The Middle School Literacy Coach: Roles, Contexts, and Connections to Teaching
Antony T. Smith
A dissertation
submitted in partial fulfillment of the
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Doctor of Philosophy
University of Washington
2006
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College of Education
University of Washington
Graduate School
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Antony T. Smith
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__________________________________________________________
Sheila Valencia
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__________________________________________________________
Sheila Valencia
__________________________________________________________
Yasuko Kanno
__________________________________________________________
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Abstract
The Middle School Literacy Coach: Roles, Contexts, and Connections to Teaching
Antony T. Smith
Chair of the Supervisory Committee:
Professor Sheila Valencia
College of Education
This study investigates the professional development work of instructional
coaches in the area of middle school literacy. In response to a nationwide call for
creating highly-qualified teachers, states, districts, and schools have turned to alternative
professional development models in an effort to impact teacher knowledge and improve
classroom instruction. Instructional coaching, a professional development model that
involves placing an educator within schools to provide ongoing support for teachers on
issues of knowledge and practice, is experiencing explosive growth in popularity in
response to the challenge of producing highly qualified teachers. The implementation of
instructional coaching programs has outpaced research, however, especially at middle
and secondary levels. This qualitative case study explores the work experiences of
literacy coaches at the middle school level, considering roles the coaches assumed,
contexts that affected these roles, and connections between their coaching work and
changes in teacher learning and practice.
Data were collected using field observations and interviews from three coaches,
four principals, and six teachers in two school districts. Analysis indicated that the
literacy coaches assumed a wide variety of roles by performing tasks that related either to
classroom instruction or schooling in general. Time spent on these two sets of tasks was
divided unequally, with the majority of coach time being spent on schooling-related
tasks. A number of middle school contexts impacted the work of the coach, appearing to
make ongoing engagement in the coaching process difficult. Connections between
coaching work and changes in teacher learning and practice were few.
The results of this study suggest the coaching process became fragmented when
the coach assumed a large number of roles. Middle school contexts appeared to have
considerable influence on these roles, and at times seemed to present obstacles that
impeded the coaching process. Additionally, initial connections between coaching and
changes in teacher learning and practice were few, suggesting a misalignment between
the coaching process and issues of teacher knowledge. This study suggests the potential
to affect literacy instruction may be enhanced by clarifying coaching roles and
connecting them to a trajectory of teacher change.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
List of Figures .................................................................................................................... ii
List of Tables ..................................................................................................................... iii
Chapter 1: Introduction.......................................................................................................1
Chapter 2: Review of the Literature ...................................................................................5
Teacher Learning ...................................................................................5
Teacher Knowledge .............................................................................12
Middle School Literacy ........................................................................15
Summary ..............................................................................................19
Chapter 3: Research Methodology ...................................................................................21
Design ..................................................................................................21
Participants ...........................................................................................23
Data Collection Methods .....................................................................28
Data Analysis .......................................................................................31
Summary ..............................................................................................36
Chapter 4: Composite Narrative: Diane ...........................................................................38
Day One ...............................................................................................41
Day Two...............................................................................................52
Coaching Issues and Perspectives ........................................................62
Chapter 5: Composite Narrative: Grace ..........................................................................74
Day One ...............................................................................................75
Day Two...............................................................................................89
Coaching Issues and Perspectives ......................................................101
Chapter 6: Composite Narrative: Michelle .....................................................................113
Day One .............................................................................................116
Day Two.............................................................................................127
Coaching Issues and Perspectives ......................................................137
Summary of Narratives ......................................................................145
Chapter 7: Cross-Case Analysis .....................................................................................147
Coaching Roles ..................................................................................147
School Contexts .................................................................................159
Connections to Learning and Practice................................................167
Summary ............................................................................................171
Chapter 8: Discussion .....................................................................................................173
Findings and Implications ..................................................................173
Limitations .........................................................................................189
Conclusion .........................................................................................191
References .......................................................................................................................193
Appendix A: Coach Intake Interview Protocol ...............................................................199
Appendix B: Coach Follow-up Interview Protocol ........................................................200
Appendix C: Coach Observation Interview Protocol .....................................................201
Appendix D: Classroom Teacher Interview Protocol.....................................................202
Appendix E: Principal Interview Protocol......................................................................203
Appendix F: Codes with Descriptions ............................................................................204
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure Number
Page
1. The Coaching Process and Professional Knowledge Landscapes .......................179
2. Instructional Coaching and a Trajectory of Teacher Change ..............................185
LIST OF TABLES
Table Number
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
Page
Adams and Jefferson Middle School Demographics .............................................. 25
Wallace School District Contact School Demographics......................................... 27
District Demographics ............................................................................................ 28
Diane Composite Day One ..................................................................................... 42
Diane Composite Day Two..................................................................................... 53
Grace Composite Day One ..................................................................................... 75
Grace Composite Day Two..................................................................................... 90
Michelle Composite Day One ............................................................................... 116
Michelle Composite Day Two .............................................................................. 128
Classroom Instructional and School-Related Roles .............................................. 147
Classroom Instructional Roles: Percentage of Total Observed Time ................... 149
School-Related Roles: Percentage of Total Observed Time ................................. 155
Chapter 1
Introduction
Standards-based reform in education has placed an increasing emphasis on improving
literacy instruction and student reading achievement (Elmore & Rothman, 2000). Over the last
15 years, the demand for literacy skills has increased, the current level of reading achievement
remains stagnant, and the achievement gap between students of different demographic groups
persists (RAND, 2002). The federal No Child Left Behind Act (2002) adds more pressure to
raise student reading achievement by requiring that all children read at grade level by the end of
grade 3. Yet while considerable attention is currently being paid to early literacy, adolescent
literacy continues to experience an ongoing crisis (Conley & Hinchman, 2004). The fate, years
later, of students who failed to meet the NCLB grade three standard, remains unclear.
Research has revealed little about how to improve the reading of young adolescents,
especially those who enter the middle grades behind their peers (Jackson & Davis, 2000). Both a
landmark review of research (Witte & Otto, 1981) and a survey of schools (Irvin & Conners,
1989) suggest that middle school reading is taught in a variety of contexts, including separate
developmental or remedial classes, language arts classes, content-area classes such as
mathematics or science, or not at all. Additionally, the quality of classroom practice and type of
reading instruction, when reading is taught, may vary widely. With a paucity of research on
adolescent literacy, urgent questions remain about middle school teachers’ classroom practice and
about the kinds of professional development that may affect teacher learning.
Professional development is a powerful way to address teacher learning and classroom
practice, as improving instruction is considered a crucial link between setting high standards and
boosting student achievement (Elmore & Rothman, 2000). Although traditional approaches to
professional development are largely considered inadequate in meeting teachers’ learning needs
in relation to new achievement standards for students (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1996;
Elmore & Rothman, 2000), a number of new and innovative approaches have grown in popularity
in recent years. Common elements among these approaches include teacher collaboration,
sustained and ongoing change efforts, teacher reflection and inquiry, and connections between
professional development goals and teachers’ work with students (Darling-Hammond &
McLaughlin, 1996). Professional development would, ideally, provide teachers with learning
opportunities over time and in context, increasing the chances of affecting teacher learning and
classroom practice.
Coaching, one popular model of ongoing professional development, aims to provide
long-term support for teachers in learning and implementing new instructional strategies by
addressing many of the elements listed above (Poglinco et al., 2003). Coaching is unique from
other forms of professional development in that it promises to provide reflective learning
opportunities, over time, within real-world school contexts. Coaches would collaborate with
teachers over an extended period of time, addressing issues of teacher learning and classroom
practice identified by the teacher, coach, or administrator. The increasing popularity of coaching
may be attributed, in part, to its promise of ongoing, relevant, context-aware support of teacher
learning and changing classroom practice.
In the content area of reading, specialists have begun to take on new leadership roles as
literacy coaches. Tasks and duties related to these coaching roles vary widely, from peer tutors to
professional consultants to evaluation-oriented trainers; as noted by the International Reading
Association, reading coaches engage in a variety of activities, “from informal activities—such as
conversing with colleagues—to more formal ones such as holding team meetings, modeling
lessons, and visiting classrooms” (IRA, 2004, p. 2). The underlying purpose of coaching is to
improve student achievement through changes in teacher learning and classroom practice.
Despite the increasing popularity of coaching and the great potential of professional
development it presents, there is little research documenting its effectiveness (Neufeld & Roper,
2003). As noted in the International Reading Association’s standards for secondary literacy
coaches:
Ideally, before hiring new secondary literacy coaches, schools and districts would be able
to consult a solid body of empirical research suggesting whether secondary literacy
coaches are effective and what array of factors influences their effectiveness.
Unfortunately, given the current demands of No Child Left Behind policies and the everpresent achievement gap in middle and high schools around the United States, waiting for
that body of research to be produced before committing to coaching is neither feasible
nor wise (2006, p. 45).
Instead, the recommendation is to research what already exists, asking questions
important to practitioners and relating findings back to them to inform practice. This study
follows this recommendation by examining the process of literacy coaching in middle school
contexts. Three specific questions guided this study:

What roles do middle school literacy coaches play in different school settings?

In what ways do contextual factors, and the coaches themselves, affect these roles?

What connections can be made between coaching and teacher learning and classroom
practice?
Existing research suggests that a wide variety of roles and tasks occur under the term
“coaching.” However, precisely what the coaching process entails, how it is affected by the realworld contexts of middle school settings, and how coaches’ efforts affect teacher learning and
classroom practice remain questions largely unanswered. This study examines these vital issues
in an effort to better understand how the process of coaching plays out in context and the ways in
which coaching may contribute to changes in teacher learning and classroom practice.
The organization of this dissertation is as follows: In chapter 2, I review the literature in
relation to teacher learning, forms of teacher knowledge, and middle school literacy. Chapter 3
provides an account of the methods used in this study. In chapters 4, 5, and 6, I describe the work
of the three literacy coaches who participated in the study; these descriptions are written in
narrative form, representing compilations of coach experiences as well as teacher and principal
perspectives of the coaching process. Chapter 7 looks across cases of coaching, providing a
cross-case analysis in relation to the study’s research questions. In chapter 8, I discuss the
conclusions, implications, and limitations of the study.
Chapter 2
Review of the Literature
“New structures for individual and organizational learning must replace the usual notions
of training, inservicing, or dissemination with possibilities for knowledge sharing anchored in
problems of practice” (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1996, p. 206). “Knowledge sharing,”
in terms of professional development, includes a variety of alternative approaches that attempt to
move beyond single-session workshops and training sessions, in order to more thoroughly
address issues of teacher learning and to bridge the gap between what teachers hear in meetings
and what they teach in classrooms. I draw on three areas of research to better understand the role
of professional development in teachers’ professional lives, especially in relation to issues of
literacy: 1) Teacher learning theories and research on professional development and coaching; 2)
Theories and research relating to types of teacher knowledge; 3) Research on adolescent literacy
development and methods of instruction.
Teacher Learning
Teacher learning is situated within the larger concept of teacher change, which is
described as learning, development, socialization, growth, improvement, implementation,
cognitive and affective change, and self-study. Change efforts in education traditionally moved
in discrete steps from research to change agents to practitioners (Richardson & Placier, 2001).
An alternative to this type of change process, identified as empirical-rational, is that of a
normative-reeducative change process, which emphasizes the social nature of intelligence and the
need for individuals to participate in their own re-education (Chin & Benne, 1969). Change
strategies adhering to this process share a number of components, including focusing on the needs
of the client (individual or group), collaboration between change agent and client to problemsolve, and the selective use of resources in addressing these problems. Professional development
efforts grounded in this approach to change emphasize changes in beliefs as well as practice, the
development of a change orientation, and the growth of dialogue and community as important
elements of teacher change. Teaching is considered a complex endeavor situated in a variety of
contexts.
The situated learning perspective asserts that the contexts within which activities occur
are integral to the learning that takes place within them (Putnam & Borko, 2000). From this
perspective, teachers must be provided with opportunities to enhance knowledge and change
beliefs as they learn new instructional approaches. These opportunities might include inquiry,
reflection, examination of prior knowledge, and formation of professional discourse communities
(Putnam & Borko, 1997). Wenger (1998) similarly identifies networks and formal and informal
groups in school settings as communities of practice, where teachers are engaged in networks and
group interactions beyond the relative isolation of the classroom (Lortie, 1975). Learning is tied
to social participation, an “encompassing process of being active participants in the practices of
social communities and constructing identities in relation to these communities” (Wenger, 1998).
Professional development programs, seen from the situated learning perspective, would need to
be: embedded in context; collaborative and interactional; sustained and intensive; and would need
to be ongoing in nature to sustain growth in teacher learning and create change in instructional
practice (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1996; Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2001; Garet, Porter,
Desimone, Birman, & Yoon, 2001; Steiner, 2000).
Instructional coaching, a relatively new and increasingly popular form of professional
development (Dole & Donaldson, 2006; Toll, 2005), would seem to promote a number of the
traits identified by both the situated-learning perspective and the normative-reeducative change
process. Conceptually, instructional coaching would involve having a knowledgeable individual
work with teachers at the school or classroom level, over time, on issues of teacher learning and
classroom practice. Currently, coaches appear to have been assigned two major responsibilities:
teacher mentoring and literacy program advocacy. These two responsibilities are reflected in the
IRA standards for middle and secondary literacy coaches, with the four standards evenly split
between them. Standard 1, “Skillful Collaborators,” and standard 3, “Skillful Evaluators of
Literacy Needs,” emphasize literacy-program advocacy and collaboration. Standard 2, “Skillful
Job-Embedded Coaches,” and standard 4, “Skillful Instructional Strategists,” stress the
importance of working with teachers to provide mentoring and assistance in learning and
implementing literacy-related instructional strategies (IRA, 2006).
This dual set of responsibilities is consistent in the literature. Toll, for example, defines
literacy coaches in relation to the responsibility of mentoring teachers: “A literacy coach is one
who helps teachers to recognize what they know and can do, assists teachers as they strengthen
their ability to make more effective use of what they know and do, and supports teachers as they
learn more and do more” (2005, p. 4). In her examination of the evolving role of reading
specialists, Dole (2004) agrees with this focus on mentoring teachers, stating, “Among the most
important kinds of reading coaches’ activities are teaching demonstrations and modeling of
lessons …The reading coach may also have observed in classrooms and provided them with
feedback about their lessons” (p. 4-5). From this point of view, the primary responsibility of the
literacy coach is to work with teachers as a mentor.
Other definitions of coaching emphasize literacy advocacy over mentoring. Sturtevant
(2003), for example, defines literacy coaches as “master teachers who provide essential
leadership for the school’s entire literacy program. This leadership includes helping to create and
supervising a long-term staff development process that supports both the development and
implementation of the literacy program over months and years” (p. 11). Walpole and McKenna
(2004) also place importance on this coaching responsibility, identifying a crucial part of the
coach’s job to be a school-level planner, someone who will “plan and implement programs
designed to help students improve their reading and writing including those supported by federal,
state, and local funding” (p. 11). They do not stop with just this one responsibility, however,
going on to identify a total of five coaching responsibilities: planner, learner, grant writer,
researcher, and teacher of teachers. This last one, incidentally, moves the coach back toward the
responsibility of literacy coach as mentor.
Literacy coaching, then, seems to be a combination of literacy-program and mentoring
responsibilities. Several researchers, in fact, provide definitions of coaching that include both of
these responsibilities to some degree (Blachowicz, Obrochta, & Fogelberg, 2005; Coskie, 2005;
Knight, 2004). The coaching process, defined using this dual-purpose definition of coaching,
would entail the literacy coach addressing the professional development of teachers as a wholeschool literacy advocate and teacher mentor in order to improve literacy instruction. What is
unclear is whether there is an optimal balance between these two sets of responsibilities, which,
considering the coach’s available time, might be in conflict. How a literacy coach might manage
to strike a balance between advocating a literacy program at the whole-school level and
mentoring individual teachers in classrooms remains an open question.
