Collegial Coaching Conversations: Designing and delivering a workshop with a coaching approach by Martin Richards
This blog is the second in a series that follows two coach trainers, Martin and Alexandra, as they train college teachers to adopt a coaching approach to holding collegial coaching conversations following lesson observations. This is different to Instructional Coaching, where an external education expert coaches teachers. With Collegial Coaching Conversations, it is the teachers who will observe and coach each other. Thus they are being trained in a meta-method that does not rely on their expertise in education.
In the previous blog, we looked at why some training missions in education feel near ‘impossible’. We got a sense of the delicate balance of ‘doing coaching’ vs ‘being a coach’, and took a brief look inside the hearts and minds of instructional leaders as they deliberated on why the training course was important. We also shared what happens when two coach trainers design their working alliance.
Martin and Alexandra are both experienced teachers, trainers and certified coaches. . They have worked together on assignments coaching teachers, on and off, for several years.
The aims of this blog are to:
Share a design of leading the workshop with a coaching approach for experiential learning
Demonstrate the effects of role-modelling collaborative leadership as course leaders
Setting up and delivering the initial workshop as peers and guiding experts
The purpose of the workshop
A college Management Team has requested a whole day's lecture plus a workshop on “Coaching Conversations” which will form the basis for teachers carrying out lesson observations and giving coaching feedback on other teachers’ lessons. The Management team members said they already know how to observe teachers’ lessons and give constructive feedback based on agreed criteria, and now they want the teachers to take on the roles of observer and give each other feedback. Time has been allocated in the teachers’ timetables for observation and feedback.
It’s important to note that neither the Management team members nor the teachers will become, or want to become professional coaches. They already have a profession, they are educators. They want to learn about coaching conversations because they hope it will improve their work as managers and teachers.
Designing the workshop with a coaching approach: a snapshot interview with the Course Leaders
Interviewer: What made you choose SMART? Surely everyone knows about SMART for goal-setting, especially teachers.
Martin: They do. That’s why we chose it. A safe choice, something solid that we could build on.
Alexandra: We noted that the lesson observations would be carried out several times a year and wanted to give them new tools that could support them in that. We had a tool for the coaching conversation after each observation as well as the familiar tool that would be quick and easy to use in the moment - SMART.
Interviewer: So which tool will come first?
Martin: The GROW Model. You know, the checklist of Goals, Reality, Opportunities and Way Forward. We assumed that the biggest stumbling block would be giving feedback. Receiving feedback can feel very personal. Teaching is personal as well as professional. We wanted them to have a clear structure for the coaching feedback, so that they could focus on the structure and avoid giving personal comments and opinions in their feedback.
Interviewer: So you will teach them GROW first?
Alexandra: No, we will teach them to listen.
Interviewer: Listen? Surely they can do that already?
Alexandra: Again, yes, And, listening is a skill that can always be developed. It’s at the core of coaching. Listening without making judgements is the skill that’s needed in these sensitive situations. Teachers are naturally quick to assess a student’s understanding and identify any challenges they may have. And that skill must be made secondary to the listening skill when giving feedback to a colleague.
Martin: Judgement has to be turned ‘off’ for the coaching conversations.
Interviewer: And how will you do that?
Martin: The plan is to reframe their Judging skill as an annoying habit - one that’s not useful in the context of working with colleagues. It’s a skill that teachers are so good at, it has become automatic. And for giving feedback to a colleague rather than a student, they would need to manage that habit to access their deeper Listening Skills.
Interviewer: So you will teach them listening skills, refresh those skills I mean, and then teach them GROW, and SMART
Alexandra: And AFORM
Interviewer: What’s that?
Martin: Just like GROW is a structure for the coaching conversation, AFORM is a checklist that gives structure to the working relationship and outlines the steps to take before, during and after the observation.
Interviewer: What structure do they need? Surely they know how to work together?
Alexandra: There’s a lot of history between the teachers who work at the same college. It’s important that they design something new for collegial observation and feedback. It’s a different conversation than they might have had before.
Martin: The first step is to describe the new working relationship. As colleagues, they have probably discussed teaching their subject, challenges with students, challenges with parents, exam pressure, marking etc
Alexandra: And this is something new, so we will give them a clear yet flexible structure to work with.
Interviewer: How will it work out? What are you most nervous about?
Martin: Being taken seriously by professional educators. Neither of us teaches on a regular basis any more. We are to some extent ‘outsiders’. That’s a strength of course...
