Electronic Portfolio By Dan Case

Contents Introduction Commitment to Students and Student Learning; Classroom setup Timetabling Meeting diverse needs Profiles Professional Knowledge; This course Resource list Blooms Taxonomy Professional Practice; Report card Brochure Leadership in Learning Community; and PD Days Department Head Student Success University of Ottawa Ongoing Professional Learning. Interview PQP Guidance Specialist Reflection and Goals

Introduction Having never done an electronic portfolio, I felt intimidated by the thought of learning a new format while trying to convey what I have learned over the last few months. However, once I began to reflect on the course, I realized that the hardest part would be deciding what to leave out rather than the format and what to include. I have decided to break my portfolio down to the 5 Standards of Practice as instructed and include exemplars where appropriate.

1. Commitment to Students and Student Learning Classroom Setup – I included this here because it sets the foundation for student learning. By having a well organized and carefully planned room, students will learn in a welcoming, caring, and safe environment that will hopefully inspire learning.

Profiles – I included this task as it was probably the most influential to me. I am working through my apprehensions of “labelling” students to trust the diligence and intentions of educators as they profile students in order to meet their learning needs.

Meeting Diverse Needs – This assignment helped me to reflect on many things I am doing well in my classes thus far and has helped me to feel confident that I am making a conscientious effort to meet the various needs of my students.

Timetabling – This is where I got to really appreciate one of the challenges that elementary teachers face that high school teachers perhaps take for granted. How a teacher timetables the course will have an incredible impact on the learning that takes place and the comfort level of all in the classroom. It is amazing to see all of the considerations that go into creating a timetable for a class!

2. Professional Knowledge This Course – this course is an example of how I am adding to my professional knowledge and keeping current in my practice. Resource List – Sharing resources with colleagues is an exceptional way to enhance professional knowledge and continue to grow as an educator. This task was one of the ways that we are encouraged to share with each other during the course. Another were the various discussions on the discussion board. I had a few examples in mind, but with the issues with the course today, I was unable to access them to include them.

Blooms Taxonomy – it has been a very long time since I intentionally reviewed Bloom’s Taxonomy and the fact that it has changed without my knowledge reinforced that it was about time I did. I included this assignment because it is obviously important to know how students think in learn in our profession.

3. Professional Practice Though I do not teach in the junior division, nor have I taught in an elementary school, I have found that two assignments in this course were key into providing some insight of some areas where I learned some new elements of professional practice: The Brochure – This was important because taught me how important parent/teacher communication is in junior division education. The Report Card – There are some key differences between the high school and elementary school report cards thus it was quite important to see these during this course

4. Leadership in Learning Community This is probably one area where the course did not offer as much insight as it did with the other standards of practice. Nonetheless, I believe that this has been a strength of mine as an educator (particularly in the last 5 years or so), so I decided to include a list of the things that I have done or will do in this area.

A) PD Day Presentations – I have done three presentations at our board and school professional development days. These presentations have been on assessment and evaluation, using turinitin.com as a evaluation tool, and a litter court activity that I run with my law classes B) Student Success- I was the student success teacher for 2 years and got to work closely with many different teachers in my school and board as I contributed and benefited from a rather close professional learning community

C) University of Ottawa – For two years I have had the privilege of teaching the Senior History course in the Faculty of Education at the University of Ottawa. This is a great opportunity to share my teaching experiences and resources with new teacher candidates and learn from them about the many new discussions they are having in education. D) Department Head – I have served as an acting department head for two years and this fall I will be moving to another school in order to become the department head of social science. This responsibility allows me to work with teachers, stay current on new resources and initiatives in our curricular circles, and collaborate with other leaders in our school and board

5. Ongoing Professional Learning Obviously this course was an opportunity for me to participate in some ongoing professional learning. I could include every assignment and discussion as examples of how this is applicable but I will choose one: Interview Assignment- this assignment gave me an opportunity to have a meaningful and educational discussion with a teacher actively working in the junior division. She gave me insight that reading a book or website, or having an online discussion really could not accomplish.

