Even those educators with years of experience tend to fall into a rut.  It’s natural human instinct to stagnate.  A refresher course or learning something new can benefit all teachers, whether their focus is the refinement of content area teaching skills or moving into a new area of study. Three of the most beneficial staff development offerings are Literacy Workshops, Six Traits of Writing and Special Education workshops.

Literacy workshops are an essential component of 21^st century success.  The future of a child depends highly on learning to read and write.  Lacking these skills will put a burden on our future as a society when these individuals remain unemployed, homeless, and/or unable to contribute to society. Literacy is not just an issue in our country, it exists worldwide.  Literacy workshops provide teachers with effective strategies to monitor children’s progress with information and tools for quick and meaningful assessment of a student’s knowledge and abilities.  Additionally, literacy workshops increase teacher knowledge of balanced literacy activities as well as create techniques designed to accelerate student acquisition of reading and writing skills.

Another staff development “must” is The Six Trait Writing Workshop.    Unlike any other model out there, the Six Traits are a wonderful way to objectively score student writing in any subject. The Six Traits provide a common language and greatly help with revisions and editing.  Moreover, the rubrics are guidelines for quality writing and scoring. Because the descriptors for each of the traits are easy to understand, scoring a student’s writing is a much simpler task for the teacher.  Best of all, the Six Trait’s can be used across the curriculum.  The model works well in all subject areas and writing assignments.  Students will find the Six Traits are not just something applied in English class, but in all areas.  Finally, the Six Traits are a wonderful tool for ESL students.  Teachers who have ESL students will find that their students writing will grow more rapidly when they apply the Six Traits, and teaching will become a lot less problematic.

Finally, Special Education staff development workshops are some of the best classes an educator can take, whether they have special education students in their classroom or not.  As schools become more inclusive, it is crucial that both special education teachers and general education teachers work together to adapt curriculum materials and teaching techniques to meet the needs of students with disabilities.  An inservice focusing on Special Education will train educators to work cooperatively and maintain joint responsibility for specified educational instruction. The general education teacher and the special education teacher will learn that they can collaboratively bring their skills, training, and perspectives together to strengthen teaching and learning opportunities. Collaboratively, their goal will be to provide appropriate classroom and homework assignments so that each student is learning, being challenged and participating. The ultimate goal of Special Education staff development is to achieve a balanced classroom.  Additionally, general education teachers will learn more about specific learning and behavioral disabilities and will use this knowledge to perfect their current responses to intervention (RTI).

Professional staff development is a continual process.  Teachers as well as principals need to be kept fresh and informed.  For more information about one or more of the classes mentioned, please contact Educational Training Specialists at 1-800-279-7135 or www.training4teachers.com.

While each state has its own set of guidelines for what counts as a teacher continuing education course, the most important qualification seems to be that it helps a teacher become better at his or her craft, or to be more effective in some way with students.  In most states, the course does not necessarily have to be from a college or university.  ETS has gone the extra mile to ensure that our courses will count in any state: we have sought continuing graduate credit from Chapman University that teachers can elect to receive (at a nominal additional fee, and after completing all necessary requirements of that course) after attending one of our teacher workshops, so as to ensure that every teacher training we offer will qualify in every state.

Yet, this extra step (and expense) is not always necessary.  For example, in Arizona, State Board (of Education) rule states that teacher professional development can be a combination of college credits and teacher workshops in a shorter period of time (say, during the last two years before certificate expiration), or teacher staff development or teacher workshops only if done over the 6 years between renewal.  Either way, the ability of teachers to choose provides some flexibility in how they approach their teaching license renewal.

While ETS offers trainings in the public, we often are contracted to perform in-district or schoolwide trainings.  What’s nice about either option is that each teacher in the training can choose whether or not they want to pursue the college credit on their own.  Let’s face it – those of us who have been in education for a long period of time know that, in many cases, opting (and paying for!) college credit is unnecessary once we reach the top of the salary schedule.  We are happy to receive the certificate for having attended the course.  Sitting at the same table during a staff development training, however, might be a second- (or fifth-, or seventh-) year teacher who needs that credit to move across the pay scale.  At ETS, we understand this only too well, and have committed ourselves to offering teachers that choice.

Finally, however you decide to pursue your continuing education units or staff development clock hours, I have only one piece of advice for you:  Make sure it’s time and money well-spent!

Teacher training company provides proven training for teachers working with English Language Learners

While many teachers can help students get to a basic level of proficiency in the English language, it takes an entirely different skill set to help English learners succeed at levels which will one day prepare them for higher education and the workforce

Phoenix, AZ (Vocus) July 30, 2009

Educational Training Specialists, LLC, the leading private provider of Arizona’s required Structured English Immersion training, is now offering these workshops nationwide. Anne Swigard, the company’s president, expanded its offerings to bring much-needed information and strategies to teachers who are working with English Language Learners.

