Description of the Evaluation Program

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Description of the Evaluation Program

For this reflection paper I chose to look back at my first year as an elementary school assistant principal and the training and experience I had with the teacher evaluation process. The year was 2004 and during the first month of school I was assigned to participate in a three day training session on how to observe and assess teachers using the Formative Observation Data Instrument (FODI) and the Formative Observation Data Analysis (FODA) forms. I attended this training with six other new assistance principals from schools within the district. We learned the procedures and processes for evaluating teachers from a retired principal. With my newfound knowledge I returned to my school and began evaluating our 61 faculty members ranging from first year teachers to educators with more than 30 years experience.

As the year progressed I became more comfortable with the observation process though it often consumed a sizable portion of my time. In March I observed our music teacher, Mrs. X, who was new to our school and had recently returned to the district from Wake County. During the pre-observation meeting she informed me about her past teaching experiences and mentioned that she had taught for six schools and districts over the past ten years, never staying at one school for more than two years.

I observed one of Mrs. X’s general music lessons in the late morning with a class of 19 first grade students. I witnessed teaching and classroom management procedures that clearly needed improvement. The processes for having students enter the room and taking attendance occupied the first ten minutes of a 40 minute class period. The teacher showed a picture of Beethoven and talked about...

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...; Robert B. Meadows; Allen B. Dyal. "School principals' perceptions: the use of formal observation of classroom teaching to improve instruction." Education. Project Innovation (Alabama). 1995. Retrieved June 09, 2010 from HighBeam Research: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-17855124.html

Hollis, Jim. "From observation to insight: using handheld devices to gather information from classroom observations, principals can aggregate new knowledge about instruction and overcome the ambiguity of what is going on in the classroom." Leadership. Association of California School Administrators. 2010. Retrieved June 07, 2010 from HighBeam Research: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-218449016.html

Toppo, G. (2003). Who's Watching the Class? Retrieved June 7, 2010, from USA Today, http://www.usatoday.com. Web site: http://www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/2003-08-10-webcams-usat_x.htm.

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