WEBVTT 00:00:00.719 --> 00:00:03.612 Everyone needs a coach. 00:00:03.612 --> 00:00:06.713 It doesn't matter whether you're a basketball player, 00:00:06.713 --> 00:00:09.991 a tennis player, a gymnast 00:00:09.991 --> 00:00:12.212 or a bridge player. 00:00:12.212 --> 00:00:14.701 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:00:14.701 --> 00:00:17.160 My bridge coach, Sharon Osberg, 00:00:17.160 --> 00:00:19.415 says there are more pictures of the back of her head 00:00:19.415 --> 00:00:22.932 than anyone else's in the world. (Laughter) 00:00:22.932 --> 00:00:26.594 Sorry, Sharon. Here you go. NOTE Paragraph 00:00:26.594 --> 00:00:30.185 We all need people who will give us feedback. 00:00:30.185 --> 00:00:32.422 That's how we improve. 00:00:32.422 --> 00:00:35.402 Unfortunately, there's one group of people 00:00:35.402 --> 00:00:38.208 who get almost no systematic feedback 00:00:38.208 --> 00:00:40.393 to help them do their jobs better, 00:00:40.393 --> 00:00:41.792 and these people 00:00:41.792 --> 00:00:44.942 have one of the most important jobs in the world. 00:00:44.942 --> 00:00:47.171 I'm talking about teachers. 00:00:47.171 --> 00:00:49.110 When Melinda and I learned 00:00:49.110 --> 00:00:52.322 how little useful feedback most teachers get, 00:00:52.322 --> 00:00:54.276 we were blown away. 00:00:54.276 --> 00:00:58.400 Until recently, over 98 percent of teachers 00:00:58.400 --> 00:01:01.053 just got one word of feedback: 00:01:01.053 --> 00:01:03.773 Satisfactory. 00:01:03.773 --> 00:01:06.266 If all my bridge coach ever told me 00:01:06.266 --> 00:01:08.651 was that I was "satisfactory," 00:01:08.651 --> 00:01:11.428 I would have no hope of ever getting better. 00:01:11.428 --> 00:01:14.726 How would I know who was the best? 00:01:14.726 --> 00:01:18.326 How would I know what I was doing differently? 00:01:18.326 --> 00:01:20.710 Today, districts are revamping 00:01:20.710 --> 00:01:22.994 the way they evaluate teachers, 00:01:22.994 --> 00:01:26.303 but we still give them almost no feedback 00:01:26.303 --> 00:01:29.476 that actually helps them improve their practice. 00:01:29.476 --> 00:01:32.808 Our teachers deserve better. 00:01:32.808 --> 00:01:36.036 The system we have today isn't fair to them. 00:01:36.036 --> 00:01:37.857 It's not fair to students, 00:01:37.857 --> 00:01:42.887 and it's putting America's global leadership at risk. 00:01:42.887 --> 00:01:46.346 So today I want to talk about how we can help all teachers 00:01:46.346 --> 00:01:50.604 get the tools for improvement they want and deserve. NOTE Paragraph 00:01:50.604 --> 00:01:54.470 Let's start by asking who's doing well. 00:01:54.470 --> 00:01:57.938 Well, unfortunately there's no international ranking tables 00:01:57.938 --> 00:01:59.864 for teacher feedback systems. 00:01:59.864 --> 00:02:01.654 So I looked at the countries 00:02:01.654 --> 00:02:04.759 whose students perform well academically, 00:02:04.759 --> 00:02:07.064 and looked at what they're doing 00:02:07.064 --> 00:02:10.103 to help their teachers improve. 00:02:10.103 --> 00:02:13.336 Consider the rankings for reading proficiency. 00:02:13.336 --> 00:02:15.826 The U.S. isn't number one. 00:02:15.826 --> 00:02:17.881 We're not even in the top 10. 00:02:17.881 --> 00:02:22.819 We're tied for 15th with Iceland and Poland. 00:02:22.819 --> 00:02:25.045 Now, out of all the places 00:02:25.045 --> 00:02:27.635 that do better than the U.S. in reading, 00:02:27.635 --> 00:02:30.174 how many of them have a formal system 00:02:30.174 --> 00:02:33.165 for helping teachers improve? 00:02:33.165 --> 00:02:36.000 Eleven out of 14. 00:02:36.000 --> 00:02:38.565 The U.S. is tied for 15th in reading, 00:02:38.565 --> 00:02:43.166 but we're 23rd in science and 31st in math. 00:02:43.166 --> 00:02:46.250 So there's really only one area where we're near the top, 00:02:46.250 --> 00:02:48.422 and that's in failing to give our teachers 00:02:48.422 --> 00:02:52.043 the help they need to develop their skills. NOTE Paragraph 00:02:52.043 --> 00:02:55.600 Let's look at the best academic performer: 00:02:55.600 --> 00:02:58.765 the province of Shanghai, China. 