Teacher observations don’t have to be terrifying!
Personally, I have a love-hate relationship with my teacher observation. I love that they only happen once or twice per year, and also HATE that my effectiveness as a teacher is evaluated based on one or two 30 minute observations of my classroom.
So…I got a little tricky in my observations….
What if we had an effective plan to ensure that more of our work was evaluated? Most teachers will agree that evaluating us on one day does NOT present an accurate picture of what we do or accomplish in the course of a day, week, month, and certainly not the entire school year. So, I came up with a plan that I’ve used for several years to force administrators to evaluate me on more than the 30 minutes they spend in my classroom on a given day.
I am a special education teacher, and my students fluctuate drastically when new people are in the classroom….really any change can trigger an unpredictable class period. Let’s be honest, part of the reason we special education teachers love our jobs is the lack of predictability, but when it comes time for teacher observations….this can pose a problem.
Step 1: Plan for Success
This step starts at least two weeks before your teacher observation (more if possible). Administrators, no matter how frequently (or infrequently) you see them, are well aware that students struggle in certain skills. Mention, in passing, that your students are struggling in a certain area, but you are reteaching the concept and expect the students to perform better very soon. (Extra bonus if you can talk about how Progress Monitoring has helped your students make progress.)
This shows your administrator that you are aware of how your students are doing (use fancy words like “formative assessment” to further impress admin). Show admin that you have a plan in place to solve the issues. Make your admin aware that your students need work on a certain topic or skills, and when they come in for your teacher observation and your students ROCK that skill, they will be super impressed. This forces your administrator to see that the skills you are teaching your students extend over more than one day or week.
Step 2: Practice, Practice, Practice!
In the time between dropping your hint about your excellent knowledge of your students, and actually being observed, have your students practice the skill or topic in a variety of formats. This helps all students, including those with special needs, generalize their learning and become more comfortable using that skill. To be impressive, use fancy terms such as “spiraling the curriculum” to explain this time leading up to your teacher observation.
Step 3: Plan to Shine (in the background)
When planning your observation lesson, devise an activity (but call it a lesson) in which the students show off their knowledge or skills. Culminating project or presentations are great for this. This activity should include the skill you discussed earlier, but shouldn’t be strictly about that skill. This shows that you have built up your student’s skills. They can now use that skill to complete the next step in their learning. THIS is how you force your administrators to evaluate you based on more than just one observation. They are now observing you, with the background knowledge about your students, and the progress they have made on the recent unit or topic. You will be allowing your students to show how amazing you are as a teacher through their new knowledge or abilities.
Step 4: Facilitate that Lesson!
During the activity, allow your students to take control because they will be presenting their knowledge. Your students take center stage, teaching the class, while you stand back and assist your students in being amazing. Show your admin how much trust you have in your students. Allow them to show the presentation or conduct the activity, while you watch in awe at all you have taught your students. This ticks the box for students taking ownership of their own learning. It also shows working on social skills while teaching content. The more that you show your ability to hand learning over to your students, the better environment for learning you have created. This is SUPER impressive to your administrators.
Step 5: Show Off Your Skills
Obviously during the teacher observation you must be doing SOMETHING. Show off those amazing behavior management skills! Have the classroom environment in tip-top shape to assist the presenters. Make sure your administrator hears a few of your encouraging words. Use proximity to help keep THAT student under control.
Worried about behavior during a presentation? I don’t! The administrator is in the room! Use that to your advantage! Students know admin is in the room and will act better if they know they are watching them. I have conducted teacher observations in kindergarten and high school special education settings. When students know the administrator is there to see how much the student has learned… as well as watch you… the better behaved even the most challenging student will be.
Step 6: Talk About How Far They Have Come
Now, for the final step….the post-conference. THIS is my least favorite part of the teacher observation process. I am not afraid that an admin is going to tell me I could have done a better job. I know I could have. Why? BECAUSE EVERY LESSON COULD HAVE GONE BETTER.
I always look back at my lessons, no matter how great they were, and think about all the ways I could have done better. I think about things I should have done differently. Most of the time, when asked to rate my lessons, I rate them lower than my administrator (except that one admin I had, who, did not know how to evaluate a special education teacher). So….how do I work around this most-hated aspect? I focus myself on how far the students have come….including referencing that comment made in passing weeks ago. (It never hurts to remind a busy administrator about how struggling students aren’t struggling any more.) Focus, in your post-conference on the culmination of the unit of work. Let’s face it, teaching isn’t about one short lesson, it is about building toward something better…. Reference hurdles your students have overcome to make it to the activity your administrator witnessed. It is very hard to mark someone down when they are able to show that their students have made a lot of progress in a short amount of time. This is what you have shown them through this process.
Now that you have rocked your teacher evaluation… What do you do? Get back to doing what you do best! TEACHING! No matter how the teacher observation went, or what your evaluation says, you are doing the best for your students. At the end of the day, that is why we all got into this profession.
There will always be hoops to jump through….so jump….then get back to teaching!
BONUS TIP: Ok, so this is also one of my secrets to rocking my observations…. Student use of technology. I have made it a point to make sure that my students create something during the lesson. Or that they have made something which is presented during the teacher observation. Teaching students to actively create using technology has greatly boosted their learning, as well as my observation scores! Administrators know that students need to learn to utilize technology effectively to create products. Show administrators that you not only encourage the use of technology, but integrate it into lessons and activities. Prove that you deserve to be recognized as an outstanding teacher!