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.  

The Beginning.

I wouldn't really consider myself an avid writer, though I have a file of my writing that is getting pretty large.  I don't often refer back to it but when I do I am always amazed by what I gain from it.  I find that in writing I gain clarity from putting my thoughts on paper that I can’t get any other way. 

For the past few months I have debated whether I should start a blog or if I should just continue to write my thoughts into a word document that will be filed away.  I have historically avoided making these thoughts public. But, lately I have had a change of heart. As I have become more involved in professional development on Twitter I find that the thoughts of others and how they deal with the daily troubles of teaching are very important to me.  I first began by looking for resources, then I began to appreciate the passionate conversations about teaching with people who feel the way that I do about the job.  Recently I have started to read more blogs. 

I often find that the things that I like the best about a blog are small throw away comments that I connect with or that provide me with insight.  I have really grown as a teacher and as a person for reading and considering these essays and the people who wrote them.  It was at this point that I felt (as I did with Twitter) that it was time to start giving as much as I take. 

I hope that over time a blog will serve as a chance to reflect on what I am doing and what I have done.  The more I record what I do, the more I find that I can avoid mistakes, make meaningful lessons and then share them with others.

I am realistic about the fact that I cannot write every day.  I am a busy person, and tend to be unhappy when I am not.  Yet I like what I am doing to count and I think that in this case writing can make what I am doing count for much more.

After 17 years of teaching I have decided that in the classroom, the best that I can offer to the world is to get my students ready to learn. In class I get them ready to learn by creating an environment that rewards learning but also by teaching them the skills they need to do so.   When a student is overwhelmed by life, I get them ready to learn by showing compassion, listening and then making my lesson relevant to their lives today. (This is actually a policy of mine, if they ever challenge me about why a lesson matters to them today and I can’t give them a solid answer, the lesson is over and they get a free day. It forces them to look for the connection.)

I find now that if I want to be a really good teacher I have to do the same thing for myself.  I have to be ready to learn.  New facts, new methods, new technology, regardless of what it may be, I cannot close my mind to where the world and my students are going.  I need to be ready to help them get there.