🎙️Ep.4: Building Bridges to Brilliance: Tisha & Dave’s Story of Connection

What This Episode is About

This episode is all about how mentorship and community can breathe new life into teaching when burnout feels overwhelming. You’ll hear how Tisha went from ready-to-quit to reignited, thanks to one powerful connection with Dave and the Teach Like a Pirate community.

Together, they talk about finding your voice, taking risks, and embracing the messiness that comes with growth. At its heart, it’s a story about how sharing your magic—and letting others remind you of it—can transform not just your classroom, but your whole journey in education.

Meet Our Guests

Tisha Richmond is a high school culinary arts teacher, author, podcast host, and i2e Canva Specialist from Southern Oregon. With over 20 years in Family & Consumer Science and experience as a Tech Integration Specialist, she brings creativity and innovation to education. She is president of Southern Oregon CUE and serves on the CUE executive board. Tisha has authored Make Learning MAGICAL, co-authored the EduProtocol Companion Guide, and co-wrote the children’s book Dragon Smart with her son, Tommy—each inspiring playful, engaging learning experiences for students and educators alike.

🔗 Tisha on X/Twitter

🔗 Tisha on Instagram

🔗 Tisha on LinkedIn

💻 Tisha’s Website

Dave Burgess is the New York Times best-selling author of Teach Like a PIRATE, co-author of P is for PIRATE, and president of Dave Burgess Consulting, Inc., a publisher known for powerful and innovative books that inspire educators worldwide. A former Teacher of the Year in San Diego, Dave built his reputation on reaching hard-to-motivate students through creativity, showmanship, and passion. Today, he delivers high-energy keynotes and workshops that blend performance, magic, and practical strategies—leaving educators inspired, equipped, and ready to transform student engagement.

🔗 Dave on X/Twitter

🔗 Dave on Instagram

🔗 Dave on LinkedIn

💻 Dave’s Website

Key Takeaways

• Burnout doesn’t have to be the end of the story; connection and community can reignite joy and purpose in teaching.
• Tisha heard Dave on the Edu All-Stars podcast, where he performed an audio magic trick about letting go of fear and perfectionism—sparking a major turning point in her career.
• Start collecting your stories, ideas, and classroom wins in “buckets” (quotes, blog posts, lesson ideas). Over time, these can grow into books, talks, or resources to share with others.
• Mentorship and belonging fuel growth. When educators feel supported and connected, they rediscover their magic and carry it back to their classrooms.

Resources & Mentions

• 🎧 Edu All-Stars Podcast episode with Dave Burgess (the one Tisha first heard and mentioned was so impactful)
• 📘 Teach Like a Pirate by Dave Burgess
• 📘 Make Learning Magical by Tisha Richmond
• 📘 Dragon Smart (Tisha’s children’s book, illustrated by her son)
• 🌐 Tisha Richmond’s blog and resources
• 🌐 Dave Burgess Consulting collection of books & speakers – DBC Inc.
• 📱 Wakelet (mentioned as a tool for curating resources and ideas)

Transcript

Cate: All right. I am so excited to have two of my favorite edu people in the universe here. Tisha Richmond, Dave Burgess. Thank you so much for being here. Hi. 

Tisha: Hello. Super honored and excited to be here. Thanks so much for having us. 

Dave: Yeah. Hi Cate. 

Thanks so much for having us on the show. 

Cate: Amazing. Amazing. alright, so knowing that the bridge is really about building, celebrating, and, propagating connections and education, I wanna start by just like, why you guys are here together.

'cause I reached out to Tisha and she's I gotta bring on Dave. So what's that story? what's your guys' story? 

Tisha: So when you asked me to bring someone on, I was really just thinking about who is that one person, especially over the last 10 years, 11 years, that have been really transformational to me.

Who is that person who has mentored me, who has given me advice and wisdom and encouragement whenever I've needed it? And that is Dave. And to share a little bit about the journey and how we connected. It was about 11 years that I was a teacher ready to leave education. I was burnt out, I was tired.

our district was going through a strike, like all of the things were happening and I just felt very alone and disconnected. And a classroom set of iPads propelled me into this world of being a connected educator. I went to the, my first. Ed tech conference called iPad Palooza and my world was open to this world of innovative, passionate educators that I'd never knew existed.

