I used to be a literacy coach... and here's why I need one.

I am not a new teacher.  In fact, this is my twenty-third year in my school district.  Eighteen of those were spent teaching seventh grade language arts (and sometimes US history) and four of them were spent as a literacy coach.

As a coach, I worked with the teachers to improve literacy instruction across the curriculum.  Surprising as it may seem, I spent most of my time working in math, science, and social studies classes rather than in the language arts classes.  I loved going into these classes and thinking with the teachers about the challenges of incorporating reading, writing, and choice into their curricula and then working with them to implement the ideas we came up with together.  I was always amazed at how we could take my knowledge of research in literacy education and pair it with their content expertise to find new ways to engage students in the hard work of learning.

Now, I'm back in the classroom, and I'm finally able to put all of the things I've learned over the past four years into practice.  I know so much more about teaching and learning than I did when I first stepped away.  I've had the opportunity to watch teachers and kids and think about engagement and learning.  You'd think I'd be the best teacher I've ever been, right?

I am.

I am much more aware of limiting how much I talk so that my students can talk and think more.  I provide my students with opportunities to make choices about their learning over the course of the school day.  The feedback I give my students is clearer and more targeted than ever before.  You'd think I wouldn't need to work with the literacy coach in my building.

You'd be wrong.

I've spent the past two months working closely with my coach because I want to continue to grow. Having Luanne come into my room to work alongside me provided the opportunity for me to discuss my teaching and my students' learning with a highly knowledgeable peer in a setting unrelated to my professional evaluation.  She could make recommendations for next steps with particular students and small groups because she was in my class, getting to know the students as readers and writers, and we had many conversations about what to do to move students forward.  This time with her in my class was important to my growth.  In some ways, it validated me; it helped me to see that I DID remember how to teach after being in a support role.  In other ways it challenged me by reminding me that my way was not the only, and perhaps not the best, way to approach a topic.  I'll miss having Luanne in my room several times a week.  She's now moving on to work with other teachers in our building.

I know not all teachers are lucky enough to have instructional coaches to support them in their work.  But we can seek out coaches and mentors on our own.  I know that I rely on one of my teammates to help me plan my math instruction - trust me... I need that help as I've never taught math before!  I seek out Twitter chats such as #g2great and #3rdchat which focus on instructional practice in order to "meet" other teachers who are smart and innovative and help me push myself.  This desire to continue to grow as a teacher is as strong as ever.  It is important for all teachers to have this growth mindset. We need to be models of curiosity and life-long learning for our students.  We need to keep up with the research and new thinking in our field.

So I think the thing I've been trying to write through today is the idea that as a teacher, I can never stop learning.  I can never know all there is to know about my craft and there is always room to grow. Need a friend to read and discuss a professional book?  Email me.  I'm always a willing participant. Have a problem you need someone to think through with you? I'm your girl, as long as you'll do the same for me.  Read a great book about teaching and learning lately?  Tell me the title so I can buy it.

Because I honestly believe you can never learn too much.

Learning Together

I work for a small (three elementary buildings and one junior high) school district in the Chicago suburbs.  There are lots of things that make my district unique, but the one I've been thinking about quite a bit today is the district's commitment to job-embedded professional development.

Each building in my district has a literacy coach, and our primary job is coaching teachers and providing PD opportunities throughout the school year, after school and during the summer.  One of the ways we encourage teachers to learn together is through our Model Classroom Lab program.  Our model classroom teachers complete a rigorous application and interview process, and were chosen NOT because they are the very best teachers in the district (though I would argue they are among them), but because they consider themselves learners. Our model classroom teachers are constantly looking to improve their practice, and open their classrooms to their colleagues to learn alongside them.