Beyond responsibilities, a number of coaching models have been suggested in the
literature. Existing research on coaching incorporates a range of possible coaching models, many
of which overlap and are sometimes used interchangeably in the literature. While at one end of
this range is the model of coaching as facilitating team planning with minimal observation and
evaluation (Joyce & Showers, 2002), and at the other end of the range is the model of coach as
supervising and evaluating teachers (Anderson & Pellicar, 2001; Glickman, 2002), many studies
seem to focus on models of coaching existing somewhere between these two extremes. Peer
coaching, collaboration, and mentoring represent a somewhat blurry middle-ground of coaching
conceptualizations. Underlying this variety of coaching models are the common goals of
affecting teacher learning and changing classroom practice.
A number of studies have examined coaches working as consultant, where the coach is
available to provide teachers with advice or expertise to improve instructional practice
(Hasbrouck, 1997; Hasbrouck & Christen, 1997; Tschantz & Vail, 2000). Coaches in these cases
act as mentors, monitoring teachers’ progress, providing expert assistance, and guiding an
ongoing reflective process (Anderson & Shannon, 1995). A one-way flow of knowledge is
common to this type of coaching: Knowledgeable mentors provide expertise and assistance in the
learning process of less-knowledgeable teachers. The coach might help teachers interpret new
information and apply it in the classroom, potentially bridging the gap between information
learned outside the classroom and how to implement new strategies with students. While this
approach has been examined in some narrowly-defined cases (Ballard, 2001; Kovic, 1996),
questions about its effectiveness in the social contexts of schools remain. It is unclear, for
example, how a coach might compensate for vastly different levels of literacy experience among
teachers she would be consulting, or how a coach might deal with an array of school contexts and
programs in which the teachers were attempting to implement new instructional strategies.
A second model prominent in research is that of peer coach, where the coach works in an
environment conceptualized as a self-help community which fosters transfer of new skills,
companionship, peer feedback, and self-reflection (Gottesman & Jennings, 1994; Joyce, Calhoun,
& Hopkins, 1999; Joyce & Showers, 2002). In this capacity, the coach works as a peer in
cooperation with classroom teachers; one person is usually assigned to serve as coach for a school
year, but in some cases teachers switch places, taking turns being the coach. This coaching
model has the potential to allow for smooth transitions between professional development
situations and work inside the classroom, as teacher and coach may likely be considered as peers;
peers may also find it easier to create forums for sharing and learning from teaching experiences.
This possibility is suggested by the positive response to, and claimed benefit of, coaching work
and planning among teachers across a number of studies where the sense of teacher isolation was
reduced, and where teamwork resulting from the peer coaching approach was found to have a
positive effect on knowledge acquisition and teaching practice (Kohler, McCullough-Crilley, &
Shearer, 1997; Ponticell, Olson, & Charlier, 1995; Slater and Simmons, 2001). In these studies,
coaches worked with teachers in their classrooms on goals established by coach and teacher
together. Coaches and teachers in these cases possessed similar levels of knowledge, and teacher
learning appeared to have been positively affected. Research on this peer coaching model does
not address how learning beyond the immediate classroom would be affected, how middle-school
contexts might affect the process, or how peer collaboration work might address the whole-school
literacy plan. Also unaddressed is the issue of the coach being able to maintain a peer
relationship with teachers while at the same time providing literacy expertise.
A third coaching model emphasizes collaboration, where groups of teachers are assisted
in team planning and problem solving. The coach as collaborator and change agent provides
opportunities for continuous learning with the support of colleagues (Lieberman, 1996),
formation of discourse communities (Putnam & Borko, 2000), and nurturing a school-wide
culture of inquiry (Szabo, 1996). In complex school settings, coach participation in subject
matter departments, informal study groups, or administration-directed action teams would likely
take place, for a variety of purposes and with a range of outcomes. Specific coaching
responsibilities in these studies seem unclear, but in many activities the coach possesses some
administrative authority. The question is how coaches function in these different contexts, as
well as the kinds of roles the coach might assume when collaborating with groups of teachers to
coordinate professional development and the learning of new instructional strategies.
Two habits of effective cultures of inquiry, identified by Szabo (1996), are capacity
building and community building. Although it might be assumed a literacy coach could play an
active role in capacity building, “linking to outside perspectives and expertise in ways adapted to
local needs” (p. 79), it is unclear how this process might occur in the context of middle school
literacy. Similarly, the community-building responsibility of establishing relationships through
collaboration raises questions of coach emphasis, logistics, and program implementation.
Further, in relation to the dual responsibilities of literacy-program advocate and teacher mentor, it
is not clear how both of these might be balanced and addressed when working to build teacher
community and capacity. Overall, there is the suggestion of coaches working in collaboration
with teachers as agents of change within schools. What remains unclear is how coaches might
balance and negotiate several coaching models, from mentor to peer to facilitator, while going
about this work.
In summary, instructional coaches are identified in the literature as having two distinct
responsibilities: literacy program advocate and teacher mentor. These responsibilities are not
exclusive, and the literature suggests that the coach should address both (IRA, 2006). In addition
to these responsibilities, a wide variety of coaching models exists. These include consultant, peer
coach, and collaborator, to name three. Within middle school contexts, it is uncertain how these
coaching models and responsibilities might work in concert or in conflict with one another as the
coach goes about her daily work to improve literacy instruction.
Teacher Knowledge
Coaching addresses several types of teacher knowledge. In this study I have utilized the
metaphor of the professional knowledge landscape (Clandinin & Connelly, 1995) as a way to
organize concepts of teacher knowledge as they relate to the coaching process. This landscape
exists at the intersection of theory and practice. As Clandinin and Connelly explain,
We imagined the landscape as a professional location that teachers experienced as filled
with epistemological and moral dilemmas. As we imagined it, the landscape was
composed of two places, in-classroom and out-of-classroom places. We characterized
these two places as being different. The classroom place on the landscape is a place of
teaching activity and interwoven stories of these activities. The out-of-classroom place
on the landscape is one of abstract talk about abstract policies and prescriptions. These
abstract policies and prescriptions are fed into the landscape via a conduit that connects
the world of theory with the world of practice. Dilemmas are created as teachers move
back and forth between the two places on the landscape (p. 67).
Coaching holds promise as a mechanism for bridging the gap between these two places
on the landscape and for addressing the dilemmas teachers face in the difficult process of
acquiring knowledge in the abstract out-of-classroom place and implementing it in the practical
in-classroom place of daily activity. To better understand this mediating role of coaching,
however, several types of knowledge need to be identified in relation to teaching, coaching, and
professional development in general. These types of knowledge include subject matter,
pedagogical content, practical, and personal practical knowledge. Each of these types, embedded
in context, has the potential to be influenced through coaching, and in turn to influence teachers’
classroom practice.
Subject matter and pedagogical content knowledge
Subject matter knowledge consists of factual information, central concepts, and
organizing information (Grossman, Wilson, & Shulman, 1989). Yet knowledge of a subject is
frequently influenced and shaped by the teaching methods through which this subject matter
knowledge is delivered. The transmission of content without recognition of pedagogy is difficult
to conceive in relation to teachers working in classrooms. Rather, teachers may tend to show
flexibility, deviating from lengthy unit plans, for example, or changing content as necessary to
meet students’ needs (Schempp, 1995). Thus, the ability to transform subject matter knowledge
into something teachable defines the concept of pedagogical content knowledge, a form of
knowledge prominent in teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes. It includes forms of
representation, analogies, demonstrations—“in a word, the ways of representing and formulating
the subject that makes it comprehensible to others” (Shulman, 1986, p. 9). Research suggests that
pedagogical content knowledge is a powerful factor in deciding not only how to teach, but also
what to teach (Grossman, 1989; Schempp, 1995).
Unlike more traditional professional development approaches, coaching has the potential
to deeply impact teachers’ subject matter and pedagogical content knowledge because it is
potentially situated both inside and outside the classroom. Coaches working with teachers would
have opportunities to facilitate the learning of new subject matter; coaches observing teachers
could have the opportunity to witness the transformation of subject matter knowledge into
pedagogical content knowledge, and would even have the chance to help teachers reflect on this
process. Coaching has potential, over time, to affect teacher learning, to deepen levels of subject
matter and pedagogical content knowledge, and to influence classroom practice.
Practical and personal practical knowledge
Practical knowledge is defined as knowledge of students, curriculum enactment, and
practice within classroom settings (Doyle, 1988; Elbaz, 1983; Lampert, 1985). Practical
knowledge is a prominent feature of the professional knowledge landscape, as it bridges thought
and action through various forms, including rules, principles, and images (Elbaz, p. 138).
Coaches, working with teachers both within and outside of classrooms, would seem to be
uniquely situated to observe and help develop teachers’ practical knowledge in practice, as they
would seem to have the rare opportunity to provide teachers with professional development
support in both the out-of-classroom and in-classroom places on the professional knowledge
landscape of teachers.
Personal practical knowledge addresses personal influences on a teacher’s forms of
knowledge, and is based on the belief that teachers “hold knowledge that comes from experience,
is learned in context, and is expressed in practice” (Clandinin, 2000, p. 29). Connelly, Clandinin,
and He (1997) describe personal practical knowledge as a way to capture the idea of experience
in order to talk about teachers as knowledgeable and knowing persons. This form of knowledge
is found in a teacher’s practice, and brings together subject matter, practical, and even personal
knowledge on the professional knowledge landscape. The ideas of practical and personal
practical knowledge are consistent with the notion of communities of practice, allowing teachers
to see themselves as holders of knowledge (Craig, 1999) that can be reshaped through
professional development experiences (Clandinin, 2000). In this reshaping exists great potential
for innovative forms of professional development such as coaching, where social interactions in
both the in-classroom and out-of-classroom places on the landscape can be transformed into
reflective learning opportunities for teachers.
Types of teacher knowledge considered here include content knowledge, pedagogical
content knowledge, practical knowledge, and personal practical knowledge. Each of these forms
takes shape on the professional knowledge landscape, a metaphor constructed at the intersection
of theory and practice, useful in conceptualizing types of knowledge in two distinct places, inside
and outside of the classroom. Coaching holds promise in bridging the gap between these two
places, promising to help bring knowledge learned outside the classroom place into the teacher’s
daily practice.
Middle School Literacy
Although there are many different types of coaches charged with the task of improving
instruction, this study focuses in particular on middle school literacy. Research on middle school
literacy and effective reading instruction for young adolescents is scant. In particular, more work
needs to be done to understand and support adolescents in classroom, school, and community
contexts (Conley & Hinchman, 2004). This study considers both the current state of middle
school literacy instruction and effective methods of teaching reading, both of which apply to
literacy coaching efforts at middle schools. Several elements of middle school literacy programs
and instruction will be mentioned here to better understand the subject matter contexts in which
literacy coaches do their work.
The first element potentially affecting the coaching process is a range of literacy
programs at the middle school level. Adolescents experience a variety of literacy settings over
the course of a school day. For example, some students receive direct instruction in reading
classes, some receive reading instruction as part of a Language Arts block, and others may not
receive any specific reading instruction at all. Coaches involved in school-wide professional
development plans will need to navigate across the array of literacy settings experienced by
students as they work with a variety of teachers.
Second is the element of content area reading, where students are expected to read and
understand various subject-matter reading materials in classes focused on mathematics, science,
language arts, or social studies. As Irvin (1998) observes, “Sole emphasis on content leaves
students with isolated information and without strategies for learning new content; sole emphasis
on reading process leaves students with little about which to think or write” (p. 241). Most
teachers do not feel there is a coordinated effort to teach reading skills in content-area classes,
and that without more coordination and shared planning time, the development of school wide
reading programs would continue to struggle (Gee & Forester, 1988). Coaches may face issues
of inadequate preparation of content-area teachers to teach reading, or of resistance to spending
class time in science, math, or social studies classes to teaching reading skills and strategies.
Third, when reading is taught in middle schools, it tends to neglect higher-level thinking
and reading skills, addressing instead lower-level skills in isolation (Langer, 2001). This trend is
symptomatic of middle school instruction overall, which despite recommendations from research,
“is still dominated by direct instruction, low-level skill routines, and passive activity” (Beane &
Brodhagen, 2001). Reading comprehension strategies in particular, vital to higher-level reading
processes, may not be taught at all (Dole, 2000). Coaches may face this gap between
instructional theory and classroom practice when working with teachers to affect learning and
improve instruction. It is unclear, though, how literacy coaches might address comprehension
instruction when working in middle schools with large number of teachers; this effort might
involve observing, teaching demonstration lessons, serving as a curriculum materials resource,
facilitating department meetings, or conducting professional development workshops. The
precise ways in which instructional coaches might balance professional development
responsibilities and roles with knowledge of best practices in adolescent literacy remain unclear.
One dilemma affecting literacy coaching efforts is the scarcity of research-based
recommendations on how to improve reading instruction the middle grades, especially with
students who are struggling with reading (Jackson & Davis, 2000). This makes the work of
literacy coaches even more challenging. Some intervention studies, however, do suggest a set of
elements necessary for positively affecting the reading achievement of young adolescents. These
include a thematic and integrative focus across content areas, a strong link between reading and
writing, an element of student discussion or interaction, and the direct teaching of reading skills
and comprehension strategies (Chinn, Anderson, & Waggoner, 2001; Guthrie et al., 1996; Joyce,
Hrycauk, and Calhoun, 2001; Langer, 2001; Loranger, 1999; Morocco, Hindin, Mata-Aguilar, &
Clark-Chiarelli, 2001). These specific strategies may not be part of the classroom practices of
many middle school teachers who have not been prepared to teach reading, and in fact may be
quite different from how many middle school classes are organized and run.
Reading Across Disciplines (RAD) and programs implemented by the Middle School
Reading Task Force (MSRTF) represent two school-wide efforts to improve reading
achievement. RAD blends reading strategies and study skills with established curricula in the
content areas through interdisciplinary reading units (Rathjen, 1998). MSRTF focuses on the
development of strategic reading by teaching reading skills and strategies across content areas
(Johnson & Tompkins, 1998). Both of these programs have had a positive impact on student
reading achievement as measured by performance on standardized tests. Both RAD and MSRTF
work to address the literacy-instruction learning needs of teachers not typically associated with
the teaching of reading; by doing so, these programs attempt to address a variety of contexts in
which middle school students engage in literacy tasks. Coaches might have a number of
interesting roles and challenges working with school-wide literacy programs such as these.
Research on reading comprehension, one of the elements listed above as necessary for
improving reading achievement, reveals a set of elements necessary for improving students’
comprehension. Summarized by Block and Pressley (2002), they include: vocabulary, prior
knowledge, reading strategies, self monitoring, and wide reading. While many of the studies
examining these elements were conducted at the elementary school level, several have involved
middle school students. One such intervention, reciprocal teaching, focused on teaching a set of
four comprehension strategies in small-group settings (Palincsar & Brown, 1984). Another
intervention, Transactional Strategies Instruction, had a similar focus on comprehension, but also
included a component of explicit teaching using a model of direct explanation, where the teacher
served as a model of strategy use (Gaskins & Elliot, 1991). A third study focused on teaching
self-monitoring and reflection to a group of young adolescents identified as struggling readers
(Dole, Brown, & Trathen, 1996). Classroom teachers delivering this instruction modeled their
thinking as a way to demonstrate the use of the targeted strategies. All three of these
interventions were shown to have a positive impact on students’ levels of reading comprehension.
Student discussion and response to literature is another necessary element of reading
achievement that has been studied with young adolescent students. One such study, an
intervention emphasizing whole-group argumentative conversations as a means of supporting
comprehension, was implemented by Lee (2001), who investigated a form of collaborative
reasoning utilizing elements of cultural empowerment, building and using prior knowledge,
literary response, and discussion. As the study progressed, interaction among students increased
and scaffolding of discussions became less teacher-directed and more shared by students. The
result was the gradual formation of a community of learning among students who had previously
been resistant to reading or discussing literature. Other studies suggest young adolescent students
are aware of discussion as a means of better understanding what they read (Alvermann, 1996;
Wells, 1996).
