Thou Shalt Not Judge!!! Unless You're a Principal

EDAD 610: Instructional Innovations

The Teacher

Guadalupe Solis is the teacher for EDAD 610. I got to find out more about him this class. He does a lot for education in the county of Tulare. I think it is a little funny, I started my school career in Tulare. Not my teaching career, but my school career. I started school at Kohn Elementary and Dr. Solis knows where that is. It is a small world.

The Applied Theory Paper- Teacher Observation and Evaluation Analysis

This paper was interesting. I enjoyed reading about what a teacher evaluation should be and what it really is. I had an idea of how much teachers do not want student achievement to be in their evaluations but I did not really have an idea of how much they did not want it to be in there. I also did not know that it was the law for student achievement to be included in the evaluation. I love when an assignment proves to be fruitful.

CP#1: Instructional Supervision Interview

The interview with my principal was eye-opening. I have never had the opportunity to work at a large school. Really, I have not had the opportunity to go to a large school. I don't know how they work. I would think it is like a small school, but bigger. This may not be the case. At a small school, you really have time to get to know everybody. You get to know their families and hobbies. You really get to know a lot about them. In reality, you become a small family. I think, for these reasons, this interview was so enlightening. If you have to fire someone or lay them off, you know a lot about these people and letting someone go is not always the easiest thing to do, but it is part of the job.

CP#2: 21st Century Learning Assessment
This assignment is wicked, evil, and not to be trusted. To be honest it was difficult and unclear. We had to evaluate a couple of schools using the 21st Century Learning Assessment. The only problem was...The schools weren't anywhere to be found. Luckily, Dr. Solis jumped in, did some extra work, and helped us out. I am still a little lost on this assignment, and the class is over. Maybe I will have a revelation and will figure something out. 
CP#3: Instructional Observation and Feedback
Difficult. That is what I have to say for this assignment. I know what you are thinking. When I say difficult, I don't mean a twenty-page paper with even more references. An assignment where you have to dig up a dead president in order to do a ten-minute interview that has to be written out. 
This assignment was difficult because I had to observe a teacher who has been teaching for over twenty years... No, this was not the hard part, this was actually very interesting to see someone who has honed in their craft to orchestrate their classroom. The hard part was trying to give him feedback, constructive feedback. The feedback that he would find relevant to his craft. This is one of the most difficult things I have had to do!

The Videos

Once again I had a lot of fun with these videos. One of the videos had a lot of tricky camera work. I don't know if you will notice it but it is pretty cool. The only video I had trouble with was week 6 video. I really did not understand some of the questions. I don't know if it was the way they were worded or what. I did the best I could with what I had. I hope it is good enough. You can check out these videos at The Screaming Teacher.

It was this video. This is the video with the Camera stuff.

Overall

Overall, this class was interesting. I really liked the principal interview and classroom observation. The rest of the stuff needs to be revamped, an old makeover if you will. The two biggest things I a taking away from this class are, sometimes you have to make very difficult decisions. You may not be comfortable with them, but they have to be made. The second thing is, I am going to have to give feedback to teachers who have A LOT more experience than me. This is not necessarily a bad thing. I just have to work with the teacher to give them the best feedback I can.