You Have to Own Your Growth!!!

You have to drive your own PD, no one else can do it.

I had decided on the title of this blog during the ride to school this morning. Then while I was about half way through writing it I was distracted by the fact that tonight’s #edchat was discussing similar ideas.  I took away a few great ideas as I always do but I became increasingly frustrated by some of the participants referring to professional development as something that needs to be imposed and requires mandates. Mandates?

In my classroom I have long abandoned the idea that I can force knowledge on my students.  They have to embrace knowledge and they have to want to learn.  I foster learning by making the content meaningful, connecting it to the realities of their lives and offering them choices within the classroom.  They need to own their learning.

Regardless of the reasons for it, schools do not often offer the same choices and opportunities for teachers.  It is my experience that PD is often generically crafted to meet the general needs of the staff, more like hints, and suggestions. If I were to make a list of the most meaningful moments of growth in my career I can’t honestly include one school sponsored initiative among them.  

When I came to my current school, I attended a four year long New Teacher Program.  It was geared toward helping 1st year teachers be successful and become effective.  I really think it is an effective way to get teachers started.  But for me it wasn’t exactly what I needed.  I was 13 years into my career.  Yet as time went on I found that the teachers were talented and they asked very introspective questions.  Their thoughts offered me a lens through which I could evaluate myself.  It was a real opportunity to grow, just not in the way the school had intended.

If you want to be an effective teacher you cannot rely on the school to make it so and provide you with the magic answer .  You have to take charge and own your growth.  A career’s worth of school run PD will not provide you with all that you need to excel.  Define what you need in order to grow and be effective, then address those needs. 

I love teaching. It has always been my passion. My passion to grow as a teacher grew from that.