Teacher Heidi Gallegos reflects on her experience as a Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING fellow during the foundation’s year-end luncheon at the Skirball in May of 2011.

At the Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING, we encourage our fellows to provide us with constructive feedback regarding their perception of the work we do at the ART of TEACHING.

Since 2008, we have captured fellows’ feedback via our annual survey, aimed at assessing their perception of the program and the likelihood that they will utilize what they have learned at the ART of TEACHING to continue to enhance their teaching practice even after their two-year fellowship has come to an end.

Last December, we reported the results of our 2011 survey of fellows, which revealed a collective belief among fellows that the ART of TEACHING enhanced their skills, increased their passion for teaching, and strengthened their ability to inspire students. Our fellows were adamant that the skills acquired as part of their ART of TEACHING fellowship would likely continue to enhance their practice well into the future.

We could not have been more pleased with those results, until this year, when we received the results of our 2012 survey. Once again, we asked fellows to candidly share their perception of the fellowship. And once again, their responses demonstrated an overwhelmingly positive perception of the fellowship and a strong belief that the ART of TEACHING has:

• Improved their ability to instruct
• Deepened their content knowledge pertaining to their area of focus
• Increased their passion for teaching and ability to inspire students
• Expanded their repertoire of teaching methods
• Encouraged collaboration among students and joint work among teachers
• Increased expectations of students’ learning
• Encouraged fellows to take on leadership roles at their schools
• Taught fellows skills that will continue to enhance their teaching practice even after completion of their fellowship

The positive feedback of our fellows, while a validation of our program, is really a testament to their hard work and the commitment of their mentors over the course of their fellowship.

At the ART of TEACHING, we believe an openness and a willingness to learn is one of many steps towards achieving “excellence in teaching”. Through our surveys, we hope to demonstrate that we too are open and willing to learn, to improve, and to enhance the impact of our fellowship. We invite you to view the full results of our 2012 survey here.

On the first day of their first year teaching, new teachers walk into their schools and meet their colleagues. They might talk about the latest state assessments, textbooks that have just arrived, or the newest project the district is spearheading. Some veteran teachers may tell the newcomers “how things are done” at the schools. And then, as teachers have done since the founding of public education in the U.S., they take leave of one another, walk to their classrooms to meet their students, and close the door. Continue reading…

Ivan Cheng, who spent more than two decades teaching math in Los Angeles schools, is one of a growing number of researchers who believe conventional methods for making teachers better don’t necessarily help their students. A professor of secondary education at California State University, Northridge, and a principal in a federal project looking for new ways to connect at-risk eighth graders with algebra, Cheng points to the billions of dollars spent on traditional professional development programs that have produced few results. Continue reading…

Webinar takes place on Thursday, April 5^th at 10:30 a.m. (PDT)

LOS ANGELES, March 29, 2012 – Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING announced today that it will co-present a live webinar, along with the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), entitled When Good Enough is Not Enough: Pursuing Teaching Excellence, taking place on Thursday, April 5, 2012 at 10:30 a.m. (PDT).

This web seminar will explore practices that promote and sustain teaching excellence, featuring the insights of Judy Johnson, Executive Director, Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING; Lucia Laguarda, Principal, Hemenway Elementary School in Massachusetts and Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING board member; Jodi Manby, Staff Developer, Growing Educators and ART of TEACHING alum; and Gregory Nicholson, Senior Program Officer at Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING.

Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING has collaborated with NCTE in the past, as a member of an alliance of stakeholder organizations in the National Center for Literacy Education project, which was launched by NCTE and the Ball Foundation in November 2011, in an effort to support literacy teaching and learning across a variety of disciplines.

When Good Enough is Not Enough: Pursuing Teaching Excellence is presented as part of NCTE’s Instructional Leadership Series, sponsored by the Ball Foundation, and is available to school leadership teams at no charge. To register for this webinar or for further information, click here.

Excerpt:

For half a century, external remedies have been tried and are not sufficient. If American education is to see major improvement, it is time to concentrate on the core components of what happens in the classroom—who is teaching, what is being taught, and how those key elements are funded. Those are the hard issues, and we have approached them timidly. Now, we must confront them forcefully.

To download full paper, click here.

Harry Gordon wasn’t exactly pushy in the email he sent me, but he made his point. He said he understood the Miramonte Elementary School scandal was a story that had to be done, but he wondered why there couldn’t also be a positive story about teachers. And he had one particular teacher in mind — his son. I liked the idea that Gordon was sticking up for his son, Patrick, 45, who teaches at Gahr High School in Cerritos and had just won an award named for the legendary East L.A. math teacher Jaime Escalante. Continue reading…

Judy Johnson, the executive director of the Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING, discusses the ART of TEACHING program, what makes it unique, and how fellows benefit from it.

Judy Johnson, the executive director of the Cotsen Foundation for the ART of TEACHING, offers advice to new fellows in the ART of TEACHING program, encouraging them to take advantage of the resources provided to them, to be passionate about their learning, and to be willing to take risks in the pursuit of teaching excellence.

Now bearing the imprimatur of 46 states and the District of Columbia, the Common Core State Standards represent a major step forward for schools and the students they must prepare to graduate from high school ready for college and careers. Yet a fundamental contradiction underlies the progress: While we are promoting radical change in creating a coherent national framework for what students should know and the way they learn, we have not yet committed to offering teachers the deep learning they will need to transform the way they work. Continue reading…