Personal Professional Assessment #1

Kayla Lewis
In starting field experience III, I have several goals that I would like to accomplish as a student
teacher. My main goal that I shared in my D2L post is as follows:
If I develop a better understanding of long range planning, then I will be able to design
lessons that build upon each other which will allow my students to gain the desired skills
in writing and communication in a gradual manner that encourages them to progress
because the desired outcome will be just beyond their current ability rather than too
difficult
I chose this goal because I believe that long range planning is essential in being a good teacher. It
is vital that teachers know not only what their students will be doing tomorrow and the next day,
but also in the coming months. With this long range planning, teachers are able to focus on the
end goal for where they would like their students to be in terms of new knowledge and skills.
Then, teachers are able to break these large goals down into smaller goals which can be achieved
through only a few lessons. By contrast, if a teacher only plans a few lessons at a time, his/her
students may not reach the same level of knowledge and skills as the teacher who had this goal in
mind all along. Because I believe that this goal is extremely important in becoming a good
teacher, I plan to revisit it throughout this entire field experience.
Other goals that I have for this practicum are more specific to various elements of a
junior high English Language Arts classroom. My goal for the first week was simply to learn
what happens in these classes on a daily basis. After being in University for so long, and then
teaching high school last year for practicum, I was uncertain of what the students do all day in

junior high. I feel like I met this goal this week through my observations of the six classes I am
working in, so I do not need to revisit it in the coming weeks. Another goal I have that I will be
working on in the coming days relates to the timing of my lessons. My goal is to develop a better
understanding of how much time students should be given for various tasks. Obviously they need
enough time to complete the task, but not so much time that they finish early and start losing
focus. My goal is to figure out what this time frame actually looks like in grade 7 and grade 9.
Finally, my fourth goal that I will continue to explore in the next two weeks is developing the
ability to know where each of my students is in terms of their understanding of what is being
taught. Formative assessment is important so that teachers can make the most of their
instructional time by spending more time in areas that students are struggling and moving onto
the next topic once students understand the current one. In order to accomplish this goal, I am
planning to make use of several assessment strategies during my lessons. Some of these include
teacher check-ins as students are working and exit slips before they leave the class. I also want to
learn more strategies from each of my partner teachers.
My main goal to develop a better understanding of long range planning covers the first
three KSAs: 2d) knowledge of the subject discipline my understanding of the ELA curriculum
will directly influence my ability to set long-term plans. The better I know the curriculum, the
better prepared I will be to create plans that cover multiple learner outcomes. 2f) Understand the
purpose of short, medium, and long-term planning this KSA directly relates to my goal as I
plan to develop skills in each of these areas of planninglong term plans to set expectations for
where my students will get to and short and medium term plans that will build on the skills
students already have in order to get to the desired outcome. 2i) Develop a range of instructional
strategies - By establishing these long-term plans for my classroom, I will able to think in

advance about the range of strategies I can bring in to ensure that all of my students get to the
desired outcome.
2j) Traditional and electronic teaching and learning technologies will be a bit of a
challenge for me in this practicum as use of technology is not a priority of the school I am in.
However, each classroom has a few computers in it and a few others are available in the learning
commons so I am hoping that I can make use of the technology that is available for my lessons.
For week 2 I have prepared a lesson that requires students to create their own newspaper using
templates from Google Docs. This lesson is my experiment in asking the students to use
computers throughout the school responsibly as I cannot supervise them in multiple locations at
once. Other classes in the school make use of the computers in this way, but my partner teacher
has yet to try it with her classes. Once this lesson takes place, I will have a better understanding
of how the students will use the technology available in the school.
2m) Learning is enhanced through the use of home and community resources week 2 at
my school includes three sessions of parent-teacher interviews. I plan to attend some of these
interviews to develop a better understanding of the parent and community resources that are
available at this school and how I can make use of these resources in my teaching.
In conclusion, my first week of field experience III was mostly dedicated to familiarizing
myself with the culture of a junior high ELA classroom. My goals moving into weeks 2 and 3
include a focus on long range planning, determining appropriate timing for lessons and activities,
and learning and practicing formative assessment strategies. I intend to focus on the first three
KSAs in the coming two weeks while becoming a bit more familiar with how the third and
fourth KSAs fit within this school.