Need Professional Development?

Yeah right - most teachers now a days have SO much professional development that they can't stand the term. They groan and whine. There are better things to do with their time, like grading papers, writing interactive lesson plans, and such.

But for those of you who still need some PD, I found a great place to get some online. Yes, at night in your jammies you can get your PD hours in. I found it when doing a search on the US Department of Education's Technology homepage. Under the "features" there is a place that says Get Online Professional Development Now. Being a curious person, I clicked on the link and it took me to PAEC. What's PAEC? It's the Panhandle Area Educational Consortium, and in 2006 they committed to continuing support of their online course site. Their courses are good for credit in 49 different states and you can actually create a personal portfolio to track and manage your own professional development activities. The courses are 15 minutes of streaming video with reflective questions and small tasks to help foster understanding. If you want to complete the entire course, you're looking at 2 hours. There are courses in ELA, science, math and other topics. What other topics? "Turning Data into Information", "Differentiated Instruction", and "Got History? Effective Practices" are just a few.

I might enroll in a few of the courses and see what they are like. They are free, thanks to a grant from the Federal Government. It's nice to see our tax dollars at work in a good way. Has anyone else checked these courses out? What's your thought?