Professional Growth Plan Final Report

PART 1

1a. What data are you using to guide the development of your professional learning goal (e.g.
reflections on teaching, teaching observations, mid-program evaluations, student feedback)

The data that I am using to guide my development are teaching observations, my own
reflections after teaching lessons in the classroom, and personal experiences working with
children outside of the program. The professors give excellent advice, and they can tell me
what I do well and what I need to imporve on. There is always room for improvement, even if
you are the best you have ever been. My own reflections share real time contemplations about
how I personally feel the lesson went. When writing about personal experiences, it is easier to
see patterns. When going by pure memory, it can be easy to forget simple interactions or
conflicts. Lastly, using my experiences with children outside of the program has prepared me to
deal with behavior management, having impactful conversations with them, keeping your
patience, and being a professional and adult in their lives rather than trying to be overly
friendly and their friend.

1b. What does the data tell you?

The data tells me that I am good at classroom management for the most part, yet it still needs to
be fine-tuned through experience. There are situations where I do excellent, but I have found
myself being unsure of how to proceed in difficult situations. So far, I believe this can be
remedied by teaching in a classroom with set procedures and expectations. Without these, as in
the classroom I have been exposed to during my Junior Internship, it can be difficult to control
the class when they are not used to order or different ways of completing tasks. Overall, I have
a calm and warm demeaner with students, and strive to make them feel cared for. I try to
understand, not be understood. The data also tells me I need to work on delivering instruction.
While I try to stay confident and come off that way, I have found myself in situations where I
am unsure of the answers students give me, content I am teaching, or have trouble proceeding
because I am unsure how to respond to students. Professors have told me not to ask a question I
do not know the answer to. I hear myself doing this but need to work on stopping. I have also
been told that I need to work on not asking students questions, such as “What are you doing?”,
when I should be using a command instead. This gives them the opportunity to talk back or go
against my authority when instead I need them to listen to me right away. For example, instead
of asking a student, “What are you doing?” when they are sharpening a pencil while I am
speaking, I should remind them of the rules and tell them to sit down. This gives them no room
to argue.
2. Using the information from question 1, what is your focus area (write both the Danielson
domain and the component that you have identified as having the greatest potential for
increasing student learning below)

Domain: 3 – Instruction

Component: Communicating with Students

3. What goal will enable you to strengthen your practice (write your goal statement below)?

My goal to help strengthen my practice is to teach scaffolded content, make it clear and
accurate, and make it more rigorous to activate students’ intellectual engagement.

4. Describe what you will do to build professional background knowledge related to the
domain and component that you have selected in order for you to achieve your goal (e.g. what
articles/books will you read, what internet resources will you use, what workshops will you
attend, will you interview or observe teachers)?

In order to build my professional background knowledge related to my goal, I would like to

read The Highly Effective Teacher: 7 Classroom-Tested Practices That Foster Student Success
by Jeff C. Marshall, The Exceptional Teacher: Transforming Traditional Teaching through
Thoughtful Practice by Elizabeth Aaronsohn, and Teach Like a Champion by Doug Lemov.
These books are about effective instruction, which is where I lack practice. I hope to read these
books in order to receive strategies to teach, help me communicate content to the students, and
prepare myself before lessons. A website that I plan to use is teachingchannel.org. This website
has made it their mission to create an environment where teachers can watch, share, and learn
new teaching techniques. They create videos designed to introduce new ideas, strategies,
learning environments, and so on. This can help me see how other teachers are designing
classroom instruction and following through with it.

5. What specific activities/actions will you implement to help attain your goal (e.g. administer a
student interest inventory, develop lessons that include multiple project options for students,
include the use of formative assessments during instruction, video tape and critique one’s
practice, establish procedures for the distribution and collection of materials and supplies)?

In order to help myself attain my goal, I plan to continue videotaping my lessons and reflecting
on them. I can always go off memory when reflecting and thinking about how to teach in the
future, but it is much easier to see what needs to be worked on when I am able to see every
detail and consider how I want to proceed after watching the evidence. I also plan to implement
more formative assessments into my instruction. I find that I do not use enough assessments
and cannot tell if students are able to understand my lesson or know what they took away from
it. When I implement this, it will help me be able to modify my lessons and instruction when
the students communicate what their knowledge.

6. How will you collaborate with other professionals to meet your goal?

I will collaborate with other professionals by observing other teachers, supervisors, university
professors, and my peers with their teaching, attending professional development meetings
during my Senior Internship, and asking for advice and how another would plan their
instructions to help guide my lesson planning.

7. What evidence/artifacts will you collect to demonstrate that your goal is being met?

 Video recordings
 Reflections on teaching
 Formative assessments
 Materials and research used to teach instruction
 Observations from CT and supervisors
PART 2

1. What did you do to build your professional background knowledge related to the
domain and component that you selected? Did you add any new professional learning
opportunities during your internship?

