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ATTENTION Success team.... You can listen to this article if you do not want to read.. Click on the listen to the broadcast link at the top of the article.

-This is why Pianta thinks that to change beliefs, the best thing to do is change behaviors. "It's far more powerful to work from the outside in than the inside out if you want to change expectations," he says. -"Connections of the outside work to make connections on the inside."- Becky Bailey, Conscious Discipline -"The benefits of noncontingent (that which is not tied to positive or negative behavior but simply occurs "just because") attention are fairly obvious. Like all of us, students need to be noticed and valued. When they feel noticed and valued, they are more likely to be motivated to engage in appropriate behaviors." - R. Sprick, CHAMPS Whatever we personally believe about discipline philosophies and programs aside, the fact is that many different people through many different programs and studies continue to emerge with the same theme. To change the way a brain thinks and works takes more than talk. It takes doing and forming connections and relationships. This is true of children's behavior...but more importantly OUR behaviors as adults also.

I really liked this article, not because it gave any truly new information, but because it reminds us that high teacher expectations can affect the performance of the students they teach. This is very true with the students in our alternative settings. As the years have gone by, we have steadily increased our expectations for the students, and they have risen to the occasion. If we expect more, they do more. According to the article, Rosenthal "found that expectations affect teachers' moment-to-moment interactions with the children they teach in a thousand almost invisible ways. Teachers give the students that they expect to succeed more time to answer questions, more specific feedback, and more approval: They consistently touch, nod and smile at those kids more." This also goes back to building the positive relationships with the students...if we build the positive relationships, then the students want to meet the higher expectations we put before them...they want to make us proud, and in doing so, make themselves proud, gain confidence, and perform better overall.

Every day is a new day! That is what came to mind as I read this article. It helps me to forget the mistakes from the day before and give the student another chance at success. I liked the article because it demonstrates again how much influence we have over our students. Remember the "aha" moment when you first realized the students were actually listening to you in class? Also, I appreciated the importance of consistency and building positive relationships. A nurturing adult promotes emotional and academic growth and we have so many opportunities in a school setting to "touch" kids.

This article so supports our implementation of Safe and Civil Schools at all levels in the district and Conscious Discipline at the elementaries. If you have not had the opportunity to read through the Foundations and CHAMPS modules, do so when you have the time. The focus is based on developing relationships with students through teacher behaviors and rate of positive interactions.

"Engage. Talk with students about their individual interests. Don't offer advice or opinions - just listen." So many of us in this field are problem solvers that we forget to keep this in mind. I really think we need to do this more with our kids, our friends, mates and our employees. Many times the "curse of knowledge" gets in the way of getting to the root of the issue/concern. I personally need to remind myself that engaging is not necessarily "hammering" the solution for folks.

I think the points made in this post apply to parenting, teaching and supervision. Children raised with high expectations are more likely to succeed but your own behavior can affect your expectations of those you influence. Very applicable in the workplace as well with adults. Behavioral change is not easy and it something we must constantly work on to be good authority figures. Good suggestions.

The expectations that are set for our students, teachers and even family members are a significant part of what the future holds. We hear about setting the bar high, but it's not enough to set the bar. I have experienced how important it is to not just talk about what is expected but to show and model the expectations. It is very easy to tell someone what they are doing wrong and then give a set of directions on how to correct the incorrect behavior. It is much harder to try to redirect incorrect behaviors by modeling. I am guilty of this with my own children, I tell them what they shouldn't do but turn around to do exactly what I have told them not to (and say but I'm you mother and I can do what I want, wrong). I have found that showing appropriate behaviors and practicing desired expectations is the best way to improve leadership. Plan of action will include less talking and more modeling.

One of the suggestions Pianta offered for teachers who want to change their behavior toward problem students was: "Think back on your own best and worst teachers, bosses or supervisors......How did the best and the worst make you feel?" Thinking back about my high school years, I wouldn't have considered myself a "problem student". However, I definitely lacked confidence. I'm eternally grateful to my English teacher, Sharon Kingston, and my journalism teacher, Margie Wilson, for believing in me and inspiring me to get out of my shell. They treated me with respect, gave me lots of responsibility, challenged me and expected great things from me. I tried hard to live up to those expectations. A few months ago I ran across my high school yearbook and saw that Mrs. Kingston had written ".... know that you've not accidently been gifted." Even 30+ years later I still want to make her proud of me. More importantly, I want to inspire the young people in my life to be their best. Encouragement goes a long, long way.

Often we talk about having high expectations for our students. I'm wondering now if maybe we should talk about how to treat students as if we have high expectations for them. Rather than "expect their very best" perhaps we should be saying "treat them as if they are going to do their very best every time."

