It's "nearly impossible" to measure a teacher's impact on student achievement, writes Brian Huskie.
"The Gates Foundation spent $575 million trying to accurately assess teacher effectiveness" and wasn't able to build a "reliable and valid" model. There are too many variables.
Some evaluators operate by the mantra that “the person doing the talking is the person doing the learning,” he writes. If students are talking that "suggests student engagement, which implies student learning, and so must be preferable to teachers . . . teaching?"
Of course, it's easy to measure what percentage of class time is devoted to students talking, much harder to evaluate the quality of what students say, and even harder to know who's learning what.
But there's a new mantra, Huskie learned in a teacher training session. Now, “the person doing the smiling is the person doing the learning.” During a training session, teachers were told students would signal their engagement and learning by showing “visible delight.”
What if students look thoughtful or puzzled or determined? No learning indicated? I was an excellent student, but I didn't enjoy every minute of it.
Huskie prefer to "look at larger trends over longer periods of time and see pretty clearly what works . . . Teachers teach. Students practice. Students test. Make sure students are grouped by ability. Make sure discipline is a school-wide priority."
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