Today I had the pleasure of facilitating our first lab session of the school year.  The group gathered to explore conferring across the content areas in the classrooms of two seventh grade teachers - one in language arts and one in science.  Our participants were varied as well:  a math teacher, a language arts teacher, a fourth grade teacher, and a second grade teacher.  Throughout the day, we spent time talking about where each of us is in our conferring practice and ways in which we want to grow.  We watching two very different conferring styles in two very different content areas, yet found similarities and common ground.  We'll repeat the process in February, and between now and then all of the participants as well as the teacher hosts will continue to experiment and refine their conferring practice.  I'll support the teachers in my building, and the two elementary teachers will receive support from their building coach.

I've been lucky enough to host labs, facilitate labs, and attend labs as a participant.  No matter what role I've played during these experiences, I leave the day feeling smarter about my practice than I did that morning.  Because the learning occurred in my building with my colleagues and was supported by my teammates or my coach, I was able to take the things I'd learned in the lab and put them into practice right away.  Sometimes those new ideas were great and worked right away, and sometimes they bombed.  But even the flop has something to teach.

Job-embedded PD, whether it's coaching, a lab experience, a study group, or an in-district workshop feels different than off-site workshops or conferences.  While I enjoy going out to learn from and with other people in my field, it's the immediate, in-my-face experiences that have made the biggest, longest lasting impact on my professional practice.  I've seen this mirrored in my colleagues as well.

So even though I felt like a needed my roller skates today to get to all of the places I needed to be, it was all worth it.  I know the kids we were watching and the teachers who participated and hosted all learned something today.  They were smarter at the end of the day than they were at the beginning.

And isn't that what it's all about?

A Little Cognitive Dissonance Can Be a Good Thing

Last week, I had the pleasure of hosting Cris Tovani for a PD day at my school.  She spent the morning meeting with our seventh and eighth grade teams, discussing ways to engage and motivate students.  In the afternoon, she met with our building literacy coaches, and we talked about ways to engage and motivate the teachers we work with in the PD we offer, not just coaching cycles, but also book studies and workshops.

One of the things I do for myself as a professional, something I have always found to be an essential part of my professional life, is to participate in professional development opportunities with an attitude of "I will learn as much as I can."  This session with Cris was no different.

We talked about the PD opportunities we provide for teachers.  We talked about how many of the teachers in our buildings take advantage of those opportunities. We talked about the cultures of the buildings in terms of teachers being learners as well.  We talked about whether or not it is ok for teachers to "opt out" of professional learning.

In one of our buildings, every core academic teacher is expected to engage in coaching, either individually or with their grade level teams.  I knew this was the expectation in this particular building, as we've talked in our coaching team about the different ways this coach makes this happen. Thinking about implementing this in my building makes my head hurt.  I am one person.  I don't know how I would physically coach roughly 40 people every year.

Cognitive dissonance.

This doesn't mean I shouldn't think about possibilities.  This doesn't mean I shouldn't consider whether or not this approach is the right one for my building.  This doesn't mean I shouldn't engage in conversation around this topic with my principal.

Cris also suggested that the learning targets our teachers use to communicate goals and expectations to students would improve the effectiveness of our PD sessions and coaching cycles.  That engaging teachers in conversation around possible targets for their coaching might increase motivation and engagement in coaching.

Cognitive dissonance.

Why wouldn't I use a technique used across the building with students, one that I've seen to be highly effective in keeping teachers focused on keeping mini-lessons short and to the point, in my coaching?  It is just as important that I keep my observations and coaching conversations to the point.

Cognitive dissonance can be uncomfortable.  It makes my brain hurt.  It makes me wonder if I really know what I'm doing at ALL.  When I am feeling this, I KNOW this means my brain is working to take in new information and fit it in to what I already know.  I KNOW that when I give myself time to process (preferably verbally with others), I can make sense of the tough questions I've been asked, and I can incorporate new ideas into my work, which ultimately makes me a better teacher and coach.

Writing this makes me wonder if I am asking the teachers I coach the questions that will provoke cognitive dissonance.  I wonder if I am offering PD workshops and book studies that will push teachers to consider their practice in new and different ways.

Am I providing opportunities that will lead to real growth?  I think this will be the big question I pursue as I reflect on my work this year.

