Caution: Classroom under observation

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Caution: Classroom underobservationPeter Sullivan a , Judith Mousley b & AnnGervasoni aa Australian Catholic Universityb Deakin UniversityPublished online: 09 Jun 2010.

To cite this article: Peter Sullivan , Judith Mousley & Ann Gervasoni (2000)Caution: Classroom under observation, Asia-Pacific Journal of TeacherEducation, 28:3, 247-261, DOI: 10.1080/713650693

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Asia-Paci® c Journal of Teacher Education, Vol. 28, No. 3, 2000

Caution: classroom under observation

PETER SULLIVAN, Australian Catholic University

JUDITH MOUSLEY, Deakin University

ANN GERVASONI, Australian Catholic University

ABSTRACT In this article, it is argued that there are serious dif® culties in observing someone

else teach for the purpose of providing evaluation or corrective feedback on their teaching. The

article reports on responses from a group of teacher educators who watched a videotaped

classroom lesson. Their written critiques were surprisingly contradictory, so much so as to call

into question the reliability of lesson critiques. It is suggested that, where observation and

critique of classroom teaching are used, summative judgements be avoided, and that a major

goal of observations be to stimulate debate about different teaching styles and individual and

cooperative re¯ ection. Most importantly, observers must acknowledge the variety of intentions

and perspectives of classroom teachers.

Observation of Student Teaching

Among the many dilemmas which classroom teachers face is that on one hand, thereis an urge to tell pupils how to do tasks, and yet on the other hand, an appreciation ofthe need for pupils to work things out for themselves. Teacher educators have similardilemmas. The urge to tell the teacher education students to teach according to currenttheories is balanced by a sense that the student teachers can best learn to teach throughre¯ ection on their own experience. We suspect that the widespread use of observationand critique of individual lessons by teacher educators and teachers is motivated moreby the former urge. Perhaps teacher educators and supervising teachers (including us)think that if we use particular issues arising from observed lessons as springboards tocommunicate our considerable wisdom about teaching, then the student teachers willgain from the experience.

Our main foci in this article are the practices, commonly included as part of thepre-service teacher education, of observation of student teaching, and writing critiquesof that teaching. Generally, such observations are carried out by supervising teachers,but at times lessons are observed by teacher educators, and at times their reports areweighted heavily in the determination of gradings for practice teaching.

Boydell (1986) reviewed research on student teacher supervision practices and wascritical of the conventional apprenticeship model in general as well as of the assumptionthat lecturer supervisors contribute meaningfully within that model. Boydell arguedthat there is an inadequate theoretical basis for this approach to teacher preparation,and she presented models that call for different contributions from the teachers andteacher educators. Our concern is not so much the cost of the current ineffectivesystems, but more that they signal an inappropriate direction for teacher education.

We are certainly concerned about the use of observations as a signi® cant com-ponent of evaluation of student teachers. Even as formative input, such feedbacksystems have been criticised. For example, Freiberg & Waxman (1988) reported that

ISSN 1359-866X print; ISSN 1469-2945 online/00/030247-15

Ó 2000 Australian Teacher Education Association

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248 P. Sullivan et al.

feedback from supervising teachers was generally inadequate since they are too oftenreluctant to be critical, and their comments are frequently super® cial. They claimedthat the comments from supervising lecturers are too few to make an impact andcertainly such comments are not valued, possibly for the structural reasons explained byBoydell (1986).

We are not arguing that teaching practice and feedback on that practice are notpotentially valuable, but that the purposes of observation and critique must be recon-sidered. The basic goal, we suggest, should be to foster teachers who can learn fromtheir practice, rather than replicating or reproducing the practice they observe or merelyfollowing other people’s instructions. It is desirable that student teachers formulatetheir own theories of teaching that are themselves available for critique, and becommitted to a view that their future teaching is informed and in¯ uenced by theoutcomes of their experiences. They also need to develop their own skills of criticalobservation and analysis of pedagogy.

How Objective Are Classroom Observations?

