Here is my 2015-2016 professional growth statement:
I want to finally use pausing, a collaborative norm for any group, in the real way, not mechanically. I hope that doing this will allow me to get a window into what my students are getting, really getting, from my instruction. I want to always explore what I need to do to ensure that my students and I are at the highest possible level of communicative awareness of what each other is saying/thinking during class.
I may have at my fingertips all the best skills and strategies in the world, but without that window, that awareness of what my students are really getting, then those skills and strategies cannot be used to maximum effect in the instructional process.
Not only do I want to be able to be aware of what my own students are honestly and truly getting from my instruction, I also want to develop the capacity to be able to listen to myself while teaching. What does this mean? It means that I want to always observe my own instructional self, monitoring my instruction from within, with a kind of compassion for myself. I want to be able to forgive myself when things aren’t going perfectly.
I like to know that I don’t have to learn TPRS right now perfectly.