Approaching the Peak: Goal Reflection

I outline my original goals for taking the leap into a master's program: keep my educational practices current, learn new techniques and tools, and progress my teaching license. I explore how they have evolved through a year's worth of classes and reflection. Readers will get a sense of how my priorities have changed based on course material and will see where my priorities lie as I complete my graduate work.

Taking Stock of New Peaks to Conquer: Future Learning Goals

I give specific goals for the future: keep my technological expertise current, enhance my content knowledge, and educate myself about social-emotional learning and culturally responsive teaching. I outline action plans for how to achieve them and connect them back to my classroom. Read with my goal reflection, this essay serves as an update to my goals including graduate experience.

Reflecting at the Peak: Synthesis of MAET Experience

I reflect deeply upon the experiences I have had in the MAET program and their impact on my professional life. I connect my learning back to the stated objectives of the MAET program and my personal goals upon starting the program. This essay serves as the culmination of my master's program and demonstrates my desire to continue learning & growing as my career progresses.

I give an explanation and analysis of what I believe learning is based on experience as a teacher & learner, historical information, and scientific theories. This piece demonstrates my ability to synthesize course material and incorporate my own experiences to create my own philosophy.

I created a thorough, reflective 21st century lesson plan for "Writing Professional Emails" as a part of the professionalism unit I taught in the fall of 2019. The lesson culminated with real life application as students wrote an email to a teacher of their choice - practice that would prove invaluable during remote learning.

I asked the question "How can I incorporate grammar meaningfully into my curriculum and still assess it appropriately?" Many English language Educators struggle with finding the correct balance of time between explicit grammar instruction and practical English instruction. I conducted research, surveyed my colleagues, and polled my students. I found that there is no easy solution to this wicked problem - but we can strive for progress.

I draw connections between English Language Education, content-area classes, and life outside of school in this essay about the importance of knowledge transfer. This essay demonstrates my ability to thoughtfully apply psychological research into learning to everyday classroom settings. It includes concrete examples of daily routines & events in my classroom.

I helped my colleagues with our quick transition to remote learning by creating this Thinglink, which is intended as a straightforward way to learn more about the most important aspects of teaching online, based on my experience teaching for Michigan Virtual. This piece demonstrates my ability to use a wide variety of media to reach varying audiences.

I take a leadership role to propose the reorganization of the English Language Education department and class offerings at Braintree High School using readily available resources. I took a practical approach and stuck to the staffing & budgetary limits of our current department to propose a workable, quick solution to better meet the needs of our students.

I created this thoughtful and relevant professional development session for my content area colleagues to help them create accessible assessments for all learners. The specific audience I had in mind was high school teachers creating semester and final exams, but I created this session to be applicable to all secondary content-area teachers and assessment levels. It contains practical information with tips like using high contrast fonts, clear language, and giving students a chance to demonstrate what they know beyond what is asked.