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.

Standard 3 - Educational Research bPortfolio Reflection

Standard 3 – Teacher leaders improve teaching and learning through the use of educational research at the classroom and school levels.

Prior to engaging in the Teacher Leadership program, I was not very involved in utilizing research in my classroom or with my colleagues. I have participated in one or two loosely structured attempts at something similar to action research, but saw little success. From the start of the program I have seen the importance of conducting research to improve my knowledge of pedagogy and become the best teacher possible. As Sagor (2011) states, "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 has helped guide me through this program to focus on things that are going to help increase my ability as a teacher. Reflecting on my second and sixth quarters in the program where I took classes on applying research and action research, respectively, my understanding of what is necessary to grow as a teacher has increased. 

My introduction to research and its’ application came in Applying Action Research in School Settings. During this course, we learned to dig into the research to determine the validity of the findings presented. The practice of deciphering valid research from primary sources helped me refine my overall research ability and develop a better eye for valid academic research. The final product from this class shows the level to which my comfort for critiquing research has developed. In this paper, I read, and critiqued, research regarding mindfulness practices in schools. I was able to successfully articulate the issues and inconsistencies within the research, at least that which was reported, and determine what I other information should be reported to build the credibility of this article. This helped me moving forward with both research for my classes and papers, and when determining the action research project I chose to do the following Winter.

My Action Research in School Settings class allowed me to use the information gleaned from the applying research class and helped me understand what I needed to do to perform a successful action research project and report. As I stated earlier, I have had very little practice with performing structured research in the classroom, so having a bit of a guidance was very helpful. Reflecting back to my Survey of Instructional Strategies class, I had the opportunity to perform some action research, at least to some extent, with a colleague. This experience also gave me a bit of knowledge about what to do and expect when performing my own research in my classroom. The approach taken in the instructional strategies class was based off of collaborative work, but did not take a great deal of research outside of what we did for class. The collaborative work did provide a basis for determining what issues may be addressed in a classroom setting and what approach may be taken to help rectify them (as evidenced in my collaborative inquiry project).

In undertaking my action research, I first had to understand what approach I should take. As Ravid (2011) states, "Action research is conducted by practitioner-researchers in their own settings to solve a problem by studying it, proposing solutions, implementing the solutions, and assessing the effectiveness of these solutions" (p. 4). Working from this definition, I decided to look at the literature about technology and formative assessment in a high school math classroom. I was able to find very little, so I decided to do some research of this on my own. Performing this research did not yield a great deal of positive data, but was very useful in determining what steps should occur for me moving forward (see my action research paper). Because of this, I am continuing my research in the area of technology and formative assessment so that I can better utilize what I have started.

Moving forward, I will continue utilizing what I have learned from both my project and action research in general. As Sagor states, "The greatest value of what we learn from our action research lies in the power of the new knowledge and the insights we gained for informing our future actions and consequently benefiting our students" (2011, p. 163). Moving forward is where the real value of action research lies. The changes that I will enact as a result of my research from all of my classes is going to help me to become the teacher I hope to be. Figuring out where all of this research will take me moving forward, I was struck by another quote by Sagor, "If we are to become truly reflective practitioners, the thing we must always do before commencing action is to reflect deeply on what we already know about the challenges before us and use that thinking to design thoughtful theories of action to guide our future work" (p. 163).

Further, I plan to work with my peers on developing action research that may be applicable to my school. York-Barr, Somme's, Ghere, and Montie (2006) state that, "Action research, therefore, should also be considered as a way to promote reflection and learning in small groups or teams, and schoolwide" (p. 141). As a teacher leader, I will work to help all of my colleagues conduct their own action research, possibly together, to attack one of the many difficulties we all have. As Hattie (2012) urges, "A key role of learning leaders is to construct the learning of the adults in the schools" (p. 175). To help move my school in a positive direction, I need to take on the role of a teacher of students and of adults. This is one of the most important realizations I have had as a part of this teacher leadership program.