Modelling Co-Leading
We are mindful of our working alliance metaphor of riding on two monocycles, connected by a rubber band. This was presented in the first blog. Furthermore it’s important to demonstrate and role model how two leaders can collaborate, sharing the task of guiding, facilitating, asking questions, gathering responses etc in a smooth, respectful, light yet firm way as this is what we wanted teachers to also achieve together, collegially.
Co-leading demonstrates the level of trust two teachers need to have in each other and the structure that they are following for the coaching conversations to succeed. By modelling this live, teachers will be able to pick up on the need for such strategies without us formally teaching them.
The Wide Open Room
The room was wide, rows of about thirty chairs were placed across the room. And the room was shallow, there were but four rows of chairs. “Unusual, but not impossible to work with.” Not all the chairs were occupied by a teacher, they were comfortably spaced. “Perhaps in subject or friendship groups?” The teachers had arrived after their morning ‘fika’, coffee and a sandwich served by the management team. When the teachers had settled into their places, Dorothy introduced Martin and Alexandra as the facilitators of the introductory course to Coaching Conversations. The teachers applauded briefly and politely.
Standing side by side at the front of the room, Martin and Alexandra silently took in the view of the audience. Martin wondered to himself, “What kind of energy is here?” Alexandra was pondering the same question. They exchanged silent glances. They had felt enough to know they needed to shift, to balance this oblong audience. Martin moved a few steps to the right. Alexandra moved a few steps to the left, making the distance between them greater and the rubber band between them stretch tighter. In their working alliance discussion, they had agreed on a metaphor of riding unicycles whilst connected by rubber bands. They wobbled a bit on their unicycles and held their red and yellow umbrellas up high. Nobody minded. Indeed, their wobbles indicated vulnerability. Always a good thing.
Everybody saw the subtle steps the co-leaders had taken to engage with the energy in the room. Every teacher there knew what Martin and Alexandra were doing and why. That’s the glory of working with educators. They engage at many levels simultaneously. “No need to explain, they can see what we are doing.” Most of the teachers had, after all, worked in this oblong room with large classes on many occasions. Martin and Alexandra were feeling it for the first time, and responding accordingly. The teachers knew what the co-leaders knew and understood why they had chosen to stand so far apart. And they were all feeling the challenges there would be for the co-leaders to communicate with each other. Interest piqued.
Guiding Questions
Martin introduced the guiding questions for the day.
“We have these two questions that will guide us today, based on the goal of you carrying out lesson observations and giving coaching feedback of other teachers’ lessons.” He looked over at Alexandra, who was standing beside one of the flipcharts in the room. He twitched the rubber band slightly.
Alexandra pointed at the first of two questions she had written on the flipchart, and asked the audience, “How do you feel about being observed?” She paused for a few seconds, and asked, “How do you feel about giving feedback?” She pulled on the rubber band, and nodded at Martin.
Martin repeated the first question “How do you feel about being observed?” He asked for a show of fingers, “We would like to see an indication of where you are now on these questions. One or two fingers means you are very unsure, uncomfortable, nervous perhaps, and a show of eight or ten fingers shows you are very confident and comfortable.”
A sea of hands went up. Some teachers held up both hands, some showed just one or two fingers. Martin acknowledged their input. He slackened the invisible rubber band that was forming between him and the audience, and made space for Alexandra to speak.
Alexandra repeated the second question “How do you feel about giving coaching feedback?”, and asked for a show of fingers again.
The co-leaders eyeballed their perception of any hesitancy in the teachers responses and considered what seemed to be their weakest areas. “OK, so now we have an idea of where you are this morning.”
Martin cycled across to Alexandra’s flipchart and reviewed the results of the “on a scale from 1-10” activity by writing numbers next to the two questions on the flipchart for later comparison.
Alexandra turned her unicycle and faced Martin who was on her turf, and challenged, “What about you Martin? How do you feel about being observed? How many fingers?”
Martin balanced on one foot, showed eight fingers, then put two away.
“So, a six?” Alexandra summarised and asked. “Why is that?” she asked, whipping the rubber band taught.
“If I don’t know the true purpose of the observation, I feel less comfortable about being observed.”
Martin started to cycle back to his turf, wheeled around and asked Alexandra, “What about giving coaching feedback? How do you feel about that?”
Alexandra wobbled slightly as she stood erect and showed all ten fingers.
“OK, that’s now. What about a few years ago, when you were a teacher?”
Alexandra let one hand drop, put her foot on the floor for balance, and revised her vote to four fingers.
