Book Notes & Reflections: The Art of Coaching (Chapter 10: Facilitative Coaching Activities)

I've never blogged my notes and thoughts through a book, but I figure there's never a better time than NOW!

My goal is to create a reference & reflective place for me as I continue growing as a coach.

See my notes from all book chapters on my Coaching Page.

Direct quotes from the book are in blue.

• Reminders for any of these activities:
• "Chunk" learning
• Understand fellow's ZPD
• Have plan for GRR (Gradual Release of Responsibility)
• Another way to think about facilitative vs. directive coaching: Do they "pull" the client twoard learning or "push" the client toward learning?
• Activities:
• Visualization and Guided Imagery
• Guided imagery is a story / seqquence laid out by coach for fellow to follow.
• Visualization can go in many directions, just given questions to spur thinking
• Role-Playing
• Videotaping
• "...the changes that result after teachers watch videos of themselves far outweigh those that result from principal observations." (page 180)
• You must have a focus question or issue to explore
• Fellow can watch the video alone or with a coach
• I videotaped a lesson for all of my fellows this winter/spring. Only two or three of the ten chose to watch it with me, the rest chose to watch it individually and reflect.  Since this was the first one, some of them were able to identify an area of focus, whereas others we just saw what came about through watching.  For the second one I think it will be easier to pick an area of focus.  It's definitely not natural for teachers to want to be videotaped, but it's so powerful.  My struggle is helping them get from "I'm doing this because it's required as a part of the fellowship" to "I'm doing this because I know I'll learn and grow from the experience."  Our school purchased 3 SWIVL cameras, which makes the recording super easy.  I'm hoping to have it become a more natural part of professional growth on campus next year.
• Surveys
• I also had my fellows give their students a survey at the end of the first semester.  Some chose to give questions solely getting feedback on the effectiveness and engagement of different tech tools, whereas a few did venture into asking questions about classroom environment and teaching practice.  For some of them, it was meant to serve the purpose of introducing them to Google Forms.  For all of them, I hope that they saw the value in collecting feedback from students.  It was such an essential part of my practice as a teacher. [Here are some sample surveys I gave, you are welcome to click through them to check them out, just don't click "submit" at the very end]
• This chapter (page 191ff) includes sample surveys to give - Principal to Staff and Teacher to Students.
• Positive Self-Talk
• Writing
• Exploring Metaphors
• Storytelling
• utilize fellows telling stories about their life outside of work to help make connections to their work and reveal aspects of their character/personality that could be helpful in our work.
• Visual and Artistic Activities

...Until Chapter 11...

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