Standard 6&7 Meta-Reflection: Communication and Collaboration
Standards 6&7 indicate that I need to: Communicate regularly and effectively with colleagues, parents, and students through a variety of mediums & cooperate with other professionals to bridge gaps between schools and community and between departments/disciplines within schools.
I created this Action Plan as a final project for EDU 6600 Communication and Collaboration. It meets the criteria for standards 6 & 7, the Communication and Collaboration standards. In order to create this Action Plan I had to understand the needs of our school based on OSPI’s Nine Characteristics of Effective Schools and the characteristics of quality professional development. Research shows that targeted, quality, job-embedded, continuous professional development and learning increases teacher effectiveness. Teacher effectiveness is the best predictor of student success.
Part of my action plan is to address concerns with communication with our school community as a whole. I would like to regularly and effectively communicate with colleagues, parents, and students through a variety of means. Many of my colleagues desire to collaborate more often and more effectively, but without a plan these meetings don’t happen as much as they need to. As part of our district professional development team I cooperate with other professionals to bridge gaps between the science departments at our high schools and between departments/disciplines within schools. One area of growth for our school is to communicate more effectively with parents and other community members. These are all a part of my action plan.
The staff at my high school is working hard to support students, but a lot of that work has been done individually in the past. Part of my action plan involves teachers working collaboratively to solve problems. We are blessed to have OEL in place at our school this year, but meeting 6 times away from our classrooms is not as effective as continuous professional learning (using the skills we learn at OEL). Teachers who are constantly learning and engaged in developing professionally can be more effective with their students. Teachers who work collaboratively are better able to assess student progress toward goals. Planning time to work collaboratively with colleagues will help all of our students to be more successful.
