Saturday, May 9, 2015

Advantages Posed By Instructional Rounds

By Toni Vang


Teachers should use tools that enhance or improve their teaching skills and methodologies. The instructional rounds enhances a culture of collaboration between the teacher and their colleagues. These rounds provide feedback to the teacher on how others are working when they sit down for a discussion. It will also act a reflection ground after classes on how well or bad they fared in their classes that day.

The rounds are used once in a while and they cannot be used all the time. Once a semester is okay. However, it has to get agreed upon when it will be done, it should not be something abrupt. The lead teacher is chosen depending on how professional he is, how well he can control a group and how well of a leader he is. He also should be a leader somewhere else which makes him command respect from other teachers.

In some schools they are also called instructional coaches, people who other teachers can listen to. Some people feel uncomfortable with such arrangements thinking that they are being valued, which is not necessarily the case. The teachers who are observed do so on a voluntary basis. However, some veterans in the field can also be chosen to demonstrate how it works to those who are new to the rounds. Any teacher can volunteer his or her class for the rounds.

The small groups that have been formed are no more than five people. This is so that they can be easy to manage as well as for the observation circle to get completed faster. Moreover, the students ought to be informed first so that they cannot feel intruded into since they are also part of the learning process, without them the program would not be there in the first place.

The rounds take place during actual learning time. They walk in a few minutes after the class has started and they slowly and quietly settle at the back of the class. There are seats preserved for them. Taking notes is an important part of the lesson. Some are selective in what they observe while others make a general observation of everything going on.

The rounds take no more than fifteen minutes to avoid too much disturbance to the students as well as so that the teachers can go back to their classes. The teachers need to take notes for future reference and also so that they cannot forget any point during the discussion. Moreover, they have to be very keen on what is going on since they have to try by all means to get something good from the lesson.

After the class, they meet after the classes for a discussion. They bring up the positives about what they observed after which they bring up the negatives. They do not dwell too much on the negatives neither do they bring them up bluntly and rudely. Actually, the negatives are brought up as questions in a bid to be polite and thoughtful.

The positives have to turn out more than the negatives, otherwise this will discourage the teachers from participating. Rules are very important in such a forum as there are some teachers who might choose to annoy others just for the sake. Those who cannot follow them ought to be ejected from the group before they destroy relationships between them and their colleagues.




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