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Hello everybody and welcome to another great episode of my EdTech Life.
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Thank you so much for joining me on this wonderful day and wherever it is that you're joining us from around the world, as always.
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Thank you so much for your continued support.
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We appreciate all the likes, the shares, the follows.
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Thank you so much for just interacting with our content.
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We really appreciate it.
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I really appreciate it.
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As you know, we do this for you because we wanna bring you some great conversations, we wanna bring you some amazing guests and, of course, all of this goes back into the education space, where we can continue to learn and grow together, and I'm really excited about today's conversation.
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Today, I would love to welcome to the show Mr Arturo Guajardo, who is joining us from Pocket Talk.
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Arturo, how are you doing today?
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I'm doing great, Fonz.
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How are you?
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Well, I have to say I'm excited to be here.
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Before I even ask you that, you're doing.
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That really just fills my bucket, too as well.
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So today is going to be a double portion, a double filling of buckets today, for work and getting to interview you and getting to know you a little bit more, and also for our audience members, I should say, to get to know you a little bit more and the work that you do.
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So, arturo, let's go ahead and dive in.
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So for our listeners today, those of you that are not familiar with your work just yet, but after today I know that you'll definitely have a lot of followers Tell us a little bit more about you, know your background in education and what your context is within the education space.
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Absolutely.
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Yeah, I think I kind of lost track a little bit.
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I want to say about my 32nd year in education altogether.
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So I go back a ways.
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I go back into the 90s, early 90s, when I became a bilingual teacher here in Austin, texas, did that for about 10 years I think.
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10 years of mostly fifth grade, some fourth, some third, working with multilingual kids from mostly from South Austin and kids from all over Latin America and a few from other parts of the world.
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So it was a wonderful experience for about a decade there.
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Beyond that I went into the ed tech world.
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Soon after that I became an ed tech coach also in Austin ISD.
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So I did that for about another eight, nine years after that and then I jumped over into the ed tech vendor side, I guess on the partner side, where I did about, I think, 11 years at BrainPop.
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And then I went over to Osmo and now I'm here at Pocket Talk.
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We're here a couple of years now.
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So, yeah, so everything from the classroom in the 90s all the way over to the tech world, we're just trying to keep up with it all.
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Yes, absolutely, and you know what.
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That's something that I do admire and you know we were talking a little bit, you know, briefly, before we got into the chat.
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You know talking about TCA and talking about conferences and you know it's always great for me at least, when I go and visit a vendor and I do hear you know the experience that they've had in education and many times, you know, sometimes the experience is a little bit less, sometimes it's a little bit more, but just hearing you know, like what you described you working through Austin ISD, going from the classroom to edtech coaching and then going into, you know, the world of edtech as a vendor, working through BrainPop and so on, it's just amazing to the experience that you have and seeing different perspectives, not only for yourself.
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But now you know the work that you're doing through Pocket Talk and then, now that we are here, you're getting to tell us a little bit more and using that experience to really just drive up and amplifying what Pocket Talk is doing.
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So I'm really excited to get to know that a little bit more.
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But I did want to just touch a little bit on your brief.
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Well, briefly, on your background, I know that you know you yourself started as a non-native English speaker, you know, and now you're 32 years later well, 32 years in education now, you know, and with all of that experience you know, can you tell me a little bit about how that helped you transition kind of into ed tech world?
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Or maybe are you seeing a little bit more or ed tech companies putting a little bit more attention to that as far as the language barriers and, you know, trying to help students just really overcome those barriers?
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Yeah, no, absolutely.
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I went to, grew up in Houston, went to schools there in inner city Houston and started speaking English because I had two older sisters who they would bring home their English that they were learning in school.
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So I kind of picked up a little bit at home before I started school, kind of from then.
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But it was definitely broken English, you know.
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It was like what I was.
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They were, you know, a few years older than me, so it was a little kid English.
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I guess you could say that they were bringing home to me and sort of teaching me.
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And then school was.
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It could be challenging at times.
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There were definitely times when I definitely felt that I did have a little bit of obstacles to overcome when it came to language.
