Heights teachers learn by observing their peers

In mid-May, 15 Cleveland Heights-University Heights educators gathered at one of the district's seven elementary schools to observe and analyze one aspect of the practice of teaching in that school.

It’s akin to how physicians use the medical rounds model to help find ways to improve the practice of medicine. Such observation and analysis is at the heart of the Instructional Rounds process–a professional development tool designed to establish high-level teaching and learning as standard practice in classrooms throughout the district.

By the end of the 2010-2011 school year, every school in the district will be involved in the IR process. 

"Instructional Rounds is a tool to provide a high-quality education to all of our children,” Superintendent Doug Heuer said. “Our goal is to create a common understanding of high-level instruction and spread it to all classrooms."

CH-UH district staff became involved three years ago through the Ohio Leadership Collaborative and has implemented the process locally for two years. Instructional Rounds is being implemented building by building using a method developed by Dr. Richard Elmore, a professor of educational leadership at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, and his colleagues.

According to Elmore, observations are focused on a problem of practice, which is an instructional issue inhibiting desired results. Educators use feedback from the rounds team to focus a school’s professional development program, part of a long-term process to make understanding and implementing effective instruction the professional norm.

While some think of teaching as an art - more a personality trait than something that can be learned and mastered - the IR approach classifies teaching as a practice. Effective teaching actions that meet a defined goal can be identified, developed in a school staff and applied by all teachers. By building a shared commitment to results and a common understanding of the connection between teaching practices and results, the rounds process promotes effective instruction for every child.

Teachers are central to all aspects of the process. Teacher leader Jen Bennett is the district’s lead rounds facilitator, while Robert Swaggard, a social studies teacher, guides the process at Heights High. 

Cleveland Heights Teachers Union President, Tom Schmida, a teacher at Heights High, likes the process for its emphasis on teacher input.

“Part of the strength of the rounds process is that teachers develop the problem of practice and are on the rounds team," he said. "We are working to make sure the feedback from the rounds team translates to good professional development that addresses the problem."

Before a school's leadership team invites an observation team into their school to check on the school's progress, the school conducts a thorough self-examination and identifies an instructional barrier – the problem of practice. The school then develops questions to guide the IR team’s observations, which generates feedback to address the identified problem.

The IR team that met in May was invited to look at classroom conversation and its impact on what Bloom’s Taxonomy, a classification of learning objectives, calls higher-level thinking. For example, while students need to memorize multiplication facts, at some point they also need to apply that knowledge and use it to analyze, evaluate and create.

The IR team conducting classroom observations that day included the district rounds facilitator, the director of elementary education, the principal and five teachers from the host school, two teaching specialists, two high school teachers and a John Carroll University education professor. The day-long process began with the school principal and teachers describing the evidence that led the faculty to define its problem of practice. They also shared the guiding questions that they hoped would elicit the feedback they needed.

With this information in mind, the observers organized themselves into three groups, each visiting four classrooms. Their task was to objectively describe what students and teachers were doing, creating snapshots of instruction in the school. The debriefing that followed was an intense conversation that included correction from the facilitator when subjective language slipped into the descriptions.

The evidence and feedback from the IR team will be used to improve the level of classroom conversation and the intellectual work done by students.

The adult teaching and learning cycle is ongoing and will continue over several years as educators identify, describe and agree on norms for teaching. This work will make education more intellectually stimulating and engaging for students, and will prepare them for life and citizenship.

Joy Henderson and Susie Kaeser worked together at Reaching Heights for 11 years.This is their first post-Reaching Heights retirement project and it was great fun to collaborate again. Susie is an active Cleveland Heights volunteer and Joy is the parent/community liaison for Heights High.