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coaching A Strategy for Developing

Instructional Capacity

p r o m i s e s & p r a c t i c a l i t i e s

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper Education Matters, Inc.

The Aspen Institute Program on Education

The Annenberg Institute for School Reform

June 2003

t a b l e o f c o n t e n t s

iii FOREWORD

v PREFACE

1 INTRODUCTION: THE PROMISE OF COACHING

A Natural Outgrowth of Research on Student Learning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Professional Development that Supports Teaching for Understanding . . . . . . . . . . 2

4 WHAT IS COACHING AND WHAT DO COACHES DO?

Change Coaches: Focusing on Leadership for Whole-School Improvement . . . . . . 4

Content Coaches: Focusing on Discipline-based Instructional Improvement . . . . . 7

11 HOW ARE COACHES PREPARED?

Elements of Professional Development for Coaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Challenges in Creating Effective Coach Professional Development . . . . . . . . . . . 14

15 WHAT CONDITIONS SUPPORT COACHING?

Before Starting a Coaching Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Conditions Essential for Successful Coaching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Some Practical Conditions to Consider . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

19 WHAT CHALLENGES DOES COACHING PRESENT?

Allocating Coaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Finding Time to Do the Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Changing Teachers’ Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Measuring the Quality and Impact of Coaches’ Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

26 THE IMPACT OF COACHING: OUTCOMES AND BENEFITS

What Outcomes Can Be Expected? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Is It Worth the Effort? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

29 APPENDIX A: COACHING SMALL GROUPS

34 APPENDIX B: COACHING THE COACHES

37 REFERENCES

iiiCoaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

f o r e w o r d

A s the nation continues its unprece-dented effort to improve teaching and learning, the stakes are getting higher.

The idea that all children can reach chal-

lenging standards, once a fervent hope, is

now national policy. Urban school districts,

where low performance and inequitable

opportunities to learn are prevalent, are

embracing bold strategies to meet this goal.

District leaders understand that large-

scale improvements in teaching and learn-

ing require them to support schools in new

ways. In the past, district support often pro-

duced inequities: some schools, and some

teachers, received the help they needed

and, as a result, some students did well,

while others languished. But now districts

are recognizing that enabling all students

to learn at high levels requires professional

development on a large scale and a new

way of delivering it.

The need for professional development

is obvious: many teachers are not prepared

for the challenge of educating all students

to high levels. And district leaders know

that the traditional workshops, confer-

ences, and courses do not provide the

ongoing, context-sensitive support that

teachers and principals need to improve

teaching and learning substantially.

One promising strategy districts are

embracing is coaching. By employing part-

time or full-time coaches in schools, dis-

tricts can provide ongoing, sustained sup-

port to principals and teachers to improve

school organization and classroom instruc-

tion. The coaches work side by side with

principals and teachers, observe their work,

and offer critiques and models of effective

practice. They put them in touch with

resources that can help them. And they stay

with schools over time, helping principals

and teachers meet new challenges as they

arise.

To be sure, those implementing a strat-

egy such as coaching will likely confront

obstacles in education systems that are not

designed to accommodate different roles

for teachers based on expertise as practi-

tioners rather than years of experience and

education. And it represents a substantial

investment in professional development.

Boston, for example, devoted $5.8 million

from general school funds to support

seventy-five coaches in ninety-seven schools.

But the district, like others employing the

strategy, believes that the investment will

pay off in improved teaching and, ulti-

mately, in improved student achievement

and greater equity.

The Urban Superintendents Network

has a keen interest in coaching. The Net-

work, established two years ago by the

Aspen Institute’s Program on Education

in a Changing Society with support from

several national foundations, is composed

iv Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

of the leaders of a dozen of the nation’s

largest school districts. These superintend-

ents, divided almost evenly between career

educators and those whose prior profes-

sional experience had been in other sec-

tors, all face the urgent challenge of large-

scale, sustained instructional improvement.

The Annenberg Institute for School

Reform has also been examining large-scale

instructional improvement through its Task

Force on the Future of Urban Districts.

The task force, which includes educators,

researchers, and policy-makers, is currently

working with districts to develop the capac-

ity of district central offices to support

improved teaching and learning in schools.

To help the Aspen Urban Superinten-

dents Network and other district leaders

understand the promise and practicalities

involved in coaching, the Aspen Institute’s

Program on Education in a Changing Soci-

ety commissioned Barbara Neufeld and

Dana Roper to prepare a paper describing

the approach and the challenges involved

in implementing coaching strategies. The

Annenberg Institute for School Reform

agreed to copublish the paper and to dis-

tribute it broadly.

The authors, from the evaluation firm

Education Matters, Inc., in Cambridge,

Massachusetts, are deeply knowledgeable

about coaching. As evaluators of school

reform in Boston, which includes coaching

in all of the district’s schools, they have

seen firsthand how the strategy works. They

have also studied the implementation of

coaching in other districts, including San

Diego and Louisville, and have examined

the literature thoroughly.

The result is a useful and timely guide

for district and school leaders who are con-

sidering coaching as an arrow in their

large-scale-improvement quiver. It offers

details on what coaches do, what knowl-

edge and skills they need to have, and what

districts need to do to establish conditions

to make coaching effective. The paper also

helps districts navigate through some of the

challenges they face in putting the strategy

in place.

As Neufeld and Roper note, there is as

yet no widespread evidence that coaching

will improve student achievement. But

there is good reason to believe coaching

holds promise. That’s why districts are look-

ing eagerly at the strategy. This report is an

excellent place for district leaders to start.

Robert Schwartz Warren Simmons Senior Advisor Executive Director

Aspen Institute Annenberg Institute Program on Education for School Reform

vCoaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

p r e f a c e

T his paper takes as its orientation theknowledge and skill that district lead- ers must draw on if they are to develop suc-

cessful, systemwide approaches to coach-

ing. However, the paper is also written to

be of value to coaches, teachers, principals,

and policy-makers who can benefit from

understanding what we call the promises

and practicalities of coaching.

Our analysis is based primarily on what

we have learned from Education Matters’

longitudinal, qualitative studies of this pro-

fessional development approach in Boston,

Corpus Christi, Louisville, and San Diego.1

Over the last six years, we conducted hun-

dreds of in-depth interviews with coaches,

teachers who work with coaches, principals,

and central office administrators in an

effort to learn about the design, implemen-

tation, and influence of coaching on whole-

school, instructionally focused reform. In

addition, we observed district-provided

coach professional development as well as

school-based professional development

provided by coaches, and we reviewed per-

tinent documents related to coaches’ work.

During this time, we produced many

reports on the progress of whole-school

improvement in these districts with special

attention to coaching and other learning

opportunities for principals and teachers.

This report reflects a synthesis of what we

have learned.

While this research forms the basis of

our analysis and synthesis, the conclusions

also draw on what we have read in the liter-

ature about other approaches to coaching

(for example, in Hank Levin’s Accelerated

Schools Program and in America’s Choice)

and on other work with which we are

familiar (for example, the middle school–

focused work of the Center for Collabora-

tive Education–Boston and the work of

the Education Trust with respect to imple-

menting its Standards-in-Practice approach

to helping teachers develop assignments

that are standards-based and academically

rigorous).

We begin with a look at the promise

of coaching: while not yet proven to

increase student achievement, coaching

does increase the instructional capacity of

schools and teachers, a known prerequisite

for increasing learning.

We then ask the question: What is

coaching and what do coaches do? In this

section, we provide some descriptions of

coaches’ work and how that work is likely

to contribute to instructional improvement.

Then we consider what kind of preparation

Partial support for the development of this paper was pro vided by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation

vi Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

is needed for this work. In this section, we

describe some of coaches’ learning needs

and explore ways in which their profes-

sional development can be shaped to

address those needs.

We then turn to the practicalities of

implementation. We identify the conditions

that should be in place at the start of

implementation and we consider a range of

challenges that are likely to accompany the

start-up and continuation of coaching as a

key component of a district’s professional

development program.

Finally, we suggest what significant

improvements school districts might expect

if they choose to implement coaching as

part of their instructional-improvement

efforts.

All across this country, there are

coaches, teachers, principals, and others

who have embraced the challenge of imple-

menting coaching with the goal of provid-

ing students with high-quality teaching.

Without these dedicated professionals,

coaching would not be as fully developed

as it is today. Therefore, we want to thank

each of the many educators we have inter-

viewed over the last six years – many of

them six or seven times – for the knowl-

edge they have shared with us and for their

unflagging efforts to meet the learning

needs of their students. More particularly,

we want to thank Cathleen Kral, Instruc-

tional Leader for Literacy K–12 and Coach-

ing, and Elliot Stern, Principal, Edison Mid-

dle School, both of the Boston Public

Schools, for their thoughtful and encourag-

ing comments on the initial draft of this

paper.

Barbara Neufeld Dana Roper

Education Matters Inc Church Street

Cambridge MA www edmatters org

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

Seeking to improve instructional prac-tice and, ultimately, student learning, districts across the country have embraced

an old idea and given it a new application.

Taking their cue from athletics, where

coaches have enabled football and tennis

players to succeed by helping them

strengthen their skills before game time,

districts have adopted coaching as a model

for the professional development of teach-

ers and principals. The goal is to engage

educators in collaborative work designed to

contribute to the development of intellec-

tual capacity in schools.2

At its best, coaching helps educators

make informed decisions about instruction

and school organization that will lead

teachers to teach in ways that help students

gain a deep knowledge of subject matter so

that they can bring that knowledge to bear

on problems and questions that matter.

No one, as yet, has proven that coach-

ing contributes significantly to increased

student achievement. Indeed, there are

scant studies of this form of professional

development and how it influences teach-

ers’ practice and students’ learning. How-

ever, in light of our current knowledge

about what it takes to change a complex

practice like teaching, there are reasons to

think that coaching, in combination with

other professional development strategies,

is a plausible way to increase schools’

instructional capacity. The results of

instructional reform in Community School

District 2 in New York City provide a com-

pelling example of how coaching can sup-

port improved teaching and student

achievement when it is embedded in a sus-

tained, coherent, districtwide effort to

improve instruction.3

What do we know, then, about the

promise of coaching?

