1. NORTH CAROLINA TEACHER EVALUATION PROCESS TRAINING 2-Day Training for Phase I, II and III 2008-2010 *This 2-Day training is to be replicated to meet the needs of each individual LEA in NC **REVISED JANUARY 2010
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8. In North Carolina, for every 100 9 th grade students… … 70 students graduate four years later … 41 students enter college … 28 students are still enrolled in their 2nd year … 19 students graduate with either an Associate’s degree within three years or a Bachelor’s degree within six years Source: www.achieve.org NORTH CAROLINA’S Educational Pipeline (2008)
9. Future-Ready Students For the 21st Century The guiding mission of the North Carolina State Board of Education is that every public school student will graduate from high school, globally competitive for work and postsecondary education and prepared for life in the 21st Century.
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11. 21 st Century Skills Framework p. 12-16, Manual
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17. Teacher: Phase I: 2008-2009 13 districts participating: Jones Newton-Conover Alexander Orange Iredell/Statesville Hertford Scotland Elkin City Wilson Camden Cherokee Alleghany Rutherford
18. Teacher: Phase II: 2009-2010 Anson Ashe Asheville City Avery Beaufort Bertie Brunswick Caldwell Currituck Chatham Clinton City Craven Dare Duplin Edenton-Chowan Edgecombe Franklin Gates Halifax Haywood Hoke Hyde Macon Martin Montgomery Moore Pasquotank Perquimans Person Richmond Surry Roanoke Rapids City Stanly Swain Tyrrell Vance Watauga Washington Wayne [District teams trained regionally (Oct 2008 – Mar 2009)]
19. Teacher: Phase III: 2010-11 *Remaining 63 districts will begin implementation August 2010
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34. A Vision of K-12 Students Today http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=d1296214afd7cc367045
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36. “ If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.” ~~John Quincy Adams
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43. “ A good deed is never lost: he who sows courtesy reaps friendship; and he who plants kindness gathers love.” ~Basil
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50. “ Get over the idea that only children should spend their time in study. Be a student so long as you have something to learn, and this will mean all of your life.” ~~Henry L. Doherty
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55. “ The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” ~~William Ward
66. “ Keep steadily before you the fact that all true success depends at last upon your self.” ~~Theodore T. Hunger “The talent of success is nothing more than doing what you can do, well.” ~~Henry W. Longfellow
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82. Day 2 : Making it Real Activities WELCOME BACK
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Editor's Notes
You will begin your training with an agenda (see sample agenda included). Depending on the length of the training, you may change the times and content you will be covering. There are 3 primary parts to any full training: the standards, the process and practicing with the rubric.
Introductions may or may not be necessary (depending on your group) and should take no more than 10 minutes to cover. Icebreakers, pair-shares, and/or get-to-know activities of your choice are appropriate.
This slide defines your purpose. It is important to understand there are two primary reasons why NC has moved to new standards and evaluation instruments for all educators. It is important that teachers know these changes are not because teachers have been doing a bad job. Teachers are some of the hardest working people we know. Instead, the two reasons are because our world has changed and we need to match that in our classrooms.
This is the opening activity. You will create the cards and decade placards prior to your training session (see Materials section or download from website @ www.ncpublicschools.org/profdev/training /teacher/ ).
This is the opening activity. You will create the cards and decade placards prior to your training session (see Materials section or download from website @ www.ncpublicschools.org/profdev/training /teacher/ ). Each person should have at least one card (preferably a white index card) with an event that occurred in one of the decades you have taped on the wall around the room. (Note: Put a LETTER on right hand corner of card for each decade---ex. 1940s (A), 1950s (B). This will help you easily check for accuracy when activity is completed). Say: We are going to take a walk through time and look back at the decades from the 1940s to the present. The cards have been randomly placed at your seat. Take your card and please move to the decade you think your event occurred and then we will come back together as a group to discuss. Allow each person to share the event on their card and choose certain cards to highlight for emphasis on how the world has changed over time from the 1940s to present. Examples: 1940s---Postage stamp costs 3 cents, first kidney dialysis machine and Atomic Bomb invented 1950s---Matchbox vehicles, Little Golden Books, and “Leave it to Beaver”, 1 st Burger King with a milkshake and burger for 36 cents. 1960s---Artificial heart introduced, FM Radio debuts 1970s---Daisy wheel printer, dot-matrix printer, laser printer and ink-jet printer all invented, Pong is 1 st video game introduced 1980s---Soft bifocal contact lenses and disposable contact lenses, first cell phone commercially sold and digital cell phones become available 1990s---Pentium Processors available, DVDs come on the scene 2000s---Bluetooth and Nanotechnology debut, Virtual Hug Shirt, You Tube videos, Artificial heart and liver available
While it is fun to look back over time, the reason for doing that exercise is to frame what is and could be ahead for our students. The next activity will utilize the colored cards at your table. (You will create the cards prior to your training session (see Materials section or download from website @ www.ncpublicschools.org/profdev/training /teacher/ ). Each person should have at least one card (preferably a colored card) with an event that occurred in one of the decades you have written in the right hand corner of each card---ex. 2020s, 2030s, etc. When you call the decade, the person will stand to share the event on their card with the group. Again, chose a few examples to highlight throughout your session. 2020s--- 2030s--- 2040s--- 2050s--- 2060s--- 2070s--- 2100s--- Say: Let’s consider a child who began Kindergarten with us this year (2009). On the colored index cards are predictions of what we expect life to be like. While these are only predictions, the source used for these has been making predictions since the 1950s and they have an accuracy rate between 96 – 98%. Even if only half of these events occur, it will provide a picture of what we can expect life to be like for our students in years to come.
Say: Clearly, in looking ahead at what we expect our student’s will experience in their lifetime will have a tremendous impact on how we teach the skills necessary for them. Thinking about such things as a robot being mentally and physically superior to humans, space elevators are built to the moon and artificial intelligence entities are awarded PhDs, we can be reasonably sure that what is happening in many of our classrooms is not adequately preparing our students for this future. Again, not that we have been doing things wrong or doing things badly, but rather, the world is different and we need to change our classrooms to keep up with the changing times. With that being said, the first primary reason for these changes is for us to adequately prepare children for their expected future.
Say: The other reason is because of this slide. In NC in 2008, for every 100 9 th grade students, only 70 were graduating within four years. That is alarming. Those students are real---they are our neighbors, our nieces, even our own children. That would be like lining up all of the freshmen at your high school by 100, counting off and after 70, telling those students to go home. They will not be in the graduating class with the peers they are with right now. The State Board says that is unacceptable. We must graduate more students from our high schools. Beyond that, the students we graduate are also not graduating from our colleges and universities at an acceptable rate. We must prepare students for college, work and life in the 21 st Century, a fast-paced, global, ever-changing future we know they will experience.