While the literature identifies elements necessary for improving reading achievement and
suggests ways to implement these elements, such as comprehension strategies and literature
response, many concerns regarding reading instruction at the middle school level remain.
Adopting a school-wide approach to teaching literacy, reading strategies in particular, presents a
substantial challenge to literacy coaches, especially in relation to the coaching responsibility of
acting as whole-school literacy program advocate. Another challenge is the implementation of
reading strategies across content areas, with teachers who may not have well-developed
backgrounds in literacy and who may not see the teaching of reading as their responsibility.
These challenges (and others) may face middle school literacy coaches as they work to affect
teacher learning and classroom practice.
Summary
Three areas of research help inform an understanding of the ways instructional coaches
might go about their work in middle school contexts. The first area of research explores issues of
teacher learning, professional development, and the coaching process. This research indicates
that means of professional development that address concerns and issues relevant to teachers, is
ongoing in nature, and possesses an element of collaboration, are considered to be more effective
than traditional forms of professional development that are inherently more isolated and transitory
in nature. This research also suggests that coaching is comprised of at least two major
responsibilities, that of a whole-school literacy advocate and mentor of individual teachers, as
well as a wide range of coaching roles, from observer to supervisor to collaborator to peer.
The second area of research addresses forms of teacher knowledge, especially knowledge
as it relates to professional development and the application of knowledge in the classroom. Of
particular interest is the metaphor of professional knowledge landscapes, and the resulting
identification of out-of-classroom and in-classroom places on the landscape in relation to
teachers’ professional knowledge experiences. This metaphor and its associated places provide a
framework for interpreting the ways in which literacy coaches might interact with teachers as
they move to affect teacher learning and practice through whole-school advocacy and teachermentoring work. The third area of research pertains to middle school literacy, highlighting
challenges coaches may encounter as they work to improve instruction and at the same time
suggesting interventions coaches might utilize as resources in their effort to change the way
reading and writing are taught, and ultimately, to improve student achievement in literacy.
Chapter 3
Research Methodology
In this study I examined the ways in which three middle school literacy coaches went
about their work. To study the coaching process in context, I chose a case study approach to
qualitative research, allowing me to frame and study individual coaches as they functioned in
context. I examined roles coaches assumed while engaged in the coaching process, contexts in
which this work occurred, and ways the coaching process was perceived to have had an impact on
teacher learning and classroom practice. The specific questions that guided this study were:
1. What roles do middle school literacy coaches play in different school settings?
2. In what ways do contextual factors, and the coaches themselves, affect these roles?
3. What connections can be made between coaching and teacher learning and classroom
practice?
Design
To address these questions, I designed a multiple-case study structure (Yin, 2003), in
which the overall topic of the coaching process was examined through the individual cases of
three coaches working at different schools in two districts. The purpose of this type of multiplecase design is to thoroughly describe unique cases while identifying themes across cases. The
two coaches from the first district worked under similar circumstances, being assigned to work at
one middle school each, while the third coach was responsible for working with all seven middle
schools in her district. Incorporating these types of similarities and differences into a multiplecase design adds power to case study research by allowing the researcher to examine similar and
contrasting results across cases (Yin, 2003).
The unit of analysis for each individual case was the literacy coach, but the framing and
bounding of each case remained flexible (Wells, Hirshberg, Lipton, & Oakes, 1995), depending
on the kinds of job duties, school contexts, and personal interactions that shaped the work
experience of each coach. This flexibility was useful in exploring and describing a variety of
roles assumed by the coaches in various school contexts, and made it possible to strike a balance
between constructing a well-defined research purpose and remaining open to exploring new
phenomena as they were encountered in a range of settings and contexts.
While flexible in some respects, each case was shaped in terms of conceptual, social,
physical, and temporal boundaries (Miles & Huberman, 1994). Conceptually, these cases were
bound by the coaching process as developed and experienced by literacy coaches at the middle
school level. This study primarily looked outward from the coaches’ points of view. Social
boundaries also branched outward from the coaches, determined by the various networks of
interaction experienced by each coach. These varied widely across individual cases. The
physical boundaries of each case were established by district and school location and by each
coach’s job duties. Temporal boundaries were affected by daily schedules and the school
calendar: bell schedules, block classes, vacations, report card and conference periods, and
standardized testing schedules had a substantial impact on both the coaching process and teacher
time. Overall, the boundaries of the cases were rigid enough to determine what would be
included in the case and what would not, while remaining plastic enough to accommodate
variation between the individual cases of the coaches studied.
As researcher I positioned myself as a participant observer, moving across the continuum
between the roles of participant and observer (Patton, 2002) as dictated by the particular contexts
and situations I encountered while observing the coaches. Overall, my participation was limited,
with just enough to help participants be comfortable with my presence without becoming part of
the coaching interactions. Observations themselves were overt in nature; informants were told
the general topic of the study and the purpose of my presence before observations began.
Participants
Three middle school coaches from two western school districts agreed to participate in
this study. Seeking a small number of participants in order to thoroughly describe and analyze
individual cases, I utilized Patton’s (2002) maximum variation sampling strategy to identify
participants. This strategy emphasizes describing the unique qualities of each case while looking
across them for common themes or patterns. I began by contacting three coaches with whom I
was already familiar and then identifying two other coaches whose job duties appeared to differ
from the first three. I made initial contacts via email and telephone, subsequently meeting with
four of the five coaches to outline research procedures and ask for participation. The fifth coach
chose not to participate. During the interview process it became clear that one of these four
coaches worked almost exclusively in the district office and not in schools, so she was excluded
from the observation portion of the study.
While these educators had the word “coach” in their job titles, overall coaching-program
structures and actual work assignments varied widely. In order to create a clear picture of these
participants and the contexts surrounding them, I will introduce each of them separately.
Grace
Grace (all names in this study are pseudonyms) was a literacy coach at Adams Middle
School, an urban school, grades 6-8, in the Stevens School District in a western state. Her fulltime position was one of three in the district funded by a private foundation. This private
foundation had a five-year grant to the school district, the aim of which was to increase the
reading achievement of students at three of the district’s lowest-performing middle schools as
measured by statewide achievement tests. This study took place during the second year of this
grant-funded coaching program. While these coaches were considered full-time employees at
one school each, they were technically not part of the district-funded coaching program. The
district program consisted of building-level elementary school coaches, a handful of content-area
curriculum coaches who worked out of the district office and visited middle and high schools, and
several coach leaders who coordinated the district-wide program and facilitated professional
development sessions (for coaches and teachers) at the district office. While the private
foundation provided full-time literacy coaches to three of the lowest-performing middle schools
in the district, the district coaching program did not provide full-time coaches to other middle
schools.
Grace was in her second year as literacy coach at Adams Middle School when I began
this study. Adams Middle School had a diverse population and a large number of students
considered at-risk for academic failure (see Table 1). The goal for Grace and the other grantfunded coaches was to improve the reading achievement of this population of at-risk students.
The initial focus the year before was to work with sixth-grade language arts teachers on issues of
literacy instruction. By the next year, the year of this study, the focus of the coaching program
had expanded beyond sixth grade, becoming more at the discretion of the building principal. As a
result, Grace and her principal decided she should focus on working with four teachers at
different grade levels, in addition to helping the principal with various tasks.
Table 1 Adams and Jefferson Middle School Demographics
School
Enrollment
Free/reduced
Price lunch
Transitional
Bilingual
Special
Education
Meeting
Reading
Standard
Classroom
Teachers
Years
Teacher
Experience
Adams
800
70.8%
23.2%
13.1%
50.2%
49
10.3
Jefferson
745
69.0%
13.1%
14.7%
36.8%
41
12.9
Diane
Diane was also funded by the grant. She worked as a literacy coach at Jefferson Middle
School, which, like Adams, was located in an urban setting in the Stevens School District.
Although Jefferson and Adams were similar in some ways, they differed in terms of the
percentage of students considered transitional bilingual as well as the percentage of students who
met the state reading standard for seventh grade (see Table 1).
This was Diane’s third year as a literacy coach, her second at Jefferson, and while she,
like Grace, had spent the previous year focusing on sixth-grade teachers, the current year brought
more flexibility, so that Diane could potentially expand her role while still working with sixthgrade teachers. With the consent of her principal, Diane used this flexibility to explore ways of
supporting language arts teachers at seventh- and eighth-grade levels and to work with other
teachers who requested assistance.
Both Adams and Jefferson Middle Schools were located in Stevens School District, a
large urban district of approximately 46,000 students. The district average for free or reducedprice meals, in 2005, was 42.2%, lower than at either of these two schools of interest. District
rates for Special Education and Transitional Bilingual classification, at 12.4% and 12.7%
respectively, were also lower than at these two schools. Students at both Adams and Jefferson
also scored lower on the state reading test than the district average, which was 55.1% for seventh
graders. Grace and Diane, as part of the grant-funded coaching program, were charged with the
task of improving these scores by working with teachers on literacy-related issues of teacher
knowledge and classroom practice.
I had become acquainted with Grace and Diane the year before as a research assistant to a
professor working as a consultant to this grant-funded coaching program. At that time the
program had been expanded to include three coaches, one at each of three low-performing middle
schools in the district. My role was to take notes at planning meetings and professional
development sessions for coaches and teachers; I was not directly involved in the coaching
program. I became interested in the work of these middle school literacy coaches and decided to
ask them to participate in a research study on the coaching process. Two of the three coaches,
Grace and Diane, agreed. As described in chapters 4 and 5, these two educators came from quite
different backgrounds, and the schools in which they worked were unique from one another in
terms of demographics and school culture. From working with them in a limited capacity I felt
their work warranted further research.
Michelle
Michelle was a language arts curriculum and technology coach in the Wallace School
District, an increasingly diverse, medium-size district ten miles outside an urban center, also in a
western state. She worked with language arts teachers and departments in all of the middle
schools in the district—seven altogether. Although I had previously taught as a classroom
teacher in this district, I had not worked at the middle school level and did not know Michelle. I
contacted Michelle via email using contact information found on the school district’s website
identifying her as the middle school language arts curriculum and technology coach for the
district. After meeting with me for an informational session and initial interview, Michelle
agreed to participate in the study.
Michelle had been a middle school language arts teacher in this district for seven years.
This was Michelle’s first year in this newly-created position; district officials, initially providing
elementary schools with shared literacy coaches (2 schools per coach), had decided to expand the
coaching program to include middle and high schools. The program focused on subject-area
curriculum support, and rather than assigning a person to one or two schools, subject-area specific
coaches were expected to travel to multiple schools, working out of a shared office space in the
school district administration building. During this study I observed Michelle working in five of
the seven middle schools assigned to her: Lincoln, Wilson, Fillmore, Harrison, and Truman.
Table 2 presents demographic information for these five schools.
Table 2 Wallace District Contact Schools
School
Enrollment
Free/reduced
Price lunch
Transitional
Bilingual
Special
Education
Meeting
Reading
Standard
Classroom
Teachers
Years
Teacher
Experience
Fillmore
614
24.6%
11.2%
11.4%
74.5%
35
10.4
Harrison
818
8.9%
7.7%
8.9%
90.9%
45
11.8
Lincoln
497
41.9%
16.9%
15.9%
50.3%
37
7.0
Truman
693
17.3%
.9%
9.2%
81.7%
36
8.9
Wilson
792
10.1%
.3%
8.8%
79.6%
43
11.2
While her work at these schools varied, Michelle’s primary responsibilities were to
support language arts teachers with the implementation of newly-adopted district curriculum
materials and to provide assistance in using classroom-based and curriculum-related technology.
This dual role originated in the funding structure of the district’s expanded coaching program:
While half of the funding for Michelle’s position came from typical staffing sources, the other
half came from the district’s extensive technology fund approved by school district residents in
the form of a property-tax levy. In practice, the two halves of Michelle’s task seemed integrated,
as many elements of the new language arts curriculum were technology-oriented.
Wallace School District demographics provide a contrast to the urban district in which
Grace and Diane worked: approximately 16,000 students, 18.6% free or reduced-price meals,
9.7% in special education, and 8.8% transitional bilingual (see Table 3). Michelle’s job also
provides a contrast to the coaching situations experienced by Grace and Diane. Grace and Diane
were housed at a single site each, while Michelle traveled to many schools as part of her job.
Grace and Diane’s positions were funded by a private foundation, while Michelle’s position was
funded by district resources. Grace and Diane had the job title “literacy coach,” while Michelle
was “language arts and technology coach.” Each of these coaches, working in a range of
contexts, provided a unique case within the overall study of the coaching process.
Table 3 District Demographics
District
Enrollment
Free/reduced
Price lunch
Transitional
Bilingual
Special
Education
Meeting
Reading
Standard
Classroom
Teachers
Years
Teacher
Experience
Stevens
46,000
42.2%
12.7%
12.4%
63.2%
2,680
11.9
Wallace
16,000
18.6%
8.8%
9.7%
84.3%
920
10.1
Data Collection Methods
Data collection occurred over a five month period. I observed each coach for three oneweek visits, with a break of at least one week between visits. During these observations I
followed the coaches throughout the day as they interacted with students, teachers,
administrators, and district personnel. I observed coaches working by themselves in offices,
conferring with teachers during planning time, tutoring students inside and outside classrooms,
teaching groups of students with and without the classroom teacher’s assistance, facilitating
department-, school-, and district-level meetings, and interacting with administrators, other
coaches, and district personnel. I took field notes during these observations. These notes focused
on roles assumed by the coaches, interactions that occurred between coaches and various other
groups and individuals, and the variety of settings and contexts in which the coaches went about
their work.
Scheduled interviews provided a second source of data for this study. At the beginning
of the first visit, I conducted an intake interview. This interview was semi-structured, utilizing a
more rigidly structured protocol than used in conversational interviews to ensure the inclusion of
specific areas and topics across participants interviewed (see Appendix A). Later, after the
sequence of three observations was complete and after an initial analysis of the data had been
performed, I conducted a follow-up interview with each coach (see Appendix B).
Conversational interviews (see Appendix C) were also conducted with coaches during
each visit. The protocols for these interviews were designed with enough structure to address
purposes, goals, roles, and thoughts about the specific coaching tasks, while also allowing the
freedom to pursue unique situations that occurred within the range of contexts in which the
coaches operated.
I selected two classroom teachers to interview and observe in relation to the work of each
coach. When selecting teachers, I used the strategy of intensity sampling (Patton, 2002), where a
small sample is identified and purposely chosen as being information-rich examples of the
phenomenon of interest. For this study I looked for teachers who had interacted with the literacy
coach a number of times since the beginning of the school year, as these individuals represented a
rich source of information on coaching roles in action, contexts surrounding teachers and
coaching, and the extent to which the coaching process might affect classroom practice and
teacher learning. All six teachers selected worked with one of the coaches, but in different ways.
Some worked with the coach on planning and curriculum issues, while others co-taught lessons
with the coach or observed her teaching demonstration lessons. The determining factor for
selection was that of regular contact: each teacher selected worked with the coach on three or
more occasions.
Five of the six teachers taught combination language arts and social studies classes, while
one taught language arts to Special Education students. Levels of experience varied from three to
more than ten years. I conducted an interview with each of these teachers (see appendix D) and
observed five of them teaching for at least one class period (the Special Education teacher was
unavailable due to scheduling conflicts).
Finally, I interviewed four principals about the coaching process (see Appendix E).
Principals selected included those working with Grace and Diane (at Adams and Jefferson Middle
Schools), as well as the principals of two of the schools with which Michelle worked during the
time of my observations (Fillmore and Wilson Middle Schools). I chose these two principals
because Michelle had worked with teachers in these schools in different ways; my hope was that
they might provide unique perspectives on the coaching process occurring at their schools. All
interviews were digitally recorded for analysis.
