Motivating Teachers for Improved Education Quality - Essay Sample

Introduction

Usually, success and quality of education in a given school majorly depend on the level of motivation as well as the performance of the individual teaching staff in the various classrooms. Teachers Appraisal involves assessment of the teachers' performance level intending to make a judgment or maybe providing feedback regarding their competency as well as the performance in the teaching profession. Typically, performance appraisal for the teachers mainly focuses on supporting the professional enhancement, career development of teachers as well as also serves in holding teachers responsible for their practices in the education sector. Regularly, practical evaluation of teacher's appraisal plays a significant role in improving the success and growth of the education sectors in a given country. Therefore, this particular paper will help in discussing various approaches to consider when in need of appraising the teachers on their performance.

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Always, teachers require feedback based on their performance to assist them in identifying any problem arising in their profession and also to enhance their teaching activities, and through the support of the effective leadership in school (Peterson, 2017), and also to enhance and make various learning institutions as the professional learning societies. Besides, teacher appraisal also assists in providing numerous opportunities for incentivising, recognising, as well as a rewarding effective practice in the teaching profession. Thus, enhancement of the useful assessment for the teachers is an essential element towards the desire and push in improving teaching as well as the learning process, and also to improve the outcomes of the education sector.

Analytical Approaches of the Teacher Appraisal

Regarding its meaning, the teacher's appraisal refers to the assessment of the performance level of the teaching staff to give feedback or make a decision that ensures support for the enhancement of their teaching activities. Typically, most countries apply different range of strategies of appraisal (Sykes, and, Winchell, 2010), which includes the performance appraisal of teachers for completing the probationary periods, and also appraisal which is part of the performance management, which may consist of the process of registration, ordinary performance appraisal as well as the promotion appraisal, and finally the reward schemes. These key terms mean the following:

First, completion of the period of probation refers to the performance appraisal of the individual teaching staff as a result of completing the probation periods in the teaching profession. During this period, the evaluators help in appraising the competency and the performance improvement of the newly employed teachers, evaluate some factors of their performances and also to determine professional development requirements. Lastly, after the completion of their probation periods, teachers can also benefit significantly by receiving promotion in the teaching profession. Secondly, the performance management strategy involves a formal appraisal of teachers designed to ensure that the goals of people and the education sectors get achieved. This type of appraisal consists of teachers' professional assessment and the development of a career, as this appraisal will help in monitoring and improving the teachers' performance. They include the registration of teachers, an average teacher's examination, and promotional evaluation. Lastly, the reward schemes include the assessment for teachers that is designed explicitly in determining a chosen number of teachers who are high performers in their teaching profession, intending to acknowledge as well as reward their competence, and their performances via the rewarding processor may be salary rise.

Elements of the Teacher Appraisal Aspect

Generally, the standard objective policy concerning the performance appraisal, particularly in the teaching profession, is ensuring that the assessment for teachers contributes towards the enhancement of the student's result via the improved practices of teaching as well as the professional learning of the teaching staff. These elements are four in number, and all of them are interrelated: The first element is Governance, which is more concerned with the structure and design of the appraisal of the teachers. Also, this aspect covers all the purposes of the teacher appraisal as well as the balance between the developmental together with the accountability roles of appraisal activity.

The second element is the procedure, which involves ways in which these aspects become combined for creating a particular appraisal model. This aspect includes needs for the appraisal frequency, reference standards development as well as the instrument combination that can help effectively in collecting relevant information (Sykes, and, Winchell, 2010). The third aspect is known as the capacity. It involves distribution analysis of responsibilities to ensure proper appraisal implementation and the training, support given to appraise, the teacher to be assessed as well as to use the outcomes of the appraisal. Result application is the last aspect, and it involves how the evaluation for the teachers get follow up as well as how the results get utilised for further judgment or actions. The elements using the results include the performance feedback, plans for professional enhancement: career development, and other financial rewards.

