Improving Instructional Quality in Jewish Day Schools and Yeshivot ...

methods for delivering content and assessing understanding, andsupporting materials” (p. 243). Suggestions for enhancing curriculumdevelopment are made later.III. Professional DevelopmentLack of professional development (PD) and common meeting timefor faculty – PD is episodic and uneven at many schools. Althoughteachers meet informally, there is often little time to meet formallyand consistently to work on instructional issues e.g., curriculumdevelopment. Teachers are sometimes respected for their knowledgeand experience. They are given much latitude in terms of subjectcoverage and instructional methodology. Although the principal oftenmonitors teaching by checking lesson plans and occasionally meetswith groups of teachers, instructional quality could be enhanced bymuch more planned meeting times where teachers and administratorscollaboratively develop and engage in a coherent and ongoing PDprogram. PD is often top-down initiated without meaningful input byteachers. No wonder that so many teachers find PD useless. Bestpractices definitely demonstrate that instructional quality is improvedby continued in-school learning by all educators (Joyce & Calhoun,2010; Yendol-Hoppey & Fichtman-Dana, 2010; Zepeda, 2008).IV.SupervisionSupervision in many schools traditionally consists of walkthroughsand occasional formal evaluative observations withoututilizing the latest cutting edge practices. There is little evidence ofprofessional growth plans created collaboratively between teacher andsupervisor. Supervision as inspection, or the absence of supervision,characterizes the tone of supervisory practices in many schools.Supervision of instruction needs to be the focus of schoolimprovement (Sullivan & Glanz, 2009).37