Saturday, September 15, 2012
Teacher Evaluation
So how about the new form of "evaluating teachers" that will be set in place by next year? I think this is very good because I know I've had my fair share of different teachers. I have had experiences with the kind of teachers that are phenomenal; they know what they are talking about and they know how to get it across to the students. I have also had teachers who are insanely genius and yet they have no idea how to share that genius. And, of course, I have had teachers where I wonder..."why the heck are you in this field?" By adding in more criteria for the evaluation of teachers, I think we can figure out who needs to stay and who needs to go. One thing I'm wondering though is: what about the kids who don't want to do anything? I know if we have better teachers, the students should be active in the classroom which should raise their grades, which is now a larger factor in evaluations. But, there are many kids who are stuck in the "I don't give a crap" mentality about school. So how large is the percentage of students-who-aren't-doing-so-well allowed to be? Anyway, I'm still not totally educated in this new form of teacher evaluation, but I can see some positive outcomes in it. I am also a little nervous about it too.
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Wow, this is interesting to me because it's something I was not previously aware of! I did not know that they were changing the evaluation of teachers. Considering I do not yet know what these evaluations include I guess I can't give any opinions with finality, but I can say that this is good news for me to hear! Those types of teachers you described I have also obviously had in my days and I think the more in-depth the feedback is, the better that teacher can become or continue to be. I was a little confused when you changed the subject at: "One thing I'm wondering though is: what about the kids who don't want to do anything?" Are you referring to the kids who don't want to do the teacher evaluations? Or do you mean what should teachers do in general about kids who don't care about school? Since the subject of this post seemed to be teacher evaluation, the sudden change of subject threw me off, haha. I interpret what you mean as what are we going to do about the kids who give bad teacher evaluations simply because they hate school and not because their teacher wasn't good. I can totally relate, for I know a few kids from my high school who'd just say whatever on evaluations; not take it seriously. This is something to really think about!
ReplyDeleteLike Stephanie, I did not know they were considering this as well. I feel that it can be beneficial like you said; however, I feel that this can place unneeded pressure on a teacher to be "safe" in the classroom and not to be creative in trying to teach their students. Some teachers may be nervous to waste time on different ways to teach students a particular topic. They may be afraid of what if it doesn't work, that they will have to spend even more time teaching it over. Then the question is raised that if the teacher is phenomenal, what happens when the students simply do not care? I agree, when I observed classrooms for one of my classes I noticed instantly that a majority of the class either didn't care about what they were learning or did the bare minimum to scrape by with a C or B. I'm also kind of curious at what exactly these points of evaluation would be on. I think it's a bit impossible to but a definitive definition to what a good teacher is simply because no student is the same, nor does every student learn the same. So for one evaluator or student, a teacher may not be efficient and for another, the teacher may maintain the perfect teaching style preferable to them.
ReplyDelete"And, of course, I have had teachers where I wonder...'why the heck are you in this field?' By adding in more criteria for the evaluation of teachers, I think we can figure out who needs to stay and who needs to go." Is this going to be nation-wide or in Pennsylvania? Just wondering because not all states have teacher unions, some states have teaching unions but they are not manditory, and in PA you have to be in the teaching union. Will the union find ways to keep the teachers who 'need to go?' I'll have to read more on this and see what I can find- I'm glad you brought it up. I've definately had a couple teachers who had little or nothing stimulating to offer students.
ReplyDeleteI can honestly say that I think giving high school students this kind of responsibility would be a bad idea. Personally, I have had many teachers that I thought were great. These same teachers would have gotten terrible reviews from people I knew in high school who didn't care about school at all, and maybe had a personal vendetta against a teacher because of a grade or homework assignment that wasn't accepted. I don't think that these students would have cared enough to understand what was on the line for these teachers if their evaluations were poor all of the time. I am in agreement with the previous comment that these evaluations would cause teachers to not want to venture outside of what they felt was their safety zone, and would eventually lead to some pretty boring lesson plans.
ReplyDeleteI know I had experience in high school with every type of teacher you mentioned in your blog. Being a student who wanted to be a future teacher, I knew the importance of doing well in school and I definitely did care. Even as hard as I tried, I would often struggle in the math and science field. A lot of reason for my struggle was because of some of the teachers I had. I remember that evaluations for our teachers meant our principal coming in to a class for one period and just watch the teacher do her lesson. We were always told about it before hand and told to make sure we behaved. With most teachers you would always tell they tried to do a little extra when it came to evaluation days. I think this shows how seriously some teachers take their jobs. Shouldn't you be striving everyday to teach like you want to impress someone and make yourself look like you know what you're talking about? Why does it take someone coming in to evaluate you to make you perform at your best?
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