STIR Education Micro-Innovations that raise results DATA DRIVEN TEACHER ACCOUNTABILTY
FOCUS: BEHAVIOUR MANAGEMENT DATA DRIVEN TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY STIR EDUCATION At STIR Education, our belief is that the best way to improve the quality of education is to empower teachers and principals. As the people closest to the challenges of providing all children a high quality education, teachers and principals are uniquely placed to lead change in the education system. STIR has two very simple ideas about how to do this: 1. By identifying the teachers and principals who have created successful, innovative practices what we call micro-innovations to improve education in their schools and recognising their efforts publicly. 2. By creating an ecosystem that enables those micro-innovations to be shared with other teachers and schools through partner organisations and teacher networks and that encourages and inspires the development of additional micro-innovations By identifying teachers innovations and building the STIR network of teachers what will become India s most creative community of teachers - our aim is to improve the quality of education for over 1 million children in the next three years. H.K. SHARMA AND JANTA MODERN PUBLIC SCHOOL H.K. Sharma is Principal of Janta Modern Public School in Vijay Park, East Delhi. He is committed both to supporting and developing teachers and to motivating parents in order to provide all of his students with the best possible education. H.K. Sharma is determined to continue to improve the facilities at his school and aims for all his students to go on to further study. 450 students are educated at Janta Modern Public School which charges fees of about Rs.300 per month. H.K. Sharma is working hard to build the idea that education should be a close partnership between teachers and parents. This guide introduces just five of our micro-innovations: We hope that it inspires you to introduce a similar idea in your classroom, to share your own micro-innovations with STIR and to join the STIR network of innovative educators!
BUILDING A POSITIVE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PARENTS AND TEACHERS Although H.K. Sharma is very committed to the idea of creating a strong partnership between teachers and parents, he was struggling to help his teachers build positive relationships with their students parents. Very often, parents would complain that teachers were not fulfilling their duties carefully enough. Teachers, on the other hand, would blame parents for not encouraging their children to work hard at home. I needed a way to create more visibility about exactly what was going on in the school so that I could provide parents with the information they wanted and so that teachers could show parents how they were working with students. I wanted to make it clear to parents what is the school s responsibility and what is the parent s responsibility. DO THESE CHALLENGES SOUND FAMILIAR? To keep track of student learning and to hold teachers to account, H.K. Sharma has introduced a student tracker that allows him to monitor both student progress and teacher activity. HK Sharma developed a SOLUTION that enables him to keep track of STUDENT LEARNING and the TEACHERS PROGRESS towards the set target. And then share this information with PARENTS. H.K. SHARMA S SOLUTION: TRACKER FOR STUDENT PROGRESS Teachers use the tracker to monitor key information about each student every day, such as attendance, punctuality, dress code and completion of homework and, where appropriate, grades gained. This information is presented to H.K. Sharma by teachers in a report each month and can then be used in discussion with parents. The reports are used by H.K Sharma to set specific teacher targets; successful implementation and meeting of the targets is used as the basis for deciding teacher rewards.
H.K. SHARMA S ADVICE It might take some time for the tracker to become routine in the school but when it does, if used properly, it will be useful for students, teachers and parents. If you decide to use a version of this innovation in your school: 1. Be patient and expect teachers to take some time to get used to using the tracker. 2. Understanding the importance of the tracker: Invest time in explaining to students, parents and teachers why each piece of information being collected is important for their learning and progress. 3. Making use of information gathered: Make sure that teachers are equipped to make use of the information they gather. There is no point having information about students if it is not used to support improved teaching and learning! Could you introduce a tracker to monitor student progress at your school or in your class? How could you make use of data to ensure that your teachers and students are completing the tasks required of them and making progress as learners? You could introduce the tracker in exactly the same way as H.K. Sharma has (see Step by Step guide ) or you could design your own method to keep track of student progress. The key is that you use the information you gather to help improve education for your students!
DATA DRIVEN TEACHER ACCOUNTABILITY: STEP BY STEP GUIDE PREPARATION AND RESOURCES REQUIRED 1. Planning how to make use of the tracker: Before you introduce a tracker at your school, think through exactly what you want to track, why you want to track that information and how you plan to make use of the information. Do not waste time tracking information you will not use. 2. Designing the tracker: Design your tracker so that it is easy to use and understand for teachers and parents alike. Think, in particular, about how you could make your tracker understandable for parents who are illiterate. 3. Consulting the teachers about the tracker: Spend time consulting with your teachers about the information to be gathered on the tracker what information will be useful for them on a day to day basis as well as useful to school leaders and parents? 4. Printing the tracker: You will, of course, need to print a tracker and have enough available for each student at the school. Once you have prepared your tracker, follow the steps given below to implement: 1. Explain to the teachers why you are introducing a tracker and make sure they understand how it should be filled in. DRESS CODE 2. Explain to parents (at a parent teacher meeting) that a tracker will be introduced to monitor their students performance and to provide parents with the information they need to support their children s learning. 3. Gather the information required about each child on a daily basis. 4. At the end of each month, analyse the data and decide on three priority improvement targets for each child and ask the teacher to help the student achieve these targets. 5. Share these targets with the student and their parents and explain that you will be keeping a very close eye on those targets for the next month.
WHAT DO OTHER TEACHERS SAY? POSITIVE BENEFITS: The information I gather in the tracker has really helped in making my conversations with parents more effective. I can now show very clearly the areas in which students need to improve and talk to parents about how we can make this happen. CHALLENGES TO OVERCOME: It can be hard to gather all the information about each student every day, especially if the class is very large. Having very clear routines for collecting information is essential.