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In particular once I got up into the higher grades and was given tougher reading assignments, you know, when somebody handed me a William Shakespeare boy.
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That just blew my mind when I had to try to figure that out on top of just English in general.
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And that's a whole other kind of English.
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It's a whole other language as far as I was concerned.
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And so there are definitely times when I felt like there was support that was lacking along the way.
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But luckily I did have some really good teachers that did understand that and did help me, and help me not just linguistically but also just helping me figure out my identity as a, as a latino, as a student and and, uh, getting comfortable with with just all of that.
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Because it was definitely.
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There were definitely times when you know I needed a little push, I need a little help in in those kind of directions and, and so there were definitely uh, uh teachers that helped along the way and helped me get to get to where I am now.
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But then in the ed tech world, yeah, absolutely there's there.
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I would see it so much when I was teaching because I have students who came in.
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You know, I would have some students that spoke zero English and then I'd have some students that kind of were everywhere in between, you know, zero to ten, and so so you kind of had to figure out, okay, well, this student needs this, the students needs this, the students needs this and and kind of figure out what supports they needed and trying to provide that.
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And then back then, with EdTech coming around, I was definitely in the classroom during those opening EdTech environments that were coming out and we we're talking, I'm going back pre-internet, I'm going back to cd-roms.
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You know, I'm going back to to those, to those periods of time and and back then I have to say, you know, I would find those cool technologies, oh yeah, this is going to be great, this is going to work wonderful, wonderfully well.
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But then there was no, no language support, and and so that was that was like okay, well, that's going to work over in this other classroom, but not necessarily in mine, and so slowly I would see it get better and better.
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There was definitely times when you would see a big jump in the language support that was available with some technologies, but honestly it was slow.
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It definitely took a while to get there and I'm happy to see now that I think now we're sort of getting to that point where you do see a lot more language support and a lot of the technologies have come a long way and in particular, like with Pocket Talk, which we'll talk a little bit more about, I'm just excited that we finally have a tool that can fundamentally support a student when they just need to communicate and when parents and teachers need to communicate, and that, to me, is going to be incredibly valuable across the board in schools everywhere, not just in the US but around the world.
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Excellent.
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Well, thank you so much for that answer and your background.
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I mean it's kind of a little bit similar.
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For me, the only thing is is growing up as an only child, I didn't have that support from older sisters or siblings, and so, you know, going to school and my first language obviously being Spanish, I didn't learn English until I was in about that I can remember, probably about second grade, middle second grade, my third grade.
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I was, you know, pretty decent and I was okay, but I mean, talk about those tough times being a language broker too as well.
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For my parents I always tell people the story I was like you know, I'm an eight year old kid reading like documents and translating and and well, boys, I think.
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It says and and well, I think it says, and you know it was very interesting and, like I said, kind of growing up here in the Valley, you know that's one thing that we, we always saw, and of course now myself too, included, being now heavily immersed in this world of attack it really surprises me many times that we are barely where we're at right now as far as what language supports are, and of course it's getting a lot better.
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But even in the years that I was in the classroom, like I was talking to you briefly, it was the technology just it wasn't there, it didn't have that language support.
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And then having to work with students that would often come in, and I had students not only coming in from Mexico and speaking Spanish, but then I had students in my district where they're coming in from Japan, they were coming in from Korea, they were coming in from Israel, and to be able to communicate with them was just very difficult at that time.
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But things are getting a little bit better.
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But this is a great segue now into understanding and for you to tell us a little bit better.
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But this is a great segue now into understanding and for you to tell us a little bit more about pocket talk and what pocket talk is and what it does for the classroom.
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Absolutely.
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Yeah.
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Pocket talk is amazing.
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It's a we're a translation solution that's being used all over, all over the country.
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Right now.
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We're in about I think at this point about 500 school districts coast to coast.
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I've been lucky enough to work with school districts in New York City.
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I was in Florida a couple of weeks ago.
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I'm going to California in a few weeks.
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Next week I'll be in Seattle.
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Lots of usage all over.