And at that conference, I was just given all of these hashtags and handles and podcasts and all these things that. Like I was hoping would inspire me. So I came home and I started, getting on Twitter and I started listening to podcasts and, I've always had running in my life in some way. And at that point I was running daily and I started listening to podcasts and I was listening to this podcast called edu All Stars.

the hosts were Todd Nesloney and is it Chris Nessie? Dave, Chris Kess. 

Dave: Chris Kessler. 

Tisha: Chris 

Kessler, that's it. Wow. And I listened to that podcast and this guy named Dave Burgess came on as a guest and I listened and I was just. I was so inspired and it just really resonated with me in a big way. And it's funny 'cause I just for fun, I went back and I found it this morning and I was listening to it and Oh, can we 

Cate: please 

put that in the 

Cate: show notes?

Tisha: That's yeah. Amazing. You for sure have to. And one of the cool things about this episode is Dave shares a magic trick. Imagine doing a magic trick like audibly, right? If, anybody can do it, it's Dave. And when he. Shared this magic trick. He was also sharing a lesson, right? Or an experience. And in this magic trick, he basically is asking the participants, 'cause we're all like engaged in this magic trick as listeners ask us to.

get rid of these things. Fear of failure, believing you have to have everything figured out before you start perfectionism. Lack of focus, fear of criticism, and fear of change. And when you can get rid of all those things, you're ready to teach like a pirate. And when I listened to that this morning, I'm like, oh my gosh.

Like when I think about this past 11 year span, I think about, whoa, those are. Definitely major factors that I have been able to throw out to really just, I don't know, repark, my joy and my passion for education. And so I give. So much credit for today for that. from that podcast, I found the teap chat and I got connected there and I started learning from other educators and I started sharing some of my story.

And again, Dave was always the one that would just encourage me when I would share out that thing that I did in my classroom that I wasn't sure if it was a really great idea or not, like my students loved it. But is this something that would really benefit other educators? Was always there to say, oh my gosh, this is awesome.

Keep going. And I just have appreciated that so much. And through TLA it was probably another two years later because Make Learning Magical was born in 2018. I felt enough confidence to. To have an empowered talk with Dave and to write a book proposal and share my manifesto of how I went from a burnout teacher to a teacher that was able to spark that joy again and really transform what teaching looked like for me and really create unforgettable experiences in my classroom.

And that journey has just led me to so many incredible experiences and new jobs and, More books and speaking engagements. And again, Dave has always been there through that journey. Encouraging and inspiring and, giving me, advice as I've needed it. And I've appreciated that so much.

Cate: That's there's so many little nuggets in there that I feel. Could really, the audience could really resonate with just that idea of feeling low, getting excited about a few like tools that came out, then stumbling into this whole community. and one thing you shared that came up in a previous recording was the fact that there was an actual human named Dave.

On the other side of the screen when you were sharing a really vulnerable experience you had in the classroom. So Dave okay, turn the, turning the coin over. what's your version of this? 

Dave: first of all, it was quite a blast from the past, that podcast that was, that's awesome. that was really going out on a limb 'cause it was being broadcast live and then also it was being recorded.

And so I was doing a magic trick for people. All over the world really. live on a podcast, on a stream and so if something went wrong, it was there was no backtracking, right? And so it was, I remember it, that was like the, I think the first and the only time I tried to do that.

Tisha: It's what? I just have to interrupt for a moment. It was so funny in it too because, at one point he's Oklahoma, I see that you didn't do this like this time. so he, it was really funny. Yeah. The way that he pulled it off. Oh my 

Dave: God. Was calling, out states, have no idea. Oh my god.

I had no idea who's watching, who's listening, but Hey, you down there in Texas? I said, put it on the bottom of the day I can. 

Cate: Oh my. I can't wait to listen. 

Dave: Yeah, it was pretty fun. Yeah. But yeah, so that was, Yeah, so there's so much there. Those things that I tried to embed in that magic trick, those ideas and those concepts were things that had been part of like the kind of the teach, like a pirate message, and were things that I was seeing as I was speaking that were holding educators back from sharing amazing things they were doing.

There's just this unique thing in education where, we don't really know how special we are because we're all, we're alone in our rooms and so like I, I think. I taught with some people for 17 years. Same campus. Same like same, passed each other at the mailbox, getting our stuff out of our little mailbox in the office every day, right?

