The Art of Coaching Teachers

   


  Coaching can take on many different forms. There are performance coaches, skill coaches, instructional coaches, and life coaches among others. I am going to expound on coaching as it relates to education and my role as a special education teacher.

    In the school system that I teach in every school has an instructional coach. One of the most beneficial things a coach can do is model, model, model. During data meetings at my school, we always start with positive items and gradually move to things that need more attention. As we brainstorm strategies that would help aid in closing the achievement gaps among our students, we also discuss how these strategies should look in action. Whenever a teacher is in doubt about successfully implementing the new strategy, our instructional coach schedules a time to model the new strategy for them. As a special education teacher, I am constantly in and out of many classrooms for inclusion. As a result, I am able to witness the instructional coach as she models new strategies for the teachers to begin implementing. When the instructional coach views the new strategy as something that I should implement also, she meets with me and we discuss the reality of how much benefit my students would receive and she informs me of when and where I should come to watch her in action.

   According to Marzano & Simms (2016 p. 212), "coaching has been shown to be the most effective way to help teachers transfer the knowledge and skills they learn in training and workshops to the classroom". I could not agree more with this statement. I get the most benefit from workshops after our instructional coach as met with us for follow-up and feedback, which usually occurs during data meetings. In the past, I have attended many workshops where once I left the building, it was solely my responsibility to determine how I was going to use the information that was presented. Our reading coach does an amazing job helping us connecting the information we learned in professional development directly to our teaching.

    One of the greatest attributes that the instructional coach at my school possess is the ability to turn negatives into positives through reflective conversations. I have sat in on several debriefing sessions where the instructional coach reflected on a lesson with teachers by asking questions that required us to determine why we thought a specific thing occurred. One session was with the third-grade math teacher. The question was asked why do you think many of the students subtracted when they should have added. The fact was that the teacher actually used the term subtract instead of add, which confused many of the students. For me, this was the best way to approach the issue. The coach could have easily told the teacher that she was the reason why so many of the students did horrible on the assignment, but instead, she chose to have the teacher reflect back on her own mistakes. When teachers are afforded the opportunity to reflect on their mistakes, they are able to come to the realization of the needed changes themselves, instead of being told this must change (Marzano & Simms, 2016).

Reference

Marzano, R., & Simms, J. (2013). Coaching in the classroom: The classroom strategies series. Indiana: Marzano Research.

Ed-Tech Coaches

      Research continues to support the theory that coaching enables individual to achieve performance improvement. According to Yirci, Karakose, and Kocabas (2016), "Reviewed literature findings show that coaching in education and business organizations provides significant benefits such as ensuring a more competitive and efficient, organizational structure, increasing employee motivation and strengthening the capacity of employees towards working as a team" Yirci, Karakose, and Kocabas (2016). Instructional coaching has a history of going through many changes, however, within each change, the end result remains the same. Each coach anticipates improved employee motivation and effective teaching. 

    Coaches must use several steps to help teachers improve student achievement. Implementing the coaching continuum requires the coach and the teacher to perform a self-audit to help select a goal element, reviewing research and theory about that element, and the coach and the teacher examining various strategies to work Marzano and Simms (2013). I believe it is safe to say that coaches can be looked at as portable professional development. I have heard them referenced as "critical friends". When coaching is done right, relationships are built and goals are attained.

   As technology continues to evolve, so must our knowledge of effectively integrating technology into our curriculum. This is where coaches can play a major role. Often times new teachers are only equipped with the knowledge they obtained in college. Instructional coaches are continuously in professional development involving the latest trends in education and technology, however, it means nothing if they do not come back to school and turn around their training.

  As times have changed and technology has evolved, so has many school systems. Many now have instructional technology facilitators whose primary role is to work directly with the teachers in planning lessons that incorporate technology.

References

Kocabas, I., Karakose, T. (2016) Coaching as a performance improvement tool at School.

Journal of Education and Practice, 7(14), Retrieved from

http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1102816.pdf

Marzono, R.J. & Simms, J.A. (2012). Coaching classroom instruction. Marzono Research
         Laboratory: Bloomington, IN.

