With its central argument that teachers who are passionate about what they do will yield better results, this book will be useful to both school leaders wanting to help staff get the most out of their classrooms, and teachers interested in how to improve their experience of teaching.
Visible learning: a synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement
Synopsis
The message of this book, the result of 15 years of study by the author, is that ‘what teachers do matter’s and that what teachers do well has positive effects on their pupils. Based on 800 meta-analyses on the influences on achievement in school-aged pupils, Professor Hattie argues that more emphasis on teaching and learning - and less on assessment - would improve everyone’s experiences of education.
Visible learning, Hattie explains, is the key to good teaching within this context of learning. It occurs when teachers see learning through the eyes of pupils and help them to become their own teachers. Teachers, Hattie argues, often assume that pupils are learning when they are not. This enhanced role for teachers as evaluators of their own teaching would work as a barometer for good practice and sharing excellence.
Hattie believes more advocacy of this approach would help put the ‘passion for teaching’ back into debates around excellence in education, which he feels has been all but abandoned in a sector focused on results. Allowing teachers and learners to become passionate about learning by seeing it through each others eyes will be one of the best drivers of achievement, he predicts.