edTPA? Good Grief!

Abstract

Over the course of six months, edTPA went from being an abstract jumble of letters thrown around to describe some assessment that we were going to have to do at some point before graduation (yes, the conversations were that uncertain) to a very concrete mountain that each member of my cohort was expected to climb triumphantly, in spite of the fact that the road to the top was still in the process of being built. In the beginning, I tried to pretend it didn’t exist, in the middle I found myself grappling with how to best fit into a model that didn’t seem to appreciate who I was as a teacher, and in the end I accepted that I had to jump through the hoop of fire at the end of the road if I wanted the medal of state certification hung round my neck. In psychology, they’d say I went through the five stages of grief and loss—denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Now how’s that for a resounding endorsement for edTPA?

Keywords

• Student teachers
• Student teacher evaluations
• Teachers
• Teacher certification
• Teacher certification standards
• Teacher training
• Education
• Applied linguistics
• edTPA