Observation in the classroom

Since classrooms are a mixture of several aspects, the one related to observation could not be forgotten, instead, it should be mentioned and explained spacially when talking about assessment. It is unavoidable to observe what happens inside of our classrooms and during our classes, due to the fact that they are never static or empty... on the contrary, we are always dealing with different ways of behaving, different strategies and with our own thoughts as well.
Observation is a useful tool that teachers use in order to analyze, understand and improve the practices and happennings inside the classrooms, it is fundamental at the moment of assessing the students, the groups, the activities and the plans made at the begginning.


Through observation teachers can assess what students have learnt, the students' learning strategies, the effectiveness of the teaching strategies and the materials that are being used, which is fundamental in the day-to-day practices; in this way according to what has been recorded decisions can be made and solutions match to the needs that have been identified.


In order to find observation useful and practical it should be organized with reference to specified language objectives, since in this way he attention is focused on the part of language learning that us relevant to and the instruction is organized according to the objectives. All these obtained inferences and observations help teachers to explain what happens inside their classes and to look for new ways of dealing with students, instructional plans and practices.


Finally, observations can be made through anecdotal records, checklists and rating scales, all these ways are different among each other, but in general what should be decided in all of the cases is the purpose of the observation, the kind of observation that will be used, the way in which the observation will be made and the information will be collected, which methods for record information will be implemented and finally the preparation of report forms in which the explanations are exposed.


I think observation is crucial in every classroom we enter... From it we can infer how students feel, theways they use to try to overcome their problems with the language, their thoughst and reactions towards the activities we take them and most of all we can get to know their personalities and the multiple intelligences we can help them explore and explode in our classes.

A framework for evaluation

It is necessary to be aware of the importance of our decisions as teachers. This is the reason we always need a strategy for making sound decisions that eventually will provide better results for our students.
Since evaluation is a four-step process, which includes identifying purposes, collecting information, interpreting that information and finally reaching a decision, it requires taking a deeper look at what these steps mean, and most of all it requires finding or building the necessary conections among the aspects of classroom-based evaluation so that positive results are drawn.


One of the most important things to take into account at the moment of making a decision is the effect it will have on students' outcome related to language learning, obviously. This implies observing, analyzing and studying the components of evaluation and based on those analysis making a decision. For example, if at the moment when instructional objectives are being assessed students' needs must be taken into account; and if there is a mismatch between these two categories a change must be implemented, so that the purposes of the course match with the students' needs. Another case in which decisions must be made is at the moment of assesing the instructional plans versus instructional objectives; in here, it is necessary to be conscious of what the objective is so that the way it is intended to be attained matches with it... If not, it would be contradictory to -for isntance- teache speaking by means fo writing long paragraphs. Objectives must provide the basis to assess students' acievement, so, in the former example if the objective was related to speaking, then the way to asses those students was related to that skill as well. Decisions are required also when instructional plans are judged against instructional practices; if things are not going as planned the teacher must act immediately . Finally, another component of classroom's assesment is what students can decide or are able to decide at the moment of comparing what they need to the objectives of the course they are taking; all those thoughts will end up in affecting their learning strategies and their study habits.


The strategy for evaluating consists on keep on comparing all the aspects involved in it, plus the input factos that have an effect on students performance. A lot of people base their evaluation practices on comparing just the achievements at the end of the course versus the beginning-of-the-course objectives, but it goes beyond that. Evaluation requeries an on-going analysis of what happens in the classroom, what was planned, and what is being achieved, in this way improvements can be made and, teachers and students can take advantages of the decisions that assesment involves.

Testing, Assessing and Teaching

Being able to create, provide and live learning experiences from testing and assessing should define the new generation of teachers that is about to start their labour as well as the new generations of students who will receive lots of benefits from these experiences.

It is mandatory to keep on looking for new ways of integrating former theories with new happenings and tools around the world, and this is the reason why it becomes so important to know that the role of teachers and tests nowadays has transformed into a wider and flexible practice, and that we should take advantage of that and start working on improving the way test and assessment is carried out in our classrooms.

The continuous assessment that we -as teachers- do on each class, from all the comments and opinions that our students give is nothing more than the proof of the commitment and dedication that we have to our profession and to our students. On the other hand, it is necessary to be aware of the responsibility that we have at the moment of giving feedback to our students... As I said before, it is time to turn some ancient practices and start looking for more effective ways of helping our students, so that their learning process goes beyond what they expected and we give them the chance to overcome whatever difficulty they find.

Finally, I find very important to know the difference between testing and assessment, since it gives us enough clarification to understand what we need to do and what students need to do in each one, and, in this way do the one that fits our needs the most, without forgetting our students as well.