Mike Schmoker is a former school administrator, English teacher, and football coach. He is the author of many articles and books. His most famous is called, "Focus, Elevating the Essentials To Radically Improve Student Learning". In Focus, Schmoker encourages school leaders to prioritize around three things that are essential to improve student learning. These three things are:
1. What we teach (outstanding curriculum)
2. How we teach (strong pedagogy)
3. Authentic Literacy (purposeful reading and writing in all subjects)
Schmoker is also critical of many teacher evaluation models. He believes that in order to use teacher evaluation to improve instruction, administrators should be making frequent, unannounced visits to classrooms. These visits should zero in on clear and well-defined objectives, student attention and student engagement, several short activities within a given lesson, opportunities for students to practice what was modeled, and teacher review for understanding.
Here in Mendham, we are working to remained focused on clear, priority-driven teacher observation and evaluation that is designed to reinforce practices we believe to be exemplary. We think Schmoker would be pleased...
1. What we teach (outstanding curriculum)
2. How we teach (strong pedagogy)
3. Authentic Literacy (purposeful reading and writing in all subjects)
Schmoker is also critical of many teacher evaluation models. He believes that in order to use teacher evaluation to improve instruction, administrators should be making frequent, unannounced visits to classrooms. These visits should zero in on clear and well-defined objectives, student attention and student engagement, several short activities within a given lesson, opportunities for students to practice what was modeled, and teacher review for understanding.
Here in Mendham, we are working to remained focused on clear, priority-driven teacher observation and evaluation that is designed to reinforce practices we believe to be exemplary. We think Schmoker would be pleased...