Hard Facts & Half-Truths: Teacher Observation

One of the pillars of belief in the independent and international school world, a belief shared by most governing boards who rely on school management for an accurate indication of teaching quality in schools, is that the head of school is a skillful, highly-qualified observer of teachers, due to that person’s years of experience in education. It’s not just the head of school, though; it would include division heads, directors of curriculum and instruction, and others—anyone who ever observes teachers in some form of evaluative capacity. The operative cognitive underpinning here is: “They’ll know a good lesson when they see it.”