Coaching that Works!
“One-two-three, coach!”
Many teachers throughout the country seem to go through just such a quick process to become a coach to other teachers. Not so in Hillsborough County, FL. How students learn to read is way too important to this district.
A Complete Process
Hillsborough’s reading coaches program is multi-tiered, thorough, and elaborate —one might even say exclusive. Elementary Coaches receive official certification after 180 hours of training. Until they do so, they do not coach within the district despite a waiting list of schools requesting language arts coaches.
Begun in 1999, the Hillsborough County Elementary Coaches Program entails a full recruitment and selection process, training in groups and individually, classroom coaching, and a Summer Institute. Approximately twenty five teachers annually undertake the year-long process to become certified as a language arts coach. And during that same year, student reading scores steadily improve, as they have since the program began.
“Our program is unique in that our screening process is very deliberate,” says Cheryl Jones, who heads the Elementary Reading Coaches program.
“Two things set us apart,” echoes Mary Vreeman, who works with Cheryl. “First, the upfront work we put into coaching people, and second, the many, many layers of support they receive once they have become a coach.”
From Spring Training to Boot Camp!
The “upfront” work includes a selection process where individual teacher’s beliefs are elicited, a foundational piece to coaching. They must turn in a narrative application and a video of their teaching, and a good recommendation from their school site administrator. Applicants also take a test that reveals their content knowledge in the area of Reading Instruction. Once all that information is gathered and analyzed, they are notified whether they will be invited to the next step of the recruitment process.
If accepted, they attend “Spring Training,” so named as it resembles training for athletes but actually lasts half a school year, from December to June.
The Spring Training involves after-school sessions twice a month. Here coaches learn the content of both reading instruction and coaching– strategies to use to assist teachers who teach language arts, taught by Jones and Vreeman with outside experts brought in.
These candidates continue to work in their classrooms, applying the skills and strategies attained in Spring Training. Members from the district reading team visit and observe them. Once they have been observed and have fully participated in the training and their follow homework, they enter the Summer Institute portion of the training process.
In the Summer Institute, teachers go through what Jones and Vreeman laughingly refer to as “boot camp.” The Institute begins with two full days of training on the process of coaching delivered by Steve Barkley of Performance Learning Systems, Inc.
Getting out of the Comfort Zone
After the two-day training, students arrive for summer school and pour into classrooms. Each coaching pair teams up with a classroom teacher and begins the coaching process, building rapport with the teacher for a week. The coaching is centered on reading, the focus in summer school.
Then Jones and Vreeman change them up, have them switch coaching partners by giving the coaches a new partner, different grade level, and a different classroom. “If they were comfortable with coaching Kindergarten teachers,” says Vreeman, “then we move them to third grade.”
“We raise their discomfort level during the summer because this reflects what will happen when they become a reading coach during the regular school year,” adds Jones. “They’ll be with different grade levels, different teachers, daily. We want them to be able to adapt quickly.”
An Ongoing Support System
For support, Hillsborough Elementary Coaches meet twice a month after they have been qualified as coaches. One meeting consists of full day professional development training with 100-plus elementary coaches. An outside expert comes in to work with them on particular topics, such as Barkley of PLS or an expert consultant in the area of literacy development.
Coaches also meet in small Professional Learning Communities from their respective geographic areas, reducing the group number to about 15 or 20. They meet monthly for three hours to focus on the training and coaching aspects of their job.
This group often participates in book study programs, such as Barkley’s Quality Teaching in a Culture of Coaching©, to solidify their learning and their understanding that coaching is not about “fixing” anyone. Other layers of support include coach-the-coach opportunities where coaches go to other coaches to observe and give feedback. There is also a comprehensive electronic conference area of the district email system that allows them to share ideas, ask questions, and pick up valuable information to share with their school sites.
A Shared Vision
So why do teachers become coaches at Hillsborough? There is no more salary for reading coaches than for teaching, yet those teachers who are challenged to go to the next step in their career, to make a difference in a new way, and to satisfy their passion for reading and writing line up to apply for the coaching program. Not only do they become well-trained, certified, effective coaches, they enter the culture of coaching built into the program.
“Everyone shares in the same system,” says Vreeman. “We share the same beliefs and vision. That’s what makes it work.”
And what are those beliefs?
“That every child can be a reader. That every child can succeed,” says Vreeman. “We always try to bring it back to that. People try to sell us programs and we always take it back to ‘how is this going to make students better readers?’”
“It takes the right kind of people to make our vision work,” adds Jones. “That combines with an abundance of support and training to keep coaches empowered, motivated, and passionate about what they do to impact student achievement.”
Sounds like a lot more than “One-two-three, coach!”