Our teachers are facing an extremely diverse work setting these days as they enter into blended learning classrooms. They must incorporate all of their knowledge about technology, textbooks, and classroom management into a single day. At best, most training teachers would consider this to be an overwhelming task.
Teacher Education Students Evaluated on Efficacy
Educator prep programs are finally starting to take the initiative to hold new teachers to a higher standard. There are many changes taking place to help improve the efficacy of future educators entering into the field. For example, grants may only be made available to students in programs that are considered to be effective for the past two years. This ensures that federal funding goes only to teachers who will be more successful when entering the classroom.
However, most educator prep programs are focused less on government initiatives and more on better assessments. These tests and evaluations can give valuable insight into how the teacher is going to fare in the classroom setting. One of the best ideas to date is that educators will be evaluated based on assessments given to the students. After all, this is the best way to indicate whether a teacher is doing his or her job effectively.
Better Assessments Benefits Educator Prep Programs
A major benefit to these types of teacher assessments is that it can help to identify weak points in the curriculum at educator prep programs. If teachers consistently receive low scores on student assessments in a particular area, this could be a sign of weak curriculum at the instructor level. Unfortunately, students enrolled in these programs must begin working in the classroom immediately before the data can be collected. Regardless of how long the data collection takes, it could present a valuable resource that continues to improve the educator prep program.
The APA points out that faculty and professors do have to evaluate the readiness of teachers right now. However, taking a look at the long-term success of the program is essential to create future teachers who are effective in the classroom. We must find a delicate balance that allows us to weigh both an individual teacher and the educator prep program with the assessments given.
Preparing our future teachers for the classroom is essential to maintaining a high standard for our students. Educator prep programs are making a wise move by demanding better assessments for teacher education students. After all, these assessments are the best way to determine whether they are truly ready to be left to their own devices in a classroom. Let’s take a much more thorough approach to determining when our teacher education students are ready to move on with some of these assessments.
This article was originally written by Matthew Lynch and the original article can be found here on the conversation.