Teacher Evaluation

My husband, Brad (a high school teacher) has worked at various international schools and currently works for a US public school in Sicily (Department of Defense Education Activity School), which I will call School A. I interviewed Brad about how teachers are evaluated at school A and the international school he worked at in Hong Kong (School B). At School A the principal shows up at random to do observations and there is no pre or post observation meetings. The principal doesn’t take notes and doesn’t give any feedback. At the end of the year she rates all the teachers as “satisfactory” .  She will arbitrarily state that some teachers aren’t “doing what they are supposed to be doing” but what they are “supposed to be doing” has never been outlined. My husband heard from another teacher that as long as you write your standards on the board that is all the principal is looking for.

Teacher observation at School B was much like the video “The Formal Observation” outlined in the Teaching Channel (2018). The principal and the teacher had a pre-observation meeting involving goal setting and specific items the teacher wanted insight into (ie. wait time or correcting disruptive behavior). The principal took detailed notes that outlined your strengths and weaknesses. During the post observation meeting the teacher was given a chance to explain  The principal praised successes and gave ideas to help with challenges that arose.

It is easy to see that a teacher in School A would feel ambushed by the principal each time she showed up. The teacher would also feel that the observation was pointless (since all teachers were scored as satisfactory) and the principal didn’t care about teacher development. Conversely,  at School B a teacher would feel supported and that the principal cared about teacher development. The teacher would feel like continuing their growth as an educator because administration also had the same goal.

A teacher, like their students, should be concerned with continual growth and development.  When thinking about teacher evaluations, I agree with the article by Marzano (2012) that evaluation should be about development and measurement, with more emphasis placed on development. This idea of teacher development over measurement, goes along with the opinions voiced in the Teaching Channel (2018) video regarding formal observations.

Marzano (2012) goes on to give a detailed approach to how teacher evaluation systems should be designed. They should:

• Be comprehensive (includes items that relate to student achievement) and specific (identifies classroom behaviors and strategies). Marzano (2012) beings by outlining 41 elements of the Rapid Assessment of Teacher Effectiveness (RATE), which determines effective and efficient classroom competence. He then gives a model including “10 categories of teacher behavior that appear sufficient to rank teachers in terms of pedagogical skill” (Marzano, 2012).
• Providing clear lesson objectives.
• Understanding students' background and comfort with the material.
• Using more than one delivery mechanism.
• Providing multiple examples.
• Providing appropriate non-examples
• Maintaining an effective pace.
• Providing students with feedback about their learning.
• Engaging in timely use of guided practice.
• Explaining important concepts clearly.
• Keeping students actively engaged throughout a lesson.
• Include a developmental scale
• “Such a scale would articulate developmental levels, such as not using, beginning, developing, applying, and innovating” (Marzano, 2012).
• Acknowledge and reward teacher growth: The teacher chooses areas of growth and development in their pedagogy. At the end of the year the teacher gets an overall score and a growth score. This helps the school communicate expectations and reward growth.  

When I ponder my evaluation as a teacher I think it would be helpful to use the process outlined by “The Formal Observation” (Teaching Channel, 2018). It would also be great to use a few of the comprehensive and specific classroom behaviors and strategies (Marzano, 2012) each time I am observed. The five I want to use are:

• Providing clear lesson objectives.
• Using more than one delivery mechanism.
• Maintaining an effective pace.
• Providing students with feedback about their learning.
• Keeping students actively engaged throughout a lesson.

References

Marzano, Robert. (2012, November). The Two Purposes of Teacher Evaluation. Retrieved on

February 28, 2018 from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/nov12/vol70/num03/The-Two-Purposes-of-Teacher-Evaluation.aspx

Teaching Channel. (2018). New Teacher Survival Guide: The Formal Observation. Retrieved on

February 27, 2018 from https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/preparing-for-formal-observations