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Reflections of a Peer Coach

Becky Todd December 14, 2015 December 14, 2015Collaboration, Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, digital education leadership, EDTC6105, iste coaching standard 1, leadership, mentorship, moving forward, peer coach, Professional Development and Program Evaluation, reflection, Visionary Leadership

While the entire Digital Education Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University is designed to be a hands-on experience which embeds learning opportunities into students’ current workplace, this course, in particular, provided students with a meaningful opportunity to practice our newfound skills in a professional environment. Under the tutelage of Dr. David Wicks, Associate Professor and Chair of the Digital Education Leadership program and Dr. Les Foltos, Director of Educational Innovation at Peer-Ed and author of Peer Coaching: Unlocking the Power of Collaboration, students were trained as peer coaches and we worked with a collaborating teacher from our respective schools. I chronicled that learned and the skills I obtained in posts throughout the quarter and now, as this course comes to a close, I’m reflecting on the work that was done and thinking about how to sustain my skills as a peer coach in the future.

The importance of peer coaching practice in schools became evident to me very quickly into the quarter. Teachers that are supported create students that are successful. Well-renowned researchers of teaching methods and staff development, Bruce Joyce and Beverly Showers, have found that teachers that have been coached generally demonstrate the following:

Practiced

No Experts Here, Just Collaborating Colleagues

Becky Todd December 10, 2015 December 10, 2015coaching, Collaboration, Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, digital education leadership, EDTC6105, iste coaching standard 1, leadership, lesson, mentorship, peer coach, Teaching, Learning, and Assessments, TPACK, Visionary Leadership

This quarter, through the Digital Education Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University, my classmates and I are building skills towards becoming peer coaches in our respective schools. As I describe in an earlier post, peer coaches work with a collaborating teacher to help them to recognize their amazing abilities through questions and periods of reflection, allowing the collaborative teacher to solve their own challenges with the help of a safe, supportive cheerleader on the side. One essential aspect of the peer coaching role is exploring the lesson improvement process, where the collaborating teacher and the peer coach examine a current lesson plan and find ways to enhance what is already being taught. As I move forward with the idea of lesson improvement, I am left wondering how to balance the role of coach without crossing into the position of “expert.” In Peer Coaching: Unlocking the Power of Collaboration, author, Les Foltos, warns readers that “teachers want a coach to be a peer, not an expert” (Foltos, 2013, pg. 19). Teachers don’t want someone to telling them what to do, they want a friend and a colleague to talk though a lesson and share ideas that could enhance … Read More

Using Universal Design to Differentiate Instruction

Annie Tremonte November 22, 2015 November 22, 2015Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, Differentiation, EDTC6105, EdTech, EdTechChat, ISTE 1, ISTE2, peer coaching, Project-Based Learning, Student Choice, Student-Driven, Teaching, Learning, and Assessments, Universal Design, Visionary Leadership

As part of my recent exploration of peer coaching, I have recently explored what it means to peer coach and what 21st century learning looks like in the classroom. Now, my attention has progressed to think about lesson improvement within the peer coaching process. As previously discussed, effective learning challenges students to shift from simple consumers of information, to […]

Librarians and Teachers Working to Incorporate 21st Century Skills

Becky Todd November 8, 2015 November 8, 201521st century, 4 C's, coaching, Collaboration, Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, Digital Citizenship, digital education leadership, EDTC6105, information literacy, leadership, librarian, mentorship, peer coach, reflection, Teaching, Learning, and Assessments, TPACK

This week I explore the first and sixth ISTE Coaching Standards through the Digital Education Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University. Through my studies, the terms “21st century skills” and “21st century learners” continue to pop up. These phrases have been used in abundance over the last decade, but what do they really mean? And how do I, as a school librarian, help incorporate them into the classroom? In an effort to succinctly articulate my musings, my question this week is as follows:

What are 21st century skills and how can they be incorporated into the classroom in a meaningful way that enhances the curriculum?

Before I can explore the implementation of 21st century skills, I needed to pause and illustrate what a 21st century learner might look like:

The National Council of Teachers of English define a 21st century learner as someone who is able to:

Develop proficiency and fluency with the tools of technology,

Build intentional cross-cultural connections and relationships with others so to pose and solve problems collaboratively and strengthen independent thought,

Design and share information for global communities to meet a variety of purposes,

Manage, analyze, and synthesize multiple streams of simultaneous information,

Create, critique,

Why Do We Need to Define What 21st Century Learning Looks Like?

Annie Tremonte November 8, 2015 November 8, 201521st century learning, adaptability, EDTC6105, EdTech, EdTechChat, EdTechSandbox, flexbility, global readiness, ISTE1, ISTE2, peer coach, peer coaching, Professional Development and Program Evaluation, Student Choice, Student-Driven, Visionary Leadership

This week in my studies with the Digital Education Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University, I am continuing to explore ISTE Coaching Standards 1 and 2 by investigating what effective student learning looks like. Just as norms are an important part of a peer coaching relationship, so too is a shared vision for what effective 21st century learning looks like. This […]

Establishing Norms for a Successful Peer Coaching Partnership

Becky Todd October 25, 2015 October 25, 2015Collaboration, Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, digital education leadership, EDTC6105, iste coaching standard 1, ISTE coaching standard 2, leadership, mentorship, peer coach, Professional Development and Program Evaluation, Visionary Leadership

This week I continue my exploration of the first and second ISTE Coaching Standards through the Digital Education Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University. As I delve into these standards, I also hone my skills as a peer coach, merging my studies with my new role as Technology Integration Specialist. These opportunities of real-time implementation of my education has me wondering why more graduate (and even undergraduate) programs don’t follow a similar model, with students catering their learning to fit their “real lives.” I am so very thankful that my homework is directly connected to the responsibilities of my job. This week, for example, I was introduced to a variety of communication tools to make the peer coaching experience equally effective for both the coach and the collaborating teacher. My classmates and I devoted time to hold mock coaching meetings to practice these new skills, an exercise that initially felt silly, but proved to be a great confidence builder.

While this activity was designed to train peer coaches, the communication skills are useful in all collaborative relationships (they were a great reminder for all areas of my life). Les Foltos, Director of Educational Innovation at Peer-Ed and author of … Read More

Coaching Relationships with New Teachers: Implementing Inquiry over Advocacy

Annie Tremonte October 25, 2015 October 25, 2015EDTC6105, EdTech, EdTechChat, EdTechSandbox, iste coaching 1, iste coaching 2, peer coaching, Professional Development and Program Evaluation, Visionary Leadership

This week in the Digital Educational Leadership program at Seattle Pacific University, I am exploring the roles of communication and collaboration in peer coaching as they align with ISTE Coaching Standards 1 & 2. Foltos (2013) asserted that effective communication and collaboration in a coaching relationship, “emphasize[s] inquiry over advocacy” (p. 87). He stated that reliance on advocacy […]

Exploring What it Means to be a Peer Coach

Annie Tremonte October 11, 2015 October 11, 2015Content Knowledge and Professional Growth, EDTC6105, EdTech, EdTechSandbox, evaluation, ISTE1, new teacher, peer coach, peer coaching, Professional Development and Program Evaluation, reflection, Visionary Leadership

This quarter in my studies in Digital Education Leadership at Seattle Pacific University, I am studying the practice of peer coaching. I have arrived to the table unsure of this role and ready to explore the model alongside my cohort of peers who come from rich and diverse educational environments. So, I am starting with the […]

Category: EDTC6105