My Coaches' Couch: October 2026

Friday, October 30, 2026

Coaching for Teacher Agency

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You can find My Coaches Couch, the podcast (with different content) in your favorite podcast app or at MyCoachesCouch.podbean.com.
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George Bernard Shaw said, “To be in heaven is to steer.” This statement illustrates how prized personal agency is to the human spirit. This, of course, includes the teacher’s spirit, which can sometimes feel crushed under top-down directives and prescribed curricula. A low-cost way to avoid teacher attrition and keep the best teachers in the profession is to offer teachers opportunities to steer their own ship. Effective coaches adjust their approach as teachers gain experience and expertise. Increasing agency for teachers as the lead learners in their classrooms is empowering and energizing, sustaining teachers in their professional roles.

When teachers have agency (power and choice) over pedagogy, they have more energy and grit for this important work. Thinking about how to best support learning – using all they know about content, pedagogy, and their students – is demanding work, but it is empowering and life-giving!

As coaches, we sometimes unintentionally take up hierarchical positions of authority. Coaches who work intentionally to flatten hierarchies, instead of hanging onto their own positions of power, are more successful in their work.

What Does Agency Look Like in Coaching Work?

As coaches, we might value teacher agency but be unsure how that looks in practice. That’s because how it looks in practice will vary based on teacher needs. It gets complicated!

When a teacher will benefit most from seeing a coach model a lesson, honoring agency might sound like the teacher deciding what her focus will be as she observes. Discuss, in advance, what she feels would be most valuable for her to pay attention to.

When making recommendations seems the most valuable coaching move, offering a few options (instead of just one) for the teacher to consider honors the teacher’s agency. Even this opportunity for decision-making helps teachers exercise expertise and feel more powerful about their practice. Instead of, “try this,” offering, “Some things you might want to consider…” gives the teacher ownership to think things through. By providing multiple suggestions, we increase choice.

Asking questions opens the conversation to teacher’s own ideas and encourage them to explore possibilities and consider new approaches. Asking questions nudges teachers to identify their own next steps instead of looking to the coach for answers. Saying, “What are some possibilities you’re considering?” encourages teachers to do the intellectual work of weighing options. The decisions teachers make will reflect their understanding of their students and their own teaching contexts.

When coaches affirm or praise, teachers recognize the value of their own thinking and instruction, and that honors their agency and reinforces their confidence! When teachers' ideas and efforts are recognized, they feel more confident trying different approaches and taking instructional risks. They exercise their agency in ways that lead to productive change. The goal is not for teachers to leave a coaching conversation feeling good because they were praised, but to leave with a stronger sense of their own capacity.

No matter which of the 5 coaches moves from the GIR model you’re leaning on, you can do it in a way that supports teacher agency.

Charting Their Own Course

instructional coaching is not about taking the wheel, it’s about helping teachers become more confident and capable of steering their own practice. Offering options, thoughtful questions, and intentional affirmation creates opportunities for teachers to exercise their professional judgment and build on their own strengths, The goal is not for teachers to depend on a coach – it’s to help them chart their own course.

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

Boost creativity by chatting with a human (instead of AI):

https://theconversation.com/ai-may-quickly-generate-ideas-but-working-with-people-leads-to-more-creative-ones-292417

Making PD stick:

https://www.k12dive.com/news/how-can-leaders-ensure-professional-development-sticks/832394/

Teaching character traits vocabulary to deepen literary interpretations:

https://ccira.blog/2026/10/05/teaching-literary-vocabulary-to-deepen-close-reading-and-interpretation-a-beautiful-entanglement/

Leveraging multisensory learning:

https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/multisensory-learning/

Microteaching as a coaching process to support teacher (and student) growth:

https://www.edthena.com/visible-learning-micro-teaching-2-ways/

That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!

Want more coaching tips? Check out my book, Differentiated Mentoring & Coaching in Education: From Preservice Teacher to Expert Practitioner, available from Teachers College Press! I’m so excited to share it with you! TODAY you can use the code: OCT2026 for 15% off. Click here and I’ll email you the free Book Group Study Guide that includes questions, prompts, and activities you can use as you share the book with colleagues. I hope you’ll love this book as much as I loved making it for you!

