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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yun-g_tYnMY

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Better Conversations - Instructional Coaching Group

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https://www.brightmorningteam.com/science/resilience

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Learn to make Onward and The Onward Workbook your go-to-guide for managing stress, preventing burnout and thriving as educators.

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Get your copy here Welcome to the 6 Tools Website! This site contains supplemental materials and resources for you to use as you plan and implement the tools in your schools and districts. Please remember to use #6ToolsforMathCoaches to discuss on social media. I’m looking forward to learning alongside you all! Tool 1 Building Teams … 6 Tools Read More »

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Opportunities that may take place over a longer period of time, require restructuring or class coverage, and/or participation with parties outside the classroom

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Opportunities that may take place over a longer period of time, require restructuring or class coverage, and/or participation with parties outside the classroom

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https://workforce.education.asu.edu/

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Opportunities that require some prior planning, follow up, or restructuring of a class period. 

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Opportunities that require some prior planning, follow up, or restructuring of a class period. 

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School News Network | A Window into Your Public Schools

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Two teachers, one big class - School News Network | A Window into Your Public Schools

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The pilot has already shown gains in instructional time, behavior and academics…

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These design strategies can help support relationship-building and active learning in a team-teaching environment.

Harry Campbell / The iSpot

However, most schools trying team teaching models need to rethink how their school environment can support a fundamentally different approach to the one-teacher-one-class model that was the norm when most schools and classrooms were designed. "Design"-whether it is architecture, interiors, or instruction-is really about creating something with an intent. I'm guessing that most readers don't have the opportunity to design an entire new school (but some do!). Still, most teachers can make important choices about how we set up our classrooms.

In this context, designing a supportive environment for team teaching can make it more effective and magnify the benefits. Preparing an environment for team teaching serves as a daily reminder of the value of collaborative teaching to students and teachers alike.

Design for Collegial Relationships

Trust between the educators who are working together is an essential element of team teaching. Every teacher must establish their classroom culture. In team teaching models, this picture becomes more complex. The way that the adults interact with each other provides an important model that the students will immediately observe and learn from as well.

For example, how does one educator speak to the other if they have a question or don't understand? How do they react to each other when they make a mistake? How do they share the labor in the classroom: Does only one teacher do the "tedious" tasks like cleaning or organizing? Each of these social dynamics provides a model for students to see how peers can and should collaborate with one another.

Designing for trusting teaching dynamics means preparing your space for each teacher to assume different roles throughout each day. How can you prepare the environment to support this breadth of roles in a day?

Rethink "teacher space" as more communal, rather than private. Reduce the amount of exclusively "owned" space in the room. Make the teaching desk available to multiple users, or eliminate the teacher space in the classroom entirely.

Include areas in the room that emphasize each teacher's strengths. Decorate the room with each teacher's identity. For example, the room might display one teacher's artwork and the other's movie posters. You can also organize your space for each teacher's favorite teaching methods. If one teacher loves reading circles and the other loves STEM projects, show that both are important with their own spaces in the classroom.

Protect teacher peace and identity within a more collaborative framework. Team teaching emphasizes human connection but does not eliminate the need for rest, planning, or personal moments. Make a plan for where and how you can make a confidential phone call, get highly focused work time, or simply eat your lunch alone when you need 20 minutes of quiet. Your plan could include reorganizing a faculty office/lounge for more personal space or having access to another area for some privacy and ownership.

Design for Fluid, Active Teaching

Team teaching is most effective when your model helps teachers integrate other effective practices into their teaching. Those practices can include project-based instruction and supporting student autonomy. Team teaching makes it easier to design interdisciplinary projects because each teacher can become an expert on different elements. For example, one teacher may be the class technology expert, and another may be the mathematics expert. As different teachers offer different resources to students, it elevates their autonomy by giving even more choices for how to engage the adults throughout the project.

Designing your environment to emphasize active, autonomous learning means preparing for more student movement and the structured unpredictability of creative student projects. How can you help students find what they need when you don't always know what it will be in advance?

Hack your space for flexibility and agility. Flexible furniture is great for helping teachers and students move and reconfigure the environment throughout the day. Add tennis balls to the bottom of chairs and tables to make them easier to slide (or simply add casters).

