PSI Professional Growth Plan/Goals

Name: Kristin Kobbert

Dates: Nov. 3 Dec. 9

School: Vauxhall Elementary School

Practicum

Teacher Associate(s):
School Administrator:
University Consultant:
A. Professional Goals
Goal #1: to improve my classroom management strategies that maintain control
of the class and work specifically on voice level and assertiveness
Rationale: I have never felt like a very assertive and commanding person and I
do not want to give students the impression that they can walk all over me. I want
to be able to control the classroom and make it the best possible learning
environment it can be.
Goal #2: to develop and practice making detailed lesson plans that includes
appropriate and effective assessment methods
Rationale: besides the couple of micro-teaches, I have had little experience in
lesson planning. I hope to be able to gain experience in planning lessons and
making sure to include detailed descriptions to keep my lessons on track. I want
to focus on using assessment methods that really do a good job on checking the
students understanding of the desired learning outcomes.
B. Strategies (How I will go about achieving my goals?)
Strategies for addressing Goal #1: I will find a few strategies that I want to try
in the classroom and also observe strategies my TA uses for classroom
management that are effective. I will try to maintain a normal and natural voice
when addressing students.
Strategies for addressing Goal #2: when creating my lessons I will write the
activity descriptions as though someone else were teaching the lesson for me, this
will force me to be very detailed and leave nothing out for when I have to execute
the lesson. I will include assessment questions to ask students and ask my TA to
check for effectiveness of the assessments I use.
C. Indicators of Progress Towards Goals (How will I know when and if I have
achieved my goals?)
Indicators of Progress for Goal #1: TA and UC feedback; self-monitoring; and
if I feel better about classroom control
Indicators of Progress for Goal #2: reflecting after lessons if the plan included
all the necessary elements; using the assessment methods I have developed;
feedback from TA and UC.

D. Timeline for Completion I hope to complete both goals by end of practicum Dec
9th 2014.
E. Reflections on Professional Growth
Reflecting back on the professional goals I set for myself in PSI, I am very
pleased with the progress I made in achieving my goals. The first goal I set for myself
was to work on my classroom management strategies, specifically on assertiveness in
how I use my voice. The reason I set this goal was because I felt that I did not have that
commanding teacher presence that helps in maintaining control of the classroom.
Observing my TA teach was a very helpful strategy to work on this goal, because I was
able to make note of some of the little things she does to control her classroom and then
test out which ones worked for me. I realized that establishing a routine to get back the
attention of the students worked the best for me in terms of classroom management, but
also that it wasnt something that will just work right away. I tried this at first and then
realized that training the students was necessary for an attention routine to work and after
sitting down with the students and practicing it was much more effective. This was one of
the most important things I learned in regards to classroom management techniques.
My second goal was to work on developed lesson plans, because I felt that it was
an area in which I had little experience as a first year student teacher and I wanted to
make sure that I included all the major components into my lessons. I wanted to
specifically focus on the assessment area and work to include for, as and of assessment
practices into my plans. I achieved my goal by creating quite detailed lesson plans for the
first few lessons I taught, and was rewarded when my TA said my lessons were well
thought out. I asked my TA about what she does for assessment in her lessons and was
able to observe some of for, as and of techniques and then try them out on my own. I used
a lot of review at the beginning of my lessons to assess for learning and find out what the
students already knew about the material we were covering. Questioning became a very
important means for me to assess the students during the group activities and the closure
discussions. Since I was only doing sporadic lessons, there wasnt some big final project
that I used as a summative assessment, but I would collect the worksheets to check for
student understanding. The most important thing I learned about including assessment in
my lesson plans was that it didnt always have to be a big thing, but could be just quick
questions or checks here or there to see how the students are progressing.
My two goals for PSI of working on classroom management and developing
lesson plans were ones that I set because I felt not very confident in those areas.
Throughout my practicum I was able to observe different ways of doing these things, try
out what worked for me and develop my own techniques. I feel like I achieved my two
goals by simply being in the classroom and gaining experience practicing them. I am
going to continue to work on my classroom management and assessment practices
probably for most of my teaching career, but I am satisfied with my growth in these
areas.