Professional Development
Teachers use a big chunk of summer break for professional development. Whether it's reading professional books with colleagues, taking on line courses, completing college classes, or participate in "live" training, the learning continues.
I just spent the last four days (of my summer break) with over 35 St. Lucie County teachers learning how to be effective teacher leaders to increase student achievement. Next week, teachers from across our district will participate in collaborative planning training and over 45 teachers spent last Friday gaining knowledge and ideas about how to integrate STEM activities in their classrooms. Sometime in July, I will be attending a Ruby Payne training along with other St. Lucie County educators. The list goes on.
Not only do we participate in "live" professional development, we also read professional books and journals to learn more techniques to use in our classrooms. While reading these books, many educators take notes and practice some of these strategies in order to be ready to use them with students in August. As of now I have a total of seven books I plan on completing by the time August rolls around.
Finally, many teachers complete graduate courses during the summer. Personally, I'm working on two classes. One is on-line while the other will meet for one full week in Boca Raton. I really don't mind as it will get me one step closer to a Masters in Reading!
Planning
Not only do educators spend a big part of their summer break improving their craft via professional development, we also plan for the coming school year. This begins with reflecting on what worked this past school year and what didn't. My grade group will join me at my house for a few days (not consecutively) to unpack the standards and plan for the first months of the school year. Planning begins with looking at the standards. What do we want our students to learn? What is the goal? Then we look at how we are going to assess them. What will be some formative assessments and informative assessments? Then we research best practices and choose activities, books, etc. As you can see, planning is very time consuming.
Setting up the classroom
Contrary to popular belief, we are not given a week to get our classrooms ready before the students report. At best, we are given two full days. Most of us spend the last two weeks of our summer break in our classrooms cleaning, creating those bulletin boards, arranging our classroom libraries, distributing classroom supplies, etc.
Finally, Vacation!
Yes, we do take vacation! This is needed to recharge the "batteries" before a new set of 22 students enter our classrooms in August. I usually carve out 2 full weeks of "fun in the sun", shopping, traveling, and just relaxing!
I just LOVE what I do and I happily do what I must in order to prepare for a new school year, as do many educators. In the end, we do what we do for the students.