Say: And that is the guiding mission of our State Board: graduate more students from high school and college and prepare them for a future in the 21 st Century (which is right now!). The previous activities explained what the possibilities are and we must educate ourselves in order to build the skills in our students.
Say: This is how we are expected to accomplish those two goals. Notice the fourth bullet: “Leadership will guide innovation in NC Public schools”. When we say “innovation” what other words come to mind that mean the same thing? (After getting responses such as creativity, change, thinking outside the box, etc. discuss briefly how everyone must step into leadership roles and consider innovative approaches to educating students. Our roles will change to match what is happening for our students.
Say: Please open your manuals to page 12. This is the 21 st Century rainbow. We are currently one decade into the 21 st Century, therefore we are not only preparing for the 21 st Century---we are in it! Yet, when we talk about 21 st Century skills and ask educators what a 21 st Century classroom looks like most of us would either not respond or some may mention “technology”. This rainbow helps make 21 st century skills more practical (beyond theoretical) so let’s take a look at it. In the center of the rainbow in the green section are the things we need to be teaching: the core subjects and the 21 st century themes. These themes are listed on the bottom of page 12 and include things such as health literacy, civic literacy etc. At first thought, we may think about not having time to effectively teach the basic core subject areas. How are we going to add the 21 st century themes to our already packed day? We must do it by teaching differently. We will teach the items that are on the outside of the rainbow: life and career skills, learning and innovation skills and information, media and technology skills included in the core subjects. Would you say technology is a part of 21 st century skills? Absolutely, but notice it is only one part. There are many other skills our students need to know in addition to using technology as a tool. Teaching must look different now. For a long time, the teacher was the primary holder of knowledge. Students would come to school to learn the information the teachers gave them. Now we have computers that can hold far more information than one person can possibly know. The teacher is no longer the holder of knowledge, but rather the teacher’s new role is to be the “facilitator of learning”. It is the teacher’s role to help the students learn to think, problem-solve and analyze. At the base of the rainbow are the items that need to be in place for us to be successful in teaching the rainbow items. First are the standards and assessments. You are here because we have adopted new standards and assessments (evaluations) for all employees in NC, but we are also working on revising standards and assessments for our students because our practices must match the outcomes we expect. The EOC and EOG tests you will be giving in the spring are not 21 st century tests. We all know they are not, but we are working on changing how we assess students in NC. The second part of the foundation is curriculum and instruction. We are currently revising our essential curriculum in all content and grade level areas to ensure our curriculum is 21 st century. We no longer need to spend three weeks memorizing the state capitals when a student can log on and find out the capital of a state in 30 seconds if they need to know. The third part of the foundation is professional development. With the new instrument we will see a shift in how we use our professional development funds because in this instrument it is necessary for all professional development to be directly linked to a teachers’ performance on the evaluation instrument. We are moving away from one day shots at PD and going much deeper to support teachers. The last and largest part of the foundation is the learning environments. We know that for this work to be successful we must create the right learning environment in the classrooms for our students, as well as the right learning environment in our schools for our adult learners. As we continue to grow more effective in using PLCs in our schools, creating a learning environment that is supportive and nurturing for both students and teachers is essential.
This slide gives background information on the development and adoption of our new state standards. Originally a commission consisting of superintendents, principals and teachers thought they could take the old teaching standards and add some technology to them and have 21 st century standards. However, when the commission began their work they quickly realized they would need to start fresh and thus the creation of the 5 new teaching standards.
This slide gives background information on the development and adoption of our new state standards. Originally a commission consisting of superintendents, principals and teachers thought they could take the old teaching standards and add some technology to them and have 21 st century standards. However, when the commission began their work they quickly realized they would need to start fresh and thus the creation of the 5 new teaching standards.
Say: So what’s the biggest difference between the old standards and the new standards? Primarily it is how well all the standards are now aligned. If you are looking at the superintendent standards, the principal standards or the teaching standards you will find similarities throughout all of them. They are all based in 21 st century skills and focus on student learning and adult collaboration.
Say: There are new evaluation systems for all NC Principals effective July 2008. In the summer of 2008, over 3000 principals and their evaluators were trained on the instrument with the understanding that they will be using the instrument beginning that year and they would build training teams and levels of support for principals throughout the year.
Say: Standards for school counselors, social workers and school psychologists are complete and we are in the process of training those professionals around the state. However, their evaluation instrument has not been developed so they will continue to use whatever evaluation instrument they are currently using until their new instrument has been completed. They will not use the new teacher instrument for evaluation purposes.
Say: These are the first 13 districts that volunteered to begin using the instrument in 2008. They have done a fabulous job of leading us through changes that have now given us a better instrument to use with the rest of the state.
Say: Phase II Districts began implementation this year in 2009. We were originally seeking 50 volunteers to begin using the instrument, but we ended up with 39.
Say: Which means the remaining 63 districts will come on board next year in 2010. At that point, every teacher will be formally evaluated on the new instrument and every LEA in the state should then be on the same page with the knowledge of the standards and the steps of the evaluation process.
Say: Now let’s look at what is the same about all the evaluation instruments---the superintendent, principal or teacher. They are all growth models. Rather than averaging the employee’s performance over the course of a year, this model allows the evaluator and the employee to work together throughout the year and the evaluation is not completed until the end of the school year. Meaning, a person may begin the year with a developing rating in a particular area, but may be rated proficient by the end of the year, if they grow and show development to that level.
Say: The instruments are designed so we can use the same tool for a beginning principal or an experienced principal; a beginning teacher or an experienced teacher. The rubrics allow educators to know the exact behaviors expected for the levels of performance. We will use data and artifacts to help us determine an employee’s performance and finally, unlike our old IGPs, the new instrument has goals that are directly tied to the person’s performance on the rubric.
Say: Again, that information is true for any instrument developed in our state. Specifically looking at some features in the teacher instrument (just highlight a few), It will serve as a measure of a teacher’s performance because it is their evaluation instrument. It will also help them reflect on their own practice. Research clearly tells us for adults and children that when a person does a self-assessment of their work, their performance is likely to increase just for having done the self-assessment. This instrument will focus the goals and objectives of schools and districts as all of our work is tied back to these rubrics.
This is a coaching and mentoring model. It is much more interactive than the former evaluation system, as the teacher and evaluator work together to help grow a teacher’s skills. This work also is directing what is happening at every public and private university in NC as they are required to change their teacher prep (and principal prep) programs to align with these standards and instruments by 2010-11. That means a few years from now we will be graduating students from teacher education programs and enter our schools already proficient in 21 st century skills.
