Reflection+on+Professional+Development+Agenda

The first step to developing a professional development plan for any campus is to know the areas of need, to do this administrators and teachers need to analyze the data. A variety of assessments should be used in order to give a more complete picture about student needs than a single form of assessment. The beginning of this exercise included a deeper analysis of our campus TAKS data than I had ever experienced before. I found the multi-year and AEIS comparison charts particularly helpful, I think it would be beneficial for my current campus to adopt the use of them in our yearly analysis of student TAKS data.

After selecting an area that needed improvement, I developed an action plan that would support not only the struggling learners, but all students within the school. This included activities for students that involved more learning modalities, and directed professional development and additional resources for teachers. This is not something I have had to think about before as a teacher, in the past when it came to professional development I simply had to show up when instructed to do so. Having to plan a professional development session has given me a new perspective on them as a learner.

As an Instructional Technologist, I hope to ensure more personalized professional development for teachers. It is redundant and wasteful of resources to have teachers attend a workshop for a skill or technology that they have already mastered. It causes a disconnect from the workshop, long before the workshop reaches the information that the more technology literate teachers actually need.