Modeling as a Blueprint for Redesigning Instruction

Have you thought about how different teaching is from other professions?  In the giant Venn diagram of jobs, teaching has many characteristics that fall only within its sphere.  One of them is the experiences teachers bring to the profession.  Unlike other professionals, teachers take on their role having had considerable experience as recipients of the service they are about to provide.  Although a new lawyer may have had some interactions as a client in the legal system, and certainly doctors have been patients multiple times in their lives, teachers have far more experience in the “customer’s” seat, having spent at least 17 years in school prior to entering the profession.  This experience is what Lortie (1975) called an “apprenticeship of observation.”  Although there are some benefits to this vast experience, it comes at a cost.

Throughout their years in school, most teachers’ experiences have included examples of less-effective instructional practices.  Modeling is a fruitful way to redesign these pedagogical approaches.  For example, testing in recent decades has focused some teachers’ instruction on acquisition of facts as a learning goal.  This goal may manifest itself in the use of fill-in-the-blank worksheets and closed discussions with teacher as dispenser of knowledge.  If you are working with a teacher who has inherited such practices, it’s time for an instructional remodel!

First, find a thoughtful way to call attention to the practice that needs replacing.  Think like an architect.  What is it that’s ineffective in the current set-up?  Why?  Be able to describe it.  Be able to back the concern with more than a logical explanation.  Acknowledging the impact of past experience and then drawing in the voice of an outside expert by using an article or citing research can diffuse the finger-pointing feeling.  Then help the teacher to see the redesign you’re envisioning.

Modelling can serve as a blueprint for redesigning instruction.  It can help a teacher overcome less-effective practices absorbed through their “apprenticeship” and apprentice them into more effective instruction.  As you model, encourage the teacher to look for the differences – specifics ways in which she can remodel what she’s been doing to update instruction.  For example, to remodel the less-effective teacher-as-dispenser and student-as-fill-in-the-blanker routines, the teacher might notice your open-ended questions and the ways in which you use graphic organizers to support student thinking. 

Remodeling can be overwhelming as a DIY project, but with a coach for support and modeling to provide a blueprint, the teacher you are working with can move forward successfully with their redesign project!

Lortie, D. (1975).  Schoolteacher: A sociological study. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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

A video about revising a lesson:

https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/when-lesson-plans-fail

A collection of articles about elementary math instruction, including teaching fractions, understanding spatial skills, and the role of gender in math instruction:

https://fs24.formsite.com/edweek/images/spotlight-on-elementary-math-sponsored.pdf

An article from the coach’s perspective about purposeful guided reading lessons and grouping students for instruction:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/articles-detail-view.php?id=1195

An article from Teen’s Health on test anxiety (includes an audio link to have the article read aloud):

http://kidshealth.org/teen/school_jobs/school/test_anxiety.html

Using the internet safely:

https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/teaching-digital-citizenship

That’s it for this week.  Happy Coaching!

Close Reading and Romance?

What do close reading and romance have to do with each other?  A lot, according to S.I. Kishor, author of the short story, “Appointment with Love.”

I usually steer clear of the Common Core Wars and focus my blog comments on coaching-specific topics.  But this week I watched a short (28 minute!) movie that exemplified my own view on close reading so well that I felt the blog could take a detour.  Math folks, don’t stop reading – the main character in the movie is a high school math teacher!

Without being a spoiler, I’ll just say that the movie, called “The Book and the Rose,” (and taken from the short story referenced above) tells the tale of a couple who initially meets and eventually falls in love because of notes sprawled in the margins of a donated book.  A spunky and insightful personality is illuminated by those marginal comments, providing an authentic model for close reading. 

Unfortunately, with adoption of the Common Core, close reading has sometimes turned into a very formulaic enterprise.  “That’s not how you do close reading,” I recently heard.  “You don’t think about author’s language use until the third read.”  But what if that idea happens to pop into your head the first or second time you read a selection?  Or what if it there’s one sentence that is actually worth rereading four or five times, because you just love the way it sounds, or the image it paints, or what it makes you think about?

My point is, close reading is a very good thing.  And it is exactly what the name implies: reading closely.  It shouldn’t require a formula.  It should require an active mind and attention to things both big and little that are hiding in the writing. 

Can you know someone’s mind and heart by reading their responses to a book through the notes they wrote in the margins?  I suppose it depends on the book.  And I know it depends on the reader.  Watching a short romance movie got me thinking about how close reading can mean spilling our thoughts – our conundrums, our querries, and our insights - onto the margins of a page.  If you want to convince someone of the merits of close reading (and that someone is a hopeless romantic!), you just might want to share the movie, “The Book and the Rose” (available now on Netflix).

That’s it for my blatant movie promotion – next week I promise to return to my more staid comments about coaching!

