Identify the specific behaviors. Before the observation agree on a couple specific skills to observe. These skills should align with the goals the client is pursuing. For example, a principal working on developing his emotional intelligence might shadow another principal for an afternoon and observe how he communicates with staff. The first step is identifying the specific behaviors that the client would like to see someone else model.
Ensure quality. It is essential that the practitioner who will be observed is indeed exemplary in the specific areas that your client wants to see. Sometimes we might be told, “Mrs. W at XYZ school is a brilliant kindergarten teacher! You've got to see her.” Although we can ask about what makes her brilliant, a coach must visit and affirm this recommendation before taking a client on a field trip. While a case can be made that the “nonexample” is valuable to observe, I would suggest that given that it's usually tricky to get release time to observe other teachers, and that you really want developing practitioners to see exemplary practice, it's better to make sure that the quality is what you want it to be.
Once the focus of the observation is clear, the coach engages the client in a conversation about how the data will be gathered. It's not uncommon for a new teacher, for example, to observe a master teacher and be overwhelmed by what she sees: her attention flutters all over—to the filing system by the door, the extensive routines and procedures that students have internalized, and the teacher's comfy shoes. It's the coach's responsibility to make sure that before entering another classroom, the client has some ways that she has agreed to document what is related to her goal area. For example, if the client wants to observe routines and procedures, she might write down as many as she sees—pencil sharpening, entering the room, turning in homework, and so on. While she might not understand how they are used, and this can be discussed during a debrief conversation with the observed teacher, her attention can focus. Or perhaps the client wants to observe how a sixth-grade teacher redirects challenging student behavior—she can script what the teacher says or take notes on her nonverbal communication. It's the coach's role to help the client determine what she'll notice and how she'll document it. You can encourage a client to jot down other topics she'd like to bring up with the educator who is being observed, but it's essential to have a focus.
On the field trip the coach should engage in the same kind of data-gathering protocol as the client—scripting teacher talk or documenting patterns of participation or whatever was agreed on. The coach can also note other effective practices that can be discussed with the client if he brings them up. Finally, the coach needs to model good field-trip etiquette.
After the visit we debrief with reflective questioning strategies to prompt the client's learning. We want to hear what the client saw, learned, and can take back and act on. Close the debrief by asking the client to commit to taking certain actions based on what he learned. For example, if a teacher is really excited about the way another teacher had his classroom set up, then we might ask, “Tell me two things you'd like to try implementing in your class? When do you want to have that done by? What support do you need in order to meet that goal?” Our role is to elicit reflection, encourage experimentation and risk taking, and then push for our client to do it. Sometimes coaches are the only ones who can add the push—because we're not the boss, and often clients appreciate this.
Taking a client to observe a colleague also serves to build connections between educators. Whenever possible, we want to bring people together, foster relationships, and help our client find other resources to draw from.
Shared Reading
Most coaches read a lot about best practices and current research and acquire extensive libraries on topics related to the areas they coach. If a client identifies reading as a way that he likes to learn, then a coach can suggest a shared reading. A coach can also anticipate this and can come to a meeting prepared with articles. For example, if a coach knows that at her next session with a principal they will discuss distributed leadership, she might show up with an article in her bag on this topic. As their conversation develops, the coach can offer the reading if the client says he needs more information. The coach and client can then read the article together and discuss it immediately, or the coach can leave the article.
Whenever possible, I encourage the client to read the article during our meeting. My role is to carve out learning time and hold that space. Many of us have stacks and stacks of books and articles we intend to read, someday. It can be a real gift to a client to sit and read and engage in a discussion together. We can also help the client focus on a specific area or two, and then consider what he can use, apply, or attempt. We are always nudging our client toward his goals.
Looking at Data
Data analysis is another activity that coaches frequently engage in with clients. Data includes student work, survey results, test scores, suspension data, graduation rates and so on. There is no shortage of data analysis protocols, but Exhibit 12.3 offers a basic template.
Exhibit 12.3. Learning from Student Data: A Discussion Protocol for Three-Phase Dialogue
Phase I: Prediction
Before looking at the data set, respond to these questions:
What might we expect to see?
What might we expect to learn?
Phase II: Observation
Look at the data and make observational comments:
What do students actually present?
What facts or patterns do we notice in the data?
Sentence stems could include:
One fact I notice is …
I am surprised by …
A trend I think I see is …
I can quantify that by saying …
Phase III: Inference and Conclusion
After all observational comments are made, discuss inferences and conclusions:
What hunches do we have about causes for what we observe?