Trying This Again, But Different

This blog has been largely dormant since I left the classroom and moved into the literacy coaching position in my building.  I've struggled with how I can write about the work I do, thinking alongside teachers to solve problems of practice or working with them to grow as professionals.  A large part of my job is the trust I need to build with the teachers who let down their guard and invite me into their classrooms and their professional lives.

I was afraid that if I wrote about this work, it would violate this confidentiality and trust.

But as I learn more and more about being a coach and being reflective about my own practice, I realize there are things I can write about in relation to coaching as well as good instructional practice. To some degree, I can write in generalities about my work with teachers, but be specific about my own reflection on the work.

It will be a fine line to walk, but I'm sure I can do it.  As time goes on, I feel a greater need to write about the work I do and reflect upon it in order to grow as a coach.  While I could do this privately, in a notebook no one else will see, I also crave feedback from others whose jobs are similar to mine.  I am the only middle school coach in my district, and while I have a learning team composed of the coaches in the three K-5 buildings, there are many situations that are unique to the middle school.  I'd love to grow a professional network as a support system.

It may take me a while to find my writing groove again, but I am determined to do it.

And I'd be grateful if you'd join me in my search to find my voice.

Put On Your Listening Ears

Image used via Creative Commons License from http://www.flickr.com/photos/niclindh/1389750548/

Today was one of those days when I truly enjoy my role as a coach.

I got to spend an 80 minute block observing in a social studies class, listening in on conversations students were having around an article they were reading.

I spent 40 minutes listening to a science teacher talk through his thinking about a lesson in which he will think aloud how to summarize a newspaper article on a science topic and how he is connecting his language and the expectations for student summaries to the work they do in their language arts classes.

I spent another 40 minutes listening to a language arts teacher describe pre-assessment results and thinking through how she will adjust instruction based on the data she collected.  I also listened as she described the format of her small-group lessons.

Today I listened.

The teachers I met with today didn't necessarily need help with they work they were doing.  They needed to talk through their thinking with someone.  They needed a listener who would ask questions that would help them to think more deeply about their practice.  They needed time to process.

When I was still in the classroom, I would often have conversations such as these with my teaching partner.  We would plan our lessons together and ask each other questions, often playing devil's advocate, imagining the questions students might have or predicting student roadblocks.  These conversations were great practice for much of the work I do as a coach.

Tomorrow I will be in that science class and in that language arts class listening as those teachers put into practice the lessons we discussed today.  Both teachers have asked me to listen for specific student language and to look for specific student behaviors.

I'm learning that listening is perhaps the most important thing I do as a literacy coach.  It can be hard not to jump in with suggestions for how I would do the lesson or the language I would use in a demonstration or think aloud.  I have to think carefully to determine what each teacher needs at a particular time during our coaching conversations.  I have to remember that providing an opportunity for a teacher to reflect on his or her practice in order to refine a lesson or rubric or activity is just as important and impactful as demonstrating in a classroom or co-teaching a lesson.

Organizationally Challenged

Organization has never been my strong suit.  In the classroom, I would start the year off strong...everything had a place, and most of the time, I made sure things got back in those places.  I usually managed to keep things going until the end of the first grading period, and then things slowly fell apart.

As a coach, I have a smaller space but many more materials (my office/instructional space doubles as our book room) to keep organized.  If something is out of place in my office, the whole thing looks messy, so I have to make sure to put things away as soon as I'm finished with them.

I also have many different kinds of files to keep organized, and different people need access to different materials.  Last year my big accomplishment was taking our assessment wall digital, figuring out how to take the kinesthetic experience of moving cards on the wall and replicating it somehow.  I put our literacy data into a Google doc and put conditional formatting on certain data points, so that as teachers entered scores, the cell changed colors to indicate whether or not the student had met benchmarks.  I figured out how to organize my coaching notes and plans as well, going with the old school binder and dividers, a system I've decided to continue this year since I prefer to write my notes when I meet with teachers.  I find that when I'm typing my notes I tend not to look at the teacher as much.

