Have
you ever given coaching feedback, felt like it was well-received, and then seen
little change? Unfortunately, a teacher’s
acknowledgment of a problem doesn’t mean she can implement a solution.
This
week I had a conversation with a coach who was feeling frustrated with the
results of her efforts. She had been giving detailed, specific feedback but
seeing no changes in instruction! What could be going wrong?
I
asked her to tell me more.
During
a grammar lesson, it quickly became apparent that the approach the teacher had
planned wasn’t working. Students did not understand. Later, when the coach brought this up, the teacher
readily agreed and recognized she should have been flexible and changed something in the middle of the lesson. The
problem was, the teacher didn’t know what that something was. Even though the feedback had
included detailed examples of students’ misunderstanding, it didn’t lead to a
better next lesson.
The
coach gave another example. During an
observation, this coach had taken careful notes and chosen some details to
share with the teacher. For example, she’d
noted that many students were off-task and did not appear to be engaged. That was
a problem! The teacher’s reply was that
yes – she had noticed they weren’t engaged. She was aware of the problem.
It was
a problem, however, that the teacher didn’t seem equipped to solve. She needed
specific recommendations. She needed to hear something like:
“When
planning your lesson, think about how you can incorporate students’ interests. For
example, Thanksgiving is coming up and they’ve been talking about that turkey
dinner! You could center their math problem around a shopping list for Thanksgiving
dinner and how much of each item they might buy if they have $60 to spend.
Making the problem relevant to their experience will increase engagement.”
I
reminded the coach of the recommendation equation we’d discussed earlier:
Feedback + Advice = Recommendation. The coach
realized she had left out the “advice” portion of the equation.
Sometimes teachers take feedback well – they nod and agree when a problem is
identified. But there are times when they can’t take it from there without your help. User-friendly
feedback at these times includes recommendations. Without the
recommendation, the feedback isn’t useful. In fact, it is frustrating.
A
novice teacher who is just beginning to build a teaching repertoire may need
support in using your feedback. They need you to figuratively hold their hand
and turn the feedback into a recommendation.
A recommendation that can be put into action will make direct feedback welcome
and user-friendly.
This week, you might want to
take a look at this potpourri of ideas and resources:
Using
music parodies to teach history:
4
minutes of movement increases students’ attention:
Executive function (mental
processes that help us plan, organize, control emotions, and manage time) in
teens is intermittent; here are some suggestions for improving it:
11 Tips for Teaching about
Theme:
Read
the blog post, “Dipsticks” for ideas to share about formative assessment
(includes 53 ways to check for understanding!):
That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!
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