Why are we getting the results we are?
Sentence stems could include:
This pattern or trend might be because …
Maybe we're not seeing ____ because …
A reason for this result could be …
Then ask:
So what? And, now what? A set of guidelines for coaches can make this a learning experience:
Refrain from all judgment about the data: Coaches do not blame but we insist on thinking about what can be done and what is within our sphere of influence.
Employ an asset approach: What's working here? Where do we see growth, learning, or affirmation?
Support the client in disaggregating the data: we need to examine the experience of students who have been historically underserved—including African American and Latino boys, girls in math and science, English language learners, and so on. We apply the lens of systemic oppression to looking at data and consider whether all children's needs are being met.
Use a confrontational questioning strategy to raise inequities that surface in the data: A coach prepares by thoroughly analyzing the data beforehand and preparing the questions she will pose if the client doesn't identify the inequities in the data. The questions need to be very mindful to avoid blame, but they also need to surface uncomfortable data. For example, a coach might ask a client, “What do you notice about how your English learners did on the exam?” We can explore the root causes for what's being observed in the data and offer probing questions to deepen the client's thinking.
Guide the client to determine one or two areas where growth can be made: A coach encourages the client to make specific plans to interrupt inequities. We direct the client to think about what she could do within her sphere of influence. We always ask, “Now what?” “What would you like to try?” and “What can you do that will result in increased student learning?”
Debrief the learning experience: As with all of the activities we engage clients in, after we've done any kind of data analysis work we need to check in about how our client experienced the work. Coaches nee
d to be very mindful of how teachers and principals feel about data: the larger context in which we work is highly charged and rather scary when it comes to data.
Coaching on Time Management
Many teachers and administrators request support with time management. Steven Covey, the author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People (1989), provides an indispensable framework for thinking about how we use our time. He offers a simple graphic of four squares and suggests that all time is spent divided between four kinds of activities:
Urgent and Important (Quadrant 1): putting out fires and dealing with crises and last minute tasks
Not Urgent and Important (Quadrant 2): planning, preparing, relationship building, reflection
Urgent and Not Important (Quadrant 3): low value but required tasks, some e-mails, calls, and meetings
Not Urgent and Not Important (Quadrant 4): busy work and some e-mails and calls
The graphic Covey offers to represent this is easily found online and is very useful to share with clients and to reference.
One activity to do with clients is to ask them to sort their daily activities into these quadrants. Just helping them reflect on how they spend time can be helpful. The domain of not urgent and important is the highest leverage area to work in: this is where relationship building takes place, as well as long-term instructional planning, positive phone calls home to parents, systematic analysis of student data, and so forth. This is also the domain in which efforts toward systems change take place and the one where most educators spend the least time—given the amount of urgency we encounter on a daily basis, it's really hard. This is where a coach plays a critical role—we carve out that space and time, we nudge toward exploring root causes, we help our clients recognize that much of their daily responses to the urgency could be mitigated by spending time working in the not urgent and important zone.
Once clients are familiar with this framework for thinking about time, you can often just ask clients, “What quadrant are you working in?” to provoke reflection about their decisions.
Conclusion
Sometime our clients are “doers”; the thought of “just sitting and talking” with a coach can make them very anxious. Directive coaching activities can feel satisfying to such adult learners. At the same time, a coach can integrate reflective conversations into the activities and help the client deepen her learning.
A coach needs to try using all kinds of approaches with clients. We don't want a client to get stuck in one way of learning—they might be settling into their comfort zones and apprehensive about taking a risk. And we need to remember that the purpose of engaging in activities is to help a client make progress toward meeting her goals. We are always working from and toward goals.
Chapter 13
Technical Tips and Habits of Mind
Read this when:
You are a brand-new coach and want to address issues of scheduling and time management
You suspect that your coaching conversations don't flow or don't get where you want them to get or feel awkward
Tricks of the Trade
The coaching tips and habits of mind in this chapter are shared as they arise sequentially in coaching. I'll begin with the logistics of setting up a coaching schedule, planning a coaching conversation, and preparing for a coaching meeting. Then I'll describe the arc of a coaching conversation, how to manage some of the technical elements during a conversation, and which habits of mind a coach may need to hold during a conversation. Finally, I'll suggest some routines for closing a coaching conversation.
