Coaches support collaborative
reflection when they offer opportunities for teachers to share their work and
problem-solve together. Last week’s post
talked about the “5
P’s” for productive conversations. When these characteristics are the norm,
we listen to and understand each other better.
Of course, listening only works when
someone is talking! So teachers need to balance listening with sharing during collaborative reflection. As
each member of the group puts his or her own ideas on the table, using phrases
such as, “Here is one idea…” or “Another consideration might be…” helps
to keep the conversation open. Both
inquiring into the ideas of others and advocating for one’s own ideas are
important to productive dialogue.
As the conversation unfolds, asking
one another questions helps us stay open to new ideas. Teachers can ask, “What if…?” “Would it be possible to…?” or, “If we (did this), then could students…?
To
assure that conclusions are well-founded, member of the team can ask clarifying
questions. Asking a colleague to “say more about that” or to respond to
the query, “Why do you think that?” helps
us to make meaning and recognize best practices.
As
a coach, you can model this kind of language and also have an explicit conversation
about its benefits. Including sentence
stems like these in a box on the agenda can be a good reminder to everyone.
Reflecting collaboratively increases
collective efficacy – the belief that what we do as teachers makes a difference
for student outcomes. Research by John Hattie
shows that collective
teacher efficacy is strongly correlated with increased student achievement
– three times more powerful and predictive of achievement than student
motivation, socio-economic status, or home environment and parental
involvement! When teachers get smarter
together, so do their students. That’s
why the language of collaborative refection deserves special attention.
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Teacher collaboration and reflection are things I’m passionate
about! You can read more about it in my
book, Collaborative Lesson Study,
which is now two weeks old. J It’s available here (20% discount code is TCP2019).
If you’d like to join the free Facebook book club for the book, click here. Discussion begins Sept. 27 with Chapter 1.
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This
week, you might want to take a look at:
Research book clubs for “pretend”
readers:
A teacher talks about learning from
coaching feedback:
Layering texts with Padlet to build
background knowledge:
A
good description of the “Stop & Think” comprehension strategy:
Keys
to productive struggle:
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