     

Partnerships

    When I think about coaching, my mind is automatically directed to an instructional coach. In an elementary school setting and instruction coach is a teacher that works directly with teachers by first creating a partnership with the teachers they are working with and then meeting the teachers where they are and helping them grow with the end goal of student impact in mind. It is hard not to compare a coach that many teachers encounter on a daily basis, to a coach who coaches athletes, or a team. According to Marzano and Simms (2013), Inner Game Coaching involves looking at the person's perceptions of their performance, focusing attention on objective details which in turn increase their awareness. Coaches in a school setting and those that coach for teams have several things in common. One thing that stands out to me is that both coaches set the bars high and believes that the goal is attainable. Whether you are coaching a team to a victory, or coaching a team of teachers to tap into their student's hidden talents, both have essentially raised the bar. All players on a team and teachers on a team enjoy being challenged and behind every challenge, there is a coach behind them just cheering them on just like the man in the picture below.

via GIPHY
via GIPHYretrieved from https://giphy.com/gifs/coach-K9PRz6zhxHhqo

   Current research on coaching typically guides the latest trends in coaching. It is a cycle that sometimes repeats itself. What is considered best practices today, will not be what is practiced or considered effective in coming years due to research. In my opinion, effective coaching involves far more than instructing a teacher on how to become more effective. Coaching should include mentoring and lots of modeling and supports. The instructional coach at my should is a shining example of effective coaching. I was able to identify many elements in her coaching model that align with what I read in chapter 2 such as measuring progress, providing resources, and demonstrating lessons.

     Reflecting back on the chapters read and connecting research to practice, Joyce and Showers (as cited in Marzano and Simms, 2013) listed five ways that coaching helped teachers transfer training to the classroom which includes; practicing new strategies frequently, new strategies are used more appropriately, greater knowledge retention, explained new models of teaching to their students, and understood the purpose and use of the new strategies. Research show that when done correctly, coaching will have a high impact on teachers and students. Coaches have not always been around, however, I believe that they are here to stay.

References

Joyce, B., & Showers, B. (2002). Student achievement through staff development (3rd ed.).          Alexandris, VA: Association for Supervision and Curruulum Development. 

Marzono, R.J. & Simms, J.A. (2012). Coaching classroom instruction. Marzono Research
         Laboratory: Bloomington, IN.

What makes good instructional design?

What is good instructional design?
Good instructional design to me is when a trainer knows their audience. By knowing their audience I mean actually knowing what their needs are, knowing the motivation behind them attending the training. Is this something that they want to know more about, or are they only here because it is mandatory? A trainer with good instructional design has clearly stated objectives, assesses the audiences learning, and has a well thought out plan that includes activities and handouts. I had the pleasure of sitting through an excellent presentation our first day back titled Disrupting Poverty. My oh my was this lady an excellent presenter. My colleagues and I were able to identify many components of instructional design. She started off with an icebreaker, and she had graphic organizers, multiple media sources, and much more!

What is something that I learned that I did not know before?
 The main and most important thing that I will take away from this class is the ADDIE model. Up until July 2016, I viewed training as a means to learn new things. George Piskurich has taught me that there are benefits to having a well thought out training. When trainees are engaged, they will learn, and the benefit will be improved performance and ability to complete related tasks (Piskurich, 2015).

What is at least one thing you will change in your own design for future trainings/PD sessions?
My presentation is on using Google Forms. I plan on doing all of my behavior plans using Google Forms. Therefore, I need my teachers to be experts in this area. I plan on beginning with a short icebreaker where they pair up with a partner for 3-5 minutes and come back and share one thing that they did not know about that person. Next, I will play a short video clip which will be my introduction, which includes my objectives and overview. I will demonstrate how to complete a behavior plan using Google Forms followed by my trainees using Google Forms to create a form of their choice. In future trainings, I would change my icebreaker to be something more fun. My participants in my Google Forms training, all know each other which presented a small challenge. I truly believe that if I start with a great icebreaker, my trainees will be captivated and wanting more!

