New Mexico Teacher Competency

Competency 9: The teacher works productively with colleagues, parents and community
members.
Competency 9 is working with parents, teachers, and community members. This is
important because teaching is a social process. It takes time and effort to create relationships that
support effective learning.
Parents
Parents need to know the teacher cares about their child. To show the parents this, a
positive relationship needs to be established early on. We need to foster ongoing going open
communication from the onset. This can be done through emails, phone calls, class events,
meetings, and a variety of reports, such as contracts.
While working at the YMCA with the after school program I created a behavior plan
based on positive reinforce and recorded daily. I was able to set this up because I had already had
established a positive relationship with the parents.
Colleagues
I found team teaching with others was more effective than teaching in isolation. I saw this
working at the YMCA, with my mentor teachers and as an Educational Assistant. The best
example was the partnership between my mentor teacher and another 5th grade teacher. They met
every day and discussed problems and concerns along with successes. They provided each other
with support that ranged from sharing curriculum ideas to behavioral management strategies.
Another mentor I worked with had had 12 other student teachers. He said he loved the
conversation student teachers brought, the new ideas from their college courses and the team
teaching it made possible with 2 adults in the classroom.
Community
Over the course of the semesters I saw my mentor teachers use projects to bring
classroom community together on a daily basis.
One example of tapping into the community was a Mock Trial unit my mentor teacher
used in her class to teach the standards related to the legal system. My mentor teacher had been
an attorney before becoming a teacher. By connecting with people she had known as an attorney
and some parents of students who were attorneys, she was able to arrange a field trip to the court
house and observe a trial. After having the students see the courtroom first hand, they were then
more able to organize a mock trial of their own. My mentor teacher continued to bring in people
outside the classroom. For instance she included other school staff members to participate. The
principle was the judge, students from other classrooms participated as an audience for the trial.
She worked with the third grade teachers to organize the third grade students to be the jury. The
parents helped organize costumes and scenery. This unit was a big success in numerous ways.
The most exciting outcome was the success of a student who had a stuttering problem. He was so

excited about his speech in the trial that he practiced it over and over again. He was able to
perform his part without any stuttering.
Artifact
The artifact I am including in my portfolio is a sample lesson plan. I chose this because it
represents the biggest impact collaboration has had on me during my student teaching. My
mentor teacher spent hours with me helping me fine tune my lesson plans. I would write what I
thought were complete lesson plans. I included all the areas required. Then my mentor teacher
would go through the plan with me. Her questions and ideas help me to see the importance of
organization and thoughtful planning. We both agreed this was my area of weakness. It was very
reassuring I had support as I faced this challenge. Just when I thought I had included everything
possible in a lesson, she would ask me a question which brought out a whole line of things I
hadnt thought about. Because of these sessions, my plans greatly improved and I began to learn
the numerous details that needed to be addressed in a plan.