Billions of dollars are spent annually across the United States on teacher professional development, but how much of this money makes a real difference and is relevant to teacher’s development? outcomes?
As a classroom teacher for more than fifteen years, I spent hundreds of hours in conventional professional development sessions Some examples would include a 20-minute after school training on “compassion circles” and mandatory ESL and standardized testing raining. These experiences, however well-intentioned and costly, did not really create long-term changes in my teaching practices. So, what's more effective? There is a useful distinction between traditional “professional development” and professional learning. Professional development, which “happens to” teachers, is often associated with one-time workshops, seminars, or lectures, and is typically a one-size-fits all approach. In contrast, professional learning, when designed well, is typically interactive, sustained, and customized to teachers' needs. It encourages teachers to take responsibility for their own learning and to practice what they are learning in their own teaching contexts.
Effective professional learning not only has the potential to improve both teaching and student outcomes, but can also be effective in recruiting and retaining teachers. According to research, high-quality professional learning:
Teachers must decide to improve their practice before systemic change can happen through professional development activities.
To assist the professional development process for both teachers and IT professionals, Digital Promise, in conjunction with Google, has established a new program called the Dynamic Learning Project to help introduce new education technology into the classroom. 
 
EdTech magazine has identified 5 Key Areas of Technology Professional Development for Teachers: 

1. Content Focus: When providing technology coaching, concrete examples are key.

 

1. Active Learning: Similar to the success teachers have found with students through new pedagogical practices, allowing teachers to actively engage in their own learning can help them retain lessons on using technology to solve classroom challenges.

 

1. Sustained Duration: The idea behind this one is relatively simple: Training takes time..
   
   
2. Collective Participation: Along with learning from trained technology coaches, some of the best sources for educators are other educators. Teachers involved in technology integration worked with each other to share ideas for ways to use their new tools to engage students. 
   
   
3. Coherence: While all four of the previous points are important, the most crucial component is guiding these principles around school-specific goals for outcome improvement. Utilizing data analytics can be a helpful way to understand where technology can best be injected into a school curriculum.

Guided with these principles and with an assignment from my graduate professor, I’ve set out to do some professional development on my own. My goal was very practical, how I can use online tools to enhance collaboration in my classroom.
My first stop was a youtube.com, there I was able to find a very informative webinar: Tech Tools for Interactive Remote Teaching Webinar Tech tools for interactive remote teaching webinar with Sam Kary of The New EdTech Classroom. In this webinar, Sam shows different strategies for how to make remote teaching more interactive and engaging for students.
There I’ve learned how to combine some tools I’ve been already using in my classroom to make my students interact with me as well as with each other more effectively.
My second stop was EdTechTeam website where I’ve learned how to create digital lessons in google slides.
My third and final stop for that day was a Tick Tock app, where I followed #algebra and handpicked a few really impressive videos on how to factor a trinomial.
Now, I am ready to create my own lesson with these tools at my disposal! Stay

I’ve created this choice board for my Financial Foundations class. The whole Unit study is presented in this mode. Students are allowed to choose two or more activities to complete. The activities are structured in a way that allows students to make choices on how deep to go into the unit depending on their previous experience with taxes as well as their preferences to work with math topics vs exploration of the topic. Students are asked to complete enough activities to make at least 50 total points. By design they must complete at least 3 activities of their choice. This form allows for a good degree of flexibility and differentiation. I hope you enjoy exploring this choice board!
Follow the link to see the choice board: Taxes: who and how?