My final thoughts are that it should not matter the need, it should not matter the makeup of your audience, good instructional design starts with you! I would like to end with a quote from the book that I would like for you to take a moment and reflect on. "A good ID is always going back and forth along the strands of ADDIE to create the best learning intervention possible" (Piskurich, 2015). Is this you?

Reference

Hicks, T. (2013). Crafting web texts. In T. Antao (Ed.), Crafting digital writing: Composing  texts across media and genres. (pp. 36-60). Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Skills and Training Enhancement

In the world of education, as professionals we are mandated to continue our learning. Many hours each year are allocated for various trainings and professional development. While this requires dedication and commitment from teachers, most of these trainings are not effective. In my opinion, the most effective trainings that I have encountered were the trainings that actively engaged us and focused on the needs of our students. Many of the wonderful trainings that I attended started off with an ice breaker followed by activities that got us up out of our seats and moving. Piskurich (2015) states that "The quality, and possibly the success, of your training program can be measured by the activities you develop for it." This drives home because these are the most memorable trainings because of the engagement. This reminds me of a training that I attended call Non-Violent Crisis Intervention. This training evolved learning about ways to identify behaviors and prevent escalation. After we studied a topic, we then traveled to the next room to practice strategies to assist us in handling explosive situations. The trainer had us in stations, at tables, and working our way around the room completing various anchor charts.

As I reflect back upon the chapters, we were taught various ways to complete the development stage of our professional development and do it right. I like how the author really detailed the introduction phase of training. Introductions should be short and to the point. They should let the trainees know key learning points and objectives (Piskurich, 2015). I believe that a good introduction should add excitement to the training . I like to think of it as the bait and tackle. The bait meaning what captures the learners attention and the tackle is keeping it. Furthermore, as I continued to navigate through the text, I was introduced to shortcuts. Everybody loves a shortcut, and when it comes to designing a well thought out training, I believe that sometimes shortcut are needed. Piskurich (2015) noted that software exists that in theory, is designed to help us through the instructional design process, but warns us to stay clear. I understand this to mean that all that glitters is not gold. As with any shortcut we may take, we must remain vigilant that the shortcut we have chosen gives us the results that we are looking for. In addition, we were also introduce to different design applications. My favorite was social networking-based learning. This continues to be a trending topic in education today. I view social networking and training as a win-win. Why is this you may be asking? Well, if social networking has become a universal part of millions of peoples lives, then what better way to drive your point across to trainees then using what they relate to most? Social networking would be a great way to demonstrate collaboration during your training.

  I chose to write about is Padlet has my technology tool I could use to enhance my training. What is Padlet you may be asking? Padlet is an application that one can use to create bulletin boards as an avenue for displaying a topic. Some of the great features includes the ability to add videos, images, and links. These displays are interactive and very user friendly. When I think about how I can use Padlet to enhance my presentation, I envision a platform for me to display my presentation, have my trainees complete discussions, have my trainees complete an interactive KWL chart, and complete their exit tickets by sharing something that they learned before they leave the training. I absolutely adore Padlet. It's fun, new (to me), and innovative. For those of you who would love to know more about Padlet, please view this short video below.

In conclusion, it is my belief that no matter what tool we choose to enhance our training, it is up to us as trainers to take the necessary steps to ensure that we have great instructional design.



                                                                     Reference
Piskurich, G.M. (2015). Rapid instructional design. Learning ID fast and right. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

"Design"er Training

As I reflect back on the chapter, there were several things that stood out to me such as;using objectives in training to help trainees guide their learning, prerequisite learning, and training activities. I will begin by elaborating on using objectives in training to help trainees guide their learning. Piskurich (2015) states that majority of training programs do not provide their trainees with objectives and that it is shameful because well-written objectives can be used to guide their learning. Rapid Instructional Design has been an eye-opener for me. It has forced me to analyze all my past trainings. As I reflect back on each and every one of them, I am left feeling a bit compunctious and sad. I can not remember one training that has provided learning objectives. "Objectives help you focus on "need to know" content and avoid or at least control "nice to know" information (Piskurich, 2015, pp. 129). How many times have we attended training that contained "marshmallow fluff" just to ensure the trainer met their time requirement? I believe that by providing the learners with only information that is essential to mastering the core concept of the training, the learners will leave the training with a sense of accomplishment, instead of feeling like the picture below.