Guidance Specialist – I completed my the third part of my guidance specialist this past winter and it was a incredibly useful experience for me even though I am not a guidance counsellor nor will I be in the near future. Anyone that works with children would benefit from this enriching experience. Principal’s Qualification Program – This summer I intend to take the first part of my principal qualifications. Though I am not 100% sure that this is what I want to do, I have heard from many friends that it is excellent p.d. so I am looking forward to learning about education from a different perspective.

Reflection and Goals To be honest, my main reason for taking the junior qualifications course was that it was a means to an end. My intentions are, at some point in the not too distant future, to move to administration if possible and one of the necessary steps is to be qualified in three levels of teaching. Since I had my intermediate and senior already, it only made sense for me to take my junior qualification course. I had rather minimal interest at the outset of the course, but what I found in taking the course were excellent approaches to teaching no matter what level one is working with. There is an emphasis (and rightfully so) of using differentiated instruction at all levels of teaching. In this course, I was exposed to the use of student and class profiles as a means of assisting in effective differentiation strategies. Though I have some reservations with profiling, I think that if done responsibly, they can be an integral part in assisting teachers as they learn the needs of the students and investigate the best methods to reach those needs. These profiles have to be living documents and be flexible enough to change as the needs of the students change. They also need to be able to grow and develop as the student matures and develops. If the professionals who are working with these documents can ensure this, then student and class profiles can be incredibly helpful. They are helpful with current and future teachers and administrators, but also with supply teachers. Some of my colleagues have stated in their postings on the topic that profiles are a great way to come into a class prepared for many challenges that may exist. Since I have not been a supply teacher in years, this is something that I lost sight of but can definitely appreciate given the feedback of my fellow candidates.

My future goals in education are to continue to develop as a leader in education. Beginning this fall, I have accepted a headship in Social Science at a new school and will be returning to the Faculty of Education at our local university to teach the Senior History course for teacher candidates. I will also be taking my principal qualification course (part one) this summer as I continue to learn about educational leadership and move towards a possible career in administration. This course has helped me in this regard because it gave me so much more than just the qualifications necessary to take the PQP. It has given me strategies and inspiration to improve my teaching practices and has even started me to thinking that I may like to be an administrator at an elementary school someday rather than a high school. The impact and connections that a principal can have at an elementary school seems to be much more rewarding though I am sure I will learn more about this this summer.

Another area where I found the course very helpful is the discussion of classroom setup and learning stations. This is, and always has been, a weakness of mine. Though I believe that this is more essential with younger students, I also believe that it can be quite valuable with students of all ages. Having a well thought out and organized plan for the design of the classroom would be an essential component for creating a warm, welcoming, and engaging learning environment. Creating this type of environment is essential for student learning. I like how the videos we watched and the chapters we read demonstrated some very easy and useful ways to creating a classroom geared towards student success. Creating learning stations creates an environment of reinforcing ideas, inspiring creativity, focussing students on the task at hand. All of these are significant components to unit and lesson design that can start well before one meets the students in his or her class.

One final area that I found quite engaging and useful is the assignment on character education. I am a firm believer that teachers in elementary and high school are people who teach students science, math, history and so forth whereas teachers at post-secondary institutions are teachers of science, math, history and so forth with so many students in their class. The key difference is that we are teaching students and professors are teaching subjects. I really liked how the readings we looked at emphasized modelling as a key component to character education. This has to be one of the most effective ways to teach as students will follow the examples of the teachers whether those examples are good or bad. They would see right through the “do as I say and not as I do” approach. In some ways, it matters less about the lessons that come out of our mouths and more about the lessons that we model. For example, students will learn to be more accepting of others when they see people whom they look up to accepting others rather than reading about it in a book or hearing about it as a story.