As a result of this orientation we are not focused on coaching designed to help teachers implement scripted highly prescribed instructional programs

To date New York City’s Community School District is the most famous and influential professional development experiment that included coaching; and it is likely that without the District experience coaching would be less of an option for districts than it is today It is important to note however that coaching was only one part of District

’s approach to improving instruction For a review of the work undertaken in District see Elmore

Improving teachers’ learning – and in turn their own

practice and their students’ learning – requires profes

sional development that is closely and explicitly tied

to teachers’ ongoing work Coaching addresses that

requirement

I N T R O D U C T I O N

t h e p r o m i s e o f c o a c h i n g

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

A Natural Outgrowth of Research on Student Learning

Coaching is a natural outgrowth of the les-

sons cognitive psychology has taught us

about what it means to learn and to know

something. Researchers have found that

student learning includes much more than

remembering and repeating what the

teacher has said; it also includes the capac-

ity to use what has been learned in tradi-

tional and novel ways, the capacity to make

connections between new knowledge and

old. To accomplish learning of this sort,

schools must provide students with oppor-

tunities to solve problems and come to

understand academic content in more

complex ways.

This vision of student learning (see

the discussion in Cohen et al. 1993) casts

teachers as guides or coaches who facilitate

learning by “posing questions, challenging

students’ thinking, and leading them in

examining ideas and relationships.” These

activities are considered essential because,

they write, “what students learn has to do

fundamentally with how they learn it.”

The implications of these ideas for

schools and teachers are significant.

Schools and classrooms need to become

places in which children and teachers

challenge each other about facts as well

as opinions, places in which students

approach academic content through

assignments that involve problem solving,

critical analysis, or higher-order thinking.

Teaching that includes all of these compo-

nents is known as teaching for understand-

ing. It is a fundamental part of standards-

based reform and central to many of the

latest approaches to teaching reading, writ-

ing, mathematics, and science.

Professional Development that Supports Teaching for Understanding

To teach for understanding, teachers need

new learning as well.4 But traditional

approaches to professional development

are not designed in ways that are likely to

help teachers learn what they now need to

know. This is because, as Ann Lieberman

observes, our understanding of how stu-

dents learn applies to adults as well; yet,

traditional forms of professional develop-

ment do not take advantage of this knowl-

edge. As she notes:

It is still widely accepted that staff

learning takes place primarily at a

series of workshops, at a conference or

with the help of a long-term consult-

ant. What everyone appears to want for

students – a wide array of learning

opportunities that engage students in

experiencing, creating, and solving real

problems using their own experiences

and working with others – is for some

reason denied to teachers when they

are the learners. In the traditional view

of staff development, workshops and

conferences conducted outside the

school count, but authentic opportuni-

ties to learn from and with colleagues

inside the school do not. (Lieberman

1995, 591–596)

See Windschitl for a detailed analysis of the demands of this kind of teaching

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

Almost everyone writing in the last

fifteen years about how to improve teach-

ing recommends changing the traditional

organization and content of professional

development so that it better addresses

teachers’ learning needs in light of the

same findings from cognitive psychology

that undergird new ideas about students’

learning needs. Reformers argue that pro-

fessional development of the sort needed

to help teachers teach for understanding

requires both new ideas about what counts

as professional development and new poli-

cies that provide the framework within

which professional development can occur.

The best information available about

the essential features of teacher profes-

sional development5 suggests:

• It must be grounded in inquiry,

reflection, and experimentation that are

participant-driven.

• It must be collaborative, involving a shar-

ing of knowledge among educators and a

focus on teachers’ communities of prac-

tice rather than on individual teachers.

• It must be sustained, ongoing, intensive,

and supported by modeling, coaching,

and the collective solving of specific

problems of practice.

• It must be connected to and derived

from teachers’ work with their students.

• It must engage teachers in concrete tasks

of teaching, assessment, observation, and

reflection that illuminate the processes

of learning and development.

• It must be connected to other aspects of

school change.

Reorganizing professional develop-

ment along these lines has led to great

interest in coaching as a critical component

of teacher professional development. This

is a logical outcome. After all, coaching, at

its best, adheres to these principles: it is

grounded in inquiry, collaborative, sus-

tained, connected to and derived from

teachers’ work with their students, and tied

explicitly to improving practice. And, given

that the changes advocated for teacher pro-

fessional development mirror those recom-

mended for instructing students, it follows

that professional developers, like teachers,

must take on the characteristics of coaches

and become collegial supports rather than

direct instructors.

Implementing a coaching model does

not mean giving up other approaches to

teacher learning. There are good reasons

for having large group instruction that

introduces teachers and principals to a new

concept or activity. There are great benefits

to intensive summer institutes that focus on

content as well as pedagogy. There are

many good reasons for teachers to broaden

the array of people with whom and from

whom they learn. But improving teachers’

learning – and, in turn, their practice and

student learning – requires professional

development that is closely and explicitly

tied to teachers’ ongoing work. Coaching

addresses that requirement. This list (with changes from the original order) is from Darling Hammond and McLaughlin

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

C oaching is school-based professionaldevelopment designed in light of the district’s reform agenda and guided by the

goal of meeting schools’ specific instruc-

tional learning needs. Coaches can support

instructional improvement in a number of

different ways.

Change coaches address whole-school,

organizational improvement.6 They help

schools examine their resources – time,

money, and personnel – and allocate them

more effectively. They develop the leader-

ship skills of both teachers and principals.

Content coaches focus more exclusively

on improving teachers’ instructional strate-

gies in specific content areas; for example,

mathematics or literacy. Such coaches are

likely to work most directly with teachers

rather than with principals.

Whether a district decides to use

coaches whose work is directly tied to

instruction or coaches whose work directly

supports the collaborative learning environ-

ment of the school more generally, or both,

all coaches must deal with issues of instruc-

tional capacity. Instructional capacity, after

all, is at the heart of all coaching work.

Change Coaches: Focusing on Leadership for Whole School Improvement

Change coaches help principals focus on

instruction, make the best use of school-

based resources, and nurture teacher lead-

ership.7 The coaches’ influence cuts across

w h a t i s c o a c h i n g a n d w h a t d o c o a c h e s d o ?

The term coaching includes activities related to devel

oping the organizational capacity of whole schools

(such as increasing leadership for instructional reform)

It includes helping principals and teachers reallocate

their resources and improve their use of data in the

service of improving instruction And it includes activi

ties directly related to improving instruction (such as

one on one observation and feedback of teachers’

instructional strategies and small group learning of

new content and pedagogy)

In some districts such as Boston the name change coach has been dropped because the emphasis on change alone seemed insufficient The individuals who engage in this work are now known as capacity coaches to emphasize their role in developing whole school capacity to focus on instructional improvement

Some principals already have the skills needed to create a professional community of learners in their schools and shape their own work to focus on instruction Such princi pal knowledge and skill is described in Supovitz and Poglinco However in our experience most principals do not have such knowledge and skill Coaches as a result enable such principals to learn what they need to know in order to support their teachers’ learning

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

content areas and grade levels to bring a

whole-school focus to the work of improv-

ing teaching and learning. Change coaches

also assist with the examination of school-

wide assessment data and help schools use

the data to plan improvements in line with

resources and the district’s priorities.

The work of change coaches is espe-

cially important now that principals must

take a greater leadership role in instruction

than in the past. To meet these demands,

principals need the classroom-based knowl-

edge and skill with which to support and

hold teachers accountable for implement-

ing the instructional strategies they are

being trained to use. At the same time,

teachers, too, are taking leadership roles.

Principals must collaborate with teachers so

that, together, principals and teachers can

address their schools’ needs.

Many principals are challenged by the

complex demands of increased collegial,

instructional leadership. Change coaches

can play a significant, multifaceted role in

providing principals with the help they

need to take on their newly defined roles.

Specifically, change coaches can:

• Help principals understand the importance

of recruiting teachers to assume instructional

leadership roles to drive whole-school

change. Sometimes this involves encour-

aging principals to listen to teachers

more in order to identify their leader-

ship potential. Sometimes it means help-

ing principals inspire teachers to take on

instructional leadership roles, including

decision-making and problem-solving

tasks.

• Act as strategists and assistants in building

capacity for shared decision making.

Coaches engage principals in discussions

before meetings and debrief them after-

wards to help principals learn to reflect

on their work. They help principals and

teacher leaders develop focused agendas

for meetings and professional develop-

ment sessions. Change coaches may help

principals understand and use the data

available to them and even assume the

role of “community organizer” by putting

together the schools’ various action

groups, mobilizing and coordinating

group activity, and developing strategies

to win support for various proposals.

These organizing tasks are all related to

the larger goal of spreading instruction-

ally focused responsibility throughout

the school community.

• Model leadership skills for principals as well

as for teachers. Change coaches can

explicitly draw attention to the skills they

use when they facilitate meetings, listen,

offer suggestions, or forge compromises.

For example, they help principals partici-

pate but take a less dominant role in

instructional team meetings. They also

support teachers who are learning to

work with their principals in new, more

open and collaborative ways.

• Assist in scheduling. Coaches help princi-

pals set aside blocks of time in which

teachers work in specific curriculum

areas or share common planning

periods.

• Help principals organize their time so that

they are able to visit classrooms regularly

to observe instruction and offer feedback to

teachers. Good instructional leadership is

more than having a presence in class-

rooms; it requires principal engagement

with teachers about teaching and learn-

ing. Change coaches can encourage this

engagement by giving principals con-

crete strategies for analyzing instruction,

such as asking students what they are

working on.

Change coaches understand that the

focus of their work is on developing

instructional leadership knowledge and

skill in principals and in teachers. And

these coaches understand that, even

though their work takes place in a district

with a specific approach to school reform,

each school varies and coaches must “cus-

tomize” their work to each school’s particu-

lar needs. Some principals are knowledge-

able about reform and eager to take it on;

others are less knowledgeable and less will-

ing to do so. Some schools face minimal

disruptions to teaching and learning, and

some face frequent disruptions. And

schools are at various stages of implement-

ing components of instructional reform.

Within such a range of settings,

coaches must figure out when and how

hard to push principals and teachers to

Encouraging Leadership Styles that Mesh Well with Collaborative Whole-school Improvement

Understanding their principals’ styles of interaction enables coaches when needed to help principals learn to be one among many significant contributors to discussions about instructional reform In taking on this role the coach is helping the principal learn to interact with teachers in the same kinds of ways in which teachers are being asked to interact with students in order to foster their learning by actively engaging them in the work Here two coaches reflect on this kind of work with prin cipals *

COACH The principal usually grasps things long before the group does so sometimes he doesn’t see the need for prolonged conversation around a topic As a result I have to come and say “You’re really talking too much in the group ” To which he says “Okay all right I can take that Let me think What should we do?” We talk about it and at the next group he tries to stifle that natural urge that he has He’s willing to take suggestions where I’m not sure everybody would be He’s not saying “Go away I’m going to do this the way I’m going to do it ” He really wants to be successful

COACH I didn’t want the principal to come to the meetings in the past because he tended to take over And then people just felt like he’s telling them what to do instead of them owning the problem But I’ve said to him “You know there are times when you do need to come but you need to come and listen to people as much as you need to come and give them a sense of what your parameters are ” And I told him that we will get where we need to go a lot less painfully and a lot quicker if we trust teachers more and attend to this process stuff more When he came to the meeting at the beginning of the year he was very clear about what his expectations were but then he really did a good job of listening throughout the rest of the discussion

* We have edited the quotes that appear in the paper’s sidebars and appen dices in order to make their points clear to the reader As a result they are not the exact words of any individual in our teacher or coach sample

address the reform agenda. They also

need to gauge how directive to be when

they see little movement at the school

level and how much collaboration and

joint decision making they need to

encourage in order to embed the reform

agenda in the school. These issues

require coaches to make decisions con-

stantly about how best to proceed. There

cannot be a “script” for change-coach

work any more than there is script for

teachers’ work.