Think creatively about other environmental elements: Remove doors from cabinets to let different groups see and use more materials, place markers by windows so students can use them as a writing surface, and orient some student seating near a teacher space to facilitate team members' ability to do small group support within larger activities. Whether those resources are digital (like tablets) or analog (like mobile marker boards), the goal should be that students or teachers can quickly get them and respond to spontaneous needs that arise in the learning process.

Organize your space with "movement" as the default. Move your desks and chairs into clusters, with varied spaces for circulation. The groups can be different sizes and shapes, because different teachers can and will be managing different activities in them. The differences between group compositions can extend to how you engage new work surfaces, like windows for a new writing surface, walls for pin-up space or a mounted screen, or counters for an additional work surface.

Smaller reconfigurations happen more often than you may realize, and even more often with multiple teachers working together. You never know when people will need to scoot a table to alternate between periods of high circulation and periods of more spread-out tabletop work.
Note: A thank-you to Stacy Roth for her ideas and expertise in developing this article.
Team teaching offers the potential to make teaching more collaborative and satisfying by connecting multiple adults in a shared classroom practice. These are some early design approaches to supporting team teaching, but it is still an area of active research!

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Designing Your Classroom for Collaborative Teaching

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These design strategies can help support relationship building and active learning in a team teaching environment.

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Days in the Life: The Work of a Successful Multi-Classroom Leader®

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A matrix based on a teacher's belief in themselves and their belief in students can facilitate effective instructional coaching.

Hannah Thompson was in her first year of teaching, and like many novice teachers, she lacked confidence in her ability to do the job. (I changed the names in this article to protect confidentiality.) Her class management skills were still undeveloped, and her fourth-grade students required more structure and consistency.

Not knowing that many first-year teachers face similar challenges, Ms. Thompson was on the verge of quitting. She needed a full-scale intervention, and as an instructional coach, I was called in to help.

Benefits of Intervening in the Classroom

Co-teaching can be effective at accelerating teacher skill-building. Ms. Thompson needed someone to reinforce the idea that her students were capable of meeting expectations, and she needed to feel that she was capable of leading the class. I assessed that she had a low belief in herself but did believe that her students were capable of meeting expectations because she saw how they engaged in their special classes and in the cafeteria.

Over the next three days, I spent many hours in the classroom, pulling students out as necessary, circulating around the classroom, and occasionally addressing the class. Ms. Thompson started to repeat my behaviors. At the end of the third day, we debriefed. "I didn't think it was possible for me to get through a whole math lesson like this!" she said.

"And you did it because you narrated behavior, held students accountable, had clear directions, and much more. You have learned so many skills in such a short amount of time," I replied.

Reinforce positive mindsets about student(s): "I didn't know that my kids could do that!"

Reinforce positive beliefs that teachers hold about themselves: "I didn't think it was possible for me to..."

Make explicit connections between teacher actions and student actions

Build a lot of teacher skill

As this example illustrates, intervening in the classroom can do the following:

Risks of Intervening in the Classroom

But there are some risks if leaders do not assess the situation correctly. For example, Ryan Dawson was a middle school math teacher who also had classroom management difficulties. I thought modeling would be the best course of action. I planned the lesson and was ready to go. Almost immediately, students started yelling at me, "Are you here because our teacher sucks?" Mr. Dawson looked on in horror as students started moving out of their assigned seats, putting on their headphones, and talking to each other. While I was able to regain some control, it was ultimately a bust.

After the lesson, Mr. Dawson said, "See! What did I tell you?" The modeled lesson had reinforced negative mindsets about his students, and he used that as an excuse in every future conversation.

Unfortunately, I had not assessed the situation correctly. In prior conversations, he had blamed the kids for every problem he was having. He had high belief in himself and low belief in students. Modeling was not the way to go. Mr. Dawson continued to believe that it was the students' fault, made little effort to improve his performance, and was released from his contract at the end of the school year.

Decision-Making Matrix

After years of testing, iterating, and refining, my team and I finally figured out the two factors that influence how to intervene when a teacher needs support. First is the extent to which the teacher believes in their students, both academically and behaviorally. The second factor is whether the teacher believes in themselves and has high or low self-efficacy.

Coaches and administrators can use the following matrix to determine their action.