Scheduling
If a coach can construct his own schedule, (as opposed to being handed one) then he can consider how to use his time. This gives him the opportunity to manage his time well and also develop a valuable communication tool so that his supervisor and teachers know what he is doing and how he spends his days.
A coach may be most effective when his time is distributed amongst five task areas:
Coaching observations and conversations.
Preparation: gathering materials for clients, reading research and best practice, analyzing student data, planning meetings and coaching conversations, and so on.
Collaboration: the meetings that a coach might have with a principal, another administrator, or a district partner, or participation in site walkthroughs or instructional rounds.
Team participation or facilitation: Coaches may support teams at the sites they work at—maybe an English department, or a fourth grade circuit of teachers. If they are site-based, then coaches may also participate in leadership and decision-making teams.
Coach reflection and professional development: It can be very useful for a coach to dedicate some time each day to reflection. Coaches should also be engaged in their own systematic professional development, ideally guided by a more experienced coach. Chapter Fifteen will expand on this.
Figure 13.1 offers a sample weekly schedule for a site-based coach. On my website there's an example of a centrally-based coach schedule. All coaches should develop a weekly schedule for their own focus and direction and for external accountability and communication purposes.
Figure 13.1 Sample Weekly Schedule for Site-Based Coach
Planning for a Coaching Conversation
Planning for a coaching conversation is similar in some ways to planning a lesson—we construct a couple clear goals, design a route to meet those goals, anticipate the challenges that might arise, and review material that might be helpful. As when you design a lesson, when you plan a coaching conversation keep in mind that you may need to change course, modify plans, or even abandon the directions and activities you planned because some other skill gap becomes apparent or a more pressing need presents itself.
Planning for a coaching session is essential. After some experience, we might be able to walk into a meeting with a client and wing it but we will be much more effective if we have a plan tucked into our coach-minds. As we move through the conversation the client won't notice when we subtly guide the conversation, the thoughtful questions we seem to pose on the spur of the moment, or the way we calmly react to whatever comes up. If we have planned, then we might have anticipated that the client could need a particular resource and we'll have a copy of that resource copied and ready to hand over. If we have planned, then we walk into the coaching meeting with the big picture fresh in our minds—the needs of the client and his goals, as well as the needs of the students and community he serves.
So how do we plan this meeting?
Step 1: Where Does My Client Need to Go?
The first step to plan a coaching conversation is to identify where my client needs to go in a particular session. To do this, I read over the notes and reflections I made after our last meeting. This helps me remember where my client was in her learning the last time we met. Then I consider where the conversation might need to go to move the client toward her goals. In order to do this, I review the work plan and my notes from recent sessions. I consider the evidence that my client is making progress and speculate on remaining gaps in skill, will, knowledge, or capacity. I look through my notes to see if there are any patterns in the holes—are there topics or issues that the client seems reluctant to address?
Based on the client's goals and recent sessions, I plan for the upcoming meeting. What might be a meaningful outcome for this meeting? What might be helpful for my client to think about or do? Which coaching approach might be the most effective? Might it help to engage in some action together? Or have we been doing a lot of activities but not spending enough time reflecting on them? Exhibit 13.1 offers a template for a planning coaching conversation.
Step 2: Who Do I Need to Be?
Once I have determined where the client needs the conversation to go, and I have some ideas about how we can get there, then I figure out who I need to be as a coach. This is the second step in planning a coaching conversation.
Exhibit 13.1. Coaching Session Planning Tool
These reflection
prompts can be used to prepare for a coaching session or conversation. It can be very helpful to write out responses and to look back at them after the meeting and over time.
Where did our last coaching conversation end and what do I need to come back to with my client? Was there anything I said I'd check in on next time?
What are the goals for this coaching conversation? Are there goals related to the work plan that need to be addressed?
What are my intentions for this meeting? What do I want my client to think and feel by the end of it?
What might my client's disposition be? What do I know about where he or she is going to be?
What do I anticipate might be happening with my client or might be challenging? How can I prepare for this and manage these challenges?
Do I anticipate my client will need to release emotions? If so, how can I do this? What works for him or her to process emotions?
How can I enroll my client in this conversation? How can I make it matter to him or her?
Of the six coaching stances, which might be most effective? Is there a coaching stance that I haven't used much that might be worth trying?
Can I anticipate that my client might want to engage in any coaching activities? Which ones might I suggest? Which might help my client reach his or her goals?
Are there any materials (articles or tools) that I might gather and bring with me in case my client requests them?
The Art of Coaching Page 28