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

Ravid, R. (2011). Practical statistics for educators. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Sagor, R. (2011). The action research guidebook: A four-stage process for educators and school teams. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
York-Barr, J., Sommers, W.A., Ghere, G.S., Montie, J. (2006). Reflective practice to improve schools: An action guide for educators. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

EDU 6600 Reflection

Starting out, 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 course, 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. From the beginning of the course 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), consist 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 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 persons life when they attended a school. This belief, along with the belief that all students are capable of reaching for and meeting 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 that 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 by 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.
In looking through this quarter, 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 happening in the moment and 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, this class 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.

bPortfolio Reflection #3

I would like to see my school utilize lesson study in a genuine way. We did this a little bit with an earlier administrator and the results were okay. Back then, our focus was related more to just general teaching strategies, not something explicitly related to the goals of our school. I would like the opportunity to pursue this practice with my current peers and with the goal of finding research based practices that are highly effective in increasing academic vocabulary and literacy. As a Math teacher, choosing a topic so Humanities-based may be surprising, but there is a great deal of emphasis on modeling and utilizing language and literacy skills in Math and Science (the state assessments in particular) that this is the type of work that would be very useful for all. We could start by looking through our individual curriculum to determine a specific topic related to language/literacy acquisition. In Math, this may be something related to being able to identify the mathematical action words in a story problem that indicate what steps or process would be best. We would move on to creating a plan and developing a question or two we would want answered through our research. Again, in Math this could be related to the depth of understanding in Math-specific vocabulary, how this will be assessed, and what types of learning opportunities will be available to aid in this acquisition. We would then move to researching the areas hopefully being able to identify practices or strategies that will help in general and in our specific classes. By finding and utilizing these strategies, we are working on developing a common set of practices, or a set of practices that aim at the same result. Moving forward, we will reflect on the practices that worked well and not so well to determine what is going to work best. Then, we will start the cycle once again, looking for something that will help further lead our students to even more success.

Overall, this process will be hindered by a few things. First, time is always a factor. With all of the initiatives we must work on for the state or district, time is at a premium. Another thing that is going to be difficult is the research aspect. Teachers may be hesitant to take on something like researching strategies that could, potentially, take a great deal of time and may be difficult to find. Another issue that may arise is that some teachers may not feel comfortable working together to share their practice in ways that this process would require. This is the most difficult thing to overcome in my opinion. Teachers, young and old, have varying levels of comfort in people accessing their classroom or their teaching practices and this can too much to ask a person until they trust those with which they work. Developing a camaraderie or sense of common purpose is going to be vital to being able to do this work with success in any school situation.

The current state of collaboration at our school is not where we would all like it to be, but it is improving. There are elements of collaborative work, but there is not a great deal of structure, at least not as there is with the lesson study. Our collaboration occurs mostly as an entire staff and does not always allow the deeper work that could happen when working with a smaller group of 6-10 people. A next step we could take would be to split up our staff into similar areas of interest and then begin forming relationships that will allow us to dive deeper into our practice than we currently do. Overall, I think our school is doing a good job with where everyone is at in their practice. We have a great deal of early career or first year teachers who are figuring things out and much of our learning is directed toward them. As we progress through the year, I am certain that we will be able to work on a deeper level and begin collaborating with one of the models we have studied.

Adult Learning Practices at My School

Being an adult learner at my current site has changed significantly over the past six years. When I began at my school I felt like the practices used for adult learning were ineffective. Our professional development was consistently brief and discontinuous. I can remember one instance where we had one introductory training on teaching students growing up in poverty and then never heard or saw any information regarding this again. In another instance, we had a training on arts integration and then heard nothing about it again until the next training which was months away. Thinking back on how we, as adult learners, were expected to adapt any of the information presented with so little information and/or follow up, it is not surprising that many teachers felt as though we were unable to really use anything we were supposed to be learning.

The way that Zepeda presents adult learning is much more closely aligned to the way that my school works on initiatives now. For one, our learning is now more individualized or self-directed. This has allowed us to choose what we feel will be most productive to further enhance out practice. We have some freedom to participate in informal or incidental learning as presented by Marsick and Watkins. When we do our work in committees or in focus groups, we are given a chance to frame our learning and interact with each other through implementation and reflection. The shift in focus we have seen at my school is tackling learning in a much more context-based situation as presented by Hansman.

As our school has moved forward these past several years, we have begun to see the learning of teachers through the lens that many of the authors this week have presented. Whether through an individualized approach so we can focus on the information we feel will benefit our practice most or through the reflection we regularly incorporate, our learning practices are much more effective. The change that has taken place has given me a new perspective on how we should approach teacher development and has made me realize what effective professional development looks like. Our practices are not perfect, but they have moved in the right direction thanks to a change in administration and teachers who have spoken out to make our learning more productive.