La mia maestra è da 10 e lode! Una ricerca azione sulla valutazione degli insegnanti con il contributo degli studenti

The introduction of teacher evaluation in the Italian school (Law 107/2015) has obliged teachers and headmasters to cope with new processes, which could bring improvement and reflection on school practices but which are often seen as problematic. Moreover, it has given to parents and students the chance to take part actively in the evaluation processes, by inviting their representatives to enter the evaluation committee of the institute. It has been a remarkable innovation, in which the difficulties that have appeared since the approval of the Law – teachers’ opposition, uncertainty about evaluation management, lack of specific competences and of guidelines – have been only partially solved in the following years. The action research that we present, carried out in six schools in the province of Padua, was aimed at contributing to the definition of a teacher evaluation model which could support schools in the application of the Law, while enriching it with a professional development path and with the actual participation of all the people involved. The research has demanded the active collaboration of the schools’ headmasters: they have been invited to define aims, times and methods with the research group, in order to build together some tools which could be useful and as complete as possible but, at the same time, quite simple in their form and sustainable as regards the effort for their implementation and diffusion. At first, teachers and school evaluation committees were given specific questionnaires aimed at stimulating the reflection on some aspects of evaluation; then, we carried out some focus groups with teachers, parents and students to gather opinions and expectations about “the good teacher”. The analysis of the focus groups, shared with the headmasters and the teachers, highlighted that the contribution of pupils and students was particularly interesting for the purposes of teacher evaluation and professional development, as pupils and students are the real targets of the school service and the actors directly involved in the learning processes. This interest, along with the scant participation of parents, made the research group and the headmasters decide to carry on the work focussing mainly on the “voice” of the students: starting from the analysis of the focus groups, we have identified the areas which turned out to be the most relevant for the students among those suggested in international literature as characterizing the teacher profile. A comparison between the model elaborated by Indire – used in Italy since 2015 for the competence assessment of the newly hired teachers and derived from Perrenoud (2002 [1999]) – and the areas identified from the students’ opinions and tales, has led to complete the model with some missing indicators, mainly referred to relationships, respect, evaluation and fairness. Starting from the same data, we have then prepared some questionnaires – for primary and secondary school – to get the point of view of the students about their teachers. Three schools have already used the questionnaire to assess the teachers, another is going to use it during the school year 2018/19. Not only has the research brought to highlight that the point of view of the students is essential to have a feedback about what happens in the classroom – which had already been confirmed by many research papers – but it has also shown that this point of view is accurate, that it is really effective in spurring the teachers to observe themselves from a different perspective, and that it can be significant also for the headmaster and for the teachers when it contributes to a more comprehensive evaluation, aimed at professional development.