Martin leaned towards the audience and prepared to deliver the punchline to their performance, “What happened? How did you get from that, a four, to a ten?” he asked.
Alexandra drew up her unicycle beside Martin and they announced together, “Practice!”
Taking a moment to receive the silent applause for their little demo of goal-setting by asking open-ended scale-questions, Martin rounded off the activity by waving at the numbers on the flipchart, telling the teachers, “Our aim is to raise these numbers by at least 2 steps.”
AFORM
This section describes the broader structure that holds the Lesson Observation and Coaching Feedback sessions during the year.
On Martin’s flipchart was written, vertically:
A
F
O
R
M
Martin balanced himself in front of the flipchart and introduced the AFORM model in his teacherly voice, “Each letter indicates an action to be taken. The letter A stands for Align. The two colleagues who are going to observe and be observed, need to find a working relationship that could be a little different to the one they have with their students. It is a working relationship based on trust, curiosity, nonjudgement, and a desire to support a colleague in their professional development. Each working relationship is unique and evolves over time. Perhaps the first meeting alignment meeting is tentative, which may lead to another realignment meeting later on in the year. Yet perhaps the first meeting is bold and courageous, and there may still be a need for another realignment meeting later on in the year. As the two colleagues grow in confidence in each other’s ability to support without critical judgement, they can expand what is included in their alignment.” He passed the audience’s attention to Alexandra who had moved to stand beside him.
Alexandra explained gently, “The next letter stands for Formalise. When the two colleagues are in agreement about what will be observed and how it will be observed, how they will work together and how the feedback will be given, it is extremely useful to write this down in a document that formalises their new relationship as supportive colleagues.” She nodded along the connecting rubber band to Martin.
Martin continued to explain in teacher mode, “The O stands for Observe. There may be many observations during the year, each one has its own focus as well as observation strategies and tools.” He flicked attention back to his co-leader.
Alexandra continued her gentle explanation, “The R stands for Reflect. This is where the colleagues individually or together reflect on what happened during the lesson observation. This conversation is also called the coaching feedback, but we prefer to call it a reflection because it suggests that it comes from a mirror that is perfectly flat. Ideally, the observer should only reflect back what they saw and heard, and avoid making any interpretations of what happened.” She passed the audience’s focus to Martin for the last letter of the model.
Martin closed the description, “The M stands for Modify. We have found that it is easier to talk about modifications that might need to be made rather than changes that need to be made. There are a lot of changes in the education world and changes are often externally imposed. Modifications lie within the educator’s power to describe, implement, and follow-up.” He paused at the end of his description, not sure of what to say next. He felt that there was more to say, but could not recall it. He looked across at Alexandra.
Waving her (red) umbrella Alexandra explained a vital detail, “As you can see from our description, the choice of what is to be observed is made by the teacher who is being observed. There may well be a college-wide accepted set of standards regarding how teaching has to be done at this college, however, we strongly recommend that the observer brings nothing of this into the lesson observation that has not already been mentioned by the teacher who is being observed.” She paused for effect. “The first hint of an external list of expectations, of rights and wrongs being brought into an observation can have the effect of puncturing the trust that is essential to the success of the observation and the coaching feedback.” Having put her point across, she folded her umbrella and relaxed.
Whilst Alexandra had been pirouetting under her umbrella, Martin had recalled what he wanted to say. He brought up an issue of ethics, he unfolded his red umbrella and stated, “Whether or not teachers are following the college-wide accepted set of teaching standards, is not an issue for the Observer. It is an issue for the teacher being observed and for their Mentor, the head of the department, or the head of school for example. The only exception to what may be observed, is the wider accepted behaviours of adults towards young people, for example, an educator may not strike a student. And if such a thing should happen it is in everyone’s interest that it be brought into the light. This is something to include in the Alliance: What will be observed and what will not be observed.” He snapped shut his umbrella and looked across at Alexandra whose radiant smile seemed to indicate full agreement.
Reflections and Insights:
This blog was written at the same time as I am writing a book on the same theme. As I write, the details, the learnings come from reflecting on what I have written. They are:
Start with what they know (safe choice) and build from there
Simple structures such as guiding questions and acronyms help us remember what to do, so we don't get lost in the conversation
Having a fun metaphor helps course co-leaders communicate with each other, especially in times of stress
Listening is a skill that must be learned.
Finally, in our third and final blog on collegial conversations, we’ll share how we enabled the teachers to feel and experience coaching through a demonstration as they began to practice it on themselves.
Connect with Martin Richards and read his other posts published on the good coach.