00:02:58.765 --> 00:03:02.098 Now, they rank number one across the board, 00:03:02.098 --> 00:03:05.017 in reading, math and science, 00:03:05.017 --> 00:03:08.388 and one of the keys to Shanghai's incredible success 00:03:08.388 --> 00:03:12.022 is the way they help teachers keep improving. 00:03:12.022 --> 00:03:14.351 They made sure that younger teachers 00:03:14.351 --> 00:03:18.018 get a chance to watch master teachers at work. 00:03:18.018 --> 00:03:20.292 They have weekly study groups, 00:03:20.292 --> 00:03:23.126 where teachers get together and talk about what's working. 00:03:23.126 --> 00:03:26.481 They even require each teacher to observe 00:03:26.481 --> 00:03:29.619 and give feedback to their colleagues. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:29.619 --> 00:03:33.318 You might ask, why is a system like this so important? 00:03:33.318 --> 00:03:36.176 It's because there's so much variation 00:03:36.176 --> 00:03:38.257 in the teaching profession. 00:03:38.257 --> 00:03:42.414 Some teachers are far more effective than others. 00:03:42.414 --> 00:03:45.103 In fact, there are teachers throughout the country 00:03:45.103 --> 00:03:48.656 who are helping their students make extraordinary gains. 00:03:48.656 --> 00:03:50.899 If today's average teacher 00:03:50.899 --> 00:03:53.495 could become as good as those teachers, 00:03:53.495 --> 00:03:57.671 our students would be blowing away the rest of the world. 00:03:57.671 --> 00:04:00.578 So we need a system that helps all our teachers 00:04:00.578 --> 00:04:02.590 be as good as the best. NOTE Paragraph 00:04:02.590 --> 00:04:05.187 What would that system look like? 00:04:05.187 --> 00:04:07.212 Well, to find out, our foundation 00:04:07.212 --> 00:04:09.663 has been working with 3,000 teachers 00:04:09.663 --> 00:04:11.847 in districts across the country 00:04:11.847 --> 00:04:16.066 on a project called Measures of Effective Teaching. 00:04:16.066 --> 00:04:18.417 We had observers watch videos 00:04:18.417 --> 00:04:20.163 of teachers in the classroom 00:04:20.163 --> 00:04:23.751 and rate how they did on a range of practices. 00:04:23.751 --> 00:04:25.589 For example, did they ask their students 00:04:25.589 --> 00:04:27.680 challenging questions? 00:04:27.680 --> 00:04:31.997 Did they find multiple ways to explain an idea? 00:04:31.997 --> 00:04:36.497 We also had students fill out surveys with questions like, 00:04:36.497 --> 00:04:38.210 "Does your teacher know 00:04:38.210 --> 00:04:40.767 when the class understands a lesson?" 00:04:40.767 --> 00:04:43.923 "Do you learn to correct your mistakes?" NOTE Paragraph 00:04:43.923 --> 00:04:46.752 And what we found is very exciting. 00:04:46.752 --> 00:04:50.871 First, the teachers who did well on these observations 00:04:50.871 --> 00:04:53.322 had far better student outcomes. 00:04:53.322 --> 00:04:56.580 So it tells us we're asking the right questions. 00:04:56.580 --> 00:04:59.393 And second, teachers in the program told us 00:04:59.393 --> 00:05:02.943 that these videos and these surveys from the students 00:05:02.943 --> 00:05:05.626 were very helpful diagnostic tools, 00:05:05.626 --> 00:05:08.255 because they pointed to specific places 00:05:08.255 --> 00:05:10.283 where they can improve. 00:05:10.283 --> 00:05:14.326 I want to show you what this video component of MET 00:05:14.326 --> 00:05:16.910 looks like in action. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:16.910 --> 00:05:19.857 (Music) NOTE Paragraph 00:05:19.857 --> 00:05:21.538 (Video) Sarah Brown Wessling: Good morning everybody. 00:05:21.538 --> 00:05:23.706 Let's talk about what's going on today. 