Week 4: What is your own Theory?
In this week’s reflection, I’ll start with some of the questions I found myself wrestling with. I asked myself: Hessa, what does supervision mean to you? And how do you define it? I used to believe that the most wonderful thing about learning is the idea of “no right or wrong answer”. This view appreciates uniqueness and values the diverse perspectives. However, Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007) made me rethink about this belief. They helped me notice the risk that might come sometimes with having varies theories of supervision. Each supervisor has his/her own theory with which they view the educational world they stepped in. Their theory is the compass that guides them to reach their targeted destinations and it’s the rationale for the decisions they make. Indeed, theory is what shapes practice. Everything so far seems impressive so you might say where is the risk then? The following graph is what I created to represent my answer. As you can see, there is one destination that we, all supervisors, hope to reach. We all strive for enhanced systems and ultimately improved teaching and learning. Each one of us picks a certain path based on particular beliefs and values with the assertion that this selected path is the one that would take us to the finish line. Unfortunately, this is not always the case and in many times supervision fails to getting anywhere near that finish line.
The risk here is embodied in the way these supervisors might attribute the failure of meeting their planned goals. How often does one question his/her theory of practice? According to Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007), “when students are not learning well, and when teachers are not teaching well, the problem may be the quality of supervision the school provides” (p. 6). This is right, however, it rarely happens in reality. When there is a problem, when goals are not achieved, the problem could be anything but not supervision. On the other hand, when there is a success, fingers mostly point to the supervisors. I am wondering how uncomfortable it would be for teachers, parents, administrators, and others to “critique” or “accuse” (I couldn’t find a better translation) the supervisors, or actually the offered supervision.
This wondering takes me to a related theme, which is evaluation. In the past weeks, we had some great discussions about teacher evaluations. Reading Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007) made me think about a different type of evaluation, which is supervisor evaluation. How can we hold supervisors accountable? How can we assure that they are qualified? Do they go through evaluation processes themselves? Who does these evaluations and how often? What about teachers’ perspective on the supervision they receive? Are there any surveys? Or any tools to gain knowledge about the quality of support teachers receive? When it comes to teacher evaluation, it’s essential to make sure that every student has a competent teacher. But what about the teachers themselves? How can we make sure that every teacher has a qualified supervisor that will help them improve their teaching and ultimately their students’ learning.
Another wonderful theme that I felt connected with is building a culture of supervision in schools. Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007) stated that in a community of practice, “teachers come together in a common effort to help each other teach and learn, to care for each other, and work together in advancing student academic achievement” (p. 5). Thus, it’s all about having a “common purpose” and a “shared practice” and this is where a sense of belonging starts to grow. In these communities, teachers are valuable participants, leaders, developers, decision makers, and professionals holding their own power and control. Although I am a big advocate for building such learning communities in schools, I believe that this needs careful planning, implementation, and ongoing monitoring. You cannot have a strong community unless you have strong members, this is what I believe. The following visual shows how I actually perceive it.
In their second chapter, Nolan and Hoover (2011) discussed “the seven essential skills of classroom based supervision” (p. 22). Although they are not listed in order, their order seemed very meaningful to me: an effective supervision starts with trust and positive relationship, promotes reflection and inquiry, and fosters professional learning communities. Again, the individual teacher member is the starting point.
In terms of practice, the big aha moment to me was the idea of teachers’ satisfaction. I felt like slapped in the face when I read how Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007) described the idea of “winning friends”. According to them, this is inauthentic and manipulative and teachers realize quickly and they don’t like it! By reading this, I started a conversation with myself: I restated my goals and targets in terms of relationship and communication. It’s been a priority to me since day one that I am always concerned about how do my interns feel, whether or not they are satisfied, and how “happy” they are. So am I trying to manipulate them? Of course no! after moving forward in the chapter, I realized that they aren’t against the idea, but the issue is were does satisfaction fit in the process: a tool or an end? It would be problematic when used as a tool (controlling teachers) and this is not my intention at all. What matters to me, is raising the level of satisfaction as we move forward and as my interns see advancements and improvements in their growth. The sentence I always say to them is, “together, we will make the most satisfying and rewarding internship experience” so again, it’s not the satisfaction that comes first in the process, but it’s growth and development which in tern bring satisfaction. I am very thankful for Sergiovanni and Starratt (2007) that they made me reflect on my goals and examine my intentions. Also, I wish that they had elaborated more with examples in this regard because I didn’t completely understand the perspective they presented in the book.
Finally, in terms of connections to my inquiry, this week’s readings took me back to the questions I had the first week regarding communication and relationship. I want to utilize my interns’ reflections along with my own journals and video-recorded debriefings as data sources. I might look at how my conversations (post conferences basically) are inviting them to share and reflect as well as the extent in which these conversations promote their growth and development. For example, what type of questions do I ask? How much do I listen? Etc.
References
Nolan, J., & Hoover, L.A. (2011). Teacher supervision and evaluation: Theory into
practice. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. (3rd edition)
Sergiovanni, T. J., Starratt, R. J. (2007). Supervision: A redefinition, (8th Ed.), (xv-53). Boston,
MA: McGraw-Hill.
