• Cover page for your IPDP
• Core competencies: self assessment and plan of action
• CDA : self assessment and plan of action
• Standards for Vermont Educators of the Department of Education: self assessment and plan of action

• Meet Richard, an assistant teacher. He currently teaches in a licensed child care center where he has been a teacher and a substitute for five years. Richard decided to use the Vermont Northern Lights Core Competencies when developing his IPDP.
• Meet Rosa. She operates a registered home day care. She has been in the early childhood profession for fifteen years and earned her CDA two years ago. Rosa has chosen the Child Development Associate format for developing her IPDP.
• Meet Melanie. She is an afterschool program coordinator and decided to use the Core Competencies for Afterschool Professionals to write her IPDP.
• Meet Maeve. She is a teacher-director in an inclusive, licensed child care center, where she has been an Essential Early Education teacher for seven years. Maeve has a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology with a minor in Special Education. She uses the Standards for Vermont Educators as part of her public school licensure.

• Documentation of Professional Development form (click here for PDF version)
• Knowledge and Practices to Promote the Emotional and Social Development of Young Children- This document provides a comprehensive overview of the many kinds of information, skills, and practices needed to promote the emotional health of young children in our communities. It is designed to help individuals and community teams identify their strengths as well as areas for learning and growth around the Infant and Young Child, the Family, the Community, and Interpersonal Relationships and Teamwork. The sections about the Infant and Young Child and the Family include knowledge and practices for use in group-care settings like child care centers, day care homes, early intervention programs, and other early childhood education programs. http://www.healthvermont.gov/mh/docs/cafu/2002/emotional_social_devel.html
• Remember to check out the Career Advising Guide for Early Childhood Professionals for other information about opportunities for professional development

Excerpt from Planning Your Professional Growth
Planning Your Professional Development: An Overview

• Why is my professional development important?
• What is an IPDP?
• How do I get started?
• What are the different frameworks that I can use to structure my IPDP?
• What will my IPDP look like?
• Why should I create an IPDP?

Why is my professional development important?
Children deserve the very best we can provide for them. They deserve to be in the best possible environments. They deserve to be surrounded by opportunities and materials that support their optimal development. Most important, they need to be in relationships with caring, responsive, and knowledgeable adults.

The quality of children’s experiences depends largely on the knowledge and experience, skills, and dispositions of the people who work with them. Everyone who works with children and their families needs to understand early childhood education, and afterschool professionals must understand their special context as well. As your professional interests and the demands of these fields change, it is important to expand your knowledge and skills. This document can help you to prepare and carry out a personalized professional development plan to attain your goals.

What is an IPDP?
An Individual Professional Development Plan (IPDP) is a thoughtfully developed guide designed by you to increase your knowledge, skills, and expertise for working with children and their families over a period of time in any setting.

In your well-designed IPDP, you will do four basic things:

1. Assess your current interests, knowledge, and skills.
2. Prioritize specific areas for growth.
3. Clarify strategies, and identify resources and your plan of action.
4. Reflect on your progress and professional growth.

Your investment of time and money in professional development will be most effective when you know what you want and need to learn. Since no two people are identical in their interests, skills, knowledge, or professional situation, no single plan for professional development will work for everyone. For this reason, you must create your own professional development plan. Furthermore, the IPDP is a process as well as a document. It guides your professional growth and reflects changes over time as you achieve your goals.

How do I get started?
There is no single approach that works for everyone. Some people have certain frameworks or formats in mind for developing their plans, while others look for examples to give them ideas. If you are starting from scratch, here are some steps to make this process easier and more useful for you. Find some worksheets later in this booklet that also will help you.

First, prepare to write your IPDP:

1. Think about what you do now and what you would like to do in the future professionally. (For example, see the Vermont Early Childhood Career Lattice, page 11.)
2. Find a mentor or knowledgeable colleague to guide and support you. (See “Finding a Mentor” on the following pages.)
3. Find out if your employer or program uses a particular IPDP format, or select a framework to guide your thinking and professional development choices. (See “Professional Development Frameworks” section in this booklet, page 5.)

Then, write your IPDP by following these steps:

1. Assess your current knowledge and skills.
2. Prioritize what you want and need to work on.
3. Clarify your strategies and timeline, and identify the resources you need.
4. Implement your plan.

Finally:

• Reflect on and document your new learning and growth.
• Periodically revise your IPDP to reflect your growth, new professional interests, and needs.

What are the different frameworks that I can use to structure my IPDP?
There are several options available to you. You may already have a framework that you are using that you can continue to use. However, your setting and employer may require one particular framework. If you don’t have one already, there are several different choices. Three of the more common frameworks are listed below:

• Core Competencies for Early Childhood and Afterschool Professionals
  Designates five Core Knowledge Areas. Within these, there are specific core competencies across all levels of professional development, from Level I (entry level) and beyond. The core competencies are an all-encompassing framework for professional development, appropriate for early childhood and afterschool professionals in Vermont. Download the full text of the core competencies at http://northernlightscdc.org.
• Child Development Associate (CDA)
  Designates eight competency goals that are common to all early childhood settings including home visiting and classroom settings, with children birth to pre-kindergarten. This framework comes from the CDA Council for Professional Recognition, the national organization that awards the CDA credential. This credential is used by Head Start programs and is a logical step in the Vermont Child Care Apprenticeship Program and Career Level II in the Vermont Northern Lights Career Development Center system. A similar national credential is the early stages of development for afterschool professionals. Find more details about the CDA at http://www.cdacouncil.org.
• Five Standards for Vermont Educators from the Vermont Department of Education
  Highlights the five standard areas for obtaining or maintaining a license to teach in the Vermont public school system, including public-private partnerships with other early childhood programs. These five areas are Learning, Professional Knowledge, Colleagueship, Advocacy, and Accountability. Early childhood or afterschool professionals at the Bachelor’s degree level or above are strongly encouraged to seek teacher licensure with endorsement in early childhood education, early childhood special education, elementary education, or related fields. Find more information at http://education.vermont.gov.

What will my IPDP look like?
Some individuals are part of programs or organizations that are already using their own goal-setting and professional planning formats. Others may choose to use one that corresponds with the three frameworks listed above. Many formats are acceptable when you assess, prioritize, clarify, and reflect in your IPDP.

Why should I create an IPDP?
Your professional practice is the way that you go about working with children and their families on a daily basis. Professionals strive to apply the most current knowledge of the field in realistic, effective, and creative ways. The ongoing improvement of your professional practice is necessary for yourself and for the children you work with. It keeps the work interesting!

Reflective practice is a term used to describe the way professionals approach the successes and challenges in their careers. When you engage in reflective practice, you show a commitment to problem-solving. This means that you are willing to admit that there may be problems, and then investigate the issues. You decide what to do in situations based on all of the information, past experiences, resources, and knowledge available to you, and follow through with your decisions. You seek changes in yourself, in others, and in the systems in which you work. Reflective practice is the hallmark of professionals.

Your IPDP helps you to hone your professional practice. Even the most masterful teachers benefit from the process of writing and maintaining their own IPDPs. To provide children with the best, it is important that we strive for the best in ourselves, personally and professionally. Your IPDP serves as a map, but it alone will not take you to your destination. It is simply an important tool to support your ongoing growth and contributions to children and families. The rest is up to you!

To read more, download the full Planning Your Professional Growth document at the top of this page!

© Northern Lights Career Development Center
Last modified August 5, 2007