Monday, September 7, 2015

Book Notes & Reflections: The Art of Coaching (Introduction)

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.

 The author, Elena Aguilar, describes her experience being coached as one where she felt "stretched, but supported".  This is how I want my fellows to feel.  I want to push them just a little past their comfort zone, but make sure they confidently know that I am there on the ride with them.  My area for growth is in how to effectively "stretch" adult learners in an appropriate way that challenges them and makes them feel valued.  Aguilar says her coach "asked provocative questions... guided [her] to look at situations from a perspective [she'd] never considered... pushed [her] to try something different in [her] work." From my (one year) experience with coaching, it seems easier with certain teachers to do this than with others.  Part of this goes down to the foundational level of relationship, but part of it is also personality and communication style.  How do we make it work with all types of teachers (not in the same exact way for all, obviously)?

What is Transformation?  Aguilar pushes for "coaching for transformation", so it's important to define what transformation is.  She says that it is "an end result almost unrecognizable from its previous form, a change so massive and complete, so thorough and comprehensive that until we are there, it is unimaginable."  As I reflect on last year, I do see some teachers whose practice was transformed, but others that definitely were not.  I must remind myself that transformation does not happen in a year, and I may have just helped to plant some seeds with the teachers I work with that will lead to a transformative journey.  Thinking about this definition is actually a little scary because we don't know where we will end up.  It's risky, and a little hard for my "goal-oriented" brain to wrap my head around that we are working towards a goal that isn't clearly defined.  Just a few paragraphs later, Aguilar says that coaching is challenging for the goal-oriented or those that like working in a linear progressions; however, she then states that "goals and plans will be crucial for this journey, as long as they are guides and not dictators."  Phew!

Coaching for transformation is not just about coaching individual teachers, but about helping change the whole system.  This seems daunting, but it's important to understand that it takes time.  I must remember this one "simple" fact:  "While the whole system may take generations to transform, the coaching [I] do today can impact students immediately.  The effort is well worth it for them."

...Until Chapter 1...
Posted by at No comments:
Labels:

My Life as a Digital Learning Coach - Week 1 Reflections (Year 2)

I've wrapped up my first "official" week back to work, starting my second year as a Digital Learning Coach.  "Official" means that I've been back sporadically for pre-school events since August 10th, but now the teachers are back and students started last Tuesday.

The beginning of the year has been much crazier than last year, and I really think it's because of the relationships I was able to build with teachers over the course of last school year.  At this time last year, I was brand new, was just figuring out Haiku (our LMS) and everything else myself, and didn't really know anybody.  Now that I've built the foundation with the teachers at my site, they are much more comfortable coming and asking for help, whether it be a quick question or something more involved.

[For those of you that are new to my blog... My role as a Digital Learning Coach has me at one high school site 4.5 days a week (the other .5 day I'm with the other DLC's across the district, there are about 12 of us for grades 6-12, 6 middle schools and 4 high schools).  I support all of the teachers at the site (110) but specifically focus my work on teachers that have applied to be "fellows" in a year-long Tech Fellowship.  This year, I am working with 11 teachers: 5 math (3 of them as a group, the other 2 individually), 2 social science, 3 English, and 1 Science.  You can read a little more about my coaching setup and other details on my Coaching Page here.]

On Monday, which was a Teacher Work Day, I opened my schedule up for my new fellows first, and ended up being booked solid from 8am-3pm (with a 15 minute lunch :)), working with 10 teachers, 8 of them being new fellows.  Most of them were just getting set up for the year, needing help on Haiku or Google Classroom.  However, with a few of them we actually designed some "First Day of School" activities using Padlet. 

 For the Padlet Activities, students wrote their name with an adjective (you know, like "Creative Crystal" or something like that), wrote something about them (one teacher had them write 3 facts about themselves, another had them write the best part of their summer), and then take a selfie with their webcam to post to the wall.  Both teachers who used this activity loved it and said the kids were engaged.  In addition, they were able to get to know the students more quickly, as well as the students learning about their classmates.  They used the privacy settings to "Moderate Posts" so the students didn't see each other's posts until the teacher approved them.  This allowed the students to not be as apprehensive in posting their picture because it wasn't going to appear right away - they would have time to "retake" it if needed.