Stormy, I think you are absolutely correct! We should convey that 'I believe in you . . . I have high expectations for you . . . I am here to help you along the way as you achieve high expectations . . . '

"After that intensive training, Pianta and his colleagues analyzed the beliefs of the teachers again. What he found was that the beliefs of the trained teachers had shifted way more than the beliefs of teachers given a standard informational course. "This is why Pianta thinks that to change beliefs, the best thing to do is change behaviors. "It's far more powerful to work from the outside in than the inside out if you want to change expectations," he says. In other words, if you want to change a mind, simply talking to it might not be enough." Here's the rub to me. Moving from discussion about beliefs about students to expectations and accountability for actions with students. It is easy to talk about how all kids can learn in a meeting. It is another thing altogether to look at what is happening with individual students in classes. Hopefully our walk through process will take us beyond just talking about equity in learning to action on that front.

One of our focuses this year is the 3 R's and 3 C's. As I read this article, I reflected on the 7 Ways Teachers can Change Their Expectation. It correlates with the significance of relationships. Immediately, it makes me think of a famous quote by Maya Angelou, "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." Children rise to the expectations set by their teacher. If children feel important and validated by their teacher, they tend to excel. Years down the road, children remember the feeling they had in their teacher's room not if they "passed" a state assessment. When we look at both the steps of watch and listen, these fit into the idea of customization. This is where we need to know our student's interest and motivation in order to engage them in our lessons. Student engagement is one of the key elements in our new Walk Through forms. It leads us to think how individualization is key to actively involve all our children in instruction. As administrators, we should lead by example. We all know that relationships are key and we work on this. However, can we think about how to customize our interactions/staff developments with the staff but still lead our campus with high expectations?

You mean the relationship and the way you interact with kids/people could influence their effort/success? This is not a new concept....I am interested to learn more about how you can actually train an educator to have high expectations for ALL students on a consistent basis. As the leader of a campus, can the expectations you establish and communicate for staff and students have an impact on the collective school family? Just wonder if this could be applied to the campus leadership position as well?

While I agree with the concept whole heartily, I am not sure if we (educators) have truly embraced the actual concept. Public schools have not evolved to maximize this concept because our entire system is still functioning to try and educate all students in the same way (generalization). Our school day is designed the same way for all students (K-8). Our school hours and the delivery of information has been designed the same way for at least 100 years. If we feel the expectations of a teacher is directly related to the students performance AND we know that educating a student from poverty is different than educating someone who is not than WHY do we have the same system in place to educate everyone. We need to open up our system and let the students find the teacher that will directly increase their performance.... Theoretically, this will allow students to take ownership with the experience that will maximize their learning.

I think we all agree that a teacher's expectations for a student has a tremendous effect on the student. But as administrators, how do we instill expectations corporately so that high expectations are the norm for the entire staff? One small act, remark, or how we handle a situation sets the tone, expectations of who we are as a staff. How do we do that as leaders?

I think Mike hit the nail on the head when he said, "How can we learn more about how you can actually TRAIN an educator to have high expectations." I think we'll all agree that having high expectations of students is important, but we have to find an effective way to get our teachers to first change their own expectations, and secondly, to communicate and hopefully inspire students to rise to the occasion.

Sounds like a form of self-fulfilling prophecy to me. If we believe the students can learn and if we believe that we can teach them - they will. We as educators hold much power in the success or failure of our students. Our biases, believes, and assumptions about "others" impact how much we expect; thus, we impact how much they achieve.

AVID---need I say more! We just moved one of our students from regular English to Advanced English (just one example). He is one of our AVID students who was excelling in regular English. His English teacher recognized the fact after 5 weeks that he was capable of performing in an advanced class. There was no hesitation on anyone's part to change his schedule. We have high expectations for our students! On the flip side, we had one student who was having behavior issues in a regular Math class. After a meeting with the teacher, principal and student we decided that because he was making "A's" and "B's" in his regular class, he was not being challenged. We decided that he was capable of succeeding in an Advance Math class. This student started crying! He knew there would be more work involved. He had extremely low expectations for himself. It is our job and duty to recognize the potential in our students and ACT! AVID is an action program set up to push students beyond what they or their parents may expect from them. It is our job as campus leaders to instill in our teachers the importance of high expectations. Teachers will follow the lead of their campus leaders...low expectations or high expectations depends on how WE address issues such as the ones I just mentioned above.

Long before standardized test, teachers where in tune to students needs. They taught creatively , had high expectations for their students and there was no teaching to a test. Teachers got to know their students and they customized education to the students needs. Bring back creativity to the classroom , build relationships with students,and see every student as an individual , and we will see the achievement gap began to close.

