Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Using "Teacher Video Selfies": A Free Resource from Harvard University

I recently returned home from China where I conducted teacher training on phonics strategies and activities for English teachers. Below is my super-professional selfie that I took with the teachers on the last day of the training.


Believe me. I don't usually take selfies with the teachers I work with. But I posted this photo because of the relevance to a concept from Harvard University's Center for Education Policy Research: Teacher video selfies to analyze evidence of your teaching and your teacher performance. The resource, entitled "Teacher Video Selfie: A self-guided module for analyzing videos of your own instruction", can be accessed here. Essentially, teachers record two 10-15 minute teaching segments, and then teachers watch their videos to analyze their performance and self-direct adjustments to their instruction. While watching their videos, teachers write notes about what they notice. Then teachers analyze their notes with guidance from the module/toolkit to learn how to effectively conduct self-observations and set goals for improvement. See the link to view the step-by-step procedure.