Say: The next few slides are definitions and items that need clarity for you as you familiarize yourself with the instrument. This will help ensure that we are all in the same place with the same foundational knowledge. First, this instrument is NOT a portfolio model and hopefully people will not refer to it as such. However, artifacts are used to help determine or substantiate a teacher’s performance. The difference between a portfolio and an artifact is that an artifact is a natural by-product of the work done by a teacher. With a portfolio, the person creates a document and shows it as a representation of what they do, but an artifact is something that is already there just by the way the person does their work. So for example, a principal may look a teacher’s newsletter to assess their written communication skills with families, but a teacher would never be asked to write a newsletter so for this evaluation. Lesson plans are another good example. A principal may look at a teacher’s plans to help them know how effective the teacher is with planning, but a teacher will not write a plan just for this instrument. Those are some possible artifacts that may be used.
Say: There is only one time in this instrument when it is important to know who are beginning teachers in your building and we will point that out a little later. For the most part, you simply need to know that all teachers fall into two categories: Probationary or Career status. Beginning teachers are automatically considered probationary teachers. Career status is granted to a teacher after s/he has successfully worked in a NC district for 4 years. If a teacher moves here from another state they must complete 4 years of teaching in a NC district to gain tenure, even if they taught 50 years in another state. Once a teacher has earned career status in NC and moves to another district in NC, the receiving district has the option of granting them immediate career status or giving them probationary status for one year and grant career status at the end of that year. For the purposes of this instrument, you need to know the status of your teachers to know how many observations are required in the process. The next set of terms we want to be clear about are formal and informal observation. A formal observation lasts for at least 45 minutes.
Say: An informal observation lasts a minimum of 20 minutes or longer. The definitions of formal and informal observations have nothing to do with whether the teacher knew about the observation or whether there would be a pre or post conference. The only factor determining a formal or informal observation is the amount of time of the observation: 45 min or longer for formal; 20 min or longer for informal. This time needs to be all in one sitting. A person can’t do 4 five minute walk-throughs and count that as a 20 minute observation. The evaluation instrument is based on a rubric. The rubric is based on the 5 teaching standards. Each of the standards has a set of elements and the number of elements will vary for each standard. There may be as few as 3 elements or as many as 8. Within each element are specific behaviors or descriptors that show what a teacher needs to do to demonstrate mastery of the element.
Say: Next, let’s review the rating scale used in the evaluation instrument. The first level is developing . Developing is the level where a person is learning, but has not mastered a skill. The person knows they need the skill, but they have not successfully accomplished the skill. In many cases, the developing level is simply an “awareness” stage. Developing is not a rating to be afraid of. We are all developing when we learn new skills. If a teacher were to tell you they didn’t ever want to be developing, you should be concerned because essentially they would be telling you they don’t ever want to learn anything new. When we learn something new we have to start with developing until we reach mastery. The proficient level shows that person can do the skill. It may not be easy for them. They may have to plan a long time or work really hard to be successful with it, but they have demonstrated that they can do the skill. The accomplished level is when the person can do the skill naturally and easily and they do this skill almost all the time. If you go into a teacher’s classroom and see a skill at an accomplished level you can be reasonably sure that if you go back on Wednesday and on Friday and any other day you will continue to see the teacher easily demonstrating that skill.
At the distinguished level, this person does the skill naturally and does it almost all the time and in this instrument at the distinguished level it usually means they know the skill so well they are teaching to other adults. *In the old evaluation instrument, almost all teachers in NC were rated “above standard” on their evaluation. With this new instrument you cannot equate “above standard” with “distinguished”. The new instrument has significantly raised the expectation of skills from teachers. In the old instrument the principal would come in and observe and check off things such as “did the teacher start the lesson on time?”, “did the teacher have all of their materials ready”. If we continue to evaluate teachers on items like that it would be equivalent to you or I going to a new doctor and deciding if that was a good doctor to treat us because s/he remembered to bring the stethoscope into the exam. Should teachers always have their materials ready? Absolutely. It is a basic expectation for teaching professionals. In this instrument we are going much deeper into teacher’s skills. As a result, most teachers will find themselves at the proficient range with some occasional accomplished and distinguished ratings. It was easy to be above standard if you were evaluated on checklist-type items (such as starting your lesson on time and having prepared materials). Now as we evaluate 21 st century skills, etc, the common ratings are likely to be proficient and accomplished. A teacher could not possibly be distinguished in all areas. This may be a hard transition for teachers who are used to above standard ratings on their evaluations. Try to remember, it isn’t that the teachers have become worse. It is that we have raised the standard and expectation of what we want from teachers. The final level is “not demonstrated”. Not demonstrated means there is no awareness that the skill is needed at all. If they have never heard of the NC Standard Course of Study, that would be “not demonstrated” and be a problem! Not demonstrated will be a very rare rating. If during the school year, in a coaching/mentoring model, the evaluator does not see a teacher using a skill, the evaluator is expected to bring that to the attention of the teacher. When they do it brings the skill into the teacher’s awareness and thereby moves it from not demonstrated to developing so it will be very rare to get to the end of the year and not have some awareness of any skill found in this instrument. However, if a principal brings a skill into a teacher’s awareness and they don’t even try to improve in that area, then they may be rated as not demonstrated at the end of the year.
Performance Goals are the goals that teachers will create each year. Each person will be writing goals that are directly tied to their performance on the rubric. Even if the teacher (Career) is not in the formal evaluation process that year, they will still develop performance goals for the year. *In this instrument, the administrators (School Executives) that are qualified to conduct “administrative” observations must have an administrative license or a supervisory certificate. In the past, a teacher may have been observed by an administrative intern, but that will no longer occur. An administrative intern may be given opportunities to complete observations for their program, but it will not count toward the teacher’s evaluation process because the person must have an administrative license or a supervisory certificate. This is only true for those observations required by an administrator, not for the peer observation (we will discuss peer observations later in the process). Every teacher will do a self-assessment at the beginning of the year. At the end of the year there is a summary evaluation form completed and that is when the teacher is actually evaluated for the first time.
(Teacher Responsibilities are outlined on the next few slides and are self-explanatory. Review any that may impact your district or has relevance to those in your audience)
(Teacher Responsibilities are outlined on the next few slides and are self-explanatory. Review any that may impact your district or has relevance to those in your audience)
(Principal/AP Responsibilities are outlined on the next few slides and are self-explanatory. Review any that may impact your district or has relevance to those in your audience)
(Principal/AP Responsibilities are outlined on the next few slides and are self-explanatory. Review any that may impact your district or has relevance to those in your audience)
(Video Title – Digital Natives). This video is a great example of the impact teaching should have on our students from their mouths.
Say: We are now ready to work through the five teaching standards. The standards are not in order of importance, but they have been placed in a specific order. Why do you think, if they are teaching standards, the commission chose to begin with the standard about teacher’s demonstrating leadership? (You will receive several responses that will likely include “teachers are leaders in the classroom, you have to be a leader first, etc). After responses, acknowledge them and refer back to the State Board’s mission: If we are going to accomplish the two goals of graduating more students from high school and college and having them ready for the 21 st Century, we need all teachers to step into leadership roles.
