A reader asks the following:

SC,

Does anyone have a sample comment sheet to hand to teachers other than the PowerWalks form? I need one that specifically will address a concern.

SC Response Let me explain why this is not a great idea.

1. Three minutes is a random wisp of time.  Good or bad, the sample size of one walk-thru is too small to make an accurate judgment.

2. Though one short walk-thru tells me little, an aggregation of 15 to 20 walk-thru’s will produce a fairly accurate trend line.  Based on that trend line, I can coach, suggest, support and in some cases dictate.

There are times you may want to share an “Atta-boy” with a teacher after a classroom visits.  By all means do so.  It is best to do this verbally, but notes are nice also.  You don’t need a form for that.  A post-it note works perfectly.

Then there are times that you will see something during a classroom visit that causes a concern.  Again, by all means write a note… to yourself, to go back and talk to that teacher.  A note written to a teacher in a case such as this is the easy way out.  If you have a concern, you owe it to the teacher to go talk to that person.  9 out of 10 times that teacher will have already self-corrected the issue that concerned you by the time you get back to them.  And the one teacher that did not… really needs your assistance.

So in summary, the feedback from a single formative visit is a smile, a thumbs-up, a positive note or a quick conversation.  After 15 to 20 formative visits, then you have a data review and coaching conversation.

I hope this provides some clarification. 

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