I requested weekly written reflections from each coach participant as an additional source
of data. Prompts were sent via email each week during the data collection period, and the
coaches were encouraged to compose a response to the prompt and return it to me on my next
scheduled visit. Only two of the coaches completed this task, however, and only one responded
to more than one prompt. As a result, I considered these written reflections as a supplemental
source of data. All three data sources—interview notes and audio recordings, weekly reflective
writing from coaches, and field notes—were transcribed and coded for analysis.
Data Analysis
As researcher I worked to balance the tension between emic and etic perspectives (Patton,
2002). Although some glimpses of how the coaches felt about and experienced their work came
to light in the data, especially through daily conversational interviews, the data analysis for this
study was primarily conducted from an etic perspective, allowing me to describe, compare, and
contrast the experiences of each of the three cases of coaching in this study, as well as to consider
patterns and trends across cases. In this section I describe the series of steps I took to analyze the
data set in relation to the study’s research questions. First, I will outline the two general
approaches I used for my initial analysis. Second, I will describe the process I used to construct
composite narratives highlighting the experiences of each coach. Third, I will outline the ways in
which I used information from the initial analysis to consider specific issues of coaching roles,
social contexts, and impacts on teacher learning and classroom practice across the coaching cases.
General approaches
To conduct my initial analysis I utilized two approaches befitting case study research:
categorical aggregation and direct interpretation (Stake, 1995). Categorical aggregation involves
analyzing data for the purpose of identifying prominent themes and clustering data segments
around them. To address the first approach, I first entered all field notes, interview transcripts,
and reflective memos into Atlas.ti (Version 5.0), a qualitative research software program. This
allowed me to look for patterns in coaching roles, actions in various contexts, and teachers’
classroom practice across the individual cases of coaching. Through this process, I developed a
set of thirty-six codes aggregated into five general categories: coach background, coaching roles,
social contexts, classroom practice, and teacher learning. See Appendix F for a complete list of
codes.
Each general category contained a number of codes, some of them broadly-defined and
some very narrow in scope. Nineteen codes, for example, related to different types of roles
coaches assumed during the coaching process. Some of these, such as “Coaching Role-Substitute
Teacher,” referred to very specific roles occurring in easily-identified episodes; in this case, a
total of thirteen coded data segments were recorded in relation to Grace either discussing or
performing the role of substitute teacher in instances when the school had too few substitute
teachers for the day. No other coach was asked to perform this role. Other codes relating to
coaching roles were much more broadly-conceived, necessitated by more general yet readily
identifiable themes in the data. An example of this type of code is “Coaching Role-Perceptions
Of,” which refers to instances in the data when any participant or informant reflected on the roles
assumed by coaches or used in the coaching process. One hundred fifty three data segments were
labeled with this code. By spanning a number of coaching roles, this type of code helped
highlight patterns in the data beyond the analysis of discrete roles.
To address the second approach outlined by Stake (1995), direct interpretation, I
reviewed coded data segments in a secondary process to highlight additional themes as well as to
pull apart differences across the cases of individual coaches. A vital step in this process was to
use the codes to go back through the entire data set to see each segment in context and to analyze
specific roles, contexts, and themes across each case of coaching. This process of directly
interpreting the data set allowed for additional themes, not immediately apparent in the first
approach, to emerge. For example, a theme labeled “Culture of Testing Fear” became clear
through this process. Teachers at two schools, Adams (Grace) and Jefferson (Diane), consistently
brought up issues of anxiety over the upcoming seventh-grade state reading test and the need to
help students complete test preparation materials. These instances appeared as segments under
several codes, including “Coaching Role-Professional Developer,” Coaching Role-Resource
Person,” “Social Context-Department Culture,” and “Social Context-School Culture.” The theme
of “Culture of Testing Fear” emerged from the data in a clear and dramatic way through this
process of directly interpreting the data by analyzing coded segments in context.
Composite narratives
The next step in data analysis was to use information gathered from the first two steps to
construct composite narratives of the experiences of each coach, in order to vividly portray the
coaching experiences of Diane, Grace, and Michelle. Considering this study’s three-fold focus on
roles, context, and connections, a necessary step in exploring these issues was to provide a
detailed picture of what it was like for these three coaches to go about their daily work, assuming
a variety of roles and navigating a number of contexts in an effort to help teachers learn and
improve classroom practice. Using Atlas.ti (Version 5.0) as a filtering tool, I examined data
segments relating to sixteen codes that would provide a basic outline of the types of tasks and
interactions that made up the daily experiences of the coaches. Other data segments from other
codes were added to this outline to fill in details and to add depth and perspective to the
composite narratives. The initial codes used in constructing the narratives included “Coach
Background—Coaching,” “Coaching Role—Perceptions Of,” “Coaching Role—Resource
Person,” “Teacher Learning—Coach Perspective,” and others. I selected from hundreds of
segments (assigned to these sixteen codes) those which most closely captured the daily
experiences of each coach; roughly sixty coded data segments for each coach were compiled and
sorted into a general narrative framework for constructing a story of the experiences of each
coach. These segments were sorted into two overall categories of coaching roles and related tasks
comprising these roles. The first category, classroom instructional, was narrowly-focused,
including only roles and related tasks that appeared to focus on issues of instruction and
classroom practice at the teacher level. The second category, school-related, contained a broader
range of roles and tasks beyond the first category, including roles and tasks that appeared
connected to school issues or events in general but not necessarily to issues of importance to
classroom teachers. Coded segments of data relating to these two categories were drawn from the
entire data set, including observation notes, interview transcripts, and written coach reflections.
The process of constructing composite narratives is based on the idea of composite
biography (Connelly, Clandinin, & He, 1997), where “events and stories, from a number of
participants, are collected. Stories are constructed and made up of bits and pieces of the lives of
multiple participants” (p. 669). In this study, however, each composite is a compilation of the
experiences of one individual rather than that of several people merged together. A set of three
distinct composite narratives, one for each coach, was the result of this process. The composite
narratives in this study took the form of two full days of experiences for each coach, along with a
concluding section detailing perspectives of the coaching process as expressed by the coach,
principal, and participating teachers.
The purpose of the composite narratives is to portray the experiences of the three coaches
by focusing on the most relevant, critical data (Yin, 2003) while compensating for the day-to-day
variability of research fieldwork. To keep the narratives true to the overall observed experiences
of the coaches, I made sure they ran parallel to the quantitative distribution of time observed in
the field. In other words, the narratives represent the same proportion of classroom instructional
and school-related roles and related tasks that I observed in the field. In this way, the narratives
remained representative of the coaches’ observed experiences. Coach time spent mentoring
teachers, for example, was represented as the same percentage of time within the narrative as was
observed in the field. Using this representative structure I wrote the composite narratives for
Diane, Grace, and Michelle, forming chapters 4, 5, and 6 of this study.
Themes across cases
The third step in data analysis was to analyze coaching roles, contexts, and connections
across cases, forming chapter 7 of the study. Coaching roles were analyzed across cases, building
on processes already described, in order to better understand the nature and frequency of
observed roles and related tasks as they related to teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes.
First I reviewed all transcribed observation field notes for all coded data segments relating to
coaching roles, tallying these segments for episode frequency, and calculating the percentages of
the total amount of observed time represented by each coaching role. Results of these
calculations were then compared across coaching cases to provide contrasting role profiles for
each of the three coaches. Second, I analyzed the two categories of coaching roles, classroominstructional and school-related, and the various tasks coaches performed within them, in relation
to the coaching process and its purpose of addressing teacher learning and classroom practice
through literacy advocacy and mentoring work. This analysis allowed me to consider the manner
in which various coaching roles might relate to issues of teacher change.
To analyze the contexts in which coaches worked, I reviewed coded data segments from
all sources relating to various contexts in order to identify and support theoretical propositions
(Miles & Huberman, 1994) illustrating the possible effects of such contexts on the coaching
process. One such proposition to emerge from the data was the identification of a common
curriculum reference or topic of discussion as a seemingly-powerful tool for enabling coaches to
address issues of teacher learning and classroom practice. Support for this proposition was found
across all three coaching cases, primarily in relation to codes such as “Coaching Role—
Curriculum,” “Coaching Role—District Liaison,” and “Social Context—District Culture.”
Another proposition indicated the persistent influence of school culture, whether inherently
negative or positive, on the coaching process. In considering these themes I looked back across
the analysis of coaching roles to consider possible effects school contexts may have had on the
various roles coaches assumed as they went about their work.
I used a similar process to examine possible connections between the coaching process
and teacher learning and classroom practice. By reviewing related coded data segments in
context, I identified a set of propositions that could be supported by data. Given the greater-thananticipated variety of coaching roles and effect of contexts on the coaching process, less evidence
than hoped was readily available to support propositions connecting the coaching process with
teacher learning or classroom practice. Questions emerged from the data, however, including
whether evident changes in classroom practice would transfer from one teaching situation to
another. This set of propositions was supported by data segments coded “Classroom Practice—
Teacher Observation,” “Classroom Practice—Principal Perspective,” and “Teacher Learning—
Coach Perspective.” I also looked across roles and contexts to consider the possible interplay
between these elements of coaching. The analysis of these issues across the three cases of
coaching forms chapter 7 of this study.
Summary
The purpose of this study was to examine the ways literacy coaches go about their work
within middle school contexts. The study was a qualitative, multiple-case study, involving three
coaches in two school districts. Data were collected through observations, interviews with
coaches, teachers, and principals, and coaches’ written reflections. All interviews were audiorecorded; interviews, field notes, and written reflections were transcribed and coded with the
assistance of Atlas.ti (Version 5.0). Several levels of analysis were conducted, beginning with the
clustering of coded data segments around common themes and the direct interpretation of data as
filtered through the sets of codes. Further analysis focused on constructing representative
composite narratives portraying the work experience, in context, of each coach, and on focused
analyses identifying propositions relating to each research question and supporting them with
coded data. In the following four chapters, the results of the study are presented.
Chapter 4
Composite Narrative: Diane
The next three chapters are devoted to portraying the experiences of the three coaches
who participated in this study. This chapter begins with a review of the process I used to
construct the composite narratives, and a summary of all three narratives follows the third
narrative. These three narratives describe and explore ways the coaches went about their daily
work in middle schools, negotiated various roles and contexts, and interacted with students,
teachers, and district personnel in a number of school settings. Each chapter tells the story of one
coach over two days. These stories are composite narratives, based on the idea of composite
biography (Connelly, Clandinin, & He, 1997), a constructed series of episodes drawn from the
complete data set for each coach and pieced together to create a poignant yet representative
picture of what life in schools was like for Diane, Grace, and Michelle.
The composite narratives are a way to cohesively and vividly present data drawn from
many weeks of observation (involving over 100 informants) as well as coach, teacher, and
principal interviews. To preserve the essence of the coaching experience, the composite
narratives were constructed in a multiple-step process. First, I clustered coded data segments
around common themes that had emerged from the data. Second, from these clusters I chose
episodes that most clearly or vividly illustrated some facet of these themes. Third, I assembled
the two representative days, keeping the length of each episode true to the amount of time the
coach actually spent in the episode as observed in field observations. Fourth, the proportion of
classroom-instructional and school-related roles was calculated, based on time observed, to match
the proportion that occurred during the entire field observation period. Classroom-instructional
roles, and the tasks that comprised them, focused on teachers’ daily instruction and work with
students, or on planning related to this work. School-related roles, and tasks that comprised them,
included everything else that was related to school. Anything a step removed from actual
classroom happenings, from department meetings to professional development sessions, was
considered a school-related. All three composite narratives were constructed to accurately reflect
the classroom instructional and school-related ratio of roles observed in the field.
While realistic, the composite narratives are also poignant and compelling stories,
bringing together a variety of episodes that illustrate the roles, contexts, and interactions the
coaches experienced as part of their work. Constructing the composite narratives allowed me to
draw from the data a series of powerful representative examples that highlight patterns and trends
that emerged from analyzing the large amount of data collected for this study. What follows are
the stories of Diane, Grace, and Michelle, along with a table for each that outlines each day of the
composite narratives.
Diane
I found Diane’s office at Jefferson Middle School down many flights of stairs, past the
library, the gym, and much overgrown shrubbery. Her office was located in a portable building at
the far edge of the school’s property. Boxes sat along one wall, filled with dozens of trade books
Diane had purchased for the school and sets of nonfiction reading curriculum materials several
teachers at the school were pilot testing. A large shelf of resource books having to do with
literacy, coaching, and professional development stood next to her desk. As Diane mentioned in
her initial interview, she had read all of these books and met many of the authors. She had talked
with them about reading. Literacy was a passion for Diane, and these books represented that
passion.
Diane’s work with literacy began thirty years ago with a Masters degree in early
childhood education. She had many years of experience working as an elementary school
teacher. Over the years Diane had been part of a number of professional development
opportunities focusing on literacy and literacy assessment, mostly at the elementary level. She
began working as a coach in the Stevens School District seven years ago, in a district-level job
that was part of an initiative focused on interpreting assessment data and providing literacy
support to struggling schools. After three years of work, Diane felt the initiative had raised
teacher awareness of issues such as the gap between assessment and instruction and of best
practices in reading instruction. But despite this increased awareness, little had actually changed
in regard to instruction. Reflecting on this experience, Diane noted, “People were at the point
where it was a language arts class and they were teaching literature, but the whole notion of
strategic reading in the middle school was just not there.” Looking back, Diane considered this
job to have been a precursor to what are now considered roles and responsibilities of a literacy
coach: she went to schools, met with groups of teachers, and helped them develop strategies to
address problem areas in classroom practice.
Her next job more closely resembled coaching, although the term coach was not in use at
the time. She traveled between three Stevens School District middle schools, offering support to
teachers working with struggling readers and writers. Specific goals for her work were not
identified, and Diane felt that working with three different schools was too taxing, so after two
years she transitioned to working at Jefferson Middle School full time—and by this time the title
“Literacy Coach” appeared next to her name. She was one of three coaches at three different
middle schools in the district, funded by a grant awarded by a private foundation. During the
school year prior to this study, Diane and the other coaches were instructed to work primarily
with sixth grade teachers. The intent of this focus was to have a positive impact on the youngest
readers in the school and then to expand upward as these students got older. The three coaches
met on a regular basis, received professional development in literacy and coaching, and worked
with teams of sixth-grade teachers to improve instruction. While she collaborated with the other
two coaches on this work, Diane also found herself negotiating with Jefferson’s school principal
to determine specific ways in which she might work with teachers to best support the school’s
improvement plan. Diane felt tension between the goals of the grant program and those
expressed by her principal, Linda.
During the year of this study, the foundation gave the coaches more flexibility in their
work. Diane strove to expand her focus to include seventh and eighth grade teachers. One of her
primary goals was to weave reading comprehension strategy instruction into as many classrooms
as possible, to foster and encourage change in this direction without mandates or excessive
pressure. “Explicit instruction of reading strategies, that’s a key piece of what I do. I model and
help people in determining what the difference is between assignments and teaching and
understanding. That’s huge.” Diane chose reciprocal teaching, a clearly-defined set of strategies
utilizing student discussion groups, as an instructional tool to help move teachers away from a
whole-group lecture format. Her plan this year was to work with a targeted number of teachers,
about six, on explicit instruction and small-group formats, with reciprocal teaching offered as a
model. Day- to-day work to address this plan was, at times, a challenge for her.
Day One
Table 4 provides an outline of composite day 1 for Diane. It shows that she split her time
fairly equally between working on classroom instructional and school-related tasks. What
follows is a narrative account of these episodes, providing a detailed picture of how Diane
experienced the coaching process at Jefferson Middle School.