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

The text from the original short story, “Appointment with Love.”  WARNING:  It doesn’t portray the essence of close reading – you’ve got to watch the movie for that.  And if you’re going to watch the movie, don’t read the short story until after watching the movie!

http://www.snopes.com/glurge/therose.asp

I bought the movie on Amazon so I could show clips at an upcoming professional development meeting.  You can find it at:

http://www.amazon.com/Treasured-Stories-Collection-Lucado-Story/dp/5550268124/ref=sr_1_2?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1394230440&sr=1-2&keywords=book+and+the+rose

Okay, now I’m really done with the movie promotion. 

Here's video about acting out word problems:

http://nicoraplaca.com/one-strategy-attacking-word-problems/

Do teachers need to switch things up now that spring is around the corner?  Here’s a Pinterest board about the thinking behind varying seating arrangements:

http://www.pinterest.com/runfardvs/classroom-seating-arrangements-and-learning-spaces/

Tips for professional development:  What to do when people are talking while you’re presenting:

http://heatherrader.com/archives/208

That’s it for this week.  Happy coaching!

Variety is the Spice of Life – and Coaching!

No two teachers are alike, so no two coaching cycles will be, either!  The GIR coaching model can serve as a guide no matter who you are working with, but where you begin and the way you move through it will change every time. 

Working with Expert Teachers:

When I talked to a coach who was working with an expert teacher to implement the CCSS, she said, “She really didn’t need the modeling, or the recommending, either.  I jumped right in with questioning.  That helped support her thinking and reflection.”  But later, when the same teacher was working on differentiation – a complex teaching skill – modeling and recommending were included before moving to less-supportive coaching approaches.

Working with Novice Teachers:

Another coach talked about how the model guided her as she worked with a less-confident teacher.  “She really needed the modeling,” she said, “and at first even that wasn’t working.  She didn’t know what to pay attention to.  Modeling started working better once I gave her very specific things to watch for.”  Then they moved into recommending – a phase that lasted a long, long time!  Questioning finally became the dominant move (even though recommending lingered) very late in the coaching cycle.  And the coach felt they never made it to praising when she commended the teacher’s work; it still felt more like affirming, because the teacher seemed still to be looking for validation.

The Upward-Trending Line

I hope the GIR Model will be a guide for you as you work with a variety of teachers.  Coaches have told me that keeping the upward-trending squiggly line from the model in the minds helps their coaching move forward so they don’t get stuck in a coaching cycle.  Teachers increase in competence and confidence (even with difficult instructional approaches) as we continually push the upper limits of their ZPD’s by adjusting our support.  You’ll likely use a variety of the coaching moves described (modeling, recommending, questioning, affirming, praising) at some point during each coaching cycle – and with some teachers, you’ll hang onto an approach throughout the time you are work together.  But shifting which move is dominant – which one you are doing the most of – helps to move your work forward.   So change it up every time, in response to teachers’ needs.  Variety is the spice of life – and coaching!

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

A quick video about anecdotal records:

https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/informal-assessment-strategies?utm_campaign=digest&utm_medium=email&utm_source=digest

Touchy topics sure to get the ideas flowing for opinion/argument writing:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/articles-detail-view.php?id=1486

Tips for handling questions during professional presentations:

http://heatherrader.com/archives/date/2013/11

Drawing diagrams of a word problem makes a big difference!  Check out ideas for support this strategy at:

http://nicoraplaca.com/one-strategy-attacking-word-problems/

If you have the patience to listen to (or skim through) this recording, you’ll find an incredibly powerful message about student engagement and learning (don’t stop at the computer part – that’s not really what it’s about):

http://umano.me/c/XNOr/how-a-radical-new-teaching-method-could-unleash-a-generation-of-geniuses

Just for fun……12 Things you should never say to a teacher:

http://weareteachers.tumblr.com/post/74492609694/12-things-you-should-never-ever-say-to-teachers

Co-Teaching: High-Voltage Collaboration!

Coaching cycles are “co-laboring” activities, with coach and teacher working in concert to ensure that students have the best-possible learning experiences.  That co-laboring can take many forms.  Near the end of a coaching cycle, co-teaching may be the right move.  Kids really benefit and coach and teacher see each other in action in this side-by-side scenario. 

I’ve had many opportunities to observe co-teaching, but one stands out in my mind.  Sue and Sherri worked seamlessly together as they co-taught lessons.  It’s easy to put two teachers to use in a classroom during guided reading, with each having a group, but what impressed me about this dynamic duo was the way they shared the air during whole group instruction.  The class held meaningful discussions, with teacher and coach posing thoughtful questions as needed to keep things going.  When it was time for a quick table talk, both instructors leaned in to hear the conversations.  When the flow of whole-group discussion was punctuated with a stop-and-jot moment, each of them zeroed quickly in on students who they knew would need extra scaffolding.  Like bees buzzing in and out of the hive, it ran like a perfectly orchestrated activity. 

