Una revisión sobre programas de observación de la práctica educativa

Résumé

This paper features a review of 58 international observation programs of educational practice to get an international approach about it and to understand what kind of teacher professional development is launched according to observation model developed: evaluation, development and collaborative (Gosling, 2005). Specifically, we pursue three objectives: (1) to describe the programs; (2) to identify if there is an international trend; (3) to understand the reach of the collaborative model. We examine the following categories through documental analysis: (i) general aspects; (ii) objective; (iii) methods; (iv) role of observation. Results show a rising trend in collaborative programs among teachers and, also, they show a confrontation still present today between the evaluative and the collaborative models. There are several future research areas, highlighting two of them: to study the impact of programs in teacher performance and student learning, as most of them don’t gather this information, and to analyze in depth the observation models which are executed in each program. To achieve both, it is important to rise above the limitations of this research, by expanding the number of reviewed programs, focusing on a geographic area or doing a comparative study between countries as to better understand teacher professional development policies through the observation of educational practice.