Embedded Files
West Hawaii
BEGINNING TEACHERS
BEGINNING TEACHERS
PROFESSIONAL GROWTH PLAN FOR THIRD-YEAR CREDENTIALED TEACHERS
PROFESSIONAL GROWTH PLAN FOR THIRD-YEAR CREDENTIALED TEACHERS
Building Teacher Efficacy and Earning Tenure
Building Teacher Efficacy and Earning Tenure
In their third year, teachers focus on consolidating their skills, taking on leadership roles, and preparing for the transition from probationary status to tenured positions.
Third-year teachers should continue working on any incomplete activities from the previous year's Professional Growth Plan to solidify your teaching practices and demonstrate readiness for tenure. When questions and challenges arise, seek guidance and support from experienced colleagues and administrators. Your former mentor and the West Hawaii Teacher Induction & Mentoring Team will always be happy to help guide and support you, please don't hesitate to reach out.
Third Year teachers are invited to participate in the Beginning Teacher Learning Community (BTLC) and will receive stipends for any sessions you fully participate in.
Use the menu to the right to jump ahead to each focus area of your Professional Growth Plan.
The Classroom Environment
The Classroom Environment
Effective teachers organize their classrooms so that all students can learn. They maximize instructional time and foster respectful interactions with and among students, ensuring that students find the classroom a safe place to take intellectual risks. Students themselves make a substantive contribution to the effective functioning of the class by assisting with classroom procedures, ensuring effective use of physical space, and supporting the learning of classmates. Students and teachers work in ways that demonstrate their belief that hard work will result in higher levels of learning. Student behavior is consistently appropriate, and the teacher’s handling of infractions is subtle, preventive, and respectful of students’ dignity.
2a. Creating an Environment of Respect and Rapport
The teacher displays solid knowledge of the important concepts in the discipline and how these relate to one another. The teacher demonstrates accurate understanding of prerequisite relationships among topics. The teacher’s plans and practice reflect familiarity with a wide range of effective pedagogical approaches in the subject.
2b. Establishing a Culture for Learning
The classroom culture is a place where learning is valued by all; high expectations for both learning and hard work are the norm for most students. Students understand their role as learners and consistently expend effort to learn. Classroom interactions support learning, hard work, and the precise use of language.
2c. Managing Classroom Procedures
There is little loss of instructional time due to effective classroom routines and procedures. The teacher’s management of instructional groups and transitions, or handling of materials and supplies, or both, are consistently successful. With minimal guidance and prompting, students follow established classroom routines, and volunteers and paraprofessionals contribute to the class.
2d. Managing Student Behavior
Student behavior is generally appropriate. The teacher monitors student behavior against established standards of conduct. Teacher response to student misbehavior is consistent, proportionate, and respectful to students and is effective.
2e. Organizing Physical Space
The classroom is safe, and students have equal access to learning activities; the teacher ensures that the furniture arrangement is appropriate to the learning activities and uses physical resources, including computer technology, effectively.
Mentoring Tools to support your refinement of your Classroom Environment:
Knowing Students: consider what influences a student’s learning and identify next steps that will provide support
Knowing Students Across Multiple Dimensions: gather and analyze information about student’s learning preferences, background, and metacognitive skills
Communicating with Families: outlines upcoming communication to parents using the given structure, taking into consideration the desired outcomes of the communication
Resources to support your refinement of your Classroom Environment:
Creating an Optimal Learning Environment: Effective teaching and learning can only happen when an Optimal Learning Environment is in place
Panorama Education Resource Hub contains a wealth of information on both how to navigate your Panorama account and strategies for using the data to improve your school
Here to Help support and resources needed to address mental, social emotional, and behavioral health needs
Hawaii Multi-Tiered System of Support HMTSS is a data-driven, team-based decision-making framework for achieving positive outcomes for every student through a layered continuum of evidence-based practices
Crisis Prevention Restraints & Seclusion and Suicide Awareness & Prevention
Positive Behavioral Interventions & Supports (PBIS) and Restorative Practices are used to increase positive outcomes for student behaviors. Both emphasize prevention and positive responses to positive behavior and a positive school climate.
