Develop Your Staff
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Professional development activities that have proven effective will be included in Develop Your Staff. Your contributions are welcome. Send them to principal@osu.edu. Please indicate if we may use your name in the “contributor” credits.
Teacher Portfolios to Guide and Support Professional Growth
Introduce your staff to portfolio development and make them partners in evaluation.
Portfolios are already required for National Board Certification. In Ohio, passage of Senate Bill 250 established Local Professional Development Committees (LPDC). Like the National Board, most LPDCs recommend teaching portfolios to document and reflect on practice.
If you want to expand your school’s commitment to continuous improvement in teaching, invite your staff to get started on portfolio building. Here’s how:
Presenters
At Middle School West in Gahanna, Ohio, we were fortunate to have three National Board certified teachers, Roben Frentzel, Karie Gregory, and Kristi Griffiths. Their direct experience with portfolios, along with their professional excellence, gave them serious credibility with staff.
Bottom line for presentation: A team effort will yield the best results.
Resources for All Staff
Plastic, open-top file containers
Hanging file folders to store artifacts, with tabs organized by standards
or domains like those listed below
Charlotte Danielson and Thomas McGreal’s book, Teacher Evaluation
to Enhance Professional Practice
OR
Danielson’s article, “New Trends in Teacher Evaluation,” Educational Leadership, February 2001
Introduction
Present one of the following frameworks, or adapt them to your own district’s performance criteria.
National Board Standards
- Teachers are committed to students and their learning.
- Teachers know the subjects they teach and how to teach those subjects to students.
- Teachers are responsible for managing and monitoring student learning.
- Teachers think systematically about their practice and learn from experience.
- Teachers are members of learning communities.
For more information, go to www.nbpts.org
Domains of Professional Practice from Teacher Evaluation
- Planning and Preparation
- The Classroom Environment
- Instruction
- Professional Responsibilities
Activity
Explain the main components of the portfolio:
Documentation. Artifacts that provide evidence of good teaching practice in each evaluation area. Examples include:
- Observation narrative from principal or colleague
- Unit plan
- Lesson plan
- Teaching document
- Student/parent surveys
- Assessment document/scoring rubric
- Student work sample
- Parent communication
- Attendance record for conferences
- Phone log
- Professional activity log
Reflection. Written commentaries on the documents that detail why and how they were used, how they promoted student learning, what was learned from them?
Reassure teachers that reflection is self-assessment and does not involve risk.
Hunt-and-Gather Work
Allot one-half to one hour for teachers to work individually in their rooms or offices. They should select artifacts that are readily available, with the goal of finding at least one for each standard or domain.
Reconvene as a large group to discuss the process, give teachers an opportunity to share findings with colleagues, and announce follow-up activities.
Outcomes for Teachers
Charlotte Danielson: “Professionally rewarding and growth-producing.”
National Board candidates: “Virtually everyone who goes through the [portfolio] process, even those who are not successful, report that they have become better teachers because of the effort.”
Source: Danielson & McGreal, Teacher Evaluation to Enhance Professional Practice > .
