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A Qualitative andQualitatively DifferentFormat for the Evaluationof Student TeachersSara Fritzell Hanhan aa Center for Teaching and Learning at theUniversity of North DakotaPublished online: 19 Jul 2012.

To cite this article: Sara Fritzell Hanhan (1988) A Qualitative andQualitatively Different Format for the Evaluation of Student Teachers, Actionin Teacher Education, 10:2, 51-55, DOI: 10.1080/01626620.1988.10519389

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01626620.1988.10519389

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A mid-sem ester conference provides the se tting for helpin g student teachers rec­ognizc . articu late lind improve a personal style of teaching

A Qualitative and Qualitatively Different Formatfor the Evaluation of Student Teachers

INTRODUCTION

Document at ion and subsequent evaluation of stude nt teach ing are ofte n co n­stra ined by issues o f tim e and co ns iste ncy. es pec ially when a un iversity superv isoris evaluating more than one student. On e of the first thin gs to go in cons iderationof tim e is narrative description; on e of the first to go in cons ideration of con sistenc yis the recogni tion , appreciat ion, and suppo rt o f indi vidu alit y . This essay presents aformat for describi ng and eva luating the work of stude nt teachers that recogni zesand bu ilds o n ind ividual teaching sty les with in a workable tim e fram e ,

Man y-if not most-teach er education pro gram s have dev eloped a printed formfor documenting the qu ality o f work the stude nt teacher dem onst rates . So me formsask supe rv isors to chec k unsati sfact ory or satisfactory and then to add narr ative co m­ment s in the remainin g I by 4 inch space; others as k supervisors to rate stude nts inove r 50 skills co ns idered to be essential for all teachers . Th e former does not rest rictthe supervisor to part icul ar mod es of ratin g . but she is co nstrained by space and isgiven littl e directi on for obse rvi ng and documenting the quality of the stude nt'steaching. Alt hou gh thi s kind of form has the potent ial for description of individualsty les of teaching . it offe rs little dir ecti on or room for describing them . and con ­seque ntly. leaves insightful description s largely up to ch anc e (and size o f hand ­writing).

A chec klist or rat ing sca le , on the other hand . requires the supe rviso r to see allpotenti al teachers in a parti cular way. Stude nts are evaluated (and va lued) by howwell their teaching dem on strates a pred etermined set o f characteri stics or skills . Th eingred ients of suc h a list may vary depending upon the philosophical or theoreti calorientatio n of the form wr iter. but whatever the ingredi ent s . there is little possibilitywithin such a sys tem to see how the stude nt's teach ing sty le. with un ique stre ngthsor un ique co mbinations of traditionally recogni zed stre ngths , might speak for itsel f.The potenti al for recogni zing what for thi s particular teach er work s is minimized .Furthe rmo re stude nts ha ve littl e ch ance of coming to know them se lves as person swith trul y individual sty les of teaching that ca n be trusted as foundations upon whi chexperiences ca n build .

Sara Fr itzell Hanhan is Assistant Professor of Education and Chairof Early Childhood Education for the Center for Teaching and Learn­ing at the University of North Dakota. She teaches undergraduate coursesin Early Childhood Education and graduate courses in Child Study andEducation.

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BACKGROUND

At the Unive rsity of North Dakota 's Ce nter for Teaching and Learnin g , member sof the Ear ly Childhood Educa tio n Faculty have developed a process for descr ibin gand evaluating the teach ing practices of student teachers that falls betw een meth odswhic h rely on predetermined static catego ries and those that give no di rection forobservation and docum entation . Th e process is now in its six th yea r of use at theUnive rsi ty Children's Ce nter, the camp us child care center and lab schoo l for un­dergraduate students studyi ng Early Childhoo d Education. Dur ing anyone semes ter,six persons student teach in this setting . Eac h student work s for one half day (as doregular paid teac hers) and is ass igned to his ow n gro up of eig ht chi ldren . A studentteacher is paired with a paid teac her to share one of three large areas of the Ce nter,mak ing eac h area educatio nal home to 16 children and two teachers- one studentand one regul ar staff member.

As support for the kind of meanin gful learnin g and retl ecti ve teaching hoped forduring the stude nt teaching experience, students simultaneo usly take two co ursesdesigned to connect closely with this clin ical experience . Enro llment in these co ursesis acco rdingly restricted to the six student teachers . One class meets weekly as agro up and focu ses on issues such as curriculum development , classroom manage­ment , individual child needs, parent involvement , etc . as the y present them selv eswithin the context of teachin g a group of yo ung children . Th e seco nd class is atutorial which invol ves wee kly individu al meetin gs betw een the stude nt and the Ed­ucational Direct or of the Center to focus on more personal aspec ts of the processof becom ing a teacher of yo ung children. Ce ntral to this course , and to the semes ter­long student teacher supervision process , are regular observation of the student teacherby the Educa tional Director and a related three- or four-person mid-sem ester co n­ference . This mid-semes ter co nfere nce is the heart of the process which falls be­twee n the two formats descr ibed above and which has been found to be part icul arlyeducatio nal for supervisors and students.

