For years, people have speculated about what makes a great teacher.
But now there is data. It has been gathered painstakingly by Teach For America for over a decade, and it covers hundreds of thousands of kids. TFA linked the test scores of students to their teachers, so that TFA can spot patterns in the data: Which teachers are causing big boosts in the kids’ scores–for instance, advancing them by three grade levels in one year? And what traits do those star teachers have in common?
He goes into a few pieces of that data in his post, and recommends the full article for more.