 Google Classroom was presented at our Summer Institute and there are a TON of teachers (fellows and non-fellows) on board with using it.  While I still love my Doctopus (mainly due to the ability to push out documents in groups, the ability to view assignments both by assignment and by student, and the ease that Goobric is with it), teachers that have not really used Google Drive with their students before are jumping all over it!  There is so much potential for transformative, formative, feedback-based instruction when students use Google Drive for their work.  I'm very excited for this, if you couldn't tell :)

On Tuesday, we had a training with our team of DLCs, and we had some great discussions and did some activities to help frame our work for the year.  Our "Word of the Year" is YET, which goes along with the District's summer reading book of "Mindset".  We are not perfect, we are still growing, we are not there... YET!  

 One of my favorite activities was a Communications Style Survey / Discussion, which you can find here.  I am dominantly a Thinker, and it was great to reflect on the strengths and weaknesses of my dominant communication style and how to improve communication with those of different styles.  I am doing this survey with my fellows over these first few weeks as well.

Wednesday started my first "real" day on site.  Thankfully I did not open up my calendar to teachers in the morning because I had plenty of work to get done.   Over the next 3 days, I met with 18 teachers in person, worked with 2-3 over the phone, and countless more via email.  I've decided to continue using Doodle for my appointment calendar for non-fellow teachers to schedule time with me.  I've found it very easy to add to my calendar each week (I try to be scheduled about 2 weeks in advance), and I get an email (and a push notification from the Doodle app on my phone) anytime a teacher signs up for a time.  I do have to manually add it to my calendar, but otherwise it's very simple.  I did try using Google Calendar appointment slots last year, and I just ran into too many kinks that I tried Doodle and liked it. 

I was able to have my "initial fellow meeting" with nine of my eleven fellows this week.  The purpose of the initial meeting is to have a conversation, get to know one another, and launch some ideas for the year.  My initial meeting had three main parts:

 1. Conversation about Coaching Experience & Expectations
I gathered different questions from multiple books and resources this summer and had an informal conversation with my fellows.  I didn't ask every question to every fellow, but I did take notes as we talked so I could remember the key things they said.  I didn't use these questions last year so I didn't know exactly how it would go.  I ended up being really happy with how it opened our discussion and set the focus for the year. Some of the questions I found very useful were:

