The Limitations of the Common Approach and the Educational Value of Teacher Observation

The aim of this paper is twofold. In the first part it engages in a critical examination of the common mode of approach to teacher observation from a pedagogical and psychological point of view to determine whether it is suited to the task of teacher training. Our contention is that it is not for it is vitiated by four fundamental limitations which deprive it of any educational value. So, in the second part of the paper it deals with the question whether teacher observation could be reformed, or if it should be abandoned. To answer this question the paper examines the pedagogical benefits of another mode of doing observation, employed in the field of academic development, and it argues that it should be taken as basis for a new model of approach to teacher observation.