Coaching With Chris

There are many different ways that I would love to help provide technology coaching support. Below are a number of different ways that I can help.

Co-Plan

If you have a technology integration strategy you would like to try, I would love to help plan a lesson with you. My priority will be to make sure we can integrate the technology within your specific teaching style. You as the teacher can continue to guide the students and construct the learning process. The technology is simply the tool to get you there more efficiently or provide learning to students more equitably. Our typical co-planning cycle will begin by finding the right technology tool that fits your needs and integrates well with your current workflow. Sometimes, teachers want to use a brand new platform because they have been hearing it pop up in various teacher circles. In these cases it may be important to conduct a needs assessment to see if it will work given your particular circumstances or if there is an even better alternative. I firmly believe that all technology-enhanced learning should be purposeful.

Co-Teach

Is there a technology-integrated teaching strategy that you would like to try, but don’t feel comfortable yet? Within the co-planning construction, we can plan to co-teach within the scope of the coaching cycle as well. Some of the recent technology-integrated co-teaching opportunities I have been a part of have been:

• project based learning,

• inquiry-based learning,

• flipped classrooms,

• higher-order thinking strategies,

• and using formative assessments to support student learning

Observe and Provide Feedback

There is much a teacher can learn from having someone observe their practice. Whether you’re a beginning user or experienced user, an objective lens can always help to determine if you are putting your best practices forward. Our cycle here will begin by determining a set of “look-fors” that you would like for me to observe while you teach. This can be a supplementary part to a co-planning and co-teaching coaching cycle or simply an observation of a technology implementation that you have worked with and for which you are seeking some feedback.

Find Resources

If you are not sure what you need, we can do a needs-based deep dive into different instructional tools that are available and find the one that fits your needs.

Provide Training

At our school, I have learned that there are many free resources available for many of the programs our school, district and state supports. The only problem is that, due to our time difference here in Hawaii and our limitations with large-scale department level pull-outs during the school day, we often don’t have access to them. I can provide support for some of these tools. The training can be a pedagogical approach to technology-enhanced teaching and learning that you are interested in or a specific technology tool that you would like to use. We can begin with a needs-based assessment as part of our coaching cycle and find the right fit for you and/or your department/school site. If I can't provide the training, I will find someone who can and will join the training as a source of additional support afterwards.

Be an Ear!

Sometimes we just don’t know what we need. In these times, perhaps all it takes is an ear to listen. Sometimes we feel better after just talking. Other times, the ear has become a sounding board to allow for internal organization of thoughts. And there are also those occasions when talking it out leads to a confluence of thinking where problems meet potential solutions through collaborative discussion.