Data-Driven Instructional Practice in Action (Part 2)
Studying the daily practices of those teachers whose students register high standardized test scores in reading and math has begun to alter preparing, selecting, and evaluating teachers. Journalists (here and here) andresearchers ( Allington) have reported (and shown on videos) what such teachers do to manage their classrooms as they teach content and skills from kindergarten through geometry and senior English. Data-driven instructional practice in action.
A short hop-ski-and-jump away are new policies to evaluate teachers on the basis of student test scores (often called “value-added measures”) and use of these data-driven practices in their classrooms. That is happening inWashington, D.C., Cincinnati, Houston, and other cities.
The road from data-driven instructional practice to evaluation and (don’t forget pay-4-performance bonuses), however, has potholes aplenty. Judging teacher performance on the basis of using data-driven practices and