Coach
In the education context, a "coach" is a person whose responsibility is to provide individualized guidance and support that takes place directly within the instructional setting. This support is intended to promote teachers' learning and application of instructional expertise (Taylor, 2008)
In UVEI, a Faculty Coach is critical a critical person in the life of an intern. They are supporters and supportive critics of an Intern’s teaching. The Faculty Coach observes when the Intern is teaching, provides written feedback, supports the Intern through weekly communication, and ultimately assesses achievement of the Competencies. Faculty coaches may be regular faculty members or may be adjunct faculty members whose work is exclusively focused on coaching and facilitating inquiry groups.
UVEI approach to coaching:
Field coaching plays an important role in guiding Interns towards competency, ensuring that their field experiences are leading to continuous improvement. Field coaching methods consist mainly of the skills of observing instruction (for teachers) and of conferencing (for teachers and interns).
The key elements of observing include:
- Collecting low-inference evidence of instruction.
- Connecting low-inference evidence to the UVEI (research based) framework of instruction.
These data (and other forms of evidence of practice) are then used in conferencing. Conferencing takes on several forms depending on the nature of the conference (post-observation conference, collaborative problem solving conference, goal setting conference, or competency attainment evaluation “progress” conference). However, the methods of coaching are quite consistent across conference types, requiring coaches to exercise effective coaching and facilitation skills; engaging the participant emotionally, interpersonally, and cognitively in the process through coaching language and practices. These methods include:
a) Sequencing: Different conference types call for variations in sequencing, however a typical conference sequence follows the general pattern:
- Opening, (re)establishing rapport
- Bringing focus
- Moving practice forward
- Closure, establishing accountability for next steps
b) Stances: Effective use of and ability to shift between coaching stances:
- Instructive - Instructional leader directs interactions based on assessed needs, providing information about teaching or procedures; and offering suggestions; options; and solutions with rationales
- Collaborative - Instructional leader guides interactions without controlling them and co-constructs solutions and co-identifies material.
- Facilitative - Instructional leader acts as a facilitator, surfacing and clarifying the teacher’s thinking and problem-solving, and supporting teacher self-assessment and self-prescription.
c) Questioning/Inquiry: Ability to deploy a range of discourse strategies designed to surface, clarify, and/or deepen Intern thinking:
- Paraphrasing
- Clarifying
- Mediation
- Non-judgment
- Suggesting
- Probing
- Prompting
- Naming assets
- Referencing low inference evidence
d) Reflecting On Growth: Ability to engage the Intern in meta-cognitive reflective thinking:
- Building a conceptual model of effective teaching/leadership
- Naming practice
- Naming growth
e) Transformational Equity Focused Coaching Approaches :
- Put inequity on the table
- Making inequality tangible
- Connect forms of oppression
- Highlight the historical perspective
- Uncover curricular bias
- Significance of social group membership
- Tensions between urgency and hope
- Uncovering biases and assumptions
f) Feedback Loop: Together, the skills contribute to the feedback loop. The “model of effective instruction/leadership” is intended to define the desired level of performance. The collection of low-inference evidence, and the process of insuring that the coach and teacher agree on the evidentiary basis of the conference, work to define the current level of performance. The moving practice phase is intended to provide information about the means and methods for addressing the developmental gap. And finally the closure phase, which includes clarifying next steps, creates some accountability for new actions to address the developmental gap. The feedback loop, however, is not complete unless and until the Intern takes new action and progresses in their development.
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