Professional Development Transcript
Michigan Council for Exceptional Children Conference
March 2016
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The special education team at my school attended this conference together for one day in March 2016. Throughout the day, we each attended breakout sessions of our own choosing based on areas of special education that we were interested in. I attended a session regarding brain based behavioral interventions and another session centered on self-monitoring as a behavioral intervention. I used the sessions at this conference to pursue additional information on behavior, an area in which I would like to improve my skills.
Urban Education and Poverty Workshop
March 2016
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This was a full day professional development split into two sessions. For one session, there was a lecture/discussion about urban education and educational implications of teaching in an urban area. We discussed biases commonly held and how our biases, both conscious and unconscious, affect our students. The other part of the day was a presentation about poverty and its effects on education. During this session, we explored the school to prison pipeline and ways in which we can, as educators, work to reverse the effects of poverty on our students.
National Heritage Academies Fall Regional Training
November 2015
Reading Street Overview
October 2015
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Data Workshop with Ingham Intermediate School District
October 2015
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My Sidewalks Implementation Workshop
September 2015
Behave with Care Schoolwide Behavior Support Workshop
September 2015
National Heritage Academies Summer Regional Training
September 2015
Curriculum Training Reading Street
June 2015
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I have compiled a list of the professional developments I have attended over the past year. These are both professional developments offered by my school and those I attended by choice. Each entry is accompanied by a brief description of the training and what it meant for me as an educator.
Our school offers regional trainings a few times a year in which we meet with teachers from other schools within the same charter company. At this particular training, the special education session centered on writing behavior intervention plans (BIPs) using function based interventions. As a group, we used case study information to create behavior plans for mock students and then compared our plans with other groups. As a professional learning group, we also discussed behavior issues faced at each of our schools and shared ideas with each other. This training was good for networking with other special education teachers.
Our school switched English Language Arts curriculum this school year. This Reading Street Overview training, served as a follow-up to a curriculum training we received in the summer. This session helped us to trouble shoot any issues that we were having with the new curriculum. Teachers were also given ideas and resources for planning activities for workshop and intervention times within their classrooms. As a special education teacher, this session gave me information on how to assist classroom teachers with their workshop and intervention times while integrating with the classroom curriculum.
Our data workshop with Ingham Intermediate School District focused on using data to plan interventions for low achieving students. We attended sessions on the implementation of and progress monitoring used within Rocketmath. During this workshop, we also were trained on using the progress monitoring feature in Aimsweb and on using the reports and data provided within the Aimsweb system to monitor student progress and design and adjust interventions for our students. For me, this training provided valuable information on how I could use Aimsweb results when writing Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) for my students.
With our change in reading curriculum, our school also received the My Sidewalks on Reading Street intervention curriculum for K-5. This workshop provided training on how to use the intervention curriculum, administer the assessments within the curriculum, and use the assessment results to place students in specific levels of the program. We also were trained on how to monitor progress within the program and use the data from assessments to move students between levels or exit them from the program. I used this curriculum with certain groups of my students and found the training in the use of assessments for placement very helpful.
With our beginning of the year professional development, our school provided a workshop on Behave with Care, our school-wide positive behavior support system. Reviewing the behavior levels and which behaviors fall at which level was helpful for me since I am not a classroom teacher and do not always deal with disciplinary procedures within classrooms. Providing this training to the whole staff allows our building to remain more consistent in the ways in which we deal with behavioral problems. Consistency is the key to an effective behavior system.
Functional Behavior Assessment Training
September 2015
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This was a full day training given at Building Bridges Therapy Center. The school social worker and I attended this training together. In the past, our social worker has handled all functional behavior assessments (FBAs) at our school, but we are moving towards more of a full team approach. This training provided examples of FBAs completed using the competing pathways models, which was new to our school system this past school year. Also with receiving training on completing the paperwork, I learned valuable information about completing FBAs as a team and using a collaborative approach to create function based behavior plans.
The special education summer regional training focused on the completion of transfer IEPs at the beginning of the school year. Our school system has strict guidelines to follow when receiving in new students with IEPs. The completiong of a transfer IEP itself is not a complicated process, but this training provided us with information and guidelines to follow when making the determination of whether or not to fully accept and IEP or to write a new IEP within 30 school days. This training was beneficial because it helped me to become more critical of incoming IEPs to make sure they meet the standards and guidelines set by our district.
In order to prepare for a change in reading curriculum, our staff attended a full day workshop on Reading Street, our new curriculum. At this training, we reviewed the curriculum materials and set-up of the curriculum program. While I do not teach the classroom curriculum, it is important for me to be familiar with the curriculum in order to support my students and the general education teachers. Being familiar with the classroom curriculum and the skills covered helps me to identify any instructional holes my students may have and to identify any pieces of the curriculum that may be difficult and in need of modification. Knowing what my students are doing in their classroom allows me to design more effective interventions.