Feedback Usually Misses the Mark — Stop Playing Games and Have Real Conversations

I think feedback usually fails, and I think we've got to stop playing games.

See, for feedback on teaching to work, we have to see something that is worth commenting on, and we have to have something valuable enough to be worth sharing.

And that sounds like it should be pretty straightforward, but it's not.

I believe that when we get into classrooms as instructional leaders, we're seeing the tip of the iceberg of practice.

I use that metaphor of the iceberg to indicate that about 90% of teaching practice is hidden beneath the surface, right?

It's thinking, it's planning, it's relationships, it's routines and procedures, it's things that happen outside of the lesson, or it's things that happen during the lesson, but in the teacher's mind.

And I'm with Charlotte Danielson in thinking that teaching is mainly cognitive work, right?

Teaching is not mostly a stage performance where you do things physically, you pass out papers, you say words, you conduct activities.

Teaching is mainly in the cognition, in the thinking.

So I believe very strongly that teaching is intellectual work.

And if we want to give feedback on teaching, it needs to be useful at the level of thinking and not just at the level of second guessing.

And see, that's my problem with a lot of feedback is that it's essentially second guessing decisions that are way down the line and not really interested in the thinking that produced the behaviors that we saw and heard in the classroom.

So I'm doing a webinar on this next week, and I'd love to have your thoughts on feedback as I prepare for that.

I don't have registration set up or anything, but let me know what you think about the feedback that you get as a teacher, or if you're an administrator, the feedback conversations that you have with teachers.

One of the things that I'm very interested in helping people stop doing is play this fake feedback game.

The fake feedback game goes like this.

I have an idea for you.

I watched you teach and I have some feedback because I know I'm supposed to, and I don't feel great about it.

Like it's not good feedback.

It's not feedback that I'm eager to share, but I have to come up with something.

So I come up with something and then I share that with you as if I really mean it.

And then you play your part in this fake feedback game and act like it's good feedback.

And you say, oh yes, Justin, thank you.

I will definitely try that.

And you know, you definitely will not because it's not very good feedback.

And then I say, excellent, just let me know how it goes.

We've played the fake feedback game and I feel validated because I've done my job.

I've earned my keep as an administrator and you feel relieved because it's over.

You don't have to sit through this conversation any longer and you know I'll never be back to check if you actually implemented the feedback because who cares because it wasn't good feedback anyway.

We play this game over and over again because we think we're supposed to.

because we think that is the role that we are supposed to play.

And my contention is that that whole thing is kind of silly, right?

Why don't we just have an authentic conversation?

Why don't we let teachers do most of the talking in feedback conversations?

Because it's the teacher's thinking that matters here.

Like as an observer, I want to know what the teacher's thinking is.

I don't necessarily want to tell you everything that I thought because I don't know that much about the lesson until I hear what you are thinking, right?

Like as an observer, I only know the 10% that I was able to see directly.

And to get at that other 90%, I need to be listening most of the time.

So I have a lot more to say on this, but I'd love to know what works for you in feedback conversations.

What does not work when it comes to feedback on observations?

And I'm thinking mainly formal observations, but maybe informal walkthroughs too.

Leave a comment, let me know.