In order to further build my professional background knowledge for Danielson 3a:

Communicating with Students, I read the book Teach Like a Champion by Doug Lemov
and The Power of Our Words by Paula Denton. Teach Like a Champion helped by
giving advice on how to teach with different techniques and how to implement them, as
well as why the techniques work. The Power of Our Words built my knowledge by
explaining how the language used between teachers and students matters. Using
language can make the difference between how directions are received, how engaged
students are, bring social and emotional learning (SEL) into the classroom, hearing to
students and listening to what they say, and so on. A new opportunity that I was able to
complete during my internship was attending weekly professional learning communities
(PLC) where the second grade team met to analyze data and discuss what they are
completing in the classroom, gather advice from others, and communicate with the
school’s academic coach. Another opportunity I had was attending “first-year teacher”
meetings that my CT organized and ran. I sat in the meetings listening to advice new
teachers received and questions they had. My own questions were able to be answered,
too. My school also held meetings after school for teachers that I attended and on early
release Wednesdays, I attended several professional development meetings.

2. What specific activities/actions did you implement to help attain your goal? Describe at
least 4 specific activities.

Activity 1: Overtime, I videotaped several lessons during my internship to

gauge how my teaching was being received by the students, as well as listen and
watch myself teach so that I may reflect on what needs to be improved and what
I am doing well. As stated in part one, it I easier to reflect when it is not only
memory the reflections are based on.

Activity 2: Using formatives in my lessons was an activity I made sure to

implement more when teaching because this helped my communication between
myself and the students. Before I would find myself unaware of how students
are intaking the information I was giving them because I did not check their
understanding with formal and informal formatives. During my internship, I
gave myself a mission to almost always end lessons with some type of
formative. Doing this helped me communicate with my students and catch what
needed more improvement and what they could move on from. I realized
overtime it is easier to give students a quick formative to understand where they
are rather than move on from what is simply observed during fast paced
teaching.

Activity 3: Throughout the internship, I read the previously stated books Teach
Like a Champion by Doug Lemov and The Power of Our Words by Paula
Denton. Through reading, it gave me a chance to become introspective and
 reflect on how I am teaching and what I need to be doing better. For example,
The Power of Our Words has a chapter titled, “Reminding Language: Helping
Students Remember Expectations”. After reading this chapter, I realized that my
previous communication with students about expectations was unacceptable. I
was expecting them to know my expectations and follow them without
questions, when in reality, I needed to remind them and model what I wanted so
that we all had the same understanding.

Activity 4: At the beginning of the internship, I gave all the students two
surveys for their interests and their learning styles. In the previous semester, I
gave a learning style survey as well but did not use it with the intention on
learning students from it. I did it again this semester with the additive of the
interest survey so that I may learn what my students are interested in, what
drives them, how they learn best, and what makes them different from others.
My intention is to use the knowledge, form better relationships with the
students, and differentiate the content I am teaching to be suited best to each
child.

3. Did you meet your intended goal? Describe the evidence and artifacts that demonstrate
the professional learning goal was met (include at least 5 descriptions of evidence).
Two pieces of evidence must be the focused observations by your cooperating teacher
in your selected area of growth (attach the feedback provided by your cooperating
teacher). Label and describe each piece of evidence and explain why each piece
helps meet your intended goal. Attach the artifacts to the end of the report.

Artifact 1: Assessment C #3 by Supervisor

My supervisor filled out the Assessment C form for my third observation. This
was the most recent observation that occurred before schools went online for the
remainder of the school year. My observation showed that I was meeting my
goal of having clear and accurate content, and intellectually engaging students.
The lesson was teaching the life cycles of plants and animals in science. My
supervisor gave me a developing rating in 3a, but this is expected with my
experience. I had planned to share the standard and instructional purpose with
students, engage students in questioning and discussions to begin the lesson, and
had correct and appropriate spoken language.

Artifact 2: PGP Focused Observation

This was the only PGP focused observation completed by my CT due to moving
schools online. The observation was during math and teaching measurement of
meters and centimeters. I met my goal because I engaged students, integrated
them into the lesson so that they may practice together, and gave them work to
complete in pairs or individually. Also, I had preplanned questions for them so
that they were learning the content fully and nothing was left out. This also
prepared me to think about the answers I may receive so that I was prepared to
give feedback. I used the worksheets students were filling out to prepare for
following lessons so that I understood what they were able to learn.
 Artifact 3: Formatives

By using formatives, both informal and formal, I met my goal of knowing what
my students were learning. A part of teaching with clarity and accuracy is
knowing what the students are taking away from the lesson. Giving formatives
helped me identify what content still needed to be retaught, see patterns of
where students may be getting lost, know what information can be moved on
from, and acknowledge what students may need more help than others. This
allows me to scaffold and differentiate my content to individuals or groups and
make sure that all students have the same learning opportunities.