via GIPHY

As I continued to navigate through the text, I came to a topic that after I read it,  I had a smile on my face. That topic was titled prerequisite learning. This made me smile because finally I was reading something that I had a good experience with. Almost all of the technology trainings that I have attended had prerequisite skills that where listed as a requirement before signing up for the training. Although the author gave examples of prerequisite learning lists that did not involve technology or using a computer, I was still able to understand the importance and need. As Piskurich (2015)  states, prerequisite learning sets trainee expectations and gives the trainer information about what to expect from their trainees. This reminds me of a training on Promethean Boards that I attended several years ago. This was actually a level two training, but I decided to attend it anyway because a friend of mine had signed up. The prerequisite for attending level two training, was successful completion of level one training. While this training dove deep into Promethean Boards and its advanced features, I was left feeling lost because I had never received the basics.

Furthermore, when I think about training activities, I visualize an action that is being performed by the trainees. As Piskurich (2015) noted, well-designed training contains lots of activities. Some activities/strategies that I have witnessed being incorporated into training include; think-pair-share and advance organizers. What is think-pair-share you may be asking? It is a learning strategy/activity where students work together to answer a question about an assigned reading. It requires students to think individually about an answer to a question, pair up with a partner and share ideas with classmates. Think-pair-share fosters learning by promoting classroom participation and providing an opportunity for all students to share their thinking. It increases participation by students that would not normally raise their hand to share out loud. Let's take a closer look at think-pair-share by viewing this quick video below that shows an example of it. 

 During my experience teaching 1st grade, we were mandated to use this strategy. We called it turn and talk, but all in all, it is the exact same thing. I would absolutely have to say that it was successful because it gave the students confidence that they other wise would not receive during traditional question and answer. I put a slight twist on it. Instead of my students raising their hands to share their own thinking, they had to share what their partners discussed. My rationale behind the twist was that my reluctant learners would feel more confident sharing what someone else had to say without worrying if their thinking was right or wrong. 

When I think about advanced organizers, I think about a graphic organizer that is used in advance.
Advanced organizers are activities or graphic organizers that help the learner organize new information. They are used at the beginning of a new lesson and foster learning by informing the learner what information will be important.I have very little experience with advanced organizers, hopefully that will change.

In conclusion, I would like to add that during the design phase of instructional design, trainers are creating the blueprint for their training, which requires creative thinking. As each phase continues to build upon the next, I look forward to seeing what comes next! 

                                                                  Reference
Piskurich, G.M. (2015). Rapid instructional design. Learning ID fast and right. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.


 

Why do we need instructional design?

When I think of instructional design, I visualize a house being built. According to Duggan (2005), before you start building your house, you first decide if you really need a house and if so, what kind of house. During the analysis phase we must also decide if training is actually needed and if so, what kind of training and what will the audience learn. Once we have decided that training is necessary, we create our blueprint or design our draft plan detailing learning objectives and solutions. The development stage can be viewed as building the house. When you start to develope your plan, materials are created to help the leaner benefit more from the lesson or training. Next, we have the implementation stage of instructional design. When comparing this stage to building a house, Duggan (2005) made the correlation between moving into the new house and testing out doors and appliances and testing out your lesson or training by doing a test run on people and using the feedback to tweak things and make them better. The final stage is an evaluation. Just like you would evaluate your newly built house to ensure it functions properly, we must also reflect on the effectiveness of our training or lesson. This can be achieved with the use of surveys or feedback given at the conclusion of the training or lesson Duggan (2005).

Furthermore, I believe instructional design is needed because in education, there is not a one size fits all model to learning or delivering instruction. Each student is unique from their personalities to their style of dress and so are their needs for learning. Let's look at some advantages & disadvantages of instructional design. When I think about the advantages of instructional design, I visualize a flexible approach to delivering a product.  As Piskurich (2015) states, "The main advantage of instructional design is simple: it assists you in correctly doing what you need to do (p.9)." Other advantages of instructional design would include cost, learning, and time effectiveness. The disadvantage of instructional design is that it requires additional resources (Piskurich, 2015).

