About Shannon Mitchell
Shannon Mitchell is a dedicated social worker based in Edmonton, Alberta, with a strong focus on learning and development. She began her career 20 years ago in Home Visitation, supporting families as they welcomed new babies. Most recently, she has been serving as a Training Specialist in Foster Care at The Family Centre in Edmonton. Previously, she worked as the Provincial Training Coordinator for the Alberta Home Visitation Network Association, providing training and support to professionals working with families.
Shannon is passionate about applying adult learning principles to design unique and engaging learning experiences. Her background in Home Visitation has shaped her ability to think creatively and view eLearning as an opportunity to engage differently. Whether through reflective book clubs to meet prerequisites, innovative tools, or hands-on practice opportunities, Shannon enjoys crafting trainings that support learners to learn!
Connect with Shannon Mitchell: Email | Linkedin
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Resources Mentioned
Alberta Home Visitation Network Association
The Transcript
**Please note that all of our transcriptions come from rev.com and are 80% accurate. We’re grateful for the robots that make this possible and realize that it’s not a perfect process.
Sam Demma
Welcome back to another episode of the High Performing Educator. This is your host, Sam Demma. And today we are joined by Shannon Mitchell, who is a dedicated social worker based in Edmonton, Alberta. She’s very passionate about early childhood education, adult education, learning and development, and also streaming.
Sam Demma
She has an insane tech setup. The first time I met her, she very much impressed me with her, with her technology and skills and I’m so grateful that she’s taking the time out of her schedule to come on the show here today. Shannon, thank you so much for being
Shannon Mitchell
here. Oh, thank you for having me. It’s really exciting. My first podcast, Sam. This is the first one? Yeah. The first of many. Well, let’s hope. We’ll put my LinkedIn and people can can tag me if they want to talk to me more, right? Absolutely.
Sam Demma
Uh tell me more about your passions for both childhood education and also adult education. Where do those come from?
Shannon Mitchell
So they intersect in a way that maybe people don’t always think about very much. I can’t say that I thought about it much when I was kind of in the field, you know, one-on-one doing work with families. But when you look at early childhood, first of all, it’s really the basis for everything. So every dollar we put into early childhood gives us back about $4 into our society. So really important and really fun work. And I did a lot of work with families
Shannon Mitchell
where I was supporting them in the home to, you know, embrace their parenting style, to find things that are working for their family, to really engage them in being mindful and intentional parents and really looking at what they can do to support their child’s development now, what they can do to support their family’s development, those sorts of things. What I wish I had had a better understanding of, although I didn’t do terrible, Sam, I’ll tell you, is how adult learning principles would play into that so well. And how understanding how adults learn could have really helped me support them
Shannon Mitchell
to be learning new skills as they were learning to parents. And so as I continued my career and got into working with teaching training professionals about how to, you know, work with families and things. I found the two passions just really collided in a way that I wasn’t necessarily expecting, but was logical if I kind of took a step back and did some reflection.
Sam Demma
That’s amazing. Did you know growing up that you wanted to work in development of children and adults, or is it something that you stumbled into?
Shannon Mitchell
Kind of. So I was that kid. I was a volunteer. I worked at a food bank from like from the time I volunteered at a food bank for the time I was like 12, until I was about 16. I really was, you know, I was a candy striper. I did those things. I really enjoyed helping people. I really enjoyed getting involved. And I went through a little period kind of in my late teens. I think when our children are 12, 13, 14, we should really nurture that spirit because it’s there in almost all children and they don’t always know how to help. But there’s often this thing that comes out of
Shannon Mitchell
really recognizing the world and wanting to make a difference. And I believe if we really hone in on that, if we really help them grab that and go with it, that things can go really well in the world. I think it could change the whole world if we really help children at that age really move through that. I ran into, when I was about 16, 17, some really significant hypocrisy. And I didn’t have anyone to talk to about it.
