Free Scenarios For An Education Worker Essay Example

Scenario 1. In this situation, there are a number of key problems that have to be addressed. Websterton is a school that shows a number of features of a school that might potentially fail very soon in the future: the low staff morale combined with the fact that the staff members are largely new is not necessarily a negative feature for the institution, but it also certainly has the potential to be difficult for the school to really begin to heal in this particular scenario. Due to the structure of the American educational funding system, the fact that test scores are declining is likely to be of particular concern for administrators: when test scores decline, the school is likely to experience less federal funding, which contributes to a continued downward spiral for the school as a whole.
The first goal for Webstertown Middle School will be to reduce class size. All the evidence suggests that new teachers will be more effective if they have smaller classes, and although small class size can be difficult to achieve, it will be fundamentally important to helping new teachers become good teachers. In addition, continuing training opportunities should be offered for these teachers to ensure that they are not lost to other schools in the area and that Webstertown is able to hold on to the teachers that the school is developing. Providing new teachers with the maximum opportunity to succeed should be the main priority for the school, or the situation is likely to go from bad to worse.
Scenario 2. To address the problem of teacher morale, a number of very important steps must be taken. The hypothetical states that teachers feel unsupported and believe that the evaluation process is unfair, and this is very important information; at the end of the day, teachers are employees, and employees respond to assessments very much in the same way regardless of their field. First and foremost, the assessment structure must be addressed within the school system. Assessment structures must be well-defined to be fair and balanced; when assessment structures are ill-defined, they tend to be much more subjective. The first goal for the district, then, will be to clearly define assessment criteria and include fair, achievable goals for every instructor within that assessment criteria. In addition, teachers should be educated on this assessment system, and should be told exactly what they can expect from the assessment process as a whole.
Another important thing to focus on when utilizing the assessment process is the importance of good communication skills. No one responds well to a bad review or assessment, so framing assessment appropriately—that is, not “watering down” the message while still positively framing the outcome of the assessment—is very important. One of the key suggestions is to frame a negative assessment as an opportunity for dialogue between administrator and employee, and ask the employee where the confusion lies—and how the administrator can help the employee better reach his or her achievement markers. It is likely that there will be conflict when a bad review is given to an employee, but a bad assessment or review does not need to be devastating. An administrator needs to revisit the employee’s classroom to ensure that the appropriate changes have been implemented.
Scenario 3. Successful schools are a wonderful boon to the United States and to their students. The goal of creating a successful school is nothing to scoff at, but when a school is to move beyond successful and into extraordinary, a number of changes have to be considered. Perhaps first and foremost, when moving into this new place of employment, the administrator must meet with staff and get a better sense of what is working and what is not working within the current structures of the school. Perhaps staff are happy with administrative support, but they want to integrate more technology into the curriculum; perhaps staff would like more autonomy in their curriculum choices. Regardless, the most important thing is for staff to be able to communicate with administrators about what is working and what is not in the current curriculum.
Once this assessment is made and it is determined what is working, the administration can move towards an alternative set of structures that encourage creativity and innovation from the staff members. Nearly all schools that are considered “excellent” have an alternative teaching strategy; many of these schools are technologically integrated and have a more project-based curriculum. Moving towards a creative, innovative, project-based curriculum while keeping the strengths of the old curriculum is something that should be closely considered for this particular school.
Scenario IV. The first step to dealing with problems like parent complaints about a teacher is to go and speak directly to the teacher about the complaints. There are always two sides to a story, and while the teacher’s behavior might not be excusable—and it isn’t—there might be some frustration that the instructor is experiencing that might be easily alleviated. Perhaps she has too many students or not enough support; each of these things can be addressed by the administration, which will allow the instructor to better tend to the needs of students.
However, the teacher also needs to be notified that her behavior is unacceptable and that there are serious problems with the way she is treating students. An assessment of her classroom can be conducted, and that assessment can be used as a way to start a dialogue with this instructor about better teaching methods and a more effective way of communicating with her students. It is important that students feel safe and supported in their reading classes, as reading is a subject that is fundamental to long-term success; without an effective reading teacher, a student might become fearful or stressed by the subject, which is detrimental to the overall academic success of the student.
As an administrator, the goal is to better this institution of learning—not just through the facilitation of education, but also as a facilitator of a community of educators. As an administrator, one is allowed the flexibility to make decisions that will seriously affect the lives of young people and staff members, and it is important to value that flexibility and appropriately weigh the consequences and potential outcomes of every decision made. An administrator must be a visionary first and foremost, with the goal of making as much as possible from as little as possible; academic success should be only part of the overall picture for the students within the organization. Success and the facilitation of success comes in many different forms and the role of the administrator is to provide pathways to success from many different avenues.
An administrator might be the leader of an organization, but the administrator should never lose sight of the value of the others within the educational environment. From top to bottom, the members of the educational institution must be valued and their creativity and innovativeness honored.
Overall the class had good flow and the teacher was clearly engaged with the students. Attached is the informal analysis. One thing that was interesting was the educator’s layout of the classroom; some of the students had to turn in their chairs to see the board, and the room lacked a clear focal point. However, as a science classroom, this could foster group work quite effectively—the short view into the classroom was not enough to fully evaluate student accessibility. The instructor’s rapport with the students was clearly good, and his use of individual work, assessment, and then group understanding assessment was also extremely effective and demonstrated a clear knowledge of the difficult aspects of his curriculum and the potential pitfalls students might experience.
It is indeed hard to see the peer observations through a supervisory lens. As an educator, it is part of my educational paradigm to focus on teaching strategy and the teaching structure of a classroom. I see methods and ideas rather than positives and negatives, and I think at first, it is hard to see teachers as people who must be assessed. As an educator, it is of course difficult to be assessed; it is stressful to receive an assessment, and many educators are fearful of assessments because it is rare that a single day in a classroom can be representative of the whole teaching pedagogy of an educator. As a supervisor I am sympathetic to these fears, but it is still difficult to facilitate the paradigm shift in my own mind from educator to supervisor and into that position of power.
However, there are definitely benefits to acting in this position. It has allowed me to divorce myself from some of my emotions regarding assessment, and I am not more certain that the assessment process can be a positive one. It has also given me the opportunity to watch a great many excellent teachers, which is also a very important experience in the long run. Of course, every time I watch teachers I get new ideas and learn new “tricks,” so to speak; however, more than anything, I learned that how outsiders view my classroom is different from how I view it, and I can be my own worst critic in many ways.