Never one time saw them teach a lesson. so we work around people all the time. But that doesn't necessarily mean that we're connected to people and that we're Understand what, I don't know what this person does in their English class. I get my stuff outta my little mailbox.

I go, I go down to the social studies department and so even though it's. Seems like we're highly connected on our campuses. Often we're very isolated. And so that's one of the things that like about the, the t creating community and like the #TLAP community is this place where for people where maybe they don't feel supported on their campus, maybe they don't found, like they've found their people, they're a group that kind of resonates with what they're into and what they do and their passion around the work.

It was a place where people could come and say oh, I'm not alone. There's other people like me. Yeah. And so I think that's a big part of this story is we initially got connected through the podcast, but then through, an online community of educators Who were just coming together to try to lift each other up in challenging times, 

Tisha: which is still going by the way, Teala.

Cate: I was just gonna ask Yeah. 

What is the, and #TLAP being teach like a pirate. So what does the #TLAP community look like now? 

Dave: So I would say it's not as active as a big we're. We're taking the summer off, which is the first time we've ever done that. Okay. Okay. But I think the chat started in the spring of 2013, 

and so 

I think we're probably about the longest running consistent chat.

We've been running weekly chats for over 12 years. 

Cate: Are you still on X or Twitter? Whatever. So 

Dave: this last little stretch, we were on blue sky for a while. Yeah. And then when we come back we'll see what it's gonna be, but yeah. Yeah. But there's been consistent chats weekly for over 12 years in the #TLAP community.

Cate: And you have like deeply committed community members there. Tisha is not the only person who is an early. Joiner and is still in there. And I've long admired, the strength and like the authentic trust that comes out of anybody that like, I think starts in that group. and I've had the experience of getting to like actually meet some of these, my Twitter friends in real life.

Like I feel like those, you are both Twitter people to me. And when you actually get to see them and give them a hug and be like, yes. Yes, you're human flesh, like this is real. that there's just there's really nothing. There's, it's hard to put words to it because you go through these really vulnerable public moments together.

Yeah, that's so true. Yeah. 

Dave: I've had some very strange interactions with people that's related to that. Okay. 'cause like for, I, for a lot of people, I think that I became like almost like a mythological creature, you're a pirate, yeah. And it was like this thing that he's, this social media thing that maybe uhhuh and then like I'll see like maybe I'll turn a corner at a conference and run into someone and they have this look on their face of yeah.

Oh my. Like you're a real person. Like, the, you said the thing about the flesh and blood is yeah. They're almost shocked that I'm actually, I'm like, Hey, how you doing? Whatever. Like they're just like. Their whole world is blown. wait a second, you live online in that Twitter place. Like you're actually real.

You're not just like a po Like, I'm like my voice in ear. An avatar. Yeah, like an avatar. Like it's, 

Cate: I feel the same way. Tisha, I'm sure you've had those moments too. If you're really like, no, I'm Tisha. or you go into your're doing your session and you're like, yep. All those ideas I tweet about, this is what it looks like in real life, Totally. So when you have those moments of connection, like in real life, and this is for both of you, like how, how do you feel after, I mean I know or is there a moment that you've had with somebody where you're like, that just stuck with me. That was a moment that I won't forget. Not to put you on the spot 'cause we didn't prep that question, but I'm curious.

Tisha: Yeah. I find so much, It just fills my soul anytime. That I am able to connect with my, this community that most of the year I'm online with. in person. It just, it, just like meeting with your closest friends, because they become that because they are, you're connecting, through Twitter or whatever social media platform it is, but.

They're there for you in those times when you might feel really low or alone in your district and you just find such inspiration and joy from connecting there. So then to meet in real life and And have that tangible like conversation, whether it's over coffee or in a hallway or in a conference session.

It just is so fulfilling and just brings me so much joy. So anytime I come back from a conference where I see my people, I just, my heart feels super full. Yeah. 

Dave: It's kinda a strange closeness that comes from. Being in space with people where you're sharing not only your work, which is very personal to you, 

but then also maybe some of your failures, your vulnerabilities.

Yeah. And so when you're in a place where you're vulnerable with people, and then they lift you up and pick you up and Support you in those moments. And then it's when it, especially when it's done in an online space and then you see them in real life, it's like you feel like, oh, this is this person I feel so strongly connected to.

I feel like I've known them forever. 