It is imperative what we "inspect what we expect" and develop an environment where ALL students are engaged and challenged. As educators, we are the key and we must lead in a way that unlocks the door of unlimited opportunities.

We do have some teachers in CSISD who practice the very behaviors that convey high expectations and build relationships. You know who the are; they're honored at The Hall of Fame Banquet year after year. How do we move beyond talking about them and start behaving like them?

I agree with Hector's comment. Too often I am trying to help a student solve a problem when I need to listen first and foremost. To really know our students and connect with them professionally can go a long way to supporting them educationally. When we understand where they are coming from we can then help them reach beyond our own expectations and achieve their potential.

What teachers expect drives student learning? What we expect drives everything we do. As a system we have to have a set of expectations. Why? It determines our success. Is this true??

Much of student success boils down to one factor - relationships! It should be at the heart of all we do every day.

"If we visualize each student as a jar of potential, our responsibility is to take the lid off and point the jar in the right direction, not tighten the top so the highest level of creativity never gets out." I love this image. I think this can sometimes be more challenging to accomplish with our special needs students, but it's just as applicable.

The ugly truth is that the standardized testing world that has evolved around us has slowly chipped away at our appreciation for truly creative people. I think we are finally seeing how critically important it is to be able to "think outside of the box" in order to work through challenges and problems. This is the single greatest skill that separates leaders from followers in my opinion. Everything else falls into the category of "tools in the toolbox" to make those great ideas come to life.

"Learning is not a race for information but a walk of discovery."- unknown Isn't teaching about teaching children how to learn and leading them to do so. A defined skill set does just that...defines what we learn. Great jar / lid visual Kim.

@Jeff @Kim @Jon. How do we encourage creative teaching, evaluate it and report it to our parents and constituents?

@EC: I think we have to be willing to support risk taking in our teachers, showcase their efforts and celebrate their successes as well as the successes of the students. The evaluation is reflected in the learning demonstrated by the students b/c the learning is the desired outcome of the teaching. We report it in terms that the layperson can understand as opposed to an AEIS report....

"Confidence is the most valuable gift a teacher can give. We have to make sure that this is what is at the end of our educational path.'' Unfortunately too much testing is placing restrictions on what these great teachers can do for students who we need to be let out of the jar to be creative and allowed to discover solutions for the rest of us.

Ronnie Helm. When you reach one mile stone in education there will be new one to over come. We will never reach perfection as some may think,because we live in an imperfect society. The teacher who are risk taker should be rewarded, and encourage to think out side the box more.

"The U.S. became a great country by doing new and better things, not by repetitively enhancing minimal skills." That is the key in the standardized testing debate. Sandy Kress and Bill Hammond believe that these skills equate to success in the workplace. Either that or they would like more standardized testing at even higher levels, with more schools failing, so their buddies can get rich by providing curriculum, technology or for-profit charter schools.

"The point of education is the help students achieve the most important things." What are the most important things? Who is deciding what those important things are? Do they need to be the same for everyone? What common threads are essential in the field of education for our students to walk away with at each grade level? What is the vision of where our kids should be when they leave CSISD? If we talk about customization, each of us determines what is important to ourselves. In the realm of education, how do you make sure that each of us (educators) is being held accountable to achieve that with our students? We can't just leave it to fate and chance. Otherwise, our children will not be getting a similar education district wide. That is the struggle we face in our field, as we know one size does not fit all. I loved the concept of "If we visualize each student as a jar of potential, our responsibility is to take the lid off and point the jar in the right direction, not tighten the top so the highest level of creativity never gets out. "

I think it's interesting that the author acknowledges that one of the crutches that we've become accustom to is that we rely on research first before we are willing to step out and try a new method. Let's face it, someone had to be the pioneer in creating the first math worksheet or building the first iPod app. I think as a country, we need to encourage our educators to blaze a new trail. Is it always going to be successful? No. But, it could be wildly successful. Are we willing to be complacent in waiting for the research or do we want to model for what we tell our students? - Dream and make it happen!!

@jeff How do we satisfy our obligation to the stay if we only report data to our constituents as you have described?

I believe that part of encouraging innovation and creativity is fostering an environment that is supportive even when an idea doesn't go as planned. Does such an environment exist in CSISD? How about our community?

I came to realize a while back that standards don't prepare students for very much. Standards are just the framework of expectations and educational objectives. States, including Texas, have spent nearly twenty years formulating 21st century standards for a 19th century school system. And, we wonder why schools across America lag behind other countries. Also, as each of us know, there is a significant number of students that are unable to meet the standards and put forth little effort. These test scores say more about students cultural background and socioeconomic status than about their abilities (every research you can find supports this). The perception of the public schools has been formed around the failure to meet these standards. It looks like most districts across America are "Waiting on Superman". If you haven't seen this documentary...take a look!

