High School English Teacher

Role Overview 

AISJ High School English teachers model the way. We model what we teach for our scholars.  High school teachers know that we measure our success by the learning that is taking place inside and outside of the classroom, and not the teaching alone.  High School teachers believe that by working in partnership with our parents, scholars, and greater community, all of our scholars will be prepared for success to get to and through college and make an impact on the world at large around them through collaboration, innovation, and excellence.

Job Responsibilities

Planning and Preparation for Learning

• Demonstrates lesson design with standards and unit outcomes in mind
• Demonstrates planning with consideration of differentiation needs, scholar engagement, and anticipates scholars’ misconceptions and confusions using a Unit Delivery Plan
• Demonstrates a plan for summative and formative assessments to monitor scholar learning
• Demonstrates content knowledge
• Review and update curriculum   

Classroom Management

• Is direct, specific, consistent, and tenacious in communicating and enforcing very high expectations.
• Shows warmth, caring, respect, and fairness for all students and builds strong relationships.
• Successfully inculcates class routines up front so that students maintain them throughout the year.
• Gets all students to be self-disciplined, take responsibility for their actions, and have a strong sense of efficacy
• (follow up) Is alert, poised, dynamic, and self-assured and nips virtually all discipline problems in the bud.  

Delivery of Instruction

• Orchestrates highly effective strategies, materials, and groupings to involve and motivate all scholars.

Professional Responsibilities

• Designs each lesson with clear, measurable goals closely aligned with standards and unit outcomes.
• Collaborates with colleagues to plan units, share teaching ideas, and look at student work.
• Seeks out effective teaching ideas from colleagues, workshops, and other sources and implements them well.

• Gets all scholars highly involved in focused work in which they are active learners and problem-solvers.
• Successfully reaches all scholars by skillfully differentiating and scaffolding

Monitoring Assessment & Follow-up

• Frequently check for understanding and adjusting teaching, re-teaching and follow-up from the data
• Analyze and reflect on collected data to continuously ensure lesson & unit plans are designed to meet student needs
• Gives students a well-constructed diagnostic assessment up front, and uses the information to fine-tune instruction.
• Has students set ambitious goals, continuously self-assess, give feedback, and take responsibility for improving performance.

Family and Community Outreach

• Communicates respectfully with parents and is sensitive to different families’ cultures and values.
• Shows parents a genuine interest and belief in each child’s ability to reach standards.
• Gives parents clear expectations for student learning and behavior for the year.
• Promptly informs parents of behavior and learning problems, and also updates parents on good news.
• Updates parents on the unfolding curriculum and suggests ways to support learning at home. 
• Responds promptly to parents' concerns and make parents feel welcome in the school.

Collaboration

• Working with colleagues to analyze data for placements and reflect on work (what worked and what did not work)
• Seeking and accepting feedback from colleagues to improve student growth
• Capitalizing on each other’s strengths and working with each other’s areas of growth

Other Responsibilities

• Engage with community in after-school activities 
• Engage with community in open communication
• Supervision duties will be assigned
• After School Activity (1/week) and office hours (2/week)

Profile of the candidates who fits this position and core values

• Future Friendly/Focused: annually set professional goals that are focused on future growth.
• Reflective: reflective on their own professional practices and open to feedback from colleagues and administrative supervisors. Being reflective for self-awareness and challenging oneself inward, to assess and think about ways to continue to grow as an individual.
• Intrinsically Motivated Practitioner: be intrinsically motivated and proactive in their professional practice
• Open Communication: communicate clearly with all stakeholders. Keeping open lines of communication with colleagues, parents and scholars. Communication is key! Being open, honest, respectful, consistent, direct, and clear is a recipe for success, connectedness and contribute in a healthy overall working environment
• Open-Mindedness to Neurodiversity: will respond to the needs of their scholars through learning experiences that cater to different zones of proximal development.
• Open Collaborator: works with colleagues to plan and consider data to inform instruction that ultimately impacts the scholar's academic and personal outcomes.
• Engaged: is engaged with their community and seeks ways to positively contribute within the school walls and at various community events.
• Resilient/Adaptive:  Being open to change and to considerable variety in the workplace.

• Knowledge of current practices: displays knowledge and expertise in learning and teaching strategies that potentially align with AISJ’s philosophy of learning and teaching.
• Agentic Learners / Teachers: has voice, choice, and ownership of their learning and teaching practices and will promote them among the scholars
• Data informed: uses data to inform learning and teaching. They will collect and analyze data and consequently use the data to take action to enhance learning for all scholars.
• Scholar Centered: adopts an approach to learning that is centered on scholars and that allows scholars to construct their own knowledge and understanding of the world around them.
• Driven:  is motivated and determined to achieve their goals, support scholars’ personal goals, and to support the school in achieving its strategic goals.
• Culturally Responsive: considers the multicultural backgrounds in their classroom. Their instruction, assessment, and planning is informed by each scholar’s unique background and experience.
• Passionate Community Member:  is able to display teamwork through empathy, active listening skills, a positive attitude, and general sense of pride in their work for scholar learning.
• Insatiable Innovators: is able to follow the mission, vision, and core values of the school while operating under their divisional leadership and initiatives within their classroom with little to no guidance from school administration.

Experience and Qualifications

• Master’s Degree in Education or related field
• State Issued Teaching License
• Minimum of Five Years teaching experience

• Pre-AP Certification in appropriate field preferred
• AP Certification in appropriate field preferred
• IB Certification in appropriate field preferred

Note:

This is not necessarily an exhaustive or all-inclusive list of responsibilities, skills, duties, requirements, efforts, functions, or working conditions associated with the job. This job description is not a contract of employment or a promise or guarantee of any specific terms or conditions of employment. The school may add to, modify or delete any aspect of this job (or the position itself) at any time as it deems advisable.