Outcome 1:
Participants use various support functions including collaboration, consulting, and coaching to support teachers during classroom visits.
Participants use various support functions including collaboration, consulting, and coaching to support teachers during classroom visits.
This photograph is from a coaching visit where I was helping a teacher from my professional development cohort prepare for her upcoming Level 1 Google Certification exam. During this visit we went over some of the different Google applications and ways to use them. As a part of this meeting, I introduced the G Suite Training extension for Google Chrome that would provide her with tutorials on just about everything related to G Suite. Coaching and mentoring has been a two way road in my experiences. The facilitator is often seen as the holder of all knowledge tasked with enlightening the teachers with what they need to know. In most cases, I would survive as a guide through different question techniques as the teacher worked themselves to their own solution. Another benefit from coaching that I have experienced is that the teacher is not the only one growing through the process. I have had the privilege to work with some veteran teachers that helped me grow just as much as they have.
Outcome 2:
Participants conduct effective classroom visit activities which include modeling instruction, helping with the lesson planning cycle, providing technology assistance, reflective practice, problem solving and program implementation.
Participants conduct effective classroom visit activities which include modeling instruction, helping with the lesson planning cycle, providing technology assistance, reflective practice, problem solving and program implementation.
This spreadsheet is a log of one month's visits with some of the teachers from the Tiger Tech cohort. During the visits, my jobs would vary from assisting in lesson planning, resource provider, and tech support. On one particular visit I assisted a teacher in setting up a BreakoutEdu kit for her class. Once set up, I was able to observe her implementation with a class. The BreakoutEdu activity allowed this teacher to engage students through an inquiry based lesson. In many visits, I have served as tech support. My skills as technology director has led many to ask for help in setting up printers, creating Google folders in Drive to share resource videos, or suggesting different tech tools that will work in different settings. One area I feel I have grown most through this specific outcome has been problem solving on the fly. Working with technology in the classroom never seems to work as planned and being able to adjust to whatever is thrown at me has become an important characteristic I am working to develop.