Professional Development at the Middle-Level

 

What does it mean to be a professional middle-level educator?  What do you see in the field as far as professionalism from your teacher and others?

“… all educators experience professional learning in the workplace regardless of the intentionality of the organization to foster such learning or even the intentionality of the individual to learn.” (Bickmore, 2014)

 

              I chose the quote above from the AMLE article, “Professional Learning and Professional Development in the Middle Grades” because I liked the way it emphasized that intentional or not, learning is a pillar of being a great professional middle-level teacher. Whether it be from a pedagogical standpoint or staying curious about your students and curriculum.

As an adult who is in her early 40’s, I’ve also had the opportunity to identify and understand how I learn best both from an understanding and retention perspective. I know I learn best when collaborating and practicing. I retain information better from hearing it being explained to me vs reading it from a book or text. This information can also help guide me in my own professional development as I plan a student IPDP and future IPDP’s as a licensed teacher. I will ensure I’m choosing topics that will make me a better teacher for my students while choosing platforms and experiences that will maximize the learning outcomes for me personally.

And what’s great is that I don’t have to learn only from those people within the building that I teach. I greatly enjoyed learning about the various organizations that support middle-level educator development as part of this module. AMLE is one that I have been most familiar to this point, using their website for articles to support course research in previous classes. I love their mission statement: “AMLE is a membership organization dedicated to helping middle school educators reach every student, grow professionally, and create great schools. We do this by empowering educators to create opportunities to cultivate the potential and possibilities of young adolescents,” (AMLE, 2023). We don’t have to do it alone and these organizations help to weave connectivity through the middle-level environment not only in our country, but throughout the world. Their extensive library of professional development material, research articles, podcasts, blogs, and videos is as helpful as it is impressive.

              I have also learned from the material in this course that the professional environment as a middle-level educator is focused on collaboration, teaming, and a interdisciplinary approach (AMLE, 2013). Other than the students, I believe these elements are what drew me to middle-level teaching. I thrive in an environment where I hold some level of expertise, but the team only succeeds through leveraging the powers of the whole. This collaborative experience fosters the environment for learning… learning from peers, learning about different content areas, and learning how to improve working together with other people.  

 

 

 

References

 

AMLE. (2013, November 6). Influence of the Middle School on American Education. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nSXYsAfvgQ

Bickmore, D. (2014, October). https://www.amle.org/professional-learning-and-professional-development-in-the-middle-grades/. July 20, 2025, https://www.amle.org/professional-learning-and-professional-development-in-the-middle-grades/

Home. AMLE. (2023, August 7). https://www.amle.org/