(QUOTE: Use as needed)
Say: Standard 1 is about Leadership and it has five elements. The information will be repeated (what each standard is and how many elements) several times in case you might have an activity later today when the information is helpful. The first standard is about leadership. It has five elements and the first element says that teachers will be leaders in their classrooms. This doesn’t really come as a surprise to teachers. If a teacher decides to go into the profession, they are expecting to be leaders in the classroom. But the first bullet says: teachers will take responsibility for ALL students’ learning. For a long time, our focus was that the majority of our students would be successful. If you got to the end of the year and 99% of your students demonstrated learning that would feel like a good year. But if this teacher (point in the direction of any participant) has 99% success and they (point to another) and they also have 99%, etc. then all of a sudden we have 1, 2, 3 … 30 kids out of 100 not graduating from high school. We have not effectively helped teachers to realize that their entire purpose is to be sure every child in their care will learn. Sometimes we hire them and explain their responsibility to teach “third grade” or “advanced algebra” and the implication is that if you go into school each day and deliver your curriculum for advanced algebra then you are doing your job. This standard tells us that we have to look deeper to be sure every child is learning what is we are teaching. We can’t simply deliver the curriculum and believe that if they get it great—and if they don’t, they can repeat it or not receive credit etc, but I did my job. Notice this element also says we will establish a safe and orderly environment. People often ask “where is discipline in this instrument”? Well, here it is in one spot. Notice the instrument will not provide a checklist of what a “safe and orderly environment” looks like. You won’t find something like “the teacher has rules posted” because we want teachers to maintain creativity and how this person (point randomly to a participant) establishes a safe and orderly environment may look different than how this person (point to another) establishes that. That is reasonable. The research tells us a safe and orderly environment needs to be there for students to be successful, but one person can accomplish differently than how another accomplishes it.
The second of the five elements for standard 1 (leadership) says that teachers will demonstrate leadership in their school. Now for some teachers, they are comfortable with this element. They enjoy serving on committees, being a grade chair or a department, etc, but for other teachers this may not be very comfortable. The standards are written with the expectation that all teachers will master all the elements and not pick and choose which ones they will do. So often in schools there will need to be as much effort helping our natural leaders move into the role of follower as there is helping our reluctant followers move into leadership roles. For those who like to be leaders and we have easily allowed this because we didn’t want the role, it will be a challenge to be a follower especially if the person leading is reluctant or not yet very skilled at it. Also notice this element says that teachers will participate in the budget process and the hiring process. This is a great example of how all of the standards are closely aligned. In the principal instrument, their first standard is strategic leadership and they have an element that calls for them to distribute leadership in their schools by involving teachers in the budget process and the hiring process. This is important because if we put in the principal instrument, but didn’t put it in the teacher instrument, principals would be trying to get teachers involved and not all teachers would participate. And vice versa, if we put it in this instrument, but not in the principal’s then teachers would be trying to participate and principal might say “no thanks – we got it”. Because of the alignment, the expectations are there for everyone.
The third of the five elements for standard 1 (leadership) says that teachers will lead in the teaching profession. This where some teachers may want to jump ship! They may think, “I understand needing to be a leader in the classroom and I have to be a leader in my school, but now you are saying I have to be a role model for the whole profession?! And yes, to truly demonstrate leadership we need teachers to positively represent our profession. Unfortunately we have created far too many situations where people in education have felt it is o.k. to complain about our work: we don’t get paid enough money, there are too many tests, parents aren’t doing what they need to do for their kids, etc. We knew going in how much we would get paid. No one expected us to work and guess what our paycheck would be. You would have to be living in a cave not to understand the role of testing and accountability in education today. So if we are aware of all of these factors, then why do we hurt ourselves and our profession by spending so much time complaining about them? Teaching is not for everyone. In fact, it is probably a minority, but we all know the damage that a few negative people can do to a learning community. Leading in your profession means you accept the challenges that come with the job and continue to work in a positive and professional manner. Does that mean you can’t have a bad day? Of course not, but it does mean that we all have to reflect on whether the majority of our talk about our work falls into a positive category or a negative category.
The fourth element for Standard 1 says that we will be an advocate for our schools and students. While these standards were completed in 2007, long before the current budget crisis hit, there is no greater time when it is any more vital that we are wise advocates in our profession. When legislatures have to make tough choices between giving money to police officers or firefighters or teachers, we have to be sure we are clear on what we really must have and where we might be able to compromise.
The fifth element for Standard 1(leadership) says that if a teacher is going to demonstrate leadership they must maintain high ethical standards. Often many teachers do not understand that when you make the decision to be a teacher and to work with children you automatically place your professional AND your personal life at a higher level of ethical code of conduct. Many teachers think that if they do the right thing during the day when they are with children, that what they do after hours is there personal life and does not matter, but in actuality a teacher is a teacher 24/7 and is expected to lived by the code of ethics at all times. REVIEW STANDARD I before moving on to the activity. TIME CHECK: You should be here around 10:30-11:00 (if you began at 9:00), and ready for a morning break.
Time 10:40 - 11:00 10 Minute Activity 10 Minute Report Out
(QUOTE: Use as needed)
Standard 2 is all about the environment and diversity and it also has 5 elements. This is a great standard because it recognizes that if we do not create the relationships and environment to support our students, then learning cannot take place. You may have a few students who are high flyers and will learn no matter what, but most children will not learn if they are not in an inviting, respectful, supportive place for learning. This standard has 5 elements and the first element says that EACH child is entitled to have a positive, nurturing relationship with caring adults. Notice it says “each” child, not “the easy” children. Not just those children who do their homework every night and have positive, active parents, but EACH child including the 16 year old who cusses you out when you ask for the homework or the child who bullies the other children in the class or the one who doesn’t smell so good when they come to school. Each and every child is entitled to that relationship. It does not specify who that person is in the school, but at least one person should have one. People are human beings and occasionally there may be a time when you don’t connect with a particular student in quite the same way. I will never forget Peggy (or substitute your own story here). I was devastated the first time I realized that I wasn’t going to automatically love every child in the same way. I’m not sure what it was with Peggy. Maybe she was just too much like me. I’m not sure, but I knew I just wasn’t connecting with her the same way I did most children. So I made sure I set Peggy up with the guidance counselor so she had someone to have that “special” relationship with. I still made sure hopefully that I treated her with respect and gave her a good educational experience, but I knew in my heart that someone else would need to provide that special caring and nurturing relationship that this element refers to. Teachers are expected to ensure every child has this type of relationship with someone in the building. That means careful planning and communicating, particularly at the high school level where several teachers share students.
