Book Review: Amanda Howard and Helen Donaghue (eds.) (2015) Teacher Evaluation in Second Language Education. London, New York: Bloomsbury

Despite some variation between individual chapters in terms of the issues they address, the approach taken and the depth with which empirical data are analysed, this volume will be valuable for many readers involved in teacher evaluation and development, particularly via lesson observation and feedback. Various contributors offer fresh and thought-provoking perspectives on familiar issues; I was certainly prompted to think critically about some of the established practices in my own initial teacher education context. Taken as a whole, the book provides a strong argument for developing processes which empower teachers as active, reflective agents in their own professional learning – in contrast to the top-down, managerial approaches which often predominate