Written by: Andrew J. Smith, Math Consultant at Kent ISD

“Great teachers are much like jazz musicians, both deliberately setting the stage and then improvising. Great teachers have plans yet to respond to student learning and needs in real time…great teachers need to know the tools of their craft.” – Hattie, Fisher & Frey, Visible Learning for Mathematics, p. 17-18

Acknowledging the power and effect that individual teachers possess, but also recognizing our capacity as a regional service agency to support individual teachers was on the minds of Kent ISD’s Math Team, as they began strategically planning for the 2017-2018 school year.  They believe in both the power of professional learning and providing districts with the resources and opportunities to implement professional learning.  As a regional support, the Kent ISD Math team wanted to be able to stay connected and provide support to classrooms and individual teachers.  

The National Implementation Research Network determined that “sit and get” professional learning opportunities transfer to the classroom 0% of the time, where coaching in the clinical setting transfers back to the classroom 95% of the time.   

With this information in mind, the Math team, thought innovatively and arrived at a Blended Coaching Model. This model blends face-to-face coaching opportunities for individual classroom teachers with digital coaching that occurs twice a month.  

Blended Coaching Model in Practice

In September, the Math team collaborated with individual teachers in three schools: Cedar Springs High School, Kettle Lake Elementary and Kent City Elementary. The districts were willing and interested in what this model might look like within their buildings and groups of teachers.   The individual teachers involved ranged from first year teachers to teachers who have taught for 27 years.

Teachers from these buildings wanted to be involved in this model and they each identified an area within the FARROP tool that he/she wanted to learn more about and receiving coaching/feedback around during this process.   Each building was assigned a Kent ISD math coach who would be coaching alongside the individual teachers, both virtually and face-to-face, over the next several months.

Virtual Coaching

In October, the coaching cycles began in each of the buildings. The individual teachers video recorded themselves two times a month utilizing SWIVL technology.  Once their video was uploaded to the cloud, their Kent ISD math coach could watch the video.  While watching the video, the coach was able to pause the video and provide feedback based upon the individual teacher’s focus area.

Once the coach provided coaching, questions and feedback, the video would be available to the classroom teacher.  The classroom teacher could then watch themselves on video and simultaneously see the coach’s feedback as it happened.  After the teacher had the opportunity to watch the video and read the feedback, they were able to reflect in a document that was shared with the coach.

Face-to-Face Coaching

In addition to the virtual coaching cycles, a coach visited the above mentioned buildings once per month to have a pre-observation coaching session, an observation, and a reflection into planning conversation.    These face-to-face meetings allowed for the coach and teacher to build a relationship, trust, and rapport. Teachers were able to get immediate feedback and coaching around the topic they had previously identified as an area they wanted to focus and grow.   

After several months of virtual and face-to-face coaching cycles, the Math team is now wrapping up their first year of blended coaching. Thanks to the hard work of teachers and coaches, along with the SWIVL technology, the Math team was able to meet each teacher where they were at in their individual journey.  They were also able to digitally capture change in practice.    

As the teachers have begun reflecting on this process, they have emphasized their appreciation for the time, the perspective, and the collaboration to reflect with a coach. They also also found it helpful to focus their attention on one professional learning goal all school year long.

As the Kent ISD Math team begins planning for next school year, they are excited to continue this model in these same three buildings and expand to continue to support classroom teachers at regional level.

For more information regarding this model or to about the teaching and learning of mathematics contact:

Rusty Anderson rustyanderson@kentisd.org

Marcus Deja marcusdeja@kentisd.org

Andrew Smith   andrewjsmith@kentisd.org

This blog post was written by Andrew J. Smith, Math Consultant at Kent ISD and edited by Amanda Walma, Professional Learning Coordinator at Kent ISD.