Professional Development Plan

Domain 1: PLANNING AND PREPARATION

NM Domain 1 Element:

1F: Designing Student Assessment

Professional Learning Goal:

I will check for understanding throughout lessons and provide opportunities for students to show where they are in their own learning.

Rationale: Why am I focusing on this element?

It's so important to have strategies to assess your students during and after your lessons. This will let you know who is getting it, and who is not quite there yet.

Action Plan:

• Plan and include three to five exit ticket questions in my weekly lesson plans.

• Have a teacher's clipboard strictly dedicated to taking notes for formative assessments when walking around the classroom.

• Give immediate feedback when students hand in work.

• Use any resources available to generate questions.

Time Line:

Exit tickets and taking notes of student progression were added to lesson plans beginning week of February 1st, 2021.

Resources:

• Blooms Taxonomy

• Math playground Website

• Edutopia

• Mr. Dennis

Outcomes:

Week of February 1st:

At the end of our phonics lesson, I had asked my students to decode a few words on a small piece of paper, and then hand it in to me when they finished. It only took a few extra minutes, and as a result it really gave me an idea of where each of the students were at.

Week of February 8th:

After completing a lesson in math, Mr. Dennis and I came up with an exit ticket with 2-3 questions that related to the material students were learning on that given day. We were working on finding the area in unit squares, and wanted to see if the kids were understanding the material or not. When we finished reviewing the exit tickets, it let us know that we needed to take more time on that lesson we had done because there were lots of students who were struggling with it. Acquiring this feedback is so beneficial so we can get students back on track.

Week of February 22nd:

Students were doing a draft model in writing where they had to go through the editing process. They turned in their rough drafts to me, and then I proceeded to give them feedback a day afterwards. They appreciated the immediate feedback as it let them know right away what they needed to work on and improve for their final draft copies. If you wait too long to give them their feedback, it's not going to help anybody.

Domain 1 Reflection:

Over the course of the past few weeks, I have been learning how important it is to assess my students. There are so many benefits for both myself and the students for giving and receiving that immediate feedback from their work. It will lead students to becoming more successful in the classroom having that knowledge of what they need to be improving on as we move forward.

Domain 2: CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR LEARNING

NM Domain 2 Element:

2D: Managing Classroom Procedures

Professional Learning Goal: I will improve on managing my expectations and routines for students to have more enjoyable learning experiences in the classroom.

Rationale: Why am I focusing on this element?

Action Plan:

• Begin modeling how our morning meetings and closing circles should look like.

• Have students demonstrate this by practicing how we need to be coming into the classroom every single day.

• Students will have an opportunity to create a word-map of what they would see, hear, do, and feel more of and less of in a healthy classroom learning environment (PAX Good Behavior Game).

• Word-map will be displayed on the wall as a constant reminder for students.

• Practice our lesson transitions with each other, and things that are okay and not okay during our breaks.

Time Line:

Modeling classroom expectations and routines will begin the week of March 22, 2021.

Results from this experiment may vary but we should start seeing some improvements by the end of the month.

Resources:

• Mr. Dennis

• PAX Good Behavior Game

• Word-map poster

• Knowledge of students

• Student Input

Outcomes:

Week of March 22: On Monday, I had students stop at the door before entering the classroom to begin our morning meeting. I asked them one-by-one to demonstrate how they think we should be begin our day. Each student quietly walked to their seats, sat down, and remained silent until further directions. I applauded them and explained that this is what I expect everyday when we enter the classroom for morning meeting. Later in the day during our writing workshop, I began to introduce and launch PAX. I announced to the class that we will be doing an activity where they need to imagine the most wonderful school day and what would happen on that day that made them feel wonderful. I asked students to identify some examples of things they would see, hear, do, and feel "more" of and "less" of during those wonderful times. Lots of students were engaging in these conversations in efforts to make our classroom a better learning environment. The best thing about PAX is that students are creating this themselves so it's their voice and not necessarily the teacher's. Anyways, we spent a few days working on this word-map, and then by the end of the week we printed the poster to display on the classroom walls.

