Teacher Common Assessment of Practice (TCAP)

The New Hampshire Teacher Common Assessment of Practice (NH TCAP) is a performance assessment developed by a consortium of New Hampshire Institutions of Higher Education (IHE's, meaning the programs that run teacher licensure programs). Based on California's Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT), the tool was designed over the course of 2013-2014 and is being piloted by 300 teacher candidates in 9 institutions over the course of 2014-2015. As the tool develops, it will likely become a requirement for licensure beginning in 2015-2016.

The tool is conceptually related to National Board Certification, and will likely have application and implications for teachers across the career spectrum.

Focus on student learning

In the NH TCAP, teachers will demonstrate the strategies they use to make content and related academic language accessible to students. Teachers will explain the thinking underlying their teaching decisions and analyze the strategies they use to connect students with the content they are teaching. Teachers will examine the effects of their instructional designs and teaching practices on student learning, with particular attention to students with diverse cultural, language, and socio-economic backgrounds and learning needs.

Select a learning segment

The NH TCAP requires teachers to design, teach, and assess a learning segment. The learning segment may be part of a larger instructional unit that includes multiple learning segments.

For the NH TCAP, Teachers will plan a learning segment of approximately 3-5 lessons that is designed to help students meet the standards for the curriculum content and to develop academic language related to that content.

Submit teaching artifacts and analysis

Teachers will submit lesson plans, copies of instructional and assessment materials, one or two video clips of their teaching, a summary of whole class learning, and an analysis of student work samples. Teachers will also write commentaries describing their teaching context, analyzing their teaching practices, and reflecting on what they learned about their teaching practice and their students’ learning.

Assessment of your NH TCAP

Teacher's NH TCAP will clearly demonstrate how (and whether) their practice meets the NH 610.02 Standards for Beginning Teachers and the institutional Teacher Education Program Goals and Outcomes. Scoring rubrics have been developed to align with these professional expectations for classroom teachers.