L.O., L.O. what’s going on here then?

Let it be said from the outset, I accept that lesson observations (LOs) are a fact of a teacher’s life, an unpleasant one for many but a fact nonetheless. I have developed a profound dislike of them, based on my experience over the last 15 years in my own setting. This does not detract from the inherent illogicality and weaknesses I can point to or reduce the concerns I have about the conduct and use of LOs, the dangers in relying on them for monitoring T+L and above all the abuse they are open to.

I entered teaching at a time when you would be observed as part of your training and probationary/NQT year, occasionally by the LA and perhaps by HMI. Then came Thatcher and the Tory education ‘reforms’ of the 80s, ushering in the era of ‘accountability’, amid a never ending series of upheavals and restructuring, a torch so shamefully picked up and, far from being thoroughly and deservedly doused, carried on by the Labour administrations of the Blair and post-Blair years. Serving as a fitting symbol of this whole period, OFSTED was formed as the new inquisition, ensuring schools implemented every facet of the increasingly centrist dogma emerging from government, unlike their HMI predecessors, who were feared and respected by schools, they became feared and despised. Inspections were no longer about finding out how schools were doing, they were about ensuring schools did what they were told. LAs, schools and teachers were shamefully quiescent through all of this, bullied into accepting more and more ridiculous intrusions and demands, hounded and harried by the implicit and explicit threats from inspections, SATs and those horrific league tables. The LO was an intrinsic part of this process, a valuable tool for driving change, to put it another way: school managements, LAs and OFSTED all bullied teachers with LOs.

The rationale underpinning the frequent and regular LO is:
‘it is proven to be the most effective practice in teacher education and development. Teachers learn best from other professionals and an ‘open classroom’ culture is vital: observing teaching and being observed.’ The importance of Teaching, The Schools White Paper 2010
This idea is echoed and extended in many contributions on the TES forums:
‘How is [the headteacher] going to learn what the quality of teaching is like unless they observe?’, (the purpose of the LO is) ‘to learn what the quality of teaching is’, ‘How exactly are [headteachers]to fulfil that responsibility [to monitor T+L]if they are unable to observe any lessons?’

My pre-emptive apologies go to those headteachers and PM reviewers reading this who conduct their LOs in the professional spirit of the ‘open classroom’. I would love to be able to say that I have found LOs stimulating or rewarding, a valuable tool of professional reflection and improvement. In the last 20 years I have been observed dozens of times for different purposes and in all of that time only 3 of those LOs came even close to that ideal. The rest suffered to a greater or lesser extent from the weaknesses which have brought me to my current position. My work as a union rep has served to reinforce and further inform that position.

The Heisenberg principle applies here: we know that the act of observation changes that which is observed. An LO can only tell the observer about the quality of teaching in an LO, more specifically that particular lesson, which is by definition not an ordinary lesson. I know of one case where an LO was conducted by 3 members of management: the headteacher had been the PM reviewer and consistently found fault with the teacher in question, using these observations as an argument against awarding the teacher a permanent TLR for the work they were doing in an ‘awaiting appointment’ TLR post. As the teacher approached Threshold progression a new PM reviewer was assigned and in the first LO the observer was monitored by the DH as part of the observer’s training and the HT attended to observe the DH in their monitoring role. How could the presence of these 3 senior managers not impact on the conduct of the lesson for both the pupils as well as the teacher? As a footnote: the observer graded the lesson good, the DH and HT insisted in feedback that it only be graded as satisfactory, pointing to illogical as well as inaccurate faults with the lesson. Despite their role being only to train the observer, the DH fed this judgement back to the teacher and it stood. This is an extreme case but serves as a graphic example of the Heisenberg principle. It also illustrates another key weakness of the LO: its unfair and irrefutable subjectivity.

A New Yorker once told me that it was impossible to walk the streets of the city for 30 minutes without infringing at least 12 city ordinances: I likewise defy anyone to conduct a lesson I could not find sufficient fault with to declare it only 'good' or even ‘satisfactory’ if I really put my mind to it, using any of the observation criteria I have ever seen. I have lost count of the hostile LOs I have been subjected to or been told about and in almost every case the ulterior motive or preconceived outcome was apparent. The introduction of performance related pay as a future development when Performance Management was being introduced was hotly, even vehemently denied and denounced as conspiracy theory but duly arrived as many of us predicted and now colours many an LO. Weak heads have the perfect weapon at their disposal to deny or delay pay progression beyond M6 – all they have to do is ensure PM observations are only satisfactory or just find a few faults to give justification to their ‘judgement’. There are many other factors which can colour the outcome of the LO, among them, personal antipathy, promotion of the macho, hard message culture encouraged in new managers, retribution, spite, keeping people on their toes regardless of the damage it may do to their self-esteem, plain egotism, bullying, ongoing campaigns to harry a person into leaving because they are ‘awkward’ in one way or another and even just the observer being slightly doo-lally: I have been involved with or heard firsthand accounts of all of these.

