Lesson Observations -evil or blessing?

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I have had 3 learning walks this week and I have had 4 different people come into my room/lessons at different times looking at behaviour, learning environment and teaching. All of these people are at the head’s request to try and improve standards within the school.

Read the rest of the post Observations
These are the opening words to a post about classroom observations and their frequency. Although the author (Nick Overton) is personally OK about the number that seem to be happening in his school, he does question the pressure they can bring.
As a head teacher, particularly at the beginning of the school year, you have to strike the balance between letting staff relax and get into their stride and finding out if anyone is struggling. Bad habits are easy to acquire but very difficult to change so getting into see how things are going sooner rather than later can be really beneficial.
For me the key about observations is the conversation before and after. The before should be to explain the reason for it and what the focus is going to be. The after is about what was seen and how the good can be shared and how the not-so-good can be improved. I’m a firm advocate for peer observations. They can be less threatening and both parties learn from them.

How do you view observations? A necessary evil or a blessing in disguise?

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