School-+Malvern+Central+School

Wow! What an amazing journey this has been. I am fortunate enough to be working 4 days a week in a coaching role with great staff and students. I am currently focussing my work with seven staff in the level 3 team working on improving writing and with 8 staff in the level 2 team working on improving reading. The coaching journey has been a rollercoaster ride of ups and downs, laughter and tears. What I have learnt along the way:  · Initially I missed the kids   · Silence is golden- Sometimes it is best not to say anything   · It is great to be a co- inquirer and not the expert   · “Tell me more about.....”- I love this phrase   · Literacy generates excitement among staff and the kids- this excitement is contagious and could be bottled   · Possibilities are endless and restricted by creativity and ideas   · Expect the unexpected   While we have a long way to go on this journey of discovery, we have covered a number of kilometres already. I look forward the trip ahead. 24/8/2010 I really enjoyed Julie’s workshop session. It was a chance to look at the resources available to us from the Department. It was great to have time to have a play with support to find certain things while having a coaching hat on, thinking about how we can use these resources to support the staff we are working with. I especially like the Literacy Professional Learning Resources- Reading, Writing and Speaking & Listening overviews. I like the fact that it is all on one page with hyperlinks to get directly to the website for more information. I find that I sometimes get lost navigating my way through these resources which wastes a lot of time and causing frustrations. I know that I will be using these resources with my teams. Thanks Julie for the supported time to work through these. One of the things that we are trying to improve is the assessment tools. PROBE is one that is suggested so we are looking into that. I would be interested in knowing: · Who already uses this assessment tool? · How PROBE is being used schools? · Whether anyone has PROBE that links to the VELS progression points?

=
HIJulian, it's Julie here. I'm glad you found the workshop useful. There are lots of great resources and information in the DEECD website, but it does take time to find your way around it. Using the retrieval charts and the Literacy Professional Learning Resource Table of Contents is the best way to quickly find your way to where you want to go. In answer to your question abour PROBE: the consultants at ACER will tell you that it should be used as a drill down assessment tool - it's not designed as a first level assessment (On Demand Progress Tests, PAT-R, TORCH etc will do that job). PROBE is best used when you need more information about a child's skills. I hope that helps - contact me if you need more information about this. Julie Kerr ======

6/10/2010  THEN AND NOW REFLECTION: Before beginning the Establishing Literacy Coaching Course I was unsure about what my job was really going to be and how I was going to work as a Literacy Coach our school. Prior to this year our school has not had any Coaching staff or any structures in place to allow coaching to occur. When I first started the biggest issues was educating staff and myself about the roles of a coach, the coaching process and getting students to reflect on their own teaching practices. Staff saw the role as being a supervisory one, my perceived role was to ‘spy’ and report back.

Now I understand that Establishing Literacy Coaching is much easier when processes are in place and that there are clear understandings by all about these processes and expectations.

Before beginning this program the view was that I would have to be the ‘expert’ and show my colleagues how it should be done. I love that we have been given ‘permission’ to be co-inquirers and a real part of the journey.

I also did not want to distance myself from the kids and being a teacher, which I love. I find now that I still have the contact with kids but in a different way. It is great to see them being excited about literacy and learning. Now I believe that being an effective literacy coach involves working in partnerships in a range of role s a range of ways to build the capacity of both the teacher and the coach. Above all coaching needs to be: Tailored to the needs of the Coachee, Confidential, Safe, Targeted, Timely , Reflective and Supportive.

7/10/2010 Due to the fact that this year is the first time we have had any form of coaching at our school I thought it would be a good idea to get the staff I have worked with to also do a THEN and NOW reflection on Literacy Coaching. I have recorded some of this feedback:

- That it involves a number of professional discussions and reflections on your practice. - It is very flexible and is completely non judgemental. - The aim is to support your practice in your classroom. || - Targeted and specific to my students. - Ongoing with change happening over time not all at once. - Coaching is not just about coming into the room observing and giving helpful suggestions but also the pre and post discussions helped me reflect on my teaching and improve my practice. || -More specifically in Level 3 supporting the team to develop a consistent approach to the delivery of an agreed literacy programme, through the development of Writer’s Workshop, the refining of Reading activities & the development of an inquiry based spelling programme. || - All of the above and more! - Support was also forthcoming on an individual basis above & beyond what was mentioned above. || -After I had done this I would arrange to have the coach observe a session and give feedback to improve my teaching. || - Coaching is a focused partnership between individuals where a coach asks questions about the children in need, what is currently being done and how progress is monitored. -From that the conservation develops into specific things that need observation. -After the session feedback is given and a range of suggestions are presented. || 8/10/2010 Part of my coaching journey this year has been the introduction and development of the Writer's Workshop program with our grade 3 and 4 students and 7 staff. I asked our grade 3 students to do their own reflection on what they learnt this year as part of the program. I have been blown away by the response and insight into their own learning and the impact that the introduction of the program has had. I excited by the fact that grade 3's are so detailed and reflective on their own learning. Reflection - what a powerful tool! Before starting my coaching journey I don't think I really used student reflection enough.
 * THEN || NOW ||
 * - I understood it would involve classroom observation and assistance with how to support at risk students in your classroom, who may previously have been involved in the reading recovery program. || - Getting assistance in an area of your teaching you would like to improve in relation to reading and writing.
 * - I didn’t really know, I had done peer coaching at my previous schools so figured it would be somewhere along those lines with a literacy focus. || - Non judgemental.
 * -Supporting teachers in the classroom to develop capacity in the teaching of Literacy.
 * -I knew it would involve you coming into my class and helping me with certain areas, but I saw it more as team teaching. || -Picking a focus area and working together towards that, getting regular feedback on my lesson and how I approach the teaching of particular areas. ||
 * -I thought coaching would make me think more deeply about specific needs of the children in my class and reflect on what I was doing and what I could do better.



12/10/2010 PERSUASIVE TEXT- We are currently reflecting on our planning for this year and next to provide students with the necessary scaffolds and supports to be able succeed in the NAPLAN which for writing will be persuasive text, which I guess no doubt everyone is. I guess one of the things we are grappling with is do we as staff really know how to teach this genre and do we adequately provide students with opportunities for success? We are currently at the stage of gathering appropriate resources to support the teaching and learning of persuasive text. So if you know I any that you are willing to share for the greater good, please let me know.

14/10/2010 I like like this powerpoint I think it captures the essence of Literacy Coaching about it being a journey of discovery together. I am planning to use this literacy assessment and reflection tool (broken into parts) to get teacher to reflect on their practice so that we have a jumping off point for 2011. It covers all areas of literacy.