Standard 8 - Present Professional Practice to Colleagues

Teacher leaders will present professional practice for the review of colleagues.

As I reflect on my time in the Teacher Leadership program, I am reminded of where I began and where I have ended up. Prior to this program, I was not at all comfortable presenting information to my peers, especially things related to educational practice. I felt as though I did not have enough knowledge and experience to deserve the attention of my peers. As I have progressed through this program, I have grown in my confidence and knowledge and am now able to present information to peers and not feel out of my element.

Through classes like Accomplished Teaching and Survey of Instructional Strategies, we constantly and consistently researched various teaching practices that would work well in various classroom settings. In Accomplished Teaching, we looked at various teaching strategies that culminated in our Synthesizing Elements of Accomplished Teaching final paper. My focus at that time, as has been throughout this program, is figuring out how to differentiate well. Looking at differentiation as a means to open access to my content, math, has been a goal I have pursued for a while now. This goal is also something that most, if not all, teachers in my building are working toward as well. This is a pursuit I can help lead with the tools I have learned in this program.

Some of the differentiation tools I was introduced to through the Survey of Instructional Strategies class. The differentiation skills we learned dealt with what Hattie (2012) dubs, “Multiple Ways of Knowing” (emphasis in original, p. 113). There are many points of information in this particular section of the text, but the one that I find myself drawn to time and again is, “Materials presented in verbal, visual, and multimedia form provide richer representations than can a single medium” (p. 113). Utilizing multiple representations is something that I have worked on with my instructional coaches. During this program, I had the opportunity to work on implementing a Nonlinguistic Lesson Plan where student utilize a visual representation of functions that outline what they are and how to figure it out.

Another element dealing with differentiation we looked at deals with cooperative learning. Dean, Hubbell, Pitler, and Stone (2012) state, “cooperative learning provides opportunities for students to interact in ways that enhance and deepen their learning” (p. 37). In creating a lesson for cooperative learning, I had to work with fellow math teachers to utilize their knowledge of groupings. This shift to group learning was not easy for me and is not something I have done regularly. The utilization of nonlinguistic and cooperative learning are things that I could bring back to my school and help to engage teachers in shifting their focus and practice. This shift actually started in my work with my fellow math teacher on the collaborative inquiry project. We worked on helping our students to increase their confidence and persistence. Through the differentiation strategies mentioned above, we were able to begin helping students elevate their understanding and confidence.

In relation to helping others to improve their practice, I also had several opportunities to present information to our peers in class. Sharing our practice and things to look out for was beneficial for both the individuals presenting and those observing. This practice of presenting to our classmates was great practice for presenting to people at my school. It also helped drive home the difference in teaching students versus teaching adults. I have not had a ton of experience with teaching adults, so all the practice I have had through various presentations has been great for understanding that for adult teachers, learning occurs best when they can work collaboratively. When we worked together with people from different content specialties or different age levels, we were provided a view into the professional duties and practices of those we do not often see. As Zepeda (2013) states, “learning communities must be ready to confront the fragmented way in which schools are organized (e.g., departments, grade levels, and specialty groups such as gifted and talented), and they must be committed to working alongside each other as a collective to provide support” (p. 84). We must all work toward improving our schools. To do this, my role as a teacher leader must be to bring teachers together to tackle an issue within our school and to help others raise their level of practice together. It is always easier to work on a difficult situation or fix a long-standing issue with the help and support of our peers.

Dean, C., Hubbell, E., Pitler, H., Stone, B. (2012). Classroom instruction that works: Research-based strategies for incrasing student achievement. Colorado: McREL.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning. New York: Routledge.

Zepeda, S.J. (2013). Professional development: What works. New York, NY: Routledge.

Standard 6 - Communicate and Collaborate with All

Standard 6 - Teacher leaders communicate and collaborate with a variety of stakeholders.