Not a very technical response... But the cynical side of me says that what is important to test MUST change frequently if Pearson is to continue to make billions of dollars recreating tests Nation wide. I also felt the author's belief that we are losing the passion of teaching AND learning as we break everything down to be able to pass a test....and then another test.

"The best teachers have always taken their students to heights never achieved by others. They help young people dream and believe. " I believe this is the reason many of us became teachers. If the test is a tool to measure good teachers, what tool measures the best teachers?

I think Jeff hit the nail on the head. I know standardized testing is a reality in education but you can't take the human element out of teaching and expect to achieve the results that we would like to see in the classroom.

Anytime a teacher can do something that has the potential of positively impacting student creativity in our district, we will see a reward. The time I have spent in CSISD has been a great learning experience for me. Many things (especially technology) have changed significantly since I started working here. What I haven't seen change is the high quality of educators we have in our district. To maintain and improve on the success our district has enjoyed, however, will require even more involvement than we've ever had in the past.

Wow- reducing childhood obesity is just about the only thing talked about in the articles I read in my area of schools lately! I recently had the opportunity to attend a national conference on physical activity and healthy eating for students. There were several talks presenting studies that show physical activity helps students do better at school and score better on standardized tests. However sitting still in the classroom is often expected and PE is being decreased in many districts- though not CSISD thankfully. One talk showed research about including activity within the regular classroom without changing the teachers workload. The work done by Teresa's husband and stand up desks supports this work.

Reflecting upon the content of this article brought a very clear visual image of Ken Robinson speaking regarding education and creativity..."The fact is that given the challenges we face, education doesn't need to be reformed -- it needs to be transformed. The key to this transformation is not to standardize education, but to personalize it, to build achievement on discovering the individual talents of each child, to put students in an environment where they want to learn and where they can naturally discover their true passions. Creativity is as important now in education as literacy and we should treat it with the same status. We have to go from what is essentially an industrial model of education, a manufacturing model, which is based on linearity and conformity and batching people. We have to move to a model that is based more on principles of agriculture. We have to recognize that human flourishing is not a mechanical process; it's an organic process. And you cannot predict the outcome of human development. All you can do, like a farmer, is create the conditions under which they will begin to flourish."

How do you appropriately assess the potential of every learner? We are not driven by standardized test as a school district, but are we driven by creativity and development of confidence amongst all learners. This article made me think about are we tapping into the creativity and drive for all learners. Not just students, but staff and community members as well. What am I doing each day to invite and inspire creativity amongst my staff and with my students. CSISD....are we building confidence?

My fear is that if we only focus on the science of the teaching, we will lose the art of educating our youth.

Who gets to decide what "the most important thing in the world" is? TEA, legislators, parents, teachers, community leaders, Apple, Pearson, the highest bidder? How will we know when we are 'there'? Sometimes I feel like we are unfairly criticized for not reaching a 'destination' that is always changing. Bright spot: I'm thinking of one parent who was overjoyed when her son was finally able to clearly articulate 'I love you' - that was pretty darn important. For that parent, that student and that team - on that day - we reached our destination and we were happy to be there. "By limiting dreams, we also limit possibilities. Confidence is the most valuable gift a teacher can give. We have to make sure that this is what is at the end of our educational path." How do we measure that?

It seems that we believe that no one test is good enough to serve as the primary means of making educational decisions that shape each learners life. Common sense would lead us to that conclusion as standardized tests actually measure little. Most of the standardized tests that our students experience are constructed in the format of multiple-choice questions with one correct answer choice. The format itself limits thinking, and isn't learning about applying knowledge gained? These tests cannot possibly provide genuine accountability for measuring learning or determine what a student knows. So what do we do instead? Assessment based on student performance on real learning tasks is more useful for measuring student abilities. Do the same questions about what is important to measure exist in a more authentic assessment paradigm? Whitaker states, "The best teachers do not need research to lead them down the correct path" in the last paragraph of his article. I disagree. I believe that the best teachers are continually informed by research and become researchers in their own right.

I'm always interested in reading about this issue because I don't know that I've formed a clear opinion for myself. As a teacher, I had classes of students who couldn't fail state assessments if they tried, and I also had classes of students with chronic absences, no home support, working almost full time to pay bills for their families. If test scores are weighted heavily in teacher evaluations, I feel like a teacher who has high achieving classes doesn't seem to be on a level playing field with those who teach classes of students with obvious high needs. On the other hand, I do see the value in having some level of teacher accountability for student success on whatever measure the district or state designates as appropriate. I hope to read more about both sides of this issue.