Team Teach: If the teacher has high self-efficacy and low belief in their students, a coach would choose to team teach. Teacher and coach teach the class together after planning a clear delineation of responsibility. For example, the coach may choose to open the lesson and turn it over to the teacher for guided practice. Having additional capacity in the classroom can demonstrate to the teacher that the students are capable of meeting expectations and learning outcomes with the right guidance and support.

Live Coach: If the teacher has high self-efficacy and high belief in students, a coach should live coach. In live coaching, the teacher teaches the class. The coach offers live guidance to the teacher and does not address the class. This may look like using hand signals in the back, offering quick feedback to the teacher when students are working on another task, or even acting like a student (e.g., "Ms. Thompson, can you help me figure out what page I am on?").

Model Teach: A coach should model if the teacher has low belief in self and students. The coach teaches the class while the teacher observes. They observe a number of teacher moves and can see how the students react to each of them. In the debrief, the coach speaks to each move, decision, and result. Video-recording the lesson is also good practice.

Teach and Support: Like Hannah Thompson, if a teacher has low belief in self and high belief in students, the teacher teaches the class. The coach addresses some students directly or occasionally addresses the whole class. I knew Ms. Thompson needed a win because she felt defeated in her progress as a teacher. She had a lot of technical classroom management skills to learn at once, and so the model we chose allowed us to reset student behaviors and reestablish key procedures.

Sometimes our classrooms devolve into places where learning is hard, and an instructional coach or administrator can help to put it back on track. The decision to adopt different coaching strategies has some risks but can also have tremendous rewards. Weeks after the intervention with Ms. Thompson, I came back to see her in action again. She had maintained the changes, and her classroom was now a place of learning.

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How Instructional Coaches Can Use Co-Teaching to Support Teachers

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A matrix based on a teacher's belief in themselves and their belief in students can facilitate effective instructional coaching.

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Opportunities that can be incorporated day-to-day, during plan/prep periods, and without full release from classroom. 

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Opportunities that can be incorporated day-to-day, during plan/prep periods, and without full release from classroom. 

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Even top athletes rely on the support of a coach to improve their game. Players need coaches to help identify their unique strengths and grow their talents while increasing their skills in areas of challenge. To do all this, coaches spend lots of time observing athletes while they practice-giving real-time feedback based on current efforts, breaking skills down as needed to cultivate mastery, and encouraging players to keep trying in pursuit of their goals.

Just as athletic coaches support players in mastering their game, educational coaches support teachers in mastering the craft of teaching. And just as athletic coaches need to spend time on the court and in the field, educational coaches need to frequent their teachers' classrooms, observing teachers as they practice specific teaching behaviors and giving supportive feedback based on those efforts. Teachers need real-time, in-the-field support that is grounded in their current practice. This type of ongoing support is made possible with routine informal observations.

What are Informal Observations?

Informal observations are very different from formal CLASS observations, which require certification, official score sheets, and codes to be assigned for each cycle. An informal observation is conducted by a coach, and is an opportunity for the coach to focus exclusively on the behaviors a teacher is currently practicing, for the total 10-30 minutes of observation.

The coach collects specific, objective evidence about what the teacher is saying and doing and how the children respond in the moment. Then, the coach meets with the teacher to share notes, discuss strengths, and identify effective behaviors. Together, the coach and teacher discuss how to make effective interactions even better, even longer, and even more frequent, planning ways the teacher can have these interactions with more children. They then create an action plan for classroom practice and plan a time for the coach to conduct another informal observation with feedback, thus continuing the teacher's learning cycle.

Using the Informal Observation Form

Before conducting the short classroom visit, the teacher and coach should decide together what the focus of the informal observation will be, and when the observation should take place. During the observation, the coach should use the form to take detailed, moment-to-moment notes focused on what the teacher did and said and how the students responded to specific types of interactions. The coach should note examples of effective moments, and may also include some opportunities for growth.

After the observation, the coach should take a few minutes to plan questions to help the teacher reflect on his/her practice and the children's responses, eliciting thoughts on why effective interactions are important and how they support children's healthy social, emotional, and cognitive development. Finally, the teacher and coach should meet briefly for a collaborative discussion about the observation, reflection questions, and next steps.

