Something More

“Teachers who have as reference only their own experience… require something more than reflection to analyze and question their own practice.”

Halai, 2006, p. 704

I think it needs something more...

In previous weeks, I've talked about the overall model for Gradual Increase of Responsibility when coaching. That model includes the coaching phases of: modeling, recommending, questioning, affirming, and praising. How do you know which coaching move is the best one to support the teacher you are working with? Halai's quote, above, gives us a clue. When a teacher needs something more than her own experience in order to successfully meet student needs, modeling can provide the “something more” that is needed. Whether recorded or live, with students or without, modeling may be especially useful early in a coaching cycle. The observed experiences that modeling provides open doors for communication and support teachers as they then use the strategies in their own instruction.

Another way to provide “something more” for teachers is by making recommendations. As teachers increase the tools in their instructional toolbox and their comfort with using them, they may no longer need modeling. When using the GIR model, coaches shift to the practice of making recommendations as the coaching cycle moves forward. In doing so, coaches take an expert stance. They draw on research and experience, advocating for particular choices and actions. In addition to taking into consideration the needs of the student, coaches need to consider the knowledge and abilities of the teacher in order for recommendations to be effective. This stage of the coaching cycle requires credibility and trust, which coaches have been working to build.

In this consulting role, coaches encourage teachers to use appropriate practices and attend to instructional goals that target the unique needs of their learners. Coaches often make recommendations early in the coaching cycle as teachers are determining goals for the cycle and deciding what approaches to take. The coach may provide information about instructional strategies; content or skills being taught; the developmental processes of learning; or the standards, curriculum, or resources being used (more about those next week).

Early in the coaching cycle, if teachers are looking to the coach for guidance, modeling and recommending can be useful coaching moves that add “something more” to the teachers toolkit for student-centered instruction.

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Wondering what you might model or recommend? Check out these links about instructional best practices:

Turn and Talk is the topic of this podcast with Harvey & Goudvis:

www.stenhouse.com/html/mp3harveygoudvis1.htm

Find graphic organizers galore at:

eduplace.com/graphicorganizer/

Here's a student-friendly guide for annotating a text:

faculty.bucks.edu/specpop/annotate.htm

Happy Coaching!

Coaches Model Expert Thinking

At the end of a cold winter day, what can be more welcoming than a crock pot full of spicy chili – or artichoke chicken, or pulled pork, or beef-vegetable soup.  Are you hungry yet?  The point is, unless you’re the cook, you don’t know what’s simmering inside a steamy crock pot until you take off the lid, releasing wonderful smells and making peaking possible.  Expert thinking can be kind of like that – only the “cook” knows what’s inside until she makes her thought-processes public. 

To “take the lid off” the comprehension process, teachers often verbalize their own thoughts while reading orally.  Listen in as Debbie Miller opens her mind to her first graders so they can understand the processes she uses to think about the book, Night Sounds, Morning Colors by Rosemary Wells:

“Listen again to the words about the faraway train and its whistle,” she says.  “When I read those words, such vivid images, or pictures, come into my mind.  I have an image of my mother, brother, and me streaking across the flatlands of Kansas on a train called the El Capitan….I hear the rumble of the wheels on the tracks and see the porters in their fancy red and black outfits.”

(Excerpted from Reading with Meaning)

This detailed process of making thinking public is called “think alouds.”  In a similar way, coaches can model expert thinking and problem solving as they work with teachers.  When coaches think about modeling for a teacher, they usually think in terms of modeling in the classroom (see Jan. 4 post).  It’s also important, however, to model the decision-making strategies used to design and guide instruction. 

As you meet with a teacher, you can think aloud about approaches that might be taken during a lesson and illuminate the many factors under consideration.  For example, a coach may review assessment information, consider students’ strengths and weaknesses as readers, determine where students lie on a developmental continuum, weigh possible learning experiences (considering the benefits of each), and determine a plan of action all while making her thinking public by sharing it aloud as she goes through this process.

It might feel strange at first to verbalize your thinking in this way.  It’s about being really in tune with how you make instructional decisions – all those many factors you automatically consider --  and then taking the lid off your brain and letting your teacher-friend see how you do it. 