Trauma-Informed Care ensures a culture of support for all students and helps staff members recognize those students who may need additional support and services
National Education Association: Trauma-Informed Practices
Understood.org: What is trauma-informed teaching?
General Learner Outcomes (GLOs): Observable behaviors, which are demonstrated in daily classroom activities
Nā Hopena A‘o (HĀ): competencies that strengthen a sense of belonging, responsibility, excellence, aloha, total-well-being and Hawaii (“BREATH”) in ourselves, students and others
Planning and Preparation
Planning and Preparation
Effective teachers plan and prepare for lessons using their extensive knowledge of the content area, the relationships among different strands within the content and between the subject and other disciplines, and their students’ prior understanding of the subject. Instructional outcomes are clear, represent important learning in the subject, and are aligned to the curriculum. The instructional design includes learning activities that are well sequenced and require all students to think, problem solve, inquire, and defend conjectures and opinions. Effective teachers design formative assessments to monitor learning, and they provide the information needed to differentiate instruction. Measures of student learning align with the curriculum, enabling students to demonstrate their understanding in more than one way.
1a. Demonstrating Knowledge of Content and Pedagogy
The teacher displays solid knowledge of the important concepts in the discipline and how these relate to one another. The teacher demonstrates accurate understanding of prerequisite relationships among topics. The teacher’s plans and practice reflect familiarity with a wide range of effective pedagogical approaches in the subject.
1b. Demonstrating Knowledge of Students
The teacher understands the active nature of student learning and attains information about levels of development for groups of students. The teacher also purposefully acquires knowledge from several sources about groups of students’ varied approaches to learning, knowledge and skills, special needs, and interests and cultural heritages.
1c. Setting Instructional Outcomes
Most outcomes represent rigorous and important learning in the discipline and are clear, are written in the form of student learning, and suggest viable methods of assessment. Outcomes reflect several different types of learning and opportunities for coordination, and they are differentiated, in whatever way is needed, for different groups of students.
1d. Demonstrating Knowledge of Resources
The teacher displays awareness of resources beyond those provided by the school or district, including those on the Internet, for classroom use and for extending one’s professional skill, and seeks out such resources.
1e. Designing Coherent Instruction
Most of the learning activities are aligned with the instructional outcomes and follow an organized progression suitable to groups of students. The learning activities have reasonable time allocations; they represent significant cognitive challenge, with some differentiation for different groups of students and varied use of instructional groups.
1f. Designing Student Assessments
All the instructional outcomes may be assessed by the proposed assessment plan; assessment methodologies may have been adapted for groups of students. Assessment criteria and standards are clear. The teacher has a well-developed strategy for using formative assessment and has designed particular approaches to be used.
Mentoring Tools to support your refinement of your Planning and Preparation:
School, Family, and Community Resources: familiarize teachers and mentors with available resources within their schools, districts, and broader communities
School Resources: overview of who and what is available at the school
Knowing Students: consider what influences a student’s learning and identify next steps that will provide support
Knowing Students Across Multiple Dimensions: gather and analyze information about student’s learning preferences, background, and metacognitive skills
Planning Conversation Guide: support teachers in analyzing or planning a standards-aligned lesson based on knowledge of students and content to meet the needs of every learner
Instructional Groups: Using assessment data to plan differentiated instruction is at the heart of effective teaching. Take into account the strengths and learning needs of your students as you form groupings for differentiated instruction.
Resources to support your refinement of your Planning and Preparation:
Universal Design for Learning reduces barriers in instruction, provides appropriate accommodations and supports.
Edutopia: Project-Based Learning Engaging students in real-world projects for collaboration, research, and communication.
Instruction
Instruction
In the classrooms of accomplished teachers, all students are highly engaged in learning. They make significant contributions to the success of the class through participation in high-level discussions and active involvement in their learning and the learning of others. Teacher explanations are clear and invite student intellectual engagement. The teacher’s feedback is specific to learning goals and rubrics and offers concrete suggestions for improvement. As a result, students understand their progress in learning the content and can explain the learning goals and what they need to do in order to improve. Effective teachers recognize their responsibility for student learning and make adjustments, as needed, to ensure student success.