Here's an example of how the Informal Observation Form might be used:

Reflecting and Collaborating with Teachers

Reflecting on our work with someone else is a vulnerable activity. It takes a positive, trusting teacher-coach relationship (and lots of coach sensitivity) to inspire teachers to take the risk of sharing their honest reflections, ideas, and opinions. In order to make the most of the limited time they have with a teacher, coaches should take time to plan which notes they will share (focusing on examples of one or a few behavioral markers) and identify reflection questions.

During the post-observation conversation, teachers should be asked "why" and "how" questions and given opportunities to brainstorm and plan strategies to further improve specific interactions, focusing on making these interactions longer, deeper, and more frequent. Coaches should repeat and extend the teacher's ideas and scaffold next steps to promote the teacher's successful practice of new and enhanced teaching behaviors.

Teachers need support in their classrooms in the same way that athletes need support while practicing their sport. The classroom is a teacher's arena, and teachers need coaches on the field with them as they practice new plays and try out new behaviors. Teachers deserve real-time feedback about their efforts, what areas of their practice are working, and what areas might need more time to develop. Most importantly, teachers need coaches to help them understand why what they are practicing matters and how it positively impacts their students.

Our Informal Observation Form was created to support coaches in doing just that. So print the form, grab a pencil, and put on your favorite jersey. You've got a practice to coach !

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Informal Observations: How They Help Teachers Grow in the Classroom

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Even top athletes rely on the support of a coach to improve their game. Players need coaches to help identify their unique strengths and grow their talents while increasing their skills in areas of challenge.

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Observing Through a Coaching Lens: 8 Ideas to Lift the Level of Conversation and Transform Practice

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Reflecting on Observations This is my 16th year in education and it is safe to say that my growth and development as a human being and educator rests on the shoulders of those who generously took t…

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Educational book studies give teachers opportunities for powerful professional development built on collaboration and connection.

Book studies foster collaboration, provide educators with choices for professional learning, and help teachers explore new ideas. With an explosion of educational texts coming on the market post-pandemic, educators have more book options than ever. The bones of a book study are pretty universal: pick a book, read it, discuss it, earn continuing education credit.

Through my personal experience in a dozen book studies, both as a student and as an author/guest speaker, I've witnessed huge differences in book study execution, leading to very different results. Based on these experiences and conversations with book study host Dr. Nikki Vradenburg, NBCT, director of education with Montana PBS, several factors emerged that elevate a basic book study to a truly meaningful professional learning experience.

1. Provide Choice

Pretty simple: Increase engagement and growth by offering choice. Compared with a district-mandated book study done for a whole staff, engagement was greater in a summer course, Vradenburg notes, "because it was the teacher who had found the book study based on their own interest and desire."

Gather recommendations from teachers, then provide several book options. Better yet, collaborate with other districts-in your state, region, etc.-to offer even more choices and ensure diverse perspectives for discussions (see No. 2 below).

As you build your book list, acknowledge that not all books will lead to action and impact in the classroom. What's your goal: A feel-good experience? To increase the use of best practices and drive innovation? Explore new theories and methodologies?

If you're not sure about a book, consider these questions: After we identify with the text and perhaps feel good or inspired, then what? What's the takeaway? How will this book shift the teaching and learning environment? How will this book help make things better for teachers? For students?

2. Ensure that you have a diverse group of educators

Exposure to new ideas and experiences is critical to helping educators grow. We don't know what we don't know. When surrounded by the same people every day, it's easy to think, "This is what teaching and learning looks like." To foster greater innovation and increased impact, seek out diverse perspectives. Combine buildings. Coordinate with other districts and cohost your book study. Reach out to a district that looks and operates differently than yours.

Not only does a mixed group of educators fuel divergent thinking, but also it helps teachers break out of their roles within their building. Vradenburg notes, "It's too easy for us to fall into labels and then have a hard time seeing people in other roles." Plus, when we're surrounded by people we see every day-especially our own administration-people tend to censor themselves, Vradenburg points out. While this is respectful, it's not always the best for growth, problem-solving, or innovation. When teachers interact with educators from outside their district, they can be seen and heard in new ways, deepening the learning experience.

3. Set clear tasks: Read this, complete this

Having a concrete task helps hold teachers accountable for their learning and ensures more vibrant discussion. This doesn't mean micromanaging the process, just simply providing clear objectives and deadlines. This structure can also help ensure that credit is available for the book study. See my Book Club Sample Framework for ideas.