It is worth noting that even though our main thrust is to call into question the critiqueof practice teaching of pre-service teacher education students by university lecturers,the points we make apply equally to other classroom observers, who include schoolprincipals, teaching colleagues contributing to peer appraisal or clinical supervision,and researchers.

As part of so-called accountability processes, some school principals are now choos-ing to observe teachers and to include the `evidence’ collected as part of a teacher’ sappraisal. Hughes & Ubben (1994), for example, among wide-ranging advice to schoolprincipals, recommended that classroom observation be part of staff appraisal, and eventhough they suggested that the goals of the observation be discussed with the teacher® rst, said that the `observation need not be long’ (p. 264), implying, perhaps, thatimportant information on which to base judgements can be determined in shortclassroom observations.

Observation of classrooms by researchers has been considered a laudable way tocollect research data. For example, Evertson & Holley (1981) suggested that `classroomobservation gives us a view of the climate, rapport, interaction and functioning of theclassroom available from no other source’ (p. 90). Evertson & Holley did note someconcerns, and they recommended that observers clarify the purpose of observations,observe for as much time as possible, design schedules to match the purpose ofobservations, and adopt a multivariate approach. Subsequently, Evertson & Green(1986) were more cautious. They argued that classroom events observed are a functionof the method of observation, that no one view of reality is more valid than any other,and that observations must be contextualised as much as possible. They noted fourtypes of observational research, including those which utilised categories, as well asthose which relied on description, narrative reports and technological records. Withinthe narrative genre (the most relevant to the purpose of this report), they noted the useof diaries, the reporting of critical incidents, the description of specimens and the takingof ® eld notes. Evertson & Green even questioned the construct of `reliability’ whichEvertson & Holley claimed to be established. Evertson & Green challenged the conceptof agreement between observers, and stressed that where observations are used, theyshould be conducted over long periods and that researchers must make efforts toappreciate and report the sociocultural knowledge the participants bring to classrooms.

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Classroom Observation 249

What is clear is that it is dif® cult for observers to prepare objective reports on theevents in classroom lessons. The dif® culty may be partly due to a lack of clear de® nitionof goals of teaching, partly due to the lack of clarity of some of the constructs used to

^ describe teaching, and partly a result of lack of de® nition in the terms that we use tocommunicate with each other about teaching.

It seems that it is better to acknowledge that observers provide just one perspectiveon classroom events, and that observation should be used strategically. It seems thatboth the observers and the subjects must take considerable care in interpreting suchcritiques. If observers are not aware of the teachers’ personal constructs about teaching,and if the comments of observers have the potential to be in¯ uential, then observationand critique may be quite counterproductive.

`Learning about Teaching’

It is necessary to describe the project overall so that the context of the data that arepresented can be interpreted. The results reported here are from one component of alarger project that aimed to identify features of quality teaching and to develop somemechanism to assist teacher education students to engage in the study of those features.The project arose from concern that student teachers did not seem to be aware ofaspects of quality teaching that they may have observed during the practicum (Mousleyet al., 1991). Initially, it was felt that it would be useful to have an instrument that couldbe used by teacher education students to focus their attention to particular elements ofteaching and to develop their skills of observation and analysis.

As a ® rst step, teacher educators were surveyed to seek some broadly-based view ofthe features of quality teaching. The responses to the survey were categorised and sixmajor components of quality teaching were identi® ed (see Sullivan & Mousley [1993]for a full description and justi® cation). The identi® ed components can be presentedschematically as shown in Fig. 1.

Building understanding

MaterialsPrior knowledgeMathematical thinkingConnectionsConceptual developmentRe¯ ectionSequenceReview

^

Organising for Nurturing Engaging Communication Problem-solving^

learning^

Clear purposeAbility levels Active Pupil-to-pupil Investigation

^

Clear instructionNon-threatening Personal discussion Open-ended

^

Class organisationRapport Enjoyment Sharing strategies Challenging

^

QuestionsRelationships Real world Cooperative work Posing

^

AssessmentGoal setting Motivation RecordingEnthusiasm Variety

^

^ FIG. 1. Six components of quality teaching.

