The Secret to Great Coaching

The secret to great coaching -

Whilst reading highlight:

key points or learning

aha moments (something you know but have just remembered / things that click etc

questions you may have

At the end of the reading:

Reflect on your highlights and then select:

3 key points (any)

2 aha moments

1 question or pondering you may have.

Successful coaches realize that routinely taking on the role of the expert with the answers is the wrong path toward collaboration and capacity building.

• “If you want teachers to take ownership for learning, the coach can’t be the expert”

1. build relationships with collaborating teachers by building trust and respect.  
2. Most important in building capacity of teachers is being supportive - if you’re not supportive it leaves them reluctant to take risks and innovate.

If questions are asked and you can answer them try not to instead ask more questions that help them come up with strategies

The primary responsibility for learning rests on the shoulders of those learning and relying on inquiry is a powerful method to reach that goal.

PONDER… what if they don’t realise how bad they are or not really wanting to do any more for themselves??

Ha  just go the answer!

Key importance is to ensure the learner is taking responsibility for their learning and the key to this is for the coch to facilitate learning.

How?

by using inquiry to encourage their learning partner to question current practices and to consider new practices and strategies. The coach may play an active role in helping the peer identify answers to the challenges they face, but ultimately the peer who is collaborating with the coach is making decisions and choosing a course of action. As I work with peer coaches,

Teachers won’t grow if you tell them what to do. Coaches  job is to build capacity not dependence.

Inquiry builds capacity - it helps them

Key is to define roles between the coach and teacher

Probing questions are a good tool to use to encourage teachers to solve issues that face them.

•  Probing questions get the teacher to think more deeply about and develop answers to the issues important to him or her. They can offer teachers a different perspective that helps them draw alternative conclusions on how to approach a problem. Probing questions are at the core of the inquiry method of learning and build the collaborating teacher’s capacity to create and offer students powerful learning activities.
• What makes a good probing question?  First, it must be a question

Effective probing questions usually start with a paraphrase, and they are often open-ended. Stems or sentence starters might include the following:

• You said …; have you ever thought about …?

• Why …?

• What might the next step be?

• Are there other strategies that you could use to …?

Remember, the purpose of the probing question is to get teachers to think more deeply about their practice.

One of the most powerful probing questions I have heard is also one of the simplest.

“So you tried … with your students. What did you learn from that?”

Or the question might be asked a slightly different way.

“So you tried … with your students. What did they learn from that, and what is your evidence?”

Remember, the purpose of the probing question is to get teachers to think more deeply about their practice. Simple probing questions can be incredibly powerful reflective tools.

• Probing questions are the key to inquiry-based learning and are essential for coaches who want to avoid advocating for a solution based on their ideas and experiences.

• Getting to an effective probing question, Ley says, is like peeling back the layers of an onion one at a time

Important sum up

TO keep questions focused on student learning and not the teacher it’s important to use probing questions that emphasize what the students are doing and learning is critical.

Want to be a coach they can learn with and from.

Effective coaching requires that coaches develop collaboration and communication strategies designed to play the role of a friendly peer working to help his or her learning partners solve the issues challenging them.

Effective coaches need to remember that taking on the role of the expert can help create learned helplessness. Inquiry helps teachers build the capacity to improve teaching and learning.