When I reflect back on an instruction that I have experienced, I am reminded of a training called Learning-Focused, and the trainer had the majority of the audience feeling like the picture below.



via GIPHY

Learning-Focused was a series of trainings designed to make teaching more effective. The session that sticks out the most to me was the training on vocabulary strategies. The trainer prepared a PowerPoint, handed out an outline of the PowerPoint, and read verbatim from the presentation. At the end of the session, we filled out a reflection of the training, which included how we would implement the new learning in our classrooms.

A great example of training that I attended would be the Google Summit. This is training that I would recommend to everyone. The presenters identified their targets, broke the sessions down into several sessions, ensured that the audience was engaged in meaningful learning, and they asked for feedback at the end of each session.

In conclusion, I believe it is safe to say that as long as there are trainings or lessons to be delivered, there will always be good and bad experiences. Until everyone catches up to the 21st century learning, we will continue to see the good and bad elements within most training that we encounter.

Resources

Duggan, C. M. (2005). Designing effective training. Journal of AHIMA, 76(6), 28-32. Retreived     from http://library.ahima.org/doc?oid=59954#.V4mYkqK1xzU 

Piskurich, G.M. (2015). Rapid instructional design. Learning ID fast and right. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

 

Merging Education With Social Media

As social media is becoming a universal part of life, schools must jump on the bandwagon. I think it is safe for one to say, social media is here to stay. As Hicks (2013) states, "If we simply have students sign up with a social media service and then use it in the same way we use other web-based tools-distribute assignments, have students randomly reply to each other in discussion posts- we are not inviting them to think deeply and creatively about how to craft social media texts (p.140)." Setting a purpose for using social media is just as importance as its integration into our classrooms. So, how do we begin? Before we can start using social media in our classrooms, we need to determine what our intentions are for its users. Social media should be used to engage students and help them dive into the lessons that teachers create to help build better students.

Twitter is a popular platform that many teachers have discovered. In my opinion, it is one of the easiest to use regarding social media integration. There are many ways to use Twitter to enhance educational practices. Let's take a look at a Twitter Chat feed that I chose to analyze. This chat has the hashtag #tntechchat. It is dedicated to Tennessee teachers, but open to others.

These teachers are chatting about anything EdTech. They often feature Guest Moderators from across the county. In this particular snapshot that I have chosen, teachers are discussing topics and responding to other peoples questions. Hashtags are used when they are making statements or asking questions to ensure that their responses stay inside of the chat. When they want to respond directly to someone, they use the @ symbol to ensure their response gets directed to the correct person. As noted in Hicks (2013) intention matters and this group of teachers understands the importance of the hashtag and @ symbol in order to move the conversations forward.

Let's take a closer look at the snapshots on the left using the MAPS heuristic. Regarding purpose, I believe that this Twitter chat is designed to inspire and enlighten dedicated teachers. It takes some genuine dedication to log onto a computer and converse about your job after hours. The intended audience is dedicated teachers interested in discussing educational technology topics for professional growth. Furthermore, when looking at the situation, tweeters within this chat were able to deliver their message through pictures, videos, photos, links, and up to 140 characters of text. This particular chat had chats further down the feed, dedicated strictly to GIF only replies.

Analyzing my chosen text for possible digital enhancements, I established the only media allowed by Twitter that was not used, were videos. Perhaps video clips demonstrating support for their responses could have been used to digitally enhance the chats. I am pro-social media inside of the classroom, as well as my school district. Neither Facebook nor Twitter are blocked. Teachers have the freedom to use these platforms at their discretion.

In conclusion, as commercial pressure on other districts continues to limit the potential for social media truly having its place inside of the classroom, we as 21st Century teachers must rise to the occasion of proving them wrong (Friesen & Lowe, 2011).

