professional growth plan

This year has been a big growth year for my technology skills. However, just as technology is constantly changing, I will need to keep honing and practicing skills to maximize my use of technology in order to increase student learning. According to the American Educational Research Association:
To be effective, professional development must provide teachers with a way to directly apply what they learn to their teaching. Research shows that professional development leads to better instruction and improved student learning when it connects to the curriculum materials that teachers use, the district and state academic standards that guide their work, and the assessment and accountability measures that evaluate their success.
(Summer 2005 )
This research is supported by agencies such as National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future and Westchester Institute For Human Services Research who specifically identify effective professional development that:
• is integrated with district goals to improve education
• is designed according to teacher-identified needs
• provides a strong foundation in subject content and methods of teaching;
• is informed by research on teaching and learning
• is continuous and ongoing, providing follow-up support for further learning.
As the goal of my professional growth plan it to improve my skills and effectiveness as a teacher so as to increase student learning, I hope to create a plan supported by research.
The key components of my professional growth plan are as follows:
1) Maintain my content coach website using Google Sites, and incorporating Google Docs forms and discussions through Wiki Spaces. By using technology as an integral part of my daily work, I should increase proficiency.
2) Continue professional reading to stay updated on technology issues.
3) Utilize technology for both instruction and assessment in the lessons I design, both for students and when delivering professional development to teachers.
For me, continuing to integrate technology as a part of my teaching, likely utilizing the very helpful TIPS approach, is going to be key, as opposed to approaching technology instruction and integration as an “extra” that I need to try and fit in.
I find the daily briefs I receive from Education Week and ASCD Smartbrief to be very helpful keeping current on updates in education and technology in a quick and easy way; there are also notices of professional development opportunties. NCTE is also how I keep current in language arts/ English educational issues, research on best practices, and ongoing professional development opportunties. NCTE offers great webinars and a virtual conference each year that I can participate in, even while in Alaska! I have Edutopia and Thinkfinity bookmarked and I reference them pretty frequently as well.

References: 
Edutopia: http://www.edutopia.org
Thinkfinity: thinkfinity.org
ASCD: ascd.org
NCTE: ncte.org
Education Week / Ed Leadership: edweek.org