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One of the products of the project was an interactive multimedia resource to be usedto support students in their learning about and study of teaching, entitled `Learningabout Teaching’ (Mousley et al., 1996). The development of this resource involved® lming a range of classroom lessons that had been constructed to illustrate the sixcomponents of teaching as described earlier, and then storing the videos on CD-ROMdiscs. In order to validate the existence of these components in the lessons, thevideotapes of the recorded lessons were shown to experienced teacher educators whowrote critiques of the lessons. This report arises from the critiques of one of the lessons,but the experience recounted was typical of many such incidents.

Critiquing a Lesson

The lesson that forms the basis of this report was on the topic of volume, for a Year 6class. It revolved around the open-ended investigation `Design as many differentbox-shaped buildings made from 24 cubes as you can’ . The teacher ® rst asked thechildren to study a single cube and to brainstorm what they knew about it. She thenintroduced the problem in the context of the theme that the class was using at thetimeÐ marketing. The children worked on the problem ® rst individually and then ingroups, choosing their own methods for recording their solutions. After responses of thestudents were reviewed, the teacher distributed a worksheet of speci® c problems.

A video of this lesson was shown to 22 teacher educators. Fourteen of these wereasked to write an unstructured critique, using any format they wished on a blank sheetof paper. The other eight observers recorded their critiques on a structured instrumentthat was basically a sheet divided into six labelled sections, one for each of the sixcomponents listed earlier. These respondents were asked to rate the teaching for eachcomponent on a linear scale, then to write an unstructured comment on that compo-nent. In effect, this forced the comments of these latter observers into the six categories.

The critiques were written during viewing of the video of the lesson. As well aswatching a video of the lesson itself, the observers were shown a lesson plan preparedby the teacher. Before viewing the lesson, they were shown an interview with theteacher that had been taped prior to the lesson; and after viewing the lesson, theywatched an interview with the teacher taped after the lesson. Data were also gatheredon the respondents themselves: their areas of teaching expertise, research interest, andlevels of experience at writing lesson critiques.

Using this process, we sought to determine:

· whether the reports of the observable features of the videos were consistent with ourimpressions of the components of teaching presented;

· whether the six components are useful as a way of organising critiques of a lesson orthe analysis of critiques; and

· whether structured or open format is more usable and informative for presenting/reporting critiques.

The data gathered were qualitative, allowing personal impressions to be recorded, justas they would be if the observers had been visiting lecturers observing a studentteacher’s lesson. Written comments provided the descriptive data necessary to elaboratethe interpretations of the observers (Stake et al., 1993). The qualitative analysisprogram NUD.IST (Non-numerical unstructured data by indexing, searching andtheorizing) (Richards & Richards, 1990) was used in the analysis of the writtencritiques. In summary, each discrete comment was coded to attach it to a descriptor

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from Fig. 1. Using NUD.IST, the comments were then grouped and examined, usingprocesses of categorisation outlined by Guba & Lincoln (1994). Both researchersindependently inspected the categorised phrases and sentences and then sought con-sensus on any disputed codes. Statements were recoded where necessary. For eachcategory, two colleagues were asked to identify any phrases that did not seem to belongthere, but this resulted in few further changes.

A Useful Framework

Observers’ comments (both structured and unstructured) on the lesson ® tted easily intothe six components. Both formats produced similar sets of comments, with theunstructured format producing a wider range of comments and suggestions. The easewith which the written reports on the lessons could be categorised suggests that the sixcomponents and the various categories are a useful way to organise comments made inteaching critiques. Each comment made by the observers could be associated uniquelywith one of the categories included in the framework outlined earlier. While it isobvious that there are many different ways of grouping and structuring comments onlessons, the key to interpretation is that the components were comprehensive, and didnot require comments to be `forced’ into groups, or set aside.

It is useful to examine which of the categories were more commonly used. Sevenwere each used, unprompted, by more than 40% of the respondents. They were:

· clear purpose;· clear instruction;· class organisation;· conceptual (understanding);· real world;· non-threatening;· relationships.

Clear purpose was used by 70% of the teacher educators. Given that the scope of thecomments was so broad, the fact that these seven groups stood out represents someconsensus on their importance to this set of teacher educators.

