Playing Teacher

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Playing Teacher , we talk about something every educator feels at some point— what it means to be yourself in a school system that often prefers you to color inside the lines. Whether it’s pushing against outdated norms, teaching in ways that aren’t “in the handbook,” or simply showing up as your full, weird, passionate self, going against the grain can make you...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Playing Teacher , we rewind to one of the most surreal, exhausting, and defining chapters in modern education: COVID in New York City. Teaching during the pandemic wasn’t just about pivoting to Zoom—it was about surviving, adapting, and finding humanity in the chaos. We talk candidly about what it meant to be an educator when the world shut down: the scrambled e...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Playing Teacher , Matt, Rob, and Brugge crack open one of the most sacred and underrated parts of the school day: preps and lunches . More than just breaks, these windows of time were life-saving lifelines in the relentless hustle of NYC public school teaching. We reflect on how these moments offered space to breathe, plan, decompress—or just stare into the void...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Playing Teacher , we dive into The Hook —that elusive, electric moment when a teacher pulls students in and makes them want to learn. It’s the magic trick, the spark, the wink across the room that says, “This is going to be good.” But here’s the thing: it’s not in the lesson plan template, and it sure doesn’t show up on most rubrics. Too often dismissed as fluff...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Playing Teacher , we pull back the curtain on a not-so-secret weapon in our teaching toolbox: cinema . Whether we were screening something in our makeshift movie theater during lunch or showing a film to an entire class, movies weren’t just a break—they were world-builders . But this episode isn’t about the obvious curriculum tie-ins (you won’t hear us talking a...

Send us Fan Mail Teaching, Sanity, and the Fine Line Between Passion and Burnout In this episode of Playing Teacher , we ask the question that lingers behind every empty coffee cup, every hallway meltdown, and every wildly creative bulletin board at 2AM: Are we okay? Spoiler alert: probably not. We take a lighthearted but honest look at the emotional rollercoaster that is life in the classroom. We...

Send us Fan Mail “Ok, if it’s so easy you teach my class..please show me the way.”  Ah, the fantasy of every teacher. Imagine a scenario where you’re told to change roles and write up your supervisor who wants to show you how it’s done…you know because they were once an “expert teacher.” But what if it bombs? Matt and Rob relive this once in a teacher’s lifetime experiment and discuss better alter...