The second of the five elements for Standard 2 (environment and diversity) says that we will embrace diversity and bring it into our classrooms. Now in this element we are not just talking about Black History Month or Cinco de Mayo. We are talking about bringing diversity into our classrooms on a daily basis. When we think about our look ahead at the future remember we discussed 95% of advanced nations being computer literate and our students voting on global issues. Do we really want our students working and socializing with people across the world and voting on issues that affect the entire planet if we haven’t appropriately taught them tolerance and different points of view? There are some classrooms in NC where diversity is right there in front of them. The classroom may have a large population of African American students or Hispanic students. If the teacher doesn’t effectively bring diversity issues up in this classroom, you can be sure the children will bring them in. In other classrooms, it is a very homogenous group of students. Every face in the room is a white child. It is even more important in these classrooms that we are effective in bringing diversity in because if the classroom looks like that then there is a good possibility their grocery store looks like that, their church looks like that, their neighborhood, etc. If we don’t bring them diversity where will the children learn it? Sometimes this is a topic that teachers move away from because they are no sooner trying to bring diversity into the classroom then a student will speak up and say “yeah but my mom says this about those people” and it becomes uncomfortable for everyone. But rather than moving away from diversity, we need to empower teachers to feel comfortable responding to students and saying “yes, your mom might feel that way, but in this classroom we look at all kinds of feelings and ideas people have”. Diversity of course is much more than just race or ethnicity. What are some other ways in which each child is diverse in our classrooms? (Look for answers including special needs, socio-economic status, religion, sexual orientation, motivation, etc) and discuss briefly.
The third of the five elements for standard 2 (diversity and the environment) says that teachers will treat students as individuals. The first bullet – maintains high expectations for all students---means every child literally should be treated as an individual. If we go into any one of our schools and attend a faculty meeting and have teachers raise their hands if they maintain high expectations for all students, what would happen? (All hands in the room would go up). Right. All of us like to believe we maintain high expectations for all students, but if we are effectively doing that, why are we graduating only 70 out of 100 kids from high school? This is tough because as human beings it is natural if we are with a group of low performing students to begin to lower our expectations. It happens without even realizing it and it takes a concerted effort to make sure we maintain high expectations for every child. (Can substitute another story here). I met with a teacher once and asked her why a particular student did not turn in his homework. She said that she didn’t expect him to and when I asked why, she explained that the child was in a very difficult situation. She said the dad was in jail and mom was working two jobs to support the 5 children and the only person at home to help this student with his homework was the 14 year old brother who was busy caring for the 2 year old twins. What that well-intentioned teacher didn’t realize is that as soon as she told that boy that he didn’t have to do or couldn’t do what everyone else was expected to do because of his circumstances, she was locking him in to the very life she was hoping he could avoid. What teachers need to understand is that the expectation remains the same. What changes is the level of support we provide to the student to meet the expectation.
The fourth element says that teachers will adapt their teaching for the benefit of students with special needs. Look at the first bullet – collaborate with specialists. We have made only baby steps in progress with this issue. We still have far too many situations where the special ed teacher says “I only have the child 3 times a week; it’s the regular ed teachers’ responsibility” and the regular ed teacher says “he has a special ed label; he is the special ed teachers’ responsibility”. Now they may not come out and say it exactly like that, but their actions indicate it. We have work to do on creating the environment where teachers come together and say “this child is our responsibility; how will we make him successful”? Special education teachers cannot possibly know the entire content of all regular ed curriculum for the many different grade levels and subject areas they teach. It would be impossible for them so the regular ed teacher needs to be the curriculum expert for the special ed teacher. And the special ed teacher needs to be the expert on how to make adjustments and modifications to help the child. And this means more than simply changing the curriculum level of the work they are doing. All too often if the child is 3 rd grade reading on a 1 st grade level we simply give him 1 st grade work. Then when he is 5 th grade he is doing 3 rd grade etc. When does he ever catch up? Thinking back to our early conversation on leaders guiding innovation in our schools, we hope this is one area where we will become more innovative. Does it make sense that if a child is reading 3 years behind his current grade that he still comes to school and goes through the exact same day as a child who is on grade level? More than likely, those 30 kids that do not get a high school diploma have a special education label. Notice too though that this element doesn’t say they have an IEP. It says students with special needs. That can incorporate many more students than just those with an IEP.
And finally the fifth element for Standard 2 which is about the environment and diversity says that we will work collaboratively with the families and important people in our students’ lives. Isn’t it interesting that standard 2 is about the environment and diversity and yet here we have added element about something that is rarely in our daily environment? Why do you think they chose to put this element about families with this standard? (Solicit responses about the importance of families, needing to know what the students’ life is in the hours they are not in school, etc). Sometimes teachers at the high school level struggle a little more with this element because they work with so many students they say it isn’t possible to have relationships with all those families. Story: Last year when my son was a senior in high school, one of his seven teachers sent me an email on the first Friday of the school year that was about 6 – 8 sentences long. It told me what they had done that week and what they expected to be working on in the next week. And without fail, every Friday for the entire school year that email was in my inbox. Did I have more of a relationship with that teacher than I did the other 6? (Yes) Absolutely I did. Because I knew what they were working on if I saw something in the newspaper that was related to what they were doing I could cut it out and accidently leave it next to my son’s cereal bowl and we might have a conversation about the topic. So not only did this teacher establish more of a relationship with me, he helped with my relationship with my son. Story: At one of my schools I implemented a policy where I asked the elementary teachers to make a personal contact with each family within the first 10 days of schools. The initial resistance was understandable because they were getting ready for open house, trying to collaborate etc. I insisted that they stick with the 10 day deadline. Almost every teacher ended up commenting on what a positive policy that turned out to be. Why is that? (Solicit responses). Exactly – when contact is made in the first 10 days the only thing the teacher has to communicate is that they care about the child which is the most important thing the parent wants to hear. Because the teacher doesn’t know the child yet, the parent is the expert and does most of the talking. This gets the relationship off to a positive start. If the same policy were in place, but further into the school year, who would be doing most of the talking? (the teacher)
Time 11:15 – 11:30 Activity Slide. (After the groups have done the activity, engage a whole group conversation with participants giving answers for each of the three areas) 5 minutes each discussion… After activity, REVIEW STANDARD 2. What is Standard 2 about? (Environment & Diversity) And how many elements does it have? (5) What was Standard 1 about? (Leadership) And how many elements does it have? (5)
(QUOTE: Use as needed) ~~LUNCH BREAK FOLLOWING STANDARD 2~~ After returning from lunch, begin Standard 3.
Standard 3 – Notice that we have discussed three of the five standards for teachers and we haven’t started teaching yet! These standards and the evaluation instrument take into account everything you do as a teacher – in the classroom and outside of the classroom. Standard 3 is about content and it has 4 elements. The first of the four elements says that teachers will align their instruction with the NC Standard Course of Study. Now we all know that the SCOS is just a starting point and teachers must go much deeper, but every teacher should be using it at least for the framework of their instruction. But look at the last bullet. In this instrument there is an expectation that all teachers will develop and know literacy skills appropriate to their area. That means that even the Algebra teacher or the Biology teacher need to know how to teach the literacy skills needed and used with their subject area.