Table 4 Diane Composite Day One
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
Office work
7:00
50
School
Hall walk
7:50
10
Instructional
Coaching Stephanie
8:00
60
Instructional
Video review
9:00
60
Instructional
Resource searching
10:00
60
Instructional
Lunchtime librarian and office work 11:00
90
School
Debrief with Stephanie
12:30
20
Instructional
Resource searching
12:50
30
Instructional
Meeting preparation
1:20
60
School
Instructional council
2:20
60
School
Office work and hall walk
Diane began her morning very early, with quiet time in her office for gathering materials,
answering email, and finishing work from the day before. Before the first bell, she walked the
halls making contact with teachers, fielding questions and taking requests. Teachers might ask
Diane to find reading materials for them, or to schedule an appointment to talk about a particular
reading strategy. Today she was approached by a seventh-grade language arts teacher who asked
Diane to locate some student practice booklets for the state reading test, which was scheduled to
be administered in about six weeks. Diane acknowledged that several teachers, over the last
couple of months, had requested test-preparation materials from her; she told the teacher she
would find some booklets and deliver them to the teacher’s mailbox.
Although Diane did not mind doing tasks such as locating test materials, her primary goal
was to work with teachers on literacy strategies and small group instruction. To make an impact,
Diane hoped to focus on a smaller number of teachers on a regular basis rather than all or most of
the 41 classroom teachers in the school. Commenting on this and her plan as Jefferson Middle
School’s literacy coach, Diane said,
It turns out there isn’t one way at all that works, so I’m constantly in this mode of
monitoring, changing, and adjusting, cajoling, pushing, and prompting people to do more
when things aren’t working rather than giving up or falling back to some previous thing
that makes the teacher more comfortable, which is a retreat, usually, from instruction.
That’s what I do and it’s based on these goals. I’m really glad we have them because
there’s just so much work to do and it’s also the purpose we decided was to work with a
smaller group and not everybody in the whole school, so that I’m not dealing with putting
out fires everywhere although I tend to get sucked in when people say, “Can you help me
with this? Can you help me with that?” I tend to do that, but the real goal is to work with
specific people.
Coaching Stephanie
Diane tried to work on a regular basis with Stephanie, a sixth-grade language arts and
social studies teacher. Stephanie tended to teach using a lecture or whole-group approach, but
had expressed interest in trying out some new instructional strategies with her students, many of
whom she considered to be struggling in class. Diane and Stephanie had decided some weeks
before to implement reciprocal teaching in Stephanie’s class of twenty-six first block students and
to capture the process on film to present at a national conference later in the school year. Their
goal was not to produce a video showing the finished results of reciprocal teaching—that is, of
small groups of students expertly discussing texts using the four reciprocal teaching strategies of
summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting. Rather, their goal was to capture the
process, the effort, of initiating reciprocal teaching with a group of struggling readers. While
presenting at a national conference was exciting, Diane’s underlying purpose was to set up
Stephanie as a catalyst for encouraging others to engage in the reciprocal teaching process.
As the bell rang and first period began, Diane entered Stephanie’s classroom and began
setting up her video equipment. While she tested sound and lighting, Stephanie began her
introduction of today’s reciprocal teaching strategy:
Stephanie:
“What is predicting?”
Student 1:
“It’s when you guess the answer before you get the answer.”
Student 2:
“When you think about what’s happening, then estimate what will happen.”
Stephanie:
“What helps you predict?”
Student 3:
“The cover and the back of the book.”
Stephanie:
“So it’s not just a wild guess.”
Student 2:
“You know a few of the details and some information, then you can predict.”
Stephanie put a copy of a text, “Chinese Cultural Studies: A Holocaust of Little Girls” up
on the overhead projector and worked through a think-aloud about what she predicted would
happen after the first paragraph. Stephanie was trying to demonstrate to her students how she
herself might use prediction to help understand the text.
Wanting to be sure that students understood why they were learning the strategy, Diane emerged
from behind the video camera to address the class:
“Stephanie is spending quite a bit of time on prediction. Why? How will that
Diane:
help you?”
Student 9:
“It helps you understand the story.”
Diane:
“How? Do you remember reading before you knew prediction?”
Student 3:
“Yes.”
Diane:
“Was it different? How was that?”
Student 3:
“It was about the same.”
Diane:
“Lots of people do research on this stuff. They have found that prediction helps
build connections in your brain. It’s pretty complicated. When Stephanie made
her prediction she knew something about the word Holocaust because this isn’t
about Jews, it’s about little girls who aren’t Jewish. It causes you to have to
think and to build connections.”
Stephanie pointed out that this was important, and instructed her students to review the
article, read each section, and make a prediction. Diane added, “Think about what you know;
make a connection to what you think the author is going to write about.” Students worked in
pairs, reading through the article, writing predictions and later verifying them against what was
actually in the text. Diane circulated with the video camera while Stephanie helped pairs with
their work. Students seemed worried about verifying their predictions—about finding out they
were “wrong.”
Twenty minutes later most students had transitioned to silent reading. When the end of
class was approaching, Stephanie called attention to the front of the room for a few closing
comments. “We’re going to do this again,” she said. “Neither Diane nor I are sure you got it
right. It’s practice so you get credit for trying it. A real prediction is detailed. Some of you are
worried about getting it wrong.”
To this Diane added, “It’s kind of a risky business. There’s no problem if your prediction is off—
as long as you’re thinking.”
When the bell rang, Diane packed up her camera and tripod and headed back to her
office. On the way there I asked her what would be next with Stephanie, Reciprocal Teaching,
and prediction. Diane answered, “The next piece is to work with her on how to teach it.” Diane
shared that she had been hoping Stephanie would utilize more small-group work and student
interaction when introducing reciprocal teaching strategies. What she had observed instead was
basic whole-group modeling without details, followed up by independent student work.
Instructional steps between these two, ones that would have included guided practice with teacher
support and peer support through group interaction, were left out of the lesson. Diane saw
working on instruction as the next step in her coaching work with Stephanie, and she was
planning to discuss these points with her after lunch during Stephanie’s prep period. Diane noted,
“Every step of the way needs to be very cognitive.”
Video review and resource searching
Diane spent the next class period in her office, working with her video equipment and
viewing the footage she had taken in Stephanie’s class. On one level, she viewed the recording
from the perspective of a director, commenting on lighting, sound, and different angles and shots
she had tried to capture. She brought her knowledge of video production to this task. On another
level, she viewed the recording from the perspective of literacy coach, developed through years of
studying reading research and teaching methods. She noted the tone Stephanie used with
students, which sometimes sounded sarcastic to her; she commented that Stephanie might have
talked too much in the lesson and may have asked too many rote questions. Diane decided to
make a videotape of the lesson and let Stephanie see it on her own time, probably at home. Diane
thought it might be a catalyst for discussing instructional strategies with her.
Once Diane had viewed her recording and decided what to do next for her videoproduction project with Stephanie, she focused on looking online and through reciprocal teaching
binders for resources to help Stephanie work with predicting, the strategy introduced today, and
with other strategies soon to be introduced. Diane had mixed feelings about using her time to
find materials instead of working in classrooms. She pointed out that there was no set language
arts curriculum in the Stevens school district—only a list of standards for each content area.
Elementary schools could choose between four published reading programs, but at the middle
school level Diane thought the funds for a middle school reading program weren’t available, due
to district budget shortfalls, before materials had been purchased. While she would have liked
teachers to find their own materials, she acknowledged the need for assistance in the apparent
absence of current resources, so she did what she could.
Lunchtime librarian and office work
Diane’s lunch break had evolved into a sort of open house for students seeking interesting
books to read. Over time, Diane had purchased hundreds of high interest books, often with her
own money. Some teachers at the school had started sending students to her to find books to read
during silent reading time; apparently, the word had gotten out, and now many students came to
Diane’s office during lunch to borrow books. There weren’t too many options for students during
lunch: They could play basketball, run around outside, or, according to Diane, sit in the library
and scream. Diane commented,
I am out here and I have a lot of kids who come in at lunch time that read or talk to me
about reading which has been great. I have books that are kind of more edgy than the
ones in the library. I try to make it my business to have some interesting stuff out here,
so a lot of the kids who are struggling, in fact it’s quite a few of the special education
kids, who come out here at lunch time and chat or want food. I try to get them to pick
something new to read.
Diane thought many of the students who came to visit were struggling readers, or at least
reluctant ones; her self-assigned task was to talk with these students and match them to books
they would not only read but enjoy as well. On this day, two of the students who came to visit
were familiar to Diane. They were eighth-grade special education students, first sent by their
language arts teacher, Heather, some months before, students who now visited regularly and
appeared to be avid readers of adolescent literature and Japanese anime graphic novels. Today,
one of these boys asked Diane about a new release in a series of graphic novels. Diane said she
hadn’t bought it yet, but would pick it up later in the week so that he could borrow it. The other
boy wasn’t sure what kind of book to choose, so Diane offered a few suggestions. He decided to
go with a collection of gross-humor tales and jokes.
A few minutes after the two boys left, an African American boy walked in the door and
declared that he was already reading Harry Potter and didn’t know why he was here. Apparently,
his teacher had recommended he see Diane about interesting books, so here he was, during his
lunch time—here by choice yet seemingly uncooperative. Undeterred, Diane began talking with
him about books, and it soon became clear that he was a reluctant reader who strongly disliked
reading at school. She had a knack for getting teenagers to talk to her. Guessing that his current
selection was chosen for show and not interest, Diane suggested a few racier, teen-oriented titles
written at a level of difficulty appropriate for struggling readers. He shrugged off Diane’s
cautionary note and agreed to try a novel that Diane said might contain swear words or references
to drugs. He said he was sure he could handle it. As he left, Diane said, “Read it during silent
reading time, just to make your teacher happy.”
Diane noted that she had hooked up a number of kids with books; kids who weren’t
reading or who told their teachers they hated to read. Although this evolving role as a sort of
lunchtime librarian initially surprised Diane, she decided that it was enjoyable and a good way to
motivate students to read. Besides, she was sure they weren’t finding interesting books in the
school library. According to Diane, the librarian was known more for yelling at kids about hall
passes and computer use than for selecting books adolescents might find interesting. She was
getting to know these students just by spending a few minutes with them, and felt that by offering
them high-interest books, and an alternative space for hanging out, she was addressing the
literacy needs and interests of a group of students not otherwise served at school. Diane was
excited about this, and didn’t mind when students came in to browse the bookshelves while she
took her lunch break, looked through her email inbox, or read books and resource materials while
sitting at her desk. She also wasn’t terribly concerned when some of her books failed to make it
back to the shelf. At least these kids were reading.
Debrief with Stephanie
During fifth period, after lunch, Diane went back to Stephanie’s room to have a
debriefing session on the predicting lesson. Diane began the conversation with a compliment,
moving quickly to the topic of instruction:
Diane:
“I saw you do a wonderful job modeling, and then they went to work. I was
thinking there might be a step in between. Maybe partners.”
Stephanie:
“Great idea.”
Diane:
“Do we need something different?”
Stephanie:
“Yes.”
Diane:
“It would be good if it was something you would have them read anyway. Pairs
would also be more motivated.”
Stephanie:
“Working together is a purpose. Predicting with details to really be thinking and
processing—it’s difficult.”
Diane:
“Talk about using clues. Clues and evidence.”
Stephanie:
“What if I had them highlight what they think might be clues in the passage?”
Diane:
“Also, some groups could report back and that would keep you from getting
stuck scoring all of these papers. They would do the activity with a buddy and
then stop and see what you found out.”
Although this conversation lasted less than half an hour, Diane managed to ask Stephanie
a number of questions, and in a subtle manner, to address what she considered to be important
instructional issues. Diane liked to use the power of suggestion when coaching individual
teachers. She wanted Stephanie to think pedagogically about steps between teacher modeling and
independent practice, and to consider ways students might work with lesson material in a way
more supported by the teacher. Diane concluded this part of their talk by offering to find a
passage to use the next day for guided practice. Stephanie thanked her for the support, admitting
she felt tired today.
For the last few minutes of their conversation, Stephanie talked about her second-block
language arts class. She expressed extreme frustration with this group. Apparently a small
cluster of students behaved badly, and one in particular seemed a catalyst for all sorts of
disruption. Stephanie mentioned she had enlisted the help of the physical education teacher and a
parent volunteer to attend the class and help maintain order. Despite this adult presence,
Stephanie considered the group to be out of control and worried that most students would fail the
class. Diane suggested coming in to observe the situation to help Stephanie come up with an
action plan, both for class management and for helping this group of students focus on working to
understand what they read. Stephanie agreed as she began getting ready for her next class.
On the way back to her office, Diane told me that although Stephanie’s first- and secondblock classes were the same in theory, in practice Stephanie’s approach with them was quite
different. She was introducing reciprocal teaching strategies to the first class and having students
work in small groups, while the second class continued to receive whole-group instruction in a
lecture format. Stephanie did most of the work for these students, reading the social studies text
aloud while students followed along, and telling them what to write in their notes. She did not
have them work in small groups, and was not teaching them how to use reciprocal teaching
strategies to improve their reading comprehension. Diane seemed somewhat disturbed by this
apparent lack of transfer of Stephanie’s learning. She and Stephanie were working diligently to
implement new strategies to help the first-block students learn, but the second-block students
were not benefiting from these efforts.
Resource searching and meeting preparation
Diane spent the rest of the school day in her office. She started with the task of searching
both online and through resource binders for short articles for Stephanie to use when working
with her first-block students on the predicting strategy. She found a text that would work, but
that she might have to retype so that Stephanie’s students wouldn’t struggle with its small font
size and strange formatting. Diane said she would use the text to help Stephanie incorporate
guided practice and small-group work into a lesson, and that she would be in class to help or even
to teach it herself if Stephanie wanted to observe.
Once Diane had located the text for Stephanie’s class, she answered a few emails from
teachers requesting materials and then began to prepare for an instructional council meeting she
would need to attend after school. Today’s topic was how to prepare for the seventh-grade state
reading test, and Diane admitted she was a bit anxious about the meeting, since she knew this
topic was worrying teachers as they braced themselves for the upcoming test they would begin
administering in the next six weeks. Diane was to attend this meeting not as literacy coach but as
seventh-grade representative, since none of the seventh-grade teachers wanted to do it. Diane had
agreed to represent them on the council, even though she hadn’t really worked with them as
literacy coach. But it was a way for her to voice her concerns at council meetings. Although she
considered this role to be temporary, nobody had volunteered to replace her. She gathered the
materials she had on Jefferson’s previous-year performance on the state reading test, and a few
minutes after classes were dismissed for the day, she made her way through the now-empty halls
to the closed-door session of Jefferson Middle School’s instructional council.
Day Two
Diane’s second composite day is outlined in Table 5. Unlike her first day, the second day
shows more time spent school-related than classroom instructional tasks. This day-to-day
variation was typical, as teacher availability and scheduling demands were factors in Diane’s
daily coaching experience. Overall, the tasks illustrated in days one and two combine to form a
ratio of classroom instructional and school-related roles that is true to the complete data set of
Diane’s observations.
Table 5 Diane Composite Day Two
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
Office work
7:00
60
School
Planning with Heather
8:00
150
Instructional
Office work
10:30
90
School
Principal meeting
12:00
60
School
Observing Beth
1:00
20
Instructional
Office work
1:20
60
School
Office work
Diane arrived at work at about seven o’clock. Sipping a cup of tea, she spent the next
hour or so considering how to make a tentative summer workshop as useful as possible for
teachers at her school. She had learned that the foundation funding her position had agreed to
fund a summer workshop for teachers from all three schools hosting a grant-funded coach.
Christina, who worked for the grant trustees as a coach facilitator, was beginning to organize for
the summer meeting and wanted input from coaches, who were expected to present some of the
sessions. Diane said that she was concerned about the fragmentation of ideas, that offering too
many optional breakout sessions might blur the professional development focus each of the
coaches had for his or her school. With this in mind, Diane decided she ought to build on her
reciprocal teaching work with Stephanie and present that at the summer institute. It would be a
way to continue encouraging teachers at Jefferson to use reciprocal teaching strategies in their
classrooms.
