Quantum particles and teachers share something in common – they both act rather strangely and become unpredictable when observed. One of the laws governing the quantum world says that particles change their nature according to where and when they are being observed and who is doing the observeing. This sounds absurd but it’s true. When considering the practice of observations I am sure teachers can relate to this. Does a certain staff member put you at ease during the observation? Or how about the time of year, or even time of day that the observation is being carried out. An impending lesson observation can induce stress, anxiety or excitement, which can all change the nature of the oberservation. I’ve heard of some teachers having wildly different judgements from one observer to the next, even with the same or similar lesson taught. What this certainly reveals is that judgements can change with the simplest of variables: observer and context. This is an inherent flaw in the process.
How unreliable can the process of observations be?
Very unreliable, as the data might suggest. Professor Rob Coe who leads Durham University’s Centre for Education Monitoring writes “if a lesson is judged ‘Outstanding’ by one observer, the probability that a second observer would give a different judgement is between 51% and 78%.” To put this in a different way, in the worst cases there’s almost a 4/5 chance that an ‘Outstanding’ lesson will be judged differently from one observer to the next. Further still, Coe argues that there’s a 90% chance that an Inadequate rating would be given a different judgement between different observers. The jury is in – lesson observations are fundamentally flawed in their current design.
But what if there’s a way to reduce this flaw
If we are quantum like in our observations, what does this mean for the profession? A sea of uncertainty? Wobbly discrepancy in the fog of grading teaching and learning? One approach is to accept that this is the way things are and carry on as normal. But how helpful is this? A more valuable approach would be to scrap judgements all together. In this I mean one off judgements at the end of a lesson. I once read some great advice about this from two educational bloggers whom I highly regard – @teachertoolkit and @johntomsett. In my role as a leader, when observing colleagues I always place emphasis on the diagnostics (strengths and areas for development) during the feedback phase. In fact, my language explicitly frames this as I begin with “it’s not about the judgement but how you can get better”. Nobody wants to be told they are inadequate for this often breeds feelings of failure and it’s just as unhelpful to be called ‘Outstanding’ lest we become well rested upon our laurels. As teachers we should all want to get better regardless of where we are in our craft- graded judgements can be an impediment if they are a destination in of themselves. I believe we should move to a more dialogic approach- guided and purposeful discussion about what actually makes good teaching and learning. I have recently become very interested in the role professional coaching could play in the profession. If schools had designated teaching coaches, they could guide each teacher towards becoming better practitioners. This is more attractive and potentially overall more effective in that it involves a long term commitment to improving teacher effectiveness. Of course, coaching needs to be done in the right way with well trained staff possessing the right disposition. Coaches will help teachers do the the following:
- Identify where they are currently
- Support the coachee in getting to where they want to be
Of course there are more intricacies and nuances embedded within each of these stages but a well skilled coach will have the abilities necessary to handle these. The two points above are not an exhaustive list of ingredients, but more a like a set of fundamental principles.
If you’d like to respond, critique or expound upon any of these suggestions please do so.