Tisha: Yeah. 

Dave: you just pick up where you left off and often. Yeah. But my experience that most people, are very much, the same kind of empowerment that you get from them online when you meet them in person, you're like, oh, this is exactly who I thought it was gonna be.

Yeah. Like very rarely have I met someone who I'm just like, oh, this is not what I was expected. I'm disappointed. I'm usually not disappointed. That's she, when I meet my people. 

Tisha: Yeah. 

Dave: Face to face. I'm rarely disappointed. I'm usually like, yeah, this is exactly who I thought it was gonna be. I love this person.

Cate: Yeah. You two have something really like next level in common, which is not only have you been super dedicated to building community online and in person, but you, you've written books. you are also like, people get intimate with your stories. They do, they'll bring you on vacation and they'll bring you into their bedrooms or their living rooms and, I wonder, how so Tisha being an author and Dave being an author and running a whole publishing empire, what is it about your stories? How do you, go through the process of determining which are the stories you wanna write down and share that way? 

Tisha: Wow. I would say for make learning magical.

Cate: And we'll put links to books in, in show notes. Okay. 

Tisha: Yeah. So thank you. Make Learning Magical is really my manifesto and it, is truly telling my story of how I was at that really low point in education and I was ready to leave and it's taking a look. Into my classroom and really breaking down the seven keys that were able to transform what teaching looked like for me and really create those unforgettable experiences for students.

And so my hope in writing down my story and sharing kind of that transformative process. I was hoping that would resonate with other educators that may have felt that low point in education too, or maybe had felt like they'd lost their joy and sharing, these are the seven keys that unlocked my classroom.

It's not gonna look the same for you, but whether you teach culinary arts or. English or math or PE or whatever subject it is, kindergarten through high school. I'm hoping that they can take those keys and really apply it to their own experience and be able to find ways to transform what teaching looks like for them and what learning looks like for their students.

And so it was a very personal, yeah. Story that I wrote with actionable things that an educator could do to, help restore or spark joy or create, better learning experiences for students and a better teaching experience for them. So it, 

Make learning magical. Most definitely. It was written from the heart and it was a book that I was so grateful to have the opportunity to write.

'cause my experience really transformed what teaching and learning looked like for me forever. And I wanted to be able to give back and share that with others. So that was that story. Dave, do you wanna share anything? Before I dive into Dragon Smart. 

Dave: Yeah, so I think I can remember, I can very clearly remember conversations we had around, make learning magical when Tisha pitched it.

And she is used that term twice. Manifesto. That's a term that we use at Dave Burgess Consulting all the time. And in fact, an Empower Talk, which you have with every prospective author goes through an Empower Talk with me or now possibly Tara Martin. And, the m is for manifesto and it's this whole idea that we don't want people to write books they're a little interested in, or they think it's gonna fill a gap in the market or sell Or anything like that. we want people to write the core message that they want to share with other educators in the world. And I always tell them like if you could give a TED Talk next week, like this would be your TED Talk. I want your Ted Talk book. if you could give a keynote, this would be your keynote topic.

This would be the kind of thing that after you were done speaking, you would just wanna like slam the mic down and break it. Because who the heck's gonna step on the stage after what you just said? You just crushed it. And then what we tell people is here's the problem though. The, a lot of people who can be that passionate about speaking and about their message and sharing it, then when they get behind a computer, all of a sudden they feel they have to be very formal, professional, and academic.

And the two dimensional written page already sucks out all that emotion and intonation. And inflection, and gesturing, all that kind of stuff that, that a, speaker has. So you have to go almost over the top as a writer to bring in that kind of passion and that personality into what you do.

And so like we're looking for books that have that flare of originality and that manifesto flare to them. this person is like on fire about this message. It's coming. Like they just can't. Possibly keep it inside of them. Yeah. And they can't wait to share it with the world. And that scares a lot of people.

Yeah. A lot of people are scared by people that are that passionate about their work. But whenever we see someone like that, we're like, oh, they might be one of us. they might be one of, they might be one of us. And That was something that, we could feel in Tisha, is that she had this message inside of her.

And it was very personal and transformative for her. And wow, how cool would it be if she could amplify that and share it with other people? And so the big question with that one, I remember these conversations so clearly is, okay, she's a culinary teacher. Does she write the world's greatest culinary book?

