The assessment of teaching practice

Abstract

Education is concerned with change - with a process of change but generally speaking we educationalists aren't very keen on much change. Getting teachers or examiners or headteachers or Education Officers or College Principals to change their practices is not easy. We tend to be a cautious lot; we are inclined to be rather complacent and satisfied with the way we do things. We are imprisoned by our own comfortable habits and tightly constructed little worlds. As we progress through our professional life we progressively narrow the scope of our work. We become trapped in our field of specialization. We become caught in a web of fixed relationships. Our opinions harden. Our ideas congeal. Our horizons narrow. Our sympathies dry up. We develop set ways of doing things. Nothing surprises us.