Professional Self-Assessment Form

Teacher Candidates Name: ______Ms. Louisa Steadman_________ Date: _____April 4, 2017_______

Mentor Teachers Name: __Ms. Jessica McCormick__ School: _Mellichamp Elementary School_

Grade Level (s)/Subject Area(s)________________4th Grade All Content_____________

___________________________________________________________________________________

Instructions to the teacher candidate: Please reflect on your professional performance, and
respond to each of the following prompts.

1. In terms of the ADEPT Performance Standards, what are your professional strengths?
How have you built on these strengths so far, and how do you plan to do so in the future?

I feel that my professional strengths in terms of ADEPT performance standards include short-
range planning of instruction, establishing and maintaining high expectations, maintaining an
environment that promotes learning, planning assessment and using data, using effective
instructional strategies, and providing content for learner, and professional responsibilities.

I feel that my strengths in creating short-range lessons by creating lesson plans in a timely
manner and sharing them with my cooperating teacher and the other teachers within the fourth
grade team. Working with the fourth grade team allows for collaboration which has helped me
become better at short-range lesson planning. I have grown in terms of making my expectation
for student performance clear. I set high expectations for all students by preparing them each
week with the goals of the lessons I am teaching. Each day, students will know what is expected
of them because I have an outline available at the start of each lesson.

I have built on my strengths of creating a classroom environment that encourages and supports
student learning by reminding students to use their set of complements when working together,
and by personally providing students with positive feedback. I remind students that they all have
the opportunity to make a 100 percent on all assignments and make a point to congratulate
students that make grades of 90-100 and 80-89. I have built my strengths in planning
assessments and using data by creating effective question stems when writing assessments and
using student scores to determine what content is being mastered, needs to be reviewed, or
needs to be retaught. When evaluating assessments, I look for frequently missed questioned and
ask myself if the question needs to be revised or if I need to reteach the content for mastery.

I feel that I have expanded my repertoire of effective instructional strategies by collaborating with
others to learn about their strategies, and simply trial and error. I have been able to experiment
with many different instructional strategies to determine which ones were best suited for myself
and the students. During my student teaching I have learned about and used the scoot strategy,
thumbs up and thumbs down to check for understanding, and the sketch to stretch review activity.
This semester has allowed me to truly test out the strategies that I have always heard about.
Lastly, I have learned a great deal about what it means to be professional and responsible. The
biggest thing that I have learned about my professional responsibilities as a teacher is to be a
team player. This means working with other teachers to discuss lesson, strategies, strengths and
weaknesses. It also means being willing and available to assist in anyway possible when needed.
Being a part of the team is an important facet of being an educator.
2. In terms of the ADEPT Performance Standards, what are your professional challenges?
How do you plan to meet these challenges?

I feel that my professional challenges in terms of the ADEPT performance standards include long
range planning and managing the classroom. Prior to this semester, I have never created a long-
range plan. Creating my first long-range plan was an important learning experience because I
learned how the process works (obtaining student information, identifying and implementing
various instructional strategies, etc.). I know that I have a long road ahead of me on improving my
ability to write long-range plans to better serve my students. Managing the classroom continues
to be something that I need to work on. I plan to improve my management by being consistence
with incentives and consequences, using classroom management techniques such as the E-N-S-
U chart and marbles in a the jar, and by holding all students to the same expectations.

3. Describe your students overall progress and achievement. What insights have you
gained into ways to improve student progress and achievement?

Overall, I feel that the students I have been working with are successful in mastering the content
provided to them. I have found that the planning process is so important to student achievement
because the teacher must (1) know the content well and be organized, and (2) must make the
lessons exciting and worthwhile. The lesson must include activities that students actually want to
do. Once the students get exciting about the content, they learn the information at a deeper level.
I have also found that making the content relevant to students make the world of a difference in
terms of how engaged they are in the content and how well they remember the information.

4. How will you use the knowledge you have gained through this professional self-
assessment to promote your continuous professional growth and collaboration?

After reviewing the ADEPT performance standards to analyze my progress in each criterion, I feel
that I have opened my eyes to my strengths and weaknesses in my instructional process. I plan
to continue to strive to improve my classroom management techniques to maximize use of
instructional time, manage non-instructional routines, and manage student behavior appropriately.
I feel that I can improve my classroom management by collaborating with other teacher and
completing my own research to learn about different techniques. I plan to experiment with
different strategies in my own classroom to determine which techniques work best for my
students. I plan to work with my future colleagues and within professional development programs
to improve upon my long-range planing process. I will use this evaluation to seek out professional
assistance from my mentor teacher during my first year of teaching, other school staff, and to also
do research on my own in order to improve my instruction. I will continue to reflect on the ADEPT
standards during my first year of teaching and beyond in order to become a better teacher in all
aspects of the standards.