Educational Leadership Observation

Carol Pippen

4/24/18

PEDU 671

I pledge this is my own work and I have neither given nor received any help.
 This leadership assignment has provided an opportunity for me to work in a capacity of

coaching another instructor. Clinical supervision came very natural to me and I thoroughly

enjoyed the process. Starting this observation cycle with brief classroom walk-throughs allowed

me to see the students I teach in a different capacity. It is a real eye-opener to see the students

that may be very reserved in one class, be very talkative and active in other classes. I felt

confident in my classroom management skills and level of instructional expertise to not only

support this new teacher but to assist her in meaningful growth as an instructor. I want to spend

my career coaching teachers and providing clinical supervision.

During the first walk-through of Teacher A’s class, the students were very unruly. They

rambled around the classroom and took a long time to settle into their desks. I could hear

Teacher A continually redirect students to find their seats and get started on the bell ringer. A

few minutes went by and the teacher instructed students to put their bell ringers away and she

began the lesson. I observed that there was really no accountability of the students to complete

the bell ringer. She also did not reference bell ringer accuracy before moving on to the next

tasks. I made a mental note of this to ask her how she would like to address it.

Next, we met. I asked her what she wanted her classroom to look like as a learning

environment. Her response was that she wanted it to be a room where students were learning

and enjoying what they were learning. They were in their seats and on task. I offered a

suggestion from my experience to be at the door when they enter to slow them down from

coming in with extra energy and to establish some classroom procedures. She agreed to develop

her classroom procedures and I would research some strategies and articles for her.

The next walk through was a couple weeks later. Teacher A did a good job of developing

procedures of students entering the room and she was using a timer to provide structure. But
when I came through her class, it was evident that she still struggled with the students staying in

their seats and being on task. I had already found the “Tough Kid Toolbox” to show her and a

couple of articles that I thought had pertinent research on strategies for out of seat behavior and

off task behavior. After this walk-through, we talked about how she could provide alternate

seating or move the students seating to help reduce the amount of out of seat behavior she was

experiencing. We decided that she would be very creative with her seating arrangements.

Teacher A taped off small areas of space around specific desks of students who frequently

experience out of seat behavior. This gave them a personal space to stand but restricted them

from moving about the room. She reported later that it helped for a little while but the students

were still getting up and moving around. Every visit into the room was during the time that the

students were beginning the bell ringer or finishing with the bell ringer and had begun classwork.

This helped me to observe growth in Teacher A’s classroom management.

Our next discussion concerned the engagement of the students with a more meaningful

bell ringer. She decided that instead of just having the students answer the bell ringer question

and then but their notebooks away, she needed to have the students working with the bell ringer

as she connected it into the lesson. Together, we developed the plan of having the students

answer the bell ringer and then pass their notebook to the next person for a positive comment.

The students really enjoyed reading their classmates work and gave very positive, supportive

comments.

We then sat down for our preconference. We discussed the articles and research and

what she liked about the strategies she was already implementing. She said using timers was

very helpful, but keeping up with the spacing strategy was very difficult. That did not seem to

work for her. So I said, if it is not working then do not use it. I encouraged her to find her own
procedures and strategies that work for her. Some of the elements Teacher A wanted me observe

was the engagement of the students, the excessively talking of students and the out of seat

behavior during our formal observation. I had already charted some of the data for these

behaviors on a previous visit so we decided that I would observe these elements in our

observation. I also wanted to utilize protocol documents that would be relevant materials used in

observations as an administrator. Using the Virginia’s teacher evaluation system, I choose to

look for evidence that Teacher A meet the performance standards. Included in these standards

are professional knowledge, instructional planning, and instructional delivery, assessment of

student learning, the learning environment, professionalism and academic progress. Some of

these indicators are for end of the year evaluations and do not meet the parameters of a formal

observation.

