Nonparticipant Student Observation of Faculty Classroom Teaching

Student evaluations are commonly used to evaluate teaching effectiveness. Nonparticipant observation uses individuals who are not a part of the learning process but rather are observers who can formulate observations about the teaching encounter, possibly with less bias than student evaluators. The purpose of this article is to analyze reports by inexperienced nonparticipant observers of faculty classroom teaching episodes. The hypothesis was that veterinary faculty have common characteristics in their classroom teaching that are observable by nonparticipant observers and that these are similar to characteristics observed historically by student evaluators. This study is a qualitative document analysis of written observations made by senior veterinary students attending pre-clinical classroom lectures by a faculty member. Each written report was analyzed using thematic concept analysis, and the researchers met multiple times throughout the process to discuss the analysis and develop conclusions about themes that were encountered consistently among observations. Common emergent themes included information formats, PowerPoint presentations, timing, organization, student engagement, and delivery. Nonparticipant observers may contribute valuable data that may enhance faculty development in pedagogy. Observations may serve to augment data from student evaluations, self-reflection, and peer assessment.