The process was developed by the autho r and by Wayne Kuklinski and GayleNelson, consec utive educa tional directors of the Ce nter. It adapts, and extends forteacher educa tio n, descript ive documentary processes or igina lly developed at theProspect Arc hive and Ce nter for Educa tion and Research under the leadersh ip ofPatric ia F. Ca rini (Descriptive Document ary Processes , 1980). It is a process wh ichis base d on a bel ief that knowledge of se lf and retl ect ive thought about one's ownteach ing practice are imp ortant co mponents of beginning and co ntinuing profession algrowth.

THE MID-SEMESTER CONFERENCE

PURPOSEPartic ipants in the mid-t erm co nference are the stude nt teacher , the Educati onal

Director of the Children 's Ce nter , and the Early Childhood Education Facult y Su­pervisor. The staff teacher wo rking alongs ide the stude nt teacher may or may notpart icip ate . Th e purposes of the co nference are (a) to enable the stude nt teacher ' srecogn ition and articulatio n of his ow n personal style as it is ex presse d in teachingpractice, (b) to identi fy strengths and areas of vulnerability within that personal modeof teaching, and (c) to develop recommend ation s for using those strengths to support

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and/or imp rove current teach ing pract ices whic h are of conce rn to the stude nt orhis superv isors .

PREPARATIONIn prep aration for the process . the stude nt teacher is asked to identi fy a focusin g

question related to his ow n teaching which is of personal co nce rn and to reflect onhis practice within the co ntex t of a set of 13 question s . (See Qu estions for Stude ntReflect ion below .) Also in preparation for the co nference. the Educational Directorobserves the stude nt regul arl y dur ing the first half of the semes ter . keep ing runningrecord s of her obse rvations. and revie ws those obse rva tions for the purp ose of de­scribing the stude nt broadl y and in an integrative . holi stic mann er. Four broad de­scriptive ca tego ries are used for orga nizing the obse rva tional data and verba l de­scription. (See Descripti ve Categor ies below.)

PROCEDURES FOR CONDUCTING THE CONFERENCEDuring the mid-sem ester co nfere nce. which usuall y takes two hours, the Descrip­

tive Review Process is co nducted as fo llows :I . The uni versity supervisor, serving as chair, opens the meetin g by describing

the sequence of review activ ities .2. The student teacher identi fies the " prese nting question " which addresses a

personal co nce rn and provi des a focus for the review process and for sub­sequent reco mme ndations .

3. The student teacher presents responses to the 13 questions. The student teacheris permitted to answe r them in an alternative sequence, or to emphasi ze oromit question s as see ms desirable .

4 . The uni versity supervisor provides a summary of the stude nt teacher ' s re­flection s , identifying themes which sugges t co ntinuity across di verse re­spo nses .

5 . Th e Educational Director present s a description of the student teacher. usingthe four descript ive categories listed below. The stude nt's co-teac her, if pres­ent. adds co mme nts and obse rva tions in eac h of the four ca tego ries as deemedappro pria te . It is import ant that the language used in this process be descrip­tive rather than evaluative .

6 . The univ ersity superv isor prov ides a summary of the Educatio nal Director ' sand co- teacher's descripti ons of the stude nt teacher . again identifying themeswhich cross descript ive ca tego ries .

7. All co nfere nce participants add and discu ss other obse rvatio ns , quest ion s , andco nce rns regarding the evolving descr ipt ion of the teacher.

H. Beginning with the stude nt teacher , the conference participant s identi fy anddiscuss what app ear to be the stude nt 's greates t strengths and areas of grea tes tvulnerability within the co ntex t of teachin g young childre n. (Beca use a per­son's strengths may , under some circumstances , sugges t vulnerab ility the useof the more co ntras tive labels , strengths and wea knesse s. is purp osefullyavo ided, and as a result, the possibilit y for interplay between the two cate­go ries is made more visible .)

9 . Recommend ation s are made whic h build on the stude nt teacher ' s strengthsand personal style. These recommend ations address questions of practice whichhave been ident ified in the presenting question and/or which have becom eevide nt in some other part of the review process .

10 . All part icip ant s discu ss and cr itique the rev iew process .

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QUESTIONS FOR STUDENT REFLECTIONQues tio ns provided studen t teachers prior to the mid-term co nfere nce for co nsid­

era tio n and ment al or writte n note-takin g are as follows:I. Which times of day and/or which days of the week see m to go the easiest

for you? Th e hardest? Wh y?2. Areas in wh ich you feel particul ar pressure and areas which arc particul arly

se lf-susta ining and smoo th-running : In which areas of the Ce nter do you fee lthe mos t co mfort and/or satisfaction? Th e least comfort and/or sat isfac tion?Wh y?