Content Coaches: Focusing on Discipline based Instructional Improvement

By and large, content coaches focus their

attention on helping teachers improve

instruction in a particular academic disci-

pline, such as literacy and mathematics.

But they do not ignore the larger issues of

school organization and resource alloca-

tion. These issues affect their ability to do

their work effectively. For example, many

mathematics reform programs require

hour-long class periods, but few schools

devote this much time to mathematics. In

order to begin to coach teachers to use

the new mathematics curriculum and

pedagogy, content coaches need to be

assured that teachers have the requisite

time available for their subject. Thus, the

implementation of content-focused work

involves dealing with the same kinds of

issues addressed by change coaches –

principal expertise as well as issues of

scheduling and resource allocation.

Helping principals focus on instruction

Some principals in reforming districts remain unsure about what to look for when they visit classrooms or how to provide useful feedback to teachers This change coach suggests specific strategies for princi pals to use in classrooms

I ask the principal “Are you going into rooms and really looking at what teachers are doing and what kids are doing?” I need to help administrators know that when they go into rooms the first thing they do is talk to kids and ask kids what they’re doing You ask a kid “What are you doing today?” If you do that with three or four kids you’ll get a quick idea of the level of instruction that’s going on in the room For example if a kid says “We’re doing chapter three ” that’s very different than if a kid says “We’re working on our sentences to make them better ” It tells you whether they’re talking content or something else So that’s a concrete strategy for a principal: what to say to kids when you’re in the room

The next coach talks about nudging principals to assess what they are really learning when they are in classrooms

My question to him was “You’ve got all this wonderful curriculum Are teachers using it? How do you know they’re using it?” He said “Well I go around to the classroom and I see that they’re using it ” I said “Give me some evidence of that ” And he couldn’t do it He could not give me evidence “Okay ” I said “You’ve been around to the third grade Have you hit a math one?” “Oh yeah I’ve hit a math one ” “Are they doing it? Tell me which ones you saw them doing ” Couldn’t do it I said “That’s where your focus needs to be Push this stuff You need to be able to see that they’re using it And then you need to ask the question Why aren’t they using it?”

Change coaches might also ask principals to take risks in front of their teachers to demonstrate their understanding of the hard work teach ers are attempting and their commitment to learning what the instructional strategies involve

It’s not always easy to learn to do running records and observation surveys [assessment strategies associated with some literacy reforms] Teachers can get a bit upset about them and find them hard to learn So what I try – and it’s the hardest part – is to get the principal to go in the classroom and let other teachers see her fum bling with this but keep going keep going I’m having a really hard time with that The principal will say to me “I can’t do this it’s really hard ” And I keep saying “Neither can I neither can your teachers But we all have to get in there and sit down and try it ” I said “You know the best model for them to see is you trying it You know? Don’t be afraid to go in and try it Let them know that gee this is hard but don’t stop Keep doing it ”

Like their change coach counter-

parts, content coaches do not have a

scripted role. They must understand

the instructional reform they are help-

ing teachers to implement, they must

be skillful in working with adult learn-

ers who may be skeptical about – or

threatened by – the reforms, and they

must know how to adapt their coaching

methods to the knowledge and skill

of the teachers with whom they are

working.

In their work with individual teach-

ers and with small groups of teachers,

content coaches must first determine

teachers’ learning needs and then

meet those needs by targeting conver-

sations around instruction, raising

questions, organizing professional

development opportunities, bringing

in research and articles, and guiding

teachers in developing new practices.

Content coaches work at both the

classroom level and the school level. At

the classroom level, content coaches:

• Help teachers transfer what they learn

about new practices to their classrooms.

In the presence of a coach, and with

the coach’s support, teachers are

encouraged to try the strategies they

are learning in district-provided pro-

fessional development. If they

encounter difficulties, the coach is

available to provide suggestions that

will improve implementation of the

new approaches.

Coaching One-on-One

A middle school literacy coach explains how she works with one Eng lish Language Arts teacher illustrating the multiple strategies and the length of time it may take to help teachers improve their knowledge and skill

I’ve been working with Teacher A pretty consistently since about the third week of school I’m usually in his classroom watching a lesson between three and four times a week

We’ve fallen into a pattern where I go in I watch and we meet up later in the day to debrief In the debrief I ask him how it went from his perspective what he noticed about it what he’s working on Then I give him some feedback about things I saw And then together we work on setting some goals for the next time the principal and other administrators come in; what he’ll be working on and what I’ll watch for him One thing he’s working on a lot is classroom management how to manage his time and the children so there’s as much work time as possible

One of the big issues that Teacher A and I are working on is that often by the time he’s got his mini lesson done and the kids are actually back on task thirty five minutes of the class period are gone and they only have twenty minutes to work So we’ve set a ten minute mini lesson goal and yesterday it was twelve which was “Phew!” And that feeds into a lot of our management problems because the kids get antsy and start talking and being squirrelly

I worked with him last year and I did several demonstrations or model lessons We kind of cotaught at times I had concerns about doing that with him this year because I didn’t want in any way to undermine his authority with the students and he’s struggling with that I know that I can come in and teach a les son and gather the kids in and have them behave but I don’t want the kids to make a comparison between me and him I felt that wouldn’t be beneficial for him so this year I’m going to make more use of other teachers and take him to see them do lessons so that within his own classroom he’s just all teacher

We’re scheduled to go see four other teachers teach during his prep period One of the things that I asked him to do was to notice what’s happening in their classrooms as far as how the children behave and how much time on task they have and to build a vision in his mind of what he wants to create in his class room I did this because I see that his expectations for himself and the kids are lower than what they could be I don’t believe that he believes it’s possible and I want him to see that it is

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

• Help establish a safe environment in which

teachers can strive to improve their practice

without fear of negative criticism or evalua-

tion. Coaches do this by approaching

their own work as continuous learners,

admitting that they are not expert in all

areas. This stance models the value of

learning together for new, experienced,

and even veteran teachers. It is just such

an environment that teachers are being

asked to create for students, and, like

their students, teachers have to experi-

ence this kind of instruction in order to

understand it.

More specifically, in the classroom con-

tent coaches:

• work with teachers to plan and imple-

ment lessons;

• work with some content-area teachers to

hone specific strategies;

• develop/find materials and other cur-

riculum resources;

• work with new teachers on new-teacher

issues as well as on instructional strate-

gies;

• encourage teachers to talk about their

practice with them and with one

another;

• observe classes and provide written and

oral feedback after observations; and

• provide demonstration lessons.

At the school level, content coaches:

• Help teachers develop leadership skills with

which they can support the work of their col-

leagues. In a number of districts, both

math and literacy teachers are being pre-

pared as “lab-site” leaders. In this role,

teachers open their classrooms for obser-

vation by others. Such observations may

help a new teacher, for example, observe

someone with more expertise in a given

strategy. And it may help the lab-site

teacher get feedback on practices she is

trying to implement. Through the estab-

lishment of lab-sites, content coaches

help develop both the instructional cul-

ture and capacity of the schools.

Coaching Small Groups

Many coaches work with small groups of teachers in addi tion to one on one coaching Such small group settings allow teachers to learn in collaboration with one another and with the coach Coaches in Boston use the Collabora tive Coaching and Learning (CCL) model to encourage teachers to engage – actively and collaboratively – in instructionally focused work

The CCL model consists of a preconference a lab site demonstration and a debriefing The preconference sets the stage for the observations to follow The coach facili tates both the preconference and the debriefing discus sions; as facilitator her role is to highlight best practices that she observed during the lab site demonstration and to offer suggestions for improvement and next steps The coach also plays an important role in ensuring that the classroom demonstrations and observations go smoothly guiding the teachers through each aspect of the lesson and gently redirecting them when necessary

A detailed example of the CCL process as used in one Boston elementary school appears in Appendix A beginning on page

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

• Provide small-group professional develop-

ment sessions for teachers. Coaches may

lead inquiry/study groups, demonstrate

pertinent teaching strategies, and con-

duct directed small-group sessions that

focus on the content teachers need to

learn.

At the school level, content coaches

may also:

• plan and implement professional devel-

opment sessions, often in collaboration

with principals and/or lead teachers;

• conduct book purchases and inventories;

• help teachers develop classroom-based

strategies for assessing student learning

and learn to use formative assessments to

inform instruction;

• keep logs of their work with students and

teachers; and

• meet with principals to review progress

and plan future work.

Over time, like their change-coach

counterparts, content coaches adjust what

they do. In light of progress at their schools

or changes in the districts’ priorities,

coaches may revise how they allocate their

time, focus on planning and making links

between standards and literacy or math

strategies, and coach small groups of teach-

ers for a concentrated period of time.

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

C oaching, like teaching, is not a rou-tine activity. It must be focused on instructional goals and planned, but it must

also be responsive to the needs of the

learners and the exigencies of specific class-

room situations. Coaches not only develop

principals’ and teachers’ knowledge and

skill; if they are successful, they also help

develop schools’ professional cultures as

learning organizations.

To accomplish such work, coaches

require professional development of their

own so that they can improve their knowl-

edge and skill to tailor their coaching to

the needs of the teachers and schools with

which they work. They need to understand

organizational development and instruc-

tion, and they need considerable facility in

working with adult learners in a coaching

relationship.

Although some educators are suffi-

ciently skillful in these areas and available

to take on coaching roles, most districts

have found that they need to “grow their

own” coaches and sustain them with rele-

vant, ongoing professional development.

Districts, as a result, need to formulate pro-

fessional development programs for their

coaches. And these programs, like learning

opportunities for students and teachers,

need to follow the guidelines for profes-

sional development delineated on page 3.