Starting out in the Teacher Leadership program, I did not give much thought to the ways in which adult learning and student learning are different. That is not to say that I did not recognize the differences, just that they were not something I really thought to think about. Throughout this program, we have been confronted by differences in the way adults learn and the way that learning activities should be structured in order to get the greatest effect. In EDU6600, we looked at the modes through which teachers will gain the most understanding and be able to successfully transfer their learning to their practice. We learned that adults tend to learn best in situations where information is transferred through or within work experience (I imagine this is especially true for teachers). Because teaching is a profession where we learn so much as we do it, learning on the job is one of the ways that is highly successful in developing teachers and their skills.

As we have seen time and again during this Teacher Leadership program, reflection is one of the most important abilities that we can develop. Experiential learning is one of the modes for learning that requires reflection and response to that reflection. The process of experiential learning, as given by Hansman (2001, p. 47), consists of "modeling, approximating, fading, self-directed learning, and generalizing". This process consists of reflection on practice at nearly every step along the way and is tied closely to the practice of job-embedded development, which happens to be my personal choice for learning or professional development. Zepeda (2013) reports that when taking part in job-embedded learning, teachers experience an increased ability to reflect on their practice, work with their peers with more ease, helps reduce isolation, makes learning relevant, helps in the transfer of new skills, supports continued development, and helps create a common language that all teachers and administrators utilize (p. 127-8). Through the development of these skills, teachers become more willing and able to work together and help create the school environment they desire.

One of the goals as a leader is to aid in creating an environment where learning is looked at as a lifetime continuum, rather than a moment in a person’s life when they attended a school. This belief, along with the belief that all students can reach for and meet high standards, is the crux of the perspective presented by Angelle, who states that, "Teachers who work in a culture of high expectations and continuous learning find that their leadership skills are actively called upon to contribute to the improvement of their school" (2011, p. 233). The overall effect of this type of atmosphere is that all teachers, leaders or not, feel lifted up and more confident in their abilities and the abilities of their students. This can lead to a massive shift in a school environment. I have been a part of a situation where leadership was not honored in any way and the school became stagnant and, frankly, a horrible place to work.

The culmination of our learning about the modes and methods for adult learning is our final product, a plan of action for an area of need in our school. Through the development of this action plan, we looked at demographics and some detailed information about our school. We then had to find an issue within our school upon which we could have an effect. I chose to look at academic language development because there is a large population of ELL students and our students' ability to utilize academic language is going to enhance their ability to perform in all content areas. The plan is highly dependent upon site-based, job-embedded learning. This particular area of adult learning is something I have had the good fortune of experiencing with math instructional coaches. It has enhanced my ability as a math teacher tremendously and I know it can do the same for others. While the plan is not something that I am able to implement, there are some elements being utilized by our school over the course of this school year.

Another course that has influenced my approach to teacher leadership and collaboration was EDAD6589. Through this course, I had the opportunity to work with many future administrators to get their perspective on working with other administrators, teachers, parents and students, and community members. We had the chance to reflect on a significant event that occurred at our school. This reflection was a great opportunity to think about how I would approach the situation (in this case, the death of a student). Additionally, I created a community engagement plan that detailed how I, as a principal, would work to engage the community of my school and how this connects to the principal standards of SPU. Both major projects in this class required me to take the perspective of a principal and really stretched my perspective.

In looking back through this program, I have learned a great deal about what will work well and not so well when dealing with adult learners. There are many different theories or approaches, but the mode I have found myself drawn to is job-embedded learning. This approach makes the learning something that happens in the moment and is applicable, rather than something theoretical happening in a conference. The plan developed, while not perfect, I believe would be useful in aiding students and their ability to utilize academic language proficiently. Overall, EDU6600, EDAD6528, and the Teacher Leadership program has provided me with a great deal of information as I work to become a teacher leader in my school.

Angelle, P.S., (2011). Teachers as leaders: Collaborative leadership for learning communities. In E.B. Hilty (Ed.). Teacher leadership: The “new” foundations of teacher education (pp.229-238). New York, NY: Peter Lang Publishing Inc.

Hansman, C.A., (2001). Context-based adult learning. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 89, 43-51.

Zepeda, S.J. (2013). Professional development: What works. New York, NY: Routledge.

Standard 2 - Promoting Student Growth

Standard 2 - Teacher leaders analyze learning to promote student growth.