3. Where in the Ce nter do you spend most of your time '! How do you spendmost of your time'! Where are you and what are yo u doin g when you havea cho ice?

4 . What do yo u view your role as teacher to be? What kind of ro le do you playin relation to the childre n?

5 . Subjects , them es , activities , interests: What themes, if any , have you chose nto pursue in your acti vities with the chi ldre n? What kind s of projects haveyo u involved them and yourse lf in'! What are yo ur plans for themes and ac­tivities'!

6. Describe the personalit y of the gro up of children with whom you wo rk. Isthere a typical foca l point for the group'!-a parti cul ar child . teacher. a topi cof interest, etc .-or is focu s more ofte n diffused?

7. How do you ge t ready for the morn ing (afternoo n)? When and where '!8 . What happ en s to you at the end of the morning (afternoon)'! Physically? Men ­

tally? Emotionally?9 . Describe so me of the indi vidu al childre n in your group.

10 . What arc yo ur goals for the semes ter? For your gro up of children? For in­dividual children? For yourse lf?

11. What strategies do you employ in " managing the children" ? What disciplineor guida nce techn iques do you tend to usc'!

12. When do you feel the most satisfac tion from you r teacher work ? The least '!13. When the routine is upset and/or chang ing , how do you regain your equi­

librium? How do yo u help the chi ldren regain the ir equilibrium?

DESCRIPTIVE CATEGORIESI . Th e teacher ' s stance in the world : ges ture, posture . inflec tion, rhythm . energy .2. The teacher ' s emotio nal tenor and disposition: tone , ex press iveness. inten sity .

range , pattern .3. The teacher' s mode of relationships with the children and other adults : attac h­

ment s , variati on and co nsistency , qualit y. range .4 . Th e teacher' s activities and interes ts: modes of engagement. pattern of in­

volvement. range , intens ity .

RESULTSOve r the past 5-1 / 2 years . 68 student teachers have been eva luated . Tw o stude nts

have been advised away from teachin g yo ung children but given ca reer directionbased on the description. In all cases . j udg ing from the sys tematic critiques of theprocess wh ich occur at the end of the mid- sem ester conference . we fee l confiden tthat the process is help ful in identifying and arti cul atin g , with and for all stude ntteachers , their own personal sty les of teachin g . their streng ths and their areas ofvulnera bility . We have also found that se lf-knowledge has generally fed se lf-co n-

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fide nce, which eve n within the co urse of a semes ter , has led to improvement inteach ing pract ice. Besides gro wing se lf-co nfide nce , the process contributes to theimpro veme nt of practice in anoth er way: the superv ision of the student teacher bythe Educa tional Director is done more knowl edgeabl y during the rest of the semes­ter , enabling feedback to be more mean ingful and focused .

Having engaged in this intensi ve process once. stude nt teachers also begin to un­derstand a process for reflect ion on pract ice wh ich ca n co ntinue to serve them asthey enter teach ing careers. Some unexpected side effec ts of using thi s process forthe supe rvisors have been their added understand ing of the variety of forms goo dteachers and goo d teach ing take and the imp roved relati on ship s that develop betw eenstude nt teacher and supervisors when the student teachers co me to know more co n­cre tely that they are recogni zed for their personal worth .

CONCLUSIONS

Altho ugh this is a descr iption of how the process wo rks in a particul ar setting.there are , in fact, only a sma ll number of fac tors which are necessary for it tosuccee d in other settings such as the publi c schoo ls. In a more typical publi c schoo lsetting, the coo perat ing classroom teacher co uld fill the role the Educa tional Directortakes in observ ing and describing the student teacher. Because the cooperating teacheris regularly in the classroom with the student teacher . he has the best opportunityfor observ ing the stude nt teacher in co ntex tually var ied situations and would havesuffic ient obse rvatio nal data to describe the student teacher in the conce ptua lly broadway required . The uni versity superv isor co uld se rve as chair. takin g the respon si­bility for the qual ity and movement of the process and ass uring respect for the in­tegri ty of the student. With these ro les for the coo pera ting teacher and the un iversitysupervisor in mind , the necessary ingredient s see m to be: a coo pera ting classroomteacher who is willing to engage in a process that requ ires obse rva tion and narrat ivedescri ption ; co mmitment by the coo pera ting teacher and the university superv isor tothe idea that there is more than one way of teaching that is worth developing andthat indi vidu als each co me to teaching alrea dy in possession of their own styles oflearnin g and living ; the respect of both for the integr ity of ind ividuals; sufficienttime to co nduct the co nfere nce .

REFERENCESI . Desc riptive Document ary Processes and Formats . ( 1980) . North Bennington .

VT : Prospect Ce nter.

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