Significance and Impacts of the Teachers Appraisal

Teachers are essential people towards the students' success in the education sector. Frequently, raising both qualities as well as the schooling equity dramatically relies on the broad extent to ensure that the teachers are highly trained and acquire relevant skills, well provided with the adequate resources and highly motivated to ensure regular performance in their teaching profession. Consequently, effective administration and the teaching appraisal become a primary aspect of the proper improvement of the teaching practices in schools. Again, it can also be one of the significant levellers which ensure positive increment to the quality of teaching with the regular professional learning process of the teachers, which is in line with the broad acknowledgement of the teaching performance and its impacts towards the students' education results.

In addition to that, appropriate teacher appraisal also gives an effective mechanism that helps in recognising and rewarding standard teaching as well as managing teacher career improvements. It also helps in facilitating the structure of the school in such ways that are very sensitive towards the talent, performance, as well as motivation of a person that allows a teacher to make progress in their career regarding their performance appraisal.

This aspect may help in addressing various issues relating to the teaching attractiveness as the choice of career as well as about the teacher's image and status and including those individual teachers who feel that their professional work gets undervalued. Similarly, the appraisal for the teachers also has an overall focused on the performance appraisal, especially in the public sector, and assists in strengthening the needs for evaluation and accountability in the education sector (Schochet, and Chiang, 2010). It is, therefore, enables the relevant authorities and school leaders in the education sector to ensure effective monitoring of the performance of every teacher and ensuring that all the students get elaborate teachings from the motivated teachers. Lastly, it also helps in identifying those teachers who are underperforming and not taking into consideration the professional growth and development opportunities in the education sector.

Fig.1. The Conceptual Framework for the Appraisal of Teachers

Obligations and Frequency of the Teacher's Appraisal

Sometimes, the teacher's appraisal may be regarded as mandatory or may be voluntary, which relies on the purposes of the process of performance appraisal. Again, the appraisal's frequency also varies from one country to another. The teacher's performance appraisal I will be done periodically at the regular intervals, for example, after every two years, at the major phases of the career progress, such as during the promotion process, or maybe on particular occasions like by the completion of probationary periods or during the contract renewal period. For instance, it is mandatory in most of the countries by the end of the probationary periods for all teachers (Rockoff, &, Speroni, 2011).

Additionally, regular appraisal for the teachers for performance management becomes compulsory in all the countries that have already acquired the formal framework for that particular activity to take place. It is also periodically happening on a given set cycle in several countries across the globe. Lastly, regarding the reward schemes, teaching staff may voluntarily apply for it in some countries like Mexico as well as Chile.

Reference Standards for the Teachers' Appraisal

Typically, an effective and reliable appraisal model for the teachers requires reference standards to help in appraising teachers based on what is correctly done in their teaching profession (Schochet and Chiang, 2010). Besides, the competence and responsibility of the teaching profession should procedurally be listed to assist in building an elaborate definition regarding what teachers should be aware of and able to perform during the exercise of their teaching profession. The primary documents for the appraisal reference include:

The professional profile of the teacher or maybe the standards of teaching that is the overall competence profile for teachers, education level, and the subject.

List of both overall as well as the professional roles of teachers, which include a job description and its structure.

List of school levels, the development project of the schools, internal rules and policies, and the yearly activity plan.

Again, reference documents should be applied consistently in the performance appraisal process for the teachers, which include; a variety of the appraisal criteria towards determining the performance level for the sole teachers for every aspect monitored. This plan means that the indicators development or the standardised forms are intended to ensure useful recording of teacher's performance regarding their impact on students. Also, the additional piece involves weighing of varied aspects monitored to help in computing general quantitative ratings, in such situations when it is part of the performance appraisal model. Generally, the necessity for the excellent activity in the performance appraisal includes the existence of the correct procedure, which consistently used by the professional evaluators during the process of performance appraisal. Usually, in context performance management, the majority of the authorities in the global education sector apply central standards of teaching or maybe norms as the typical reference for the performance appraisal.

Development of Commonly-Shared Understanding of Standard Teaching

While the majority of the countries expect their education sectors to have some elements teacher's performance appraisal, not all the education systems have the national frameworks or maybe teaching standards in the teaching profession. Hence, the absence of such particular reference frameworks as well as performing procedures for the teaching professionals, leading to the weakening of the designated capacity of the evaluators to ensure adequate performance appraisal of the best performing teachers and hinders the provision of feedback for further improvement. Most of the countries generally depend on the original education practices for the teacher to aid them i...