STANDARD 9: PROFESSIONALISM, LEADERSHIP, AND ACCURACY

Standard 9 - Professionalism, Leadership, and Advocacy – The competent teacher is an ethical and reflective practitioner who exhibits professionalism; provides leadership in the learning community; and advocates for students, parents or guardians, and the profession.

This artifact is an interview that I conducted while substitute teaching. I was able to be a part of the Special Education program and had the opportunity to interview a great teacher. Along with the interview I was able to observe the teacher. By interviewing this specific teacher I was able to get an in-depth look at what teaching was. The interview goes through a variety of questions and answers that were conducted in the interview and transferred to paper form.

Standard 9 States, "The competent teacher is an ethical and reflective practitioner who exhibits professionalism". This interview connects with standard 9 because it talks about the reflective process of a teacher. Being the interviewer I was able to practice talking with teachers about the field of education. The professionalism conducted by both the interviewer and teacher was able to provide me with some leadership within the learning community that I can use when I student taught. This shows evidence of understanding the standard because every teacher is a part of the learning community and being able to understand another teacher's perspective helps develop the teacher from both sides of the interview.

Through this interview, I was able to learn many things and took away a lot of details that I had no idea were involved with teaching. I was able to seek a professional within the educational system and gain a lot of knowledge that I didn't know existed. Talking with the interviewee and understanding the answers to the questions I posed to him I was able to learn about IEP's and 504 Plans. This was something that was brand new to me and being able to understand these things before going into student-teaching helped me develop as a learner and as a teacher. I was able to use this as a starting block to becoming the best teacher I can be.

This artifact is an evaluation of myself while I was student teaching by my college supervisor who observed me in the classroom four times throughout the semester. The evaluation was based on the Charlotte Danielson Framework. This evaluation question was one of many but this question specifically talks about the professionalism observed during the observation times.

As far as standard 9 goes, one of the performance indicators is 9I which states, "models professional behavior that reflects honesty, integrity, personal responsibility, confidentiality, altruism and respect". With this evaluation question the explanation of the how the teacher performed was proficient. It shows the professional behavior of the teacher with students and colleagues was present during the time during student-teaching.

I was able to take a lot away from the observations and evaluations of my college supervisor. I was able to understand the important characteristics a teacher needs to develop professionalism within the workplace. This has helped me to understand that when it comes to interviewing making sure that you are professional and understand the district in which you are applying to is important. Professionalism get looked over by many people and it is important to understand the importance of professionalism within the educational environment.