It is also useful to examine which categories were seldom used by these teachereducators. Only three were used infrequently:

· connections;· pupil to pupil discussion;· assessment.

In our view, there was not much overt assessment in the lesson to comment on, butthere were connections made and signi® cant pupil-to-pupil discussion. Perhaps thesefactors take less signi® cance in an observation context.

With respect to the ® rst two of the research foci outlined earlier, the data con® rmedthat the lesson did contain the components we had intended (although, as discussedlater, in a way different from that we had anticipated); and that the six components wereboth present in the lesson and a useful way of categorising the unstructured responses.

The third aspect of the research was to explore the use of a structured format for thelesson observation report. The structured form of responses directed the respondents touse the language and form implied by the categories. In that sense, assuming that thecategories are appropriate, it seems that the structure was a useful way of directing

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the attention of observers to these aspects of quality teaching. However, those observerswho completed the structured form expressed considerable dissatisfaction with theconstraints that the structure placed on the way they would have preferred to respond.We decided that, on balance, there was little point in exploring whether the givenstructure would work with teacher education students since both they and theirobservers are likely to have their own frameworks into which they will seek to ® tobservations. We did not pursue this line of investigation further.

While the data seemed to answer the questions we had asked, there was anunanticipated aspect, as is discussed next.

Are Lesson Critiques Reliable or Valid?

We were somewhat startled to note the signi® cant discrepancies between the critiquesof these experienced teacher educators. These discrepancies form the substance of therest of this report.

A feature of the study reported in this article was the need to categorise and theninspect the grouped phrases. About half of the comments were positive, about one-quarter critical and the others neutral, but we were not so interested in this aspect butin aspects of the teaching and learning that the observers focused on and in con¯ ictsbetween individual comments made. For example, people commented on particularfeatures of the lesson in both very positive and quite critical ways. The categories usedto sort the data were suitable for storing both positive and negative comments. Forinstance, `clear purpose’ was used both for comments applauding the clarity of purposeand for suggestions that the purpose should have been made clearer. In this way,discrepancies between the various responses could be identi® ed.

Five aspects of the lesson where there were notable differences between some of thecritiques have been extracted and are presented in the following sections. These aspectsare (a) demonstrating a clear purpose, (b) encouraging students, (c) cooperative groupwork, (d) directing the lesson and (e) capturing the students’ interest. There is a sixthaspect presented related to the distribution of interactions, for which there was someconsensus among the teacher educators but in our view their opinions were not wellthought-out. The existence of these discrepancies brings into question both thereliability and the validity of using classroom observation for any evaluative purpose.

Demonstrating a Clear Purpose

The ® rst of the categories in which there were con¯ icting comments and interpretationsrelated to whether the purpose of the lesson was clear. This category had 27 commentsmade by the observers, and a similar group, `clear instruction’ , had a further 14comments.

Even though `clarity of purpose’ was the most frequently used category, there wasconsiderable contention on whether the purpose of the lesson was clear to the observersor not. The interpretations of the clarity exhibited in the lessons included positivecomments on the purpose, such as:

Well organised, clear on purpose of what was intended.

A clear objective led to a suitable sequence of activities.

Teacher exhibited a clear focus for lesson.

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However, there were also comments that articulated what was seen as a need for aclearer focus for the lesson:

A clearer focus on the learning outcome and conclusion is necessary. Thiscould be aided by writing a clearer aim and distinguishing this from thelearning strategy.

The objective was too inde® nite. The lack of clarity allowed the lesson to bebogged down in the dif® cult task of converting a 3D into a 2D drawing.

Actual enactment of the exploratory phase was diffused by the lack of clarityof lesson focus and student purpose.

The focus seemed to shift during the lesson.

A suggestionÐ it is often a good idea to list on the blackboard what is expectedfrom the children to complete the activity.

The initial problem of variety of models was abandoned and the new problemof how to draw 2D representation was pursued instead.

Was it an objective that the children develop/evaluate different forms ofrecording, especially 3D? This was not clear. The lesson purpose could havebeen brought out more clearly in the class review.

