Take One! Takes Off Throughout Arizona
Take One! takes off throughout Arizona.
Many teachers consider National Board Certification to be the single most effective and significant form of professional development they have experienced. The self-reflection candidates undergo, coupled with the review of their portfolio by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) strengthens, validates and rejuvenates their practice. To increase access to this powerful opportunity, the NBPTS launched Take One!
Take One! is a powerful job-embedded professional learning opportunity designed for all educators. Through Take One!, teachers can fulfill a single entry from any current certificate area of National Board Certification, rather than the full four. Teachers can later transfer their score if they pursue full certification.
The Arizona K-12 Center is working to extend the opportunity offered by Take One! to teachers even in the state’s most rural areas. This year, the Center has supported Take One! programs in two distinctly remote communities—Chinle and Somerton.
“We’re committed to supporting professional development for teachers anywhere in Arizona,” says Kathy Wiebke, Executive Director of the Arizona K-12 Center. “We want teachers and administrators to see that Take One! can work in their communities, no matter what obstacles they may face.”
Meeting the challenge in Chinle.
Few if any areas are more challenged educationally than the Chinle School District on the Navajo Reservation in northeastern Arizona. Three hours drive from Flagstaff, and six hours from Phoenix, Chinle is isolated both geographically and economically. A severe shortage of teachers requires the district to hire up to 80% of their teachers from outside the community. This leads to massive attrition as new teachers often fail to cope with their remote surroundings, scant resources and cultural differences.
Yet passionate, dedicated teachers can still be found in Chinle, both from within the Navajo community and from the outside. And like great teachers anywhere, they are hungry to keep learning, to find new and better ways to prepare their students for a better life. With the support of the Arizona K-12 Center, Take One! is helping to nurture these teachers to perform at their best.
Sharon Deswood grew up in Window Rock on the reservation. She left for college but has returned to teach special ed. in Chinle. She is one of a cohort of teachers there who recently submitted their entries for Take One!.
“Seeing what I needed to improve on was a big eye opener for me,” she says. “Now I’m not just talking at students, but giving them the tools they need to learn.” Her willingness to undergo such rigorous self-reflection and act on it has produced results with her students. “They don’t seem as needy,” she notes. “Just by being acknowledged more they’ve got that satisfaction of being recognized.”
Ronda Tischer, an Ohio native, took a teaching job in Chinle right out of college seventeen years ago. She’s been there ever since. National Board Certification always intrigued her, but seemed too big. So Take One! was an attractive alternative.
“Now I can say I know why I do what I do,” Tisher reflects. “I can articulate how I know what I’m doing is the right thing.” Tisher also enjoyed the collaboration with other teachers in her cohort and plans to pursue full certification next year.
Rilla Fields is a resource for hearing impaired. Originally from Georgia, she has taught in Chinle for 18 years. She first came to apply the method of Cued Speech, which facilitates lip reading and therefore works for any language including Navajo. Chinle has a higher than average deaf population, but American Sign Language has never been broadly adopted.
“Take One! was an excellent educational experience for me,” Fields says. “So much so I would like to continue this.” She was especially impressed by the facilitators who visited Chinle. “People coming to us providing insight into how we look at what we do, gave that extra educational impact.”
The videotaping of her teaching also revealed significant insights: “I realized I just talked all the time, if my students were going to speak, that had to change.”
Somerton takes on Take One!
Draw a diagonal line on a map of Arizona from Chinle in the northeast to the southwest corner of the state, and you come to the agricultural town of Somerton, outside of Yuma. Its schools draw from a largely Latino-American community, in addition to Native Americans from the nearby Cocopah Indian reservation. So, a majority of students are English Language Learners (ELLs), who face cultural as well as language-based obstacles to learning.
Ricardo Madrid, in his fourth year of teaching at Tierra Del Sol Elementary in Somerton, was once an ELL himself. In fact, not repeating some experiences he had as a student is among his core motivations for teaching. “I’m a teacher because of the teachers who didn’t make a difference with me,” he says. “I thought I’m not going to be one of those teachers.”
