Discrepancies Between Students' and Teachers' Ratings of Classroom Practice: Another Way to Evaluate Teaching Quality?

• In Event: 35.081 - Roundtable Session 13
  In Roundtable Session: 35.081-12 - Ways to Determine Teacher Quality: What We Know, Don't Know, and Still Have to Learn

Abstract

Student and teacher surveys are increasingly used to measure teaching quality. However, extant research has treated student ratings and teacher self-reports as separate sources of evidence. This paper examines the utility of using absolute differences in student and teacher survey reports of classroom practice, a measure of the degree to which students and teachers are perceptually aligned or “in tune,” to predict student outcomes. Using multilevel modeling, greater classroom-teacher absolute discrepancy was shown to negatively predict student enjoyment, whereas greater student-teacher absolute discrepancy was shown to negatively predict student achievement above and beyond prior achievement. These findings suggest that the magnitude of student-teacher reported discrepancy may be revealing of teaching quality with low discrepancies signaling higher quality.

Author

• Daniel M. Dockterman, University of California - Los Angeles