Together Friends,
It’s June – a time of endings and beginnings! This will be our last Together Tour until the fall. (You can look forward to some other fun content we’re cooking up!). Let’s get to it!
Together Tour: Elizabeth Raji-Greig
This month’s Together Tour features Elizabeth (Liz) Raji-Greig, the Superintendent of Schools of Envision Education, headquartered in Oakland, California. I recently reconnected with Liz as we prepared a Together Leader training for her network, and in the middle of our conversation, she pulled up her reMarkable notebook – and I was like, “Please hold the call,” and she took me on a tour of what she keeps in this magic digital tablet. I’ve long been fascinated by digital tablets since this encounter last summer and my chat with Regan.
And you know, my birthday is in August, and I’m traveling a lot for both work and fun this summer, so maybe it is time to treat myself to a reMarkable! Admittedly, I spent a decent amount of time on Reddit reading deep on reviews, benefits, and drawbacks. Anyone else using one? Let’s see how Liz puts hers to good use – and peek at her other Together Tricks too!
Tell me more about why reMarkable is how you Together yourself.
Let’s start with the reasoning. . . I want to have the documents that I need the most at my fingertips, as well as an easy way to take notes, capture planning, and prep for upcoming events. I also need to make sure I am not dependent on my laptop for my organizational tools. My Together Tools need to be portable and easily usable because I travel to different schools and often take notes in a wide range of settings.
The result is that I have become permanently attached to my reMarkable Paper Pro and my smartphone, which has apps enabled for Google Drive, Calendar, and Gmail. Carrying these two tools around allows me to take notes and review key items. I can also capture them by topic, or group them into folders that I can quickly reference while on the move.
Tell me more how you keep it all organized in there. I have fears of it turning into another digital mess – like my Google Drive can occasionally become!
In my reMarkable, I can add notes by topic. For example, if I want to go back and see how my observation notes from a previous day compare to my current observation notes, I can look in the same document on a different sheet. I can also add a short tag that names the sheet’s content to make it easier to find later. Alternatively, I can keep a running list of notes within the same sheet, and scroll up and down to see historical information.
What do you like most about the reMarkable?
Well, I have the reMarkable Paper Pro, and there are so many things to love (its previous version, the reMarkable2, was also fantastic):
- It allows me to seamlessly write my notes and transfer them from my physical tablet to my computer and Google Drive.
- It is lightweight and easily portable.
- Handwritten notes give me flexibility in how I highlight, visualize, and structure my thoughts for myself and others.
- I can also use my reMarkable’s text to type function to change my handwritten notes into typed text that I can easily embed in documents or emails.
- My version has color enabled, which has helped me to highlight and focus on my most critical tasks in the weeks when I felt like my To-Dos were never-ending.
- I also add notes about the conversations I need to have with other people (my Thought Catchers) on the sides of my To-Do list, so I have everything in one place and a constant, visual reminder of what I have planned.
How else do you use the reMarkable to keep it all Together?
On my To-Do list, I add a circled P next to the items that are personal and not work-related. I find that I need to mix my personal and work-related tasks or else I won’t remember to address my personal To-Dos at home as intentionally as I do my work ones.
Click here to see how Liz uses her reMarkable to keep herself Together!
How else do you stay Together?
I needed some visuals of my work and home life in one location. So my work Google Calendar has holds for my family time during the week. Also, any personal or family appointments during the week are labeled “Unavailable” and colored the same color that my personal Google Calendar uses as its base color. This way, I have a visual reminder to look at my personal calendar because something is coming up.
I also use Google’s Time Insights tool to help me color-code and consider the balance of my time each week, especially when I have larger design work to do for leadership development sessions and annual planning.
I also have two little ones under five years old at home, and making sure we are on top of their schedules is a constant focus. One thing we did was create a new calendar that is nested within my personal Gmail account. I then shared that calendar and editing rights with my husband. This way, either of us can open our personal Gmail accounts and quickly toggle to putting an event or reminder on our shared calendar, which we titled “The Incredible Greigs”, so each person can see the added event immediately.
Thanks, Liz, for giving us into a glimpse of how technology serves you – and how you juggle it all. (MHM goes back to Reddit to read more reviews!)
If you missed our June Together Tips, it is a good one, and I got some lovely reader replies:
- Danny said, “Love the note that Togetherness actually fosters MORE flexibility and grace to our busy lives. So true.”
- Jessica in Australia notes, “I teach adult migrants and refugees English here in Australia and something I’ve done this year is schedule send birthday messages in our class Teams chat. We have a calendar on the wall where students have added birthdays. After class I make a PowerPoint slide with some cute birthday themed images from Pexels. Often birthdays are on the weekend or during holidays but the message still appears and then the birthday person receives a flood of beautiful messages from the other students. I wanted to share something that’s been so small to set up and brought so much joy and connection to our classroom community!”
- And my dear friend Heather messaged, “I appreciated your thoughts about Togetherness promoting connection. Your newsletter sparked me to send a few gratitude texts!”
- ‘Tis the season for transition. If you’re on the hunt for a new role, be sure to plan your transition with Togetherness in mind! No one wants to leave their contacts behind on a former laptop!
- Must-haves for adult learning spaces? We love a Together Table that has everything participants and trainers might need – and yes, we like some assigned seating! What do your tables look like?
- Now is a great time to tidy your stuff and systems! Seasonal transitions are a great time to schedule Tidy Time, whether it’s to clean up lingering tasks from the last few months, or to plan ahead for the upcoming season.
