"Never become so much of an expert that you stop gaining expertise. View life as a continuous learning experience" - Denis Waitley -
I view education as something like the field of medicine. We are constantly learning new and better way of doing things. When I was a new teacher, we were required every year to write a Professional Target Plan as part of our teacher evaluations. These plans include our yearly goals for improvement and are monitored on an ongoing basis and then evaluated at the end of the year. I was never perfect but I consistently insisted on improving myself as a professional educator. It gave me a definite direction of where to go and how to move my students forward to meet the goals. I always arrive at my destination a much more effective teacher. Things are a little bit different now with our new teacher evaluation process, but what has never changed is my constant quest for professional development so I can better help my colleagues help our students maximize their potential.
I am so honored to belong to the Teacher Leaders Network, this is the group of professional teachers and NBCT's that I have been long searching for. It is wonderful to be with the company of likeminded educators across the nation who care about practice, policy and people. As one of my colleagues, Heather, said in her welcome message to us new members: "relax, pull up a chair and a laptop, and ease into the ultimate in educational spa living. There's nothing like the forum for some great discussion and debate from other dedicated teachers."
Here are the newest members, the TLN Forum's First Class of 2011. Please take time to read their biography, you will be amazed by the high caliber of teacher leaders we have in this group (click image to enlarge):
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