The second of the four elements for standard 3 which is about content says that teachers will know the content they are teaching. We certainly hope teachers do know they content they teach, but look at the first bullet. It says teachers need to know the subject beyond what we are asking them to teach. In this case, beyond means not just what comes next but everything outside of their content leading up to it and going further. Why would it be important for teachers to know the content before and after the area we have asked them to teach? (Solicit answers) Yes, if we are truly going to address every students needs, then we need to know what comes before us because some students may have gaps that need to be filled in and we need to know what comes after because some students may be ready to move on.
The third element related to content says that teachers will recognize the interconnectedness of the content areas. This means we need to become even more effective with our vertical as well as our horizontal planning. When our students go out into the work world, they do not read on their jobs from 10 to 11 and do math on their jobs from 11 to 12. All of their learning is going to be interconnected and we need to help them make those connections in the work we do with them. Notice this element also has an emphasis on the 21 st century theme of global awareness. Global awareness is not something that just happens in social studies, but how are all of our content areas influenced by global elements.
The fourth element for standard 3 related to content is that teachers will make instruction relevant to students. Students are no different than adults. They want to know and understand why they are spending time on something. If you came into this training we talked about the engine of a tractor trailer you probably wouldn’t have stayed very long because it is not relevant to you. Hopefully this information is helpful and interesting to you because it is very relevant to your daily work life. Students also need to understand how what they are doing in school is relevant to their lives. There are two ways to establish this relevancy. Making connections with the content helps them understand how it is relevant, but we can also make it relevant with the methods we use to deliver the content. If we use methods that engage them in people skills, self-direction, leadership etc. than we are making the time relevant to the students. So relevancy can occur with the specific content or the manner in which we deliver the content. REVIEW STANDARD 3. What is standard 3 about? (Content) And how many elements does it have? (4) And the last element says our instruction must be what? (relevant)
(QUOTE: Use as needed)
Standard 4 and now we start teaching! Standard 4 is all about facilitating learning. In the old evaluation instrument, principals would observe teachers and focus almost entirely on the teacher behavior. In fact they may even script the lesson writing down exactly what the teacher says and does. In this instrument, the principal is focused not only on the teacher behavior but on the student behavior because they ultimately are trying to answer one question: are the students learning what the teacher is teaching. Standard 4 is all about being effective in facilitating learning. We have many people that may love children and may get along well with them, but if they cannot effectively facilitate learning for children they are not truly mastering the teaching standards. So standard 4 is all about facilitating learning and it has 8 elements. It is a lengthy standard because there are many pieces that must be present to truly be effective in facilitating learning for students. The first of the 8 elements for standard 4 says that a teacher needs to know more than content; a teacher needs to know and understand children and how they learn. They must know them physically, socially, emotionally in every possible way. Notice the fourth bullet has the expectation that we will stay abreast of evolving research. It is essential that we stay current with all that we are learning about children, the brain and how children learn best. Some schools effectively use their PLCs to help with this so that one month 3 or 4 teachers may bring in the latest information on brain research and the next month some others will bring the latest on literacy instruction, etc. By spreading the task out among everyone, no one person is burdened with staying current on the massive amounts of information now available to us.
The second of the eight elements for standard 4 which is about facilitating learning says that teachers will plan their instruction. In some cases, planning for teachers has become a lost art and may be pulling out a unit and knowing which pages to cover or what project to do. But in this instrument planning will take on a whole new meaning for teachers because there are many skills in these standards that we have never asked of teachers before and they will need to be written into their plans to be sure they are present in their teaching. Story: When I first started trying to change my teaching to incorporate higher order questioning skills, I had to initially write out specific questions for my lessons because I was used to asking knowledge level questions. Once I became more familiar with the higher order questions I could think on the spot and come up with them, but until it was a natural skill I had to write them out in my plans. That will be true for many parts of these standards for teachers. In order to incorporate diversity on a daily basis for example, a teacher is likely to have to plan it into their lessons or it won’t be present. Notice it does comment once again on collaboration. We have to become even more effective with how we collaborate with each other. It makes no sense for three teachers all to go home and plan a good science lesson on the same topic when one can do it and share it with the others, while the others are planning other topics.
Similar to the question earlier about maintaining high expectations, the third element is about using a variety of instructional methods and if we were to ask teachers if they do this, almost all of them would say yes. In this element, we are not talking about doing a project based assignment once every quarter or a technology unit once a month. We are talking about on a daily basis using a variety of instructional methods. Earlier we talked about Pong as the first video game – 2 paddles and 1 ball that used to keep our kids entertained for hours. Now, it would not keep their attention for more than a minute. Our students’ attention spans are very different now and in order to keep them engaged we have to mix it up all day long. This is another important time for collaboration because each teacher may have two or three methods that are their strengths and as human nature would have it, they will fall back on using those same two or three methods. But with good collaboration, we can build our bag of tricks by sharing and teaching each other. This element points out that teachers are always making two decisions when they facilitate learning for students. They will choose methods or materials to present information and then they will also choose the techniques they will use with those methods and materials. What will I use to teach this and how will I use it? Everything a teacher does needs to be purposeful and we should be able to identify why we are doing what we are doing. Story: When my son was 8 years old, we lived in a gated community in SC so I felt comfortable letting him walk up to the front gate to get the mail. It was the first week of December and he walked up and got the mail, but when he came back not only did he have the mail, but he also had 6 quarters. Now when I get the mail, I only get bills, but he came with money so I knew something wasn’t quite right. So I asked him “honey, where did you get that money”? And he said “I stopped and sold Christmas carols to the neighbors”. I said “you did what”? And he responded “I stopped at the neighbors and told them I would sing them Silent Night for 50 cents”. Now I love the holidays and the idea that my son was making a profit off silent night was not making me too happy, but before I lost my cool I took a deep breath and asked “Ian, why did you do that?” He responded, “well mom, tomorrow when we go to Wal Mart, I want to have my own quarters to put in the red kettle.” Now I still didn’t want him selling Silent Night to the neighbors, but by knowing why he did what he did it changed the entire content of our conversation. Teachers need to know exactly why they are using the methods and materials they have selected to use with their students.
The fourth element says that we must integrate and utilize technology in our instruction. Many teachers will tell us very quickly that they don’t have the technology they need to be successful with this and that is true – we have a long way to go to have all of our classrooms appropriately equipped with the technology we should have-- but we have also seen that many teachers are not effectively using the technology they do have available to them. Technology needs to become for us what the textbook once was. It should be the tool by which we do much of our learning. Not just for creating projects, but to think critically and solve problems. Story: Our office received a phone call from a principal who was upset because his Superintendent had given him a grant for 1000 I-Pods and he didn’t want them. He felt that I-Pods did nothing except blare rock music in kid’s ears. Since he had to keep them, he wanted to know from us how he could use them. We reminded him that he had experts right in his building and he put together a committee of a couple of freshmen, sophomore, etc and within 15 minutes they had generated a list of over 100 ways in which they could use their I-Pods for educational purposes. They were using them with Cornell Notes, book studies, etc. Later the principal contacted us and let us know it was one of the best things that had happened at their school. One of the challenges with this element is that most always, the students will know more than the teachers and we need to come to some level of comfort with them being the expert.
