Teachers’ Judgements of their Pupils: broad categories and multiple criteria

Twelve secondary school teachers were interviewed using a triadic elicitation technique to identify the most common criteria by which they made day‐to‐day judgements about a single class of 24 year 8 pupils taught by them. Ten common elements were identified from the teachers’ individual bi‐polar constructs to form a common, or average, set of rating criteria. The teachers individually ranked each child against the positive pole of each of the common criteria. Cluster analysis of the teachers’ rankings revealed those constructs which each teacher perceived as being most alike. Examination of the most commonly occurring construct pairings indicated that, on a day‐to‐day basis, the teachers made judgements according to three general groups of criteria: maturity and attitude to school work, personality factors, and academic ability. This was confirmed in the course of respondent validation.