3a. Communicating with Students
The instructional purpose of the lesson is clearly communicated to students, including where it is situated within broader learning; directions and procedures are explained clearly and may be modeled. The teacher’s explanation of content is scaffolded, clear, and accurate and connects with students’ knowledge and experience. During the explanation of content, the teacher focuses, as appropriate, on strategies students can use when working independently and invites student intellectual engagement. The teacher’s spoken and written language is clear and correct and is suitable to students’ ages and interests. The teacher’s use of academic vocabulary is precise and serves to extend student understanding.
3b. Using Questioning and Discussion Techniques
While the teacher may use some low-level questions, he poses questions designed to promote student thinking and understanding. The teacher creates a genuine discussion among students, providing adequate time for students to respond and stepping aside when doing so is appropriate. The teacher challenges students to justify their thinking and successfully engages most students in the discussion, employing a range of strategies to ensure that most students are heard.
3c. Engaging Students in Learning
The learning tasks and activities are fully aligned with the instructional outcomes and are designed to challenge student thinking, inviting students to make their thinking visible. This technique results in active intellectual engagement by most students with important and challenging content, and with teacher scaffolding to support that engagement. The groupings of students are suitable to the activities. The lesson has a clearly defined structure, and the pacing of the lesson is appropriate, providing most students the time needed to be intellectually engaged.
3d. Using Assessment in Instruction
Students appear to be aware of the assessment criteria, and the teacher monitors student learning for groups of students. Questions and assessments are regularly used to diagnose evidence of learning. Teacher feedback to groups of students is accurate and specific; some students engage in self- assessment.
3e. Demonstrating Flexibility and Responsiveness
The teacher successfully accommodates students’ questions and interests. Drawing on a broad repertoire of strategies, the teacher persists in seeking approaches for students who have difficulty learning. If impromptu measures are needed, the teacher makes a minor adjustment to the lesson and does so smoothly.
Mentoring Tools to support your refinement of your Instruction:
Implement Common Formative Assessments based on Priority Standards and then Analyzing Student Learning
Observing experienced teachers in their classroom can give you ideas for your own teaching practice, including classroom management, planning, and delivery procedures.
Completing a Full Observation Cycle with your mentor can provide data to help measure teacher effectiveness and provide feedback to inform and alter practice to improve student achievement. The Observation Cycle also prepares teachers for more formal administrator evaluations.
Pre-Observation
A Planning Conversation Guide can be used, but the Pre-Observation Conversation is the same, with the final step of selecting a focus for data collection
Lesson Observation/Data Collection
Seating Chart: captures real-time movement and other behaviors of individuals within a classroom and can be used to track:
students’ on- and off-task behavior
which students/groups are participating/not participating
where the teacher directs questions and which students respond
student-to-student interactions
where the teacher moves and makes contact with different groups of students
what type of contact is made with specific students
student movement
to what degree different students are engaged in the content and activities
Canva Classroom Seating Chart Templates
Teachers Pay Teachers Free Seating Charts
Smartdraw seating chart templates
101 Planners Classroom Seating Chart
Content, Strategies, and Alignment: compares the lesson’s targeted standards, selected content, and learning strategies in order to analyze and effect on how they influenced student learning
Selective Scripting: record observation data that are specific to the teacher’s
identified area(s) of focus
note the effects of instruction on students
collect objective descriptions of teaching practice, student response
to instruction, room environment, time intervals, and pacing
collect and code specific behaviors
Post-Observation Reflection
Post-Observation Co-Analysis (POCA): Discuss strengths and areas for growth based upon the data collected during the lesson observation.
Post-Observation Reflecting Conversation: articulate impressions, analyze evidence in order to build on what worked and to address areas for improvement.
Resources to support your refinement of your Instruction:
HIDOE Testing
Use Universal Screener data to design RTI
Lead the Data Team Process to monitor all students and implement research-based instructional strategies
Professional Learning Community (PLC): West Hawaii Team Analysis of Common Assessment (TACA)
Implement an effective/highly effective Student Success Plan (SSP) for EES
Professional Responsibilities
Professional Responsibilities
Accomplished teachers have high ethical standards and a deep sense of professionalism, focused on improving their own teaching and supporting the ongoing learning of colleagues. Their record-keeping systems are efficient and effective, and they communicate with families clearly, frequently, and with cultural sensitivity. Accomplished teachers assume leadership roles in both school and LEA projects, and they engage in a wide range of professional development activities to strengthen their practice. Reflection on their own teaching results in ideas for improvement that are shared across professional learning communities and contribute to improving the practice of all.
