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teacher observation
observation by teacher
Benefits and challenges of an Effective Teacher
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Accountability for teacher quality in every school has become one of our nation’s educational reform priorities. Researchers have demonstrated that teacher quality was the single most important factor influencing student achievement (Cunningham & Allington, 2003; Darling-Hammond, 2000; Darling-Hammond, Wise & Klein, 1995; Jackson, 2009; Marzano 2007; Marzano, Pickering & Pollock, 2001). The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) included provisions on teacher qualifications and student achievement. The law requires that every public school’s faculty consist of licensed or certified teachers in all core academic areas (i.e., English, language arts, civics and government, mathematics, science, economics, arts, history, and geography) by the end of the 2005-06 school year. The NCLB Act defined a “highly qualified” teacher as one who has earned a bachelor’s degree, is fully licensed or certified by the state in the subjects they teach, and can demonstrate competence in the subjects they teach (No Child Left Behind Act, 2001). This mandate, requiring all classrooms be staffed with “highly qualified” teachers, created …show more content…
Teacher education programs can do much to build lenses and conceptions that can lead to teachers being prepared for the rigors of the classroom, with classes of 25 or more students and detailed and busy curricula, and being prepared to question their own expectations, appreciating the need to talk with other teachers about teaching, and, most importantly, seeing learning through students’ eyes. Such “Apprenticeship of Observation”, as Dan Lortie (2002) refers to this issue, is a significant challenge for student teachers as they move from seeing classrooms as students to seeing classrooms as teachers of students (Hattie, Visible Learning,
Birman, Beatrice F., et al. "State And Local Implementation Of The "No Child Left Behind Act." Volume VIII--Teacher Quality Under "NCLB": Final Report." US Department Of Education (2009): ERIC. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.
The Federal definition of a “highly qualified teacher” requires the teacher to have certification for the State, having passed licensing exams. An elementary school teacher who is new to the field is required to have a minimum of a bachelor’s degree, has passed State testing, subject knowledge and skills in reading, writing mathematics and other areas of basic elementary school curriculum. A middle or secondary school teacher who is new to the field has the same requirements; however they must also demonstrate high levels of competency in each of the academic subjects they intend to teach. Academic standards have been established for each state. The idea is to prepare students for college and “the real world”. This also creates an accountability system that recognizes student growth and school progress (ESEA Reauthorization, 2010).
According to current federal education legislation, schools are required to measure and report teachers’ qualifications in order to ensure that students are receiving high quality education and district teachers equally across schools. Based on the 2007-08 Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS), twelve percent of math teachers in high school do not have a certificate or major in this subject, meanwhile the percentage for science teacher is around 4. These statistics suggest that there is a serious issue th...
Public education in the United States of America continuously faces many challenges – diverse student body, overcrowded classrooms, and lack of resources. Besides, many think that in order to provide quality of education for all students we need to improve effectiveness of our teachers. It is necessary to evaluate existing school teachers routinely. However, it will not be sufficient for improving the teacher body overall. Not only have we needed to evaluate existing teachers. It is especially important to ensure that young inexperienced teacher candidates are prepared to educate all students and meet their academic needs. Ravitch points out that “we don’t need to hire bad teachers” ( 69??? ) Thus, we need to ensure that prospective teacher candidates upon their graduation possess necessary skills to support student learning and take charge of their classrooms from day one. That is why New York and 25 other states are currently in the process of changing the way they give their initial certification. The new legislation is expected to take place in New York State beginning May 1, 2014. All candidates graduating at that time and thereafter will be subjected to the new Teacher Performance Assessment or edTPA.
Milken, L. (1999). A Matter of Quality: A Strategy for Assuring the High Caliber of America’s Teachers. Presented at the 1999 National Education Conference President’s Presentation. Santa Monica, CA: Milken Family Foundation.
As argued in “Making the Grade,” the No Child Left Behind Act seeks to reduce gaps in testing areas that have allowed kids to advance without having high-quality skills in subjects such as math and reading. By discovering what kids are slipping through the gaps in testing, it will be easier for schools to aid these students and make sure they are not left behind. Other main goals of this act include to find teachers who are not well educated in the subjects they are currently teaching, and to locate those schools who fail t...
The United States of America is ranked 15th in the world for it’s quality of education. Improvement in our education system is necessary if we want to keep up with the best nations in the world. Over the past ten years, a new push has been made to improve education in America through programs like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. States across the country are assessing teachers and schools by using standardized test scores. By using standardized test scores, states link high stakes to the results such as grant money, salary, and jobs as incentive to improve the scores for the following year. In Wisconsin and other states, 50% of these evaluations are based solely on how students score on these tests making the results have a critical impact, affecting not only the futures of the students, but also the futures of their teachers. Although it is important to give schools and teachers feedback so that they can better educate students, high-stakes testing should be used minimally for this purpose because of the lack of conclusive results they produce, and the detrimental effects that they can have on students, teachers, and even the whole schooling community.