During the pre-lesson interview watched by all participants in this exercise, it was clearthat the teacher had a strong orientation to the processes of open-ended mathematicalproblem-solving. With such an orientation, teachers value processes of investigationabove the production of directed products (see, for example, Sullivan & Lilburn, 1997).They aim to have children solve unfamiliar problems (McCoy, 1994) to seek generali-sations (Mitchelmore, 1994), to transfer between contexts (Bransford et al., 1999), andto communicate about mathematics (Sullivan & Clarke, 1991). The emphasis is not onformal mathematical content.

Observers who are predisposed to formalist teaching styles, with emphasis on teacherexplanations of mathematical concepts, rules and procedures, may well have inter-preted the absence of these traditional features as a lack of clarity in the lesson’ s focusor the teachers’ direction. The issue this raises is how observers can identify andcomment on the purpose of a lesson if they do not know, accept or understand theparticular orientation of a teacherÐ or if they are not prepared to accept it even whenit is clearly articulated by a student teacher. (As an aside, it is relevant to note that thisneed to appreciate the orientation of the teacher is relevant for pupils as well as forobservers.)

It is interesting here that, in the written comments, in no case was the teacher’ sorientation towards processes learning with use of open-ended mathematical problem-solving noted. Nor was the tension between process and product acknowledged.Considering that the observers had all seen the pre-lesson interview in which theteacher’s orientation was ¯ agged clearly, the critical observers did not acknowledge thestyle of the lesson and then criticise the style itself or the way it was used. They appearto have interpreted the lack of directed product as requiring critical comment despitethe fact that a de® ned product was not amongst the teacher’s stated aims. How oftendoes this happen when a visiting lecturer talks with a student teacher before a lessonabout plans for the teaching and learning?

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Encouraging Students

Another issue arises from the way that the teacher responded to the students. Forexample, over 50% of the observers made comments that were categorised as `non-threatening atmosphere’ . These included:

You encouraged the child with positive feedback rather than put him downÐan excellent strategy.

At no time in the lesson did [the teacher] not encourage the best effortstowards completing the tasks from each of her students.

Teacher ¼ showed respect for individuals ¼ praised questions of all levels ofability.

Very af® rmative of the trier. Teacher obviously knew level of children andspent time to help them.

She allowed the children to explore the object and each of their ideas wasgiven credence and respect.

Students were af® rmed in their responses 1 enlightenedÐ they could perceivebetter responses but were not put down.

However, there were others who were critical of the teacher’ s responses to the children.For example:

The only criticism I would give of the lesson was the dismissal of the designswhich, in my view, were creative ¼ could have been handled with a little moresensitivity.

You need to cater for different ability levels and to spend time helping weakerstudents.

The contradictions between these comments seem to highlight the need for teachereducators on one hand to clarify types of behaviours we see as supportive, and on theother hand, perhaps, to provide a balance of examples and counter-examples to supportthe points we make.

Cooperative Group Work

Another issue that provoked opposing comments was that of cooperation and collabo-ration between the children. There were positive interpretations, such as:

Children are a community of learners, justifying, explaining, questioning, etc.

Good for students to ¼ work in cooperative groups.

Teacher encouraged cooperative learning.

Children worked cooperatively remaining on task maintaining motivation.

Children worked well in teams and devising own strategy for problem solvingwith no reference to teachers’ support.

On the other hand, there were also some negative views:

Democratic exchange of views/solutions between pupils and teacherÐ butcommunication was cooperative at best but seldom collaborative in intent.

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Partner work may well have been individual as no? little? collaboration tookplace.

It was an individual effort largelyÐ could have encouraged more cooperation.

There was also one each-way bet:

Watch the group/pair/discussion groups. Worked well today in this lesson butcould be a problem with larger grades.