  • Have you worked with a coach before?  If so, describe your experience and what did / did not work well.  What has prompted you to explore coaching now?
    • Most of my fellows had worked with a coach in a non-academic capacity before, such as in athletic coaching, and we were able to begin to make the connection between their role and my role.  I like how several fellows said the coach "Gave her exercises to do, babysat her while she did them and helped her through it, and would tweak things if she wasn't doing them correctly in order that she would do them more effectively". One even mentioned the coach "anticipating where he would go wrong, knowing the pitfalls and trying to avoid them."
    • Some quotes (paraphrased / summarized):
      • "I don't know what I could do with what I already do to transform it in a technological way"
      • "I see all the things other teachers are doing and want to do it as well.  Coaching gives me somebody to teach me and walk me through it so it's not so overwhelming" 
      • "I want ways to make things easier - I'm not 100% sold that all "this stuff" will make students more successful right now"
      • "I always want to be growing and learning.  I don't feel comfortable jumping in and exploring myself because I need to be taught more.  I get overwhelmed by too many ideas because I think I should know them all right now and put too much pressure on myself.  Coaching will help with all of this."
      • "I'm comfortable with technology and like what it has to offer, but want to be held accountable to go and explore more things with a little more push.  I'm more interested in how the technology actually affects pedagogy and less just how to use it."
      • "I'm always learning and want to maximize the way I do things.  I want more hands-on practice beyond just a conversation."
      • "I'm a huge fan of tech but want to be able to combine that with my love for teaching.  I want to use tech in a meaningful way, but not just use it to use it - it needs to benefit my classroom."
      • "I like having the support and consistency of meeting, as well as the positive accountability that coaching provides."
  • What are you hoping to get out of being coached?  What do you hope your students will learn as a result of our work?
    • This is a great question to see where they are at - do they see me as a "tech-fixer", do they see the bigger picture of how technology should support pedagogy?  Do they see the connection (and importance) of impacting student learning?
    • Some quotes (teacher gains)
      • "I don't want to learn 500 things and not remember any of them.  I want to practice the same things over and over again to get good at them" 
      • "I want to not be afraid of using new things anymore"
    • Some quotes (student gains)
      • "Students gain resourcefulness from using different tools and use that to their advantage"
      • "Allow students to think at a higher level, engage them more, less busy work, be curious"
      • "Make learning more meaningful for students, improve engagement, improve student self-direction in their learning"
      • "Give them a more rich / dynamic experience; allow them to organize things to their advantage.  Have them know how to use different apps / programs more fluidly so they can focus on the learning."
  • What is your understanding of what coaching is and what my role is?
    • I phrased this more like, "If somebody walked in that didn't know me or my purpose, how would you explain my role and purpose to them?"
    • This was another eye-opening question to see how much they understand the big picture of my role.  I was very happy to not hear things like "fix my tech problems" - most if not all of my fellows saw at least some aspect of the pedagogical / technological connection. 
    • Some quotes:
      • "A person knowledgeable in technology that also taught math who can show us how to incorporate tech with both routine stuff (help the teacher) and with the content (help the teacher help students)"
      • "Can help me learn how to make tech and math complement each other instead of clash with each other"
      • "Expose me to the technology that is out there and then help me learn how to effectively use the ones that I choose"
      • "Assist me in creating and implementing lessons that have new technology in my classroom.  Show me tools that I didn't know existed and help me figure out why to use different tools."
      • "Someone who is 'more expert' in technology than me that I can have conversations with about pedagogical approaches and can act as a sounding board for thinking through ideas."
      • "Give me support in new ideas and ones that I have had little thought on; a resource so she can stop focusing on the 'annoyances' of technology and actually be able to use it in my lessons."
  • What concerns do you have about our work together this year?  What challenges do you foresee us facing?
    • Different challenges mentioned were time, pressure (internal and external), concerned if things don't work having to go back and reteach, concerned about making sure the line between "tech support" and "coaching" is clear, being able to give appropriate feedback with larger class sizes, making sure students actually bring the technology with them.
  • More individual / personal questions:
    • Is there anything I should know about you that would help me in my work with you or make our work more effective?
    • What do you know about the way you learn and communicate best that would be important for me to understand?


2. Explanation of Digital Documents on Haiku and Google Drive
I pushed out several different documents to them at the beginning of the year for our work together.  I talked them through the organization (all the Google Docs are embedded on Haiku as a type of portfolio for the year) and the purpose of several of the documents we'll be using throughout the year.  This was fairly brief and I just wanted them to see that the documents on both sites were the same, understand the "running documents" we will keep throughout the year (agendas, lesson plans, tech toolbelt, sharing log, and journal) as compared to ones we will look at just as we get started and set the stage ("first meet" discussion questions, coaching focus, norms, tech proficiencies, classroom management plan)

3. Our Purpose, Commitments, and Plan for the Year;

  • I explained how I describe my role to others, which for a lot of them closely aligned with at least some of their comments:
    • To develop technologically self-sufficient teachers
    • To enhance teaching and learning by effectively integrating technology into the learning activities
    • To facilitate a non-evaluative, collaborative partnership always seeking to improve teaching and learning.
  • I talked about the non-evaluative relationship we have and that they will see me talking to admin about whole-school issues but our coach-fellow relationship is confidential.  While there is already a foundation of trust between me and the fellow since this is my second year at the school, I still feel like it was important to address up front.  If I had any fellows that were brand new to the school and didn't have a previous relationship with me, I may go into this a little bit more and do some more trust-building.
  • I explained the coaching cycle [prebrief - implementation - debrief] that we'll start in a couple weeks after we work through the foundational "big picture" technology.
  • We looked at how TPaCK relates to both our relationship and how we approach things.  I told them the "sweet spot" is where content, pedagogy, and technology all overlap and that both of us bring different strengths in all three of those areas. Our goal is to work together to enhance all of those areas and make sure we consider all three when planning lessons.  I described the way we approach lessons is, "What content are you teaching?", "How are you planning on teaching it?", and then "What tools would support / improve / enhance what we want to accomplish?".
  • I gave them a "homework assignment" to begin reflecting on some pedagogical focuses for this year.  I asked them to come up with at least one "big idea" focus to start the year off (although it will change throughout the year and with each coaching cycle).  This will help to launch our discussion next week as we continue to get to know each other, talk through some different topics such as Norms for our meetings, Classroom Management with Tech plans that they have, the importance of reflection and how that will look this year, and begin working on the "tech proficiencies", which are the "big picture" things that will be used throughout the whole year like Haiku, Google Drive, Google Classroom, etc. 