Planning with Heather
Right after the morning bell, Heather, a special education teacher, arrived to talk with
Diane about curriculum planning. Heather had arranged for another teacher to cover for her,
creating a two-hour block of time to talk with Diane and prepare for her classes later in the
morning. Although Heather had taught before, her previous experience was with students with
severe disabilities, so she found her current assignment, teaching language arts and social studies
to eighth grade special education students, somewhat overwhelming. Since the district had
content-area standards but no adopted language arts or social studies curricula, Heather felt she
was floundering through each day not knowing quite what she should be teaching. Her hope was
to work with Diane to come up with a basic structure for class time and an outline of what to
teach for the next four months. Their conversation began on a broad, conceptual level:
Heather:
“I would love to have some structure. I am stumped by strategies—when do I do
them?”
“You make a shift from focus on order to decide what to teach. Rely on
Diane:
something that’s there—your students. It’s about learning and development.
Stages overlap, moving in a direction you want to go. Think of it as a spiral
approach to lesson planning. There’s a relationship between content and
strategies for learning. Content is a good vehicle for this. If you establish a goal
for them, then the target is there.”
Diane was trying to provide a conceptual framework for Heather. She was pointing out
the connections between content and strategies, so that Heather might see they could be taught
together. Heather seemed to be struggling with these conceptual ideas. For almost an hour,
Heather and Diane talked through a number of ideas for teaching social studies concepts in a way
that would make them real to Heather’s group of special needs students. On several occasions,
Diane pulled resource books from her shelf and leafed through them, talking with Heather about
example concepts and activities she could teach using map skills and local geography. Heather
expressed uncertainty about teaching her students the locations and capitals of countries around
the world when she was pretty sure they didn’t know which way was north.
After some time, Heather switched topics to language arts. This conversation started at a
basic level:
Heather:
“So what exactly to teach?”
Diane:
“Language arts block and social studies block.”
Heather:
“I’ve been doing journals.”
Diane:
“That’s assigning, not teaching. You could teach a writing strategy. Prewriting,
making a list of topics or collecting words. Topics?”
Heather:
“What’s your favorite article of clothing?”
Diane:
“Let’s teach them nonfiction writing. How to tie a shoe. Shoot a basket. Read a
how-to book and analyze it out loud to demonstrate.”
Heather:
“Would this happen in one day?”
Diane:
“No, I think it would take a whole week. On the first day you would demonstrate
elements of how-to books. How to write directions. To know sequence. So
break down the elements of it. Introduce a flow map. Have the group work
together.”
Beyond deciding exactly what to teach, Heather expressed a desire to establish a
predictable weekly schedule for her language arts period, to make sure students had a clear sense
of structure and that she would have time to address necessary skills and strategies in literacy.
Diane talked with Heather about essential components of language arts time and, using pencil and
paper, sketched these into a weekly calendar. As when working with Stephanie, Diane was using
the power of suggestion to help coach Heather on curriculum planning. During their
conversation, Heather asked a number of seemingly tangential questions, but Diane kept their
conversation focused on the scheduling of different literacy activities throughout the week. When
their time working together had run out, Diane suggested that Heather come to her house for
dinner to continue the conversation. Heather liked this idea, and they agreed to meet the
following evening.
After Heather left, Diane put her resource books back on the shelf and reflected on the
planning session. She said she knew Heather was rather inexperienced, especially in regard to
language arts and social studies content, and that she had thrown lots of ideas at Heather in a
relatively short period of time. It seemed that while Heather was overwhelmed and was planning
and teaching on a day-to-day basis, she had lots of good questions and was approaching her
teaching situation in a very thoughtful way. Diane hoped Heather would think about their talk,
try out some ideas with her class, and come back to Diane with new questions.
Office work
Diane spent the next hour and a half sifting through email, writing a few messages to
teachers who had requested materials and to Grace about ideas for the summer workshop the
three grant-funded coaches were planning. During this time, she also ate her lunch and talked
with a handful of students who stopped by to look at books. At noon she headed up to her weekly
meeting with Linda, the principal of Jefferson Middle School.
Principal meeting
Linda was the principal of Jefferson, and she was not doing well. Her health had taken a
turn for the worse earlier in the year, causing her to miss several months of school. Additionally,
the staff had felt unsupported by her leadership, and had recently cast a vote of no confidence.
Linda had decided to retire at the end of this year, just a few months away, but in the meantime
was still in charge.
Most recently, Linda had been out of town for several days attending a conference, so
Diane had facilitated last Friday’s in-service meetings for teachers on her own. The in-service
meetings, scheduled on a district early-release day, had consisted of two sessions, one in the
morning and one in the afternoon, both for groups of teachers at Jefferson. The topic selected by
Linda, with input from Diane, had been interpreting state reading test scores from the previous
year and considering ways to prepare students for this year’s upcoming test. Diane did not like
being in charge of these meetings, and did not believe the day went very well, telling Linda:
There were two sessions, and the second one was hostile. The teachers tore into me. I
felt it is important to portray a positive attitude so students can do well on the state
reading test. Someone got an email message talking of a man trying to get rid of the state
reading test, and this was forwarded to all of the school staff. I did not feel this was
appropriate and pointed out we need positive action.
While Diane showed frustration over how the inservice had gone, Linda sat back in her
chair, providing occasional questions and comments. She pointed out that although some
teachers might keep thinking that the test would somehow go away, it wouldn’t, and that the
focus should be on ways to help students with the skills and strategies they need to be successful.
She also noted that data from last year’s state reading test suggested progress. Linda did not
appear to hear that there was trouble among teachers on this issue, and did not seem willing to
help Diane with it.
Diane observed that the first session was more positive, and she was excited that teachers
had shown some awareness of considering teaching literacy strategies and not just test
preparation. Linda’s reaction to this point was hard to decipher:
Diane:
“Teachers at the in-service said, ‘We have to start with this in September.’”
Linda:
“Duh.”
Diane:
“But they haven’t said that before. It’s not teaching the test, it’s teaching
concepts and thought processes.”
Linda:
“And it’s about teaching test strategies related to any kind of test.”
But Diane had not been talking about test scores. She had been pushing the conversation
toward integrating skills necessary for the state reading test into the larger curriculum, as good
instruction and not just as test-taking strategies. Linda did not appear to notice the difference.
Diane continued the conversation by detailing the process she worked through in the two
sessions: looking at test response items, considering expository writing, and analyzing rubrics and
scoring criteria. She said she had tried to emphasize incorporating learning targets from the test
into teachers’ lesson planning, but that there was resistance, especially from teachers in the
second session. Diane surmised there would be lots of work to do in the next school year to move
this topic forward with school staff. Linda didn’t comment on this.
With the meeting debriefed, Linda switched topics to matters of budget, teacher
assignments, and budget allocations. Stevens School District had recently announced a list of
possible school closures, so Linda talked about how such closures might affect Jefferson’s student
population. Diane made occasional comments, but talked less than in the first part of the
meeting. With the conversation shifting from instruction, from coaching, toward administrative
concerns like budgets and staffing, Diane had less input to offer. Linda seemed to be talking to
her as an assistant principal rather than as a coach. Diane reacted by staying quiet and listening.
When Linda began telling stories about the conference she had just been to, a conference focusing
on leadership and institutional change, Diane listened. At one o’clock Linda gave no sign of
finishing her stories about the conference, the destination, shopping, and dining. Diane had
wanted to visit some classrooms starting at one o’clock. She appeared anxious to leave, but she
didn’t interrupt Linda to end the meeting. During this time the vice principal stormed by Linda’s
office door with a student, saying to him in a loud voice, “You’re going home today.” This
interruption gave Diane the break she needed to thank Linda for her time and escape from the
office.
Observing Beth
After her meeting with Linda, Diane had planned to visit some seventh- and eighth-grade
language arts classes, just to check in and see what was going on with literacy instruction at those
levels. She had sent out an email message the day before, informing school staff that she would
be in classrooms taking a look around, so today she felt ready to visit and observe. Diane had
decided recently to spend more time in classrooms, although she thought she was short of the
50% mark she considered a goal and far below the 80% that had been mentioned as a target by
Christina, the facilitator of the grant-funded coaching program in the Stevens School District.
Without a school-wide curriculum to guide her or to provide a common language with teachers,
Diane wasn’t looking for anything in particular but hoped to observe teaching and learning
activities to better understand the kinds of professional development that might be useful and
appropriate for these teachers in the near future. Linda wanted her to look for purpose statements
written on whiteboards and vocabulary displayed on word walls, but Diane saw these as
administrative concerns and tried instead to focus on literacy instruction and activities. But she
knew she should tread lightly: “The tricky thing is that nobody else is visiting classrooms, so I
have to be careful to give positive feedback.” She went into classrooms as an observer, with little
power to encourage change.
In the first classroom, Beth had already begun her session of eighth-grade language arts.
She was at the front of the room, introducing a writing activity she wanted students to complete in
the next hour and a half. Some students were sitting at their desks, listening. Others were
talking, throwing pens or bits of paper, or walking around the room looking for something to do.
Diane headed to the back of the room, sat in an unoccupied seat, and began taking notes. Seeing
a girl near her sitting backwards in her seat and talking with another student, Diane turned to her
and asked what it was they were supposed to be doing. The girl handed a worksheet to Diane,
saying, “Here, you can keep it. I’m not going to do it. I don’t care.” She explained that she
thought writing was boring and that after about fifteen minutes of work they could just sit and
talk for the rest of the time. So why bother writing a pretend letter to a celebrity?
Meanwhile, Beth continued to talk about the worksheet activity, stepping a few feet down
each row so that students might hear her above the noise in the room. After a few minutes of this,
a girl sitting near the window shouted out, “Why are you like walking around and shit? You
never get up from your desk. It’s just cause these people are here you acting like you care.”
Beth did not respond, but instead went and sat down at her desk. The girl who shouted
was slouching in her chair with arms crossed. She snapped her gum loudly. The other girl, the
one sitting near Diane, turned to Diane and said, “I’m going to a suburban high school next year,
so I don’t care what happens at this school. They have higher standards there, so I’ll have to
work harder but I’ll learn more. This school is ghetto.”
Diane asked her what she thought she would do for the next hour of class. The girl thought for a
minute and then said, “Sit and talk.” Diane did not stay to find out.
Office work
Diane looked discouraged as she walked back to her office. She did not want to confront
Beth or even to talk to her about what she had seen. Diane knew Beth had taught for over thirty
years, and was aware that several teachers in her department had tried to work with Beth on
classroom management and literacy instruction. Beth had attended dozens of trainings and other
professional development opportunities, many of them literacy-related. Diane had tried to talk to
her, too, pointing out the year before that her students’ pre- and post-scores on the Gates
MacGinitie test appeared to have gone down over the course of the year. She had talked to Linda,
the principal, about the situation. But Diane thought nothing had happened, and her visit seemed
to confirm this. She sat at her desk for a few minutes, and then said, “The students are angry
because it’s so hard for them to learn and they get angrier when the teacher isn’t helping them.”
Diane considered Beth to be “uncoachable” and thought that Linda should be dealing with the
issue. Although Diane had worked with Beth a few times the year before, she wanted no part in
any intervention attempts this year. From her perspective as the sole literacy coach among a staff
of 41, Diane did not think Beth was worth the time and effort. Discouraged by what she had
seen, she decided to stay in her office for the rest of the afternoon. Thinking about her lunchtime
student visitors, Diane decided it would be nice to rearrange the furniture in her office to be more
conducive to hanging out, reading books, and visiting. She spent the next hour arranging
bookshelves and a conference table to create a student-friendly place to read and hang out. Diane
hoped this new space would encourage students to stay longer and maybe even to sit and talk
about books with other kids.
Coaching Issues and Perspectives
Diane had worked to focus her efforts this year on expanding her influence beyond the
sixth-grade team. During my observations and interviews, Diane identified and reflected upon
several issues she saw as challenges to her work as coach: scheduling, teacher attitudes, and
administrative support. These same issues surfaced when I interviewed the principal, Linda, and
teachers Heather and Stephanie, about the coaching process.
The first issue, scheduling, was at once straightforward and frustrating: Many reading
classes occurred simultaneously, clumped together in fifth and sixth periods. This made it
difficult for Diane to regularly observe instruction and confer with teachers either before or after
a lesson. As she noted, “It would be so much better if I had the time to meet with a teacher before
their lesson, to talk to them, do some planning and find out what their thoughts are about what
they’re doing, and then meet with them afterwards.”
There was no immediate solution to this problem. Diane tried to compensate for
scheduling conflicts by observing in the morning and meeting teachers during their planning
periods later in the day, but this was only possible for Stephanie and a few other language arts
teachers. Most of her visits ended up being nearly-random observations of various teachers
working on a variety of topics and strategies—with few opportunities for pre- or post-observation
talks with Diane. This somewhat jumbled schedule made her feel that she ended up spending too
little time in classrooms doing purposeful work.
The second issue Diane identified, teacher knowledge and attitudes, was more difficult to
define and explain. She had chosen reciprocal teaching as a tool for providing a common
language and structure for the literacy coaching process, but the idea did not catch on with many
teachers. Only two teachers in the school were using it, and one of them was experienced in
utilizing reciprocal teaching strategies and thus did not need Diane’s assistance. The only teacher
Diane was currently coaching on reciprocal teaching strategies was Stephanie—and then for only
one of her language arts classes. When Diane had visited Stephanie’s afternoon language arts and
social studies class, she was surprised to see whole-group instruction, with virtually no student
participation and not one trace of reciprocal teaching strategies or small group work. Stephanie
read the textbook selection to her students, answering her own questions while students copied
notes from the overhead projector.
This startling contrast between how Stephanie was conducting her two language arts
classes raises questions about teacher knowledge. How much of the new reciprocal teaching
knowledge was Stephanie assimilating? How deep was her developing knowledge of these new
strategies? Diane was assisting Stephanie with implementing reciprocal teaching in her morning
language arts class, but not in the afternoon. There was no apparent transfer of strategies from
one class setting to the other, suggesting Stephanie was still developing a basic understanding of
the new strategies.
With only two of 41 teachers using Reciprocal teaching, Diane did not have a common
language or shared set of tools to use as a means of engaging in the coaching process. She could
announce her intentions, via email, to observe, but once in classrooms she seemed to function
more as visitor than coach. But even in the benign role of visitor, not every teacher was glad to
see her. Some teachers, Diane felt, were leery of the literacy coach and what she might have to
say. “Some people see me coming and they are reminded of what they maybe should be doing,
while others hide when they see me. Maybe they don’t really hide but they certainly move the
subject to the weather so that they don’t have to discuss something.”
The teachers who hid from Diane did not engage in the coaching process with her. Diane
did not strive to make contact with them either, and since the reciprocal teaching idea had not
gained in popularity over the course of the school year, she had no common language to use with
these reluctant teachers. When she did gain access to some reluctant teachers’ classrooms, she
did so as a visitor, and her observations did not lead to coaching and the development of new
knowledge. In this respect, Diane’s impact on teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes
seemed limited. She related to teachers to a certain degree in their out-of-classroom places, but as
an observer did not have much influence inside teachers’ in-classroom places on the landscape,
which was where coaching might have had more promise than more traditional forms of
professional development. Without reciprocal teaching strategies to discuss, or without some
other point of focus or topic to examine, Diane appeared to occupy a space with little influence or
importance on the professional knowledge landscapes of teachers reluctant to be part of the
coaching process.
Diane’s experiences with Stephanie provide a contrast to those with the reluctant
teachers. Stephanie was one of the teachers who welcomed Diane into her room to plan, observe,
and even co-teach. She enjoyed working with Diane on implementing reciprocal teaching
strategies, which gave the two of them something to talk about when they met during Stephanie’s
planning time. Stephanie identified two tasks Diane had really helped with this year:
implementing strategies and locating instructional materials. When I talked with her about her
experiences working with Diane, she explained,
It’s just too hard to implement everything without having a clue, without having
materials. You have to create all of these materials, create and or find them. That’s the
same thing as far as I’m concerned. Without any kind of feedback, because other
teachers can’t come in here because they’re all working too.