Shannon Mitchell
I wish I had the internet. I feel like the internet would have helped me, maybe. But I was trying to process this adult hypocrisy I was running into, and what it did is turn me off. I was going to go work for an oil company. And you know, so things evolved as I went to university and kind of started to find
Shannon Mitchell
myself again. I had a very, very good instructor in university, a very good person to help me pick my classes. So I was always choosing classes that would let me do other things. And in the end, I ended up with a social work degree. I was like, this is actually where I want to be. I do want to support people. I actually do have this love. I just, you know, didn’t know how to process what was happening, you know,
Shannon Mitchell
in a different space that I wasn’t used to. And I wasn’t used to being in an adult space at 16 either and running into those kind of challenges. So it’s definitely been an adventure to get there. Actually, it’s four majors in university, just in case anyone’s out there like trying to find themselves, it’s okay. You’ll figure it out.
Sam Demma
What were the other three?
Shannon Mitchell
So English, and then I was like, what am I going to do an English degree? So I was like, maybe I’ll be an English teacher. So it’s interesting. I actually did look at teaching for a hot second and I didn’t enjoy the class that I took,
Shannon Mitchell
which is a really ridiculous reason to change your entire major again. But I was like, oh, maybe I don’t want to teach. Like maybe this isn’t for me. I don’t, I don’t really, what I thought was I’m not really feeling these students and they would be my peers if I went to work in a school. So I went to social work and I had the
Shannon Mitchell
opportunity to take my social work in this really secluded little corner of Saskatchewan where we had an off-campus. So there was like 20 of us taking it kind of all at the same time. It was in-person instruction at that point because it was a little too early for the internet to be really good at learning, frankly. And had this really great experience. Learned more than I think a lot of people do in their degree because we had such an insular course and were able to kind of learn from each other
Shannon Mitchell
and really dig into courses in a way that I wasn’t expecting.
Sam Demma
That’s amazing. It sounds like you had a unique educational journey and it makes me think about my own. I was someone who went to school not really knowing what I wanted to do with my life and taking a major because I thought it was just the right thing to do because everybody else was doing it
Sam Demma
and then postponing it to pursue other passions and I haven’t returned yet. It’s been a little while. And I think it’s so important that everyone remembers that all paths are different and every journey is different
Sam Demma
and there’s no special timeline that we’re all existing on where we have to do something by a certain age or a certain time, or we are quote unquote behind. Absolutely. I loved what you said about, before we started this call, that everyone as an adult, maybe even as a young person,
Sam Demma
should get a semester of time where they’re just tasked with personal development and exploration. Tell me a little bit about where that thought or idea came from.
Shannon Mitchell
So I’m currently between things. I’m looking for employment and thinking about my next steps. And as part of that process, I’ve been filling my time with things like my library programming and LinkedIn opportunities and Nonprofit Hive, anyone who knows who that is,
Shannon Mitchell
it’s amazing, going to free seminars, downloading trials of software and teaching myself how to do the rest of the adult learning online that I haven’t had the opportunity to in my employment yet. Like, really enjoying myself. If I didn’t have to worry about my next step right now, I’d be in my renaissance, right? And so, yeah, my thought was every five years we should all have this opportunity to like take a semester, four months, and just do personal development and then hop back into employment seamlessly, get paid, not have to worry about that paycheck.
Shannon Mitchell
I think that there’s a lot of… When we’re in that grind and we’re in that work, it’s hard to make time for those things that you always want to get to. And so I’m finding I don’t have enough time still, but I’m kind of doing the things that I wish I would have more time for. And then maybe it will set me up to do more of that when I actually get back to working full-time again.
Sam Demma
There’s a lot of educators listening to this that are burnt out and stressed and anxious and pouring in so much to students and teachers and everyone in their buildings. That thought is probably so juicy for them. Oh my goodness, if I could just get a semester
Sam Demma
to take a break and explore some curiosities, it would probably excite them. For someone who hasn’t explored their curiosities in a long time, they probably wouldn’t even know where to start or like what to do with that space. What are a few of the things you’ve been exploring
Sam Demma
that have surprised you or you’ve become super interested in and can recommend
Shannon Mitchell
somebody else check them out as well. So a couple of things for me if you live anywhere near a bigger city check out your library because I know my library will allow people from the neighboring communities to access it as well and it’s no longer just books I’ve learned to use a sewing machine a laser engraver a whole studio lab space I don’t know what I’m going to do with a studio lab space, but they got one. And so I learned how to use it, you know, all sorts of things that I just wouldn’t imagine.
