For
more than a month, our team had been working on student discussion, and Bethani
was frustrated. Despite her
carefully-planned questions, discussion had fallen flat during the lesson on
character traits in her third-grade classroom. As I settled in for our coaching conversation,
I reminded myself of past experiences working with frustrated teachers. I knew we’d be more successful if I listened
to and affirmed Bethani’s frustrations, focus on one aspect of instruction,
brainstorm causes and solutions, and choose a next step.
Step One: Listen
As
Bethani reflected on the lesson, she described how the partner talk she had
used as a lesson opener had fallen flat.
Bethani had felt sure her students would be interested in talking about
themselves, but she ruminated about how, when she asked them to turn to a partner
and share two “inside traits” about themselves, there was a lot of silence
followed by a little bit of talk about what was for lunch. Later in the lesson, Bethani had given each
student a card with a trait and asked them to move to separate sides of the
room depending on whether their card listed an “inside trait” or “not an inside
trait.” She was discouraged that, when
it came time to defend their choices, they hadn’t made the distinction between
traits and emotions, and they had little to say. She had been expecting a healthy debate! As Bethani described her frustrations with
the lesson, I mentally catalogued them but didn’t
say much.
Step Two: Affirm the
Frustration
Once
the tide of Bethani’s frustration seemed spent, I affirmed her frustration. “It can definitely be frustrating when a
carefully-planned lesson doesn’t turn out the way we expect,” I said. My affirmation acknowledged Bethani’s careful
planning, and my use of the pronoun “we” demonstrated that other teachers
(including me) shared similar frustrations. Although validating Bethani’s
frustration was an important step, it simply cleared the field for the real
work ahead.
Step Three: Narrow the Focus
Although
Bethani felt frustrated about several aspects of the lesson, I knew we couldn’t
tackle everything at once. Asking
Bethani to narrow the focus was our
next step. “If you could change one part
of the lesson, which part would it be?” I asked. Bethani sat up straight and there was a long,
thoughtful pause before she responded. “The
card sort,” she said. “I knew it would be difficult, but I thought it would
lead to great discussion and help them see the difference between emotions and
personality traits. But it just didn’t
work.” My request for the one thing she would change helped Bethani
move away from the feeling that everything had gone wrong to focus on
priorities.
Step Four: Consider Causes
Now
that we had prioritized the portion of the lesson that seemed most significant,
it was time to brainstorm. Why hadn’t things gone the way she’d planned?
“I guess the concept was too hard,” Bethani replied when I asked her about possible
causes. “That’s one possibility,” I
said. “What else might have gotten in
the way?” “I’m not sure,” she said. “Describe the situation to me,” I asked. “Let’s visualize what happened.” Bethani talked about how students’ divided up
after they received their trait cards, and she described how some students
seemed confused, especially those who had a card that described an
emotion. “But I was expecting that,” she
said. “In fact, I intended it to be
hard. That’s why I thought they’d get
into discussing it.” “Tell me more about what happened,” I prompted. “I chose a few students to read their cards
after they had separated,” Bethani explained.
“Then I asked everyone to show whether they agreed or disagreed. If they disagreed, I asked them to tell me
why. But I had to repeat a lot because
they couldn’t hear each other.” Bethani
had identified several possible causes for the flopped discussion. And they all may have played a part. But to
move forward, it would be helpful to isolate a solution.
Step Five: Resolution and Next
Steps
As
I visualized the scenario Bethani had described, the thing that jumped out at
me was the space between would-be discussants.
“How far apart were the two groups of students?” I asked. “I had them go to the walls, so there was a
lot of space between the two rows.” I
didn’t respond, wondering if a pause for thinking might allow Bethani to come
to her own solution. “I wonder…..” she said.
“I found myself repeating comments.
I bet if the two lines had been closer together, things would have
worked out differently.” “Use of space
can make a surprisingly big difference when we are hoping for
student-to-student discussions,” I responded.
“Students could see each other, so that was a plus,” I said, “but
proximity is important, too.” “So,” said Bethani, “next time I’m hoping for
rich discussion, I’m going to think about how students are facing and how
far apart they are.” Bethani had
identified her own next steps.
When
I listen and affirm the concerns of a frustrated teacher, I know I’m taking
important first steps in our coaching conversation. The way I angle my questions and responses as
we move forward can help teachers to narrow to a manageable focus, consider
causes, and define next steps. Together,
we are able to discover tentative solutions.
Checking
back with a frustrated teacher is vital.
The solution we designed may work, but there’s also the possibility that
it might not be working. If frustration
has increased, a more supportive coaching move, like modeling or making specific
recommendations, may be needed. Or
perhaps other issues have cropped up and we can begin this process again. When we check back with teachers, we
demonstrate that we care about their frustrations and their successes. Together, we walk the path toward ongoing instructional
improvement.
This week, you might want to
take a look at:
My
guest post about resilience on CCIRABlog:
A
video about building coaching relationships:
Podcasts
about social justice and education:
Best books on the craft of writing:
An
interesting picture-book read aloud that looks at changes in technology and
gender roles across 400 years through one delicious dessert:
(and
here’s a video of the book if you’re curious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5ainLDFbNY)
That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!
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