Stephanie saw Diane as a valuable resource, a person she could trust to help her
implement new instructional strategies and to locate curriculum resources she would need to
effectively teach those strategies, especially in a district without an adopted language arts or
social studies curriculum. She was clearly not used to this level of support, admitting at times
that she forgot to ask Diane for assistance, assuming instead that no help would be available. But
she saw the value of the coaching process, considering it a helpful bridge between workshops and
other off-site professional development opportunities and actual teaching in the classroom. When
I asked what she thought made the coaching process work for her, she said, “Flexibility, access to
resources, that they have a real base of knowledge. And that, I would say too, if there’s
something they’re not knowledgeable about, they will go out and find out something. So in other
words, it’s honesty and integrity, basic general things you’d want.”
Other teachers requested Diane’s help in planning lessons and locating materials, without
actually participating in teacher observations or demonstration lessons. Diane saw value in this
role, even though it didn’t involve time in classrooms, because she knew that time she spent
searching for materials helped create more time teachers could spend working with students. In
these situations, Diane could use the power of suggestion to prod the teacher’s thinking and could
also utilize her considerable knowledge of literacy curriculum and instruction.
Heather was one teacher who had asked Diane for advice on developing curriculum plans
and locating materials. When I talked with Heather about her experience working with Diane,
she focused primarily on Diane as a resource person:
Periodically she has been really helpful in choosing—I am a special ed. teacher and work
with kids with learning disabilities and a lot of them are at like fourth- or fifth-grade level
though they’re eighth graders. She has a real variety of books in her space. She has
really suggested books and I just ordered a bunch of books for school next year, for
young adult reading.
Although Heather focused on resources, it was clear from their planning sessions that
Diane had done much more than find materials for Heather. She had worked with her on
planning, identifying key concepts in language arts and social studies, and thinking through ways
to efficiently organize class periods. Nevertheless, Heather focused on the materials-finding
assistance she had received. She was so busy working from day to day, putting lessons together
the night before, that the next day’s plans and the materials needed to implement them were
foremost in her mind. Heather seemed almost too overwhelmed with the daily tasks of teaching
to benefit deeply from the coaching process.
Heather’s focus on daily teaching survival was reflected in the sense of anxiety she
expressed over the coaching process. Since Heather was a special education teacher, she had
been prevented from fully utilizing Diane’s services the year before, when the specific target for
literacy coaching at Jefferson was the sixth-grade language arts team. Heather had found this
denial of services to be traumatizing:
At one point I was crying in her office and I was mad at her because I was like, “How can
you, there’s somebody who wants to be on it where there are other people on it because
they get paid, there’s somebody hungry for it and you say no, no, no.” I was mad at her
for about half of the year; I didn’t like her for half of the year.
This year, with Diane’s expanded focus beyond sixth grade, Heather had found her to be
more accessible. As a result, she had met with Diane several times to plan lessons and map out
big ideas in language arts and social studies. Still, while acknowledging Diane’s usefulness as a
resource, Heather seemed to find it difficult to engage in the coaching process. She was aware
that she could probably use more planning assistance, occasional observations, and even some
demonstration lessons. She admitted knowing that she skipped from topic to topic, planning and
teaching one day at a time rather than building on a concept or idea to improve her teaching and
her students’ learning. Reflecting on this, she commented:
I just, but the problem is I do everything once and then I’m done. I don’t know how to
build on things, to do the scaffolding. We’ve talked a little bit, but when we talk there’s a
part that’s my resistance because I’m so freaked out. And also when are we talking, after
school when my brain’s dead?
Heather saw Diane as a valuable resource, but felt she had trouble utilizing Diane’s
talents because she was busy surviving one day at a time. She was not used to the kinds of
support Diane had to offer, and didn’t always know what questions to ask. As she was talking
about the coaching process, Heather recalled an interaction she had had the year before with a
math coach. Heather compared her experiences with the math coach to those with Diane:
I remember working with a math coach, and I don’t understand math at all, I was asking
for the same thing, but it didn’t work, it was beyond my comprehension. It was
embarrassing. I couldn’t understand like third grade math so it was hard, and the coaches
are always so rushed, that’s the thing, everybody’s so over extended. The time you get is
not very much. But I don’t feel that way with Diane. I was too needy for the math
coach.
Heather’s comparison suggests a balance in the coaching process: On one side is the
teacher’s need for assistance, but on the other side is the teacher’s existing knowledge, which
must be sufficient for knowing assistance is needed and understanding help when it is delivered.
While Heather felt she managed this balance with Diane, knowing more about literacy than math,
she still considered herself “freaked out” and overwhelmed by the demands of teaching language
arts and social studies to students who were reading at a fourth-grade level and literally did not
know east from west.
Diane found that while some teachers, like Heather, were willing to ask for assistance,
other teachers did not seek her help and did not seem to want her to visit their classrooms, either.
Diane seemed to have trouble reaching out to these teachers. Her strengths were in literacy
knowledge, the power of suggestion, and her ability to talk to teenagers about reading. She did
not want to be an assertive leader or some sort of proxy administrator, so she did not push her
way into classrooms to coach teachers. As a result, most of the school’s teachers did not work
with Diane on an individual basis. She even acknowledged that visiting classrooms as an
observer was tricky, as she saw herself as the only person in the school performing
observations—so she felt she had to keep things positive. These observations did not seem to
lead to coaching opportunities. While Diane had met with Heather, on occasion, to plan
curriculum, and with other teachers from time to time, Stephanie was the only teacher in the
school Diane interacted with on a regular basis over the course of the year. She had hoped
reciprocal teaching might open doors to the coaching process, but this did not happen. Teachers
had not come to her requesting reciprocal teaching assistance, and Diane had not knocked on
doors asking teachers to use it.
The third issue Diane identified was what she considered to be a lack of administrative
support of the coaching process at Jefferson Middle School. She confessed:
Sometimes I am operating like the lone wolf here. There is a lot of lip service, “I really
appreciate what you’re doing.” That’s not a problem, but the actual ability to make
people change or do something different, to have an administrator aware of what I am
doing, aware enough that they could come and actually observe somebody in the
classroom doing something and giving feedback, that’s not happening.
Diane sensed a leadership vacuum in the school, something that greatly affected her job
as literacy coach. With both the principal, Linda, and one of the vice principals leaving at the end
of the year, the sense of leadership decay had become much stronger in recent months. Diane
could visit, observe, talk with students, and maybe even meet with teachers, but she could not
create reasons for change. She did not assertively push teachers toward new knowledge and
instructional change. Her tendency was to coach the willing, and to make suggestions. The
power to promote change belonged to Linda, and she, according to Diane, stayed in her office
most of the time. Diane could observe teachers like Beth, but she did not want to confront them,
and it was up to Linda to evaluate their teaching and assign a course of action to change their
practice and to improve student learning. Diane felt unsupported in her position and frustrated by
her apparent lack of agency within the school structure. She chose, in this environment, to work
with teachers who requested her assistance and to serve as a library resource to otherwise
disenchanted students. Diane felt she was struggling to move the coaching process forward.
Linda seemed to have a different view of coaching at Jefferson Middle School. She said
she saw Diane as the keeper of the literacy focus, someone who observed in classrooms and
helped struggling teachers develop rigorous and complex literacy instruction. This idealistic view
of Diane’s job as coach did not work well in practice. Diane did not coach struggling teachers on
a regular basis, partly because there was no common language to utilize in the coaching process
(since reciprocal teaching had not achieved widespread use), but also because Diane did not
assert herself as coach to Jefferson’s struggling teachers.
Further, had Diane asserted herself and worked on coaching struggling teachers, any
action plan she might have had would not have matched Linda’s expectations for Diane’s
classroom visits. Linda’s expectations for Diane’s observations were that she would visit
classrooms for the specific purpose of reminding teachers to write purpose statements for daily
lessons on their whiteboards and of displaying and updating word walls for building students’
vocabulary knowledge. Her perception of Diane’s task as coach/observer suggested she did not
have a deep grasp of literacy coaching issues. Word walls and purpose statements alone may not
necessarily affect change or reflect changes made to teacher learning or classroom instruction.
Diane did not visit classrooms to monitor teacher use of purpose statements and word walls.
Linda did not often visit classrooms. When she recently conducted a walk-through, after a long
hiatus, Linda acknowledged seeing few purpose statements and encountering word walls that had
not been updated in months. She commented,
When I met with Diane yesterday, one of the things I told her is in the walk-arounds that
I’ve been doing this week, I was very disappointed because I have not seen very many
purpose statements. I had hoped that it was to the point that it was organic and it was
there, being done everyday. I’ve seen some word walls that look like they haven’t even
been looked at or dusted for some time. We were talking about that, and we need to
focus back on the literacy.
Linda did not explicitly blame Diane for the missing purpose statements and out-of-date
word walls, although as keeper of the literacy vision these were, according to her, Diane’s
responsibility to monitor. But she also did not indicate how Diane would move past observing
and then requiring teachers to post these things. Linda’s expectations of Diane put her in more of
an observing and monitoring role than a coaching and assisting one, but even in this limited
capacity Diane did not receive much support from the school administration. At the same time,
Diane did not assert herself in the role of coach, either to reluctant teachers or to Linda. As a
result, very little one-to-one coaching occurred at Jefferson Middle School.
On a school-wide professional development level, Linda acknowledged, in a general way,
some preliminary work Diane had done explaining reciprocal teaching strategies to teachers and
preparing them for the upcoming state reading test. Although a broader use of reciprocal teaching
strategies did not occur, Linda considered the state reading test work valuable, as it helped
teachers examine prompts and expectations and consider ways to prepare students for the test.
But her understanding of Diane’s work as coach did not seem to extend beyond this point. She
saw test preparation as a valuable exercise; Diane saw it as a stopgap measure that should be
quickly replaced by year-round instruction of meaningful literacy strategies. Linda did not
demonstrate understanding of the teacher knowledge and classroom practice elements of the
coaching process.
Linda did express concern for Diane, although not over what Diane saw as a lack of
administrative support. Rather, she said she knew Diane felt isolated from other coaches in the
district and shunned, to a degree, by teachers at Jefferson Middle School. When talking about
Diane’s sense of isolation, Linda told the story of a math coach who had previously worked at
Jefferson Middle School. He, unlike Diane, had been funded by the district and was expected to
travel to a number of middle schools, working with individual teachers as his schedule allowed.
According to Linda, this coach had a bossy coaching style, barging into classrooms and taking
over in the middle of a lesson—even challenging the teacher in front of students. Teachers
responded, Linda recalled, by locking their doors on the days the math coach visited Jefferson.
At the end of that school year, Linda told district officials, “Thanks for the coach but we don’t
want him back.” The next year, district officials did not send one. On almost any given day,
Diane was the only coach in the school.
In a conversational interview I conducted with Diane in her office one afternoon, she
mentioned her feelings of isolation and the apparent disconnect between Jefferson Middle School
and the school district administration, suggesting that Linda was a factor in its development:
“This school has an antagonistic relationship with downtown, as Linda sometimes thinks they are
out to get her.” School principals, from Diane’s perspective, were supposed to be instructional
liaisons between district and school, but this liaison role did not always develop, depending on
the principal. Tension between Linda and district officials hindered the development of this role,
and Diane felt increased isolation as a result.
Despite this concern and their conceptual differences over literacy coaching roles and
responsibilities, Linda praised Diane and her work, calling her an excellent coach who was
respected by school staff. Linda said she had done an incredible job and had really made a
difference in the academic achievement of students. Coaching, Linda asserted, was an important
factor in the growth Jefferson Middle School had made.
In contrast, Diane did not talk about having done an incredible job coaching teachers or
having earned their respect. She talked instead about what she considered to be a sharp decline in
school climate, fueled in part by the administrative vacuum she saw surrounding Linda. Lately,
Diane said she felt almost paralyzed by teacher negativity and low expectations of students,
issues she had not considered quite so bad a year or two before. Linda’s prolonged illness had
forced her to be absent for an extended period, and this factor seemed to have a dramatic effect on
the school climate. She would be retiring in June. In the meantime, Diane heard teachers in
meetings talking negatively about students. She recounted announcements over the PA system
denouncing cell-phone use and scolding students for their possession, threatening suspension if
any cell phones were discovered. Diane spoke up when she thought she could, to point out the
positive at staff and instructional council meetings, but she felt she lacked the authority to get
people to really listen to her. She chose instead to work with teachers who requested her
assistance, provide books to otherwise disinterested students, and stay in her office locating
materials for teachers to use in their classes. These tasks ultimately reduced the time and effort
Diane put into mentoring teachers.
Overall, Diane’s experience as Jefferson Middle School’s literacy coach had its high and
low points. Her reciprocal teaching work with Stephanie seemed to have both purpose and
momentum; planning with Heather, while time-consuming, came across as a positive experience.
And students practically broke down the door to Diane’s office to borrow books—surprising
behavior for “struggling readers” on their lunch break. Diane used her knowledge of literacy and
talent of working with teens to make these parts of her job successful. But her impact beyond a
handful of teachers seemed limited, with few opportunities except to observe. Diane didn’t
consider her principal, Linda, to be able or willing to use her administrative authority to enact
change. At the same time, Diane chose not to confront teachers or to assertively position herself
to encourage reluctant teachers to work with her. When asked about how she felt about her job as
a coach, Diane replied, “Sometimes I feel it’s the best job in the world. I really enjoy it. And
then there are the times I really wish I was doing something else.”
Chapter 5
Composite Narrative: Grace
Grace’s office, located near the main office of Adams Middle School, was full of books,
piles of paper, and boxes of assessment and teaching materials. A number of professional
development binders sat prominently on a shelf, a sign of what had turned out to be several years’
worth of training and experience working in the Stevens School District curriculum department.
Before coming to Adams to work as a literacy coach, Grace had spent a number of years in the
district’s curriculum department. Her area of expertise was writing instruction. At that time, she
teamed with other content-area curriculum specialists, and with the assistance of a representative
of the professional development department, went out to schools to help design interventions and
provide teachers with support for improving student performance. Before working in the
curriculum department, Grace had spent a number of years teaching at the elementary level.
Grace told me she had been happy working in the district office, but that she decided to
move to a school-level position to get closer to students and remove herself from the political
battles she felt were being waged by merging curriculum and professional development
departments. She had been looking for a way out of what she considered to be a negative
environment, so when the grant-funded coaching job at Adams became available, she took the
chance. But all was not easy. During her first year working as a grant-funded literacy coach, the
year before this study, she, like Diane, was instructed to work with sixth-grade language arts
teachers only. While the intent of this focus was to concentrate the coach’s work in one place
and expand over several years (to other grades and subjects), an unintended consequence of this
focus was animosity toward Grace by teachers who felt left out. She knew that some teachers
questioned the use of funding to hire a person who didn’t teach classes and didn’t work with all of
the staff members, and she felt that the value of her work was unrecognized and
underappreciated. Grace said that she thought the sixth-grade team had made progress, but that at
the end of the year two teachers on the team had left, so this year some time had been spent
getting new members on board.
In the year of this study, year two for Grace at Adams, she and her principal, Judith, had
decided that Grace would work individually with four teachers while also organizing and
facilitating small group meetings and professional development workshops. They felt this was
the best way to build teaching capacity and to facilitate change in classroom practice—by
working intensely with four of the school’s 43 teachers and by working with groups of teachers in
a more general way. Two of the four teachers worked with Grace voluntarily. The other two
were assigned by Judith.
Table 6 Grace Composite Day One
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
Office work
7:30
60
School
Planning with Amanda
8:30
30
Instructional
Principal meeting
9:00
60
School
Summer planning
10:00
120
School
Office work
12:00
60
School
Coaching Amanda
1:00
80
Instructional
Record-keeping argument
2:20
10
School
Science rubric work
2:30
60
Instructional
Day One
Grace spent more time on school-related than classroom instructional tasks. Table 6
outlines the first composite day for Grace, and it reflects the pattern from the complete data set
indicating she spent a great deal of time on tasks not clearly linked to day-to-day teaching. She
did try to work with one targeted teacher each day; this goal is reflected in the composite for day
one.