This portion of the article stood out to me -- "But something's askew when you have most teachers getting top-rated reviews while numerous students in their schools fail to meet the state performance standards. Exhibit A is Dallas ISD, where about 95 percent of teachers recently earned one of the top two assessments the district hands out at the very time the number of Dallas schools ranked academically unacceptable has grown."

I am in complete agreement with Stormy's comments on this article. Although I feel that it is fair to use student performance data as part of a teacher's accountability, I think that consideration needs to be made for those teachers who may have a higher percentage of students with frequent absences, no parental support, and with circumstances that do not allow them to give their full attention to their education, thus resulting in lower assessment scores. These teachers may actually work harder for these students to make small gains, than some teachers who have students who are self-motivated and as Stormy said, "couldn't fail state assessments if they tried", yet their evaluation, if based on student performance, would be scored lower. I think that if student performance data is going to be included in teacher accountability, then teachers should also be "rewarded" for taking on the tough job of teaching the lower level, non-motivated students.

Since there is a direct correlation between family income and student performance on tests, could a fair system teacher evaluation system that relies on student test performance be developed that integrates student performance and family income levels?

What SB 4 would have required... "Principals work with teachers to create a career path for them." This is a very interesting portion of this proposed bill. I don't mean to dance around the issue of test scores being part of evaluations; however, maybe we should look at evaluations as a whole. Are we truly working to coach teachers during evaluations? What would it mean to create a career path with teachers? If our evaluation process (state as a whole) was working to improve instruction would the accountability component be such an issue?

I couldn't agree more, Laurie. Accountability measures should take into account how much progress in learning a student makes over the course of a year -- It only makes sense to consider where a student began the year and where did he/she end it? Additionally, the assessment of instruction must work in concert with the assessment of learning. We cannot focus entirely one at the exclusion of the other -- the two are intertwined. It's about balancing our study of instruction with our study of learning, then having conversations about it

Can you have a great teacher, under challenging circumstances, with poor student performance? Can you have a weak teacher, under ideal circumstances, with great student performance? I think the answer to both of these questions is "yes". Perhaps instead of weighing in as heavy as 50%, the student performance should be more like 10%-15%. That way it would count for something, but not so much as to be unfair.

I think this article created more questions for me! I do agree that some part of the teacher evaluation should be included to increase/improve accountability. But, the weight should be closer to 10-15%. On the flip side, should the student's final grade reflect a percentage of the teacher's effectiveness? I agree with the statement, "Students deserve effective teachers." But, will that happen because the teacher went through another "test" of proving their effectiveness by a probationary period before certification? Finally, I thought teaching was a "career path" for many people? I do not think that SB 4 was ready for publication and it stopped where it needed to be stopped.

As a parent, SB 4 makes sense. We all want the world to revolve around us and our children. I think most of us agree with accountability...when it is within our power. What happens when the issues are external? How do you account for the latter? In my opinion the article asks many questions but does not offer enough solutions and differential angles to the story. As much as I appreciate being breif, the solutions cannot be contained in a one page editiorial.

Ronnie Helm. Their need to be a clarification of SB 4 as to the intent of the bill. Classroom performance should be included as part of teacher evaluation, but not more than 15%.

As Stormy alluded to, some students are going to be successful no matter what when it comes to standardized testing and others are going to struggle regardless the amount of effort a teacher puts forth. Having worked in a district where a majority of the students were low ses, and now working here in CSISD, I could never agree with a proposal such as SB 4 without including factors such as family income, parental support, and a students' attendance. If this were to happen, I think then the playing field would be leveled for each district/teacher and a proposal such as SB 4 would be more acceptable.

Should test scores count toward a teachers evaluation or not? If so, how much? I wonder if this is the wrong approach? Maybe we should ask ourselves, what else should count in determining whether a teacher is effective or not? I think if we can effectively answer this part of the question it will guide us in where standardized teacher scores fit in the evaluation process. Let us determine a variety of factors that should be considered and simply let test scores be a piece of that collective evaluation puzzle.

I recently found a perspective that has helped me immensely with framing the role of classsroom observations, be they full-blown PDAS or mini-observations (walk throughs): -Observing teaching: Works from a perspective that effective teaching results in effective learning. -Observing learning: Works from a perspective that if students are learning, the teaching must be effective. Do numbers tell a story? Of course-- it is one venue for raising awareness and action. However, when a score or rating becomes the focus, numbers become a baseball bat, not a flashlight. There are so many rich resources available, such as Kim Marshall's Rethinking Teacher Supervision and Evaluation, that offer tools for observing learning and having those critical conversations with teachers that can truly transorm our students' learning.