This first week really was great and I'm looking forward to working with all of my amazing fellows this year.  I hope to continue to blog once every 1-2 weeks... we'll see how it goes this year :)
Posted by at No comments:
Labels:

Sunday, September 6, 2015

The best articles & resources I've found this week (weekly)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Posted by at No comments:

Sunday, August 23, 2015

The best articles & resources I've found this week (weekly)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Posted by at No comments:

Sunday, August 16, 2015

CUE Rock Star Black Label - TOSA: Sunday afternoon (Shareology- Exploring the Art of Effective Communication)

Shareology- Exploring the Art of Effective Communication
Lisa Highfill
@lhighfill
Lisa's Website
  • Idea with padlet: students just write their names on the padlet post and then drag it to one part of the "graphic organizer" you have put as the background (yes/no columns, 4 corners, etc).
  • How do you communicate? Padlet Idea Wall
    • Ideas I use already that I love:
      • Trello
      • Doodle
      • Slack
      • Voxer
      • Remind
    • Ideas shared on this Linoit wall and this Sharefest Doc. Some that I want to look at or try:
      • Droptask
      • "Sometimes I send emails and it is too hard to explain what you want in great detail. I use Movenote- an extension that will add a video message to your email!"
      • "Hashtag in your google calendar. It's easier to search. For example, monthly dept meetings #CIA, all your meeting with show."
      • Tech Minute YouTube playlist
Posted by at No comments:

CUE Rock Star Black Label - TOSA: Sunday morning (Pretzels and Peanuts: How to make sure everyone at the bar is thirsty: lessons from a seasoned drink mixer)

Pretzels and Peanuts: How to make sure everyone at the bar is thirsty: lessons from a seasoned drink mixer


David Theriault
@davidtedu
David's Blog

  • Always take your pictures landscape.  Why? Because you're going to put them in a presentation or a keynote, and you want to use them later :)
PD IDEAS
  • For PD with teachers:
    • DON'T talk about the APP first, talk about the PROBLEM first!
    • "Do you struggle with _____________"  "I have an app for that"
    • Rather than "Come learn about [this app]"
  • Use short videos at the beginning of PD that will help set the mood and get teachers ready for the day.
    • Find them on YouTube, Vimeo
  • Speed Dating / Speed Geeking
    • Traditional Speed Dating Setup
    • 10 rooms, 10 topics to choose from, 10 minutes only.  1 minute rotations.  4 sessions (less than an hour).  Students can do things!!  Don't all have to do with tech.
  • Twitter Chats on campus
    • All in the same room (cafeteria) - thread projected on screen.  For those that aren't on Twitter, write their answer on paper and have someone on Twitter take a picture of their writing to include them in the chat.
    • Run a "Slow Chat" (weeklong twitter chat)
  • Takeaways from PD sessions:
    • Write down what they want to implement on the block.
    • Write down the "stumbling block" that will hinder them from implementing it
    • Discuss and decide how to change the "stumbling block" to a "building block"
  • Thinklink:
    • Use for sharing resources 
    • Interesting idea about a way to present information to teachers... hmm...
David's Thinglink

Our Thinglink


See David's Thinglink above for links about these.
  • Getting Teachers on Twitter 
    • David used a Bacon Doughnut Twitter Hunt... tweeted that there were doughnuts hiding in teacher's classroom who did use twitter.  They could go get a doughnut if they learned about Twitter.  Got a few more teachers on Twitter ;)  Find the "bait" to pull them in.
  •  High Five Challenge: Give high fives or handshakes to every single student every day for a month.  
    • Empathy is huge - they have to know you care about them and not just your job.
    • Even if it seems like it's not "productive" (going out to lunch, informal conversation) - this is huge because it shows you care about them and not just getting them to do things.
  • Involuntary Curiosity Sparks - read this article later
  • Javier Perez on Instagram - draws pictures out of ordinary objects.  We all had to do it... here is my attempt at drawing...