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What we're known for primarily is a device.
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It's a little device like this, it's a little handheld device that students can use, that teachers can use, that your front office can use, your principals, your cafeteria workers, your bus drivers Pretty much anybody can have this device and keep it in their pocket, wear it around their neck I have a little lanyard here that I often wear and what it allows you to do it allows you to communicate in more than 80 languages.
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So right now, I think we're at about 84.
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We're going to be at 90 here in a few weeks and then we're just going to be adding more and more languages as we go along.
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But, like I said, what's cool about this is that it can be used so that anybody from you as a second grader or newer, you know picking up that English all the way up to us as educators in the classroom and your families at home.
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So think about your familia Instead of having to pull you to be that translator out in the real world, out in the doctor's offices, at the DMVs, at all those places that we all have to go to at times.
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Now you have a device that you can actually have the parents take along with them and be able to make that communication so much easier in all of those places.
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So we're really excited to be able to provide that kind of solution for not just for schools, but for offices and public spaces, for government offices, like I said, like the DMVs, for doctor's offices, you name it Anywhere where communication breaks down.
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That's where Pocket Talk can come in.
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And that is fantastic and just by looking at it, just the size of the device.
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Now this and I'm going to share a story because, like I mentioned, my last year in the classroom before I stepped into this role, that is when I had my student that came in from Israel and he came in mid-year.
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Just sometimes the students, I mean, they don't want to move but because of the parents' work and things of that sort, and it's very difficult and he was just having a difficult time.
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Obviously, the transition from being somewhere familiar to somewhere somewhat unfamiliar.
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But being able to work with him was something that I just kind of had to make it work.
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You know, we, through the use of Chromebooks or and at that time I had a, an iPad and we were he was just typing in things just so I can sit him next to me and just whatever I can do to help him just really capture the learning or answer any questions.
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And but I tell you, you know, being able to use the Chromebook or that iPad, as great as those pieces of technology are one of the things that I will say.
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It was often bulky and it would just be a barrier in itself because of this, but the way that you just shared Pocket Talk and, just being a handheld device, that works very easily.
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So now can you describe just the way that this works?
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Is it a real-time translator?
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just the way that this works.
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Is it a real-time translator?
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It is, it is, and absolutely so.
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Imagine your student there being able to take this with them to the cafeteria, to the playground, obviously in the classroom as well, in the hallways, and in some cases we have some school districts that allow the students to take these home, use them for homework and even allow parents to use them in the community itself.
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So they're checking these out to parents like a library book and letting them, instead of pulling you from the school, to be the translator.
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Now I can just check out one of these and use this and just bring it back the next day if needed.
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But the way it works is really simple.
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It's basically you pick the two languages here on the screen.
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You can kind of see there's two languages.
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There's English and Spanish.
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If I click on any of either language, I'll see a list.
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Here's where those 80 plus languages are stored.
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I can just scroll up and down the list here, pick whichever one I want.
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So in your case, you'll be able to speak Hebrew.
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Now we would find Hebrew on the list and I'd be able to speak English into the device.
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It'll translate it into Hebrew and then your student would speak Hebrew back into the device and you would hear it in English.
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So I talk, you talk, I talk, you talk and I can show you how that works here in just a minute with this thing.
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So notice the arrow there is pointing up.
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So that means I'm going from English to Spanish.
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If I click on the arrow, it flips and now I can speak Spanish and it'll go into English.
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So all I have to do is press the button.
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There's one physical button down here that I'll need to press and you have to hold it down, kind of like a walkie-talkie.
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Press and hold the button, start talking.
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The device starts listening, starts translating for you automatically.
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So there's the translation.
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You can read it here.
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It's a little bit tough to see on the screen here, but there's a translation.
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You can read it here.
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It's a little bit tough to see on the screen here, but there's a translation in Spanish.
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If I didn't hear it the first time, I can click it for it again, because we know sometimes our students need to hear things a few times.
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So I can repeat this as much as I want.
