Keeping Yourself In Check

While reading the contents of the last chapter in Kuma's book Beyond Methods, I was intreged by his idea of having someone observe in a classroom to help deminish any mismatches. However, as I was reading I could not help but question the process, too.

Having another collegue observe in your classroom and provide feedback can be very beneficial. This collegue can notice aspects of your teaching or even your lesson that coule be improved because they are not being communicated in the best possible way. You as the teacher have one perspective and one vision as to how you would like the lesson to go, but in reality you will have a classroom full of students, all who have their own perspective. Thus, they may not understand parts of the lesson or the teaching style like you as the teacher had planned. Much like the example provided in the chapter; the teacher knew what she meant by, "school system," but there were students in the class who were confused. The observer can recognize this mismatch better than the actual teacher because he/she is seeing the lesson unfold as a whole and not just in the role of the teacher. I also agree with Kuma in that the observer and teacher can collaborate to determine any mismatches that may have occured during the lesson to help make any improvements for the next time. Also, the teacher can learn more about his/her teaching style and methods and make a self-evaluation as well as reflection about their teaching.

Although this process appears to have many pros to it, I could not help but think how practical would the observation steps be. I understand the point of having three seperate steps in the observation process: preobservation, observation, and postobservation, but how would all of this unfold? Do teachers have that much time to dedicate to meeting with the observer before and after each lesson as well as with a few of his/her students afterward? Also, in regards to video taping or recording the lessons, where are teachers supposed to get the equipment? What if the school distrcit cannot afford to purchase the necessary equipment? Does the teacher need to get approval from the students' parents to record their children? The collegue who is observing, does he/she take the day off from his/her job? Are the observers from the same school? School district? Retired teachers?

Personally, I do have questions about the suggestions Kuma made in Monitoring Teaching Acts." These questions are not meant to be taken negatively, nor do I want to umdermind Kuma's idea of monitoring your teaching. I think the idea that Kuma has proposed in his book has great potential to help teachers enhance their teaching, but first I would need to research the idea further to try to find the answers to my questions.