Saturday, October 24, 2026

Coaches, Ask, “What’s Working?”

“What’s working for you right now?” It’s a question that invites the teacher to reflect on their own practice and share what they’re noticing about what is going well.

Instead of beginning with a problem (“What would you change about that lesson?” or “What do you want to work on?), which can make the conversation feel heavy before it has even gotten underway. asking “What’s working for you right now?” starts the conversation off with a positive tone and creates an opportunity to build on teachers’ strengths, learn more about what’s happening in their classrooms, and find a meaningful focus for coaching work.

Asking about what’s working gives the teacher a chance to identify a success, and it gives the coach an authentic starting point for reflection. This question is flexible enough to use in almost any coaching conversation, yet focused enough to lead somewhere useful.

Begin With Strengths and Possibility
Asking, “What’s working for you right now?” creates an opportunity to affirm in a way that feels specific and earned. Instead of offering generic praise, such as “You’re doing a great job,” you can respond to something the teacher has identified and help them recognize what makes it effective.

When I asked a teacher this question, she began describing a recent lesson in which students were especially engaged in discussion. As we talked through what had happened, she realized that she had asked more open-ended questions and allowed students more time to think before responding. Reflecting on the lesson helped her recognize these strategies she had used successfully as practices she could use again.

Another teacher described how he had changed his lesson halfway through because his students weren't understanding the concept. “I just stopped and tried a different example,” he explained. As we talked about that moment, he recognized how responsive he had been to his students' needs. Rather than simply moving on to the next topic, he had noticed a problem and adjusted his instruction. That was worth affirming! It also gave us something concrete to build on.

Beginning with what is working builds confidence!

Let the Teacher Do the Thinking
Something I appreciate about asking, “What’s working for you right now?” is that it puts the teacher in the driver’s seat. It starts with an observation from the teacher, rather than the coach. That matters because the one doing the thinking is the one doing the learning!

In the examples above about a classroom discussion and a changed example, when asked about what is working, teachers can uncover the reasons behind a successful moment. They may recognize a strategy they had not used intentionally or name a decision whose importance they had not fully considered.

Asking about what’s working gives teachers an opportunity to identify what matters to them and explain their thinking, inviting them to make sense of their own practice. In making sense of why something worked, teachers often discover what they want to repeat, refine, or extend.

In another conversation, a teacher mentioned that exit tickets were working well. As she reflected, she realized just how much the exit tickets were telling her about student understanding. Because the routine was already in place, it became a natural focus for our next steps. We explored how she might look for patterns in students’ responses and use that information to plan the following day’s instruction.

Build From What Is Already Working
Asking follow-up questions helps the teacher move from simply reporting a success to understanding it. Together, you can identify why the practice was effective. You might ask:
“What do you think contributed to that?”
“What did you notice students doing?
“How was that different from what usually happens?”
“What part of this would you like to build on?”
"Where else might that approach be useful?”

While reflecting on what’s working, teachers often begin generating their own next steps.

The conversation may eventually move toward a different topic. That’s fine. The question doesn’t prevent you from addressing something else. It just provides a positive, productive entry point. Even if the focus shifts, you have begun by acknowledging the teacher’s capacity and inviting them to take an active role in the conversation.

Coaching conversations often move quickly toward what did not go well or what needs to change. Those conversations certainly have their place, but when problems become our automatic starting point, coaching can feel heavy.
Asking, “What’s working for you right now?” offers another way in. It promotes growth by building from strengths rather than beginning with gaps.

This Week's Coaching Challenge
Try asking, “What's working for you right now?” at the beginning of a coaching conversation this week. Give the teacher time to think, listen carefully to the response, and see where the conversation leads.

You might discover an instructional strength you hadn't noticed, learn something new about how the teacher approaches their work, or uncover a next step that the teacher is ready to explore.

This simple coaching question can help you find a focus, gather meaningful information, and respond in ways that are aligned with the teacher's thinking. It affirms strengths and builds confidence. All of that from one simple, well-placed question. That's a coaching move worth keeping in your toolkit!

