leaders in the formative use of the tools the primary users of comprehensive
increasing wait time.
that will be the basis for their own sum- teaching frameworks. At a minimum,
Like a veteran concert violinist who
mative evaluation.
teachers can use comprehensive frame-
is still expanding his or her repertoire, a
The most effective supervision and
works to guide their daily practice—for teacher can engage in deliberate practice
evaluation systems empower teachers to example, to assist in lesson planning,
accurately assess their own practice and prioritize strategies for whole-group
self-diagnose areas for growth. In such
systems, teachers use comprehensive
instruction, or select alternative strat-
egies for students who require more
throughout his or her career and still
have areas to improve. There is no
shame in a violinist acknowledging the
need to practice for dozens of hours and
frameworks throughout the school year challenge or support.
hundreds of repetitions to learn to play
to collect data related to their teaching,
In several schools and districts where a new piece of music. Why, then, are we
reflect on their practice, and identify
we have worked, teachers have used
specific instructional strategies they can the framework as the starting point
work on to improve their repertoire of
skills.
of a comprehensive self-assessment
process; they identify specific skills
reluctant to acknowledge that a teacher
may take dozens of hours to learn a new
instructional strategy? As a profession,
we need to transcend the idea that only
teachers who are struggling need an
We need to transcend the idea that
only teachers who are struggling
need an improvement plan.
improvement plan. If the school views
the need for improvement as a liability,
why would teachers ever acknowledge
their need for deliberate practice?
In working with schools on supervision and self-assessment, we’ve found
it is essential to begin with an introduction to the research on expertise.
The school culture in such systems
for improvement and obtain feedback
This ensures that supervisors and
supports teachers by recognizing the
through such activities as peer obser-
teachers see terms like practice, growth,
need for improvement as an asset rather vation, video analysis, peer discussion,
improvement, learning, and effort as assets
than a liability. Here are some of the
and student surveys. The opportunity
to embrace rather than as liabilities to
beliefs that are central to such super-
to self-reflect and engage in professional avoid. In this frame, we understand that
vision and evaluation systems.
discussions with peers helps teachers
becoming an expert teacher is not a gift
clarify how they should invest their
bestowed on a chosen few but a journey
Comprehensive teaching frameworks
efforts to grow in the profession.
through a challenging, thorny pathway
are not just for evaluation.
that requires constant pruning. As one
In the classroom, effective teachers
Expertise only emerges through
teacher wrote after engaging in a self-use rubrics not just as summative
deliberate practice.
assessment process,
tools to determine students’ grades,
Becoming an expert in a complex field
but also as exemplars that they apply
like teaching is difficult and elusive. We
across entire units to guide students’
believe that developing expertise is the
efforts to improve. The language of the
central goal of a quality supervisory and
rubrics becomes the language of the
evaluation system.
curriculum.
Anders Ericsson, widely credited as
In the same way, both supervisors
the world’s foremost expert on expertise,
and teachers need to use comprehensive describes how people develop expertise
teaching frameworks not just for sum-
through deliberate practice—concen-
You see movies like Freedom Writers
mative teacher evaluation, but rather
trating on carefully selected, specific
to guide improvement throughout the
aspects of performance and refining
Supervisors are not the only source
school year. Used in this way, these
them through repetition and response to of data and feedback.
frameworks can create a common lan-
feedback (Ericsson, Charness, Feltovich, A recent study titled The Widget Effect
guage for practice, focusing teachers’
collaborative efforts to identify and
& Hoffman, 2006). For a musician,
this could mean focusing on a specific
(Weisberg, Sexton, Mulhern, & Keeling,
2009) identifies a lack of feedback
implement specific research-based
instructional strategies and behaviors.
We need to transcend the common
practice of making administrators
passage of music for an extended
time. For a teacher, this could mean
focusing on a specific skill, such
as asking higher-level questions or
as the primary problem with teacher
supervision and evaluation systems. The
authors found that “nearly three of four
teachers went through the evaluation
