This book gives those who provide feedback to English language teachers the tools and understanding necessary to enact practices that empower and sustain authentic teacher growth. High-quality feedback practices begin with observers reflecting on their own beliefs and practices, building a shared vision for English language teaching in their communities of practice, recognizing how to differentiate supervisory approaches in response to teachers with different strengths, and re-envisioning the observation cycle using artifacts rather than incomplete memories of events.

Although supervisors, mentors and coaches have the best intentions, conferences with teachers often take on a predictable pattern, consisting of praise, followed by extensive suggestions for improvement, leaving the observed teacher at times confused and defensive. This book reaches the important actors – supervisors, mentors and coaches – who too often do their work in isolation, with little training or oversight, yet desire to authentically advance teacher learning and not simply complete checklists for compliance purposes.

Questions that this book addresses challenge complacency in this important teacher learning space. For instance, why do we invest time and resources in teacher observation and feedback? How do we know what our return on investment looks like? How can teachers increasingly become skilled at seeing and improving on their own practice through the mentoring and supervision they receive?

Through a blend of research, theory, vignettes, artifact examination and active learning tasks, readers will gain a host of new techniques and hone their skills in carrying out sensitive, flexible and viable developmental supervision/coaching. These approaches will always centre context: on the ground, to hybrid, to fully remote teaching and supervision; and a variety of ESL/EFL teaching settings, age levels, and teacher experience levels. These approaches also emphasize artifact-based rather than memory-based teacher reflection.