Honduran Teachers Undergo Evaluations
July 16, 2013 by Alma Castro Hernández No Comments
Honduran Teachers are Undergoing Evaluations to Improve Performance
The Evaluation is to Measure a Teacher’s Abilities in the Classroom
Throughout this week, roughly 55,000 teachers will be evaluated. The first to undergo the review are educators who work in the pre-primary classrooms; on Wednesday and Thursday it will be the basic education teachers’ turn, (from first to ninth grade); and on Friday and Saturday, secondary education teachers will undergo testing.
The tests are carried out in person and online. Two hundred schools around the country were chosen to submit to the process first, while the next round will be for all other schools where teachers use the the Ministry of Education platform.
Teachers are evaluated in the cognitive areas of Spanish, Math, Education and Teaching. A review of their portfolio contains lesson plans, notes, evidence of student work and adjustments made by the teacher, the tasks assigned, as well as observation of their class in which an observer remains for 45 minutes, where they time and evaluate teaching techniques for their care and control of the group.
The evaluation is carried out by departmental personnel from the district and the Ministry of Education who have been trained for this purpose. This evaluation process began at Monsignor Héctor Enrique Santos school, and other nine educational institutions in the colonia Hato de Enmedio area.
The teacher evaluation process commenced yesterday at 1: 00, when many teachers arrived at the Ministry of Education and began their test, according to the CEO of Education Assessment, Denis Cáceres.
The Process
He explained that the appraiser asks the teacher to teach a presented portfolio. The evaluation is given right there, and if the performance is less than 100 percent, they are advised on how to improve.
Next, the evaluator observes a class where the teacher instructs. They make notes during a 45 minute session, and provide the notes to the instructor at the end, with suggestions on how to improve, said Caceres.
“This test is not to punish teachers, it is to help the teacher to do a better job and children to learn more. The teachers should not fear this assessment … fear is normal because it has never been done in the country, but we at no time are we threatening, fighting, or firing the teacher for this evaluation,” Caceres emphasized.
Lesbia Reyes, the National Education Supervisor, explained, “We are confident that these tests will be positive for most teachers; if not, the education authorities are obliged to strengthen each teacher through the appropriate channels so that they can overcome these deficiencies and meet standards that the Ministry of Education requires.”
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