For the actual observation forms, I choose the Candidate Assessment Protocol format for

this formal observation and the conferences (see attached). Included in these protocols are

criteria of well-structured lesson, adjustments to practice, meeting diverse needs, safe learning

environment, high expectations, and reflective practice. The out of seat behavior was certainly a

safe environment element concern and chatty, unengaged students would be considered an

obstacle to a well-structured lesson. The preconference form includes items I wanted Teacher A

to know I would be looking for evidence. I made note that I wanted to observe her instructional

material for appropriateness, relativity for the student, timing and pacing, feedback given to

students, teacher positioning in the room, activating prior knowledge and making connections for

students. We both agreed that student engagement and out of seat behavior were areas to

observe for improvement.

 The day of the observation came. I positioned myself in the back of the room. Teacher

A was well positioned at the door. The students demonstrated a knowledge of a routine. They

calmly entered the room, got their bell ringer books and answered the bell ringer question. They

shared their answers with each other. Most of the conversation was appropriate to the topic.

There were two pairs of students chatting off topic and two students that were frequently up

walking up other students or up to the teacher (See attachment). Teacher A would redirect them

back to their seat after answering their questions. Her lesson was very engaging, the student

participated in conversation, and offered personal experience. I could really see the students

making connections to what she was explaining. Her visual were very pertinent and the students

enjoyed the discussion. One of the pairs of off task students seem to settle into the conversation

only chatty quietly a couple of more times. The other pair were constantly talking to each about

other topics. I found myself wanted to redirect them, but refrained, remembering that I am but a

fly on the wall.

The block went by quickly as the students compared old technologies to new

technologies as part of their US II 9a,b History curriculum. They were taking notes for a quiz

they were having at the end of the week. The power point was well designed, included lots of

images of old technologies and new technologies. Teacher A would stop on each slide and

activate prior knowledge or help the students to build background knowledge. She gave positive

feedback for students participating in meaningful discussion and would calmly redirect

discussion back when she needed to move to the next slide. All the students were writing their

information, even the chatty boys located close to me. One of them even redirected another

student to catch his notes up. I realized that she was practicing ignoring them, most likely

because she knew they were getting the information and they were not loud, just a constant drone
of low conversation. A couple of times during her lesson, Teacher A referred back to the bell

ringer relating it to the lesson. I appreciate that she utilized elements of our conversation about

bridging those two pieces of class. It was very effective.

In our post conference, I was so excited to share all the awesome teaching I witnessed.

We talked about how the class was engaged and participating. I showed her the data of how

most students were in their seats for longer periods of time. However, we also discussed the

students that were getting out of their seat still. If I were continuing this administrative position,

I would help her develop a seating chart to decrease the out of seat behavior. For instance, the

students that are up and asking her questions could maybe be closer to her desk and they could

keep a conversation journal. This is a journal for the student to write questions on but keep open

on their desk. The teacher comes by frequently and writes the answers. It would decrease the

neediness of the student that was getting up frequently to go the teacher.

Teacher A seemed to gain helpful support from this process and agreed to complete a

self-reflection form. In the form she found strengths in her content knowledge and her ability to

create engaging fun activities. She also recognizing in herself the wonderful ability to engage

the students in conversation; demonstrating lots of energy. She feels she has created a learning

environment where the students feel comfortable to express themselves. I agree with this self-

perception completely. Teacher A also recognized that her classroom may need more routines,

her students’ conversations do often take them down rabbit holes of conversations and they are

off topic. She also stated that her next goal is to become better at more diverse lessons and

activities that meet the needs of all students. This was a very successful process for me and for

Teacher A.
 I learned quite a lot in this process. My biggest discovery was to remember that this an

inquiry learning experience for the teachers. They formulate the questions they want answered.

I am just the scribe taking the data and the analyst supporting the aggregation of all the raw data.

Finding the articles seemed more for me than for her. They supporting interventions for the

observed target behaviors we had discussed. I cannot say if she read them. In my personal

experience, I did not read many of the articles my administrators have given me either. This part

of the process should be more inquiry based for the teacher. The teacher should find their own

articles/research. That seems very cumbersome and would be met with disgruntlement by

veteran teachers. Taking the data, evaluating it with the teacher and observing the actual

teaching were so enjoyable for me. I felt very natural in those tasks.
 Works Cited

Tough Kid

Virginia Teaching Evaluating System

Massachusetts Protocol