Improvement
Begins with I.
Coaching
is about improvement. Coaches wouldn’t
exist if somebody didn’t want something to change. But coaching works best when the somebody who
wants something to change is the same person as the one who is supposed to be
doing the changing! In teaching, that
means instruction is most likely to improve if the teacher owns the desire for
change.
My
experience is that it’s often the best teachers who are most interested in
improvement (there’s a message in that!).
We shouldn’t be deterred from working with these outstanding
teachers. As Charlotte Danielson has
said, “Because
teaching is so demanding and complex, all teaching can be improved; no matter
how brilliant a lesson is, it can always be even better”*
Whether
we’re working with expert teachers or novices, having them choose the focus for
our coaching cycles makes coaching more effective. Brenda Powers** suggested that working on a
problem someone else hands you is “not going
to add much zest or pleasure to your teaching.” If a teacher is working on something she cares
about it’s always going to be a better problem to think about than anything
suggested by somebody else.
Instructional
frameworks can be helpful in determining a coaching focus. I like Charlotte Danielson’s work. Although her Framework for Teaching is now
being used extensively as an evaluation instrument, the title of her book is Enhancing Professional Practice – and that’s
just what we as coaches want to do. She
talks about teaching in terms of four areas, or “domains”: Planning and
Preparation, Classroom Environment, Instruction, and Professional
Responsibilities. I find that the
descriptors of proficient and distinguished practice align well with research
about effective instruction and with my own experience. During an initial coaching conversation, the
framework helps us choose a narrow, manageable focus for our work.
As
coaches, our work is improving teacher effectiveness – and that is just the
work that many teachers would like support with. In these times when the stakes are high
around teacher evaluation, coaches’ support in helping teachers improve their
practice is a valuable commodity. While
some bemoan the emphasis on teacher effectiveness, I believe that, if our
framework for evaluation is appropriate, it will be a good thing for kids. And it might just open a door or two for you
as a coach. Once you step inside that
door, allowing the teacher to choose the focus (putting the “I” in “improvement”)
will heighten the value of your work together.
*
Danielson, C. (2012). Observing
Classroom Practice. Educational Leadership, 70(3), 32-37
**Choice
Literacy Newletter, 8/31/2013.
Downloaded from choiceliteracy.com.
This week, you might
want to take a look at:
The
Danielson teaching framework rubrics, available free at:
Other
teacher effectiveness resources from Danielson on her site at:
Listen to
this informative podcast about close reading:
A blog
post about what close reading isn’t:
A video about using counting
collections in grades K-2:
That’s all for this week. Happy Coaching!
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