I agree with Mike's assertion regarding a collective evaluation puzzle. I also want to consider how a teacher's evaluation affects the principal(s) and schools evaluation? How much of their evaluation should affect the school's evaluation? While I do believe there should be a different lens or evaluation tool for students that are in poverty, I believe the true evaluation tool needs to emphasize the growth of the student. In my opinion, that is the true essence of a teacher's/school's performance - how much did a student grow while they were with us during a school year. That is our million dollar performance. Every parent wants to see their child grow and learn new things as a result of a quality teacher/school.

I agree that teacher evaluations should be based in part on student performance; however, it seems that student achievement should be considered in terms of individual student gain adjusting for starting performance or prior achievement.

I think that there are just too many variables involved for us to base a teacher's evaluation on student performance. Class sizes, available curriculum materials, instructional time, home support, individual student needs and abilities, health, attendance, prior teachers and schooling, current teachers, summer learning loss are just a few areas that Linda Darling-Hammond (2011) "Evaluating teacher evaluation: We Know About Value-Added Models and Other Methods, Phi Delta Kappan" discusses. How do you adjust a teacher's evaluation when they have 12 students in one class and 25 in another? How do you evaluate a teacher that has students from a previous grade who had a terrible teacher and are expected to have a basic knowledge base for that class. One year may have a group of students that are really on top of things, but the next year a teacher may have a group that struggles. I think that we are on the right track regarding walk-throughs. We will have the ability to identify key areas to address in a collaborative manner and help work with teachers to continue to become better teachers. We could probably all name our teachers that are struggling in the classroom. The question should be what are the "critical conversations" as Jane stated earlier that need to take place so that not only teaching is transformed, but student learning is elevated to a higher level. As has been said earlier, we should not base what we do on one test or rating.

I know there is a more relevant educational argument in this article, however I could not get past this statement. "Shapiro is retiring from the Senate so education reformers such as state Sen. Dan Patrick of Houston should take up where she left off." So will he go to work for a testing company after politics, too? Do we follow the money on this issue? Since it will be political decision, how will we use student performance measures on teacher evaluations to improve "learning"?

After I finished this article, I thought, as a teacher, Would I rather ski jump or glide down a "bumpy" slope? Both forms of the sport would get me to the bottom of the mountain (hopefully), but I would confront significantly different risks along the way. The latter idea of gliding would be less challenging- but it also causes less stress, boosting my chances that I would arrive at my destination intact and in good spirits. As exciting as the huge jump might be, it would probably end in disaster for me. The "agony of defeat" guy on ABC's "Wide World of Sports" flashed before me. The same is true for a teacher perched atop a classroom. To increase a student's chances of success in our world, the teacher must analyze how the world is changing, know and understand the mountain and glide around students as they appear on the horizon. The teacher must know what each student is -and isn't -capable of doing. As a student, I would much rather be in a classroom with the teacher knowing what I am capable of doing and helping me learn rather than jumping over me because I test well.

I agree that student achievement should be considered in teacher evaluation, but there has to be a way to level the playing field since all students don't come with the same experiences. To me, the most logical way to fairly include student achievement in teacher evaluations is to consider student growth. If student achievement were considered in this way, teachers who choose to work in challenging situations would be acknowledged for the growth their students make and teachers who have students who come to them with students working at or above grade level would be challenged to take them to the next level.

I am curious to know the role non-core teachers would play. Furthermore, if academic integration is implemented in the non-core areas, would an average score be part of the non core teacher's evaluation?

After reading the other article regarding our love of numbers, this article made me smile. Can we really quantify what a good teacher does in the classroom every day? How about considering student growth rather than student performance as a part of teacher evaluations?

Student performance should play a role in teacher evaluation. Students are our consumers; the learning outcomes must clearly be the objective for any educator otherwise, what would be the intent or more succinctly what would be the point? The heart of the debate is how much a teacher's students' performance should be weighed into the equation. There are many things to consider as many of you have noted (students' experiences, academic yearly growth, etc.). However,in most professions the bottom line is productivity. The very well-intentioned teacher that views his/her purpose as "I must teach the content" ; with no attention to the learning outcomes is as ludicrous as the home builder that views his/her job as simply to build a structure with no consideration of the market, location or design. My question now becomes "how can an evaluation be used to examine teacher behaviors that measurably improve student performance? Examining only teacher behaviors or student behaviors within an evaluative process is futile. These behaviors are simply and infinitely interwoven.

What student data are we to look at to evaluate the teacher? STAAR and EOC exams only? What about the teachers who don't teach a class with a state assessment? I agree with Tami that a consideration of student growth would be more telling than student performance on state assessments. It's not going to be as simple as the editorial states in regards to teacher evaluation.

