Coaching Journal

Lauren Thomason

Kennesaw State University

ITEC 7460

Dr. Cain

December 7, 2020

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 Coaching Journal 1

Before beginning my coaching journey, I was nervous and excited. I love being able to

help teachers learn and improve their teaching. During my Current Reality, I spoke with my

principal about who she would recommend me coaching. The teacher she mentioned, Mrs.

Sherman is on the same grade level as me and we are very close. I knew that she would be

comfortable, and I would be comfortable around her. However, I have only been teaching five

years and she has taught so much longer than me. I always feel that I should not be giving advice

to a veteran teacher. However, Mrs. Sherman loves learning the new ideas that I bring to the

first-grade team and was very welcoming to the coaching session!

Mrs. Sherman has taught for 19 years and this is her 7th year in first grade. She has taught

Kindergarten, second grade, fourth grade and EIP, (Early Intervention Program). Mrs. Sherman’s

class currently has 22 students, 12 boys and 10 girls. She also has the ESOL students in her

classroom.

The principal of our school recommended her for multiple reasons. Mrs. Sherman

struggles with classroom management and was recently put on a professional development plan.

This coaching session could benefit her to help her gain confidence with her classroom

management skills. Another reason is because she was thinking of choosing her to teach virtually

this year but was afraid of her lack of technology skills to put her in that position.

Before conducting the first coaching session, I needed to speak to Mrs. Sherman

regarding what time she would like me to visit. We spoke and decided that it would be best to

film her math lesson. At our school, we use a scripted curriculum for reading and writing. It

would be very hard to change up anything that she does during those blocks. Mrs. Sherman’s

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students are familiar with me because I also teach first grade, so me being in there filming was

no big deal for the students.

After filming, I gave her the questions that she could use when watching over the video

and then I began to prepare for my first coaching session.

Coaching Journal 2

After completing the identify section of the project, I feel relieved. Talking with another

teacher about how they could improve in their teaching was something I had never done. I have

always shared strategies or tools that I find useful and share out. I quickly learned how this is

very similar and almost as if you are just having a conversation on how you could help your

students.

The first step was to get a clear picture of reality. Mrs. Sherman and I watched the video

separately and were coming together to discuss. As I have previously discussed, Mrs. Sherman is

on a Professional Development Plan, she was very nervous about what I would say or find wrong

in her lesson. I assured her that I am not looking for what went wrong but for us to talk about

what you noticed in the lesson. Right away, Mrs. Sherman noticed the lack of engagement of her

students. Mrs. Sherman did a quick math mini lesson and had students solve task cards that she

read aloud. I also noticed the lack of engagement while watching the video. I knew right away

that technology would be a way to increase engagement of her classroom. Mrs. Sherman loves

technology but is afraid to use it.

The next step was to identify a goal. We wanted her engagement in the classroom go

from 9/22 students to 15/22 students. We discussed how this goal is a short-term goal and

eventually we could reach more students over time. I shared with Mrs. Sherman some resources

that would be good to use with her classroom. We discussed what would be the most beneficial

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to her students and she picked Nearpod. I feel Nearpod was a great place for Mrs. Sherman to

start integrating technology to increase engagement.

Now that we had a goal and teaching strategy in place, it was time to move onto the learn

section. I gave Mrs. Sherman a list of technology resources that she could also look into on her

own. I was so glad that together we could create a goal. Mrs. Sherman and I really felt as if we

were just conversing on a daily basis and she trusted that I was there to help. Overall, I feel that I

gained confidence on being able to coach a teacher.

Coaching Journal 3

The learn video was the second video in the coaching process. I was very excited to begin

this session because it was my chance to coach on the chosen strategy. I felt more confident

going into this session because I had already successfully completed one session. This session

we had a day planned and the power outages cancelled our meeting. We were finally able to

meet the following week.

Before meeting I had to prepare checklist to help guide Mrs. Sherman to reach her goal

and to use for her teaching strategy. I created two different checklists, a teacher checklist and

student checklist. With the checklist, I also provided a one-page summary describing each

section of the checklist. I reviewed over the checklist with Mrs. Sherman and she did not feel

like she had anything to change. Mrs. Sherman is not very confident in her teaching ability and it

is very hard to get her to open up about how she feels. I would try to guide her to ask prompting

questions, but it was often answered with the bare minimum.

We also discussed modeling; I explained the possible ways to model. She chose to watch

me model the strategy with my students. She was very impressed with the lesson and I feel eager

to try it out with her own students. She was still nervous that something would go wrong and she

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would not how to fix it. I think this is a common fear with technology and why so many teachers

are reluctant to use it.

The final step was for her to pick a time to implement the strategy. Mrs. Sherman wanted

me in there to help in case something went wrong. I also explained how I would be videoing so

we can measure our progress towards the goal. Mrs. Sherman and I work on the same grade level

team, so I did sit with her and guide her through how to set up a Nearpod lesson. Overall, the

coaching session was successful, I just wish Mrs. Sherman would open up more.

Coaching Session 4

Mrs. Sherman implemented the strategy with her students, and it was successful! I was so

happy to see Mrs. Sherman so happy with the lesson and her students eager to learn. They were

hanging on to every word throughout the lesson. I recoded the lesson and sent it to Mrs. Sherman

to review.

During the session, I wanted Mrs. Sherman to openly talk about how she felt

implementing the strategy. I felt she opened up more in this coaching session but still needed

more prompting to answer the questions. We looked at the data together and we noticed that 90%

of her students were engaged. This was an increase from 60% in the beginning. She discussed

how she had reluctant workers excited about working with Nearpod. Mrs. Sherman’s class met

her goal of increasing engagement with implementing technology.

The next step was to determine if she wanted to modify her goal or keep it the same.

Since her class did meet the goal, we kept the strategy the same but increased the percentage of

students engaged. Her goal was to now have 100% of her students engaged in learning. As I

stated in the previous journal, I did provide Mrs. Sherman with a list of technology resources. In

the improve section of the video, she discussed wanting to use Padlet. I would love to implement

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many different technology tools with her to increase engagement. She finally decided, that she

did want to continue using Nearpod and then eventually move on to implementing different

tools. Although, the videos are over, my time as a coach is just getting started. Mrs. Sherman is

now sharing with my teammates the great things that her students are producing, and other

teachers would like their class to do the same. Mrs. Sherman and I will meet back before

December 18th to plan another Nearpod lesson.

The first video Mrs. Sherman and I observed was a LoTi level 1, no technology was

implemented. With the use of Nearpod, we reached a LoTi level 3. All students had technology

and were using higher order thinking skills to solve math word problems. One modification that

Mrs. Sherman suggested was for students to each have their own Ipad instead of sharing with

their math partner.

I learned so much through these coaching sessions. Trust is the most important part of the

process. I coached a teacher who was very hard to get her to open up due to many bad

experiences with coaching. Mrs. Sherman felt comfortable and eager to learn and grow. I had

never imagined leaving the classroom, however after coaching with Mrs. Sherman I feel I would

enjoy teaching teachers how to meet their own goals to reach all students. Jim Knights, The

Impact Cycle, was very thorough on each step of the coaching process. I will continue to use The

Impact Cycle wherever my coaching leads me.

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 References

Knight, J. (2018). The impact cycle: What instructional coaches should do to foster powerful
improvements in teaching. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.