Abstract
The main objectives of this study were to examine trends in teacher monitoring methods (TMMs) among a representative set of 12 curriculum and didaktik countries, using data from PISA 2009, 2012, and 2015, and the association of TMMs with students’ reading, mathematics, and science performance accordingly. Curriculum and didaktik education traditions frame the study theoretically, while quantitative research methods are used, consisting of a two-sample difference of proportion test and hierarchical linear modelling. The findings suggest that across the PISA waves, the control over teachers is growing across all countries and in all three subject domains and four TMMs. However, the proportion of students in schools where any of the TMMs are used is higher and more statistically significant for curriculum than for didaktik countries. Student tests, teacher peer review, and principal observation are much more common TMMs than external inspector observation across all countries. Nevertheless, the use of external inspector observation is very low in several didaktik countries, and in the case of Finland almost inexistent. Results for Sweden seem to be over-reported as in previous survey work it was found that teacher self-assessment is the most common TMM, however, teacher self-assessment is not a variable included in the PISA survey. The results from within-country hierarchical linear models (HLMs) of associations of TMMs with students’ reading (2009), mathematics (2012), and science (2015) performance in PISA show mixed, and at times relatively large, effects from country to country and across three PISA waves, and interestingly the associations had diminished by PISA 2015. Adding a more diverse set of questions to PISA contextual questionnaires is warranted for results to be more meaningful and representative across more countries.
Highlights
Introduction and purposeWhile teacher evaluation methods have attracted researchers’ interest, primarily in the context the United States, as part of value-added models for accountability measures (e.g. Carnoy & Loeb, 2002; Darling-Hammond et al, 2012; Harris et al, 2014), no prior research has examined the trends in teacher monitoring and evaluation methods and their association with student performance from a comparative international perspective
This is a striking finding given that results from the first research question indicate that all four teacher monitoring methods (TMMs) have been increasingly used with every Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) wave since 2009; the wider spread of each TMM does not seem to be associated with students’ test scores in PISA 2015 as per the model fit and control variables included in the hierarchical linear models (HLMs) models within each country and at least not consistently enough to determine a specific pattern
Some results might be over-reported: in previous survey work it was found that teacher self-assessment is the most common TMM in Sweden (Wahlström & Sundberg, 2017) and that parents are involved in teacher evaluations in Germany (Wermke & Prøitz, 2019), but neither teacher self-assessment nor parental assessment was included as options to be reported among TMMs in the PISA questionnaires
Summary
While teacher evaluation methods have attracted researchers’ interest, primarily in the context the United States, as part of value-added models for accountability measures (e.g. Carnoy & Loeb, 2002; Darling-Hammond et al, 2012; Harris et al, 2014), no prior research has examined the trends in teacher monitoring and evaluation methods and their association with student performance from a comparative international perspective. This study is at the intersection of all these goals of international comparative studies as put forth by the NRC as it aimed to, first, theoretically explore similarities and differences between didaktik and curriculum orientations around TMMs, and second, to empirically examine how TMM practices are associated with students’ performance in PISA across different national contexts In this regard, the present study builds on the initial didaktik-curriculum dialogue (see Westbury et al, 2000) by using TMMs from PISA data sets to empirically examine differences or similarities between the two groups of countries represented in the sample, following the four selection criteria listed above. Data and methodological considerations in data analyses are described, and findings and results presented, before ending with a discussion, conclusions, limitations, and potential avenues for further research
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