I am including the link to the entire #tntechchat for your viewing.
 https://twitter.com/search?src=typd&q=%23tntechchat

                                                                 References

Friesen, N., & Lowe, S. (2011). The questionable promise of social media for education: Connective learning and the commercial imperative. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 28(3), 183-194. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2729.2011.00426.x

Hicks, T (2013). Crafting digital writing. Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.

Bloopers, take 2!

Resubmitting my introduction video has been a daunting task. While Hicks (2013) mentions going over and beyond the retelling of personal experiences and working with ideas in a theme, my original video was lacking more than just a theme. Let's take a look at what the first video looked like and prepare our minds to analyze and rip it apart!



               

This video has the appearance that it was last minute and unplanned, however, it was not. I have a hard to time looking back at it to reference for this blog. Upon viewing the first introduction video for critiquing, I discovered that I stuttered ofter. This is not something I do on a regular basis. Also, I was obviously nervous, as exhibited in my stuttering and straight ahead angle towards the camera. There is a reason that video mess ups are called bloopers, and this is clearly a blooper. As we progressed through the course, our learning has built upon the previous. We live and we learn, we study and we grow. May I now draw your attention to my video resubmission (that almost didn't happen) for critiquing against the first.



 

Analyzing my second introduction video, the genre is clearly defined (personal narrative), design and creatively will entice students to explore various video editing software. Hicks (2013) talks about these elements that I included in my retake when he discussed MAPS heuristic and how it helps students decide which approach they will take when using video texts.

Comparing video number one to video number two, it is easy for one to see the growth that has taken place in such a short amount of time. My video retake offers the viewer so much more in terms of excitement and engagement. Even the untrained eye would be able to tell that video number two, although it took just about the same amount of time and energy, was crafted by someone that had a little bit of knowledge using video texts. As Williams (2012) mentioned, there are many types of digital media and each has its own learning curve. As I reflect upon my experience with these two videos, I love how I am clearly able to see growth. What about you?    


                                                                 References

Hicks, T. (2013). Crafting digital writing: Composing texts across media and genres. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Williams, M. 2012, August 17. In the Classroom; Live Oak Elementary School Students Produce Audio Podcasts. Retreived June 20, 2016 from https://ww2.kqed.org/education/2012/08/17/in-the-classroom-live-oak-elementary-school-students-produce-audio-podcasts/.

Do Common Core Standards Affect Student's Writing?

     In today’s world of education, everyone has an opinion about what should be taught and the method used to deliver. Hicks, (2011) believes that standards encourage skill and drill. Skill and drill are just one component of teaching and learning. In my opinion, standards specifically,  Common Core Standards, help teachers to better service students. Each grade level builds on the previous by adding depth and rigor. The instruction taught in first grade will provide the foundational concepts that teachers will build on in the next grade level. I adore this new age teaching. If I were taught the way that students are learning today, I would have been better prepared when I started college after high school.

    Although Common Core does not mandate the writing process, teachers have the freedom to use whatever tools they believe is most helpful for students to meet those goals set out within the standards. I think that we all can agree that writing serves as the gateway for most graduate entrance into college and sometimes even whether or not an employer will hire you or not. Graham & MacAuthur (2002) conducted a study about how classroom teacher taught writing. Within this study, they pooled teachers from public and private schools in grades kindergarten through third grade. Eighty percent of the teachers reported teaching writing as skill and drill, while the remaining teachers reported teaching the writing process. Graham & MacAuthur, (2002) concluded that writing should be taught through a balanced approach including teaching basic skills, the writing process, and writing text. 

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As we are left to ponder the correct answer posed in my title, let’s not forget the early begins in education and how we shifted from not having standards, to being mandated on exactly what should be taught in order for students to obtain success. Why fix what was never broken in the first place? It is critical that students are exposed to a variety of text types (Hicks, 2011) regardless of what one believes to be the driving force behind the teaching.

References:

Cutler, L., & Graham, S. (2008). Primary grade writing instruction:a national survey. Journal of Educational Psychology, 100(4), 907-919. DOI: 10.1037/a0012656

Hicks, T. (2013). Crafting digital writing: Composing texts across media and genres. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.