Learning How to Change

Let's imagine your life as one long road trip. Where you are today, is not where you will be tomorrow, and maybe you have no idea where you want to end up. My life, and my career feels like this. I look back on my job two years ago, a year ago, six months ago, or even three months ago, and I am shocked by how different all of these versions of my job have been. I think about each and every lesson I have learned, whether is was intentional or not, and I appreciate the learning moments I have had. This makes me look forward to the future. It's scary though - not knowing where I want to go. This brings me to the point of this post. I just want to talk about mapping out a career plan. If anyone is like me, and likes plans, systems, and procedures, then this post will hopefully help you as much as I am trying to help myself in writing it. By writing this all down, I am trying to make myself aware of my feelings, more confident in my decisions, and more ambitious with my go...

In the spirit of cultural sensitivity, I thought I would share an article from the Economist published on Apr 9th 2016. I have made no edits to this article, but  I have bolded some phrases below for you to consider and concluded this post with some comments. The advantages of working in your own language are obvious. Those of working in a foreign one are subtle. More and more of the world is working in English. Multinational companies (even those based in places such as Switzerland or Japan) are making it their corporate language. And international bodies like the European Union and the United Nations are doing an ever-greater share of business in the world’s new default language. At the office, it’s English’s world, and every other language is just living in it. Is this to the English-speaker’s advantage? Working in a foreign language is certainly hard. It is easier to argue fluently or to make a point subtly when not trying to call up rarely used vocabulary or const...

I have been working on some new Professional Development Lessons for teachers these past few weeks, which I hope to base some future workshops on. I thought I would share the infographic I have created based on the Government of Alberta's ATESL Adult ESL Curriculum Framework. This infographic highlights 5 essential elements for building communicative competence, which include discourse,strategic, functional, linguistic, and sociocultural competencies. The infographic represents this taxonomy and shows how these elements are interconnected and how each helps build communicative knowledge and skills when integrated into curriculum and practice in intentional ways. The full curriculum guide can be found here:  ATESL Documents

My PIDP journey is coming to an end, but the life-long learning journey is sure to continue. To sum up what I have learned from my Professional Practice course, here is an infographic/poster I created. If there is only one thing you take away from reading my posts, I hope it is this: "No matter how experienced or educated you are,  there is always more to learn about what you teach others." Hang it on your wall! Share it! Sharing is caring!

There are two quotes from chapter 14 of Stephen Brookfield’s The Skillful Teacher that resonate with me in my struggles of surviving emotionally. These quotes are: “Classrooms are like storms or squalls – full of surprises, of unexpected events that throw our neatly conceived plans into confusion” (Brookfield, p. 256);  “Unless you find a way to navigate the roiling sea of emotions that the experience of college teaching generates, you run a real risk of drowning in swells of frustration, dis-appointment, or self-loathing. And if you do go under, or course, you are of no use to your students” (Brookfield, p. 253). This chapter of The Skillful Teacher focuses on an aspect of teaching not usually taught in formal education. Teaching can take an emotional toll on educators sapping them of energy, desire and compassion, which I have written about in a blog post entitled “ Energy Vampires ”. The above quotes speak to the ever changing dynamics of a classroom setting, dem...

The Big Think presented a video of the Global Education and Skills Forum in 2014. At this meeting, Bill Clinton was asked “what is the most important thing you have ever learned?” His answer was... “the most important thing I’ve ever learned is there’s more to learn.” One of my top ten TED Talks is by Adora Svitak and is entitled What Adults can Learn from Kids.  She states, “for better or worse, we kids aren't hampered as much when it comes to thinking about reasons why not to do things. Kids can be full of inspiring aspirations and hopeful thinking.” She then asks a question that resonates with me, and makes me feel truly inspired even still. Her question was “how many of you [adults] still dream like that, and believe in the possibilities?” I had to ask myself, “do I?” The truth is that when I first watched this video, about 5 years ago, I did not. Well, I dreamed. I am a creative writer, so I am always dreaming about something. But, what was I dreaming about a...

For my digital project assignment in my Professional Practice course, I have created an animated video on Peer Coaching through observation using the website www.powtoon.com .  I selected this strategy because it is important to me to attempt to change people’s misconceptions about peer coaching. I am hoping to convince teachers that the purpose of the observation is not to make the teacher look bad or to place blame, but to help. There are many benefits that go unnoticed because they are overshadowed by fear. I learned that Peer Coaching, as mentioned by the Center for Professional Development at Peak to Peak Charter School, can: improve teaching practices and student performance, enhance sense of professional skill, increase ability to analyze lessons, help teachers understand best practices in teaching and learning, provide teachers a wider range of instructional strategies/resources, and improve teaching performance. As a program manager, I hope to use this p...