Challenging the judgement of an observer is almost impossible, precisely because it is a judgement. Objective LOs based on criteria are a myth – a comparison of the current OFSTED criteria with the comments from observers to justify judgments made based on them is confirmation enough. ‘Ah, but the observers are trained to use them, aren’t they?’ is one of the more naïve (or self-justifying) counter arguments I have heard. Indeed they are but a couple of hours in a training room with an LA or OFSTED trainer is not going to overcome the many personal, even deviant motives observers can and do take into the LO with them. Just how objective are the criteria used in LOs? My school has been unable to provide me with any reasonable description of what constitutes 'sufficient' use of AFL, a definition of how fast 'pace' is and how it can be measured etc etc. 1 pupil not excited by and enjoying a task, going off task or losing concentration during an introduction or missed out of questioning in a plenary can give excuse enough to downgrade a lesson. Training for observers does not get round these problems, it merely reinforces their credibility if anyone dares to challenge a judgement. One of the popular criteria used is subject knowledge but many managers conducting observations haven’t taught or planned consistently beyond perhaps 1 subject they like, sometimes in years. I know of numerous cases of negative judgements made on lessons based on a poor understanding of what is being taught. As an ICT specialist in a primary, I know that none of my observers could teach what I am teaching and some of them have found that hard to bear. Should a teacher have the grit to take their sense of injustice or outrage beyond the feedback session where do they turn? a complaint, judged by the head, filed away? a grievance or pay panel hearing, conducted by governors predisposed to support a headteacher, as most are? even when the teacher has a good case, it will all boil down to that ‘judgement’ in the end.

There is a widespread, unthinking presumption that observations raise standards of T+L which I find dangerous but it fits neatly into the look-good culture we have grown used to working in. The act of observing may point to a problem, assuming the observation is undertaken without prejudice, using the right tools, but it certainly does not improve the quality of anything. Weighing a pig does not make it heavier, nurturing it does – it may even turn out that the scales are badly wrong. For a teacher to improve their practice after an observation they need genuine vision, perceptiveness, analytical skills and use of experience by the observer resulting in sensitive feedback, advice, provision of INSET, mentoring and modelling. What many teachers actually get is negative feedback, admonitions to do better, perhaps some utterly useless refresher course (actually an open invitation to resign) and guess what, more observations!!

There is a further misconception that the LO is the only form of monitoring available to managers, beside flicking through planning. Monitoring could be about gathering information from various sources: the drop-in used properly (sadly not likely, it has emerged as another SIP box to tick or tool of harassment for inadequate management), peer observation, team teaching, modelling by senior staff (just having a larf) but what many teachers experience is an observer sitting in a lesson ticking a sheet or wandering around nit-picking, cherry-picking and finding fault.

The grading of observed lessons gives the lie to the open classroom claim. Just as SATs have nothing to do with children and their achievements but everything to do with generating numbers to fit into spreadsheets, so too lesson observations which are graded have nothing to do with school improvement or professional development. Grading is too easily used as a weapon against particular teachers, as a way of keeping staff from progressing beyond M6, as a tool for bullying or retribution, as a means of maintaining the illusion of control for a weak manager. Observing lessons is theoretically a way of checking on standards of T+L but it is a bit like saying a gun is for keeping the peace - it can be used like that but unfortunately often isn't and we need to keep an eye on that usage and especially the user.

Every year I take my car for an MOT, the second I drive out of the test centre, it is no guarantee or reassurance that anything on my car works or is safe. On the road I mingle with several million people who have been declared competent to drive by rigorous testing in an objective, skills-based test – I always stay very alert when moving among them. LOs are about as much use as any test result: tests only tell you about the ability of the candidate to take that test on that day, LOs tell you about a teacher’s performance in that LO, with that group of pupils, in that setting, at that time, assuming (and it is a huge assumption) that it was conducted fairly, reasonably, with professional skill and intent.