Book studies are also an effective way to model new technology tools and rethink old favorites. Use a Google Form to gather favorite quotes; use Flip to vlog about two action steps that readers will take based on that chapter; share a Jamboard or Padlet to create a thought chain; go to Mentimeter to make a word cloud.

4. Ensure opportunities to connect

Make the time to actually talk, whether virtually or in person. Self-paced, asynchronous courses are great for all the obvious reasons, but nothing matches the spark of teachers in a space together talking about their craft. Vradenburg says that the discussions in the Zoom breakout groups were vibrant and continuous. People could vent, connect, reflect, get ideas, and inspire each other far more in these conversations than they could via any writing activity.

We need each other. Despite surrounding us with people all day, teaching can be an oddly isolating profession. "We had a teacher on sabbatical/maternity leave," Vradenburg shares, "and she chose to attend the book study because her brain needed the connection." And, yes, our hearts need those connections too, to reenergize and reignite our passion for teaching. It's hard, but find the time to connect.

5. Include an implementation plan

Everyone's read the book. The book and the vigorous discussions with diverse educators filled everyone with amazing ideas. Maybe that's enough. Maybe that's what's needed.

But it can also be so much more. Harness all that inspiration to drive change and improve teaching and learning. As you read, take time to identify aspects of teaching and learning that are not working-for students or teachers. Extrapolate potential solutions from the book, and use your discussions to further brainstorm ideas about what could be done instead. Provide a process for participants to work through their ideas to design something-an activity, lesson, unit, or presentation. Vradenburg uses The Educator Canvas, but use any design thinking or framework that works for your team.

The final book study meetup is then a celebration of innovative implementation ideas. Teachers share their designs and receive feedback on them. I've seen the tiniest seedling of an idea flourish with the questions, comments, feedback, and support of book study peers.

By including an implementation plan in the book study, you'll elevate the uplifting, energizing experience into a purposeful exercise in problem-solving and change-making.

Book studies offer endless possibilities: Each book opens the door to new information, each reader brings their own challenges and perspectives, and each discussion ignites unlimited ideas. So go organize. And if you'd like a brainstorming buddy as you plan, please reach out.

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5 Steps to More Effective PD With Book Studies

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Educational book studies give teachers opportunities for powerful professional development built on collaboration and connection. Book studies foster collaboration, provide educators with choices for professional learning, and help teachers explore new ideas. With an explosion of educational texts coming on the market post-pandemic, educators have more book options than ever.

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Peer coaching examples teachers in the classroom - Google Search

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Publicizing Our Practice Blog: Observe Me Protocol

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Publicizing Our Practice Blog: Observe Me Protocol

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https://robertkaplinsky.com/observeme/

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Peer Coaching: 6 Ways to Create a Culture of Coaching and Reflection at Your School

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I vividly remember the first time I was observed on that warm, sunny Wednesday morning at 9 am.I was a fresh, 22 year old bright eyed and bubbly Middle School Social Studies teacher in my very first classroom.The lesson topic for that morning; ’The achievements of Ancient Rome.’My principal nonchalantly walked through the door in her hip, retro leather jacket, and plopped down on the LazyBoy recliner in back. Although I felt like my heart was in my throat, she acted like it was just another day.

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Introducing Peer Coaching - Steve Barkley

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I had a request to assist a team of teacher leaders who had accepted the task of providing an introduction of peer coaching to teachers who are new to their faculty. These leaders have been in workshops with me during the past two years and have been taking part in peer coaching activities with members of their PLCs. I thought the outline and slides that we explored might be helpful to some of the readers of this blog who will also be welcoming new staff into a peer coaching culture.

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Student Interviews Article: Learn to Listen 

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Student Interviews Article: Learn to Listen 

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If your team is struggling with thinking about a task or an assessment, begin by asking a kid! Bring student thinking into the conversation by having members of your team interview your students.

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Learning Walks: Structured Observation for Teachers

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Teacher Rehearsal: Critical Friends Group

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Teacher Rehearsal: Critical Friends Group

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Professional development based on the Critical Friends Group protocol can guide teachers to concentrate on real classroom problems.

What are some of the most common complaints you've heard about professional development? I've heard:

This is not applicable to my class/subject/grade level/students/etc.