Or does these, but these principles are really cross-curricular. All grade levels and or does she take what she's doing in culinary and show how those principles can be applied across the whole curriculum? And so that was the direction that we took with Make Learning Magical, was to take her culinary experience and share it and show how those principles could work on a wider.

Wider scale. But, it's always fun to have those conversations. I can, just like yesterday, I can remember having those talks with Tisha about that. 

Cate: That's awesome. And, in a way, like through the partnership, through your guys' relationship, transformation of your story happened. It sounds like Tisha, like maybe you walked in thinking this is the manifesto, but through the relationship and the coaching and even just like hearing yourself say stuff out loud or writing stuff down.

I wonder, did you go through. A process of transformation as well. and if so, like what, how did that come out in other aspects of your life? 

Tisha: Yeah. I, for sure, Grappled with, I have this story that it's burning inside of me to tell, but what shape is it going to take, right? Like what? And I remember having the, having the conversation about an acronym or whether to have magical be an acronym because it is an acronym. Those are my seven keys that the letters and magical and absolutely. And I think I so appreciate, and I know Dave has done this for so many people, is really, allow my voice to be authentic and true to who I am and my experience, and also just giving that.

Guidance as far as like, how do I even start, I remember Dave saying, just start putting your ideas in buckets, if you have an idea, put it in buckets, or if you have that blog post that you wrote, put it in a bucket and just start sorting out like what it is you wanna share.

And, just so much appreciated. just that journey. Yeah. 

Cate: And thinking about. Other people, myself included, that have, we have stories, we have our little nuggets, right? We have the stories that keep us going or get in our way or just are right here or here. and. It's helped, to get it out in writing in little blog posts or, sharing little stories on social media.

But do either of you, like if someone's listening and they're like, I think I have a story, or something's right here and I don't know where to put it. what do you tell them? Like how do you, how do you coach them? 

Dave: Yeah. So I think that most people do have that story inside of them.

And whether it's gonna be a book or not is, I is not for sure. Maybe it is gonna be through blog post blogging. Yeah. Maybe it's gonna have to be through podcasts or whatever. There's lots of different ways or presentations or whatever it might be. Yeah. But, it's always, I the, it's funny that Tisha.

Mention is the buckets, because what people like, the hardest thing to do if you're gonna write a book, is to open up like a document and say, okay, page one, I can just great. That's not the way that a book is written, right? A book is written and I like what I recommend, and this is how I wrote teach like a pirate, is I say okay, you're gonna create these like folders or I call them buckets, and Like here's my classroom stories that are, that resonate and were powerful and transformative for my concept of teaching. I start, put right, put 'em in a little file, right? A little section of a notebook or whatever, quotes that I love. Oh, here's my little quote bucket. here's my presentations that I give and the key points in my presentations.

Here's another bucket. All this. And then what happens is you start to see all this stuff build and gather around you. And what seemed overwhelming at first, the concept of writing a book, all of a sudden now it's like you have more than a book. You have so much stuff. On any particular day, you can work and flesh out.

Like why don't you open up that bucket of classroom stories and write a couple of, flesh them out and write 'em out in paragraph form, And then what it becomes is not writing a book. It's more like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. 

Tisha: You have all these pieces now in 

Dave: front of you, and so now.

It's not overwhelming that you're writing a book. It's like, how do these things all fit together? And it's like more of fun, of a, how can I organize these things in an effective way? And so you're putting together a puzzle as opposed to writing a book. 

Cate: Oh, I love that metaphor so much. 'cause I puzzle, a puzzler.

Dave: Yeah. Yeah. It does make so much sense. And a lot of people speak, right? They speak about their stuff. 

Cate: Yeah. And 

Dave: so like I always say if you're a speaker, you already have a head start. Like just write down what you say. that's just, 

Cate: yeah, totally Google voice typing there. 

Dave: Yeah. there are people that do so many sessions and they're like, oh, I don't even know where to start with a book.

I'm like, are you kidding me? You have 10 breakout sessions you do at conferences, right? that's 10 chapters right there. so 

Cate: that's such a good point 

Dave: that people have so much. Inside of them and they just maybe don't know how to tap into it. And so that's one of the things that we help people do is figure out okay, how can you get all this stuff that's inside of you out and put it in, organize it in a way that's gonna be, powerful for readers.

so I, have recently, as of January started, teaching actually teacher candidates online and I get to teach them their one unit of ed tech, which is quite an honor. I have so many thoughts about why there's one unit, but that's okay. we go for it. We go big and hard. And so one of the, one of the ahas my students have made, and this is connected to what you're sharing about buckets, the.

