You are selling teaching. Attendance and retention tell you something about it, indirectly and late. The only direct evidence is watching a lesson.
Most schools either never observe, or observe in a way that makes teachers defensive enough that what you watch stops being a normal lesson.
Announce it, and be boring about it
Unannounced observation is for organisations that suspect their staff. It buys you a marginally more authentic lesson and costs you the trust that makes feedback usable.
Say when you are coming, say what you will look at, and do it often enough that it stops being an event. Twice a term for everybody, including your best teacher, is enough. Only observing people you are worried about turns observation into a signal that you are worried.
Watch four things, not twenty
Long rubrics produce scores nobody acts on. Four questions cover most of what matters:
- How much of the lesson are students producing language, versus receiving it? In a language class this is the single biggest quality difference, and it is visible within ten minutes.
- Does the teacher know where each student is? Watch who gets asked what. A teacher who directs the hard question at the strong student and an easy one at the quiet one knows their class.
- What happens when a student gets it wrong? This is where good teaching separates from adequate teaching.
- Would a parent watching this feel their money was well spent? Blunt, unscientific, and the one that best predicts retention.
The conversation is the point
The form is not the deliverable. A twenty-minute conversation within two days is.
Start by asking how they thought it went — they will usually name the thing you were going to raise, which changes the whole dynamic. Then one thing to keep doing, and one thing to change. Not five. Five means nothing changes.
Feedback nobody can act on this week is feedback that becomes a filed document.
Then close the loop
Next observation, open with the one thing from last time. That is what makes it a development process rather than a recurring inspection, and it is the step almost everyone drops.
Materials and lesson plans shared across teachers make this easier — the materials guide covers keeping them findable.