Professional Development for In-Service Teachers
November 8, 2007 at 2:41 pm | In Uncategorized | 8 CommentsHere is Ali’s presentation and handout.
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I would like to express my ideas on the work load of the teachers when they are getting professional development services during the semesters they teach. The teachers I have talked who are getting professional development expressed that there are many professional development workshops, seminars that they have to attend because of the technology initiatives. A lot of these professional development sessions were mandatory for every teacher and only some of them were optional. As far as I have understood, because of intense schedule that the teachers have, it is difficult for the teachers to manage both school work and professional development seminars. Expecting unreasonable hours of work from teachers may even have resulted in losing their motivation to learn more about teaching and technology. On the other hand, it is necessary to provide teacher these professional development services, so that they feel more comfortable using technology in an out of the classrooms. I think, arranging a reasonable professional development hours is very significant so that the teachers will believe that he or she can handle with the new information s/he learns. Giving realistic amount of help will also keep teachers motivated to get more professional development seminars.
Comment by Demet Metan — November 8, 2007 #
Professional development can be a major drain on a teacher’s time, but without it most teachers would not be able to stay current on what’s happening in their field. Face it, if a teacher graduated from college, got a job, and never did anything else to grow as a teacher, he/she would not be a very good teacher. Most teachers go on to graduate school, but even after that they need to keep learning. Technology is one area where many teachers lack specific skills, so it’s an area that a lot of schools focus on for professional development (on top of about a million other areas!). Unfortunately, more and more demands are being put on a teacher’s time so it becomes impossible to “do it all.” Even teachers who really want to stay current begin to resent all of the time they have to put in in order to fulfill their responsibilities, and then go to scheduled professional development. What’s even worse is when they spend a half day for PD and most of what was covered was either not relevant or they already knew it. Schools need to find a way to “individualize” PD so that each teacher gets the knowledge/skills he/she needs without a lot of wasted time.
Comment by Terri Miquel — November 8, 2007 #
There aren’t too many jobs that don’t require continuing professional development. Some require more than others. My background is technical. I didn’t plan on getting into the educational arena. I chose to get industry standard technology certifications including my MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer). This cert was required for the position I wanted and to get it, seven highly technical tests were required. They took me over a year to take and I would estimate at least 10 hours per week was required to prepare. That was 1999. Since that time, I have had to renew that certification two times, each requiring the same commitment. This was all time that was beyond my normal work time. Now I could have chosen not to renew, but I wanted to keep my skills fresh. I also knew what I was getting into when I started the process. Technology is a field that you will always be learning the next new thing. Now being in education for the last 8 years, I also know the demands on teachers are high and that work doesn’t end when you leave for the day. I also agree that most professional development sessions are nowhere near as useful as they could be. Having taught numerous professional development sessions for teachers in my district, I can tell you that 70% of the teachers that come into my sessions don’t want to be there and get nothing out of the session. And, I can tell you who the 70% are when they walk in the door. Now, this is just my experience with the content I am teaching, so I don’t believe this is true for all PD areas. Our district is now just starting a new professional development program where teachers can meet one on one with a staff developer. We are doing this in our high school with the hopes of being able to expand it district wide. So far, it appears the sessions are much more productive than group sessions and teachers are enthusiastic about the program. Technology is a growing part of education and everyone is going to have to keep up. We can’t afford for any teacher to be left behind.
Comment by Michael — November 10, 2007 #
“Technology is a growing part of education and everyone is going to have to keep up. We can’t afford for any teacher to be left behind.” – from Michael’s entry is SO true. And he’s right that in most any profession you need to put in extra time beyond the work day to keep your skills and knowledge base current. From my experience, the biggest gripe most teachers have about professional development is the “one size fits all” approach. At the school where I work we are trying to “differentiate instruction” for our teachers. This summer we created a list of commonly used applications and technology tools with a list of skills that need to be learned for each. The teachers then classified their current ability level for each skill (proficient, somewhat skilled, and “I’ve never heard of this!”). Now, when we do our monthly tech training there are either 2 or 3 groups that meet (based on the skills they need) separately so thatnobody feels intimidated because others seem to already know more, and nobody feels like their time is being wasted. It seems to be working so far . . .
