TeachFX is a tool that was designed and launched to help educators improve their teaching.
The idea, according to CEO and former English and math teacher Josh Poskin, is to use intelligent video recordings to monitor and improve teaching in class.
Crucially, this works via an app that be used on smartphones and laptops, so it should be easily accessible for many schools. And it's something teachers can setup and have running themselves as part of monitoring performance. Since the app works right there, feedback is available immediately, making this a powerful tool.
This guide aims to explain all you need to know so you can decide if TeachFX is a good fit for your class.
What is TeachFX?
TeachFX is an app that works on smartphones and laptops, using recording hardware, to analyze teachers -- as they work -- and provide feedback.
It's worth mentioning that this is about helping teachers improve, not enabling monitoring. As such, all the data is owned by the teachers, and reports cannot be accessed by other teachers or administrators. Although aggregated data across a school is helpfully available.
Talking about just this, Poskin says: "Let’s say a school is focused on getting more open-ended questions asked in their classrooms. We’ll show that as an aggregated thing, but never on an individual teacher level because we just philosophically believe it’s so important for anybody’s learning and growth that you feel safe doing it."
The app has been around since 2016, and after a brief scare during COVID times, it's now making $2.5 million per year and just secured $10 million in Series A funding.
How does TeachFX work?
TeachFX can be downloaded and installed on devices so teachers can login themselves. Once they do so, they are then able to set to record before beginning a lesson.
Various data entry points are available before and after, to supplement everything that is picked up by the app's ability to monitor the lesson.
After a lesson, teachers can then go through the data to see how they taught and to be given insights into ways they may considering improving.
The app will be able, for example, to tell a teacher a percentage split of how much time they spent talking versus how much time was given to the class to take part. A simple metric, but a powerful way to find the right balance that best suits the lesson and the students.
As mentioned, the over-arching numbers can then be seen across the school as a good way to address any focus that may be needed for affective change.
What are the best TeachFX features?
TeachFX is super easy to setup and use, with the app doing a lot of the work both recording data points and offering potential actions to help improvements.
This is a goal-orientated platform through which teachers can set goals, track progress as they work toward that, and ultimately, see how they achieve that goal and what affect it has. All that should equate to an empowering experience for teachers that also helps students.
Inquiry-based personal learning workshops are also available to help build on instructional capacity as well as strengthen collective teacher efficacy.
From a school or district level, this allows for wider improvements as you can share your situation with the company, go to customized workshops, and then begin with specific goals or for all teachers based on all the learning.
The company says this only requires five hours of time invested, versus 49 in other evidence-based systems, yet you get a 25% impact on student achievement versus 21% in other cases.
How much does TeachFX cost?
TeachFX does not openly advertise its costs since it works on a bespoke basis and at varying scales.
However, a small school will typically pay about $10,000 for a subscription, with a medium school paying $20,000, and the top-end larger schools getting charged $30,000.
TeachFX best tips and tricks
Start smaller
Go for a demo or trial to see if you like how this works before committing to the full service.
Check with teachers
As a school or district, be sure to check if teachers want to take part in this before purchasing.
Keep track
Spot trends and data changes to learn what works and what doesn't to improve even faster year after year.