A similar trend is in evidence here. It is not so much that there is not agreement, forthis is to be expected when teacher educators with disparate points of view observe onelesson. What is of concern is that while student teachers may hear relatively consistentadvice (about the bene® ts of cooperative group work in mathematics education, forinstance), quite con¯ icting interpretations of the classroom action are written down inthe form of critique. This must leave student teachers feeling confused, with little ideaof how to implement the strategies suggested. In this case, perhaps there is need foreducators to de® ne more closely what is meant by collaboration, to clarify its purpose,and to articulate some behaviours that are indicative of what we mean by the term.

Directing the Lesson

Comments on the level of direction shown by the teachers were diverse, and indicativeof the tensions summarised by Berlak & Berlak (1981) in their 16 `control dilemmas’ .Issues of control raised by contrasting interpretations of classroom interaction includethe giving of directions, sequencing of components of the lesson, stating a context forthe given problem, and provision of a review during closure of the lesson.

Many observers commented on the teacher’s clear directions and positive sense ofcontrol, with comments such as:

Your directions were clear and you provided opportunity for questions.

Others criticised the teacher for exerting too much control:

If this had happened there would have been fewer instructional questions andchildren would have done more processing. There was still a deal of teacherdirection here.

Her necessity to restate the problem is a result of her owning the problem notthe children.

There was clearly a problem to solve, but the teacher was constantly returnedto and took the role of `judge’ of acceptable responses, ¼ she became the`telling teacher’ .

Teacher is still appropriating student learning through summarising andrephrasing.

Moved on to teacher being decider, e.g. re parallel lines. At this stage to whatdegree were children working out for themselves?

Open in natureÐ spoilt a little by certain teacher impositions

Another source of tension was control over the lesson’ s ¯ ow. Examples of positivecomments related to the sequencing of the components of the lesson included:

Generally well sequenced.

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You led children through a series of organised steps developing their thinkingprocesses. This was a good learning time for the children.

Other observers, however, would have preferred more attention to the sequence ofactivities:

The poor description of the 3D models from the introduction became practi-cally insurmountable when children came to putting blocks into the designrequired.

There were several opportunities for teacher to follow up an issue raised by achild. This did not always happen.

I’m not sure where she is planning to go next, or how this class ® ts in with therest of the space/shape strand.

Even within a lesson structure which is low on teacher direction, a teacher-led reviewat the end of a lesson can be a signi® cant component of the learning experience. Somerespondents were critical of the lack of review:

The teacher didn’t do a review.

I would have liked clearer ¼ pulling together at the end.

What a pity to set completion of sheet for homework. There was no correctionof task.

Lesson appeared to end very abruptly with no individual check by teacher ofchildren’s efforts.

Pathetic ending and conclusion to activity. What about those who didn’t getclose to 26 different designs but for example, only 16.

However, others considered there to be an effective summary:

Good tying together at end.

Excellent conclusion to the activities. Showed appreciation of all children’ sefforts. Well done.

When observers were critical of an apparent lack of direction in the lesson, this seemedto be a result of the teacher relinquishing some of the control of the lesson to thestudents. The issue here is similar to that of having a `clear purpose’ , in that the levelof direction is a function of the approach to teaching. As before, this raises the questionof how we can comment on the level of teacher direction in the absence of anacknowledgement of the speci® c orientation and intentions of the teacher for anyparticular lesson.

Capturing the Students’ Interest

A recurring theme in the education literature (and particularly that concerning math-ematics and science education) is the desirability of using practical or real-life contextsas a way of making the situation real to the students. In the particular lesson underreview, the teacher had chosen a context into which the investigation was placed.Again, this attracted both supportive and critical comments. Her approach wasgenerally af® rmed, with comments like:

The concept of asking the children to be architects was very creative and

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getting them to go from the concreteÐ use of blocks to the abstractÐ drawingthe design is a strategy I applaud. Well done.

She effectively linked the activity to a real-life situationÐ in effect giving thema reason for the activity.

Good attempt to engage students by using a story 1 locating problem solvingin context of real world

Good inclusive strategy to mention child’ s mother as an architect andreinforce notion of girls being able to aspire to professions.

This support was not universal:

Theme of architects distracting to the purpose of the lesson.

There was even comment on the political implications of the choice of the supermarketcontext:

Why (choose a) capitalist model instead of government funded hostel,hospital, school etc.?