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

The hero’s journey for new teachers (October is a big month for new-teacher burnout!):

https://kappanonline.org/with-great-power/

6 benefits of play:

https://thegeniusofplay.org/tgop/benefits/genius/benefits-of-play/benefits-of-play-home.aspx

6 ways good teachers get better:

https://www.edutopia.org/article/how-good-teachers-get-even-better

Improve engagement, recall, and critical thinking of complex non-fiction texts:

https://www.middleweb.com/54414/using-key-words-to-build-written-responses/

This podcast about leveraging multisensory learning:

https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/multisensory-learning/

That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!

Want more coaching tips? Check out my book, Differentiated Mentoring & Coaching in Education: From Preservice Teacher to Expert Practitioner, available from Teachers College Press! I’m so excited to share it with you! You can use the code: OCT2026 for 15% off. Click here and I’ll email you the free Book Group Study Guide that includes questions, prompts, and activities you can use as you share the book with colleagues. I hope you’ll love this book as much as I loved making it for you!

Friday, October 9, 2026

Instructional Coaches, Be a Multiplier

Author Liz Wiseman urges leaders to be multipliers. While some leaders diminish, multipliers amplify the capabilities and contributions of the people around them. As instructional coaches, some of our most valuable contributions come not from knowing the answer, but from being multipliers – discovering each teacher’s genius and helping them recognize it and put it to use.

As a multiplier, coaches create conditions where teachers can contribute their best thinking and develop their abilities. When we’re sitting side-by-side with a teacher, thinking together about an instructional challenge, we use our own capabilities to bring out the teacher’s capacity. Recognizing a teacher’s talent and finding ways to help that native genius grow increases the impact on student learning.

Here’s an example: Ellie’s coach noticed her knack for drawing students into meaningful discussions. Ellie encourages students to build on one another’s ideas instead of simply stating their own thoughts. During their coaching conversation, Ellie’s coach described and praised this approach. Then they explored how to extend this strength by nudging students to ask each other follow-up questions. Ellie’s strength was magnified as her students shared the responsibility for creating meaningful conversations.

Another example: Samuel’s coach recognized his ability to identify patterns in his students’ assessment results. After the next round of formative assessments, the coach asked Samuel to share his insights about his class’s data with the PLC and explain his process for examining the data. His think-aloud benefited everyone on the team.

What one teacher finds challenging may come easily to another. Because it comes easily, teachers may not recognize their superpowers as something special. As coaches, we can be on the lookout for strengths and help teachers recognize their own genius by naming the specific things they do well and expanding the impact those abilities have on student learning. Rather than offering general praise, we can help teachers see what they're doing and why it matters, Shining this light helps them put their talent to good use more consistently. When we help teachers extend their strengths beyond what they're already doing, we expand the possibilities for their professional growth and their students' learning.

This week, I invite you to look for ways to be a multiplier. As you work with teachers, notice what they do exceptionally well. How might you help them build on that ability in a way that expands their impact? Name a strength. Help the teacher see its value. Then explore where that ability might take them next.

As we help teachers discover new ways to apply what they already do well, they multiply what they can accomplish with strengths they already possess.

This week, you might want to take a look at:
Make the closing conversation count:

https://www.smartbrief.com/original/the-last-20-minutes-of-your-offsite-are-the-ones-that-matter-most

Authors read their (PK-3) picture books aloud:

https://www.edutopia.org/article/read-aloud-picture-books-author-videos

4 things educators gain from professional conversation:

https://www.teachingchannel.com/k12-hub/blog/conversation-deepens-professional-learning/

How acting boosts learning:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-acting-out-in-school-boosts-learning/

A podcast about substantive conversation in the classroom:

http://www.idra.org/images/stories/CN-130.mp3

That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!

Want more coaching tips? Check out my book, Differentiated Mentoring & Coaching in Education: From Preservice Teacher to Expert Practitioner, available from Teachers College Press! I’m so excited to share it with you! You can use the code: OCT2026 for 15% off. Click here and I’ll email you the free Book Group Study Guide that includes questions, prompts, and activities you can use as you share the book with colleagues. I hope you’ll love this book as much as I loved making it for you!

Friday, October 2, 2026

“Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it is thinking of yourself less.”