Reflecting upon my practice prior to partaking in the Teacher Leadership program, I realized that my ability and consistency with analyzing learning was rudimentary. This is an area in which I have definitely seen growth in my practice. A quote I reflected upon in my standard three post is also quite fitting here. Sagor (2011) stated that, "even the most celebrated teachers, who are teaching the highest-achieving students, leave their classrooms frustrated, feeling that despite their best efforts, each individual student didn't progress as far as he or she might" (p. 1). This feeling of frustration is one of my motivating factors for pursuing a graduate degree. I wanted to further my ability to gauge where my students are at any given time so that I can adjust my lesson and help more students achieve more.

My pursuit of bettering my ability to analyze learning began immediately with the Accomplished Teaching class. One of my goals at that time (and one that continues to be a goal of mine) was to strengthen my ability to differentiate within my classes. Where I teach, students often come to school many years behind in their math skills, while a few come multiple grade levels above. This imbalance of mathematical skills results in classes where students are often separated by more than five grade levels of prerequisite knowledge. To combat this, I have to determine how to make the learning both accessible and challenging for each lesson. One of the activities that helped me see a different perspective was when we were paired with another teacher and had to analyze and provide feedback for a lesson plan. I was paired with a high school English teacher and was not convinced that this would be beneficial. I was wrong. Working with this teacher provided me with several ideas about how I could make the lesson more interactive and relevant to my students. The lesson I taught dealt with solving systems of equations. This is an area in Algebra that is applicable in more than one way. My collaboration helped me to see a couple different applications that I had not thought about so that my students would have more access and buy in with this content.

One area that has helped me to better analyze student learning has come from formative assessment. Ensign (2012) states that a good way to check understanding is through the use of an exit ticket which, "allows the teacher to quickly see who has mastered the day's lesson and who needs more support in the following days" (p. 160). Through my studies in this program, I have been able to increase my repertoire of formative assessments and become better at recognizing where those can be placed in a lesson. One piece of evidence came from our learning progression created in the Standards Based Assessment class. This allowed me to visualize and plan a collection of formative assessments within a unit of study.

As I progressed through this program, I further developed my ability to determine how a particular intervention effects student learning. I started this with my Applying Action Research class where we learned what to look for when researching strategies to utilize in our classrooms. This led to a strengthened ability to figure out whether an article presented a valid approach or not. My final product from this class allowed me to show the level to which my understanding of valid research has improved. This helped guide me when I planned and executed my action research project the following Winter. Going through this research project allowed me to put into practice the use of technology with formative assessment. While this was not as successful as I had hoped, it led me to a better understanding of what will be necessary the next time I utilize technology to find out where my students are at in their understanding. 

All of the things I have learned throughout this program, relating to promoting student growth, have been useful, but cannot be utilized without the ability to relate my analysis to my students. One of the most important pieces to feedback was presented to me by Chappuis, "Effective feedback directs attention to the intended learning, pointing out strengths and offering specific information to guide improvement" (2012, p. 37). This is important because if students do not understand what my formative assessments are telling students, there is not point to utilizing them. Students need to have a clear idea of where they are in their learning. Additionally, Morris and Chikwa (2016) have found that there is not marked difference between students receiving written feedback and audio feedback. This is valuable because in my daily lessons, I incorporate audio feedback constantly. Finally, research performed by Hudesman et al. (2013) states that, "The research we have reported on, when taken together with an ever growing body of other work, has demonstrated the importance of integrating formative assessment and metacognition with academic content instruction so that students can optimize their learning" (p. 12). The work we have done in this program related to formative assessment, along with the importance of reflection we have seen time and again, are both vital to strong analysis of student learning. The tools we have learned in this program are going to allow me to better evaluate students learning and adjust to help my students grow as much as possible in my classes.

Sources:
Chappuis, J. (2012). How am I doing? Educational Leadership, 70(1), 36-40.
Ensign, J. (2012). Teacher-initiated differentiation. Teaching Children Mathematics, 19(3), 158-163.
Hudesman, J., Crosby, S., Flugman, B., Isaac, S., Everson, H., & Clay, D., (2013). Using formative assessment and metacognition to improve student achievement. Journal of Developmental Education, 37(1), 2-13.
Morris, C, & Chikwa, G. (2016). Audio versus written feedback: Exploring learners ' preference and the impact of feedback format on students' academic performance. Active Learning in Higher Education, 17(2), 125-137.
Sagor, R. (2011). The action research guidebook: A four-stage process for educators and school teams. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Standard 4 - Analysis of Practices

Standard 4 - Teacher leaders engage in analysis of teaching and collaborative practices.

