Assessing Accomplished Teaching: Good Strides, Great Challenges

Abstract

This article surveys efforts at the national and international level to define and assess accomplished teaching with particular attention devoted to how assessments of accomplished teaching connect to student learning. The author finds that most assessments are based on aspects of teaching that, presumably, come together as accomplished teaching. Regarding teacher's impact on student learning, no assessments directly measure this, but rather rely on teacher-provided evidence of student learning or samples of student work. What little research exists that emphasizes the connection between accomplished teaching and student learning typically does so after the fact with sophisticated, exploratory statistical methods. The article concludes by delineating the challenges that remain in measuring accomplished teaching, especially in diverse classroom contexts, and in making connections between accomplished teaching and student learning.