Distributing Interactions

The teacher did not seek to distribute questions and other interactions evenly, butrather, allowed students freedom to contribute publicly as they wished. There weremixed comments on this style of teaching.

Some observers commented favourably on the breadth of participation, makingpoints such as:

I was also pleased you encouraged all children to participate.

Teacher directed learning suf® ciently but enabled children to contributeaccording to their potential.

Teacher maximised opportunities for varied forms of communication betweenher and students and between the students themselves.

Good process of enabling children to explain strategies and reward effort.Discussion by children enthusiastic and interested.

She allowed freedom of questioning so that the students could each conceptu-alise how they could interpret the task.

Children are a community of learners justifying, explaining, questioning etc.

You made effective use of share time when individual children displayed andtalked about their particular way of recording his/her design.

On the other hand, there were many observers who were critical of what was seen asan inappropriate distribution of interactions:

Mainly [particular students] were nurtured, but most others were left out ofthe class, so the problems of understanding by the majority of the class werenot addressed.

By the half way mark of the class [few students] had been asked questions orhad asked questions. Note how a few students seem to dominate. Do not relyon volunteers only ¼ Be aware of who is being involved and who is passive.

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The teacher restricted communication, etc. with her star pupils only, so whatlearning was achieved by the rest of the class is unknown.

Only a handful of children talking. [Students’ names] were about the onlychildren engaged.

Were you teaching mainly to 4 or 5 individuals? Occasionally ask questions ofnon-volunteersÐ a strategy to draw others into the process. Your attention isvery controlled by too few students ¼ Involve more students especially bydirecting questions and asking for explanations. Avoid teaching to 4 or 5individuals who are obviously `stars’ .

In the end most students were told how to do the task by the privileging ofparticular responses.

Teacher was communicating with very few children and the dif® culty childrenhad ¼ was poor.

Only a few children seemed to be answering questions.

Control of student contributions to lessons presents a dilemma for teachers. Oneapproach is to distribute interactions between the teacher and pupils as evenly aspossible. This can often be done by directing questions to students who have notcontributed recently. Such a teaching style is marked by stating a student’ s name alongwith the question. It provides the teacher with some sense of the progress of individualsas well as being a way of maintaining attention. This is compatible with the techniqueidenti® ed by Tobin (1984), who suggested that teachers use particular target studentsto direct lesson ¯ ow. For example, if a target student of average ability cannot answera question, this may indicate a need to revise the most recent point.

Yet, this strategy is not without problems. Such direct approaches to questiondistribution have the disadvantage of increasing the level of anxiety associated with classdiscussions. Compelling students to contribute when they may be shy, may not havethe necessary information, may not feel they can make a worthwhile contribution, ormay even be temporarily inattentive, can be counterproductiveÐ especially if anystudents are nervous about the subject in the ® rst place.

An alternateive approach is to allow students to volunteer to speak. Some may be thereporters of group discussions or have questions about the progress of an activity. Thisapproach is compatible with a view of teaching which sees the activity of students ascentral, and their reports of their ® ndings as the main stimulus of the students’ learning.In this case, the classroom prompt would be of the form, `Who can tell me about ¼ ?’

and it would be appropriate to privilege the students who indicate an intention tocontribute. It would not be a problem if the distribution of interactions within a singlelesson is uneven, but in a view of teaching which sees learning as arising from students’

explorations, it is logical that interactions will not be evenly distributed.This is a further example of where in a lesson critique the teacher of the lesson could

be receiving feedback which is at best representative of only one view, and at worst,directly counterproductive. What was interesting, ® rst, was that comments (from bothdirections) did not acknowledge any dilemmaÐ the teacher was seen as either right orwrong in her questioning approach. Second, in the post-lesson interview, the teacherhad talked about how she assessed the levels of understanding of the children as shemoved around the room during the group work stage of the lesson, but this factor wasnot taken into account in any comments about communication.