4a. Reflection on Teaching
The teacher makes an accurate assessment of a lesson’s effectiveness and the extent to which it achieved its instructional outcomes and can cite general references to support the judgment. The teacher makes a few specific suggestions of what could be tried another time the lesson is taught.
4b. Maintaining Accurate Records
The teacher’s system for maintaining information on student completion of assignments, student progress in learning, and non instructional records is fully effective.
4c. Communicating with Families
The teacher provides frequent and appropriate information to families about the instructional program and conveys information about individual student progress in a culturally sensitive manner. The teacher makes some attempts to engage families in the instructional program.
4d. Participating in the Professional Community
The teacher’s relationships with colleagues are characterized by mutual support and cooperation; the teacher actively participates in a culture of professional inquiry. The teacher volunteers to participate in school events and in school and district projects, making a substantial contribution.
4e. Growing and Developing Professionally
Teacher seeks out opportunities for professional development to enhance content knowledge and pedagogical skill. Teacher actively engages with colleagues and supervisors in professional conversation about practice, including feedback about practice. The teacher participates actively in assisting other educators and looks for ways to contribute to the profession.
4f. Showing Professionalism
The teacher displays high standards of honesty, integrity, and confidentiality in interactions with colleagues, students, and the public. The teacher is active in serving students, working to ensure that all students receive a fair opportunity to succeed. The teacher maintains an open mind in team or departmental decision making. The teacher complies fully with school and district regulations.
Mentoring Tools to support your refinement of your Professional Responsibilities:
School, Family, and Community Resources: familiarize teachers and mentors with available resources within their schools, districts, and broader communities
School Resources: overview of who and what is available at the school
New Teacher Needs Assessment: Identify professional areas of concern to focus on
Knowing Teachers: Use during the first few mentoring meetings to build a trusting relationship with teachers and gain insights into their philosophy, vision, and theory about effective teaching
Collaborative Assessment Log: guides the conversation to assess needs, establish a focus, support teacher’s movement forward, promote accountability for short- and long-term instructional goal-setting, and work between a mentor and a teacher
Communicating with Families: outlines upcoming communication to parents using the given structure, taking into consideration the desired outcomes of the communication
Individual Learning Plan: Rubric for self-assessment on the Danielson 4 Domains of Teaching
Resources to support your refinement of your Professional Responsibilities:
Panorama Education Resource Hub contains a wealth of information on both how to navigate your Panorama account and strategies for using the data to improve your school
Hawaii Multi-Tiered System of Support HMTSS is a data-driven, team-based decision-making framework for achieving positive outcomes for every student through a layered continuum of evidence-based practices
Computer Science: Equipping teachers with effective tools and strategies for using technology to enhance learning
Culturally Responsive Teaching in Hawaii: Learning basic Hawaiian and incorporating cultural practices into your classroom community. https://uhcc.hawaii.edu/olelo/
Ka Hale Hoaka Professional Development workshops aim to strengthen the educatorʻs practices to understand and serve Hawaiʻiʻs students.
Āina-Based Education: Connecting to resources and support for incorporating hands-on learning experiences rooted in the land and its cultural significance.
Current Educational Trends & Issues: Staying informed about developments in education by attending Educational Conferences and Professional Development.
Reclassification on the Salary Schedule with 15 PD Credits
If you move from Emergency Hire to Probationary, you can reclassify after 1 semester.
If you begin your employment as Probationary, you can reclassify after 2 semesters.
Understanding the Educator Effectiveness System (EES)
Understanding the Educator Effectiveness System (EES)
The EES applies differentiated evaluation tracks. Experience level, tenure status and the prior year’s rating determine the differentiated evaluation activities and support. The differentiated process reflects the belief that teachers at different stages of experience and performance levels deserve and require different types of feedback, support, and opportunities to grow as professionals.
Use this collaborative process between teachers and administrators to become confident in your practices and accelerate student learning.
Explore the evaluation requirements for Probationary 5-6 Teachers.
Student Success Plan
Two Classroom Observations
Core Professionalism
Page updated
Report abuse