Running Head: TELLING MY STORY 1

Assignment 1: Telling My Story Using My PDQP

Candee Edgar
National University
November 4, 2018

In partial fulfillment of the requirements for

TED 690 – Capstone Course
Instructor Clifton Johnson
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Abstract

In this initial paper for TED 690 – Capstone Course, there is an introduction of my teaching

journey, an outline of the six Domains: A-F of the California Teaching Performance

Expectations (TPEs), and an evaluation of my current progress in achieving competency in the

TPEs of Domain A (Making Subject Matter Comprehensible to Students) while simultaneously

identifying my strengths and weaknesses. Finally, in conclusion there is a brief discussion and

explanation about selected artifacts for Domain A to show competencies as I develop my

Professional Development Quest Portfolio (PDQP) including the rationale utilized in selecting

and completing areas of professional needs and goals.

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Telling My Story Using My PDQP

As I was completing an online Master’s Degree in Education with a specialization in teaching

English Language Learners in 2016 and volunteering to teach adults English in a program at

UCLA, I discovered my passion for teaching and my goal of becoming a professional educator.

My first employment in teaching was as a 5th grade teacher’s assistant in a charter school. In the

fall of 2017 I began my teaching career as a first grade teacher at a charter school while

simultaneously working towards my Multiple Subject Teaching Credential from National

University. While studying and completing courses, I was introduced to the Teacher

Performance Expectations (TPEs) and requirements for California teachers all while learning

about how these TPEs promote student learning. I received my Credential in June of 2018. I am

in my second year of teaching first grade; I will complete a Master’s Degree in Educational Best

Practices soon. This final Capstone Course has provided me an opportunity to create a

Professional Development Quest Portfolio (PDQP) which requires me to take a look back,

review, reflect, and self-assess my journey to becoming a professional educator.

As an elementary teacher, I truly understand what it means to be a life-long learner and value

on-going, continuous education. Although I did not have the opportunity of student teaching, as

an intern in the Credential Program with National University, I soon discovered that teaching

goes hand-in-hand with learning, and without learning there is no teaching. Costantino states

“…there is a direct correlation between performance standards for students and performance

standards for teachers. What teachers know and are able to do is the most important influence on

what students learn” (Costantino, De Lorenzo, & Tirrell-Corbin, 2009, p. 11). With that being

said, I quickly discovered in order to become successful as a teacher that I must be able to meet

California’s TPEs to accommodate the ever-changing needs of our diverse classrooms of today.
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The Commission on Teacher Credentialing in California identifies thirteen Teaching

Performance Expectations (TPEs) aligned with the California Standards for the Teaching

Profession which are categorized into the following six domains:

A. Making Subject Matter Comprehensible to Students

B. Assessing Student Learners

C. Engaging and Supporting Students in Learning

D. Planning Instruction and Designing Learning Experiences for All Students

E. Creating and Maintaining Effective Environments for Student Learning

F. Developing as a Professional Educator

These six domains will serve as my Table of Contents and will be represented throughout my

PDQP to organize, showcase, and bring to life my competencies as a professional educator. I

have selected to use Weebly as my platform to build my website for my PDQP. “Weebly lives on

the end that is all-inclusive and provides everything to get started and grow your website”

(Shivar, 2018). This will provide me an organized platform that is user-friendly and can easily

be updated to show my progress in achieving the competencies of TPEs in each of the domains. I

really like the freedom to carefully select the artifacts that will represent my competencies in

each of the domains (Costantino, et al., 2009, p. 49). These selected artifacts will make my

PDQP come to life and give my readers an opportunity to assess and reflect on who I am as a

teacher and where I am heading as a professional educator.

The domain of my choice is Domain A: Making Subject Matter Comprehensible to Students.

This has been an area of concern for me since I first volunteered at UCLA. In working with

adults as a volunteer at UCLA to teach English as a second language, I was unexperienced at

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using and adapting the proper resources to plan for their language acquisition. I did not know

that the California Common Core State Standards and the curriculum framework existed, nor did

I even know about the importance of using knowledge about my students to facilitate their

understanding of English. I was definitely lacking skills in this domain. As I became a fifth

grade teacher’s assistant and entered the Credential Program with National University and began

courses, I soon grasped that even experienced teachers are highly concerned with this area. Time

and time again, I observed experienced teachers struggle with content and making it meaningful

to students. Even & Tirosh (1995) believe that teachers “need not only understand that

something is so; the teacher must further understand why it is so” (Costantino, et al., 2009, p. 3).

For teachers to adhere to the state standards and demonstrate their teaching craft, they must

demonstrate knowledge of their subject matter and use their knowledge about their students to

organize and facilitate student learning in multiple subject areas.

Since my first experience with teaching in 2016 and up until now, I have demonstrated

significant growth, improvement, and strength in Domain A, TPEs 1 and 1A. Through

experience, knowledge from courses, professional development and training, experienced

colleagues, reflections, and self-assessments, I am now more confident to teach content-based

standards in all of the multiple subject areas. I began this school year learning all about my

students in order to help plan, design, organize, and implement instruction that will be

meaningful and understandable to them. I use best teaching practices, direct instruction, hands-

on-activities, collaborative learning, group activities, and project-based learning to make subject

matter more comprehensible and promote student learning while continuously increasing my

teaching performance competencies.

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The first artifact I selected to incorporate into my PDQP is a first grade mathematics lesson

which I designed and planned; it teaches students geometry and reasoning with different shapes;

students will learn to divide shapes and identify halves, fourths, and quarters. The second

artifact is a video clip of students learning about shapes using many learning modalities, whole

group discussions, small group activities, hands-on-activities with various differentiation

incorporated to meet the needs of all students, and on-going progress monitoring. The third

artifact is a literature review that discusses how to make learning comprehensible to students by

using class math discussions with first graders.

The reason for choosing Domain A is that my teaching performance dominates and reflects in

my students’ performance and their ability to understand what is being taught in the classroom in

order to achieve the state adopted Common Core Standards. For all teachers, this domain is

crucial; a teacher can be knowledgeable in their content area, but unable to pass the knowledge

on to their diverse group of students who are at different levels. Being able to make content

comprehensible for students is the sole responsibility for professional teachers along with

creating a safe, learning environment conducive to students’ learning and differentiating

instruction to meet the individual needs of each student for all multiple subjects. To show

continuous growth in Domain A, I will collaborate with my colleagues, attend on-going

professional development, take full responsibility for my students’ learning, and self-assess to

formulate new goals for improving my teaching competencies.

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References

California CTC, (2013) California Teaching Performance Expectations. Retrieved from

http://www.ctc.ca.gov/educator-prep/standards/adopted-TPEs-2013.pdg

Costantino, P., De Lorenzo, M., & Tirrell-Corbin, C. (2009). Developing a professional teaching

portfolio: A guide for success. (3rd ed.) Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.