Elements of Professional Development for Coaches

District-developed programs that that are

currently under way 8 suggest that profes-

sional development for coaches should:

• Ensure that principals and coaches under-

stand the “big picture” of the reform in

which they are engaged and the reasons that

undergird the changes. Such understand-

ing is not always easy because, at the out-

set, district administrators themselves

H O W A R E C O A C H E S P R E P A R E D ?

Districts must commit themselves to providing

coaches with the kind of responsive participatory

professional development that coaching affords to

teachers and principals and they must constantly re

evaluate that professional development to ensure that

it continues to provide the depth and breadth of knowl

edge coaches need for this work Creating and staffing

such programs can present considerable challenges to a

district

The districts that we have studied for the most part devote one day each week to professional development for coaches This leaves coaches with four full days to be in schools

may not be sure of the “big picture.”

They may be aware only that they want

teachers to implement a set of new

instructional activities. They may not

have articulated for themselves how these

instructional activities are related to each

other nor the accumulated demands they

make on teachers. They may not be

aware of the implications of these

demands on schools as organizations.

Districts may fail to help principals and

coaches understand as well as implement

the organizational changes that must

accompany implementation of such an

approach to instruction or even acknowl-

edge the challenges that they will face.

• Develop a strong, focused, coherent orienta-

tion program for new content and change

coaches. This program should begin sev-

eral weeks before the start of the school

year so that coaches can start their work

with a clear understanding of the dis-

trict’s reform agenda (the big picture),

the schools in which they will work, their

roles, and the specific knowledge and

skills they will need to bring to those set-

tings. In addition, coaches must be aware

of how to get help if they are struggling

with implementing their work. In subse-

quent years, when new coaches begin

their work, the district might consider

repeating such a program as well as pro-

viding new coaches with experienced

“coach mentors” to speed their transition

into the district’s work. A district should

also make some provision for orienting

Explaining the “Big Picture”

Too often when a district is implementing a new curriculum strategy (such as Readers’ and Writers’ Workshop) administra tors may initially focus only on the components of the new approach (in this case guided reading independent reading conferencing and read alouds) without explaining to principals or coaches the “big picture ” They neglect to address the funda mental questions about why this overall approach to literacy instruction was chosen how the components fit together and what its implementation is intended to accomplish As a result neither coaches nor principals know why they are being asked to implement what seems like yet another arbitrarily chosen approach to instruction

When the new teaching practices are quite different from those traditionally in use and the form and content of professional development is likewise quite novel coaches and principals need to understand the scope and rationale for what they are being asked to implement if they are going to successfully engage teachers in the work Further this knowledge is essen tial to ensure that principals and coaches are able to make knowledgeable adaptations to the instructional approach in light of school based contexts

Coaching for coaches

Just as teachers who are learning to improve their practice ben efit from opportunities to observe and to be observed by their peers coaches who are learning to improve their coaching will benefit from similar opportunities to observe other coaches’ practice and receive feedback about their own coaching work Such a professional development strategy allows coaches to observe one another’s practice through coaching demonstra tions and provides opportunities for coaches to reflect on their own and others’ best coaching practices Districts have been struggling to arrange these kinds of learning opportunities for coaches but we have come across examples of this kind of coach professional development happening in a few places Two detailed examples are presented in Appendix B on page one led by a principal and one focusing on coaching to higher levels of teaching expertise

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

new coaches who begin their work after

the start of the school year.9

• Develop differentiated professional develop-

ment for experienced coaches. It is difficult

to implement effective coach profes-

sional development that mixes coaches

across levels all of the time; therefore,

their professional development should

focus on the particular school level – ele-

mentary, middle, or high school – with

which coaches will work. In addition,

coaches need professional development

that responds to their extant knowledge

and skill and to the demands of their

schools.

For example, coaches often request

professional development that addresses

their expertise with coaching as well as

with content. They may want to learn

how to work more effectively with resist-

ant teachers and/or with teachers whose

content knowledge or facility with class-

room management is weak. Knowing that

their role is not to tell teachers how to

teach but to guide them in improving

their practice, coaches often want profes-

sional development to help them

improve their skill as guides of teachers’

learning, and both change and content

coaches often want professional develop-

ment to help them help principals take

on the instructional component of their

leadership role.

Some of this coach knowledge can be

provided during formal, whole-group

professional development sessions; but,

ideally, coaches should themselves be

coached as they work with teachers and

principals. The human and financial

demands of providing such opportunities

can be daunting, but they are essential

both to ensure that coaches learn what

they need to learn and to model effective

coaching techniques.

• Ensure that coaches are knowledgeable

about the learning needs of special popula-

tions of students. Without direct attention

to the learning needs of special student

populations, it is likely that many coaches

will not be able to provide skillful coach-

ing to those who teach special popula-

tions in either separate or mainstream

settings. Districts must ensure that

coaches have the knowledge and skill

needed to work with, for example,

English-language learners and students

with special education plans. Districts

can provide such coaching by actively

recruiting individuals with appropriate

backgrounds and by ensuring that coach

professional development includes atten-

tion to what coaches need to know about

these issues.

• Ensure that the coaches hear the same mes-

sages teachers do. Outside experts who

provide professional development often

For a number of reasons there is considerable coach turn over from year to year As a result districts need to have a strategy on hand for orienting coaches who are new to the work

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

hold conflicting views on instructional

reforms. To be sure, reforms are usually

open to some interpretation and can be

modified in light of local needs. How-

ever, in the early phases of changing

instructional practices, teachers, coaches,

and principals may be so concerned with

implementing practices “perfectly” that

they become confused and frustrated

by variations in what they are learning

and being asked to implement. Districts

can alleviate this problem by sending a

common message to coaches and teach-

ers or else by acknowledging explicitly

that there are some valid differences of

opinion.10

• Enable some coaches to become “coach

leaders.” Creating a community of learn-

ers is one way in which districts can

address the evolving learning needs of

their coaches while utilizing their experi-

ence and expertise to build on the dis-

trict’s coaching capacity. Some districts

have, in fact, created “lead coach” posi-

tions to enhance their capacity to sup-

port both content and change coaches.

Challenges in Creating Effective Coach Professional Development

It is not easy for districts to develop high-

quality professional development programs

for their coaches. One primary difficulty is

that, due to the novelty of the enterprise,

there are few people with the extant knowl-

edge and skill necessary to lead these pro-

grams. As a result, districts face consider-

able challenges in creating and staffing

coach professional development programs

that provide their coaches with the depth

and breadth of knowledge they need.

In addition, the task of providing

coach professional development can

become more difficult over time as teach-

ers and principals increase their knowledge

and skill. Put simply, as coaches succeed in

increasing teachers’ and principals’ instruc-

tional capacity, they must increase their

own instructional capacity as well. Coaches

need to be more than just “one step ahead”

of the people they are coaching.

In one district for example coaches were told by one lit eracy expert never to have teachers do a whole class read in which all students are reading the same piece of litera ture Several weeks later another outside expert told coaches that there could be legitimate reasons for using a whole class read In circumstances where coaches feel accountable for faithful implementation these kinds of mixed messages lead to confusion and frustration

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

C oaching does not occur in a vacuum;it is part of a district’s reform strategy for increasing the quality of teaching so

that students achieve at higher levels. As

such, coaching needs to be embedded in

the district’s overall reform strategy and

professional development plan; it is not a

stand-alone or complete approach to pro-

fessional development.

Therefore, prior to determining that it

wants to initiate a coaching model, a dis-

trict would do well to ask itself the follow-

ing questions:

• What are our professional development

goals and what do we want to accomplish

with our overall professional develop-

ment program?

• What would we gain from having coach-

ing as part of our repertoire of teacher/

principal learning opportunities?

• What would coaches do to help us

achieve our instructional goals?

• Are there other approaches to achieving

our goal, and might they be more appro-

priate for us?

• What else, in addition to coaching,

would we have to support to help us

reach our instructional goals?

If the answers to these questions sug-

gest including coaching in the district’s

professional development repertoire, then

the district will need to do some prelimi-

nary planning.

Before Starting a Coaching Program

Although coaching is a highly localized

form of professional development, its suc-

cess at the school level depends on the

district. Only if the district shapes the

coaches’ role, focuses the coaches’ work

around the district’s instructional goals,

and articulates the connection between

that work and schools’ overall reform strat-

egy can coaching be effective. Before

w h a t c o n d i t i o n s s u p p o r t C O A C H i n g ?

Successful coaching depends not only on the knowl

edge and skill of individual coaches but also on a

number of district and school level factors that can

enhance or thwart the coaches’ efforts The work of

coaching is highly localized and the principal plays a

key role in the program but its ultimate success at the

school level depends on the district Therefore it is

the district that needs to shape the coaches’ role focus

the coaches’ work around the district’s instructional

goals and articulate the connection between that work

and schools’ overall reform strategy

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

embarking on a coaching program, the dis-

trict needs to ask itself some very practical

questions:

• How many coaches would we need?

• What do we want them to do?

• What are the human resources we can

bring to establishing coaching in the dis-

trict? Do we have in-house people who

can take on this work? Do we have peo-

ple doing professional development now

who are ineffective and, if so, can we

replace them with others who can do

coaching?

• What financial resources can we bring to

bear on this approach to professional

development?

• What will we stop doing by way of profes-

sional development if we opt for coach-

ing?

• Whose “ox will be gored” by these deci-

sions and how will we deal with them?

• And, finally, how should we organize

coaching? Do we want to begin with a

pilot program and scale up? Do we want

to begin with a districtwide coaching pro-

gram?

Once a district is satisfied with the

answers to these questions, it then needs to

move forward to put in place a number of

conditions that will ensure that coaching

has the opportunity to succeed.

Conditions Essential for Successful Coaching

Successful coaching depends on a number

of district- and school-level factors that can

enhance or thwart the coaches’ efforts.11

Districts need to be aware of these factors

and take them into account when develop-

ing and implementing coaching. Most of

them are within the districts’ and schools’

control.

We recognize that not all of these con-

ditions will be present when coaching

begins. Indeed, some of them will develop,

over time, as a result of coaching. However,

we stress that districts must be aware of

their importance, make sure they are

addressed, and keep track of their progress

throughout the duration of the coaching

program.

For coaching to be effective, district

leaders need to:

• Provide clear, explicit, and continuing sup-

port for the coaching program. Without

question, the most important condition

for successful coaching is district support

for coaches’ work. The support of district

administrators who supervise and evalu-

ate principals, as well as those in the dis-

trict central office who develop curricu-

lum guides and local assessments, is par-

ticularly critical.