00:05:23.706 --> 00:05:27.055 To get started, we're doing a peer review day, okay? 00:05:27.055 --> 00:05:29.510 A peer review day, and our goal by the end of class 00:05:29.510 --> 00:05:31.393 is for you to be able to determine 00:05:31.393 --> 00:05:34.347 whether or not you have moves to prove in your essays. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:34.347 --> 00:05:35.816 My name is Sarah Brown Wessling. 00:05:35.816 --> 00:05:37.501 I am a high school English teacher 00:05:37.501 --> 00:05:39.564 at Johnston High School in Johnston, Iowa. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:39.564 --> 00:05:41.311 Turn to somebody next to you. 00:05:41.311 --> 00:05:44.110 Tell them what you think I mean when I talk about moves to prove. I've talk about -- NOTE Paragraph 00:05:44.110 --> 00:05:46.771 I think that there is a difference for teachers 00:05:46.771 --> 00:05:50.244 between the abstract of how we see our practice 00:05:50.244 --> 00:05:51.887 and then the concrete reality of it. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:51.887 --> 00:05:55.437 Okay, so I would like you to please bring up your papers. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:55.437 --> 00:05:58.080 I think what video offers for us 00:05:58.080 --> 00:06:00.394 is a certain degree of reality. 00:06:00.394 --> 00:06:03.030 You can't really dispute what you see on the video, 00:06:03.030 --> 00:06:05.989 and there is a lot to be learned from that, 00:06:05.989 --> 00:06:07.918 and there are a lot of ways that we can grow 00:06:07.918 --> 00:06:10.849 as a profession when we actually get to see this. 00:06:10.849 --> 00:06:13.842 I just have a flip camera and a little tripod 00:06:13.842 --> 00:06:17.252 and invested in this tiny little wide-angle lens. 00:06:17.252 --> 00:06:19.760 At the beginning of class, I just perch it 00:06:19.760 --> 00:06:22.185 in the back of the classroom. It's not a perfect shot. 00:06:22.185 --> 00:06:24.923 It doesn't catch every little thing that's going on. 00:06:24.923 --> 00:06:28.203 But I can hear the sound. I can see a lot. 00:06:28.203 --> 00:06:30.252 And I'm able to learn a lot from it. 00:06:30.252 --> 00:06:33.137 So it really has been a simple 00:06:33.137 --> 00:06:35.983 but powerful tool in my own reflection. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:35.983 --> 00:06:39.032 All right, let's take a look at the long one first, okay? NOTE Paragraph 00:06:39.032 --> 00:06:41.800 Once I'm finished taping, then I put it in my computer, 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:44.436 and then I'll scan it and take a peek at it. 00:06:44.436 --> 00:06:46.548 If I don't write things down, I don't remember them. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:46.548 --> 00:06:50.203 So having the notes is a part of my thinking process, 00:06:50.203 --> 00:06:54.290 and I discover what I'm seeing as I'm writing. 00:06:54.290 --> 00:06:56.319 I really have used it for my own personal growth 00:06:56.319 --> 00:06:59.245 and my own personal reflection on teaching strategy 00:06:59.245 --> 00:07:02.514 and methodology and classroom management, 00:07:02.514 --> 00:07:06.020 and just all of those different facets of the classroom. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:06.020 --> 00:07:08.694 I'm glad that we've actually done the process before 00:07:08.694 --> 00:07:11.219 so we can kind of compare what works, what doesn't. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:11.219 --> 00:07:14.544 I think that video exposes 00:07:14.544 --> 00:07:18.028 so much of what's intrinsic to us as teachers 00:07:18.028 --> 00:07:21.185 in ways that help us learn and help us understand, 00:07:21.185 --> 00:07:23.792 and then help our broader communities understand 00:07:23.792 --> 00:07:27.628 what this complex work is really all about. 