SamTastic Weekly Tip: 8/19/19 - You won’t improve teacher practice by doing teacher evaluation

This week’s tip: You won’t improve teacher practice by doing teacher evaluation.

The evidence is clear. Teachers don’t get better through evaluation. They do get better with thoughtful coaching. A good evaluation structure can help.. .but only if there is a strong coaching component.

Being in the classroom is great. SAMs schedule their principals to be in classrooms regularly. They also make sure to schedule frequent conversations with the same teachers.

Be sure your frequency, the number of times a principal connects with a teacher, is enough to get the change you are seeking. It is unlikely you will get much improvement if the space between interactions with a teacher is more than five days. Your TimeTrack gives you a running record of the time you spend and the frequency of interaction.

Schedule time to see teachers work using these descriptors:

• Observation: formal visit, usually for summative purposes

• Walkthrough: informal visit, usually for formative purposes

• Work with Students: informal visit, work with students to help the teacher while you watch the teacher teach

• Student Supervision: informal visit, help students pay attending and engage while you watch the teacher teach

Your feedback can happen four ways. The first three ways are conversation:

1. Directive Feedback

2. Non-Directive Feedback

3. Celebratory Feedback

4. Office Work/Prep (written feedback)

Make sure anytime you schedule to see a teacher teach you schedule a follow-up feedback session.

So, you won’t improve teacher practice by doing teacher evaluation. You still need to do the formal evaluation process. You just need to add a lot of coaching interactions. You can make the formal evaluation process scheduling easier by using TimeTrack’s Connected Events feature. Here’s a short “how to” video: Link: http://bit.lv/2ZuTxRh