This finding is not unique to the implementation of coach ing District and school level factors are known to thwart or support any number and kind of school reform efforts It is also well known that principals are key to successful implementation of school level reform In the case of coaching district commitment to the work which includes the provision of high quality coach professional development and insistence on principals’ support of and accountability for implementation can make or break a district’s coaching efforts

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

a great influence on that culture and, as

a result, need to learn how best to create

a climate appropriate for coaching.

• Ensure that the process of selecting coaches

at the district and school levels is rigorous

and fair and results in the hiring of coaches

who will be credible to the teachers and

principals with whom they work.12 Coach

credibility, by and large, rests on a foun-

dation of personal and professional

qualities. Coaches need the personal

qualities that establish trust. They need

professional expertise – which in urban

areas includes skill teaching low-

achieving and diverse students – in

order to demonstrate their value to

teachers and principals.

Principals cannot usually create the

school cultures suitable for coaching with-

out strong direction, support, and account-

ability from the district. However, there are

several conditions within the power of the

principal that are essential for effective

coaching. To support the coaching pro-

gram in their schools, principals must:

• Honor coaches’ roles and not divert their

time to other school needs. Because schools

are often short-staffed and have myriad

tasks that are not clearly in either the

principal’s or teachers’ domain, coaches

often find themselves asked to “pitch in”

in inappropriate ways that interfere with

• Understand the reforms in which schools are

engaged and possess the knowledge and skill

with which to support schools in implement-

ing them. We have seen many high-level

administrators who observe instruction

in schools and provide teachers or

coaches with feedback that contradicts

the district’s reform agenda. This under-

mines the coaches’ role and negates the

learning they might provide.

• Ensure that the coaches have well-specified

roles and make coaches’ roles and responsi-

bilities clear to all of the district’s educators.

Without question, coaches’ roles evolve.

But clarity from the outset, wherever pos-

sible, can help ensure that teachers

accept coaching. In particular, districts

must address the limits and possibilities

of coaching given teachers’ negotiated

agreements concerning use of time and

the possibility that coaching will be per-

ceived as evaluation.

• Provide principals with professional develop-

ment that enables them to create a school

culture in which coaching is both routine

and safe. Implementing coaching well

depends on the presence of a school

culture in which it is safe for teachers

to participate and to have their work

observed and critiqued. Principals have

Union contracts can pose a challenge in creating coach positions In some cases new positions must be negotiated with the local teacher union or association In others teacher seniority dominates as the method for filling teacher leadership positions The leadership positions may also be construed as evaluative which is inappropriate or forbidden under some agreements

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

their ability to coach. They may be asked

to do substitute work, proctor exams, or

organize book rooms. It is up to the dis-

trict to make clear to principals what is

and is not acceptable for them to assign

as coach work, and the district must hold

principals accountable for maintaining

those guidelines.

• Acknowledge that conversations between

coaches and principals about teachers’ work

might cause tension. While coaches are not

supposed to evaluate teachers, coaches

must be able to discuss their work and

their progress candidly with principals.

But teachers may regard these conversa-

tions with suspicion and can view

coaches as “snitches.” Coaches and prin-

cipals must work out the delicate balance

between confidentiality and reasonable

feedback so that the coach can be a pro-

ductive informant for the principal and

the principal can use the coach’s feed-

back in professional ways. In addition,

when done with sensitivity, principals can

help the coach resolve difficult situa-

tions.13 The issue of coaches and teacher

evaluation needs to be addressed directly

at the outset; only through experience,

however, will teachers develop the trust

necessary to expose their learning needs

to the coaches.

• Have substantial knowledge about the con-

tent reforms their teachers are trying to

implement. When principals are far less

knowledgeable than their coaches,

coaches may find themselves in the awk-

ward position of disagreeing with their

principals about the ways in which teach-

ers are implementing new teaching

strategies. This makes it difficult for the

principal and coach to assess progress as

well as set priorities for the work.

Some Practical Conditions to Consider

Coaches must work with those who present

themselves as learners. Like teachers,

coaches can have a powerful impact on

learners, but they cannot “make” the learn-

ers learn. They can diagnose their learners’

needs and employ multiple coaching

approaches; but, in the end, if the learner

– either teacher or principal – does not or

is not willing to learn, coaches cannot be

successful.

And, what is more, coaches have no

formal authority; they cannot insist that

those they coach change their practice, nor

can they threaten them with poor perform-

ance reviews. As a result, their credibility

depends on the knowledge and skill they

bring to the job and the trust they establish

with principals and teachers. However, even

with high credibility and trust, coaches can-

not do their work if the teachers and prin-

cipals with whom they work do not or do

not know how to support them.

Principals often play some role in determining which teachers the coach will work with and on which instruc tional strategies they will focus Principals have also on occasion removed particularly resistant teachers from coaching activities and/or targeted additional coaching hours for certain teachers

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

Even when districts and schools estab-lish the conditions that can make coaching work well, districts, schools, and

coaches still face challenges in designing

and implementing this approach to profes-

sional development. In our experience,

the most significant challenges are these:

allocating coaches to schools, finding time

for doing the work, changing teaching

practices, and assessing the impact of the

coaching work.

In presenting this set of challenges, we

do not intend to dissuade districts from

adding coaching to their professional

development programs. Nor do we mean

to suggest that there is no way to imple-

ment a model well given all of the condi-

tions and challenges that arise. Rather,

we want to stress that this approach to

professional development is complex and

requires considerable thought as well as

ingenuity in order to take the core idea

and create an effective coaching model.

The experiences of the districts in which

we have worked suggest that it can be done

well.

Allocating Coaches

With limited resources, districts must

decide how many coaches they can afford

and how to deploy those coaches for the

maximum impact on instruction. Because

the systematic use of coaches is new, there

are no tried-and-true formulas. Nonethe-

less, the experience of a number of districts

suggests that some allocation designs are

likely to work better than others.

How many days should a coach be in a school?

Given the urgency of helping all teachers

and students, districts tend to provide all

schools with at least some coaching time.

Generally speaking, this is not a good idea.

When coaches are spread thinly across a

district’s schools, teachers have insufficient

opportunities to learn from them and

coaches find themselves frustrated by their

w h a t c h a l l e n g e s d o e s C O A C H i n g p r e s e n t ?

Creating and supporting effective professional develop

ment through coaching is a complex undertaking; it

requires considerable thought as well as ingenuity to

turn the core idea into an effective coaching program

The challenges however are not insurmountable and

the experiences of districts in four often repeated areas

of concern can help districts just starting out to address

them before they undermine the program

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

inability to make a significant difference.

For example, some districts began their

coaching program by assigning coaches

to work with individual teachers in two

or more schools for one or two days per

week each. This approach has not worked.

Coaching in this arrangement is fragmen-

tary and lacks continuity, and coaches and

teachers find it difficult to build trust. In

addition, the preparation required for

such an arrangement has proven over-

whelming for coaches. As a result, some

districts now prefer to have coaches in one

school for four days each week, with the

fifth day reserved for coach professional

development.

Other districts, such as Boston, are

turning to cycles of coaching to maximize

the coherence of the coaching work and to

minimize fragmentation for the coaches

and teachers.14 For example, a coach might

work with one or more teachers, one at

a time, for several weeks and then move

on to others, either in the same school or

perhaps at a different school. Or, a coach

might work intensively with a small group

of teachers and then move on to another

group.

With whom should the coaches work?

Some districts assign coaches to work

with one teacher at a time; others assign

coaches to work with small groups of teach-

ers. Still others assign coaches to focus on

particular grade levels or to work only with

teachers who choose to work with the

coach. Which is the best approach?

In our view, questions such as these

need to be addressed on a case-by-case

basis, depending on the district’s coaching

resources and the schools’ most pressing

professional development needs. Nonethe-

less, we have observed that coaching mod-

els that rely solely on one-on-one interac-

tions between the coach and the teacher

do not show as much promise as those that

incorporate small-group learning. In addi-

tion to the increased efficiency afforded by

small groups, such interactions between

teachers and coaches lead more quickly to

the development of instructionally focused

school cultures.15 Similarly, models that rely

solely on teachers’ volunteerism do not

appear to take hold as well as those that

actively expect and encourage teachers to

participate in coaching activities.16

Should coaches be assigned to schools in which they recently taught?

Since, by and large, content coaches come

out of the ranks of teachers, some schools

tend to select coaches they know well

Information on this model of coaching is available on the Boston Plan for Excellence’s Web site at www bpe org Also see Appendix A

See Neufeld and Roper July

Some districts face barriers to requiring teachers to partic ipate in small group coaching as a result of the profes sional development parameters defined in their negotiated teacher agreements As a result most coaching models depend to some extent on teachers’ willingness to volun teer and then on the power of peer pressure when partici pating teachers find coaching a positive experience

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

as well as teachers. On the whole, although

many coaches in this position see the value

in teaching while coaching, the demands

on them are considerable and they can be

torn between spending time preparing for

their students and spending time on their

coaching work.

Finding Time to Do the Work

Even with a commitment to the concept,

districts have learned that it is difficult

to provide coaches with enough time to

implement their roles to the fullest. School

schedules and professional development

calendars limit the time coaches can

devote to the task, even while growing

demands for coaches’ help place a greater

premium on their time.

How can scheduling interfere with implementation of coaching?

Coaches frequently report that it is difficult

to find time to conference with teachers

immediately after an observation or

demonstration lesson. Time for conferenc-

ing may not be available because the teach-

ers’ preparation periods were prior to

the observation, for example. Yet, from

the coaches’ perspective, such immediate

conferencing is essential to the coaching

process. Time delays, they believe, reduce

the effectiveness of their feedback.

A uniform instructional schedule – for

example, mandating literacy instruction at

the same time throughout a building –

makes it difficult for coaches to schedule

because they formerly taught in the school.

As with everything else, there are advan-

tages and disadvantages to having a coach

who is well known to teachers and princi-

pals. One powerful advantage is that the

coach will likely begin the work in a con-

text of trust and credibility. This may help

the coach gain access to teachers.

But there are disadvantages, as well.

Coaching changes the relationship between

a teacher and her colleagues and the prin-

cipal. It may be difficult for teachers to

have “one of their own” observing their

teaching and providing feedback. Likewise,

it may be awkward for a former teacher

to establish a more peerlike relationship

with the principal. We suggest that districts,

principals, and coaches weigh these pluses

and minuses as they assign coaches to

schools.

Should some coaches retain part time teaching assignments?

