Teacher evaluations have experienced an unprecedented level of analysis and scrutiny in recent years. In 2010, the United States Department of Education specifically called for improving teacher effectiveness to ensure that every classroom has a great teacher in it (United States Department of Education, 2010). As one of four specific areas of focus, President Obama’s administration took a significant step forward in identifying teacher effectiveness as a cornerstone in its blueprint for reform in the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. States and districts are increasingly attempting to standardize and strengthen the measures used to determine teacher effectiveness. While this debate ignites strong debate among policy leaders, teacher unions, and other stakeholders, discussions regarding how to adapt teacher observations to fully recognize blended learning environments remain silent.

The federal government’s Race to the Top initiative prompted policymakers at the national, state and local levels to develop stronger evaluation programs that more accurately identify effective teachers and, subsequently, improve student achievement. Research clearly documents the strong correlation an effective teacher has on a student’s achievement gains during the school year as measured by value-added or other test-based growth measures (Goe et al., 2008; Wright, Horn, & Sanders, 1997). Sanders and Rivers (1996) also noted that teacher effects on student academic gains can be seen as both cumulative and residual. “The core of education is teaching and learning, and the teaching-learning connection works best when we have effective teachers working with every student every day” (Stronge, 2006, p.1). Since the research clearly demonstrates that the quality of teaching matters, it is reasonable to presuppose that a quality teacher evaluation process also matters in order to know if the school system possesses high quality teachers (Stronge & Tucker, 2003). This is especially true in the new blended learning environments gaining momentum across the country.

The goal now for instructional leaders is to identify the meaningful measures that need to be included in effective teacher observation protocols in blended learning settings. The following is an adaptation to the four quadrants found in Charlotte Danielson’s Framework for Teaching observation tool. Danielson’s framework for teacher observations is utilized in a number of school districts across the nation and helps illustrate how traditional teacher observation programs should be adapted to meet the unique needs of blended learning environments.

Collaborative and substantive discussions among all relevant stakeholders will ensure that leaders conducting observations are providing teachers with specific, ongoing, and job-embedded feedback that will lead to meaningful professional growth for teachers in blended learning classrooms. As with any initiative, it is important that is be a process that involves teachers to ensure its sustained promise to improve learning and teaching.