1st Edition
Crafting the Feedback Teachers Need and Deserve A Guide for Leaders
Crafting the Feedback Teachers Need and Deserve illuminates an often overlooked aspect of educational leadership: providing quality written feedback. This resource offers context, purpose, and techniques on how to capture and write beneficial feedback. Proven in school districts, Van Soelen’s strategies will accelerate improvement in classroom practice and result in teachers who crave feedback and use it to supervise themselves. Full of examples and complete with an assessment tool to gauge current practice, this book shares insights into providing effective observation and feedback within any teacher evaluation system.
Contents
Chapter One
Shining the Light in the Dark
Chapter Two
Why We Should Measure Feedback Quality
Chapter Three
Building Your Descriptive Prowess
Chapter Four
Using Conditional Language to Ponder Changes
Chapter Five
Why Point of View is Significant
Chapter Six
Explicitly Owning and Raising Assumptions
Chapter Seven
The Trickiness of Co-Teaching Situations
Chapter Eight
Nurturing A Culture of Feedback
Appendix
Biography
Thomas M. Van Soelen is the President of Van Soelen & Associates. As a former school district leader, he now provides professional development services to schools focusing on four areas of expertise: instructional strategies, SRI critical friendship, leadership development, and teacher evaluation.
"In his book, Van Soelen outlines a practical approach for educational leaders to provide teachers with valuable feedback that leads to improved practice. The tools provided in this book will help any principal, assistant principal, or instructional leader learn to develop and utilize teacher feedback for its intended purpose--improved student learning!"
--Jared Cotton, Division Superintendent, Henry County Public Schools, VA
"Quality feedback to teachers on instructional practice is the hinge upon which the true school improvement door opens. Van Soelen provides exceptional insight and strategies for providing that high-quality feedback. The specific strategies for individually crafting feedback that leads to reflection and growth are invaluable!"
--Beth Brockman, Assistant Superintendent of Strategic Initiatives and Community Engagement, Lewisville ISD, TX
"This thoughtful and practical book guides educators to move teacher evaluation past accountability and compliance and positions teacher evaluation as an essential tool for school improvement. Thomas Van Soelen focuses keenly on the importance of crafting written feedback for teachers, unlike most resources on this subject which attend to in-person feedback conversations. Crafting the Feedback Teachers Need and Deserve is an important resource for educators who are passionate about advancing the use of observations and actionable feedback to enhance teaching and learning for every student."
--Debbi Laidley, Board Member, School Reform Initiative, Inc.