Week of March 29: After modeling our classroom expectations and routines, I begin noticing some major improvements. Students were well aware and informed of what they needed to be doing every single day. We had less distractions during our classroom discussions and little instructional time was being lost now that we had established procedures. Throughout the week, I made sure to celebrate our success whenever we would be doing a good job because recognition is very important. I always kept it positive but provided feedback when it was necessary.

Domain 2 Reflection:

This was such a good learning experience for my development as a teacher. There are so many different ways you can model your expectations and routines which is the beauty of having a classroom of your own. I now realize how important it is to get procedures established so you can create the best possible environment for learning.

Domain 3: TEACHING FOR LEARNING

NM Domain 3 Element:

3C: Engaging Students in Learning

Professional Learning Goal: I will provide opportunities for students to lead in reading, writing, and mathematical discussions while pacing my lessons effectively.

Rationale: Why am I focusing on this element?

Action Plan:

• Incorporate 3-5 small group activities/discussions per week in my lesson plans.

• Have students lead more in conversations relating to reading, writing, and math.

• Observe and reflect each time we work in small groups.

• Revise my lesson plans based on my observations made from previous week.

Time Line:

I will begin including more small group activities in my lesson plan week of April 6.

Also, I will remember to reflect on each Friday with Mr. Dennis talking about how the discussions went.

Resources:

• Stop-watch timer

• Flipgrid

• Mr. Dennis

Outcomes:

The first week I was consistent in giving students opportunities to work in teams. I made sure to create openings in my weekly lesson plan that would support this kind of learning environment. For example, in science, we had just learned about Meteorologists. After the reading, I asked students to work with a partner and create a Flip-grid video regarding what the duties of an Meteorologist entails. They seemed to really enjoy doing this activity, and it reminded me how good of a tool Flip-grid can serve as for collaborative work. However, it didn't go perfectly as some groups failed in being productive with one another so this made me think about ways I can improve moving forward.

In efforts to find the right groups to work together, Mr. Dennis and I came up with a plan on Friday. We decided to change the seating arrangements to where we thought students would fit in best. After making some adjustments and getting students into their new seats, it was apparent that students indeed worked better if they were paired with the right people. As I was assessing them during our core academic subjects, I noticed improvements in teamwork skills which enhanced their learning, especially for those students who are usually quiet all the time.

Domain 3 Reflection:

This was an interesting experience to see the development and growth students can take during small group instruction. If you provide them with the right tools, they can clarify their understanding with their peers.

Domain 4: Professionalism

NM Domain 4 Element:

4A: Communicating with Families

Professional Learning Goal: I will improve on my relationships with parents and families in hopes to improve the student's academic achievement and emotional well-being.

Rationale: Why am I focusing on this element?

My relationships with families has been lacking since I started teaching at San Antonio Elementary. This is something that is really important to me to be able to develop in my last semester of student teaching.

Action Plan:

• Give weekly updates to parents about their child.

• Respond to any family concerns immediately.

• Reach out to parents anytime an event will be taking place.

• Be apart of parent teacher conferences.

Time Line:

This began taking place immediately in January.

Resources:

• Phone

• Email

• Google classroom

• Facetime

Outcomes:

Over the course of the past few months, I really got to know the parents. During the parent teacher conference, Mr. Dennis let me take over completely on my own. I was nervous but all the parents were super nice and supportive of my teaching. As I was conducting the conference, I would first give them 2 positives about their students and one thing for them to work on. However, most of the students have been doing awesome so it was all mostly good things.

Domain 4 Reflection:

It was awesome building these relationships with the families and I think they were able to see how much I care for their children. Some of the parents had mentioned how much they would talk about me at home, so that was an amazing feeling. I hope to continue being a teacher that reaches out to families for any concerns they may have or even myself.

Professional Development Plan Overall Reflection