I would like to share my own experience of observation and my concerns towards it.

Last semester, when taking the class of Inquires Into Teaching, I was required to attend at least 3 courses in PS 42 and complete observation logs to keep track of the class. Our professor asked us to record only the general procedure and major student activities in the class. Even though my observation is not as “professional” as Knoester and Malley &Hawkins have suggested in their articles, I still learned something helpful to my future teaching. I agree with Knoester’s opinion about observation notes, that they can be very helpful to polish your teaching strategies.

However, the drawbacks, or “limitations” (according to Knoester), are also obvious. Observing would take out too much time from teachers, which should have been used for class preparation or homework checking. On the other hand, it would be very difficult for facilitators to avoid mixing in subjective interpretations while observing students’ behaviors. Teachers’ bias come from various ways, like stereotype, ethnicity, cultural manner etc, which will lead to misunderstanding between teachers and students. For example, last class Prof. Doucet mentioned the stereotype of Asian kids like being quite in class, whereas, the kids might have other issues so they don’t feel like to talk that much in school. Therefore, it requires teachers to obtain sharp perception to cognize students’ thoughts under their behaviors. If teachers fail to do so, the practice of doing descriptive review would become meaningless.

Personally, I think taking field notes is very helpful, especially to student teachers, who haven’t acquired much teaching experience. By looking at real class setting, and collect students’ reflection and response in class, they would be better prepared for the start of their future teaching career. As for experienced teachers, taking field note can help better know your students, and find out good approaches to reach to students effectively.