Garnett is in her senior year of high school. She sat down at her desk and brushed her curly hair behind her shoulders. Her teacher passed out a form and she picked up her pencil and started filling it out. This class feels like a second home, the paper said. Arching an eyebrow, she chooses one of the answers from the list: never. In the past decade, education reformers worldwide have been obsessed with teaching quality. Study after study has shown that it matters more than anything else in a school and that it is too low in too many places. For all kids to learn 21st-century skills, teaching needs to be improved. In the United States, almost half of the states required teacher reviews to be based on some part of test-score data in the beginning …show more content…
Not all teachers are effective in teaching their lessons to their students. According to the legislation, “highly qualified” teachers are people who have at least a bachelor's degree, are fully licensed or certified by the state in the subjects they teach and can show competence in the subjects they teach. This factor will not determine whether or not a teacher is effective with their lessons. According to Pamela D. Tucker, author of Linking Teacher Evaluation and Student Learning, effective teachers are able to envision instructional goals for their students, then draw upon their knowledge and training to help students achieve success. What this means is that effective teachers know what to do to make their students learn and succeed while teaching a lesson. Since students would be the first-hand witnesses to “highly qualified” and “effective” teachers, an evaluation done by students would be a great advantage to their school, and …show more content…
According to Dr. Leon Robinson, one of the first five recognized by the SPE as a “Drilling Legend,” and gave annual lectures at in-house Drilling Engineering Schools on various topics, “Bad teachers are dull and uninspiring. Their lectures drone on and on, and before long it’s a struggle just to stay awake.” He continues on and tells us about his personal experiences in college with good and bad teachers. Dr. Robinson goes on to describe “effective” teachers as engaging, often entertaining, and fearless. He states, “They’ll do just about anything to hold a student’s attention and find a way to drive home an important principle. Even the most highly motivated students learn more, and retain more of what they learn when they are entertained.” Children would be able to provide inside information on whether or not their teacher is “good” or “bad.” The way we evaluate teachers now wouldn’t give correct information on whether a teacher is “good” or “bad.” As stated previously, the teacher evaluation that is done currently gives inaccurate information because a teacher can put on an act for the person who is evaluating them; the teachers can make it seem like they were “good” at teaching. As you can see, a teacher evaluation done by students would help get rid of the “bad” or “mean” teachers.
Some will argue that students are young and inexperienced, or that they could
Since the passage of No Child Left Behind Act 12 years ago, teachers are judged based on standardized tests and their students’ scores. The tests are often used as a measure for schools to determine if teachers should keep their jobs. The whole teaching profession is being shamed as inadequate. Joe Nocera, opinion columnist for the New York Times newspaper, by examining a thinker named Marc Tucker, argues for a new way to approach educational reform. To begin with, Nocera addresses reforming and reconstructing our current schools.
One of the biggest concerning the need for an increase in rigor in instruction in American schools. She discusses that in Poland students must stay in academic classes for an extra year and teachers are paid bonuses to engage in professional development work. She also notes that in Finland they “rebooted their teacher-training colleges, forcing them to become much more selective and rigorous.” In an article written by Sarah Tantillio on Only Good Books, she recognizes the validity of these statements, but comments that in America “the Common Core States Standards, which most states have adopted, they are definitely rigorous, But how they are implemented (and assessed) from state to state and school to school is still a Very Big Question.” Further in her article she points out the large population differences between Finland, Poland, and the United States, and how this affects our education system.
At the end of the class, she saw her students were yawning and sleeping. “I said, ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been boring you.’ I packed up my notes and left the room.” After she saw the situation of the class, she left the class as a result.
Higher Learning to Higher Success Countless students, teachers, and even national leaders have made the point that something has faltered in our education system. The education system in the United States has been picked apart piece by piece and scrutinized against other methods of nations. This process is repeated time and time again, always leading to a horrible truth of the failing system. Although we know something is missing, no action has been taken to mend the broken education system. The basis of this failure is the less-fortunate students who learn at a below-average level.
