Educators engage in professional learning.
When I consider professional learning, I think about the Do piece in education. Those experiential learning opportunities are the ones students seem to most often connect with. Following that thought, those would be the opportunities I want to provide. When I think of my professional learning, I look at what I have done in the past few years. I have participated in land-based learning, trauma-centred learning opportunities, and various ADST-based skills.
Most recently I have been working on hand-sewing a quilt. This quilt is meant to be a gift for my maid of honour but symbolizes so much more. It is a tapestry of fabrics from multiple generations of my family and has been built with my blood sweat and tears. My maid of honour is one of the most amazing women I have ever met. She is this strong and beautiful Indigenous woman who has been faced with numerous hardships in her short 25 years. We have always had a strong connection, but most of the things we have done together were things like learning how to bead and build regalia together. We learned how to Jingle dance together.
The new opportunities I involve myself in allow me to bring new skills and experiences into the classroom. The more I do, the more I can teach. I believe that that is the bottom line of what professional learning looks like.