Brie, Lainey and guests make lemonade from school life
On Lemonade Learning, Brie and Lainey sit down with guests from classrooms, school leadership and children's books to trade practical ideas and personal stories. Topics run from keeping project-based learning approachable to the argument that anyone in a school building, a custodian included, is leading someone.
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Lemonade Learning is built around two voices, Brie and Lainey, and the people from across education they invite to talk. Every episode starts with the pair together. The name comes from a metaphor spelled out in the show's own introduction: the sweet and the sour sides of school life are both raw material, and the aim is to make something lasting from each. What a listener gets is a set of conversations that swing between classroom practice and personal story. On the practice side, Ross Cooper and Erin Murphy make project-based learning sound achievable rather than exotic. Their conversation brings up the five E's of inquiry (engage, explore, explain, elaborate and evaluate) and questions the assumption that gradual release and errorless learning are the way to go. Ross Cooper introduces himself as an elementary school assistant principal who once taught fourth grade. Leadership gets its own thread. The Joshua Stamper episode takes a broad view of who counts as a leader: anyone in a school building, a custodian included, is leading someone somewhere. It also names a gap that aspiring leaders run into: no mentor, no support on campus and no framework for what the role involves. The more personal episodes are where the warmth is plainest. Dennis Mathew, introduced as a children's author and speech pathologist who works with elementary students, prompts a discussion of voice. One point made there is that staying silent can be harder to bear than speaking up and being told it was wrong. Sean Gaillard arrives, in the show's playful framing, from the record store next door, and the conversation settles on the person in everyone's life who sees a gift they cannot see in themselves. With George Couros, the talk weighs why sharing an idea online can feel easier than sharing it with one's own staff. Brie and Lainey make no secret of their excitement about the guests they book. One is described as a longtime wish-list pick, another as someone who brightens the day every time they talk. The pair are open about the show itself, too. A behind-the-scenes bonus reflecting on season two includes an admission that the first attempt at recording went wrong and had to be restarted. In it, the pair sort the season's guests into shared threads, with habits in one group and classroom practices in another, and one of them confesses to being an inquiry nerd while suspecting the other is one too. Episodes close with a familiar request for reviews and posts under the show's hashtag, plus a mention of sticker and swag giveaways. For a first listen, the Ross Cooper and Erin Murphy episode shows the practical side most clearly, and the Dennis Mathew episode shows the reflective one.
Made for: Suits a teacher or school leader who wants practical ideas, such as a workable approach to project-based learning, alongside encouraging personal stories from people in education. It also fits someone thinking about a move into leadership who wants to hear leadership treated as something everyone in a school building already does.
What sets it apart: It pairs concrete classroom strategy with warm, personal conversation under a running lemonade metaphor. It also includes a behind-the-scenes season reflection in which Brie and Lainey sort their guests into shared threads.
A refreshing look at learning, this podcast shares stories and high-impact strategies for educators. Join us for a glass! #LemonadeLearning
Brie and Lainey's PBL conversation may make you ask whether your school's relationships can carry another initiative.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A warm season-two reflection on habits, adaptability, and teaching ideas worth carrying forward.
Lemonade Learning's season-two wrap-up turns its familiar sweet-and-sour ritual into a warm look at what lingered for Bree and Lainey after the season ended.
A grounded case for making project-based learning part of everyday classroom practice.
Project-based learning gets a practical check-in through Lemonade Learning's conversation with Ross Cooper and Aaron Murphy. Cooper, an assistant principal in an elementary school in Westchester, New York, connects his path through fourth-grade teaching, elementary school…
An art teacher turned administrator shares practical leadership lessons for educators.
Joshua Stamper's shift from art teacher to administrator gives this Lemonade Learning episode a clear center: leadership can begin before anyone has the title.
Sean Gaylord connects educational leadership to the people who notice potential before it is fully visible.
Lemonade Learning’s conversation with Sean Gaylord frames educational leadership as a kind of careful noticing: recognizing ability before someone can fully see it in themselves.
Art teaching, grounded in real classrooms.
Classroom engagement, made concrete.
Practical systems for calmer elementary classrooms.
Practical ideas for reaching every student in the room.
Classroom strategy, talked through by working educators
Bree and Lainey use this bonus wrap-up to reflect on season two of Lemonade Learning, including the season-closer with Erin Murphy and Ross Cooper and the first in-person recording with Mike Lawrence at DLAC in Austin.
Ross Cooper, an assistant principal in Westchester, New York, and Aaron Murphy, a humanities supervisor and interim middle school principal outside Allentown, Pennsylvania, join Brie and Lainey to talk about project-based learning and their books.
Joshua Stamper joins Lemonade Learning as an administrator, author, and podcaster to talk about his upcoming book, launching September 21, with a cover reveal planned for September 7.
Lemonade Learning brings Sean Gaylord to the Lemonade Stand to talk about August as a season of "MacGyver moments" for principals, including resignations, empty nests, and isolation.
Dennis Mathew, a Mustang, Oklahoma speech pathologist and children's author, says Bello the Cello began during a 2016–2017 Boston job search when he could not find work for two to three months.
Brie and Lainey talk with George Kuros about recalibrating success after a decade of travel, a month at home, and the birth of Georgia in June 2020.
Mike Lawrence joins Lainey and Bree in Austin for Lemonade Learning’s first in-person guest conversation, recorded during DLAC with a hybrid audience and two moderators.
Brie and Lainey talk with Kerry Gallagher, an assistant principal for teaching and learning in Massachusetts and director of education for ConnectSafely, about digital wellness, school reopening, and parent guidance.
Jerry Alamendarez, superintendent in Santa Ana, California, says COVID exposed how much he relies on in-person interaction and forced him to build book clubs for administrators, teachers, and students.
Bree and Lainey host Stephanie Rothstein and Shannon Moore for a two-guest conversation centered on collaboration, reflection, and communication in education.
Two podcast co-hosts interview fellow educators about their sweet and sour moments in teaching.
An interview with educator Yaritza Vijalva about her work with overage and undercredited students and her Flipgrid show.
Hosts Brie and Lainey interview Dr.
Hosts interview a fifth-grade teacher and cancer survivor about her teaching journey, involvement in educational technology, and doctoral studies.
Hosts Brie and Lainey interview educator and author Rochelle Danae Poth about her books and teaching insights.
Educators Brie and Lainey interview UDL expert Katie Novak about the sweet and sour of learning during unprecedented times.
Two educators launch a podcast to share stories and strategies for teaching, blending personal and professional reflections.