00:07:27.628 --> 00:07:31.760 I think it is a way to exemplify and illustrate 00:07:31.760 --> 00:07:34.675 things that we cannot convey in a lesson plan, 00:07:34.675 --> 00:07:36.828 things you cannot convey in a standard, 00:07:36.828 --> 00:07:39.057 things that you cannot even sometimes convey 00:07:39.057 --> 00:07:41.867 in a book of pedagogy. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:41.867 --> 00:07:44.233 Alrighty, everybody, have a great weekend. 00:07:44.233 --> 00:07:45.469 I'll see you later. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:45.469 --> 00:07:47.756 [Every classroom could look like that] NOTE Paragraph 00:07:47.756 --> 00:07:53.183 (Applause) NOTE Paragraph 00:07:53.183 --> 00:07:56.155 Bill Gates: One day, we'd like every classroom in America 00:07:56.155 --> 00:07:58.839 to look something like that. 00:07:58.839 --> 00:08:01.460 But we still have more work to do. 00:08:01.460 --> 00:08:04.180 Diagnosing areas where a teacher needs to improve 00:08:04.180 --> 00:08:06.767 is only half the battle. 00:08:06.767 --> 00:08:09.152 We also have to give them the tools they need 00:08:09.152 --> 00:08:11.650 to act on the diagnosis. 00:08:11.650 --> 00:08:13.565 If you learn that you need to improve 00:08:13.565 --> 00:08:15.306 the way you teach fractions, 00:08:15.306 --> 00:08:17.814 you should be able to watch a video 00:08:17.814 --> 00:08:21.526 of the best person in the world teaching fractions. NOTE Paragraph 00:08:21.526 --> 00:08:24.268 So building this complete teacher feedback 00:08:24.268 --> 00:08:27.378 and improvement system won't be easy. 00:08:27.378 --> 00:08:29.388 For example, I know some teachers 00:08:29.388 --> 00:08:31.856 aren't immediately comfortable with the idea 00:08:31.856 --> 00:08:34.656 of a camera in the classroom. 00:08:34.656 --> 00:08:37.972 That's understandable, but our experience with MET 00:08:37.972 --> 00:08:41.417 suggests that if teachers manage the process, 00:08:41.417 --> 00:08:43.902 if they collect video in their own classrooms, 00:08:43.902 --> 00:08:46.878 and they pick the lessons they want to submit, 00:08:46.878 --> 00:08:50.639 a lot of them will be eager to participate. NOTE Paragraph 00:08:50.639 --> 00:08:53.592 Building this system will also require 00:08:53.592 --> 00:08:56.615 a considerable investment. 00:08:56.615 --> 00:08:59.972 Our foundation estimates that it could cost 00:08:59.972 --> 00:09:02.127 up to five billion dollars. 00:09:02.127 --> 00:09:06.481 Now that's a big number, but to put it in perspective, 00:09:06.481 --> 00:09:08.474 it's less than two percent 00:09:08.474 --> 00:09:12.769 of what we spend every year on teacher salaries. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:12.769 --> 00:09:16.081 The impact for teachers would be phenomenal. 00:09:16.081 --> 00:09:20.038 We would finally have a way to give them feedback, 00:09:20.038 --> 00:09:22.735 as well as the means to act on it. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:22.735 --> 00:09:23.920 But this system would have 00:09:23.920 --> 00:09:27.710 an even more important benefit for our country. 00:09:27.710 --> 00:09:30.883 It would put us on a path to making sure 00:09:30.883 --> 00:09:34.082 all our students get a great education, 00:09:34.082 --> 00:09:36.773 find a career that's fulfilling and rewarding, 00:09:36.773 --> 00:09:40.012 and have a chance to live out their dreams. 00:09:40.012 --> 00:09:44.366 This wouldn't just make us a more successful country. 00:09:44.366 --> 00:09:49.870 It would also make us a more fair and just one, too. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:49.870 --> 00:09:52.605 I'm excited about the opportunity 00:09:52.605 --> 00:09:57.354 to give all our teachers the support they want and deserve. 00:09:57.354 --> 00:09:59.081 I hope you are too. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:59.081 --> 00:10:00.852 Thank you. NOTE Paragraph 00:10:00.852 --> 00:10:09.160 (Applause)