Professional Development Reflection

I have been very blessed in the district of Gahanna when it comes to professional development. Gahanna has made professional development a priority over the past three years and has rearranged the district wide calendar to accommodate this need including four to six built-in professional development days sprinkled throughout the school year. Therefore, professional development is not voluntary for our staff and happens within the confines of our typical school day and year which according to the article Why Professional Development Matters by Hayes Mizell, “professional development is most effective when it occurs in the context of educators’ daily work. When learning is part of the school day, all educators are engaged in growth rather than learning being limited to those who volunteer to

One it was a way for teachers to learn from each other and Why Professional Development Matters states that, “educators’ collective growth has a greater impact on student learning across the school than individual learning does” (9). All of the teachers in that session were learning and growing which in turn would hopefully foster growth within our students. Furthermore, the day focused on data. I feel strongly that professional development that uses the data that teachers have to collect to find ways to guide instruction can be very powerful. This particular strategy allows teachers to find the strengths and weaknesses within the students learning and within their own teaching practices which is invaluable. In the article Why Professional Development Matters Hayes concludes that “effective professional development enables educators to develop the knowledge and skills they need to address students’ learning challenges” (13). Thus discussing data and finding ways to reteach or make a learning target more accessible to students directly hones in on the challenges students are facing in the