Good article and very true. It seems to me that people who are especially adept at working numbers to their advantage can talk others into all kinds of crazy things that would make no sense at all when viewed from a higher altitude. It takes a leader with courage to stand up and say "I don't care what the numbers seem to be saying, this does not make good common sense". School reform falls into this category by a score of 98%, thus proving my point. :)

Agreed. The quantitative / qualitative debate is nothing new; however, using it to discern what type of assessment is best for children AND adults is an interesting conversation. During my coaching of teachers and family facilitators for the past 3 years I found that the power of a conversation about an actual method or situation always had far more resounding effects than printing out a rated report. As a parent, I would always rather know about a specific instance of my children's growth and progress rather than a numerical grade. Is that always possible...no. Does the numerical grade or test score give me helpful information? Yes. A healthy balance that puts people first is always (in my opinion) the best choice.

Love this: "In calling this sensibility into question, I'm not denying that there's a place for quantification. Rather, I'm pointing out that it doesn't always seem to know its place. If the question is "How tall is he?", "six-foot-two" is a more useful answer than "pretty damn tall." But what if the question were "Is that a good city to live in?" or "How does she feel about her sister?" or "Would you rather have your child in this teacher's classroom or that one's?" I also like the framework that assessing is much different than measuring. Hopefully, the Texas High Performance School Consortium will build on this idea.

I love Alfie Kohn. I still feel like his book, The Schools Our Children Deserve, is the most reasoned and comprehensive look at changes schools should make for the better. Many have criticized Kohn, calling his theories too "loose" and "wishy-washy" because they put more control in the hands of the students. This article also points to the fallacy of relying too much on numbers. I relish the idea of taking numbers and observations, digging deeper and seeing what we can be discovered as much as anyone, but as noted Baseball sabrematrician Bill James often will remind his readers, numbers CAN lie and mislead. Age-old truisms sometimes are shown to have little merit. Finally, allow me to combine Kohn and a famous fictional scientist, Ian Malcolm (of Jurassic Park fame)- "just because we CAN measure something doesn't mean we OUGHT to measure it."

I am guilty of loving numbers. The first thing that I ask my children is , "what grade did you get on today's test?", instead of what have you learned from this experience. When I look at numbers it "seems" clear where things stand, or does it? The manipulation of numbers is easy and fascinating, so it was very interesting to read this article and get a new perspective of how we ask questions and gather information. I will reconsidering how I look at numbers in various situations from now on. Very interesting to kind in a different way.

Numbers do have a role in discussing achievement, but the information provided is limited. Numbers by themselves can draw our attention to a problem or a success. For example, its clear that a student who makes a low grade on an assignment does not understand the material, but the number by itself doesn't provide any information about what the student does or does not know. A teacher who works closely with the student can provide better information about what the student does not understand, or if there is a pattern to the errors they are a making. I guess the trick is to figure out how to balance the quantitative and qualitative data.

Ratings... My daughter was just accepted to the fifth largest university in America that ranks as the 53rd best school on the US News and World Report list... what's the problem? At the risk of defending quantitative analysis, I believe the problem lies in the desire to boil down information into one number, stat or rating. How is your school? Recognized? How did Texas do in the NAEP? Fourth among the 50 states? How is my son's math teacher? Proficient?

When I finished reading the article I read the comments that were posted and I found this post..."Education based on numbers may work fairly well as a means of teaching kids how to look up answers already derived, but it remains to be seen whether it will provide the intellectual rigor required to solve problems yet unanswered." Are we trying to develop strong test takers or life long learners?

I love the Steve Wilmarth quote, "Learning is social, ethical, natural, ecological, messy, compassionate, shared, open, visual, verbal, kinesthetic, and performing. Learning is not "bricks and mortar," GPA's, test scores, classroom management, contrived standards, nor isolated disciplines." When we attempt to distill evidence of learning to narrow sets of measures, are we artificially defining relevant education in a century of exponential growth of knowledge?

Although I'm a qualitative man, I have to agree with Dr. Ealy. Our desire and love for "one number, stat or rating" probably affects us more than we realize. How do we quantify an experience or a feeling when we enter a school? Unfortunately, most of the answers to those questions end with "well you just know". The numbers are important but we have to use the numbers to describe a variety of aspects as opposed to one number represent all the aspects. It's like examining your bill after a great meal at a pricey restaurant. Each number affects the total and each number is important to the total. Our goal is to make sure we understand each line and more importantly share those lines. (I've exhausted my creative examples with this post :).

Measurement is the cornerstone of the kind of learning that lends itself to being measured.". Ok this to me is the most troubling. Why? Because we encourage teachers to be creative, innovative, but yet we want to measure teaching and learning. The use of data and teacher, staff observations have to both be utilized to make informed decisions. Does the use of measured learning paralyze creativity in the classroom? In thinking about the article on teacher evaluation... How do you measure creativity, innovation in order to provide an evaluation based on a scale to determine effectiveness? Hmm...

