So this is my 4th year teaching, but it truly feels like my first year. This year I'm at a new school and I'm very excited but yet nervous about the daily administrative walkthroughs. From the P, AP and curriculum team. They do daily walkthroughs in our room anywhere from a few seconds to ten minutes. I'm happy because I will get feedback to improve my instruction and delivery.... but nervous at the same time. Does anyone work at a school that is similar? How do you get over the jitters from administration doing daily walk throughs?
I work in a small school. The admins walk through all of the time, several times a day. Even the kids have stopped saying "(admin's name) is here!". I just carry on as usual, and the kids do too.
My principal and I are so bogged down with paperwork, discipline, parents, meetings, lunch/yard duty etc. that we haven't done any walk-throughs yet. It is, however, only the end of week three, so I'm hoping we'll get to start doing walk-throughs soon. I don't see myself staying in each room for more than a couple of minutes. One can easily get a snapshot of what's going on in a classroom by just staying for a minute or two (plus, we have 30+ teachers).
My school is pretty big so it's a pretty big to-do when the admins get together to do walk throughs, it only happens once a month and sometimes they don't get to everyone. (Which is annoying because you have something maybe a little special planned and you're waiting, waiting and they don't come to you.) Walk throughs don't bother me because they don't stay too long. Unannounced informals are much more nerve racking to me because my AP will stay for a full 90 minutes so if you're not up to par that day you really can't fake it for that long. Luckily he's never caught me on a bad day.
My P does 'focus walks', so far she's done 2, one when I was sick, and today. She stays between a minute to 10, but usually it's just long enough to see what her 'focus' is. Today it was to see if the objectives are up (and they relate to the lesson) and if the grades are posted. I really don't care if the P comes in, I think the more times, the better. We're being recorded anyways and often she watches us during the day. She can't hear anything, but can see what's happening in the classroom. So even if she's not in there in person, I always think she's watching, so I'm used to that.
I guess that is a way to look at it... I do need to post my I can statements and EQ statement. I can at least say that all of my students are engaged all of the time. The only reason I'm nervous is because I'm coming from a school where I may have had a visit from P and Curriculum Team 5-6 times a year.
I am a first year teacher and we can expect 3 walkthroughs a week, the P, the VP, and Instructional Coach + a few monthly from central office. It is very nerve wracking because I am not 100% w/my classroom management and have some challenging classes...I am a bit of a wreck.....
My principals are both very busy in the office, but our halls are small, so I know they are up and down the halls throughout the day. My door is always open so they can always hear what's going on.
I do walk-throughs pretty frequently. I did a few unannounced observations at the middle school earlier this week, and just yesterday I stopped into one of the high school teacher's classes for about 10 minutes. These were not evaluative in any way--I just followed up with a brief email or conversation with the teacher. In our school, we do "data collection" walk-throughs pretty frequently, where we are looking for a specific strategy/technique, and see as many teachers in one period as possible. We just record the data into a spreadsheet, and don't put any specific information about the individual teachers. We use that information to see trends in teaching across the school and to plan future PD sessions.
How are they not evaluative? Isn't every walk-through, whether it is official or not really evaluative?
These types of observations aren't evaluative for the individual teacher because I do not record any evidence that gets tied to his/her final summative rating at the end of the school year. Data collection evaluations are evaluative on a school-wide level in that they inform us of instructional patterns, but nothing gets recorded that's linked to specific teachers. We are starting a new evaluation system this year, and anything that counts needs to be entered into the computer system. At the end of the school year, we are supposed to look at the trends in each area of evaluation in order to determine ratings of 1-4.
OK. I am not trying to argue, so please do not take it that way. But I have heard this from our admin as well. Even if it is not recorded, they really are evaluative. They are there to point out strengths, give advice, question..etc aren't these evaluative? Whether it is recorded or not, the person evaluating still takes away what they observed, it isn't really "gone" Or when admin says they are not evaluative do they mean it is not "officially" going to be recorded or brought up if there is an issue? I just find that whenever any one is observing your classroom, it really is evaluative, whether official or not. And saying it is not evaluative really doesn't make it easier...imo.
People are constantly in and out of my classroom. It's my first year and I'm under the impression that it was poorly run in previous years. I hope they like what they see!
Interesting perspectives. For the moment I'm going to take it as they are trying to see the growth and progression of my teaching style, classroom management and teaching practices. I look forward to the feedback once I receive some. The AP did a walk through an took a few notes. Luckily I was doing a circle map (I love thinking maps). My formal observation isn't until November.
Sheesh, I don't know when my P would find the time. He shows up once per year for the one required observation per year. And even then, he's only around for about 20 minutes. He's way too busy to be doing a daily walk through. Sorry about that, that sounds about as fun as sitting on a cactus.
Well the school had some issues previously. A new P has come in and despite how the daily walk throughs sound, I am enjoying how she has come in and shaken things up. She is very visible in the school, high 5s the kids. She isn't the only one who does the walk throughs. The whole curriculum team plus the AP does walk throughs. I have found that she comes in and speak to a couple of the kids, ask them what they are doing, read a sentence, what are they learning etc. So I see that I'm going to have to be very explicit and explain to the children what they are learning with each activity.
I teach with my door open. I once had the AP, who was a math teacher, hear something I said and stop by my open back door. Five minutes later, he was still there and I stopped teaching, and invited him to sit down. He did, and stayed for the whole lesson. He then wrote it up-- very favorably-- as an extra observation. (We're normally observed by our department chairs, not the AP.) I always say I'm OK with observations being taken from the hallway... I don't have to know I'm being observed. (And, no, no one has ever taken me up on it.) The ONE observation that should have worried me was 5 years ago. I was 8 or 9 days into radiation treatments, and had a pregnancy scare. Having a good idea of what radiation could do to a fetus, I was a wreck. I could have postponed the observation, but I knew that if that pregnancy test came out positive, this was likely to be the best day I would have for quite some time to come. So I taught on autopilot, and never said anything to the deparment chair about it until later that year. (Thankfully, the test was negative.)
At that rate, it would take my principal at least a solid 3 months to hit each person once.... that's why it's up to the department chairs. The AP does observe new teachers at least once. This year, I think that's about 10 extra observations fo him.
My dean comes in once a week for observations. They are usually about 12 to 15 minutes long. We do have slightly longer ones twice a year, but the data from all the observations go towards a 1-4 rating in the different categories of our evaluation. I hated getting observed at first, but two years in it is getting easier. She knows tons about my class and helps me find solutions to problems I amhaving.
We don't really get walk-throughs anymore since they have so many informal evaluations to do. But we have a new P and one new AP, so the whole admin team is coming around right now to make sure everyone is on the same page with their scoring... and to check out the teaching.
At first I thought this too. Now I get that walkthroughs, at my school anyway, evaluate the school more than the individuals. The P has now been more involved with altering PBIS, troubleshooting tech, cleanliness of the bathrooms, food in the cafeteria, etc simply because she does walkthroughs and witnesses the needs.
Yeah, and I don't mean it as a negative thing. The admin at my school is great, with a capital G. But I know that no matter what they say, when they come in my room, for what ever reason, they are always evaluating what is going on, official, on purpose, accidental, or what not. They are always taking in something that is happening in my room.
My walk-throughs are are in addition to our department chairs observations and the assistant principals. They are for 5-10 minutes a piece.
