In an era of increasing competitiveness between schools, with teachers being held accountable for student learning, principals are looking at teacher performance more closely. Principals are utilising every available tool in their arsenal to improve teachers’ effectiveness to ensure that student achieve. While many strategies and programmes are being promoted as solving the issue, coaching of teachers is beginning to produce results and gain some notice.
Teachers that have not experienced coaching previously are often fearful, particularly of being judged or being caught up in a new time consuming fad. That is not to say that coaching is wrong for schools. In fact, research shows that the on-going development of human potential, which occurs through coaching, is critical to ongoing success. There are benefits for both the individual being coached, and the school as a whole.
So what is coaching? Primarily it is transforming people as they travel a journey, whether the journey of life, or teaching career. It is both a developmental tool for an individual and an essential and integrated strategy for an organisation. It is a collaborative learning process focusing on an individual’s developmental. Rather than creating large paradigm shifts in practices, it allows manageable, step-by-step, measurable improvements to performance and motivation. Coaching can therefore reach the parts other training methods can’t.
For the teacher
For the individual, coaching is about being led, one-on-one, through a process of defining a goal and then breaking it down into manageable, measurable steps, and enabling the individual to constantly assess their progress.
Because it is offered one-on-one, it allows emphasis on setting and achieving development objectives relevant to the individual’s specific role and taking into account experience, knowledge, maturity and career path. Coaching therefore complements the individual’s overall development, allowing him the opportunities to create excellence. Coaching facilitates success.
As coaching is a journey, the process is the important aspect, not the arriving. This has a tendency to frustrate busy teachers, who desire to reach the destination through task-thinking and doing. The coach’s role is to slow down the journey, to focus on extending and exploring the route. The process provides a map to give focus and direction, rather than the coach offering solutions. Coaches lead teachers in exploring their behavioural patterns and thinking processes.
Teachers who have been coached report they benefit in having a sounding-board – someone who listens objectively, facilitates them in working out the best course of action and then helps to reflect on the outcome. In other words, coaches offer clear thinking space, challenge assumptions and help the individual to “raise the bar” in terms of realising their potential.
For the school
In striving for success, school leaders find coaching provides ways to advance the school, while respecting the school’s core values and purposes. It allows the development of teachers to be aligned to the school’s needs.
Coaching allows a move from one where people receive direction from school leaders to one where people commit to doing things they care passionately about. The process encourages the development of personal leadership and responsibility throughout the school.
It is possible to relate an individual’s behaviour to purposeful pedagogical change. By incorporating all members of the teaching staff in similar dialogue, coaching becomes strategic, more creating change in the school’s outcomes. Moreover, within a school, team coaching and the development of strategic thinking may become one and the same thing. Further, coaching helps establish and then build a collection of individuals into fully functioning networks. The resulting team unites people, bringing together the right people and raises the broadest challenge in an environment in which failure is not an option.
Schools that have effectively implemented coaching report improved school performance; improved employee morale and motivation; increased employee productivity, particularly through developing soft skills, and the creation of cultures and environments which promote loyalty, with reduced staff turnover.
Issues to consider
As with any change in any organisation, there are some factors to consider. Most important is the selection of the coach. Selecting a supervisor or school leader will at best result in the program being ineffective. An internal person who is respected and successful brings value and credibility to the role. Coaches need to have the right attitude,
be emotionally mature and motivated. They will also need ongoing support and training.
When selecting an internal coach, principals need to ensure that the coach understand her responsibilities, limitations and boundaries. Her role will need redesigning so that the coaching function is integrated into roles and responsibilities and awarded sufficient time and priority.
There needs to a systems for monitoring, measuring and recording the effectiveness of the programme at both the individual relationship level as well as programme wide.
If coaching is performed “for the sake of it,”, without clear expectations or by someone inadequately skilled, it is likely to be ineffective and potentially disruptive to employee morale and organisational focus.
Recognize that coaching isn’t a cure-all. Nor does it always work for everyone, those who are approaching retirement or who have no motivation to progress further, for instance. There are also cases where schools do not implement coaching correctly, such as using the principal or another supervisor as the coach.
A good coach need not possess as wide a range of skills as the teacher being coached. With a sound appreciation of pedagogy, curriculum and interpersonal dynamics, a good coach is simply a process person who can establish rapport; is honest and courageous in providing feedback; is a good listener; asks good questions; is visionary and analytical; and is a good planner who seeks follow-up and closure.
Coaching works in schools because it has become relevant for teachers. It is recognised as a highly effective way to quickly ramp up a teacher’s performance, while still respecting teachers as individuals, not merely as cogs in the machine.