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Teaching as Problematic

This research aimed to use critiques written by experienced Education lecturers tovalidate the existence of particular components of pedagogy in some videotapedlessons. We were not seeking overall impressions of the lesson, and did not examine thecomments for particular patterns or biases. Our focus was on whether, and how, peopleobserved particular pre-identi® ed components of the lessonsÐ and these aspects wereused as a basis for the analysis of results.

It would have been remarkable if there had been agreement amongst the observers onall components of the lessons; but the level of con¯ ict between responses was unantic-ipated. What is most worrying here is not differing perceptions of the lesson, or eventhe diversity of responses, but that not one person who criticised the teacher’ s actionsacknowledged that there are competing perspectives operating in all classrooms.

Schooling is a sophisticated and complex endeavour and at all times there arecon¯ icting demands on teachers and students. Indeed, some of our goals for schoolingcon¯ ict. For example, the goal of broad content coverage on one hand competes withan aspiration that most students will master skills, concepts, and understandings whichare seen as needed for future study. Likewise, we might hope that students developpositive attitudes to learning as well as learning particular content well; yet a review byBishop & Nickson (1983) suggested that the less empathy and concern for emotionalaspects demonstrated by teachers, the greater will be their pupils’ success. A moreurgent con¯ ict of interests was identi® ed by Doyle (1986) and Desforges & Cockburn(1987), who each found that pupils actively resist higher order thinking and problem-solvingÐ aspirations of the teacherÐ by misbehaving, and respond positively only whenthe demands of tasks are made more explicit and the risk of failure is lessened.

Each of these con¯ icting aspirations creates dilemmas for teachers. Such dilemmasare particularly important for researchers who seek to study and describe teaching.They are central to the development of effective mechanisms for providing feedback tostudent teachers after observed lessons.

Our view is that the teacher emphasised the process of doing mathematics and didnot attempt to teach directly procedures or concepts to the students. She used anopen-ended investigation as the basis of the lesson and set the lesson in a contextmeaningful to the children. She emphasised the activity of the children and wasgenerally non-judgemental in her responses to the comments and questions of thechildren. These components ® t with a style of teaching that puts students at the centreof the learning process. This was indeed recognised by at least some of the respondents.For example, one critique included the following comments:

At no time did [the teacher] not encourage the best efforts towards completingthe tasks from her students.

This speaks highly of the positive and interesting ambience [the teacher] wasable to create in her classroom, and of the innate respect evident in herinteractions with the students, and of the students with each other.

A brilliant example of teaching and learning.

Of course, this is not a style of classroom organisation and teaching favoured by everyteacher educator, but critics of the lesson neither made their own perspective explicitnor acknowledged the legitimacy of the perspective of the teacher. Their critique waspresented as criticism of her personal action, rather than as a recognition of theexistence of differing perspectives on teaching and learning. The majority of suggestions

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were presented as de® nitive statements rather than as comments with the potential toopen up discussions about tensions in pedagogy.

Conclusion

Given their relative inexperience, student teachers may not have the background tointerpret such comments into an appropriate broader framework of ideas about teach-ing and learning. They may feel that they are the subject of confusing, con¯ icting advicefrom various observers. In these circumstances, they are likely not to ® nd teachereducation helpful and reject much of what it offers.

If we are to avoid unintended outcomes which impact negatively on students’

formation as teachers, it would seem necessary to, at the very least, prepare studentteachers for a variety of points of view by making them aware of the many dilemmasteachers face in planning and teaching, prepare observers for openness to a variety oflegitimate pedagogical approaches, and ensure critiquing lessons opens up discussionsabout the strengths and limitations of different teaching. Finally, it would seemnecessary to follow up practicum periods with discussions about the different stylesof teaching observed and/or trialled by student teachers as well as the reactions ofobservers.

This course of action would open up opportunities for discussing the strengths andlimitations of different teaching actions, the intentions and assumptions of studentteachers, and the perspectives of observers. Most importantly, it would serve to makemore overt the creative and contested nature of teaching.

Correspondence: Peter Sullivan, Australian Catholic University, St. Patrick’s Campus,Locked Bag 4115, Fitzroy, 3065 Victoria, Australia.

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Documents

Caution: Classroom under observation