Coaching appeals to some teachers because

they want to work with adults. But others

are reluctant to take on the job because it

means that they must give up working with

students. In addition, some coaches want to

continue teaching in order to retain their

professional credibility and become better

teachers and, hence, more knowledgeable

coaches. As a result, some schools (rather

than districts) have made alterations in the

organization and allocation of coaches in

order to enable them to work with students

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

time with teachers. Such schedules also

make it difficult for teachers to observe one

another, since all of them are teaching at

the same time. While there may be valid

instructional reasons for uniform sched-

ules, schools need to consider the impact

they have on coaching.

How can coaching be organized as the demand for it outstrips the time available?

The success of coaching encourages teach-

ers to want to spend more time with

coaches, and more teachers to seek out

their help. But coaches usually do not have

time to help all of the teachers who want

their help, even if they spend four full days

in a school. Coaches need guidance from

their principals and from the district about

how to set coaching priorities so that there

is a rational approach to the allocation of

the coaches’ resources.

How do schools find time for small group coach provided professional development?

While coaches’ work with individuals or

small groups of teachers in classrooms is

built into the school day, the small-group

professional development they provide to

teachers around specific teaching strategies

is not. For example, coaches may lead regu-

larly scheduled teacher study groups or

present new content knowledge to teachers

before or after school or, occasionally, on

Saturdays. These sessions can stretch a dis-

trict’s coaching resources very thin, particu-

larly if coaches are spread out across sev-

eral schools. Districts and principals need

to monitor coaches’ workload to make sure

that they do not become overwhelmed by

the professional development responsibili-

ties associated with their role.

Changing Teachers’ Practices

Despite the urgency of improving teaching

and learning, the truth is that it will take

several years for teachers to master what

are fundamentally new and different

instructional strategies even when teachers

are eager to implement what they are

Finding time to do the work

A coach has arranged to accompany a teacher on observations and to facilitate the debriefing conversation that follows By including herself in the observations the coach feels that she increases the number of observations she can do in the time available

When I come in with Teacher A to watch that’s going to kill two birds with one stone because then I can give the observed teachers feedback on what I’m seeing and what they’re working on as well I’m really liking that because one of the problems I’ve run into is that Teacher B’s got a prep period when I’m watching Teacher A teach; so a lot of times I don’t get a chance to debrief It’s harder for me to see them or debrief with them afterwards and because Teacher A is more needy than Teacher B and some others he’s gotten the bulk of my attention so far But I’m starting to back off on that and think that I’ve got to do more with the others because they’re really ready to move ahead and be pushed and grow And I learn a lot from them so it’s good for me too

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

learning. Needless to say, the process will

take more time with teachers who are not

willing to change their practice or with

teachers who need help with other aspects

of their work, such as classroom manage-

ment. It is important for district leaders to

keep in mind the challenge of changing

instructional practices so as not to become

convinced that the reforms are not working

or put impossible expectations and

demands on teachers and principals. Both

of these possibilities can thwart the real

progress that may be under way, leading to

coach, principal, and teacher frustration

and exhaustion.

District administrators can help man-

age expectations for coaching by acknowl-

edging that deep changes in instruction

take a long time. At the end of a school

year, coaches can be dismayed by how little

change in instruction they have seen. They

can feel ineffective when they observe

teachers who say they are implementing

what the coach has taught, but whose prac-

tice does not seem significantly different.

Setting goals at the school and district

level, with benchmarks throughout the

year, can help the coach and teachers to

keep their instructional progress in per-

spective. In addition, these sorts of goal-

setting activities can foster rich collegial

conversations around instruction, deep

analysis of student- and school-level data,

and, eventually, a renewed sense of com-

mitment to the work and/or a clear sense

of direction regarding next steps.

What should coaches do about teachers who say “This too will pass” or who seem unin terested or unmotivated to learn new knowledge and skills?

Some teachers do not fully understand the

instructional reform and its links to stan-

dards, and they appear to be comfortable

using the practices they have always used.

Some teachers are considered “expert” by

their colleagues, and their students’

achievement scores, on average, may be

good; but they do not use the new strate-

gies to guide their instruction. Encourag-

ing these two groups of teachers to use new

approaches can pose a challenge for

coaches.17 Districts must play an important

role in supporting coaches by making clear

that the new instructional strategies are a

priority for all teachers.

What should coaches do about teachers who overtly resist working with them?

Some teachers are not only uninterested in

coaching, they are actively hostile to the

practice. They might, for example, leave

the room while a coach is modeling a les-

son. More commonly, teachers simply

ignore coaches’ suggestions. District admin-

Coaches also wonder what to say to teachers whose stu dents on average seem to be doing well on accountability assessments but who may have a number of underper forming students One of the important roles a district can play is to make sure that schools and teachers look at all of their achievement data Teachers and principals should be accountable for all students’ achievement not achieve ment on average Making sure that data are disaggregated by relevant categories before they are analyzed can allevi ate this problem

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

istrators must make clear to resistant teach-

ers that new instructional strategies and the

coaching associated with them are for all

teachers. They can reinforce this message

by holding principals accountable for

implementing the district’s plans.

What can coaches do when they work in schools where principal leadership is weak?

In schools with weak principals, coaches

find themselves unable to implement their

work even if teachers want their support.

Weak principals cannot organize the

schools’ schedules to accommodate coach-

ing and other professional development

activities. They ineffectively or incorrectly

convey district priorities to their schools.

Coaches who work in such school contexts

describe their role as “frustrating and dis-

empowering.” They perceive the central

office as ineffective and incapable of mak-

ing clear to principals that they must assert

leadership for reform at the schools.

Coaches are stymied when districts do not

provide principals with the professional

development they need to improve their

work as instructional leaders.

Providing high-quality professional

development to principals and holding

them accountable as collegial, instructional

leaders are important responsibilities for

any district, regardless of whether it imple-

ments coaching. But districts that employ

the practice have a particular responsibility

to develop principals’ skills, because weak

leadership impedes effective coaching.

Coaches must employ strategies for aid-

ing weak principals when possible and cir-

cumventing them when necessary. Without

district support, change coaches will be

unable to work with principals, content

coaches will be unable to work with teach-

ers, and schools will not be able to build

their instructional capacity.

Measuring the Quality and Impact of Coaches’ Work

It is extremely difficult to measure the

quality and impact of coaches’ work; yet, it

is essential that districts attempt to assess

coaches’ value.18 Without a sense of what

distinguishes different levels of coach qual-

ity, it is difficult to provide coaches with

appropriate professional development or

consider what impact their work should

have on teacher or principal practice.

In addition, without some links

between coaching, teacher learning, and

student achievement, it is difficult to justify

the expense of coaching, especially in times

of tight budgets when districts may be

tempted to return to older, large-group

forms of professional development. And by

taking a close look at the quality and

impact of coaching, districts may be able to

develop something like a “coaching best

practices” resource book that would be

available to all of the district’s coaches and

which would enable the district to allocate

coaches according to their coaching

expertise and schools’ specific needs.

None of the districts with which we are familiar have developed refined coach evaluation strategies or assess ment tools

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

In developing assessments of coach

quality and impact, districts should:

• Make clear the criteria used to evaluate

coaches’ work. In a number of districts,

principals evaluate coaches with only

vague guidance from central office. It

is not uncommon for coaches to report

that no one has officially evaluated

their work. But just as students cannot

improve their performance without clear

standards for excellent work, coaches are

unlikely to perform better unless they

know the criteria on which they will be

evaluated.

• Develop an evaluation instrument that is

formative as well as summative in purpose.

Such an instrument should provide feed-

back that would highlight coaches’

strengths and areas in need of further

professional development. It should also

provide sufficient documentation to

allow terminating a coach’s contract if

this becomes necessary.

It is important to keep in mind that

coaching, like teaching, is not a rote activ-

ity. Therefore, any evaluation of its quality

and impact must allow for variation in

how coaches do their work. Nonetheless,

given a district’s approach to instruction,

some coaching strategies will be more

appropriate and, likely, more effective than

others. At a minimum, the coaching behav-

iors the district stresses in its coach profes-

sional development programs should be

evaluated.

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

C oaching, the school-based componentof a district’s professional develop- ment plan, has the potential to contribute

to teacher learning, to enhance the extent

to which teachers use what they learn in

their professional development, to increase

teachers’ and principals’ collegial interac-

tions around instruction and overall school

improvement, and, thereby, to foster the

development of a strong learning commu-

nity. Coaching, in other words, has the

potential to build instructional capacity in

teachers, principals, schools, and districts.

As a result, money invested in coaching can

be money well spent.

In order to undertake effectively the

considerable effort required to implement

a coaching program, a district must com-

mit itself to the theory that improved teach-

ing will lead to improved student learning.

But having made that commitment, a dis-

trict must remember that coaching is not a

gimmick; it is not something to be added

onto a district’s repertoire of professional

development offerings. It must be integral

to a larger instructional improvement plan

that targets and aligns professional devel-

opment resources toward the district’s

goals. Under those circumstances, coaching

can become a powerful vehicle for improv-

ing instruction and, thereby, student

achievement.

What Outcomes Can Be Expected?

Coaching, as we have described it, is not yet

broadly implemented; as a result, there are

no hard data linking it to student achieve-

ment. However, there is reason to think

that coaching, thoughtfully developed and

implemented within a district’s coherent

professional development plan, will provide

teachers with real opportunities to improve

their instruction, principals with real

opportunities to improve their leadership,

and districts with real opportunities to

improve their schools.

While we would argue that coaching

alone does not have the capacity to lead to

this result, there is evidence that coaching

t h e i m p a c t o f c o a c h i n g : o u t c o m e s a n d b e n e f i t s

When coaching is integral to a larger instructional

improvement plan that targets and aligns professional

development resources toward the district’s goals

it has the potential to become a powerful vehicle

for improving instruction and thereby student

achievement

can produce the following outcomes, which

are likely to improve instruction:

• better targeted school-based professional

development that addresses teachers’

and principals’ learning needs in light of

students’ needs;

• teacher learning that carries over into

classroom practice because the coach

helps teachers implement what they have

learned;

• a willingness among teachers to share

their practice with one another and seek

learning opportunities from their peers

and their coaches, and a willingness to

assume collective responsibility for all of

their students’ learning;

• high-quality principal leadership of

instructional improvement;

• school cultures in which instruction is

the focus of much teacher and principal

discussion, and in which teachers and

principals reflect on their practice and its

impact on students and use achievement

data to drive instructional improvement.

Is It Worth the Effort?

Our detailed discussion of the practical

issues of designing and implementing

coaching may lead some to throw up their

hands and declare that coaching cannot be

worth this level of effort. But with so much

promise, we believe coaching to be a com-

mitment worth making.

