March 5, 2025

Teaching is Winning

Dive into an enlightening discussion with Antwayne Sanders, an accomplished leader in education, as he shares his journey and insights from the Winter GAEL Conference. In this episode, we explore the transformative power of continuous professional development, the importance of mentorship, and effective strategies for enhancing student literacy outcomes. Antwayne emphasizes how attending conferences, like Winter GAEL, helps educators stay current with educational trends and build collaborative networks that enhance learning environments.

Chapters

00:18 - Introduction to Antoine Sanders

21:42 - Discovering the Value of the Gale Conference

02:40:43 - The Impact of ABC Materials on Literacy

Transcript

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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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I'm here with Antoine Sanders with Griffin Spalding Schools.

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He's the executive officer for elementary education.

00:00:12.986 --> 00:00:14.851
Nice to see you, Antoine.

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How are you?

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I'm doing well.

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How about yourself?

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Wonderful, good, good.

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Can you tell me what brings you to Gale today?

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So this is year two for me.

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I've been in education for over 20 years, but I've never actually experienced a Gale conference, and so after coming last year to Winter Gale, I felt like, you know, this was really something that I've missed out on over the years, and so I really came back again to really get that feel and that understanding of what's happening in Georgia to really grow professionally.

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The focus for me is to continue to build my capacity and to be what we call lifelong learners.

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That's one of the things that I've lived by for a very long time, and so Gale is one of those conferences where you can get all the happenings from the state, as well as see what other districts are doing to continue to be successful, and so what I try to do is listen intently to the strategies and the skills that they're doing and they're using to figure out how can I take what they're doing and immerse it into the work that I'm doing.

00:01:31.569 --> 00:01:32.531
Oh, that's wonderful.

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And so what brought you on the journey to being executive officer at Grifflin Spaulding?

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So for me it was really about paying it forward.

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Over the years I've had leaders to really build my capacity and to help me to get to where I am.

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Prior to my two years here as an executive officer, I was a principal and by way of assistant principal, but the work that I did as a principal really motivated me to continue in this work and say you know, okay, so the skills and the capacity building that has been instilled in me throughout my principal coaches, my principal supervisors, why not pay it forward?

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Because I'm sure there's some principals out there that can use those same skills, those same strategies, and so the best way to do that on a you know, on a larger scale is to become a principal supervisor.

00:02:25.368 --> 00:02:27.582
And so the best way to do that on a larger scale is to become a principal supervisor.

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And I felt like that allows me to be in the work, still in the school, because I love being in the schools, but also to support those leaders who can then support their leaders as well.

00:02:38.604 --> 00:02:39.889
Oh, that's wonderful.

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And I understand you've used American Book Company materials in the past.

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Absolutely, and so prior to me coming to Griffin, I know that I heard that they used ABC as they did one of the pilot programs through social studies.

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But as a principal, our primary grades grades K through 2, they used it often for their primary kids, especially in the realm of literacy, and it really allowed our students to continue to grow.

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It was one of the supplemental resources that our especially our kindergarten teachers felt very, very good about.

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It was one of those things that kind of helped to get those kids over the top.

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So I've really enjoyed American Book Company.

00:03:23.969 --> 00:03:24.771
Oh, that's wonderful.

00:03:24.771 --> 00:03:26.627
I'm glad to hear you've had good success with them.

00:03:26.627 --> 00:03:27.985
You've seen the score improvements too.

00:03:28.341 --> 00:03:29.819
Oh yes, absolutely, absolutely.

00:03:29.819 --> 00:03:44.853
Our literacy scores, especially through our READY, the work that we've done, and our GKIDS readiness, all of those things I'm sorry, not GKIDS readiness at the beginning, but our GKIDS final assessment.

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Like we saw tremendous growth through the work that we've done, especially with the implementation of ABC.

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Oh, that's wonderful, and do you have anything you'd like to share with the Gale community?

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Oh, I just really appreciate the opportunity to be here and I'm really excited about the learning that we're going to have over the next couple of days.

00:04:02.603 --> 00:04:03.504
Oh, that's wonderful.

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Once again, thank you, antoine.

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Antoine Sanders, executive Officer Elementary with Griffin Spalding Schools.

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Thank you so much for being part of the podcast.

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Thank you.

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All right.

Teaching is Winning

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