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And then, if I'm the Spanish speaker, this little button at the bottom that I just pressed and that flips the arrow for us, but again, I can just flip it on the screen as well, but you can definitely read it and see it at the same time, or hear it at the same time, I should say.
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And then, beyond that, there's a little camera on the back.
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That camera takes pictures of text.
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So that document that you mentioned when you were translating, I can now snap a picture of it and I'll see the translation on the screen, and then I can also click on the paragraph and it'll read it out loud to me as well in my language.
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So a lot of possibilities here.
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And again, it's a device that's small enough where I can put it in my pocket, wear it around my neck, makes it easy to have those conversations that so often get missed.
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There's just so many conversations that you need to have, sometimes with a student, or a student needs to have with you, but because of that language barrier being there, you know, sometimes it doesn't happen, and then that has a cost.
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That could definitely.
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That has a cost.
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That might not happen immediately, but it might happen later on.
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One quick story I'll rambly here, but one quick story that I do want to share is the story of a student that we heard from a school.
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A student came from Ukraine and was at school.
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Nobody spoke Ukrainian either, speak in English, was going to have a fire drill, and so you can imagine nobody being able to explain to the student that this is just practice, you're safe, don't worry.
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This is what's going to happen and, of course, the alarm goes off and the student gets very upset.
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The language that the person that told me the story said the student, freaked out essentially.
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So just those kind of conversations that we pretty much take for granted you can now have in more than 80 languages.
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No, and that is so valuable.
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As you're going through this, arturo, like my teacher voice or my teacher self, like you know, like you mentioned, there's so many possibilities, many possibilities.
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I mean not only with my student that came in you know that we needed that Hebrew translation but also the fact that you just shared how you can actually take a picture of that document, so for in class, you know, as you're passing out a document.
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Now one of the things for me is, you know, I always want to eliminate any barriers for teachers also as well, or that additional.
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You know work sometimes, because it's like man, sometimes you may have, you know, three or four different students there that may speak those three or four different languages, and now it's you have to produce something in those three or four different languages.
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But the fact now that you can take that document and you can pass it out and the student can go ahead and set it to their language and take a picture of it, and now it's going to translate that for them, right now my mind is like this is amazing because, at least in my district, I can see how this can help our well number one, the classroom, teacher, room teacher, and then number two also help our ESL strategists be able to use this also with students to help them build up their skills and especially the listening skills.
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This is huge too, and you're working on the speaking skills too, so to me.
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I'm already seeing, like all of these like TELPIS I'm seeing.
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You know, just the language acquisition, that practice, being able to just feel more comfortable.
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You're learning, the student does not have that barrier anymore, the teacher doesn't have the barrier and, like you mentioned, not only teacher to student, but teacher to parent also as well.
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And many times, like in our district, we'll have district engagement with parents and many times we need that support to go from English to Spanish and if the parents can, you know, or our presenter can go ahead and use pocket talk to read out that statement, or or, you know, give that comment and then be able to play it in, whether it's in Korean or Japanese or Spanish.
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That would be fantastic.
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So I want to ask you know does Pocket Talk?
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Can it connect to a headset, if needed?
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Yes, so the device comes with Bluetooth connectivity so you could connect it to earbuds.
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If you are doing a presentation, you know, for a large group, you can plug or connect a Bluetooth to a Bluetooth speaker and just blast it out to the entire audience, to the cafeteria, to the library, wherever the audience is.
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And but yeah, to me everything you described is exactly what we want to be able to provide for the teachers Because, again, teachers already have so much going on, so much on their plate as it is, and this is just a tool to take some of that off of their already overflowing plate.
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Yes, absolutely, and I mean talk about the teacher impact.
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I mean right now just mentioning those examples and myself I could have definitely been picturing myself just simply, with this simple device, being able to communicate back and forth with my students or students, for that matter, or even parents too as well from different nationalities.
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That makes a huge impact because many times, you know, it's that communication piece that is very difficult and by removing that barrier, you're removing that frustration, you're removing that barrier to access as well.
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You're removing that frustration, you're removing that barrier to access as well, and to be able to communicate with a parent fluently in their language by using Pocket Talk to translate, that's a game changer right there.