Shannon Mitchell
And I’m like, well, if they offer it, I’m going to take it. And just they have the equipment, I can go borrow it once I’m certified. So I did that. The other thing is, I wasn’t so sure about exploring the self-directed learning aspect. there’s a lot of learning that happens best through interpersonal communication. But exploring the self-directed learning, the kind of technology side of our field, has actually been really interesting and I can see how the two can support each other so well.
Shannon Mitchell
There’s so many times, and I mean, having been a while since you’ve been a student, Sam, but there’s so many times when you’re kind of learning the same thing over and over again to make sure everyone’s got it, to make sure everyone’s got the same base. It’s basic knowledge. It doesn’t require a lot of synthesis right from us. That stuff on self-directed learning could take care of so much. I can remember like, you and I’ve talked about our generation gap, right? So we’re talking early 90s when I was in high school. And I can remember learning the metric system like six
Shannon Mitchell
times in six different courses through high school. High school is only three years in Saskatchewan. I was like so done with it. But every class had to make sure you had the base. So if I could have just gone on a self-directed learning, bloop, bloop, bloop, bloop, show I knew it, and then we could move on, life would have been so much easier, right?
Shannon Mitchell
So I think about that sometimes, how those two things are gonna work hand in hand. And I didn’t expect to find that. If you’d asked me what I thought about self-directed learning in June of this year, I would have been like, eh, I’m not sure it’s a good idea.
Shannon Mitchell
And now I can definitely see how the two can support one another and make learning more effective. And really, younger people don’t always want this interaction in particular. You know, it’s a little trickier. Those who grew up in the pandemic, even trickier yet, I think. So if we can kind of interacting with the machine kind of way, I think that we can really find something that will support adult learning principles and support people where they want to learn right now.
Sam Demma
When you think about your time doing work in learning and development, what aspects of it bring you the most joy and fulfillment?
Shannon Mitchell
I really like, I see it as a bit of a puzzle. So I am I also like telling stories and I think storytelling is actually amazing. So it’s like a win win. But I think that, you know, when I set out a course and I’m looking at what people are trying to learn, you start breaking it up into half hour chunks. They can’t listen to me from, you know, for a long period of time. What are we doing in this half hour to change things up? What are we doing to change their brain? What’s going to ground the learning here? What can we bring them in? What will will they maybe be willing to contribute?
Shannon Mitchell
I loved it every training. I did Ages and Stages questionnaire training probably, let’s say, 30 times in six years. And it was different every time because of who was in the space. And that was a training that had a lot of content. So there wasn’t a lot of room for reflection, not a lot of room for… And still every single one of them was different.
Shannon Mitchell
And I learned something every time I did it. So that was really exciting to me. I really like that process of figuring out. I like talking to people, too. My favorite training was actually virtual online trainings.
Shannon Mitchell
So the in-person was good, but I really enjoyed people from all over the province together, sometimes all over the country, connecting differently and using some of the tools that I found. I got really excited about some of the tools that can engage interaction.
Shannon Mitchell
And so I really found it more enjoyable than I ever imagined, actually. But Sam, I want to go back to those burned out people you talked about. Can I? Please. I will tell you, I think I’ve heard you ask people, and I might be preempting a question, but I think I’ve heard you ask people, like, tell me about your favourite teacher, your favourite educator. I’ve had so many and know that there’s someone out there right
Shannon Mitchell
now who is feeling what you’re doing as a teacher and it is impacting their lives. I grew up in the 70s, 80s, 90s. I was born in the late 70s and I was a girl who was talkative and curious and that didn’t always go over well in public. People didn’t always love a little girl who had a lot to say. The world was changing, but my teachers, almost all of them, adored it and nurtured it. And I could tell you, you know, my kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Paddock, and I’m 47 years old, I can tell you about Mrs. Heffernan, who made room for me to learn in my own way. I can tell you about, you know, oh, I’ve lost her name. My grade four teacher, who’s
Shannon Mitchell
now an author, I even have her book and I’ve just completely lost her, Betty Dorian, who was like, oh, Shani, you’ve kind of missed some of this along the way. We had some split classes and stuff. Would you like some extra work to learn this grammar stuff? And I’m like, I’m here for it. And she’s like, I gotcha. Right. So people who really supported me my entire way, so if you’re kind of feeling burned out, look for that child because they’re there. Sometimes they’re the quiet one who’s like absorbed and sometimes they’re like
Shannon Mitchell
me and they got things to say and sometimes they challenge you and if I really like you, I will challenge you. So that’s something, you know, even in high school was a thing. And so just recognizing that there’s a child out there who needs what you’re doing right now and that doesn’t mean you can’t take a break, but it’s not what you’re doing now is not for naught.