The fifth of the eight elements for standard 4 which is about facilitating learning says that teachers will develop student’s critical thinking and problem-solving skills. This is a very important element because while we don’t know exactly what jobs our students will have we do know they will need these skills in whatever work is ahead for them. Our world is no longer about coming to one right answer. The classroom that is effective with this element gets excited about wrong answers because they want to trace back what happened. This classroom will have problems with numerous solutions and will challenge the students to think differently.
The next element in standard 4 indicates that teachers will help students work in teams and develop leadership qualities. We know from Standard 1 that teachers are expected to have leadership qualities so if we as adults need these skills in our work world, then certainly we know students are going to need them as well. In order for these skills to be maximized there needs to be considerable amount of group work done in the classroom. If the teacher is primarily directing everything in the class, students do not have the opportunity to develop their leadership skills.
The seventh of the eight elements for this standard says that teachers will communicate effectively. This element is about more than the teacher being effective in his/her communication skills. It is also about teachers helping students to develop these skills. The state graduation project has been put on hold, but some districts are continuing to require the projects. They are telling us that the seniors are not having difficulty with the content, but rather they are challenged by presenting their work. If as seniors our students are having difficulty getting up and presenting to others, then we have missed out on the content of this element in many earlier grades. This is another situation where the teacher needs to step back into the facilitator role. If the teacher is doing the majority of the talking in the classroom, the students will not have ample opportunity to develop these skills.
The last of the eight elements says that teachers will use a variety of methods to assess what each student has learned. If we are going to effectively take responsibility for all students learning, then we need to be efficient in assessing every student to know if they have learned what we are teaching. We cannot wait until the end of a unit or for several weeks to go by before we check to see if our students have gotten what we have given them. Teachers who are effective with this element find teaching and assessing flowing together every day. It doesn’t mean a paper and pencil test on every topic, but it does mean that teachers find some way to know if every student learned what was taught today so they can decide what needs to be taught tomorrow. Notice that this element also reminds us to provide opportunities for the students to do self-assessments. In the past, we have created a very passive system where the students simply sit back and wait for the adult to tell them how they did with their work. If they don’t have opportunities to judge and assess their work for themselves then later in the work world they will be unable to make good judgments about their performance. Remember that the research also tells us that if students are doing self-assessments this automatically causes an increase in their performance.
Time: This activity will be done anytime between 12:30 - 1:00… 10 minutes for activity 10 minutes for report out
(At the conclusion of the activity): REVIEW STANDARDS AGAIN. What is Standard 2 about? (Environment & Diversity) And how many elements does it have? (5) What is Standard 4 about? (Facilitating Learning) And it has how many elements? (8) What is Standard 1 about? (Leadership) And how many elements? (5) And what is Standard 3 about (Content) And how many elements does it have? (4) And one of them says our instruction must be what? (relevant) (QUOTE: Use as needed)
We are now at our 5 th standard. Standard 5 is all about self reflection and it has 3 elements. While it may have the least amount of elements, it is still very important because the true benefit of this instrument comes in the teacher’s willingness to self-reflect and grow in their practice. The first of the three elements is about analyzing student learning so here we have a standard that is about self reflection and the first thing you look at is not yourself – it is your students. Often people who go into the field of education are known as “people oriented” people. This is very useful for example with Standard 2 in establishing relationships, but it isn’t always as useful when it comes to self-reflection because often “people oriented” people tend to decide if something is working or not based on their feelings. “That was a good lesson because the fire alarm didn’t go off and the principal didn’t interrupt and Mary stayed in her seat”. It felt good so we believe it was a good lesson. But in reality when we ask ourselves if we are good facilitators of learning there really is only one way to answer that question and that is to analyze student learning. It truly doesn’t matter how good the lesson felt. The only thing that matters is if the students learned what we were teaching. So in standard 5, self-reflection, we begin by asking: am I good teacher and the way to answer that is to analyze student learning.
The second of the three elements for standard 5 which is about self-reflection says that teachers will link professional growth to their goals. This is nice because the teacher evaluation process automatically does this for teachers so as long as teachers follow the process they will instantly be proficient on this element.
The third and final element for Standard 5 says that teachers will function effectively in a complex, dynamic environment. In this instrument we are allowed to consider everything we know about a teacher when doing the final evaluation. We recognize that in addition to being a good facilitator of learning, we also must function well as a professional with our colleagues. This element allows us to consider if we are a positive, contributing part of our professional learning community. (REVIEW THE FIVE STANDARDS ONE LAST TIME BEFORE THE CARD SORT)
Close your materials. We are going to engage in a little formative assessment activity. For this activity, each group of people will have a set of cards consisting of three colors. The blue cards are the 5 standards and they are numbered one to five so that step is easy. Simply place them horizontally across the center of the table. The yellow cards are the elements we just discussed for each standard. REVIEW AGAIN IF NECESSARY. Without looking back at your materials and collaborating with your group, try to place all of the yellow elements under their appropriate standards. The green cards are definitions of the yellow cards so there will be a one to one match between each green and yellow card. The green cards are an extension of this activity so you may not have time to place all of your green cards. When you complete your blue and yellow cards, I will come around and check your work. You may start on the green cards as you finish the yellow cards. The objective of the task is for all of the groups to successfully place the blue and yellow cards so once that is done we will stop the activity. That means you may not finish with all of your green cards and that’s o.k. Any questions on your task?
THE EVALUATION PROCESS. We are now going to begin discussing the evaluation process. You are here today receiving training in the evaluation process. Everyone must be initially trained in this instrument. That may be a DPI training, a district training or teachers may be trained by their own principals. Training occurs just one time to learn the instrument. The next step is the orientation. The orientation occurs every year for every teacher and is the easiest step in the process. The orientation is simply ensuring that all teachers have electronic or hard copies of three things: the rubric, the policy which is contained in the manual and the schedule of evaluation. The schedule of evaluation is to let the teacher know if they will be evaluated this year using the entire evaluation instrument. Probationary teachers are required to be evaluated every year using this instrument. Career Status teachers must be evaluated using the full instrument at least one time in every 5 years of their certificate renewal cycle, but districts have the choice of evaluating their Career Status teachers as frequently as they choose. Some may do it every five years; some every second or third year and some small districts evaluate them every year. Again, that is a district decision. In the years that a district is not evaluating their Career Status teachers, the district must decide what parts of the evaluation process they will complete on their career status teachers. The state requires these teachers to do a minimum of three things: the orientation, the self-assessment and goal setting. A district may choose to add other steps such as observations or pre or post conferences. The purpose of the schedule of evaluation that is given out during orientation is to notify career status teachers if this is a year they will be evaluated using the entire instrument and if not, what will be the steps of their evaluation process. This orientation process must be completed within the first two weeks of a teacher’s employment. For most employees this means they will receive the information electronically at the beginning of the school year. But principals must remember to distribute these materials to any new teacher hired after the school year begins. In some cases, these teachers won’t even have been trained in the process yet, but they still are entitled to copies of the rubric, the policy and the schedule of evaluation. Some districts are also placing the rubric and manual on their district website and simply sending an email to teachers reminding them of the location of the materials.