Comment by Terri Miquel — November 11, 2007 #
I’d first like to say that as a teacher myself I feel that professional development is an essential part of teaching. It helps you grow and learn to better yourself and your job. The only problem that I find in the school district that I work for is that we’re required to do an over abundance of professional development. Through our contract, we have to do 60 extra hours of professional development that we do not get paid for. This does not include any graduate classes that you take or in-services. Doing all this professional development is very time-consuming and leaves little time for planning and grading papers. I wish that we could do some of these meetings during the summer. I think I would be a lot more focused and learn much more. Like I said earlier though, I do feel professional development can be a good thing if it is implemented correctly. I think it’s more important for teachers who have received their 24 required graduate credits, and have not taken any courses for quite a while. I learn something new with each course that I take. Some of the in-services and 60 extra hours are very beneficial and enlightening. Most of them though are more of a waste of time.
Comment by srg205 — November 11, 2007 #
In the state of Pennsylvania a teacher must have 180 hours of professional development in order to renew their certificate. That is only 36 hours a year. It doesn’t seem much. But I was told last week that in our neighbor state New Jersey, a teacher is required to take 20 hours of professional development every year. It is interesting to see how difference each state does for their teacher professional development requirement.
I have been to a few school districts for their in-service. The topics I presented were picked according to the teacher’s demand. School district’s curriculum director sends out notice to teachers providing all available topics and asking which ones interests them; and teachers respond to it. I believe this is a good approach.
For all the in-services I did, I found that teachers are tough students. Why? My observation tells me that some teachers think they are “teachers”, so they behave like one even their role is student at the moment. If some teachers believe that they know the topic more (or better) than the presenter, ignorance or distraction will be unavoidable. The other thing I notice is that a few teachers will pick the topics they already know well (I guess that’s what they think) and do their own stuffs during the workshop. To avoid unpleasant situation I always tell the teachers in the beginning of the session that in order to be a good teacher, the first thing they need to do is to be a good student, and they can do their own stuffs but quietly and without causing any distraction. That worked well.
Comment by Pehceng Chu — November 12, 2007 #
I believe the reason teachers bring their own work to do during professional development, as Pehceng observed, has to due with several peoples comments that teachers have a lot of demands and not enough time to get it all done. I know that I take quizzes to grade or other work to meetings on a regular basis. At the college level, we do not have the same requirements for professional development as K-12 teachers, however, we do have one day each semester of PD. From my own experience, I enjoy those days best when there are a variety of workshops that I can chose from and therefore attend something that I think will be most beneficial to me. I think it is very important to offer choices and allow teachers to choose what they would like to do for PD. It is also sometimes important to tailor PD to specific subject areas. While it is important for everyone to be up to date on technology and assesment, etc. My needs as a math teacher are most likely not the same as an english teachers needs. Therefore, having sessions which are focused or targeted to certain subjects would probably be more appealing to many teachers. In addition, it is important to have a support structure in place. If teachers attend a workshop to learn a particular software or type of technology and then there is no continued support when they are trying to implement it into their classrooms, they may get fraustrated and stop trying to implement new technologies.
Comment by Carol Reed — November 12, 2007 #
I’m surprised that school district’s don’t let teachers do PD time over the summer. Is that specific to the SD or is that pretty standard among SD’s? I think taking PD over the summer is a great time for teachers to learn. They have more time, probably more interest, and could potentially work applying it to the classes they are going to teach in the fall. If they run into bumps support wise, they have more time to figure it out, or can still ask the tech people at school since it’s typically a 12 month position.
Support is also very, very, very important, as is using what you’re learning. Otherwise it’s just ‘get it and forget it’. I think SD’s are onto something with the individualized approach, or at least taking input into what should be offered.
I also understand that teachers have a lot of work to do and sometimes ‘multi-task’ during PD. However, I find it disconcerting that they can be so rude and discourtious to the presenter of the PD. They expect respect in the classroom and thus should give it to the PD instructor as well. It’s not the PD instructor’s fault the teacher has to be there.
Comment by Trish — November 13, 2007 #