First, most of the implementation

issues and challenges we have raised

accompany any district professional devel-

Developing capacity for sustaining reform

Knowing that they will not be available to schools indefinitely coaches help teachers and principals develop capacity to pursue school improvement themselves This coach is working to create a demand for data that will continue when the coach is not there

I’m trying to walk a tightrope between doing stuff and build ing capacity to do it With respect to using data to make instructional decisions I think the important thing is to make the data useful to people That might mean doing more of the front end work myself creating a demand for it and figuring out how to present the data in clear meaning ful ways that encourage rich discussions that will actually lead to change in practice or change in professional develop ment or whatever And that’s what I see as my role here On the other hand I don’t want to just produce things and papers that are just going to clutter people’s desks and then when I’m not there they will no longer do anything So the capacity piece is important But I think before that happens there needs to be a demand which there is So that’s the biggest piece I think creating demand

Another coach is helping schools develop in house capacity to lead looking at student work groups that focus on the impact of teach ers’ assignments and instruction on the quality of work students produce in light of standards This coach talks about such profes sional development which coaches provided for teachers from a number of schools

The focus of those sessions was to build the capacity for indi vidual facilitation by teachers It addressed questions such as: What kinds of things do you have to do to facilitate the looking at student work program? What do you have to do to understand this looking at student work protocol very well? During the sessions teachers actually looked at work and went through the protocol with an experienced coach They did a real looking at student work session but the coach stopped to point out facilitation points along the way and there was some interaction among each of the tables After the first session the coaches got together to debrief what had happened with the teachers and what other kinds of things they needed to know It came out that they did in fact need to know more about facilitation and developing and strengthening the culture in schools to look at work to begin with so we built that into our next session with them

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

opment strategy. If district administrators

are not knowledgeable about what they ask

schools to do, they cannot support imple-

mentation. If the district neither supports

nor holds principals and others account-

able, no program will be effectively imple-

mented. And, although some of the chal-

lenges associated with coaching may be

different from those associated with the

implementation of other instructional

reforms, there is no school reform program

that is challenge-free.

Second, coaching shows great promise

for changing professional practice and the

professional culture in which teachers

work. Teaching has been described as an

isolated profession in which individuals

work in private; and school cultures dis-

courage teachers from observing one

another or inviting others into their rooms

to observe and provide feedback. Coaching

aims explicitly at changing that culture of

isolation in which teachers have worked

for decades. There is reason to think that

teachers and principals working collabora-

tively to improve their practice can, over

time and with the support of a knowledge-

able coach, accomplish much more than

has been accomplished to date. Further-

more, our data strongly suggest that teach-

ers, after some initial nervousness, come

to value their work with coaches and col-

leagues. Many principals, as well, appreci-

ate what they have learned from working

with the change coaches.

In sum, coaching holds a great deal

of promise for districts willing to meet the

practical challenges of this difficult work.

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

Boston’s Collaborative Coaching andLearning (CCL) model provides one example of how coaches work with small

groups of teachers and demonstrates how a

coach can encourage teachers to engage –

actively and collaboratively – in instruction-

ally focused work. The model enables

teachers to learn in collaboration with one

another and with the coach. (More infor-

mation is available at www.bpe.org.)

The CCL model that we present here

consists of a preconference, a classroom

component (demonstration and observa-

tion), and a debriefing. The coach facili-

tates both the preconference and debrief-

ing discussions in order to highlight best

practices she observed during the demon-

stration, as well as to offer suggestions for

improvement and next steps. The coach

plays an important role in ensuring that

the classroom demonstrations and observa-

tions go smoothly, guiding the teachers

through each aspect of the lesson and gen-

tly redirecting them when necessary.

This example involves a fourth-grade

lab-site with a heterogeneous configuration

that included eight teachers from three

grade levels and from bilingual and mono-

lingual classrooms. Teachers had a range of

teaching experience and varied knowledge

of Readers’ and Writers’ Workshop. The

principal had urged a few of these teachers

to participate; others were participating by

choice. Some teachers, including the one

hosting the lab-site in her classroom, had

participated in a lab-site earlier in the year;

for others, this was their first experience.

The classroom component of this lab-site

included a mini-lesson, two conferences, a

small guided reading session, and a “share”

time. Three of the participating teachers

demonstrated these workshop components.

The Preconference

The purpose of the preconference is to set

the stage for the observations to follow.

Teachers gather together to hear the host

teacher review what is happening in her

classroom.

At this preconference, the host teacher

reported that her students had been

“buzzing” successfully with their partners –

talking about their books. She noted that

while many of her students could read, she

was not sure that they comprehended well.

In light of this concern, the focus for the

lab-site would be comprehension. The

teaching strategies would be linked to a

chapter in Guided Reading by Fountas and

Pinnell (2001) called “What Do We Do

When Reading Doesn’t Make Sense?”

A nonhost teacher would begin the lab-

site by doing a mini-lesson to review com-

prehension strategies. The coach asked this

teacher how she was feeling about doing

the mini-lesson. The teacher told the group

she was a little bit nervous: her lesson

A P P E N D I X A

C O A C H I N G S M A L L G R O U P S

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

would require students to articulate the

strategies they use when they get stuck with

understanding a given text, and she wasn’t

sure the students would be able to do this.

The coach said that she would step in, if

needed.

Another nonhost teacher would be

leading the guided reading group. The

coach asked this teacher how she felt about

leading this activity. She reported having

had difficulty deciding on a focus. She had

chosen vocabulary, and her purpose would

be to see if students skipped over words

they did not know or if they tried different

comprehension strategies. (This guided

reading lesson was intended to link with

the comprehension focus of the mini-

lesson.) At this teacher’s request, the group

had a brief discussion about whether the

teacher should identify the vocabulary

words ahead of time or let students identify

them from the text. The teacher decided

that she would give students the words in

advance.

The teachers then moved on to the

host classroom, where some would demon-

strate while others observed. The teaching

and observing would form the basis for fur-

ther discussions about improving/refining

the workshop strategies.

The Classroom Component

Mini lesson

The mini-lesson lasted just under five min-

utes and focused on “things that readers do

when they get stuck/confused.” Children

gathered on the corner rug and paid very

close attention to the teacher’s instructions.

When she asked them to talk about the

strategies they use when encountering a

difficult text, several volunteered. Another

teacher made a list of the suggestions on

chart paper so that they would be available

to the students. The teacher leading the

mini-lesson reminded them to use the

strategies during independent reading. She

also asked them to be on the lookout for

new strategies.

The children dispersed, and a number

of the teachers chatted briefly about the

children’s responses. The teacher leading

the mini-lesson thought that the students

had all given the same answer. The teacher

who made the list told her not to worry,

that there was some variation, although

both agreed that rereading the text seemed

to be the most popular strategy.

The coach came over and suggested

they continue the conversation in the

debrief and move now to the conferencing.

Conference

At the suggestion of the coach, the host

teacher selected the students for the con-

ferences. A teacher volunteered to do the

first conference with a boy who was reading

a nonfiction book about World War II.

The original purpose of the conference

was to check in and see how he liked the

book, but the student reported that it was

“kind of a hard book,” with parts that he

did not understand. The teacher asked the

student to show her a part of the book that

was confusing. After she scanned the page

that he selected, the teacher asked him to

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

tell her what was “hard” about the excerpt.

He could not tell her. The teacher then

asked if he was having trouble with the

names. The student sat up alertly and said

that there were too many people to remem-

ber. The teacher asked if he had been

using his Post-Its to keep track of them. He

said no. She recommended making a Post-

It for each character so that he could refer

back to them whenever he got confused.

She also suggested that he try ‘buzzing’

about it with a partner. (There were several

other boys in the class who were reading

the same book.) The student seemed

pleased and surprised that he would be

allowed to “buzz” about his confusion. The

conference ended. The coach suggested

moving on to the guided reading lesson.

Guided Reading

One of the demonstrating teachers gath-

ered a small group of students together,

passed out the books, and told the students

which pages to read. She asked them to

focus on a list of vocabulary words she had

selected. While the students were reading,

the teacher went around to the students in

turn and asked them to read aloud a para-

graph or page so that she could check their

comprehension.

Going from student to student was tak-

ing a long time, and the coach asked the

teacher to turn back to the whole guided

reading group prior to finishing. The

coach also asked the teacher to share

briefly with her colleagues some of the con-

versations she had with the individual stu-

dents, because it had been difficult to hear

them. The teacher reported that some stu-

dents were having trouble with the words

and were going back to reread and look for

context clues. Some were using that strat-

egy on their own, others had to be

reminded.

The teacher then addressed the guided

reading group and asked for definitions of

the words syrupy, neon, and turnipy. One of

the girls knew the word neon from her

highlighter markers. But everyone was con-

fused by the word turnipy. No one had ever

eaten, seen, or heard of a turnip. And

referring back to the sentence – “The

woman’s face was turnipy and bulging at

the cheeks” – did not appear to help. The

teacher kept returning to the sentence,

however, and eventually determined that

students did not know what bulging meant

either. She told them that they should have

marked that word.

The students were becoming more and

more hesitant in responding. Finally, the

teacher defined turnipy while another

teacher did a quick sketch to show the stu-

dents that turnips are heart-shaped and

that the sentence was referring to the

woman’s heart-shaped face. This visual

demonstration seemed to help.

To wrap up her guided reading lesson,

the teacher asked the students to talk about

the story, but the students did not respond

to this general instruction. The teacher

asked more focused questions: “Is the main

character in school or on vacation?” “How

do you know this?” But still the students

struggled. The coach then stepped in to

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

ask them if they were making a clear movie

in their minds. “Or,” she asked, “is the

movie still fuzzy?” “Fuzzy!” they said. This

was the first answer on which all the stu-

dents agreed. The coach told them that it

was okay, that they had only read a few

pages. The teacher then suggested that the

students go on and read the next chapter.

But the coach stepped in again and sug-

gested that the students reread chapter one

before moving on. “That way,” she told

them, “the meaning won’t be so fuzzy.”

The Debrief

The debrief began with the coach asking

for someone to talk about the mini-lesson

and the conference. The teacher who

taught the mini-lesson said she thought it

went well, but that it was clear from the stu-

dents’ responses that they did not have a

repertoire of “sense-making” reading strate-

gies. She heard five different ways of saying

“reread” but not much else. She had not

known whether to introduce a different

strategy to the students during the mini-

lesson. Another teacher said she had heard

some variation in the students’ responses:

some students talked about rereading the

words but others talked about moving on

and trying to get a broader understanding

of the passage.

