Engage in professional learning

Identify and plan professional learning needs

During my education course, I was provided with an assessment item that helped to identify learning needs based on the Australian standards. From domain one, I identified that professional knowledge was my strength. I was comfortable in building rapport with the students and identifying learning strategies tailored to their needs. Domain two, I identified that I would like more practice differentiating assessment. I have not experienced much assessment that is differentiated and so I have outlined some actions to take to strengthen this area. An action to assist this Professional development is to research strategies and suggestions made by ASCD and Luminous Learning. These specific organisations focus on special needs education and differentiating assessment to meet the diverse needs in the classroom. From Domain Three, My goal is to find broader teaching networks and local Indigenous networks in order to seek outside perspectives and strategies that I can bring into my classroom. An action to take here is to identify and join Facebook teacher groups with the specific area of implementing Indigenous perspectives.

Professional Learning Plan

Engage in professional learning and improve practice

During my final practicum in the Year One intervention Team I was invited to attend a webinar with my supervising teacher (4.3.21). The Professional Development was named "Phonemic Awareness in the prep classroom". The webinar was beneficial in showing the foundational understanding of phonemic awareness and letter-sound manipulation. This assisted in showing what the students should already know before coming into year one. The harder aspects of phonemic awareness is letter-sound manipulation. For students to identify all the sounds in a word and replace a sound in the word to make a new word is the highest form of phonemic awareness. I identified that the easiest and beginning steps in teaching phonemic awareness is to work on onset and rime. Have the students work on identifying the first sound and the last sound for example; F-ish. After the students can identify the onset and rime then the teacher can move to breaking up the word further into all the sounds; F-I-SH.

Engage with colleagues and improve practice

To improve my teaching practice I made sure to ask for feedback about areas that worked well and nay suggestions to improve. I had a feedback model printed out and was able to hand these to my teacher's during lessons they observed. After these lessons we would sit and discuss what the feedback meant and I could source some actions to improve and reflect from the feedback provided. These feedback sessions proved very useful in building my confidence and identifying areas of growth.

Apply professional learning and improve student learning

To improve student learning, I took feedback from a previous lesson and my notes from the phonemic awareness webinar. The lesson implemented identifying onset and rime in different words. Pictures of simple syllable words were printed off and the students had to identify the onset and rime of each word. A hand action was associated with the words to allow them to be more active in their learning and to develop kinaesthetic connections with onset and rime. The children would say the word and clench their fist, the first sound was spoken and the thumb was put up then the last sounds were spoken and the rest of the fingers joined together were put up, the word was then repeated altogether and the fist was clenched again. Reflecting on previous feedback about 'transferring the heavy lifting of reading to the students', I was able to implement pictures and had them identify the item and perform he onset and rime as a group. This was corrected if mistakes were made but the development of the learning was moved to a student-centred approach.

Engage professionally with colleagues, parents/carers and the community

Meet professional ethics and responsibilities

The code of ethics developed by the Queensland College of Teachers state that "members of the teaching profession are committed to the following values: Integrity, Dignity, Responsibility, Respect, Justice and Care. The application of these values are shown throughout my education course. I have demonstrated Integrity by building rapport with my students and supervising colleagues. Dignity is displayed through differentiated activities where diversity is valued and all students are treated equitably. I have displayed Responsibility through engaging in professional development in webinars and staff meetings as well as working with colleagues to develop my teaching practice in benefit for the students. I am respectful to staff and students, especially in parent-teacher interviews where trust, sensitivity and confidentiality are vital qualities. Justice has been shown through being fair and reasonable with behaviour management and ensuring just expectations and consequences are understood. I have demonstrated car through building rapport with students and displaying empathy with struggling students and committing to their wellbeing and academic progress. These values underpin my teaching identity and encourages my teaching pedagogy to grow and adapt to the needs of the staff, students and carers.

Comply with legislative, administrative and organisational requirements

The two main Government acts most relevant to my teaching career are the; Disability Discrimination Act (1992) and the Human Rights Act (2019). The Disability Discrimination Act makes it unlawful to discriminate against people with disability. This directly supports the Human Rights Act that "Every child has the right to have access to primary and secondary education appropriate to the child's need". In the current age there are more and more diversity shown in schools and to cater for this, I have undertaken Professional Development to comply with these Acts. I have completed a course in 'Child Protection - schools 2021' and received a 100% completion certificate. I have also undertaken a 'Disability Standards for Education' course that outlines the standards of practice for children with a disability.
Complying with administrative requirements I hold a current Paid Blue Card and my First Aid and CPR certificates.

Engage with the parents/carers

During my final Placement I was invited to join my supervising teacher during Parent-teacher interviews. During these 15 minute interviews I learnt the importance of being on time, concise and confidential. When talking to the parents it was important to be sensitive and sympathetic when giving negative feedback about their child, it was also beneficial to provide the parent with the strategies used in class, if its working and if it was not working, brainstorm actions that can be taken to remedy the situation. The main information I developed was that parents need to know how their child is being supported in the classroom and communication is vital for ensuring both parties are on the same page.

Engage with professional teaching networks and broader communities

In my Professional Learning Plan I outlined that I wanted to research Teaching networks that could help me as a beginning teacher. One network that I joined on Facebook is called "Beginning and establishing teachers' association". BETA holds conferences and events for beginning teachers with the purpose of setting them up for success. BETA consists of Teachers', deputies and Principals to mentor and build up beginning teachers. Another network is the "Australian Curriculum Studies Association". This association also has conferences and webinars that are recorded for professional development. In particular interest to me is the journal 'Curriculum Perspectives'. In this journal, various perspectives are shared about their work within education. This journal will be beneficial for broadening my teaching knowledge and practice.