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And now that the parent is informed of anything that they should know, and, of course, with the student.
00:22:31.944 --> 00:22:38.838
And right now my mind is already going like right now when you said you know presentations, I can hook it up to my Bluetooth speaker.
00:22:38.838 --> 00:22:53.296
This is phenomenal, because many times we have parents that come in and again it's not just one nationality but to be, able to help them and serve our learning community, our parent learning community.
00:22:53.296 --> 00:22:56.079
That is huge also because they're a big.
00:22:56.079 --> 00:23:02.346
You know they're an integral part of the child's education there in the classroom too as well, so to be able to use that.
00:23:02.346 --> 00:23:09.669
So, because I'm getting so excited here, I know I'm the one that's rambling, but I'll ask you, can you tell me?
00:23:09.709 --> 00:23:24.310
you know, I know you don't have to mention the districts or district that you're working with, but I would love to hear, just you know, some, some feedback or just some of those like great stories that that are happening within some of the districts that you're currently working with.
00:23:24.330 --> 00:23:28.134
Absolutely so there's, there's a ton.
00:23:28.134 --> 00:23:37.375
So like I kind of always start up in the Northeast and my brain always has this image of kind of going across the country, but so I always started in New York City.
00:23:37.375 --> 00:23:44.913
So the New York City Department of Education, the biggest school district in the country, has really adopted Talk Talk.
00:23:44.913 --> 00:23:50.356
I think at this point we're probably closing into about 600 schools that use Talk Talk.
00:23:50.356 --> 00:23:51.790
They're in the thousands.
00:23:51.790 --> 00:24:03.952
There's one school in particular there that what they ended up doing was welcoming their families, their newcomer families, and this is out where you can find, you know, medical help.
00:24:03.952 --> 00:24:22.846
Here's where you can find if you need food.
00:24:22.846 --> 00:24:27.134
Here's where you can find the supply.
00:24:27.134 --> 00:24:29.939
You know places where you can pick up free food.
00:24:29.939 --> 00:24:38.366
Here's where you can find job placements, job placements.
00:24:38.366 --> 00:24:45.331
And in that bag, beyond that information, they include a pocket tuck so that the family can now take that with them when they're out looking for these resources that they need in order to make their lives a little bit better.
00:24:45.331 --> 00:24:50.448
So New York City by far is our biggest partner at this point.
00:24:50.989 --> 00:25:00.574
Orange County down in Florida and in the Orlando area they use this in their welcome center so when families arrive in their districts from other countries.
00:25:00.574 --> 00:25:03.720
They can go there and find people that can speak their language.
00:25:03.720 --> 00:25:12.834
So they have staff that speak Spanish and Haitian, Creole and a couple of other languages, but you know there are many more languages that they need help with.
00:25:12.834 --> 00:25:15.277
So that's where the pocket talk comes in.
00:25:15.277 --> 00:25:17.634
So they equip their staff there with pocket talk to welcome those families and to get them the resources they need help with.
00:25:17.634 --> 00:25:18.605
So that's where the pocket talk comes in.
00:25:18.605 --> 00:25:21.691
So they equip their staff there with pocket talk to welcome those families and to get them the resources they need.
00:25:21.691 --> 00:25:30.098
And then we go across to places like Moreland in the Bay Area in California.
00:25:30.098 --> 00:25:35.394
They're a district that actually checks these out like a library book.
00:25:35.394 --> 00:25:43.013
As I mentioned, they actually have these barcoded and they scan them and then the students can check them out as they need them.
00:25:43.765 --> 00:25:47.231
And you know, with students and with families, their language needs come and go.
00:25:47.231 --> 00:25:53.052
As students get a little bit further along with their English, they may not need a pocket talk anymore and that's okay.
00:25:53.052 --> 00:26:01.875
It's like a scaffold that can be removed, can be removed, and I can turn that in and and then make that available for another student that does need that scaffold right now.
00:26:01.875 --> 00:26:10.414
So so lots of different um ways to use this, everything from families to students to to the classroom uh, you name it, it's it.