Artifact 4: Lesson Reflections

Understanding how one teaches and knowing what needs to be improved is half
the battle of teaching. I used lesson reflections to reach my goal in Danielson 3a
by writing reflecting on all the good and bad that happened in a lesson. For each
lesson taught, I spent time thinking through the lesson and writing what I did
well in teaching, and what I noticed needed to be improved. Since I was doing
this for every lesson during the internship, I was able to start identifying patters
of how I managed my students, what they were learning, and my own teaching
patterns. Writing reflections helped me reach my goal because I was able to
identify what needed time, love, and care to improve my practice, and then
correct it.

Artifact 5: Interest and Learning Style Surveys

At the beginning of my internship, I gave two different surveys to the students:

an interest survey and a learning style survey. In order to reach a level of
communication where I can teach individually to certain groups or students, I
needed to know how they learn best, reach them with background knowledge,
and what they are interested in. I am a firm believer that if SEL is integrated into
a classroom there will be more engagement, more intake of information, less
distraction from others (such as bullying being a distraction), and overall, an
environment where learning can take place. I reached my goal of Danielson 3a
through the surveys because I could scaffold content to specific students who I
now knew and intellectually engage them with knowledge specific to their
backgrounds.

4. How did you collaborate with other professionals to meet your goal?

I collaborated with other professionals in several ways. One way was observing my CT
teach and interact with coworkers, students, and administrators. My supervisors also
helped me meet my goal by observing my teaching and meeting with me in a
conference environment to give advice on how to improve my teaching. This helped
because they saw what I was struggling with and could draw from experience to help
me develop my practice. My university professors also played a role where they taught
teaching techniques and prepared me for situations before I encountered them. Other
professionals I worked with were other teachers on my grade level team. We gathered
for lunch almost every day of the week and spoke about what was going well and what
 was not based on the lessons we were collectively teaching. I met with the same team
during PLC meeting, too, to speak more in depth about data and teaching goals.

5. What new learning did you acquire as a result of the professional learning opportunities
in which you engaged?

While attending professional learning opportunities, I learned about how to engage

students to become excited about learning. The school I interned at used Ron Clark
Academy’s house system to give students an opportunity to gain points and be
rewarded depending on what group, or “house”, they are apart of. The meeting was held
to discuss how to communicate with the students and further excite them. Another
opportunity I attended was a school staff meeting that was used to discuss how different
schools throughout the district are involved with breaking the law. There were cases
established with students being represented by lawyers and the principal was using that
meeting to reteach teachers what sort of conduct is appropriate. This was new
information to me about how many cases Volusia County has against them alone.

6. What impact did the changes in instructional practice have on you as a professional?

When teaching went online, the changed impacted me as a professional by challenging

me in my zone of flexibility, as well as communicating with students. My goal was to
master Danielson 3a: Communication with Students, and this is difficult to do when my
students in second grade either do not have access to online communication or they do
not understand how to properly reply online. The school moved communication to
Microsoft Teams and students are still learning how to use the message board to post
and reply, and even be reminded about what was school appropriate. Posting on the
message board and replying to students has not been the hard part. The hard part is
getting students to respond. I find myself anticipating the return to school next year so
that I may continue growing my practice in person and giving students warmth and care
in person.

7. What impact did the changes in instructional practice have on your students’ learning?

The change of instruction practice to online learning impacted students’ learning by

taking them away from the environment of learning academically and socially. There
are set expectations, patterns, and instruction that happens in a classroom that is
difficult to be replaced in the home and with technology. From what I have observed,
my students are still growing by completing the assignments through technology and
being monitored for growth. After being out of school for over a month, I am starting to
receive messages asking when they will be returning and that they miss everyone. They
are starting to be impacted through the social distance away from teachers and friends.
Although they miss everyone, though, my CT has been in contact with parents and has
expressed how they are all rallying to get students together again when it is safe with
meet ups and parties.
8. How will you continue to develop in this area?

I will continue to grow in communication with students by continuing to build my

background knowledge, such as through teaching books and integrating SEL into the
classroom. Another way I can grow is to keep up communication with other
professionals around me. They offer good advice, can be used as support, and teach
information that may have been forgotten or is new to me. Having a community of
professionals and using them keeps the mind engaged and always learning so that the
practice will be continually enhanced. Writing reflections after teaching lessons will
help me grow, too, by actively thinking about what happened in the lesson and how to
improve me teaching. I found that this was the most personal way to grow because it is
so individual to each person.
Artifact 1: Assessment C #3 by Supervisor
Artifact 2: PGP Focused Observation
Artifact 3: Formatives
Artifact 4: Lesson Reflections
Artifact 5: Interest and Learning Style Surveys