professional development

  • Preschool Infant Toddler Assessment

    Easy Portfolios and Assessments for Early Childhood

    It’s almost spring (I’m trying to be optimistic here…), and in many places that means that it’s time to think about finishing up assessments and portfolios for the end of the school year. If you’re about to jump into that, let me help! I’ve got another video for you today that walks through why I created my own assessments, and how you can take advantage of this for your program – they really do make life so much easier! If you want to read more about these assessments and some of the different ways they can be used, then this post is exactly what you’re looking for!

  • 3 Words

    This is an interesting challenge: What 3 words describe you as a teacher? I really had to sit and think about this for a while, the words that immediately popped into my mind as far as adjectives that are generally used to describe me didn’t really seem to fit when I apply them to myself as a teacher – which is interesting in itself.  Here are the three words that I finally came up with: 1. Observant.  Not only did I regularly observe my students to gauge their interests and assess their level of understanding, I was also incredibly observant of their behaviors and emotions. If there was something going…

  • Friday Freebie – Professional Development Plan

    Happy Friday! This week I’ve shared a ton of opportunities for professional development – webinars, publications, and really great conferences.  Today’s freebie will help you plan and track all of your professional development efforts. These Professional Development Plans are not only helpful, they’re also cute.  That’s important because your PD Plan should be something that you want to post and look at every day.  Go download yours and have a wonderful weekend!

  • Amazing Conferences for Early Childhood Educators

    I’ve mentioned before that I consider myself a professional development nerd.  There is just something about a room full of teachers learning new things that I can’t resist.  One of my favorite things to do is attend a great conference, and if you’ve followed this blog for a while you’ve certainly seen my posts from the NAEYC conference.  Right now is the perfect time to start researching upcoming conferences and planning for those that you’d like to attend.  Many local AEYC conferences happen in the spring, there are all kinds of specialty conferences throughout the summer, and the big one – NAEYC is in the fall.  If you start planning…

  • Easy Resources

    I’m always looking for an Early childhood resource on some topic or another – things to share with families, articles to help teachers that I know are dealing with tough stuff in the classroom, ideas for encouraging best practice, and strategies for managing behavior issues.  The first place that I always turn is NAEYC. If you aren’t familiar with NAEYC then you must be living under a rock – I’m joking, but the National Association for the Education of Young Children is a source I trust completely, which is why I look there first.  Here are some of my favorite publications from NAEYC: Position Statements: These documents help professionals understand…

  • Free Early Childhood Webinars

    One of my favorite things about the field of Early Childhood Education is that things are always changing.  This means that I am constantly learning something new about best practices, educational theories and techniques, and innovative strategies.  I am a professional development nerd, I love trainings, seminars, and conferences, and I regularly sit through webinars solely because I find the subject matter fascinating. I wanted to share one of my favorite professional development resources with all of you and I’m hoping that you will enjoy it as much as I do.  You’ve got to check out Early Childhood Investigations, the free webinars available on this site are written by experts…

  • NAEYC 2014 – Sessions on my radar

    Happy NAEYC Conference Kick off day! I thought I’d do a quick write up about the sessions that have grabbed my attention, but let’s be real, it won’t be quick, it’ll probably be really long, because there are so many! Before we get into that I want to tell you what else I’m doing to celebrate. For the rest of the week all of my Portfolios and Assessments are 20% off! So if you are looking for ideas for portfolios, or new assessments, please take a minute to see what I’ve got, they are all standards-based and so helpful! Ok, so here are the session that I’m most interested in.…

  • Countdown to the NAEYC Conference

    I am so excited about this year’s NAEYC Conference.  I attended my first NAEYC conference in 2010 and fell in love with the whole experience.  I love the sessions, I love the expo hall, I love meeting teachers from all over the country, and I love love love traveling with my favorite teachers! This year is especially important for me because I get to present.  I love public speaking (I know, I’m weird), and giving teachers new ideas that makes their jobs easier is just about my favorite thing, so I am super pumped (I mentioned that I’m excited right). I got my badge in the mail this weekend and…