It will take some practice, but soon you’ll find that modeling expert decision-making becomes natural and begins to pay dividends.  Coaching conversations become more productive as coach and teacher thoughtfully reflect together on the many factors under consideration.  Instructional decision making is a complex process; take the lid off of that process and everyone will benefit. 

 

 

This week, you might want to take a look at:

Math think aloud lesson plan:

http://lessonplanspage.com/mathnumreasoningprobsolvingthinkalouds69-htm/

Math think-aloud video:  Here’s a (very amateur) video that does a good job of getting at the math thinking behind doing a word problem:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSc1aHjDWQo

Comprehension think-aloud lesson plans on the IRA/NCTE website Read-Write-Think:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/building-reading-comprehension-through-139.html

Miller, D. (2002).  Reading with meaning: Teaching comprehension in the primary grades.  Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers.

Vicarious Modeling

Hello, Coaching Colleagues –

You might remember last week’s blog post, where you learned that my home is under construction.  In the continuing saga of home improvements, I decided I want a craft and scrapbooking area so that I don’t have to put every photo and glue stick away between my infrequent binges of creative pursuit.  The problem with that thought is, I have a relentless need for “a place for everything and everything in its place.”  Hmmmm…..what to do?  Then, while browsing a magazine in the check-out line, I saw a photo of a closet-turned-craft-center.  Included were a workspace, pegboards, shelves, drawers, and bins.  Just close the closet doors and – voila! – all the clutter is hidden!  This seemed like the perfect solution.  But how would I go about creating this marvelous model of efficiency and order?  YouTube provided the solution with a short video clip of step-by-step construction instructions.  It’s amazing what seeing someone in action can do!

That brings me to the idea of vicarious modeling.  Webster tells us that vicarious means “serving instead of someone or something else.”  If modeling in the classroom isn’t possible or doesn’t seem like the best solution, a video clip can serve the purpose instead.  You might have a video of yourself that demonstrates the strategy in another setting. Clips from video recordings purchased from publishers or professional organizations may also be useful.  Or you could find a clip from one of the many free online sources (teachingchannel.org, choiceliteracy.com, or teachertube.com, + see below).  Better yet, spotlight the instruction of another teacher in your building. 

You can start your own video collection for this purpose.  Whenever you see something good going on, ask, “Would you mind if I capture that?” then whip out your iPhone or other friendly device and record away.  Not only do you have meaningful examples to share, you have built good will in the building.  Just be sure you don’t create “coach’s pets.”  Every teacher has an idea worth capturing!  Another bonus of home-grown videos is the authenticity factor; when you see something happening in your own school with your own student population, you are less likely to discount the idea as something that wouldn’t work for you.  As with “live” modeling, recordings need not be perfect examples; learning occurs through reflecting on both successes and less-successful aspects of lessons.  Just be sure to keep the focus positive, especially when using clips from colleagues’ classrooms. 

When video recordings are provided as instructional models, you might choose to view and discuss clips during a planning or debriefing session.  This allows for on-the-spot dialogue about how to adjust and put the ideas into practice.  Pushing “pause” lets you draw attention to nuances that might otherwise be missed.  Sometimes, though, sending the video in advance is the best solution, especially when your time with a teacher is short.  You can then use your valuable time together to tweak and transform the strategy to meet the needs of her learners.  If you don’t have any face time at all, you can share a link as part of an online coaching conversation. 

Video recordings provide an instructional model that allows the teacher to see best practices in action.  For teachers of excellence, classroom instruction is always “under construction,” and providing a vicarious video model can help move the work along! 

 
This week, you might want to take a look at:

*A great app for capturing and sharing short video clips, Ubersense.  Although designed for coaching sports, this app works in the classroom, too.  You can add voiceover, arrows, and captions to draw attention to important features. 

