Professional Development Post

Share one of your Personal Professional Development goals by 3/28 - respond to someone else's by 4/2 with suggestions.

V.  Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership:

Teachers continuously improve their professional practice, model lifelong learning, and exhibit leadership in their school and professional community by promoting and demonstrating the effective use of digital tools and resources.

·      Current Skills: I am currently a graduate student at the University of Oklahoma.  The masters’ degree that I am pursuing is in the College of Education’s Educational Psychology and Instructional Technology program with emphasis on teaching with technology.  I am also very active with professional development.  In my five years of teaching I have attended several AP workshops for chemistry, with the most recent being focused on digital technology use in the chemistry classroom.  I attended the National Flipped Education Conference in the summer of 2012 and have given two professional development talks about the flipped classroom to the teachers in my district. 

·      Need: I believe education can no longer be a one-person show.  Teachers must learn to effectively communicate with each other if we plan to increase the levels of student collaboration.  The field of education is changing everyday and new mandates are being added all of the time.  For a teacher to remain caught up with the changing times they must take their professional development into their own hands. 

·      Goal: It is my goal to renew my ISTE membership at the end of the school year and register for the ISTE conference or FlipCon (Flipped Classroom Conference) in the summer of 2014.  I would also like to prepare a session to submit for consideration about the experiences I have had using the flipped classroom model and iPads in the classroom.    

·      Measure: I plan to renew my membership with ISTE as well as register for one of the two conferences listed above.  I also plan to create a presentation to submit for approval to one or both of these conferences. 

·      Short-Term Plan: By the end of the school year or by the start of the next I will renew my membership to ISTE. 

·      Long-Term Plan: Over the course of the next school year I will figure out the conference dates of both conferences and decide which is best.  I will then apply for funding through the school or save the money myself.  I will also work on a presentation idea for the conference and have it ready to be submitted by December 2013. 

    Assessment: I will have reached my goals if by the summer of 2014 I still a member of ISTE and am attending either the ISTE conference or FlipCon, giving a presentation over my flipped classroom.