~C.S. Lewis

Coaches are usually hired because they have extensive knowledge and experience. The trust that is necessary for coaching includes both relational trust and experiential trust. The teachers you are working with need to feel seen and safe in your presence, and they also need to feel that you are credible and that you believe they are, too. Credibility comes from knowing that you are drawing from your own experience and from your knowledge in the field. Teachers need to know they can trust any guidance you might provide. So they have to know you know some things! However, your confidence will be best received if it is quiet confidence paired with curiosity and humility.

“Wait,” you might be wondering, “Can confidence and humility co-exist?” The answer is, “Yes!” and they should. The trick here is recognizing that confidence and humility are not two ends of the same continuum, but rather the hoped-for ends of different continuums.*

Confidence and Humility
Yes, we can aim for confidence and humility at the same time. What we are avoiding is shame and pride.

Confidence is the opposite of shame. Shame is negative self-judgment. It is embarrassment, guilt, and humiliation. Don’t go there! Confidence, on the other hand, is a recognition of one’s own capability. It is self-efficacy, knowing that we can make a difference. Let’s lean away from shame and toward confidence!

Confidence, however, does not equal pride. They are not even on the same spectrum! Pride is ego and conceit. It is an ostentatious display and puffed-up-edness. It will not serve us well as coaches. The truly wise coach will recognize that keeping her ego in check is necessary for developing and sustaining coaching relationships. Be a humble servant-leader.

Side-by-Side
Coaches are sometimes cautioned against spending time as the “helper” – the runner of copies, the orderer of supplies. While it’s true that coaches must guard their time and that direct work with teachers is most impactful, the quickest way I ever earned trust was stapling a border on a bulletin board.

When I was working as a district literacy coordinator, I was assigned to support teachers at a school that had just been labeled, “Turnaround,” meaning that if they didn’t turn things around, they’d be taken over. Needless to say, it was a tense environment! When I showed up for the first meeting, Elana, the instructional coach, welcomed me from atop a folding chair, where she was putting up a bulletin board. “What can I do to help?” I asked, knowing, like she did, that the superintendent would be making a “surprise” visit in about an hour. Between the two of us, we quickly finished the bulletin board, stapling up statements of district and school goals to greet school visitors. I noticed several teachers pause in their treks down the hall and look up at me, questioning. Later, Elana told me, “You won a lot of trust that way.” Rolling up my sleeves and stapling a few papers before the superintendent’s visit helped teachers feel that I was on their side, working with them, not on them.

Like my stance on the chair in the hall, coaching with confidence is a tenuous position: from confidence, we can too easily teeter to pride. If we go into conversations with our minds made up or with the idea that we need to impart wisdom, the door for dialogue and trust is shut. Instead, we can cultivate humility.

Sustaining Humility
Humility is a mindset about how we approach those we are working with. Are we stand-and-deliver directors or side-by-side partners? Humility establishes a productive horizontal stance with teachers, rather than a vertical, authoritative stance over them. We can acknowledge and draw on teachers’ expertise and experience while sharing our own.

In effective teacher-coach relationships, ideas flow easily both ways. Rather than jumping in to share our ideas first, though, in order to overcome biases about vertical leadership, as coaches, we may need to hold our ideas and talk later, so that teachers are encouraged to lead out with their own thoughts.

To move forward in a coaching cycle, I have to shift the focus from me and what I know to the teacher and what she knows. It’s not hard to make a recommendation when a teacher asks for support. It’s much harder to hold my tongue and instead of sharing my ideas, ask a question that allows a teacher to share hers. She doesn’t need to know how smart I am; she needs to know how smart she is. My questions can help her realize that she really does have answers.

If I ask, “What else have you been considering?” my question affirms the teacher as one who thoughtfully deliberates her decisions.

If I ask, “What did you notice about students’ thinking?” my question recognizes her thoughtful observations.

Questions like these that hold positive assumptions about teachers’ actions and abilities build teachers’ confidence and encourage ongoing use of the attributes that have been noted. This coaching move also sustains my humility as I see and acknowledge the wisdom of others.

Nurturing humility requires profound self-reflection, recognizing what we do not know and do not understand. We need the teacher to educate us about their own experience and the experiences of their students. As we listen deeply and interact empathically, we gain a better understanding of the teacher’s wisdom.

