Ministry Development Plans
Training Module 3 - Ministry Development Plans
The Ministry Development Plan:
A Tool for Growth in WELS Schools
WELS MDP
The WELS Ministry Development Plan (MDP) serves as a formative growth tool WELS teachers. Its function is to assist teachers and those supporting them in purposely focusing on professional growth to enhance student learning and spiritual growth based upon the WELS Teaching Standards. In addition the MDP serves as a tool to promote and strengthen discussion and data gathering regarding pedagogical practices which will allow for positive teacher and school development and assist in providing data for meaningful summative assessment.
Shifts in Thinking
The formative growth that is the goal of the MDP, involves two shifts in thinking that are illustrated in the diagrams below.
The first shift is from an input model that measures strategies the teacher implements to an output model that still values the implementation of research-based practices, but also incorporates tools to assess the effect of that implementation on student learning.
The second shift is one of emphasis. For most teachers, data collection and observation have traditionally been in the service of a summative evaluation. While the MDP is a potential data source for such evaluation, its primary purpose is teacher growth that results in increased student learning. As a result, the weight of emphasis shifts from teacher evaluation to teacher and student growth.
