Getting Away from the “Gotcha!” of Teacher Evaluation
I had a meeting last week with my mentor and our conversation throughout the day rolled around the idea of teacher evaluation. What she taught me is that “teacher evaluation” is going to take on a whole new meaning…and it’s about time.
Here’s are some thoughts we batted around:
- Teacher evaluation has to turn from a “gotcha!” (as in “gotcha doing something wrong”) into a very important step in tailoring professional development for teachers
- Teacher evaluation is going to be one of the first steps in designing “individualized teacher plans” for professional development
- Long gone should be the “one size fits all” type of professional development – we MUST take into account our staff’s individual experience, expertise and skill
- Individualized professional development plans are going to require principals and coaches to have a much higher knowledge of how to diagnose and prescribe teacher professional development programs
- We are going to need to learn to turn back to having the “teachers doing the doing” – putting them in the lead. If it doesn’t come from the teachers, the work won’t penetrate the classroom level.
- Our greatest asset is our teaching staff – we have to cultivate, weed and prune our talent pool, just as any other field does
So let me play this out for a minute here…
I am a 7th grade teacher who has some struggles with lesson planning. My general teaching skill is pretty darn good, but in terms of creating cohesive lessons and mini-assessments for my content, I don’t have that skill. During an observation, my principal and coach realize that my delivery is solid, but when I have to create lessons where curriculum guides don’t exist, the overall complexity of my lessons is at about the 4th grade level.
In the “old” way of teacher evaluation, I would receive feedback (typically in written form) from my principal, detailing the problems in my lesson.
And that’s it.
Yep – try figuring out what happens next! Try getting some real coaching! In fact, I’m not quite sure what KIND of support I even need! Help!
Under the “new and improved” paradigm of teacher evaluation, my principal and coach would meet with me and talk through the lesson, asking me lots of questions about my lesson preparation practices, where I pull my materials and where I believe my lesson struggles originate. We would probably identify together that I need some lesson planning support and would be invited to the coach’s weekly “lesson plan retreat” that’s held after school for teachers who need some hand-holding in this area. My other department colleagues wouldn’t necessarily attend this training/coaching session because their needs are different than mine.
In fact, I teach next to Mr. Tate. He’s an excellent teacher, but this year he has a bunch of Gifted and Talented kids in his classroom for the first time. When he met with the principal to make his quarterly goals, his #1 goal was to learn about techniques for his Science class that are particularly supportive of the Gifted and Talented kids. So, the coach approaches Mr. Tate and lets him know that the district is running a 3 week webinar about how to plan lessons specific to Gifted and Talented kids. He signs up…and even comes and shares information with me after every class!
THIS is true differentiated evaluation as professional development.
Nowhere in that scenario do you hear, “You WHAT? You don’t KNOW that?????” The response from the leadership is “I’ll get you help so that you can move along in your mastery of teaching skills.”
I’m sure you’re thinking, “Oh my gosh, this is going to take so much coordination.” Yep – it is. But it’s going to become HOW we think WHEN we act with a tailoring mindset.
I think we’ve clung to traditional “everyone gets the same thing” professional development because it FELT like we were really doing something special – like we were actually giving people what they needed to become more efficient and effective in the classroom.
But the truth is this, no matter how you slice it: Our classroom teachers have all kinds of different needs!
We can’t possibly say that 90%+ of professional development needs are the same for every teacher, can we?
So, here’s my encouragement to you as you prepare for what, no doubt, will be the future of teacher evaluation: Chart out all of the different resources you have RIGHT NOW that would help you differentiate professional development.
Second step? Create a very simple survey for your teachers that give them an opportunity to respond freely to these questions:
- What is the #1 thing getting in the way of your teaching of the content?
- What kind of professional development do you think would be helpful in combating that “in the way” thing?
- What type of professional development leaves you feeling like you really learned a lot on a new/semi-new topic?
Just the answer to these simple questions will help you begin to tailor your school’s PD! And that’s a great start!
“Any fool can know. The point is to understand.”
― Albert Einstein