We haven't sent out a research update in quite a while, but that doesn't mean the research scene has been quiet.
There have been a number of different studies that explored the impact of educators on student achievement. Now many researchers have turned to the question of measuring effective teaching. How do you know it when you see it? What can we learn from highly effective educators?
A recent study by Tom Kane, Eric Taylor, John Tyler, and Amy Wooten set out to answer the question: Do classroom observations impact student achievement?
Using data from Cincinnati's teacher evaluation system from 2000 through the end of the 2009 school year, the researchers found, in short, the answer is yes.
The Cincinnati evaluation system entails four separate classroom observations per school year during a teacher's evaluation cycle. Teachers are graded on 1-to-4 scale on a number of different standards. With teachers that achieved an improved rank at least one point up on the scale, researchers also saw some gains in the reading and math achievement of their students.
The research seems to indicate, then, that there is a correlation between improved teacher evaluation scores and improved learning. The conclusion suggests that classroom observations and evaluations may actually be a good measure of teaching as it relates to student achievement.
Additionally, the researchers looked at classroom practice and found that certain practices were more closely correlated to student achievement than others.
Stephen Sawchuck at Education Week writes, "...while overall teaching practice was the best predictor of student achievement, classroom management was more highly correlated with better math performance than the teachers' use of questioning. For reading, use of open-ended questions was more highly correlated with student performance than classroom management, though this finding was somewhat less robust."
Read the entire Education Week article.
Let us know what you think on ChalkBloggers. Should classroom observations be taken more seriously as indicators of student achievement?