In 2010, Charlotte Danielson wrote an article, “Evaluations That Help Teachers”, for the magazine The Effective Educator. The purpose of this article was to explain how a teacher evaluation system, such as her own Framework for Teaching, should and can actually foster teacher learning rather than just measure teacher competence, which is what most other teacher evaluation systems do. This topic is especially critical to decision-making school leaders. Many of the popular teacher evaluation systems fail to help schools link teacher performance with meaningful opportunities for the teachers to reflect on and learn from in order to grow professionally. With the increased attention on the need for more rigorous student standards, this then is an enormous opportunity missed. Students can only achieve such rigorous expectations if their teachers can effectively teach them, and research has shown that teachers who are evaluated by systems that hold them to accountability and provide them for continuous support and growth will actually teach more effectively.
“The U.S. Congress is--eight years late--taking up the rewriting of No Child Left Behind, and one of the key issues under discussion is just how big the federal footprint on local public schools should be. No Child Left Behind requires that students take an annual standardized test for purposes of holding schools ‘accountable’ from Grades 3-8 and once in high school” (Strauss, Principal). In recent years, legislation has created new government-funded markets for education entrepreneurs. Standardized tests have caused spending to shift away from the salaries, benefits, and pensions of teachers into standardized testing, curriculum, and technology. Teachers are no longer being taught to tailor their curriculum to meet a variety of students' needs and interests, but instead are being encouraged to focus more on preparing for standardized testing. Productivity is no longer what a student learns throughout an individualized education, but what each student’s productivity measures as from a score (Antush, John C.). Standardized testing can help make sure children are on the right track for their education, but it can also create problems and allow teachers to create a less diverse, unique, and beneficial educational opportunity for their
Classroom observation is defined as a nonjudgmental description of classroom events that can be analyzed and interpreted to understand what went on in the classroom (Gebhard, 1999).Through observation, mentors should attempt to provide the mentees with opportunities to gain deepening awareness of their teaching practices, personal values and beliefs (Gebhard, 2008). This awareness is shaped by enabling the mentees see their teaching differently by showing them how to make their own teaching decisions through systematic observation, and exploration of their own and other’s teaching (Gebhard, 1999; Oprandy, 1999). Put it differently, to make observation systematic and guided, it is essential to know the purpose of the observation, how to collect
So all students were given a standardized test to compile data for campuses. But, what do these standardized test show? According to Kohn (2000), “the main thing they tell us is how big the students’ house are.” The standardized test has become problematic in regards to retaining highly qualified teachers. For example, as highly qualified teachers understood the connection between wealth and academic performance, teachers begin to turn away from schools of lower socioeconomic status. As a result, many quality teachers began to leave lower socioeconomic schools to teach students with big houses. Research shows lower socio economic campuses tend to have less experienced teachers, and a high turnover rate among teachers. What professional wants to be labeled as a “bad worker” due to the labeling created by the NCLB? One of the objectives of the NCLB was to create accountability through standardized testing. However, this tool of measurement has served as a hindrance to true improvement. The standardized testing of NCLB has had a negative impact on the quality of educators for those that live in “smaller houses.” Standardized test also can impact the health of those the NCLB is trying to
Columnist, Guest. "Test Scores and Teacher Competency." The Oregonian. Oregonlive.com, 4 Feb. 2010. Web. 18 Jan. 2014.
The state’s new evaluation system was in response to administrators who produced, “superficial and capricious teacher evaluation systems that often don't even directly address the quality of instruction, much less measure students' learning” (Toch, 2008). Too often, the “good-ol-boy” attitude would insure mediocre educators would remain employed. Realizing this was often more the rule then the exception, the governor created educational mandates to focus, “on supporting and training effective teachers to drive student achievement” (Marzano Center, 2013). Initially, they expected the school districts and the teachers would have issues and experience growing pains, but in the end the goal was, “to improve teacher performance, year by year, with a corresponding rise in student achievement” (Marzano Center, 2013).
I believe that teaching is the most important profession in the world. How else can we continue to develop in such a technical world, or in any other way, for that matter? Without the transfer of knowledge to young minds, we will stagnate and wither as a world. Teaching is hope for better, more successful futures. Learning is hope for becoming better individuals, for gaining intelligence, and for implementing practical experiences in our future. Since we always tell our children that they should plan for their futures and work to realize those goals, the teaching profession should “practice what it preaches” by helping young people to reach those goals. Teaching reading during the past five years has been rewarding beyond my imagination. I have watched non-readers become readers, I have watched scores and student confidence improve, and I have been part of that change. What a reward!
Education should be a part of everyone's life. A good education offers something for everyone, whether it be on the simple level or a more complex one. Education should provide provide an opportunity for students to develop a strong sense of creativity, a high self esteem, and a life long respect for learning. Education should help students establish a strong sense of confidence in themselves. A teacher will be one factor that helps a student learn and progress along their way through life. Teachers combine their own ideas with other people's to be able to give a good education to their students.