00:26:10.414 --> 00:26:11.879
I'm always amazed.
00:26:11.879 --> 00:26:14.948
I love to hear these stories because I love to hear how people are.
00:26:14.948 --> 00:26:19.355
Our educators are using pocket talk and finding new ways to use it that I had not about at all.
00:26:19.355 --> 00:26:21.219
They're like, oh yeah, this is how we use it.
00:26:21.219 --> 00:26:22.807
I'm like, oh, that's amazing.
00:26:22.827 --> 00:26:34.987
So, yes, no, and that is all wonderful, like you said, because I mean, not only is it just making an impact within the classroom, but also, you know, just in the real world, you know just for adults even, and that's something huge.
00:26:35.027 --> 00:27:16.051
But one thing that I love that you mentioned and I want to highlight is, like you mentioned, when students need those additional supports, but eventually, once they kind of start growing themselves and understanding the language and being able to work, you know, through a conversation, and then slowly they're just by themselves kind of weaning themselves off of this, then, you know, you just simply submit it or turn it in, somebody else can go ahead and start using it, which is great because, as you know, arturo, like right now, school districts and everybody is, you know, they're always, their eye is always on budget, and what can we do and how can we maximize what we have and maximize that return on investment?
00:27:16.092 --> 00:27:28.807
And I think that this would be something great that, as you can see, that the student needs the device, but as they kind of grow and they grow, they can grow out of the device and then let it, you know, be used by somebody else.
00:27:28.807 --> 00:27:35.249
So I want to ask you as far as that is concerned, can you tell us the way that the device actually functions, the inner workings?
00:27:35.249 --> 00:27:36.471
Is this something that is?
00:27:36.471 --> 00:27:39.415
You know, do we need Wi-Fi, do we need a subscription?
00:27:39.415 --> 00:27:50.192
So how can we like just to give some information for any of our influencers within the district or people with purchasing power that are like whoa, you know, we've got to look into this.
00:27:50.192 --> 00:27:53.749
Can you give us a little bit, a little rundown as far as how Pocket Talk works?
00:27:54.390 --> 00:27:58.759
Sure, no, absolutely, and everything you mentioned is dead on.
00:27:58.759 --> 00:28:05.317
We are one of those products that I think can save a district money in a few different ways.
00:28:05.317 --> 00:28:13.579
One of the ways is that each device does include five years of cellular data right out of the package.
00:28:13.579 --> 00:28:14.810
So there's no subscription.
00:28:14.810 --> 00:28:16.821
You don't have to pay anything After you buy the device.
00:28:16.821 --> 00:28:16.960
That's it.
00:28:16.960 --> 00:28:17.806
You don't have to pay anything After you buy the device, that's it.
00:28:17.806 --> 00:28:24.634
You don't have to pay another dime, but you get five years of cellular data included in that one time you purchase it.
00:28:24.634 --> 00:28:31.112
So what that means is that I can now take this device and take it off campus if I need to, and use it on a field trip.
00:28:31.112 --> 00:28:46.090
I can use it on the school bus, I can send it home with a student or if I'm doing a home visit, I can knock on that door and be ready to talk, because it's automatically looking for those cellular towers in your neighborhood and connecting that way.
00:28:46.090 --> 00:28:48.907
So at school, yeah, get it on your Wi-Fi.
00:28:48.907 --> 00:28:57.752
That tends to be the best way to connect within a school building, just because of dead zones that sometimes come up.
00:28:57.752 --> 00:29:09.986
So put it on your Wi-Fi at school, but off campus it'll just automatically flip over to the cell tower and work that way, so that'll say there's no subscription at all, nothing.
00:29:09.986 --> 00:29:12.033
You have to worry about paying after you buy it.
00:29:12.033 --> 00:29:17.977
Then, on the other hand, we do have a subscription service.
00:29:17.977 --> 00:29:22.817
We do have one subscription service that you can choose to pick up and that's called Ventana.
00:29:22.817 --> 00:29:26.234
And with Ventana, that's your mobile device management system.