“While many teachers can help students get to a basic level of proficiency in the English language, it takes an entirely different skill set to help English learners succeed at levels which will one day prepare them for higher education and the workforce,” says Anne Swigard, President of Educational Training Specialists, LLC. “Our research-based professional development workshops provide teachers with up to 70 new strategies to help English Learners succeed in their English-speaking classrooms.”

Swigard’s thematically-based, copyrighted training programs, ‘From Many Nations to One’ and ‘Around the World in 15 (or 45) Hours’ include proven methods to reach the ELL student population. Program components include:

• Best practices for English Learners
• Theoretical principles related to language acquisition
• Brain research
• Gold-standard educational research, such as ‘Classroom Instruction that Works’ (Robert Marzano, et al)
• Cooperative learning
• Elements of Effective Instruction
• High levels of participant (and thus, student) engagement
• High-interest literacy instruction and activities for struggling readers and writers
• A method for immediate reflection and application in the classroom environment

English Language Learners are the fastest-growing population of public school students in the U.S. Currently there are approximately 5 million ELLs enrolled in US schools. Having to learn a new language and adapt to a new culture presents a wide range of academic challenges; therefore, in many states, ELLs consistently lag behind other students in achievement, contributing to higher dropout rates. Research has shown that teachers are often unprepared to work with this portion of the student population. This combination of unprepared teachers and students struggling to learn a new language foretells an uncertain future for the United States.

“Most experts agree that if our schools are going to produce a competitive labor force, something indeed has to change,” said Swigard. “That change, in my opinion, is how we prepare both preservice and inservice teachers in the methods to effectively teach all of their students – especially those who are learning English.”

For more information about Educational Training Specialists and training for teachers of English Language Learners, visit www.training4teachers.com.

About Educational Training Specialists: Educational Training Specialists, LLC is a nationally recognized educational consulting company that provides personalized English Language Learning consulting to schools and districts across the U.S. Backed by more than a decade of research and development, the company’s unique programs address the pressing needs of today’s ELL teachers and administrators, helping participants improve their classroom strategies while earning valuable continuing education hours. For more information, visit www.training4teachers.com or call 1-800-279-7135.

Phoenix, AZ (PRWEB / Vocus) September 8, 2009 — Educational Training Specialists, LLC has announced that it has received approval from Chapman University to offer optional teacher continuing education college credits for all of the company’s teacher professional development offerings. Teachers can earn one to three credits per course, depending upon which workshop they have attended.
“Teachers should have the opportunity to choose whether they would like to receive continuing graduate credits for attending our workshops,” says Anne Swigard, President of Educational Training Specialists. “There seem to be few options for teachers to receive continuing graduate education courses without going to a traditional college or university. We offer training and practicum options that are immediately applicable in the classroom, strategies-packed, and void of tests and unnecessary research papers.”

Originally specializing in high-quality staff development for teachers of English Learners, Swigard says the company began planning to offer additional topics when her workshop trainees repeatedly asked her what else Educational Training Specialists had to offer. After doing a 3000-person survey, a core of topics emerged that seemed to have the widest appeal. The company now offers a number of training opportunities that can be held in a district or school, and that feature a wide array of topics. These include teacher workshops on:

According to Swigard, the company has gone to great lengths to ensure that each instructor is highly trained in the topic which she presents. The trainers all have a great deal of experience presenting to and teaching adults. Additionally, each trainer is a seasoned classroom teacher. This combination, she maintains, makes for an authentic, exciting learning experience for the attendees of ETS’s workshops.

“We have had the good fortune to have received almost 500 testimonials about how our trainings are changing teachers’ lives by imparting new strategies into their teaching,” reports Swigard. “My passion is to help educators to feel successful with all of their students, every day. At Educational Training Specialists, our credo is personal and professional excellence. In short, we love what we do.”

About Educational Training Specialists:

Educational Training Specialists, LLC is a nationally recognized educational consulting company that provides personalized English Language Learning consulting to schools and districts across the U.S. Backed by more than a decade of research and development, the company’s unique programs address the pressing needs of today’s ELL teachers and administrators, helping participants improve their classroom strategies while earning valuable continuing education hours. For more information, visit www.edtrainingspecialists.com or call 1-800-279-7135.

For more information, contact:

Anne Swigard, President
Educational Training Specialists, LLC
800-279-7135
anne (at) edtrainingspecialists (dot) com