakes assessments.

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We guarantee score improvement.

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High-stakes assessments we guarantee score improvement.

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You can get free samples of our materials either in print or in electronic formats at abck12.com.

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We look forward to hearing from you.

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You know, one that really comes to mind is when I was teaching them money and we played a money game and it was just different amounts of money and they could figure it out with a partner and it was just real competitive.

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But they were super into it and it was just awesome.

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They loved playing money games.

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So that is really awesome.

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Yeah, that's great seeing the kids grasp that, and money is so important, right we gotta figure that one out really quick, so that's, that's wonderful.

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Um, how did you?

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What are you hoping to get out of the conference today?

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Well, today I'm doing a lot of conferences and like lectures that are based off of keeping your teacher motivated.

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How I can stay motivated, how I can stay happy in teaching, because some of those days they get a little long and you know, we just we always have to remember like, hey, put your best foot forward, we're here for a bigger purpose and let's just do it all together.

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Oh, that's so awesome.

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Well, do you have anything else you'd like to share with the ISTE ASCD community?

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I think, just always come into this with an open mind and just ready to learn, because as teachers we're always learning, like our students, and if we're not ready to learn, then we can't really gain any more new ideas and new knowledge.

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So always be ready and motivated to learn, that's awesome.

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Well, thank you so much.

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This is Caitlin Alonso with St John Birchman School in San Antonio, archdiocese.

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Thank you so much for joining us today.

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Thank you, sir, I had a great time, all right.