Coaching Connection
So We Can All Grow ~ Feb. 12, 2020
Give Feedback Like an Athletic Coach!
Decades of education research supports the power of effective feedback in educaiton, but what is effective feedback? Great feedback can be understood by the acronym FACTS: Formative, Actionable, Clear, Timely, and Supportive. And do you know who gives the best feedback? Coaches!
Formative: Coaches give feedback each day during practice so athletes can develop skills each day, not just after the game has been played.
Actionable: The feedback they give is immediately actionable - "Lead with your other foot!" leads to an immediate opportunity to reshape their effort.
Clear: Can you imagine a coach telling an athlete that the play they just ran was an A-? Their feedback points out a clear place for improvement with a clear goal in mind.
Timely: Great coach feedback is given at the time of the effort, and given often.
Supportive: When an athlete knows the coach has their best interest in mind, they want to perform for that coach.
Take this classic example from the Journal for Educational Leadership:
“My daughter runs the mile in track. At the end of each lap in races and practice races, the coaches yell out split times (the times for each lap) and bits of feedback ("You're not swinging your arms!" "You're on pace for 5:15"), followed by advice ("Pick it up—you need to take two seconds off this next lap to get in under 5:10!"). … Then, he tells her something descriptive about her current performance (she's not swinging her arms) and gives her a brief piece of concrete advice (take two seconds off the next lap) to make achievement of the goal more likely. … [What if the coach] simply yelled out, “B+ on that lap!”
So think about ways you can bring out your inner coach and PLAY BALL!
~ As Seen in the Winhawk Halls ~
Build a Sense of Community
Looking for a way to build a sense of community in your classroom? Play the alphabet game! Have students form a circle around the room. It works best to have them standing so you can have them work on voice, poise, eye contact, etc. Then begin to model for your students. Just pick a sentence starter such as, "I'm going to a picnic and I'm bringing ..." then have students choose an item that starts with an "a" and work you way through the alphabet. However, this game has a twist: the student must remember and name all the items that were said before them, helping them with their memorization skills as well. Click here for more detail on how to do this strategy in your classroom.
Bring the Learning to Life!
Students love to see theory in action, like in Jon Feldhake's Aerospace Science class. Here students got to not only learn about principles of flight, but make them happen with this one-of-a-kind launcher. Students used paper and tape to devise the style of rocket they hypothesized would fly the farthest, the highest, or the most accurately, and then launched them across the concourse to the delight of everyone watching. How can you bring learning to life in your content area?
How About Some Role Play in Your Day?
Understanding the principles of economics can be tricky, but it became much easier when Social Studies teacher Brooke Auer had students role play a traditional economy in her classroom. Students were assigned jobs such as gathering firewood, raising crops, and building housing. Some of the tasks were more labor intensive than others, which made those resources more valuable when students later shared and traded with other students. Will they be able to acquire enough supplies to survive the long winter?
HOW CAN AN INSTRUCTIONAL COACH SUPPORT YOU?
How about requesting a targeted observation?
Find an Instructional Coach
Shannon Helgeson
507.494.1610
WSHS Room 245
Jeremy Graves
507.494.1537
Learning Commons
Schoology: WSHS Best Practices/AVID Strategies Resource Page
Website: https://www.winonaschools.org/district/departments/instructional-coaching