I wondered how much planning it took to pull this off.  When I checked in with Sue and Sherri about it, their answer was surprising.  “Not much,” they said.  “We plan a general outline for the lesson and go from there.”  What made their partnering work was the shared vision they had already created and the understanding of individual needs that had developed during the time they spent together.  Specific instructional routines they’d worked on previously came together as they joined their efforts in co-teaching the class.

Co-teachers are co-laboring – working together, side-by-side, for the benefit of students.  Sue and Sherri’s co-teaching approach is just one of many possibilities.  When co-teaching, some coach/teacher combinations like to divide the lesson into clear segments, taking turns with who is leading and who is supporting.  Others prefer a more free-form, ping-ponging of instruction, with both teachers actively teaching at the same time.  As co-teachers, each partner brings unique skills and perspectives to the learning experience.

Co-teaching is high-voltage collaboration!  Coach and teacher are in sync in this interactive, interdependent enterprise.  Although co-laboring in the form of teaching together can be very effective, few educators have the luxury of co-teaching as an ongoing approach, but it can be a productive phase on the road to interdependence and collaboration, which is the end goal for the GIR coaching model.

Whether co-teaching or working together in other forms, collaboration is a shared creation that surpasses what individuals could have produced on their own.  Co-teaching and other forms of collaboration are possible when educators are united in purpose and share an understanding of instructional best-practices. If you haven’t already tried co-teaching, you might consider giving this high-voltage collaborative approach a try!

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

Free digital non-fiction texts to download and use:

http://readingandwritingproject.com/resources/book-lists-classroom-libraries-and-text-sets-for-students/text-sets.html

A free webinar from NCTE about formative assessment:

https://iste.adobeconnect.com/_a729309453/p3zymmdedcw/?launcher=false&fcsContent=true&pbMode=normal

A middle-school teacher/coach details the steps in modeling her thinking – an effective instructional approach in any subject:

http://middleschoolteachertoliteracycoach.blogspot.com/2014/01/unscrewing-our-thinking-caps.html

An article about helping students evaluate online video for research:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/articles-detail-view.php?id=1797

A digital interactive timeline and accompanying lesson:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/student-interactives/timeline-30007.html

That’s it for this week.  Happy Coaching!

An Olympic Coach's Advice

Watching the amazing feats at the Olympics this week got me thinking:  How did these athletes develop such expertise?  Doubtless their coaches had something to do with it!  I took a look at advice from an Olympic coach and realized the ideas have merit for instructional coaches as well.  Here’s my adaptation of an Olympic coach’s wisdom:

1.  Set individual goals.   

Although teaching doesn’t (shouldn’t!) foster the competitive environment that exists in the Olympic games, human nature still has us comparing ourselves with others.  According to Olympic coach Bob Bowman, a true champion is as satisfied with meeting personal goals as with receiving a medal.  High performers operate according to their own standards and are satisfied when those standards are met. 

2.  Be better today than yesterday. 

If you do that enough days, you’ll travel a great distance!  Be process-oriented and focus on the things you can control.  Skills are developed through experience.  One of Bowman’s favorite sayings is, “Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.”  It’s okay to make mistakes, as long as we learn from them and make incremental improvements.  We learn from failures – sometimes even more than from successes!  When things don’t go well, encourage teachers (and yourself!) to take the opportunity to analyze what’s going on and make changes. 

3.  Expect challenges. 

There are frustrations and unexpected situations at school on a daily basis.  Accept that these challenges will happen.  Take them in stride and focus on opportunities; encourage the teachers you are working with to do the same.

4.  Recognize that one size does not fit all.

Coach Bowman said he used to have just one tool in his coaching toolbox – a hammer.  But he quickly figured out that many people don’t respond well to that approach!  Some respond to logic, others to motivation.  Coaches are successful when they tailor their approach to the individual. 

Like the Olympic athletes soaring to success this week, coaches and teachers will find success in their work as they set personal goals, strive for incremental improvement, work through the inevitable frustrations, and expand the toolkits they use in their important work. 

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

An interactive digital graphic organizer for comparing and contrasting:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/student-interactives/compare-contrast-30066.html

A list of authors who will Skype with a classroom for free:

http://www.katemessner.com/authors-who-skype-with-classes-book-clubs-for-free/

How Google Docs are Revolutionizing the Classroom:

http://cognoscenti.wbur.org/2013/11/12/teaching-collaborative-technology-mike-kalin

Article Smorgasbord - A great PD activity for offering choice while building background knowledge:

http://heatherrader.com/archives/80

22 Formative assessment techniques:

http://www.nwea.org/blog/2013/22-easy-formative-assessment-techniques-for-measuring-student-learning/

That’s it for this week!  Happy Coaching!