*A companion to Lucy Calkin’s book, Pathways to the Common Core, the site listed below includes videos of teaching methods that support student learning with Common Core standards as a goal.  More than 40 video clips are available here:

http://vimeo.com/tcrwp/albums?utm_source=January+10%2C+2013+Communicator&utm_campaign=January+Communicator&utm_medium=email

 

*Coleman’s video about close reading of The Gettysburg Address (shared in last week’s post) has caused lots of comments nationwide.  Read Tim Shanahan’s reaction to this and other topics related to the Common Core in his post, “The Common Core Ate My Baby and other Urban Legends”:

 

http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/dec12/vol70/num04/The-Common-Core-Ate-My-Baby-and-Other-Urban-Legends.aspx

My colleague Jennifer Beasley shares her thinking about Common Core and gifted and talented learners, as well as broader implications for these standards, in her ASCD blog post:

http://inservice.ascd.org/commoncore/common-core-state-standards-a-good-fit-for-gifted-education/

Under Construction

Our home is under construction, and I am learning lots of new skills in the process!  When we moved to Arkansas, we bought a fixer-up – great view, wonderful floor plan, and lots of updating needed.  This month I learned about grout as we redid the tile in our kitchen.  After watching my husband clean and seal the muck between the tiles, I took tools in hand and successfully completed the task.  Watching a more experience “grouter” was all I needed to build my confidence in doing something I had never tried before. 

As in grouting, so in coaching.  For many teachers, modeling hits the spot, helping teachers feel secure about using new practices.  Modeling is the most  supportive scaffold in the GIR model.  In this post I’ll focus on the most typical type of modeling - modeling that occurs during a lesson.  Future posts will discuss other ways that modeling can be provided.

When teachers are learning new instructional practices, they may request that a coach model these practices.  For example, a teacher concerned about implementing close reading in her classroom asked her coach to model.  Modeling in the classroom allowed the teacher to see a close reading activity in action with her own students.  This authentic situation illustrated the nuances of  close reading, allowing the teacher the freedom to consider both teacher and student responses in a way that would have been difficult had she been in the driver’s seat.

When a coach models in the classroom, the teacher sees both the competence of the coach and her willingness to take a risk and learn and think alongside the teacher.  Don’t feel like your lesson has to be perfect; we all learn as we go by reflecting on successes and less-successful aspects of the lesson. 

When I think about my experiences with modeling, my mind returns to the time last year that I modeled a lesson in my daughter’s classroom.  She was a first-year second-grade teacher, feeling less than confident about her abilities.  In September, as the school year was just getting underway, I got a tearful, frustrated phone call during her recess break.  We decided having me model a lesson might be helpful, so I put on my super-cape and drove 700 miles to visit her classroom.  Mom to the rescue!  I felt pretty good about the vocabulary lesson I taught, especially considering that it was early in the school year and she had several special needs students in her classroom.

Recess was right after my modeled lesson, and my daughter had recess duty, so we walked together out to the playground.  My daughter broke the silence with a quizzical look and asked, “Mom, you won awards for your teaching, right?”  From the tenor of her voice, I knew the implications behind her question:  You won awards, but your teaching’s not perfect; the students weren’t perfect; maybe I don’t have to be perfect!”  Modeling gave my daughter new strategies to try, but more importantly, it let her know that perfection is not required or possible!  She set more realistic expectations for herself and her students and everybody learned more.

Thinking back on our home tiling project, I recognize now that the fact that my husband did not painstakingly level and groom each crack probably allowed me to take on the grouting task without undue angst.  Whether tiling or teaching, having a model to observe can make all the difference!

Resources to explore:

Close Reading:  Speaking of close reading, check out this discussion by Common Core author David Coleman:

http://vimeo.com/27056255

Goals:  The start of a new year is a great time for coaches, teachers, and students to think about goals.  Use quotes from this link (quotegarden.com/goals.html) and the protocol below* to get everyone talking about setting purposeful targets for their work.

*Quotes protocol preparation:  Facilitator finds lots of quotes about the topic under consideration (in this case, goals).  Quotes are printed and clipped with one quote per slip of paper.  Quotes are placed in the middle of each table.

  Quotes protocol procedure: 

1.      Grab a quote, read it over, and mull it over.

2.      Find a partner and share your quote and thinking.

3.      Trade quotes and find a new partner and repeat.

Followers:  For a good laugh and a good lesson about leadership, check out this video:

youtube.com/watch?v=hO8MwBZl-Vc

Then think about how you are cultivating followers.

That’s it for now.  Happy 2013!