At Uvic, we have the opportunity to fill out course evaluations at the end of the semester. We can sing our teacher's praises...or we can tear them a new one! Although the secondary school system is different, what do you think about offering evaluations at the end of the semester to your students?
Do you think they would take it seriously? Would you want feedback on how you structure and teach your classes? Although senior teachers have seniority and their jobs are "protected", should the administration implement this just to get some student feedback on their teachers?
7 comments:
Absolutely! I think that the school board should even collect the suggestions made by the students and take them into serious consideration. Students could offer them insight into what is working and what isnt...far more than the suits (admin) could...they just dont have time. Some students would of course give teachers a bad evaluation out of spite for a bad mark or something but that would by the minority and usually its obvious when somone is just being spiteful. Im not saying that teachers jobs should be at the whim of a bunch of fourteen year-olds. ..no way. Id rather have a chicken be my boss. All im saying is that young people always know what they dont like, even if they dont know what they like. So that being true (almost a universal truth) why not figure out how to really connect with them? Its simple to do better. All we have to do is ask.
I agree fully that evaluations should be given to secondary teachers. Even if the school I am working at doesn't do it I'll independently do it myself (at least with my own classes). Why wouldn't you want constructive criticism from your students. After all your the one teaching them so make their lives and yours easier by communicating with each other!I think that the students would take the evaluations seriously if you talked to them about it and explained that it would help you and future students out. You could even do a mid semester or year evaluation in order to find out students thoughts. I think that as a new teacher this kind of thing would be extremely helpful and would be very worthwhile
I think that students should have the oppertunity to voice their opinions on their teachers. I think that most of the student would take it seriously if you explained to them the importance of the evaluation, and the fact that this is one of the ways for them to be heard, and to have their opinions taken seriously.
As for the course evaluations at UVIC, I always found the best ones where the ones that differentiated between the course content and the instructor. Just because some students hate math, doesn't mean that they think that their teacher did a poor job. I think this would be an aspect to take into consideration when constructing the evaluations.
I think that secondary students should be allowed to assess their teachers. However, I believe that this should not be done through a multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank form, like at UVic. Myself, I find it too easy to just fill in the bubbles without really taking the time to reflect on what the questions are asking me to evaluate. I understand that reviewing such assessments would be more time consuming than the multiple choice format that gets fed through the machine, but it would be a beneficial form of assessment as answers from a series of open-ended questions would foster more student reflection and would more accurately represent a teacher's abilities.
I don't honestly know how likely it would be for such a practice to exist within secondary schools. I know that I would definately want to receive regular written feedback from the students in my classes. I think it is important to know what is working well for students, what needs to be improved in the class, how the students think it should be improved, and what they find interesting or not interesting. Such information would help me re-evaluate my own classroom strategies and methods.
I also this it is important for the students to self-assess their progress throughout the course of a school year to help them identify their weaknesses, find and test ways of improving and reflect on the effectiveness of their learning strategies and efforts.
I agree also, I think that it is a great idea to have teacher assessment forms at the end of the semester. It will give students an opportunity to feel more apart of the school and more valued. It will also be a valuable resource for teachers in order for them to see what they can do to improve their teaching style or how they can better help people in the class that are struggling.
I think the students would take it seriously when you explain to them the importance of the forms and how the forms will help us as teachers build better classrooms. I think there will always be a few students that will not take it seriously, but I believe that this will be evident when evaluating the completed forms (if it is evident, then these forms could be discarded).
I would definitely like to give my students the opportunity to evaluate me as a teacher.
This process can help me develop better techniques and it empowers the students by giving them a voice.
Af the end our practicums as we enter the 'real world' of teaching, we will essentially be on our own in the classroom-without the aid of an evaluator to help us develop our teaching techniques. Feedback form students will become our best resource to keep us on our game. Whether through formal evaluations or casual conversations with the students we can get a sense of how effectively we are teaching.
I think that teacher evaluations are definitely a good idea for the high school setting. They are a great opportunity for the students to voice their opinion on how they feel the subject they were taught and the teacher in question influenced them over the course of the school year. If they were to understand that these suggestions were to help make the class better for future students, this would further empower them in making critical decisions. The feedback would also be of great use to us as teachers, because like others have said, constructive criticism is an excellent way for us to improve our teaching skills that needed improving and also maybe a chance to look back on some of the successes that we had over the course of the school year. I know that positive feedback is always nice to receive, and if it be negative, then we know what not to do for the next time.
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