Sam Demma
I appreciate you bringing that up, especially around this time of year. I think there’s a lot of people that have been really pushing hard and they’re reaching for the break and hoping that that break gives them what they need to show up again in the new year with full recharged batteries for others. How do you make sure you stay full so that when you do show up in spaces where you need to contribute to others, you have the capacity to do so.
Shannon Mitchell
I think it’s important to think about what parts of your job do feed you. Yeah. And what parts do take your energy. So I love the online virtual training, but actually days of an on-end were draining. I had to have a variety. So thinking about where in your work you can put those places in. And what about this thing do you really enjoy? If you’re teaching littles,
Shannon Mitchell
where can you put some breaks in that will support you and the children, right? So if you’re teaching older children, where can you let them explore themselves or express their opinions? You know, I had a teacher in high school who rearranged our desks. I used to sit in the back and our classroom ended up with the back seats weren’t there anymore. There was an extra row now. And I got there not in time to like pick the back desk. So I just sat down where my desk
Shannon Mitchell
used to be on the floor. And the teacher just taught the class as though nothing happened. And by about the fourth day, I’m sitting on the floor and I’m going, Oh, God, how am I going to get out of this? Like, how am I going to get out of this Sam? And he goes, Shannon, there’s a quiz today, get your desk. And I was so relieved to get my desk. Right? So recognizing what you need to take on and what you don’t. I mean, again, I still remember this. At the time, I can very distinctly remember thinking, now I’ve got myself into this and I don’t want to just go take a desk. But by the
Shannon Mitchell
time he kind of was like, it’s time, Shannon. I was like, yeah, yeah, it’s time. So recognizing what you need to take on and what you don’t, you know, having some faith in our young people and letting them control some of their learning. Oh, I have so much to say.
Shannon Mitchell
I absolutely love this story.
Sam Demma
I appreciate you sharing it. I think we choose our battles sometimes based on our own perceived needs or desires versus what might be best for us. And I’ve done it so many times in my own life. And yeah, I appreciate you.
Sam Demma
And what’s normal, right?
Shannon Mitchell
Like this perception of what we’re supposed to be doing and recognizing that, you know, you and I are half a country apart right now in two different cities, I think. I don’t know if you’re home, but I’m in Edmonton and to get down east, I mean, there are literally an infinite number of ways to get there. Even leaving my neighborhood, how many ways are there to leave? And is any way better than another, right?
Shannon Mitchell
And so recognizing that even if we’re going the same place, every path we take is valid and it might teach us something different. This time of year, I might see new Christmas lights even if I take the long way to my neighborhood. So is that the most effective way to get there?
Shannon Mitchell
No, but does it do something different for me than yesterday’s route did? Yes. And so really recognizing that it’s okay to let kids be on their own journey. I know you have like things you have to do. I’ve done training where I had
Shannon Mitchell
to, people have to be able to do this tool at the end. But really recognizing that, you know, if we get where we’re going, we get where we’re going.
Sam Demma
Yeah, I love it. Where do you want to go in the next few years? Do you have an idea of a, I know you’re in this phase of exploration, but maybe there’s someone listening to this who might be able to connect the dot for you.
Shannon Mitchell
Yeah, I am really become more and more passionate about the learning development area. And so I will be honest, there’s not a lot of jobs in my field as far as like, connecting early childhood and adult learning. If someone has one of those, I’d be happy to take it. I’m really looking at how to grow my skills and learning development and take a position in a job that will let me kind of use what I’m already good at. I’m an excellent facilitator. I’m excellent at developing programs. I need more practice on the self-directed learning side of development and those sorts of things.