Posted by at No comments:

Saturday, August 15, 2015

CUE Rock Star Black Label - TOSA: Saturday afternoon (Re-tool and re-engage your math instruction with 3-act lessons)

Re-tool and re-engage your math instruction with 3-act lessons
Jed Butler
@mathbutler
Jed's Blog
Perris Union High School District

 Act 1
Engage, inspire, get students thinking and asking questions

 Act 2
Students asking questions
Teacher gives information that students ask for
Students solve / answer the question

 Act 3
The reveal

 The Sequel...
Flip the Question

 i.e.
"Here's a file cabinet, how many post-its?"
TO
"Here's a pile of post-it's, what size of file cabinet could it cover?"

 Teacher notes and considerations for facilitating a problem-based lesson (3-act task) from our district's recent summer institute - led by Robert Kaplinsky.

 Jed's Resources - too many awesome links!  Check it out.
Jed's Slides
Posted by at No comments:

CUE Rock Star Black Label - TOSA: Saturday morning (Beyond Closed Doors & Echo Chambers: Creating a Culture of Collaboration and Sharing)

Beyond Closed Doors & Echo Chambers: Creating a Culture of Collaboration and Sharing
Adina Sullivan
@adinasullivan
adinaeducation.net
San Marcos Unified School District

All Resources

1. What are the barriers / biggest hurdle preventing teachers from collaborating and sharing?
  • Time
  • Fear
  • Competition
Time may be the excuse that people make, but I think of the quote I had posted in my classroom: "If it's important to you, you will find a way; if not, you'll find an excuse."  I think it goes back to "collaboration and sharing are not valued by colleagues".  If they saw the value that comes from it, they would make the time.

2. How do we move from a culture of "Me" to a culture of "We"
  • It is "OUR" work, they are "OUR" kids
  • FOUR ESSENTIAL CONDITIONS (summary sheet):
    • They need a reason.  Why should I change?
    • There must be value. What is the value to me? How is this valued by others? Why is this even good for me?  Is what I do even valued by anyone else?  If not, why bother?
    • Opportunity. When would I do this?  We are all busy and have too many things on our plate? How can I fit it in?  It will feel like something "extra" you are asking the to do.
    • Models.  What does it look like? What could it look like?
3. Examples shared
  • Diigo - to share articles
  • Staff Wikispace - to share lessons and curriculum
  • ScoopIt! Boards - added link to certain boards on email signature.  Can make group ScoopIt page for all to add to
  • Teacher lesson Share (use AwesomeTable to make it easily navigate-able)
  • EdTech News website (EdTech Newsletter is just a blog)
    • everything links back to the same place.  Lesson share, newsletter, demo slam, teacher spotlight, etc.  You get them there for one reason and they have everything else at their fingertips.
  • Demo Slam with Technology Leader Teachers
    • A lot of times they just share what they are doing.  What about what others on your site - what are they doing?
    • Two minute share-out.  It's timed :)
    • Post about all of the slams publicly to share with those who weren't there!
  • Teacher Spotlight every month
    • Don't pick the teachers everyone already knows are "stars"
  • Google Plus - create communities for teachers to participate in
Other Takeaways:
  • Pull new teachers in early.  Show and teach them things and they will think "oh, everybody does it here".  As they start talking and sharing about it, the other teachers will start feeling like they are "behind" and (hopefully) will want to learn about the new things.
Our Ideas:
See our slide and all the others here
  • Demo Slam
    • During late starts, have 2-3 teachers volunteer to be a part of a "traveling slam" and visit each department to share a tech tool or strategy they are using.  
    • Other setup could be like "Speed Geeking" in that the first 15-20 minutes of a late start (before department time) is in a central location and teachers rotate through 3-4 stations with other designated teachers sharing their tool/strategy.
      • If size of staff is concerning, split it up so half the departments come for one Wednesday and the other half the next Wednesday.
    • Last option could be TeachMeet style where one teacher is sharing with the whole staff at one time (whole group) at the beginning of a late start.
  • Look at Jon Corippo's Iron Chef Slides for how he does this with students

Posted by at No comments:

Sunday, August 9, 2015

The best articles & resources I've found this week (weekly)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Posted by at No comments:

Sunday, August 2, 2015

The best articles & resources I've found this week (weekly)

Wow, so many great articles and links this week!  I actually had time to look at a lot, and there's just a lot of great stuff coming in!  Enjoy!

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Posted by at No comments:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...