The coach asked the host teacher to

comment on how the lesson went in light

of her knowledge of the students. She

replied that her students used a range of

reading strategies but could not articulate

them clearly. Another teacher said that she

has found that younger students have a

hard time talking about the strategies they

use, even if they use those strategies very

well. As a next step, she said, she would

show a reading passage on an overhead

and walk the students through the strate-

gies. The host teacher liked the idea and

said she would try it before the next lab-

site.

The coach said that she thought the

teacher did a good job with the mini-lesson

even though it lasted only three minutes.

There was no point, she said, to continue it

longer since the students could not articu-

late more strategies. And, said the coach, if

the teacher had introduced another strat-

egy, she would have been doing a whole

other mini-lesson. Finally, the coach noted

that the students in the host teacher’s class

were able to carry over the main teaching

point of the mini-lesson into their inde-

pendent work.

The coach then turned to the confer-

ence with the boy reading the nonfiction

book, noting that the boy had done a great

job of expressing the problem he was hav-

ing and that the teacher had included all

of the important components of the con-

ference: research (find out the student’s

problem), decide, teach. The teacher who

led the conference said that, at first, she

was worried because she wasn’t able to tie

the conference directly back to the mini-

lesson. The host teacher interrupted say-

ing, “You figured out what he needed.” A

third teacher went on to say that her first

instinct might have been to say that the

book was too hard for him, but then she

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

remembered that it is important for kids to

be able to read passages and to understand

that they don’t have to catch every single

name, every single detail. She remarked

that adult readers don’t catch every word.

She suggested that this topic might be a

good thing to visit in a mini-lesson around

nonfiction texts. The host teacher had a lot

of boys reading the same nonfiction books

and said that she would try it.

The coach now asked the teacher who

led the guided reading lesson to talk about

how it went. In addition to noting that

there was not enough time, the teacher

reflected that, in hindsight, she should

have let students find vocabulary words on

their own, since she had failed to identify

all of the words that stumped them. She

also commented that they were not com-

prehending the story. No one else com-

mented at this point. The coach told the

teacher to remember that she was not

teaching to that particular book, but to all

books. For that reason, the strategy was

more important than the individual vocab-

ulary words. The host teacher said that she

actually liked the fact that the students had

the words ahead of time, but they would

definitely need to read through the chap-

ter again. The coach agreed. The host

teacher said that perhaps they did not

understand the text because they did not

have time to finish reading.

With about five minutes left in the

debrief discussion tine, the coach asked

teachers what they wanted to do for their

next, and last, lab-site. She asked them if

they had any big questions outstanding

and wondered whether they were ready to

look at literacy circles or book clubs. One

teacher responded that it was too soon and

cited research literature that said these

strategies should be introduced after the

Readers’ and Writers’ Workshop was well

established. This teacher wanted to know

how one would tackle a more general

genre study. The coach said they could talk

about that in the next debrief, but that it

would be too much to handle in a single

lab-site.

The coach continued, asking: “What is

still missing? What pieces do you need so

that you can put this in place next year?”

One teacher asked about the reading

response journal and how to tie it in. There

was further discussion and final agreement

that the teachers would like to see a mini-

lesson demonstrating some of the compre-

hension strategies the students talked

about in today’s lesson. They also agreed

that they might like to have some focus on

reading nonfiction. The coach said she

would check in with the host teacher dur-

ing the week to determine what they could

work on for next week.

Though the demonstrating teachers

reported being nervous about making their

teaching public, in the end they were glad

to have had an opportunity to share their

teaching with colleagues and receive feed-

back. The coach noted the “thin line” she

walks between trying to give constructive

feedback and not sounding negative or too

critical. She finds this to be one of the most

challenging aspects of her coaching work.

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

Just as teachers who are learning toimprove their practice benefit from opportunities to observe and to be

observed by their peers, coaches who are

learning to improve their coaching will

benefit from similar opportunities to

observe other coaches’ practice and

receive feedback about their own coaching

work. To date, districts have struggled to

arrange these kinds of learning opportuni-

ties for coaches, but we have come across

examples of this kind of coach profes-

sional development happening in some

places.

The professional development strate-

gies described below allow coaches to

observe one another’s practice through

coaching demonstrations and provide

opportunities for coaches to reflect on

their own and others’ best coaching prac-

tices.

A Principal Led Coaching Demonstration

In one of a series of school-based profes-

sional development activities for coaches

led by the principal,19 one coach volun-

teered to work with a teacher in front of

her coach colleagues. The group watched

the teacher’s lesson (videotaped earlier)

and then observed as the coach discussed

the lesson with the teacher. Afterwards, the

group gave the coach feedback about what

she did well and what she might have done

differently. Later, the coach reflected on

the session.

We actually watched a video of a

teacher doing a lesson with her stu-

dents. As we watched her video, we

scripted her lesson. When it was over, I

volunteered to be the coach. I had to

go up there, just like I would with the

teachers I’m coaching right now and

debrief about the lesson I observed.

And that’s, like, you think it’s easy, but

you don’t want to give things away, you

want to make the teacher do the think-

ing. I was really careful. I tried to really

write my questions down to provoke

her thinking.

I asked her what she thought of

the participation, because there wasn’t

enough. There were about three kids

participating. I asked her what she

thought about the amount of wait time.

Then, because it was unclear to me

why, I asked her, “What was your pur-

pose in doing some charting? What

were you trying to get across? Did you

These coaches work together at the same school and in addition to their coaching responsibilities retain full time teaching positions at their site For more information regarding the development of in house coaching models such as this one in which teacher leaders take on coach ing responsibilities in order to build instructional capacity see Neufeld and Roper December

A P P E N D I X B

C O A C H I N G t h e C o a c h e s

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

feel the students had a good grasp on

this lesson after you did it?” It was

hard. We were looking at questioning

skills, and I thought she gave too much

away, and I know I’ve done that in my

own classroom.

When asked about the debriefing that

followed the coaching demonstration, this

coach said that she received a lot of helpful

feedback from the other coaches and from

the principal. One coach colleague was

able to point out a missed teaching oppor-

tunity in the lesson – a missed teaching

opportunity that became a missed coaching

opportunity.

One of the coaches told me that

she would have jumped on a certain

student’s comment and asked the stu-

dent about her thinking. And I kind of

skipped over that because I didn’t see

that. So it was an eye-opener for me,

just to get another perspective. Her

comment really stuck out in my mind

because after I looked at that section

of the lesson again I thought maybe I

should have coached the teacher on

that point.

The coach also received feedback from

the principal about the need to better

focus her debrief. The principal pointed

out that just as teachers cannot expect stu-

dents to learn many different things during

a single lesson, coaches cannot expect

teachers to absorb multiple coaching

points during a single debriefing.

Eventually everyone in the group will

participate in this kind of coaching demon-

stration and debrief, including the princi-

pal, who is herself a former coach.

Demonstrating How to Coach Expert Teachers

Coaches sometimes report that they are

unsure how to coach more expert teachers

to the next level of practice. Indeed, they

may not know what constitutes the next

level of practice if they themselves have not

learned to teach the instructional reform at

the high level of expertise of the teachers

they are coaching. As a result, they may feel

they have little or no firsthand knowledge

of practice that can inform their coaching

of highly skilled teachers.

This professional development activity

was designed to help coaches coach to

higher levels of teacher expertise. In it, a

coach professional developer (someone

who “coaches the coaches”) and an English

Language Arts teacher whose practice

in Readers’ and Writers’ Workshop is

already quite advanced are observed by a

group of coaches. One of the coaches gave

the following account of this learning

opportunity.

We had seen our coach profes-

sional developer coach teachers at a

variety of levels, but we thought it

would be good to have her coach

someone who knew a lot about Work-

shop. So we observed such a teacher

and then the coach professional devel-

oper coached this teacher, not about

Barbara Neufeld and Dana Roper

what actually happened in the class-

room, but about her role as a teacher.

The coach professional developer

took this focus because, as she put it,

the teaching was clear and nothing

had to be fixed. Instead, she stressed

the teacher’s role as a teacher, and

how she could put more responsibility

on the students, how she could facili-

tate their becoming more independ-

ent. The coach professional developer

suggested that the teaching might

encourage students’ independence if

the teaching were a little “messier,” if

it enabled the students to work on

things that they couldn’t do perfectly,

if they figured out some things

together – students and teacher –

instead of the teacher having every-

thing all figured out ahead and saying

to the students, “Here are your tools

– go, go, go.”

It was challenging and it was a

different kind of coaching. We could

see that it was tough for the profes-

sional developer. You could see her

thinking: How far do I push her

here? The good thing about it was

that it gave us some idea of how you

coach someone who is doing some

very good work in the classroom.

How do you push them to the next

level? It was a really interesting con-

versation and helpful.

Coaching: A Strategy for Developing Instructional Capacity

Boston Plan for Excellence’s Web site at

www.bpe.org.

Cohen, D. K., McLaughlin, M. W., and

Talbert, J. E. (Eds.) 1993. Teaching for

Understanding: Challenges for Policy and

Practice. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Darling-Hammond, L., and McLaughlin,

M. W. 1995. “Policies that Support Pro-

fessional Development in an Era of

Reform,” Phi Delta Kappan 76(8):

597–604.

Elmore, R. F. 1997. “Investing in Teacher

Learning: Staff Development and

Instructional Improvement in Commu-

nity School District 2, New York City.”

Paper prepared for the National Com-

mission on Teaching and America’s

Future by the Consortium for Policy

Research in Education.

Fountas, I. C., and Pinnell, G. S. 2001.

Guided Reading: Essential Elements – The

Skillful Teacher. A two-tape video set.

Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Lieberman, A. 1995. “Practices that Sup-

port Teacher Development: Transform-

ing Conceptions of Professional Learn-

ing,” Phi Delta Kappan 76(8):591–596.

Neufeld, B., and Roper, D. July 2002. Off

to a Good Start: Year I of Collaborative

Coaching and Learning in the Effective Prac-

tice Schools. Cambridge, MA: Education

Matters.

Neufeld, B., and Roper, D. December

2002. Growing Instructional Capacity in

Two San Diego Middle Schools: An Interim

Report. Cambridge, MA: Education Mat-

ters.

Supovitz, J. A., and Poglinco, S. M. 2001.

Instructional Leadership in a Standards-

Based Reform. Philadelphia: Consortium

for Policy Research in Education.

Windschitl, M. 2002. “Framing Construc-

tivism in Practice as the Negotiation of

Dilemmas: An Analysis of the Concep-

tual, Pedagogical, Cultural, and Political

Challenges Facing Teachers,” Review of

Educational Research 72(2):131–175.

R E F E R E N C E S

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