Sustaining Confidence
Beginning coaches, especially, might experience Imposter syndrome. We feel elevated responsibility because of our new role. Sometimes we want to demonstrate our authority or ability. But confidence in the coaching role doesn’t mean knowing everything; it means offering your knowledge with humility and genuine curiosity. When teachers feel both seen and respected, coaching partnerships flourish.

It can sometimes be hard to pull away from our own knowledge and experience. We have to mentally set aside the answer we would give so that we can care more about the teacher’s response.

A friend recently told me about her own child’s elementary school art teacher. Let’s call the child Emily and the art teacher Mrs. Bard. Emily was working on a drawing during art class, sketching it out with a pencil before applying paint. Mrs. Bart, wanting to teach about perspective, erased a line and redrew it at a different angle. The drawing was certainly improved in the process. When Emily brought the finished painting home, her mother praised the outcome. Emily responded, “It’s not my drawing, it Mrs. Bard’s.” Emily lost ownership of her own work through that erased and redrawn line.

I’ve cautioned against a similar practice during writing workshop. “Make sure the pen stays in the child’s hand,” I’ve said, wanting writing conferences to be meaningful for students. But I have sometimes been guilty of “stealing the pen” during a coaching conversation. Sometimes my comment erases a teacher’s valuable perspective, replacing it with my own view. Instead, we can grow confident in our role as coaches by seeing the fruits of our labors: improvement in practice growing from teachers’ own insights.

As coaches, it’s important to be confident about what we bring to the table, We can be confident that we are fulfilling our coaching role when we also acknowledge that others bring valid and valuable knowledge and experience. Coaching is a learning journey we undertake together.

Be a Co-Learner
You were hired as a coach because you have knowledge of content and pedagogy. You know how to teach effectively. Your job is to help others in their pursuits of improvement, and you have a lot to give. You know a lot, but you don’t know everything. Look to the teachers you are working with to find out what they know. They know about their students. They know about their class’s history. They know about themselves as teachers. That is a lot of knowing!

Coaching trust is built through a steady presence grounded in both experience and inquiry. When teachers sense that you truly see them, that you honor their work, and also that you bring hard-earned knowledge to your conversations, trust grows. It’s not about showcasing expertise; it’s about offering it with curiosity. Quiet confidence, paired with genuine curiosity, invites collaboration and deepens the coaching partnership.

How can you acknowledge that you are a learner, too? Your stance as co-learner is evident in your language: in how you make recommendations, in the types of questions you ask, and in the authenticity of your praise. We can say, “I wonder what would happen if…..” and truly wonder. We can ask, “Have you tried…..” because we want to know how past practice is informing present decisions. We can say, “That’s such a smart idea!” when it is!

Attributes like humility and confidence can make or break a coach’s work, even if she has all the right procedures in place. I’m working to grow these attributes myself, and I hope sharing these ideas will support you on your own personal journey. Humility and confidence are important attributes as we forge relationships and continue to develop our coaching identity.

*Thanks to life coach Jody Moore for these ideas.

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

Do you have meeting overload?

https://www.smartbrief.com/original/a-guide-to-escaping-meeting-overload

Ideas for supporting students in the “fight-flight-freeze” zone:

https://www.teachingchannel.com/blog/fight-flight-freeze

Sponsoring intergenerational reading buddies:

https://www.edutopia.org/article/adult-reading-buddies-elementary-school

Multisensory learning and movement = learning that sticks (3 min. video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9RH8rVBglg&feature=youtu.be

Using kilo -- the traditional Hawaiian practice of intentional observation -- to boost focus, writing skills and environmental awareness:

https://www.smartbrief.com/original/kilo-learning-from-a-living-textbook

That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!

Want more coaching tips? Check out my book, Differentiated Mentoring & Coaching in Education: From Preservice Teacher to Expert Practitioner, available from Teachers College Press! I’m so excited to share it with you! You can use the code: SEP2026 for 15% off. Click here and I’ll email you the free Book Group Study Guide that includes questions, prompts, and activities you can use as you share the book with colleagues. I hope you’ll love this book as much as I loved making it for you!