The idea of curating and like bookmarking is not as familiar to our emerging educators, our novice educators, as maybe we, it is to us like, us being people that have been around the tech with the classroom for 14 plus years, and I couldn't have survived all the tools that were coming at me from conferences and Twitter had I not had some sort of system to curate and then go back and.

Reset and revise and figure out what I want, and I've actually taken them over to Wakelet and I said, I'm going to also give you a lot of resources and you're gonna have research and you're gonna do research, so let's get you started on a Wakelet board. And so many of them didn't even know it existed or hadn't even thought about it.

and so what you're saying, I think if we deconstructed that even further and been, and just help our educators just start to sort through the noise. Yeah, there's just noise. Even within our curriculum that's officially adopted, there's PowerPoints and slides and images and chapters and online and Spanish and English, and it's like.

So much more than what I felt I dealt with when I was teaching TCI social studies back in 2010. It was just different. and I was in control of my curation. So I love that and I love even bringing it. Back to some actionable steps that younger emerging, not younger, but just novice teachers can take.

and then having fun with it. I tell my students all the time, if you click on something and you're not, if, and you scroll twice and it hasn't caught your eye, there's a reason just. Click on the next one. like we don't have enough time to interview every tool out there, and sometimes we just need to trust our guts.

so anyways, just made me think about what you were sharing and. And I wanted to bring it back to this idea of joy because that's so centered in what I do and what I want my teachers to do and what I help other educators do when I go out into the field. And I know that's a common thread with all three of us, very much I'm dying to, for you to tell the story of this. Of this collaboration with your son. So tell us, break it down. I'm so excited. 

Tisha: Oh my goodness. this book is also so near and dear to my heart for a lot of different reasons. One of the major reasons is it was in collaboration with my son, but I had this message, in addition to make learning magical, there was also this message that had been burning on my heart for a long time, and that was that we are all.

We're all brilliant, right? But we're all brilliant in different ways. And as my son was going through school, he struggled. I had a daughter that just whizzed right through, and my son struggled. And yet as a mom, like I saw all of the different ways that. He shined and was brilliant. It just wasn't always translating to success in the classroom.

And as a mom, it just absolutely crushed me. And as a teacher that taught culinary arts and an elective area, current technical education, I had so many students that were very similar. I could see their brilliance, but they struggled in school and in many cases, oftentimes my class was the only class that they would attend.

In fact, that same thing happened this last year where the counselor was like, I think you forgot to mark the student absent. And I'm like, no, they were here, just happened to be the only class that day they showed up at. And I just wanted so deeply to share this message for not only students, but for everyone that there's so many ways that we shine and How this all kind of came together was I had this message in my heart and I didn't know how it was gonna come out. I honestly didn't know that it was gonna come out in a book. I thought, maybe this is a, session that I'm going to deliver at a conference, or maybe it's a series of blog posts, or maybe it's a podcast or I didn't know and one.

Day. there was an encounter, my husband had an encounter with a former student, not the student, but the dad of a student in a grocery store. It was a student that we both had in class and, We had run into this dad over the years. This student really struggled in school, but we saw their brilliance.

And when I had the student in class, I even, I know that I even told him, you are going to be a millionaire someday. I know school is hard for you right now, but you are so smart and you have, there's so many ways that you shine. And so this particular conversation that my husband had that. The dad said he's thriving, he is a millionaire.

And this kid isn't even 30 yet, I don't think. Wow. And he's doing incredible. And so when I heard that story, I came home and I'm like, oh my gosh. Like this message that had been my heart for so long was like bursting. Like I have got to get this story out. And it was that day that I sat down and I just started writing this story, this children's story.

It was a rhyming kind of a story, and I got done with it within a day, and I called up my, actually texted my son. I said, Tommy, I wrote this story and I'd love to read it to you, and when I read it to you, you're gonna recognize yourself in this story. And, he said it was late at night, so he is mom, I'm about, he's in New York.

He's at the, he was at in New York at the time. He is I'm gonna go to bed. Bed, like the morning, let's read it to me in the morning. So I did, and I said, I wrote this story with you in mind and what do you think? And he is mom. I love it. I love this story so much and I said, Tommy, I would love to turn this into a children's book.

