ASSESSMENT OF TEACHERS

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28429, 8 November 1957, Page 19

ASSESSMENT OF TEACHERS

Canterbury Pattern As Standard

Transition to the new scheme for the appointment and promotion of teachers will be advanced a further stage early this month by the issue to senior teachers (grouped as division C in the new categories) of the personal assessments which will replace numerical grading for this group from next February. The Education Department has announced that provisional assessments, made by inspectors of the Canterbury Education Board to test the distribution of merit awards, has been adopted as a national standard. The personal reports are made under six headings: (1) personal professional qualities; (2) relationships with children; (3) planning, preparation, and records; (4) class atmosphere, content and quality of programme in action, methods of teaching; (5) capacity to organise and administer; (fl) professional leadership and guidance. General assessments range over a five-point scale, of which five is the highest.

Securing national uniformity among all education districts was more difficult than with the younger teachers now using the new assessments so it was decided to compare provisional division C assesments with the way inspectors considered that teachers, known and seen in their schools, ranked in merit.

Canterbury inspectors found that this sample of teachers could, without difficulty, be grouped as follows: assessment 1, 15 per cent.; 2, 25 per cent.; 3. 30 per cent.; 4. 20 per cent.; 5, 10 per cent. This distribution was applied in other areas and it was found that large education districts corresponded closely, although there was some divergence in smaller districts. Co-ordination, the Education Department says, has brought “a closer approximation to uniformity of assessment than has ever before been achieved.” It emphasises that assessments are relative within the division and are not directly related to the general body of teachers.