Learn the principles and practices
of instructional rounds, a research - based approach to observing, analyzing, and improving teaching and learning.
Called instructional rounds, the model is fairly straightforward: Initially a group of educators (referred to in the book as a network) is formed.
In this network, superintendents meet monthly, rotating between
instructional rounds school visits and professional learning sessions focused on leading instructional improvement.
Teachers are grouped in collaborative instructional teams that participate in
several instructional rounds of observing, sharing, and reflecting on their practice.
In recent years, many forward - thinking school districts have embraced the idea
of instructional rounds and created collaborative structures such as professional learning communities and data teams.
The school's principal used a modified version of the model described in
Instructional Rounds in Education: A Networking Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning (City, Elmore, Fiarman, & Teitel, 2009) to meet the teachers» needs.
In School -
Based Instructional Rounds: Improving Teaching and Learning Across Classrooms, published by Harvard Education Press, Lecturer Lee Teitel explores this innovative approach of improving teaching and learning.
By sharing real - life vignettes, the authors carefully detail the utilization of
instructional rounds as a systematic and collaborative process to engage educators in meaningful reflections about what occurs daily in classrooms.
Instructional Rounds help educators look closely at what is happening in classrooms in a systematic, purposeful and focused way.
We then began basing our classroom visits on Harvard's elements of instructional observation as described in the
book Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning.
The evidence — gathered
through instructional rounds, work samples, teacher evaluation, program documents and a teacher survey — suggested teacher understandings of PBL was not consistent across the school and not all felt confident planning and implementing the approach in its entirety.
«We set up
instructional rounds by going to other schools, based on the medical model...» © Shutterstock / Tyler Olson
New strategies to encourage consistency in the classroom include sending groups of teachers
on instructional rounds to observe classrooms, similar to what doctors - in - training experience.
Contact us or sign up for a demonstration to learn more about how iObservation's resource libraries can help your teachers prepare and reflect upon observations made
during instructional rounds.
Generate an explicit theory of action and first - draft action plan that
connects instructional rounds within your organizational landscape and other professional learning structures and instructional improvement efforts
Prior to arriving in Cambridge, participants should
read Instructional Rounds in Education (included in tuition) and prepare responses to study guide questions.
In November, for example, a brand
new instructional rounds executive program will take place, introducing a new crop of educators to the model.
As part of the SFTR program, residents also participate in «
clinical instructional rounds,» modeled on medical «rounds,» in which they visit classrooms in other schools to observe expert instructional practices, and then debrief with their supervisors.
Instructional rounds mobilize PLCs to witness in real - time what their colleagues are doing in the classroom and how this information can help them move their schools and classrooms forward.
Modeled after medical rounds, in which groups of student doctors visit patients to observe diverse cases as a teaching tool,
instructional rounds invite teams of educators and administrators to visit classes, observe instruction, debrief what they saw, and reflect on next steps.
In this practical book, Thomas Fowler - Finn, an experienced consultant who has worked closely with the Harvard team that
pioneered instructional rounds, discusses how facilitators can skillfully guide a network of educators through the rounds process.