And when I think about doing that, you are the first person that comes to mind as an illustrator. Now, given the. He had never illustrated anything before I knew he drew. He was always been very artistic, but I really didn't know what this would look like. But I believed in him and I knew that he could do it.

And I said, would you even consider, illustrating and making this story come to life and. He said, I would love to, he didn't even hesitate, which I wasn't sure what he was gonna do. Wow. And for him not to hesitate was just, so special. And so over the next month or two, I said, why don't you just draw the main character, which was a dragon.

And, really the essence of this story is it is about a dragon named Tommy who's struggling in school and. Conversation between a mom and a son telling this dragon all of the ways that they're smart and all the ways that they shine. And, so I asked him to. Create his version of Tommy the Dragon, like what this character would look like.

And so he did, and he grappled with it. He tried to come up with the character and he finally did. And he showed me. It was nothing like I, what I would've imagined. Like you can see it right behind me on my shelf. Yeah. Yeah. it wasn't at all the dragon that I had. I didn't know, like I didn't really have a dragon in mind, but it was so different.

But it was so Tommy and I'm like, I love it. And I think I might have reached out to Tara or Dave and said, okay, like we have this idea, like what I've, written a book proposal for make Learning magical, but I don't know what this would look like for a children's book. And so they gave us some guidance and, we spent the next month or two putting together this book proposal and, It like we to say that when they accepted it, like we were like over the moon, because I had really talked myself out of it getting accepted. Like I was like, because it was over Christmas break and I'm like, it had been a little bit. It had been like a little bit over two weeks, and I'm like, I think they're just waiting till after the holidays to let us down.

Easy. I didn't tell Tommy this, but I'm like, they just don't wanna crush our holidays, so we got the call that they were accepting it. We just were over the moon excited and it was such. A wild year of collaboration. Tommy really taught himself how to illustrate. Yeah. And there was a lot of back and forth with the illustration team, with the editing team.

there was a lot of times where re, where Tommy had to go back and he had to like. Redo and adjust. Dave can attest to that. It wasn't an easy process by any stretch of the imagination, but it just showed just Tommy's tenacity and just grit and. He felt so proud of the project when he, both of us felt so proud of the project when we were done because it was like it had come full circle, like this story about Tommy, this kid who maybe couldn't see all of the ways that he was brilliant, like through this project.

He saw his brilliance and he saw, oh, that God, he had this talent that he didn't realize he had. So to say it's special is definitely an understatement. it's, a project that is just so near and dear to my heart, and it's just, it's brought us closer together and bonded us to another son. 

Cate: So I, can only imagine.

So Dave, what, what did you see? What did you see that made it like a hard yes. 

Dave: So multiple things. First of all, the message itself is just very core to what we believe at DBC, that everybody is capable, possible, brilliant, and, and that schools often are not set up to, to support that and to show that.

And how can we create schools that where kids feel seen and where kids feel validated, and where they don't feel like they have to fit into some mold. But they can be, able to express themselves and their brilliance. that's very core to the message of a lot of our books. And so this was, Children's book version of that, which was gonna be, you could just picture this as a read aloud in a classroom. 

Cate: Yeah. And 

Dave: not only educators, like I want educators to hear that message about their students, but then I want students to hear that message from their educators too. So it was very much a match in an alignment with what we believe.

And then when you throw on top of it, the mothers son combo, 

Cate: oh my God. 

Dave: The fact that like the son is gonna. Illustrate a book that was written inspired by him. And like the, it's a combination between a, it's a story between a conversation between a mom and a son. Like it's, yeah, it was absolutely a no brainer.

We love that project and it's like super special to us too. but I will tell you that there's one thing that Tisha's not sharing with you, and that is that, she knows where this is going. 

Tisha: I do, she always tries to avoid this, that, leave it to Dave. I know. 

Dave: She's I sat down and I wrote this story, and oh, so you sat down, did you?

she wrote the entire book in the bathtub. 

Cate: Ah. Be what I say, intimacy. It's all very intimate, these books. 

Tisha: It's true. It's true. I do love a good one bath one. One bath. 

Cate: One bath equals one book. It's same. Same. That's amazing. Oh my gosh. I, cannot wait to read this and we'll make sure to put links to all the things that people can click on to go see both books and all the DBC collection and all of it.