My biggest challenge, though, is making sure I have everything I need when I'm out and about in classrooms.  Last year I would often find myself without an essential item... my calendar (I need a paper one for my professional life), pens, pencils, power cord, snack, laptop, etc.  I hated having to rush back to my office during the 3 minute passing period to get whatever it was I had forgotten.

In an effort to find out what other coaches do, I spent some time reading too many blogs.  Kind of like when I cruise Pinterest, reading some of these made me feel like a serious slacker.  So much chevron!  Personalized fonts!  Bright colors!  There's no way my blog would place in a beauty contest.  I did find some great ideas, though. One site, Ms. Houser:  Inspiring & Encouraging, gave me the idea of an "office in a bag."  I realized THAT'S what I needed.  A bag of some sort that I could keep packed with essentials.  I could simply grab it, slip my iPad or laptop in and head off to wherever it was in my building I needed to be.

So here it is:  MY "office in a bag"

Here's what's in it:

• power cord
• calendar
• a folder with blank coaching conversation notetaking forms
• a "to do" folder for when I have time to get some tasks finished
• an "in box" for papers or materials I'm given at meetings that need to be filed
• a pencil case with pens, pencils, and my stylus
• a lip balm
• a book
• personalized Post-It notes for leaving quick notes for teachers

Of course, I had to buy myself a new Vera messenger bag to put it all in.  I tried using a tote I already had, but there weren't enough pockets, and it was deeper than it was wide, so I couldn't find things quickly.  I am happy to report that I bought a retired pattern, so I DID get a deal on it.  I love my messenger bag because it's the perfect size.  I can't stuff TOO much stuff in it, so it can't get as heavy as some of my other bags.

SO.... we'll see if my organizational changes will help me stay on top of things this year.

How do you keep yourself organized?

The More You Know

This year is my second year as the literacy coach in my 6-8 building.  Last year I survived.  This year, my goal is to do more than survive; it's to thrive.  I'm being strategic in my schedule.  I've come up with an organization system for my coaching plans and notes.  I am reaching out to teachers in many different content areas.  I'm reading.  I'm watching.  I'm listening.

Today, Ellin Oliver Keene, author of many books including Talk About Understanding and co-author of Mosaic of Thought came to work with a group of teachers in the building.  A colleague and I realized we had been working with Ellin since our daughters, now in 7th and 8th grades were in K and 1st.  We relish the opportunity to learn alongside Ellin and to have her push us in our thinking.  Mrs. M., the teacher who hosted our observation agreed to have Ellin coach her in the moment while she taught.  Mrs. M. is also a coach (of the sports variety), and she understands that sometimes coaches have to give instruction to players during the game or even in the middle of a play.  The other teachers who were part of our group would have the opportunity to experience this type of intense coaching vicariously and the students in the class would get to view their teacher as a learner.

While I love watching Mrs. M. teach, I was in that room with a different purpose.  I wanted to watch a master coach coach.  I wanted to learn from Ellin how to be a better coach than I was last year.

Now, tonight, after having some time to process, I feel like I have so much more to learn.  There were things that Ellin saw that I missed, words she used that I wouldn't have thought of.  During the reflection time following the observation, I realized I still observed with a teacher's eyes, thinking about how I could take various strategies and language and adapt them to my own classroom.  Well... now I'm a coach.  My eyes and thinking should be tuned to the teacher, her needs, and the needs of her students... not necessarily my own.

This type of reflection and learning is important.  Thinking about my practice helps me to understand what I need to do to improve in my now not-so-new role.  I have some ideas about reading, talking, and thinking I want to do with MY coaches, and luckily I know where to seek those resources out.

The more you know, the more you realize how much more there is to learn.  Isn't that great?

This post was written as part of the Tuesday Slice of Life series sponsored by Two Writing Teachers.  Want to read what others are writing?  Go check it out!