Shannon Mitchell
And I need both of those things. I need to be able to use my skills and be learning to really thrive in a job. So if someone wants, you know, a trainer in a field I’m not familiar with, that gives me the opportunity to learn a whole bunch of new things too, which is fantastic. So I’m pretty open to a lot of different things right now. I’m really thinking about what my skills are, because I think I’m going to just get a little sociopolitical on you, Sam, but especially as women, we’re taught not to brag a lot and not to
Shannon Mitchell
own our strength and not to own our skills. And you’ll hear us say things like, oh, I just a lot more. Even when you read the research, women and actually people of colour and other people who experience marginalization are less likely to apply for jobs that they’re not like 95 percent
Shannon Mitchell
qualified for already. And so I’ve decided to be bold and apply for jobs that maybe I don’t think will call me back, but maybe they will. And so but it’s having to really be kind to myself too, because that means I’m putting out a lot of resumes
Shannon Mitchell
that aren’t getting callbacks. But I’m like, you know, 30% of these, I’m actually probably not expecting callback. And I need to teach myself to be okay with that. Yeah, so that’s where I’m at right now.
Sam Demma
And I’m so excited to hear about where it ends up. I’m sure whoever brings you onto their team is gonna absolutely love having you and be better off because of it. And if there is someone listening right now, I’ve had the opportunity to work with Shannon, and she was lovely to work with. And we enjoyed, I enjoyed all of our calls,
Sam Demma
and it was seamless. And I am not getting paid if she gets a job, just so anyone recognizes this is not a paid promotion, nor is it the reason that we set this up. We set it up well before she was in a new job search. She’s just a lovely human being that would add so much value to a team. And I hope that whoever’s listening recognizes that and opens some doors for you. In closing, Shannon, is there any last like big ideas or thoughts on your mind that you wanna share with the educators that are tuning in?
Shannon Mitchell
Yes, and I think this applies to your work too, Sam. And I did mention to this to you once in a call, but I think I can kind of tie together the educators we’ve been talking about, my experience, but also what you do. And I always think about when we talk about the little things that happen in life. Here you are, you do like three of these a week maybe. For me, it’s exciting, right? And so when you think about everything we do, if we think about it like pages in a book, you know, one page, rip, it’s gone.
Shannon Mitchell
It’s easy to rip that page. But there’s whole competitions about ripping a phonebook because it’s so hard to do. So when you think about everything that you’re doing in a positive way is really building. And honestly, we don’t need perfection in our caregivers. We don’t need perfection in our educators. Children are born to be resilient and they’re born to have people who are caring for them make mistakes and all those things. But every positive thing we do adds another page to that notebook. And as we’re going through life, we’ve got this big book of amazing things that are supporting us that can be really hard to break.
Shannon Mitchell
And so I think like you’re contributing right now another page to my book. You brought me in here and you’re like, I believe in you, Shannon, and I think that you have something to say. I think all of these educators who are watching are adding those pages to this children’s notebooks every day, and they’re not even realizing that they’re probably doing it. And so, and it doesn’t take much recognizing strengths, you know, looking for the positive
Shannon Mitchell
first, even we got to correct kids. But it doesn’t mean we can’t look for the positive first, right? All those kind of things that really build up children that will have these giant notebooks, which is the one thing they should keep in their backpack, Sam, for the whole life, right? I love it.
Sam Demma
So, so true. And within each notebook, there’s memories of people’s names on it, you know, attached to them. And so just to keep that in mind, like every action we take has an impact
Sam Demma
not only on the positive, but also it could be on the negative. And so let’s be cautious about the words we use and the actions we take. And yeah, I think about folks who have taught me what to do and taught me not what not to do.
Sam Demma
And both are equally as valuable, but some way heavier than others. If someone’s listening to this and they want to have a conversation with you, Shannon, or reach out, what would be the best way for them to get in touch with you?
Shannon Mitchell
I would say, I think you’re going to put things in the notes, right? So Linkedin, and there is my email that you’re perfectly welcome to engage with as well. Yeah, I’m learning to use LinkedIn and kind of enjoying the kind of more focused social media aspect of it, but certainly email is a good place to find me too.
Sam Demma
Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show, keep exploring during this phase of your life. And I’m so grateful for your thoughts, your ideas and your presence. your ideas and your presence.
Shannon Mitchell
Thank you, Sam.
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