Looking back through this program, I realize I had little experience in analyzing the practice of others or working with others in a collaborative way. Right away, we began looking at reflection and analysis of practices with our peers. In one of our first classes, Accomplished Teaching, we had the opportunity to work with a partner to get feedback on our teaching practice (video). This, in conjunction with our lesson plan, was the first time I had really ever opened up my practice to someone outside of those with which I work closely. This brief glimpse into collaborative analysis was helpful and set the tone for the remainder of the program.

Moving forward, we looked at some elements of collaboration within a class of my peers. For Survey of Instructional Strategies, we had the opportunity to develop several lesson plans utilizing various pedagogical strategies we learned about from our peer presentations. This allowed us to use several research-based practices with our classes and reflect with each other as a group (see lesson plan one, two, three, or four). This practice with various instructional strategies allowed me to work on various teaching practices throughout my participation in this program. During this class, I also worked collaboratively with other teachers at my school to work on improving engagement and confidence. This project was a great way to work with my colleagues to get to the bottom of an issue in our school.

More recently, I took part in an action research project where I combined technology with formative assessment to discover how my AP Statistics class would fare with this new approach. This research allowed me to figure out whether my approach to formative assessment and technology would be effective and would allow me to quickly assess student understanding. Although there were mixed results, I believe that the practice can be valuable given the correct approach (something I am still interested in determining).

The goal and purpose of all of this work is to create a community of learning within my school. This will require me to continue bringing the practices and strategies that I have learned in this program and will learn in my continued research to my staff. I hope that we, as a staff, can work to bring high quality, equitable education to our students. “Educational equity is not simply about equal access and inputs, but ensuring that a student’s educational path, curriculum, instruction, and schedule be personalized to meet [the student’s] unique needs” (Hanover Research, 2012, p. 7). This quote summarizes the approach that we will need to take to help all of our students succeed. As I have seen, repeatedly, throughout this program, working to engage and reach all students is paramount when analyzing practices to increase student learning.

In my own practice, I am hoping that my ability to engage, individually and with others, in the act of reflection on teaching practices continues to improve. As York-Barr, Sommers, Ghere and Montie state, being "a reflective educator is a commitment to your own growth and demonstrates a high level of professional responsibility and personal leadership for continuous development of your practice" (2006, p. 103). This level of reflection and work to improve practices is essential to guide teachers into new and innovative strategies. In fact, this seems extraordinarily important when dealing with mathematics. As Vigdor (2012) states, "America’s perpetual concern with youth math performance has spawned numerous initiatives that have, cumulatively, exacerbated rather than solved the problem" (p. 4). 

Being a teacher leader will allow me to help effect change throughout my school building. For students, the practices that I have learned and developed with allow me to better engage students in mathematics. For teachers, the work I will engage in is going to help them become their best selves and, in turn, help students gain all they can while students at our school. Overall, I want to help my school become a better place to be and learn. Dean, Hubbell, Pitler, and Stone (2012) liken a teacher (and by extension a teacher leader) to an orchestra conductor, "An orchestra sounds best when the composer selects the most appropriate instruments and the conductor blends those instruments in just the right way to create the desired sound" (p. 152). In my classroom, and in my school community, I hope to be the composer and conductor guiding my school to bigger and better things.

Dean, C. B., Hubbell, E. R., Pitler, H., Stone, B. J., (2012). Classroom instruction that works: Research-based strategies for increasing student achievement (2nd ed.). Denver, CO: Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning.

Hanover Research. (October 2012). Best practices in personalized learning environments. Washington, D.C.

Vigdor, J.L. (August 2012). Solving America’s mathematics education problem.

York-Barr, J., Sommers, W., Ghere, G., and Montie, J., (2006). Reflective practice to improve schools: An action guide for educators. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press.