Modeling the Intangibles

Charlotte Danielson, whose work on teacher effectiveness has been widely acknowledged throughout the country, describes an intangible classroom element that is crucial to engagement and meaningful learning:

Teachers whose classrooms constitute a safe and challenging environment for student learning have artfully combined challenge with support.  This teaching is not formulaic; it is a high-level professional enterprise in which teachers know when to cajole, when to reteach, when to praise, and when to enlist the participation of other students, all in the service of high-level learning.*

Establishing a learning environment like the one Danielson describes is an important goal that can be embedded in coaching work.  No matter what the coaching focus you’ve selected, the teacher you are working with can simultaneously consider her teaching disposition and how her values are reflected continuously in classroom interactions.  Teaching dispositions include characteristics such as:

---Fostering supportive relationships (teacher-student and student-student)

---Respecting diversity

---Holding high expectations for students

Coaches tell me that modeling is an effective way to draw attention to these attributes.  One coach said, “It’s about how I speak to kids.  That’s another part of modeling – the rapport she sees, the relationships with kids, the way I respond, the way I react to student behavior.  It’s a big part of the modeling.”  Another said, “She sees what my expectations are, what is acceptable, what is not.”  Coaches point out that these intangibles get noticed during modeling.  And often the teacher brings them up unsolicited during a debrief conversation.  One coach noted, “I model respect for the kids, and she has commented on that.  I don’t raise my voice.  Just my demeanor.  I think maybe that set her at ease, too.”

The same dispositions that made you an effective teacher constitute your effectiveness as a coach.  The supportive relationships you established in your classroom are critical in your coaching.  The high-expectations you had for your students are also needed for the teachers you are working with.  Display these attributes in your work with teachers and draw attention to them when you model in the classroom.  Your work and the work of teachers you coach will profit from an increased emphasis on the intangibles that create a respectful learning environment. 

*Danielson, C. (2009).  Talk About Teaching, Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, p. 58. 

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

A coaching blog about examining the impact of where you sit during a coaching conversation:

http://heatherrader.com/archives/365

A podcast on making formative assessment useful:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/articles-detail-view.php?id=1934

An inspiring video, “What Teachers Make”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuBmSbiVXo0

A video on mirror neurons that will give food for thought about establishing rapport:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/mirror-neurons.html

Tried-and-true protocols for professional conversations:

http://www.nsrfharmony.org/protocols.html

That’s it for this week.  Happy Coaching!

                                                            

Trying It On

When one of my daughters is in town, my credit-card statement burgeons in the category of “clothes."  That’s because we both find it’s so much more fun to go shopping when you do it with someone!  It’s also useful to have another set of eyes.  “What do you think?”  “How does this look?”  “Which one fits better?”  It’s nice to have someone who’ll give you answers to those questions.  Similarly, having someone who’ll answer questions about instruction makes teaching more effective.  

When a teacher you’re working with is trying a new strategy on for size, she may be looking for your recommendations.  Having another set of eyes is useful as she considers the “fit” of the new strategy in her classroom.  “What did you think?”  “Did this approach work better than the way I did it before?”  “How did (a particular student) respond?” “What do I need to change?”  Your honest feedback and recommendations will help your colleague hone her skills with a new approach during the “trying it on” phase. 

When your colleague poses specific questions, your answers to those questions are the best recommendations you can provide.  Even if you have other insights you’d like to share from the lesson, the teacher is giving you insight on her focus and what she is ready and wanting to do by the questions she asks.  Push your agenda aside for a bit and consider with her the answers to her burning questions.  The time for you to bring up other ideas often comes naturally as part of the conversation.  If not, you can make a note to include it in a future discussion.

Recommendations from a trusted companion are a valuable commodity.  Whether shopping or teaching, two minds and sets of eyes are better than one! 

This week, you might want to take a look at these classroom ideas about the Winter Olympics:

These suggested learning experiences connected with the Winter Olympics, from IRA & NCTE:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/calendar-activities/winter-olympics-begin-today-31068.html

Videos about the science and engineering of the Winter Olympic Games:

https://www.nbclearn.com/science-and-engineering-of-the-2014-olympic-winter-games

Lesson plans about the Games:

http://sochi2014.olympics.com.au/more/education/lesson-plans

Info. about the Olympic Symbols:

http://www.olympic.org/Documents/Reports/EN/en_report_1303.pdf

Who can forget Koala Lou?  That story, and others, are included in this book list for the Olympics:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/articles-detail-view.php?id=1939

For older students:  Info. about the tradition of the Olympic Torch Run in modern games (introduced by Hitler) can lead to discussion of other paradoxes:

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007451

 That's it for this week.  Happy Coaching!