Not every situation or exam or problem or really much of anything in life is black or white. When we work with people, we must consider reasonable circumstances, mitigating circumstances, intent; and often times, race, religion, socioeconomic conditions, education, etc., must be considered. To be effective we must have some gray in our decisions that impact others. So, a standardized test with a specific outcome (black and white) might feel reasonable and sometimes good and I would argue holds some value, is not the only measurement to consider when we evaluate much of anything. We must be more open and more grey than we often choose to be in education. Sorry Clark. :-)

While a test score gives a snapshot of a students progress, it is hard to put a number on a student as their learning and progress is not always linear. I tend to agree with Margie that we can not view people in numerical terms, but must look at all the different aspects of each person. As Eddie frequently reminds us, success does not look the same for each student. It also might not look the same each day for a student. It would be nice if schools could be allowed to view each students progress more and the results of just one test a bit less.

"All teaching is not instruction, sometimes it is only opening a door or lifting a veil. Lift the veil and one does not need to teach for the mind sees, realizes, understands." Louis L'Armour How will you measure that?

Jason showed me this article several days ago. My first reaction was, " yes!". I am so saddened by the continuing trend to quantify everything in public school. When I was in college, I read about a school district in California that put all their schools on a mastery based path. Students went to school in 3 year increments. During those 3 years they were taught skills until mastery. This eliminated the false "grade levels" that assume all children are ready for all skills at the same time. Some students mastered the 3 years of skills earlyband moved on. Most stayed the 3 years. If a student mastered some skills early, they then spent time on the others until they were mastered. This concept always fascinated me, but I doubt it it is still in existence. They would never be able to " compete" in public education now. I also thought about how we say that in CS the state test scores don't drive us.....but I think they do to a great extent. We sort of come at the issue sideways. But the need to compete is still here. Human nature?

As a student, I was a "grade grubber"...you know...the kid who wanted to know how she could get extra credit to keep a strong "A" in the class. I see the value in using numbers to measure progress in learning and teaching (along the way), but I question using numbers to truly assess the work that is being done...or more importantly, the value in the work being done. Measurement vs. Assessment...two very different things

Interesting video. I watched the movie trailer for, "Won't Back Down" which inspired this clip and WOW. I will be watching that flick in the theater this weekend. I think media like this can be inspiring and instill a sense of urgency; however, it is pivotal time of the semester for teachers' psyche and I would want to stay in the positive realm with what our schools ARE doing to achieve customization and choice and how we can do it in an even better way.

I think we can easily stay (and should stay) in the positive realm by looking at all the ways we customize, provide choice, establish relationships, etc. When we put our minds to it, I'm confident that we can out perform our charter school and private school competitors. This week, the Dallas Morning News reported that Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst named Sen. Dan Patrick to lead the Texas Senate's Education Committee, guaranteeing a battle over school choice - or vouchers - in the January session. It has been said that Dan Patrick built his political career around taking the "public" out of education and is the best ever example of "fox guarding the hen house." Both Dewhurst and Patrick, R-Houston, have said recently they want to push the idea of helping parents yank their children from failing public schools. Patrick has called school choice "the civil rights issue of our time." The 2 minute video may be a little strong, but it can certainly serve as an attention getter as we explore what it means to customize, provide choice, establish relationships, etc. I'm thinking that many of our district colleagues have heard the term 3C's and 3R's, but they can't name them. In fact, I was in a meeting earlier this week where the C's and R's couldn't be correctly identified. On the October Early Release Day, how will we process this year's Leading Indicator data?

I agree that we should keep a positive perspective on this issue, but we must also agree that the political reality of "school choice" is a clear negative for public schools. CSISD would benefit in the "short run" with school choice, but at what cost for the longevity of the quality educational programs (and jobs) in the district? Our predecessors gave our students a great place to be educated and gave us a great place to work. We should feel a "sense of urgency" to do the same for the next generation of CSISD students and employees.

I do not think our teachers sense an urgency at all. What do we need to do to help them see what is on the political horizon?

I keep wondering what it would take for us to develop "choice" within the public school. Is money the issue? We know that differentiation is imperative for student success, and it just seems that we could actually provide more choice for our students. I do agree that we should keep it positive!

This is such a simple practical way to formulate your presentations. I am sure I have done any one of these three mistakes when leading a training, but this is a wonderful tool through which to filter your presentation. Thanks, Greg

These are great tips!

Powerful video. Reminds me of some of our AVID Summer Institute student speakers. Teachers who can capture students' hearts can often capture their minds as well.