How First-Year Teachers Receive, Perceive, and Use Teacher Evaluation Feedback

• In Event: Building a Knowledge Base for Elementary Teacher Education

Abstract

Objective/Purpose. Two basic functions of teacher evaluations are to hold teachers accountable for their work and provide feedback in support of their professional growth (Steinberg & Donaldson, 2016); yet research on teacher evaluation in the United States has largely focused on the first function (Papay, 2012). Providing feedback for professional growth is especially important for beginning teachers who are still learning to teach and adjusting to new district, school, and classroom contexts.
The purpose of this paper is to contribute to research on teacher evaluation for professional growth through an examination of the evaluation experiences of a sample of 60 first-year elementary teachers in nine U.S. states and the District of Columbia to determine the nature of their evaluations, the extent to which their own values coincide with those of the evaluation system, and how, and to what extent, their evaluation influenced their instruction.
Theoretical Framework. We frame this paper uisng Engeström’s (1999) cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), which enables us to analyze beginning elementary teachers’ experiences with evaluation in a complex activity system, highlighting existing contradictions within the system. In this framework, the subject is the beginning elementary teachers, the object is their classroom practices, and teacher evaluation is the tool intended to impact teachers’ practices. Additionally, teacher evaluations are implemented within a specific community (e.g., district/school) characterized by rules and divisions of labor that define interactions among its members.
Methods, Techniques, or Modes of Inquiry. In this paper, we (a) identify the different elements of the activity system, (b) analyze descriptive statistics of participants’ questionnaire responses regarding their experiences with teacher evaluation, and (c) discuss our examination of interview data in which we identified and coded emerging themes that corroborate or challenge survey responses, or highlight contradictions in the activity system.
Data Sources. Data sources for this study include survey responses from 70 first-year elementary teacher participants on items asking about their experiences with their teacher evaluation systems and data from 152 one-hour interviews about their experiences associated with teacher evaluation.
Results. While nearly all teachers (88%) in our sample reported being observed during their first year of teaching, most (73%) reported differences between what they value most highly in their teaching and what they perceive to be valued most in their evaluations. Perhaps most importantly, teachers reported that their evaluation had “no effect” on their degree of focus on 8 out of 12 instructional practices.
Preliminary analysis of interview data supports these findings and suggests that the lack of evaluation impact on beginning teachers’ practices is linked to the lack, limited specificity, or conflicting nature of feedback.
Significance. This paper contributes to the relatively understudied topic of how teacher evaluations provide feedback to support professional growth for beginning teachers, and identifies ways in which teacher evaluation systems and principal leadership behaviors could be changed to impact the quality of beginning teachers’ teaching.

Authors

• James Pippin, Michigan State University

• Amy R. Guenther, Michigan State University

• Lindsay Joseph Wexler, Michigan State University