Deciding if or when to make a suggestion to a teacher during coaching conferences is a question that as coaches we continually ponder. I consider it a question to be answered during the coaching conference. The key is TIMING. Is the teacher ready (interested in) considering a suggestion. How can a coach read timing and increase the likelihood of the right timing?
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Podcast Transcript:
[00:00:00.310] – Steve [Intro]
Welcome to the Steve Barkley Ponders Out Loud podcast. As instructional coaches and school leaders, you are tasked with guiding continuous teacher growth to create student success. This podcast looks to support you with strategies from experienced guests, as well as my own insights that I’ve gathered over the years. I’m thrilled to have you with us. Thanks for tuning in.
[00:00:29.990] – Steve
Should I offer a suggestion? That’s a question that I’m frequently asked when training instructional coaches or training teachers in peer coaching skills. I have two fairly common responses. Number one, if we’re talking about a teacher raising a problem they’re experiencing during a pre-conference, my answer is pretty decisive. Almost never. Almost never in a pre-conference do I make a suggestion. Two, if the teacher’s problem, discomfort, or not knowing how to proceed, was raised in the pre-conference, and we are now in a post-conference, or if the issue emerged during our post-conference, my answer to the question of, should I offer a suggestion is, it depends. Now, before I explore my thinking further, let me share the responses I received when I asked ChatGPT about what various authors who write about coaching would say concerning making suggestions. According to ChatGPT, Jim Knight, in the “Impact Cycle” and other works, emphasizes that coaching should be a partnership. He believes coaches should honor teacher autonomy and work collaboratively to identify goals and strategies. While coaches can offer suggestions, these should emerge from dialog and mutual agreement rather than directive approaches. Elaina Aguilar, in, “The Art of Coaching,” suggests that coaching is most effective when it is teacher-centered and reflective.
[00:02:22.140] – Steve
While she acknowledges that there are times when coaches may need to offer suggestions, she prioritizes guiding teachers to uncover their own solutions through questions and reflective practice. Sherry St. Claire, in “Intentional Instructional Moves,” advocates for strategic and intentional coaching interactions. She supports making suggestions when they are clearly aligned with accelerating student learning. However, she emphasizes that these suggestions should feel supportive and be part of a dialog rather than prescriptive. Michael Fullin, in his broader work on educational leadership, takes a systems-level view and advocates for creating cultures of collaboration and innovation. For coaches, this often means facilitating environments where teachers feel empowered to explore new strategies. Though the the coach may not necessarily be the primary source of those strategies. Diane Sweeney, in student-centered coaching, places a strong focus on student learning and outcomes as the anchor for coaching. She suggests that coaches may need to offer strategies or ideas, but always in the context of co-planning and with the focus on how the strategy strategy impacts students, not just the teacher’s practice. Lastly, here’s what ChatGPT had to say about me. Steve Barkley argues that coaching should focus on student learning production behaviors and learner outcome conversations to guide teachers.
[00:04:21.670] – Steve
He sees offering strategies or suggestions as appropriate when coaches are helping teachers experiment with changes directly tied to those outcomes. But he stresses that this should be grounded in the teacher’s goals and context. Let’s go back to my initial responses. In a pre-conference, I almost never offer a suggestion. There are so many assumptions that a coach is making when they’ve not observed more closely in the teacher’s classroom, when they haven’t observed what the teacher is experiencing. Years ago, when I was training mentors for new teachers, I compared trying to coach a teacher without having observed in his or her classroom was like trying to coach a baseball player over the phone, having never seen them swing the bat. Having a teacher’s explanation of what she is experiencing, what she’s doing, and how students are responding is a starting point for an observation that then leads to a post-conference reflective conversation that engages the teacher in increased understanding of the situation and in exploration of additional questions to explore or for ideas of strategies that might lead to the desired change the teacher is seeking. Look at the second situation. If the teacher’s problem, discomfort, or not knowing how to proceed was raised in the pre-conference and we’re now in the post-conference, or the issue emerged in the post-conference, my answer as to whether or not to offer a suggestion was, it depends.
[00:06:21.020] – Steve
My meaning of “it depends” is judging the teacher’s engagement in a future-focused conversation to bring about an outcome the teacher wants but is currently not achieving. In other words, is the teacher ready to hear a suggestion? If not, it’s best not to make one. Here’s an example of a pre-conference that’s used to set the stage for the teacher’s engagement in the post-conference in exploring ideas for experimentation. Here’s what happened. A teacher shared that in her first-grade classroom, she was struggling with students at reading stations. She said that students often were off task or complaining to her about what other students were doing. Our conversation went something like this. I asked, “would you pick two of the centers that you’d most want to focus on changing what’s currently happening.” The teacher responded, “the wordwork and journal writing centers.” I then asked, “would you describe for me the gap that exists between what you want to see and hear happening at those centers and what you are seeing and hearing happening.” The teacher responded, “I want to see and hear students practicing the skills in the center work. Now, too often, little is being accomplished, and frequently, students are interrupting my work back with my guided group.”