The next step in the process is for the teachers to take the rubric given to them during the orientation and to complete a self-assessment.
Open your manuals to page 21. This is the evaluation rubric and it is used for the teacher’s self assessment as well as for classroom observations and for the evaluation done at the end of the year. On page 22 you will see this element which is element C of standard 1 and we will use this to show you how to complete the self-assessment. When doing the self-assessment the teacher will start in the developing column. In this instrument the behaviors that line up across the rubric horizontally are related to each other. They are one skill growing stronger. But there may be many skills needed to demonstrate a teacher can perform an element so there are skills listed vertically and these do not relate to each other. So the teacher begins by reading the first behavior in the developing column and making a decision as to whether they feel they successfully demonstrate that skill. If they do, they place a check mark in the box. If they do not, they skip that box and read the next behavior. They repeat this for every behavior in the proficient column, then the accomplished column and finally the distinguished column making a decision about each behavior and checking the boxes for the behaviors they feel they demonstrate. After completing all columns for the element the way to determine how the teacher is rated is by locating the column that has every behavior in it checked and all columns prior to that column are checked. In other words, a teacher cannot be accomplished without having checked everything in the proficient column and in the developing column. THIS MAY BE A GREAT STOPPING POINT FOR DAY 1. Give participants an opportunity to ask any final questions before you break for the day. If your group is comfortable to move along a little further, feel confident to do so. If you end the day here, present the homework assignment: Homework: Complete a self-assessment. You can think of a teacher at your current school, or teacher you have previously had or yourself, if you are a teacher. Go through the process of deciding if you can place a check in the box of every element of every standard of the instrument. As you go through the self-assessment, consider what artifacts or behaviors that you are doing that will demonstrate that descriptor.
BEGIN DAY 2… Review from yesterday and skip to slide 81 and debrief the self-assessment exercise last night. (see slide 81) The next step in the process is the pre-observation conference. This conference is only required one time during the year, but it must happen before any official observations can occur for a teacher’s evaluation. During this conference three things will be discussed: the self-assessment, the PDP and the lesson that will be observed. The teacher will bring the self-assessment to this conference and to all other conferences during the year. In this initial pre-observation conference, the teacher will share the self-assessment with the principal. The principal’s role is simply to be a reflective listener. At this point, the principal has not yet begun doing any observations or work for the evaluation process so the principal will not indicate to the teacher that s/he is rated any differently than the teacher says they are. Instead the principal is simply listening to what the teacher has to share. The self-assessment remains the teacher’s property. The principal does not make a copy or keep a copy of the self-assessment, but the teacher will bring the self-assessment back each time s/he meets with the principal. In addition to the self-assessment, the PDP and the lesson to be observed will also be discussed. The teacher will give the principal a copy of the written lesson to be observed. There is no requirement for a pre-observation conference prior to any other observations during the year.
The rubric is to be used for all observations – formal and informal; those done by the administration and those done by a peer. We encourage observers to take the rubric in on their laptops and model 21 st Century skills. When a principal or peer goes in to do an observation, he or she will place check marks in the boxes of the skill level they observe from the behaviors of the teacher. They are not checking every box as is done with the self-assessment, but rather they will find the box that is the closest description of the skill they are observing. It is important to understand that this is not a rating for a teacher, but merely a reflection of the skill observed during that particular lesson. This first observation is announced, but we do not require any additional observations to be announced. In actuality the role of the principal is to try and get as close as possible to the student’s daily experience. This is more easily attained if we do observations without announcing the observation. Remember that this first observation is formal for all teachers. Subsequent observations on career status teachers may be formal or informal. Look at page 21 in your manual. Notice in the far left column there is one printed check mark, but on the next page there are no printed checkmarks. The check marks in this far left column are there to indicate the behaviors that can be observed during a lesson. Remember that in this instrument we are allowed to consider everything we know about a teacher, inside and outside the classroom. If there is no check mark next to a behavior than it is a behavior that cannot be observed during a lesson. So when principals and peers observe teachers they will be looking at the first element of Standard 1, teachers lead in the classroom, the first four elements of standard 2 and all of standards three and four. They will not be observing for the rest of the elements in standard 1, element e of standard 2 or any of standard 5. It is not necessary to cover all elements in every observation. An observer may go in and focus just on standard 3 for example and next time they will look at standard 4. The observer has several observations to collect the data they need. The peer observations are done just like the administrator observations. Any teacher that has been trained in this instrument, which should be all teachers in the building unless someone is new to the school, can do a peer observation. A peer is not evaluating their colleague. They simply are marking the rubric for the level of skill they observe during that period of time. There is no special training to be able to do the peer observation. We are hoping to use the peer observation to expand the number of opportunities teachers have to watch other teachers teach. When teachers read a behavior on the rubric, they automatically get an idea in their head of how they demonstrate that skill, but when they go in to observe another teacher they have to look for how that teacher might demonstrate the same skill. This helps the teacher to more thoroughly understand the rubric and adds more tricks to their bag for their own teaching. The principal may ask the peer to observe a particular standard. The peer is simply to be a second set of eyes. So for example if a principal has done two observations and he or she is still uncertain about a teacher’s skill level with a particular standard, they may ask the peer to observe just that particular standard to give them more information. In the past, observers have often used scripting where they wrote down everything the teacher did or said. If a person wants to script with this instrument, there is nothing that says they can’t. However, what we have learned from those using the instrument is that scripting really doesn’t work. Part of the reason for that is because scripting focuses entirely on teacher behavior and in this instrument observations are done to look at three things: teacher behavior, student behavior and most importantly to determine if the student is learning. There is a comment section at the end of each standard. This section is to be used to help the observer remember any information that will make the conversation during the post observation conference the most helpful. Some people may write more details for each check they mark on the rubric, but that is not expected or necessary. It may be that the observer is looking for a behavior or skill and doesn’t see it. They may make a note of it in the comment box to help them remember to discuss it in the post-observation conference. People often ask if the same administrator has to do all the observations on a teacher. Because the ratings on the rubric are based on each individual observation it isn’t necessary for the same person to do all the observations on one person. This may be shared with assistant principals. However, prior to the summary conference it will likely be helpful if the people who have completed the observations discuss the teacher’s growth. It is an individual school decision as to whether to share the observations among all the administrators or to have the same administrator do all observations on a teacher.
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