Teacher Evaluation

Historical Context

The process of evaluating classroom teachers has historically pursued two distinct goals: monitoring teacher performance for the purpose of making personnel decisions, and supporting teachers in their efforts to improve their classroom practice. Unfortunately, there is considerable evidence that in many schools neither of these goals has been achieved. For many teachers and school administrators, teacher evaluation remains a process they are mandated to participate in, but one that makes little or no significant difference in their respective professional lives.

Teacher evaluation in the United States occurs in a constellation of contexts that vary not only by state, but by local school district as well. This contextual diversity includes a variety of factors including, but not limited to, the frequency of evaluations for teachers on limited or continuing contracts; the tools and methods employed to conduct the evaluations; the training, or lack thereof, of administrators to effectively facilitate the evaluation process; and the criteria used to define good teaching itself.

With regard to this last factor, the foci of teacher evaluation have evolved over time. For example, in the 1950s many school administrators were largely concerned with teacher traits such as enthusiasm and interpersonal warmth, among others. The 1960s and 1970s, influenced by an emerging emphasis on the teacher effects research, were characterized by a new focus on a teacher's classroom behaviors and their correlations with student performance as measured on standardized tests. In the early 1980s, the work of Madeline Hunter at the University of California, Los Angeles, focused on the identification of a specific planning and teaching model that included seven steps of instructional design. The findings of the teacher effects research of the 1960s and 1970s, along with practices from the Hunter model, made their way into many teacher evaluation systems appearing on teacher performance checklists and classroom observation forms. In other districts, however, teacher evaluation protocols remained unchanged and continued to focus on criteria such as personal appearance, professional preparation, and effective communication.

School Reform and Teacher Evaluation

Beginning with the modern school reform movement that found its birth in the publication of a Nation at Risk in 1983, education reformers began to pay increasing attention to teacher evaluation as a tool for improving America's schools. In the late 1980s and continuing into the 21st century, views of teaching and learning began to shift toward placing greater focus on student learning and understanding. Influenced by research from the cognitive sciences and a deeper understanding of how people learn, opinions regarding quality teaching began to embrace a constructivist view of learning. In the 1990s, other events transpired that had a significant influence on discussions of how to improve teacher evaluation. Two events that played such a role were the Tennessee Value Added studies led by William Sanders and the publication of Enhancing Professional Practice: A Framework for Teaching by Charlotte Danielson.

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