Completing Take One! has helped Madrid further this mission. “After Take One!, I understand I have been missing things,” he says. “I’m more conscious of what I’m doing, the difference I can make.” This has directly impacted his classroom performance. “I sat down and planned student interactivity with every lesson - science, math even spelling. The students love it and so do I.”
Sahara Cassidy teaches fourth grade at Tierra Del Sol. Originally from Guadalajara, Mexico where she studied in bilingual schools, she was motivated to do Take One! by her students. “Many of my kids are already disadvantaged,” she says. “They deserve a teacher that is committed to do whatever it takes as a teacher.”
The videotaping component made a special impact on her. “I had never seen myself teaching, actually observing what my students were doing, rather than just delivering a lesson and hoping they would give me something back.”
The principal of Madrid and Cassidy’s school is Veronica Lopez. Lopez has been instrumental in encouraging teachers to do Take One! and is a participant herself.
“I pride myself in walking the walk and talking the talk,” she says. “I’m showing I’m part of this learning community.” In addition to setting a good example, she’s gained real benefits as well: “It has made me more reflective of practices as a coach.”
In addition to expanding teachers individually, Lopez has observed how Take One! has had a collective effect as well. Every week her teachers meet by grade to collaborate on lesson plans. Those who participated in Take One! are “guiding where planning is going. They now realize that they are instructional leaders at our site and grade level. They are really asking probing questions, looking at their whole profession in a different way.”
Wiebke sees Chinle and Somerton as powerful examples of how teachers can be nurtured to succeed anywhere in Arizona. “This just shows that no teachers and districts should count themselves out,” Wiebke says. “Take One! is a great way to expand professional development throughout the state.”
EVENT SPOTLIGHT
Sheltered Instruction in Culturally Relevant Classrooms
Dates: July 14-17, 2008 and November 13-15, 2008
Location: Desert Willow Conference Center
4340 East Cotton Center Boulevard, Phoenix
Times: 8:00am-4:00pm daily
Cost: $350
Deadline: 6/6/2008
Notes: This class meets the 45 Completion Hours necessary to obtain a full SEI Endorsement (when combined with the initial SEI 15 Hour Provisional).
Architects of learning are mindful of today’s culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms. Classroom structures include varied readiness levels, interests, background knowledge, learning styles, cultures and languages. This learning opportunity will provide any education professional the necessary tools to build a foundation for successful content and language acquisition. You will learn to construct effective lessons based on State Content and English Language Proficiency Standards. Design meaningful learning activities that will allow all students access to key academic concepts. Explore research-based instructional strategies. Examine multiple formal and informal assessments and use data as a framework for informing instruction. Discover innovative ways to create home/school/community connections. Participants will learn from some of the nation’s most respected educators. Featured in the July instruction is, Dr. Deborah Short, one of the authors of the SIOP Model. In November, learners will have the opportunity to learn from the nationally known educator Catherine Brown. A wide variety of instructional practices will be addressed. If you’ve experienced SIOP training with us in the past, this will broaden your perspective with new, highly relevant content. Teachers, coaches, administrators, ELL directors, principals and superintendents are all welcome. Be prepared to walk away with effective instructional strategies, refine current classroom practice, and enhance your instructional leadership in the area of sheltered instruction.
STAFF PROFILE
Ashlee Markey
Event Coordinator
Ashlee, the Center’s newest staff member, focuses on supporting the National Board Certification program. She is available to answer any questions you might have related to National Board and the support programs we offer. If you attend one of the large group meetings, there’s a good chance you’ll come across Ashlee working to make sure all goes smoothly.
Originally from Portland, OR, Ashlee thought she would study education when she attended the University of Arizona. She decided she was more of a behind-the-scenes type of person so she switched to psychology, but is happy to be working with teachers now.
“The teachers are always so grateful for any help you can give them,” she says, “and it’s exciting to see people at all points in the National Board Certification process, because they put so much work into it.”
Ashlee enjoys the sunny weather here, since she went so long without it in Portland, as well as spending time with her family. She is also an avid traveler having spent time in South Africa and Europe.