Discusses how the tension and anxiety generated in the supervisory process undermines the potential of teacher supervision as a mutually beneficial and enriching experience. Reviews current supervisory approaches that attempt to redress this imbalance and outlines some problems with these approaches. Explores a collaborative model that tries to…

Argues for the abolition of teacher supervision, drawing on research into teaching realities and complexities; research about teachers' feelings, attitudes, and experiences regarding supervision; and studies on the failure of supervision to effect any improvements in teaching once teachers have been tenured. Supervision as currently practiced will…

Using transcriptions of audio- and videotaped conferences from local schools and individual settings, this article examines the claim that face-threatening acts committed during supervisor-teacher interactions, particularly the postobservation instructional conference, determine the politeness levels of both supervisor and teacher. The case study…

Discusses a study of three-way supervisory conferences. Despite an asymmetrical power relationship between the university supervisor and student teacher, the two parties played complementary roles, with the former providing more input requiring reflection and evaluation and the latter providing more input pertaining to classroom practicalities and…

This article describes a new supervision model conceived to help a school system redesign its anatomy (structures), physiology (flow of information and webs of relationships), and psychology (beliefs and values). The new paradigm (Knowledge Work Supervision) was constructed by reviewing the practices of several interrelated areas: sociotechnical…

Most reform movements do not fundamentally alter the prevailing organization, scheduling, curriculum, or structure of teaching. The time has come to view teachers as the solution to, rather than the source of, school problems. Empowerment reform raises questions and allows school practitioners to work toward their own answers. Includes 22…

Clinical supervision stresses face-to-face encounters with individual teachers about a specific teaching/learning situation. The process incorporates the use of specific objective data forming the basis for collaborating and aimed at instructional improvement. The five stages are preobservation conference, classroom observation, data and strategy…

This paper reports on an ongoing 3-year study of the current status of instructional supervision within New York City public schools. Under the influence of a centralized and bureaucratically managed system (i.e., top down initiatives), educational reform in New York City has had serious consequences for both the theory and practice of…

The fourth of six volumes in the "Elementary Principal Series," this booklet offers new principals a set of ideas, procedures, and examples associated with effective teacher supervision. The principal-teacher supervisory relationship has changed dramatically over recent years. The principal is no longer an inspector, but a colleague…

Generalizations are made about the different purposes and outcomes of supervisory conferences. Examples are provided. (Author/MLF)

Professors who study and teach supervision should realize that they are involved in creating a scholarship of practice, not a science or applied science. Pretending to "do science" maligns education's legitimacy and assigns its professors to second-class status. The practice approach has more potential for creating a true community of…

Describes and interprets the processes that supervisors currently use in conference, relying on anthropological linguistics and other qualitative techniques. Reconstructs a contextual definition of the supervisor conference and suggests some implications for future supervisory study and practice. Supervisors' controlling behaviors make collegial…

A principal boasts that he spends two hours a day in classrooms. And it is true--he really does visit his school's 17 teachers daily, chatting with students and occasionally chiming in on a lesson. But when teachers are asked what kind of feedback they get, they say the principal rarely talks to them about what he sees when he strolls through…

The Collaborative Instructional Improvement process is a communication facilitating process that enables a supervisor and a colleague to identify problems, delineate action strategies and responsibilities, specify time constraints, and establish an evaluation design. (Author)

Explains a supervisory method intended to be humanistic and clinical that holds promise even in situations where a minimal amount of supervision is possible. (Author/MLF)