Lesson Observations

Let's be honest, lesson observations are a necessary evil; an evil that few teachers enjoy. When I first started teaching lesson observations were a pain but generally supportive and useful. I think it's fair to say that nowadays their usefulness is generally limited. It all depends who is doing the observing of course. The trouble is that many observations are given by senior leadership who rarely teach (and occasionally never have) due the the mountainous paperwork now involved in school management.

So what's changed? Essentially, not a lot. They have always been an indicator of whether a teacher should be encouraged to move on, whether to another school or another career. The main difference, and the teaching profession has Ofsted to thank for this, is that feedback is a lot more aggressive nowadays.

What does that mean though?

Ten or more years ago the lesson observation was there to check that your classroom wasn't a warzone and that you, as a teacher, were imparting the correct knowledge in a meaningful way to your cohort. Plenty of warning was given to the teacher (which probably shouldn't have happened as it gave the opportunity to refine their lesson which made it too artificial) and a relatively simple lesson plan required. There wasn't a particular style of teaching or focus (unless that was thought useful); individualism was acknowledged and respected. Students were expected to listen and do what they were asked. Feedback pointed out your good points and areas that needed work, with suggestions made as to how lessons could be improved. Phrases like "What you could have done was..." and "Something that you could try is..." were commonplace. There was little or no threat of competency, or if there was, it was uncommon and probably deserved. The grading was essentially pass or fail.

The experience isn't even close to that now. Schools try to replicate an Ofsted inspection by giving little notice for observations (a day or so is fairly commone, which should be enough in all honesty). Full lesson plans and detailed seating plans are required which show all the students with special needs and whether they speak English as a second language or receive free school meals which is a current target group for government/Ofsted and therefore schools. Books must be marked with current grades or levels and a dialogue between teacher and student which will probably involve an individual question that forces the student to practise a teacher-noted gap in their learning. During the lesson the teacher must continually assess each child individually and refer back to the lesson objective. Each child must be called upon by the teacher to give or explain an answer by name and be able to tell the observer exactly what they are learning and convince them that this happens every lesson. Lessons and activities must be "active", which means that the students discover new concepts rather than get told/taught them. The feedback then gives the teacher a grade from 1 to 4 (3 and 4 are no go areas and risk competency - they should be renamed "You are crap") and involve phrases like "They will pick up on..." and "They will expect to see...", with the "they" referring to Ofsted. Any positives are glossed over and the weaknesses are pointed out endlessly, although often no ways of improving are suggested coherently. The teacher will often leave the feedback feeling pretty down, regardless of their grade.

So the differences are:

• It has gone from a relatively positive thing (possibly too positive at times) to being a threat to a teacher's livelihood when there is a shortage of decent teachers.
• The focus has moved from how you could improve your teaching to what Ofsted would want to see, which is usually a guess as it's not clear that Ofsted really know what they want either.
• Individualism was encouraged to a certain extent but now frowned upon for fear that the inspectors have a particular teaching model.
• Teachers aren't allowed to teach; the sudents have to teach themselves as the "teacher" wanders around "facilitating" discussion.

This is purely because Ofsted now have ultimate and unquestioned power over all state funded schools in England. Their judgements are unquestioned with the impression being amongst teachers that the inspectors make their judgement before they turn up and find evidence to back that judgement up. Despite what Sir Michael Wilshaw, Chief Inspector of Schools says, inspectors have a set image of a "decent" lesson and if you don't do that you are knackered.

But apparently education in England is rigorous and fit for purpose. I beg to differ.