477 – Inquiry Blog #2

What strategies, resources, tools, and networks will I use to continue to develop my information/communication technology skills and pedagogy throughout my career?

I suppose that I will increase my ICT knowledge, skills, and pedagogy the same way that I have done any of my own professional development in the last ten years. My school district doesn’t present required or recommended professional development. This is left up to our union members to devise on an individual basis. It’s usually the same handful of teachers who repeatedly host yoga, sports, outdoor school, or SOGI-related pro-D events. Occasionally, a speaker will be brought in from the community, but expert speakers, conferences, and keynotes are almost completely absent from the pro-d options in my rural district. Moreover, I work in a less-populated area of the district, and very few organized options are available without an hour or more drive each way.

All this is to say, I’ve been largely on my own in my professional development in the decade since I started working as a teacher. I’ve used the pro-d days and my allowance of funds to pursue my own interests, wherever they shift. I started my career as a drama teacher and used every opportunity to meet with other drama teachers outside my district. For a few years, I went to the provincial Alternate educators’ conference, thinking that one day I would move into a position as an alternate teacher. When that turned out not to be the case, I continued my study—sparked by the Alternate conferences—of trauma-informed practice. I followed Gordon Neufeld to Gabor Mate to Ross Greene to Linda O’Neill. In the meantime, my job description drifted further and further from classroom teaching—I was a babysitter in a study skills class that was not respected by students or their parents. I spent one pro-d day actually reading and watching articles and videos about professional development for prison guards. Demoralizing? Yes, but I was already feeling pretty down by that point.

So here are a few of the tools, strategies, and resources that I use to spark inquiry into areas of professional-development that interest me.

BCTF’s PD Calendar – I check this guy a couple times a year to see if I can invite myself to any pro-d events outside my district.

Ivan Coyote’s Instagram – Ivan is definitely one of my favourite public speakers. I never miss an opportunity to see them in person, and I pre-order all their books the moment they’re announced.

Other Instagram feeds – I have a few curated lists of IG feeds that fuel my learning. I follow them under my alternate IG profile, @bunny.detectives, along with my more fun feeds. 

-         Mental health feeds include @yeahocd, @not.making.lemonade, @cmha-bc, @themightysite, @lindsaybraman, @thehavenmh, @thelatestkate, @makedaisychains, @positivelypresent

-          Feminism/SOGI/human rights/social activism feeds include @started.as.an.ally.now.we.here, @thewomanintheroom, @aclu_nationwide, @cancivlib, @started_as_a_ally_now_im_queer, @ukfeminism, @thegreatunlearn, @stardust.feminism, @a_tired_feminist, @soyouwanttotalkabout, @blklivesmatter, @trevorproject, @berniesanders

-          Books/school/learning feeds include @ancientgreekmemes, @heartbleedsdry, @romantically_inclined, @buzzfeedbooks, @powellsbooks, @patricknessbooks, @teachermisery, @bad_science_jokes, @sparknotes_, @russellbooksvictoria

(If you couldn’t tell, I like IG. I hate Twitter, so I have no contacts on that platform.)

Stuff my mom sends me – she worked in the school district where I grew up (in West Linn, Oregon) and even though she’s not a teacher, she forwards me links, newsletters, and even sends me books that the teachers are focusing on for their pro-d.

Stuff my ELL coordinator provides – the ELL coordinator for our district has really strengthened the PLC aspect of our ELL network. She has arranged for me to go to the coast to do week-long workshops on the SIOP method and always brings new books, tools, videos, strategies, and such for our monthly meetings.

Once I feel that spark of curiosity, I usually focus on that area for a while in general, and try to find a specific focus for the specific pro-d days in my schedule. After Instagram, usually my next stop is YouTube, looking for official videos by public speakers or analytical criticism videos on the topic. I don’t often find teacher-created professional development videos on YT, even though there are a lot of ‘flipped’ classrooms on the site. YouTube was actually the first place that I heard Ross Greene’s “Kids will do well if they can” and it blew my mind. Usually, the YT videos and IG posts lead me to real books, where I can learn more about the topics I’m interested in. Then, by the time I get a copy of the book and read it, I’m ready to move on.

I also keep all my pro-d notes in one fat spiral notebook. At the front, I keep notes, dates, speaker names, and topic titles for review, but in the back of the notebook, I keep a list of “further reading” references. Anytime one speaker refers to another, or a book they’re basing their conclusions on, I jot that down, and around once a year I go back through the list and read those articles/books or look up those speakers or writers on YouTube. I maintain a pretty cyclical pro-d system this way, with reinforcements, review, and new sauce whenever possible.