521 Week 6 Blog

This has been good class for me. I feel good about my unit plan even though I have not taught the class yet. I am sure that once I begin teaching my unit plan I will need to make a few adjustments. However, I am sure that this is very normal. From the class I feel comfortable using all three of the Intel teaching strategies and even used two of them in my unit plan. This was probably the most practical part of the class for me. I like to spend time on things that I can use as opposed to talking about theories. The essential questions were probably the aspect of the class that was the hardest for me to grasp as they are very open-ended. However, as time went on and I got farther into my lesson I began to feel more comfortable with my essential question. I enjoyed listening to most every ones unit plans. This was time well spent as I was able to take different ideas that I found relevant. Plus it was just cool to see what everyone did. So in conclusion the class has been worthwhile and practical. I hope that my unit plan goes well when I teach it next fall. I am excited as I will likely be teaching the class in a room that will have an LGI projector. Enjoy your summers!!!

521 Week 5 Blog

Professional development seems to come up in every staff meeting. I have taught in three different school districts and professional development time always seems in short supply. However, I think it is the school districts responsibility to supply some time for professional development, I also feel that as an individual teacher it is important to seek out my own professional development opportunities on my own time. Many teachers complain that they don't get enough or any professional development time yet never seek it out on their own time. To me this is a bit of a double standard.
I feel it is very important for teachers to have professional development time in school. However, not all professional development time is used efficiently. I have been teaching now for 10 years and have have seen great use of time for staff development and terrible use of time. The best use of time seems to come when there are tangible result from the professional development time. Examples of this include technology training, new IEP/Special education Laws, and new updates on Autism and other disabilities that are effecting the student population. However, I have been through professional development training where nothing tangible occurs and most people leave feeling that their time could have been better spent doing other things. It is the responsibility of the school administrators to see that professional development time is used efficiently, but it is the teachers responsibility to see that it continues outside the of school time.