Tuesday, September 11, 2007

National Board Certification


I'm just winding down after a marathon day filled with meetings, duties, meetings, consultations, more meetings and culminated with a 3 hour introductory class to the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards--NBPTS as it is affectionately known to those who have to type and/or say it on a regular basis. Sharing the process will help me to reflect and get as much out of this intense process as I can!

The NBPTS has 5 core values--in basic terms they are: commitment to students, knowledge of content, assessment/management, reflection, and professional responsibilities. I believe these are values and skills all teachers should have (as I do) but understand that I am not strong in all five areas. This becomes the personal reason for going through this process. I know I have to work on professional reflection and managing student learning. In my role as a librarian, I feel that getting students excited to learn and providing them with tools to learn in different ways is an important job. However, I do understand that I am also responsible for moving students along and doing some progress monitoring.

Even though we have homework and the fact that the original class was supposed to be 45 minutes closer to my house, I'm looking forward to learning more about myself as a teacher and becoming the best teacher I can be.

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