One of the key reasons why that’s so is that many of their teachers are not very good themselves”(forbes.com). Leef’s point is that it’s not always the students fault when they receive a poor grade in a class, which supports my view because I can remember countless teachers that I simply can’t understand. There are multiple factors that go into a student's grade, but people seem to only see one side of the story. The education system in America is at a dangerous place at the moment. If this trend continues, the American education system is going to go crash and be taken over by other
This data along with data from other cities such as Chicago where only 0.1% of teachers between 2005 and 2008 were dismissed for performance-related circumstances, proves that in the united stated the public school system is broken and in need of help as stated in “Waiting for
Bob says that teacher certification is not enough to show that that certain teacher is good enough to be effective to all students. Bob states that schools in the past didn’t research the teachers so they could make the students score high on end of course exams. He states that schools have to change the way they higher teachers so they can tell the difference between good and bad teachers. Bob states that doing this would help our students to be more successful.
Struggles of Standardized Testing Students have learned since the beginning of grade school that grades matter. Once a student reaches middle school it turns into preparation for high school. Then finally once the student reaches high school it is preparation time for the universal standard test, for most, taken your junior year. Standardized testing should be removed from college standards because it only evaluates one day of testing instead of a student’s entire schooling career, teachers prepare students for the test and not teach to learn, and the testing does not define if a student will succeed in college.
These people argue that standardized tests are objective and reliable for checking on students’ educational development; in addition, standardized tests serve as a guideline for what students need. The Office of Work/Life claims that “Standardized tests provide teachers with guidance for what and when something needs to be taught” (Columbia University). As a result, they make it easy to check student’s progress and make sure they’re getting the knowledge they need. Although teachers may be held accountable, Retired teacher, Marion Brady, emphasizes that “minimal to no useful feedback” is given (The complete list). Results from standardized tests are given as numbers, not feedback.
This is a benefit that would significantly help the students. Without it students may be struggling with a topic and the teachers are not even aware. By looking at the scores and talking with the previous teachers they can determine what might be the best way to teach the students. This leads to the next benefit, teachers can begin a new year knowing how much each student already knows. Knowing where each student lies is beneficial because the teacher is then able to focus
In addition, a teacher with a classroom full of students willing to learn, they are more motivated to teach. If it is the opposite, the teacher is less
Standardized testing are giving in many areas of the nation According to a article by “The Washington Post” “The study analyzed tests given in 66 urban districts in the 2014-2015 school year. It did not count quizzes or tests created by classroom teachers, and it did not address the amount of time schools devote to test preparation”(Layton Lyndsey). Teachers are being evaluated by students and how well they do on the standardized test. Several states have tied student performance to teacher evaluation. The National Council on Teacher Quality reported in January 2014 that “about
In Diana Ravitch’s ‘(2010) article Why I Changed My Mind, she discussed how abiding by an educational system using accountability and choice has failed tremendously in America. In addition, Ravitch explained how the federally ordained policies are continuously contributing to the system’s decline as well. She believes the legislators are so focused on testing and teacher evaluation that they are ignoring the root of educational problems faced in the United States. With such strong emphasis on testing and test results, educators have changed their teaching strategies in an attempt to satisfy this broken structure. There is strong attention to preparing students to pass standardized tests while simultaneously denying teachers the time to focus
In my opinion one of the biggest problems with this is that teachers start “teaching to the test”. In other words, teachers will only focus on what will be covered on the test and not focus on what they believe is important. This leads to the question, “what are they not learning?”. It is being questioned if students are actually learning valuable skills in school that will help them in the long run or are they are learning more of a” process” and learning just how to pass a class. Standardized test can be unreliable when it comes to measuring a student’s performance.
Allowing students to evaluate their teachers, will give teachers an incentive to improve on their teaching skills. If teachers know that they are going to be evaluated by their students, they will begin to work twice as hard due to the incentives given to them. For example, a teacher who is lazy and enthusiastic about their job will come to the realization that if they don’t step up their game, they can be terminated and replaced. Essentially, this will lead to students receiving a higher quality of education. As a result,