My time could be better spent grading or planning.

I already know this.

This is so theoretical. How does it actually apply to my classroom?

One of my favorite solutions to these conundrums is a "Critical Friends Group" (CFG), where the entire faculty is split up randomly into groups of four to six teachers. They do not need to be of the same grade level or subject area. In fact, having a heterogeneous group often brings out more creative ideas and helps build connections across typical school silos.

During each meeting, participants follow a timed protocol: One member presents a classroom challenge that they are experiencing, and their peers ask clarifying and probing questions that help the presenter think deeply about the problem and reflect on possible paths forward.

The consistency of the group members helps build trust so that teachers can truly be vulnerable and share in the strengths and talents of one another. That's the beauty of a CFG: It is grassroots professional development that harnesses the capacity already present in a school. Our fellow teachers are our greatest resource.

The protocol facilitates deep listening because it requires silence from participants when one person is speaking, forcing everyone to truly hear rather than plan their response. Time restrictions encourage everyone to be concise and to the point rather than talking just to take up space.

Critical Friends Group Protocol

These are the steps of the protocol:

1. Presenter introduces their problem and a variety of artifacts they have brought along to deepen participants' understanding of the classroom context. Everyone else is silent.

2. Participants ask clarifying questions, scratching the surface of the problem.

3. Participants silently explore the artifacts, jotting down thoughts and further questions they have. Artifacts might include student work, lesson plans, assessment ideas, etc.

4. Participants ask probing questions to help the presenter think more critically.

5. Participants give warm and cool feedback about the presenter in the third person. Presenter listens without responding.

6. Presenter reflects on the feedback and plans for the future.

Everyone has a fair opportunity to speak and be heard. Participants share their expertise and wisdom, and the presenter comes away with crowdsourced ideas for improvement. Other members often end up with lots of ideas that they want to apply to their own classrooms, since, typically, the presenter's problem is relatable for everyone.

CFG Example

I recently participated in a CFG where the presenter asked for support with "Peter," a physics student who was struggling on tests.

Peter wanted to do well, believed he understood the content, and paid attention in class, yet he continued to make the same mistakes on formative assessments and exams. He latched on to a wrong idea and, no matter how many times he was marked wrong for it, continued to make the mistake.

The presenter brought a variety of the student's assignments and tests as evidence. As we engaged with the protocol, we probed: "How does this student study for tests?" "When you return work, how do you talk about his mistakes?" "Does he see patterns in the mistakes he has made?" "What has worked for him?"

We learned that the student was a meticulous note taker. He studied by rewriting notes and formulas over and over again. He latched on to physical examples, and he wanted to be a pilot.

From these probing questions, solutions began to arise organically: Engage with Peter in mistake analysis where he tracks and reflects on his mistakes in a spreadsheet. Help him generate examples related to airplanes to help him connect to the concepts. Provide graphic organizers to better arrange concepts and develop new frameworks beyond memorization. Encourage him to practice retrieval without his notes. Everyone left bubbling with new ideas, even though we didn't have Peter and didn't know anything about physics.

What Makes CFG So Effective?

It's always applicable to the presenter, since they bring a real challenge. The problem often ends up being relevant to all of us, regardless of content area, grade level, etc. We can all contribute to the conversation by reflecting on our own experiences.

Time feels valuable. We connect with our colleagues and learn from each other. The students are real, and the challenges are relevant right now.

The presenter brings an issue that they don't have a solution to. At the very least, they learn some strategies to try, and often everyone walks away with a new idea. Those who already know feel validated because they get to share their expertise.

The entire conversation is focused on application and solutions rather than theory. Our students are on the line.

I hope you'll try CFG, either as a schoolwide initiative or simply with a small group of teachers you trust. I promise that it will be time well spent.

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Professional development based on the Critical Friends Group protocol can guide teachers to concentrate on real classroom problems. What are some of the most common complaints you've heard about professional development? I've heard: This is not applicable to my class/subject/grade level/students/etc. My time could be better spent grading or planning.

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Tapping Into the Expertise in the Building

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The triad model of peer coaching takes advantage of a powerful professional learning resource available to teachers—their colleagues.

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This is an example of a peer-to-peer coaching conversation following a 30 minute observation.