I, would love to end by asking both of you that if you could, imagine. Baby teacher Dave, and baby teacher Tisha, and you're about three years old, maybe four. And, feeling all the feels that we had back then. What would you go back and tell to that version of you? 

Tisha: I have two things. One is you have a magic, all your own.

So my magic isn't your magic. Your magic isn't my magic. But you have a magic that is all your own. And so claim that magic and make amazing things happen in the classroom for you and your students. And the second thing I'll say is no risk. No magic. I actually have a necklace right here that says, no risk.

No magic. 

Cate: Of course you do. 

Tisha: And it is true like all of the things that, yeah. Over the last, especially 11 years, would not have happened if I hadn't just stepped out there and taken the risk and taken the next risk and taken the next risk. And each risk gets bigger, as you step out. And so don't be afraid to step out and take those risks.

Cate: Love it. Thanks, trisha. All right, Dave. 

Dave: So I'll go with two things too. Okay. The first is very similar to, Tisha's message is that, and this is something that's core in my message, is, what is unique about you, your particular strengths and talents and your voice that you add to your classroom is what's gonna make you most powerful and effective with students.

And so to, work to embrace that. And then secondly, as a young teacher, so what happens is, Things always go wrong in classrooms and lessons blow up in your face. Things fall flat. there's behavior management issues on days and all these kind things, but as a young teacher. You personalize it and you think that's you, think that you're, that it's your fault.

And what experienced teachers learn is that that never goes away. And that's not because you're not good at teaching, it's because this is just really hard. And there are days that don't go well. And the most experienced teachers, 20 years into the game, have. Lessons blow up in their face.

And like I taught for 17 years, in my 17th year after having written teach like a pirate, I had lessons that fell flat. I had stuff blow up in my face. I had behavior management issues on days. And new teachers think it's them. And so they need to know that. hey, that's this part of this. That's what makes this all amazing, is there's, you're never gonna get perfect at this.

It's never gonna be, it's about getting better. 

Tisha: Yeah. 

Dave: don't, so don't personalize failure. See it as feed feedback. 

Cate: and if you don't take risks, Tisha, you never get to the failure, Dave. Yeah. And it's all this like kind of full circle moment. I like to say my mantra in life is it's not pretty.

It's beautiful. 

And I think that sentiment is in line too with what you're both sharing. So I can't thank you enough for your time and if people, we'll make sure all contact information is in show notes, but if people just wanna find you across. The internet. Where do they, where would they go?

Tisha and then Dave. 

Tisha: Yeah, so my name is slightly different on all the platforms. I just like to make things, a little bit of a treasure hunt. Spicy, Tish Rich on x Tish Richmond on Instagram. you can find me on Facebook as well. Tisha Richmond. I have a Facebook group for family and consumer science educators called Gamifying, family and Consumer Science.

So you can find that Facebook. 

Cate: Oh. We didn't even get to talk about games. Tisha, that'll be the next podcast. 

Tisha: We have so much. I know. Oh my God. I know. So the, and you'll find me on LinkedIn. I'm on Blue Sky, so all the places. And then I have a website, tisha richmond.com, where I share blog posts from the last 11 years and have lots of resources there as well.

Cate: Awesome, thanks. And Dave, 

Dave: so I'm on, Twitter or X @burgessdave. My name is flipped around to Burgess. Dave, I'm on Instagram @dbc_inc and I have a podcast, the Dave Burgess show, an inconsistent podcast, the Dave Burgess show. Hopefully more consistent soon. And you can find me daveburges.com and you can find all of our books and speakers stuff@daveburgessconsulting.com.

Awesome. All right, my friends. good luck as school commences and, we move forward. I know, Tisha, you're going into the classroom. 

Tisha: Yes, I will be back in the culinary arts classroom this fall and yeah, super excited for, another year. 

Cate: You're such a fun follow on socials too, like you're so good about documenting that story, so just shout out to you and you're, you have an audience and me, so every time you post, just remember someone like. Cate is watching. 

Tisha: Oh, thanks for sharing that. 'cause sometimes I'm, of course, I wonder how I'm doing, so thank you. 

Cate: You're in. You're in my phone, girl. All right, my friends. Thank you so very much. Thank you. So see you later. Nice, Cate. Bye.