[00:08:14.730] – Steve
I continued, “are the students going to centers individually or in some grouping?” The teacher explained, “I pair them up, sometimes in groups of three. I try to place a stronger reader in each group so that he can provide assistance to a student who’s struggling.” I then asked, “if we created a continuum of low to high center engagement, in other words, a continuum that said low, low, moderate, moderate, moderate, high, and high, would you be able to describe the student behavior at each of those spots and then place your current students by name as to where you think they usually are on the continuum?” The teacher agreed that she could do that. I then asked “what if during the next week, I observed at the two centers and I recorded the behaviors that are present along with student names? If you created the continuum, we can begin by comparing what I observed with what you predicted and plan for changes from there. Perhaps I can even capture some of the students on video.” The teacher responded, “that sounds great.” This conversation illustrates the coach avoiding offering solutions at the teacher’s first mention of a problem. Two thoughts were in my mind during this conference.
[00:10:00.770] – Steve
One, I wanted to be observing first to get a clearer picture of what is happening before focusing on any change that we might bring about. Secondly, I was anxious to involve the teacher in a problem-solving process. I believe the teacher’s work with that continuum would set the stage for that teacher’s engagement in problem problem solving. We would likely discover that different strategies would be needed to move particular students higher on the continuum. We could set goals around reaching next levels of engagement, perhaps focused on just a few of the students, and then being able to identify progress or lack of progress as we experimented. A consideration I have before offering a suggestion to a teacher is the element of understanding the teacher’s view of cost and benefit of a change in teacher practice. What would be the cost to the teacher of making the change that would be built into any suggestion? How difficult might that change be for the teacher? What risk would the teacher be taking? What time might this change require the teacher’s part. For a suggestion to make sense to a teacher, the benefits of that suggestion need to outweigh the cost of making the change.
[00:11:44.370] – Steve
As I’m listening to a teacher’s reflection during our conversations, I’m considering the cost-benefit ratio. Is there something I might add that would lower the cost or increase the benefit? Perhaps co-teaching might be a strategy to lower the risk on an experiment, or exploring how a modification for some struggling students may increase learning for additional students, a benefit. Here’s another example of my thinking around whether or not to offer a suggestion to a teacher. Consider a teacher asking me to observe student engagement in a learning activity, one where students were working in groups of three to explore a problem that the teacher had presented, and the students had to prepare possible solutions, more than one, along with their assessment of the various solutions for strengths and weaknesses. Imagine that as I observed the groups working, I recorded elements of their dialogs that illustrated engagement with collaboration, questioning, and thinking. Then, in the last 15 minutes of the class, the teacher had each group report out on what they thought was their best solution and why. During that time, I noticed a significant drop in engagement. As I was observing that, an idea jumped into my mind.
[00:13:31.640] – Steve
This often happens when you’re the coach observing and you have the freedom of doing that observation without the pressure of teaching the lesson. Here’s the idea that struck me. I wondered if the student groups shared their solution and reasoning with just one other group rather than with the whole class and heard the other group’s thinking, would there have been a continuation of the higher level of engagement that the teacher had during the first part of the lesson? Now, imagine that we’re in the post-conference. I would be asking the teacher questions to gain her perspective on the level of engagement. As she shared her perspective, I would likely be able to use my notes to re-enforce her observation, and perhaps add elements that she hadn’t seen or heard. There should be lots of opportunity for specific elements, as I would have been observing different groups at different times from what the teacher was observing. At some point in our conversation, I might ask this question if the teacher hadn’t brought the topic up on her own. My question would be, “was there anywhere where you would have liked more engagement than you had?” Extending that, I might ask the teacher, “what would that extra engagement have looked like and sounded like?”
[00:15:17.350] – Steve
Following the teacher’s thinking, I might ask, “any thoughts on what you might do to gain that increase?” Should the teacher mention the latter part of the lesson? I might respond like this: “I wondered when I was observing that part of the lesson, what would happen if each group shared and debriefed with just one other group rather than with the whole class. I wondered if that might have continued the higher level of engagement like you had during the small group work.” Now, if the teacher had pointed to a different area where she would have wanted to increase engagement, I would likely have dropped my thinking and followed the teacher’s direction. Back to the question on making a suggestion. Timing is the key to offering a suggestion. Listening and questioning is key to assessing the timing. I find that when I approach coaching as a thinking partner with the teacher, both of us thinking out loud about possible strategies to gain the teacher’s desired outcome. That’s when I find most teachers are most open to considering a coach’s suggestion. Well, I’d like to hear your questions and your suggestions around sharing suggestions when coaching. You can reach me at barkleypd.com.
[00:17:03.830] – Steve
The timing is right. I’m open to hearing your thoughts. I’ve requested them. Thanks for listening.
[00:17:16.030] – Steve [Outro]
Thanks for listening, folks. I’d love to hear what you’re pondering. You can find me on Twitter or LinkedIn at Steve Barkley, or send me your questions and find my videos and blogs at barkleypd.com.
