Open for Learning

https://twitter.com/Mrsmeganpete/status/791565250742984704

It's one of those topics that seems to be on everyone's radar right now: appraisal.

Not just because of teacher registration and the Practising Teacher Criteria.
Not just because it is one of ERO's foci.
But because we are all aware that teacher professional knowledge and pedagogy needs to keep improving and we want to do it the best way possible for all the parties involved.

Like other schools, we are trialing, reviewing and refining how it's done at "ours".

I missed a very good Twitter chat last Thursday, that thanks to Storify, I could capture to enjoy today (see below).  The educators who shared did so with honesty and generosity; there is a wealth of ideas and resources to read and mull over.

Not least, Chief Executive of Evaluation associates, Anna Sullivan's blog post, How To Make the Most of Teacher Appraisal (also printed in the current issue of the NZ Education Gazette.)

The key points I gleaned from the discussion between some very thoughtful educators are good ideas to measure your system against:

• It can't be tokenism
• It must be robust
• It should be vision and values based
• It needs to be warm and demanding at the same time
• There needs to be a climate of trust
• There must be open to learning conversations
• There must be clarity at the onset
• There need to be courageous conversations
• The basis should be student learning, not achievement
• Learning includes something more holistic than achievement; being a good citizen or growing in the Key Competencies
• Critical friends and peer appraisal feature rather than a hierarchical system

And what about senior leaders? What are they appraised against and who appraises them?

For a number of years I've kept this blog, tagging my posts against the Registered, now Practising Teacher Criteria.  

I've just filled in a document I created, based on the PTCs, the criteria for APs and DPs in the Collective Agreement and our own annual plan.  I used a simple Google doc as I didn't want to put all my time into creating the tool.  It also fitted Anna's criteria of being owned by me, using media I was comfortable with (online) and not within the school domain. 

What do you do? I'd love to continue the conversation...