Office work
Grace started her day about an hour before the first bell, reading through email from
teachers at her school and from district-level personnel, looking through books on reading
instruction and approaches to writing, and organizing piles of papers from reading assessments
and professional development meetings she had recently conducted with groups of teachers.
Today, she was looking through some test preparation materials she had copied for teachers to
use with students to get them geared up for the state reading test, to be administered in about two
months. She had hoped to distribute practice booklets at an optional staff development meeting
the week before, but few teachers had attended, so now she was counting booklets and deciding
how to get them to teachers who needed them. Just as she was doing this, Marybeth, a sixthgrade language arts and social studies teacher, stopped by to pick up a set of booklets. They
talked briefly, and then Marybeth left quickly for class—just as Judith came into Grace’s office.
It was clear from this first morning that the location of Grace’s office—at the center of the Adams
Middle School campus—had an impact on how Grace spent her time, and in this case, how often
she was interrupted by brief visits.
Judith threw herself into a chair and talked excitedly about an upcoming conference on
school-wide data interpretation. She outlined the conference, the dates involved, and talked with
Grace about which teachers to bring along. A bit later, Judith bolted off, and just as Grace was
settling back into her organizing task, Stephen, the vice principal, came in, asking, “Grace, what
size of t-shirt do you wear?” She answered, he wrote her response on a pad, and then he left, not
saying why he asked. Grace sighed and went back to organizing preparation booklets for the
state reading test, trying to get everything in order before Amanda arrived for her planning
meeting.
Planning with Amanda
Grace liked the individualized component of her job and had a positive attitude toward
her work with Amanda, one of the two teachers who had been assigned by Judith to work with
her. She observed, “A one size fits all approach does not work for everybody. It’s better this
year. I don’t want it to be a waste of my time.”
Amanda, in her second year teaching seventh-grade language arts and social studies, had
been meeting with Grace throughout the school year to work on a few goals they had identified
together: teaching writing, planning writing units, and developing instructional techniques and
approaches. This morning, Amanda came to Grace’s office during her prep period to work with
her on a plan for a coaching and observation session later in the day. She rushed in, fifteen
minutes late, sat while catching her breath, and began telling Grace about her recent attempt to
teach introductory paragraphs to her students. She had tried having students consider an
exemplar introductory paragraph to identify required elements and then to use this information to
look at their own papers. Amanda found her students reluctant to critique their own work. Grace
listened, and then said,
I commend you for using your students’ work in this. I would try bringing in the three
ideas during the prewriting and develop a topic sentence. After drafting the content, go
back to the intro and come up with an opening to fill out the introductory paragraph.
Also bring in professional examples.
While her comment was directive, it was also quite broad in scope, focusing on the
overall project and not necessarily on what should be taught in today’s lesson. Amanda looked
confused. Grace’s advice was conceptual, not practical, and it did not help Amanda decide what
she should teach this afternoon. Amanda had been talking about ways to encourage students to
critique their own work, but what she had gotten from Grace was a disjointed list of writing
issues. There was no clear connection between the ideas of topic sentence, opening, content, and
professional examples. After a pause, the conversation continued:
Amanda:
“So what should I work on now?”
Grace:
“Introductions. I would teach them how to write a good topic sentence.”
Amanda:
“Write topic sentence and then think of ways to make it better. Do we do this
together?”
“I would model and do guided practice together. Take ideas and synthesize them
Grace:
into an introductory paragraph.”
Amanda:
“How do I ask for suggestions to make it better?”
Grace:
“Guided practice. They’re trying out this skill. Think aloud first. What do you
think? As a group, working together, or independently.”
Amanda:
“Their points are there but they’re missing examples. There’s not enough behind
what they’re trying to say.”
“There needs to be practice. Group practice on a common topic, local
Grace:
restaurants, for example. Kids could add to a main topic by adding details, ‘For
example...’ Every point needs elaboration. The idea is to make ideas as clear as
possible to the audience…”
Amanda had a clear idea of her students’ struggles, and tried describing these to Grace to
get recommendations on what to do next. Grace responded with conceptual phrases that were not
connected to Amanda’s concerns. Guided practice, for example, is an instructional approach that
gives students some opportunities to practice a skill with a great deal of teacher support. How it
would enable Amanda to ask her class for suggestions is unclear, and Grace did not connect her
suggestion back to Amanda’s point. Amanda did not appear to be benefiting from Grace’s
coaching.
Grace continued talking for some time, uninterrupted, while Amanda sat and nodded,
listening but looking nervous by the way she was fidgeting in her chair. She finally interrupted
Grace, asking:
Amanda:
“Where do we start?”
Grace:
“Topic, ideas, bare bones topic sentence, go from there.”
Amanda:
“Embellish the topic sentence first?”
Grace:
“Yes, you could start there. Get beyond the formula and the dead writing, no
student voice in it. Create a fluent, consistent voice—but that’s revision. I have
a good packet on openings and closings.”
In this conversation, Grace kept offering advice moving from specific to broad, while
Amanda kept asking questions to move the discussion from broad to specific. She wanted to
know what to teach today, not to talk about the big conceptual picture of how to teach the entire
writing process to a group of reluctant adolescents. While there was nothing inherently wrong
with discussing instruction at the conceptual level, it was clear from this interaction that Grace
did not seem to know how to connect her ideas and knowledge with what Amanda needed to
meet her own needs. When Amanda asked about topic sentences, for example, Grace talked
about voice. While voice may be an important element of writing, it has little to do with drafting
topic sentences. In this case her comment became an obstacle to figuring out what Amanda
should teach in the afternoon. Amanda needed help getting her students to draft with detail, not
with revising for a fluent, consistent voice. Grace’s efforts to coach were not lining up with
Amanda’s stated needs. It was difficult to tell whether progress was being made.
Finally, a shortage of time brought their disparate views together. They used the last few
minutes to come up with an action plan for the afternoon’s demonstration lesson. Grace
volunteered to teach a lesson on topic sentences and supporting details, using a prompt that would
ask students to write a letter explaining why their community was a good or bad place to live.
Amanda agreed with this idea. She asked Grace to come at one o’clock to teach the writing
lesson to her second block language arts class. With this tentative plan in mind, Amanda rushed
out of Grace’s office and back down the hall to her room, just in time for her next class.
Grace spent the next fifteen minutes considering the prompt she thought she would use
with Amanda’s class. She decided to use this one: “Your best friend’s parents are considering
moving to your neighborhood. Write them a letter explaining why your community is a good or
bad place to move.” To structure student responses and brainstorms, she brought in a strategy
called TAPF (Topic, Audience, Purpose, Form). Her hope was that this strategy would help
students understand what to write in response to the prompt. With prompt and strategy decided,
Grace turned to me and commented on her coaching relationship with Amanda:
For me, my piece of the puzzle working with Amanda is to figure out how to bring it to
her visually, how to get her to construct understanding and then talk. It’s been really
great. I’ve seen a lot of growth in her. She appreciates me. She feels respected and
capable, which is what I want to hear.
This comment seemed at odds with the discussion preceding it. Perhaps Grace did not
notice what seemed like tension in the air when they talked, stemming from Amanda’s apparent
need to focus on next steps for her teaching which in this case seemed counter to the kinds of
ideas and topics Grace kept bringing up in their conversation. Yet despite these differences in
approach, the two came up with the basic outline of a plan for the afternoon demonstration lesson,
so with her outline typed up and printed, Grace moved on to her next task: talking with Judith
about ideas for her session in the foundation-funded summer institute for teachers from Adams,
Jefferson, and McKinley middle schools (the three housing literacy coaches funded by the
foundation).
Principal meeting
Judith was in her office, mulling over a stack of brochures on her conference table.
Grace sat down and shared her summer institute idea, to conduct a break-out session on forms
and features of nonfiction text. Judith agreed this was a useful topic, especially for science and
math teachers who may not have much literacy instruction knowledge. But it was clear Judith
had something else on her mind, and soon enough she handed a glossy brochure to Grace. She
had just been to a meeting at the district office at which a number of student testing and
assessment options had been presented. The brochure advertised an online assessment program
for students, one that was adaptive to students’ knowledge levels, connected to state learning
requirements, and capable of providing specific recommendations for instruction at an individual
level. While Grace looked through the brochure, Judith noted, “Only about ten percent of
teachers can assess students effectively, to see what skills they need and to adapt instruction to
match and differentiate. This assessment is expensive, but it may be a way to bridge the gap and
address the instructional issue.”
Grace commented on the online assessment, pointing out it had many more features than
the basic test of comprehension and vocabulary the school was currently using. The problem,
they agreed, was that although teachers were giving two sections of the Gates MacGinitie each
spring and fall, they were struggling to use data from the test to guide instruction. The school’s
improvement plan mentioned differentiated literacy instruction as a goal, and both Judith and
Grace had hoped to use Gates test scores to illustrate the need to match small groups of students
to books at different reading levels. But both knew that even when teachers considered Gates
data, they were hesitant to differentiate instruction, tending instead to continue teaching wholegroup lessons using class sets of novels. With this in mind, Grace expressed doubt as to whether
the online assessment would be worth the expense.
During their conversation, Grace was clearly playing the part of advisor. Judith asked for
her opinion, looking for a way to address what she saw as an assessment and instruction crisis.
The way they interacted in this discussion seemed collegial, almost friendly, but Judith was still
the boss. Grace expressed some concern over the online assessment, citing its cost and
complexity as major drawbacks. She also pointed out that some progress had been made in
relation to analyzing Gates data for the purpose of guiding instruction, or at least to help teachers
realize that whole-group instruction may not work for classes with wide ability ranges. Judith
and Grace decided to continue addressing the assessment-instruction issue with teachers,
regardless of which test they ended up administering the following year.
Summer planning and office work
Back in her office, Grace continued her morning of planning with a visit from Diane, the
literacy coach at Jefferson Middle School. Grace pulled several resource books from her shelf in
preparation of their meeting, and once Diane arrived promptly at ten o’clock, they moved into the
library to work at a table in a quiet corner. Their main task was to create a lesson plan framework
that all teachers in both schools could use and that could be introduced in the upcoming summer
institute. Without a standard curriculum, teachers taught a wide variety of topics in many
different ways. The resulting lack of commonality across classrooms made it very difficult for
the literacy coaches to provide effective feedback and advice. There was no common language
for them to use when trying to coach various teachers, so they hoped that providing a lesson
planning template would give teachers a common tool the coaches could utilize in their work.
But this task turned out to be far from easy. First they had to decide whether to focus on units or
lessons, and then, once they decided on lessons, Grace and Diane discussed the kinds of qualities
and components that should be included in the lesson plan template. A half an hour was spent
debating the terms strategies and skills; each looked through several reading-resource books to
find definitions for these terms. They finally decided it didn’t matter much, so they moved on to
talking about lesson plan components and how to encourage differentiation and small group
instruction.
After much browsing of resource books, Diane and Grace came up with an eight-point
lesson outline, but getting to this point took an hour and a half. Their discussion had many
tangents, from curriculum choices to vocabulary to students’ needing to move around and not sit
and listen for entire class periods. Diane worried that teachers at both schools just picked topics
and activities and then simply talked about them in class. She worried that students ended up
being responsible for little and doing almost nothing.
At noon, the coaches ended their meeting. Diane, who had taken notes on the lesson plan
template outline, said she would type it up and send Grace a copy for revision. Grace put her
books back in her office, put on her jacket, and headed out to a nearby grocery store to grab some
lunch. Upon her return she answered several school- and district-related email messages and
organized piles of papers on her desk until it was time to visit Amanda’s class.
Coaching Amanda
Just before one o’clock, Grace and I walked quickly down the hall, arriving at Amanda’s
room just as she was finishing a ten-minute homework review. Grace went right to the front of
the room, said a few words to Amanda, and immediately began teaching her lesson. She started
by setting the purpose, which was to write better and prepare for the upcoming state reading test.
Grace displayed her prompt about why a neighborhood might or might not be a good place to
live, and had a student read this aloud to the class. She asked them, “What is it you’re being
asked to write about? Will you focus on the good or the bad? So what are you supposed to write
about?”
Students provided a range of answers, none of which addressed the main idea of the
prompt. I looked around at the class from my seat in a far corner of the room: 26 students, 16
boys, all students of color. They seemed to be paying attention, and several were sitting with
raised hands, waiting for Grace to call on them. She redirected the conversation, reminding them
of the TAPF (Topic, Audience, Purpose, Form) model she had introduced to the class some
weeks before and that Amanda had been using since. Grace pointed out that the topic was why
their community was a good place to live and that the audience was adults. “What does that tell
you about the language you should use?”
Students responded (some in unison) that proper language with respect was in order.
Drawing their attention back to the prompt, she asked them what the purpose of their writing
would be. After a few random answers, she introduced the word “expository,” pointing out that it
meant “to explain something.”
It seemed that students were paying attention, despite their random answers to her
questions, but at this point Grace suddenly moved in a different direction by introducing and
explaining the term “anecdote,” a word that students clearly did not know. She defined it as a
story that relates to an example or detail, and offered two examples to illustrate the concept: a
romance story like Romeo and Juliet, and a pink dress the color of cotton candy. Neither
example had anything to do with neighborhoods, the prompt topic. Amanda stood in the back of
the room, looking puzzled. Grace commented, “I kind of got off on a tangent, but it was a good
one.”
Grace continued her demonstration lesson by offering the class an example topic
sentence: “Amanda is the best teacher in the world because she is funny, smart, and generous.”
Using this sentence, Grace talked with the class about how each of those points would need to be
supported by examples and details, using anecdotes to illustrate her funniness and smartness.
Perhaps in order to keep students’ waning attention, Grace shouted to the class, “Say, ‘I must
prove it!’” Grace pounded her fist on the table while saying this. “Prove it!” everyone shouted.
They agreed that the purpose of this writing was to prove that their neighborhood was a great
place to live.
She finished this part of the discussion by mentioning form. The writing would be in the
form of a letter, and students grudgingly admitted that the letter would need to be several
paragraphs long. “So we’re writing about why our community is a good place to live,” said
Grace. “The next thing we’ll do is brainstorm on this topic: ‘Good things about our community.’
What is a good thing about a community?”
Students came up with a list of topics, including: no gangs; no violence; safe school,
good teachers who can provide a good education; places to hang out; a community center,
basketball; a play area for little kids; a supermarket; restaurants. Students seemed focused during
this part of the lesson, appearing to draw upon knowledge of their neighborhood and features they
and their parents either used or wished they had. Grace worked to focus this brainstorm, asking
students to think about things that made the area convenient, adding, “So one of the things we
could say is that these things are convenient and make life easier. So let’s do a bubble map and
come up with some adjectives.”
Grace began writing on the overhead, but Amanda, looking puzzled, suddenly called for a
break. While students milled around, Amanda talked with Grace, expressing confusion over
Grace’s use of the terms example, detail, and anecdote. Amanda wanted to know the ways in
which these terms were different and whether or not that was important. It seemed that Grace had
been using them rather interchangeably, and this had bothered Amanda, who did not see them this
way. They had not talked about these terms in their morning planning session. Although Grace
tried to explain the issue, the few minutes at break were not enough to resolve it.
Once students were back in their seats, Grace reviewed the bubble chart with students
and asked them to vote on the ones they would think might make the best case for their
neighborhood’s attractiveness as a place to live. Rayesha, an African-American girl who had
been sitting quietly, seized the conversation, firmly stating, “Parents aren’t looking to have fun in
the neighborhood. They’re looking for convenience. My mom always says stuff like that.” The
energy level in the room escalated, the vote discussion moved toward chaos, but with a little
facilitation from Grace and lots of lobbying by Rayesha, the class chose convenience over clean.
Grace wrote on the board, “There are three reasons why I believe why my community is a great
place to live. It is safe, convenient, and friendly.”
Grace moved the lesson forward by telling students that writing each of the paragraphs
was as simple as could be, merely adding details to each of the three reasons the class had picked
by casting votes. She asked students what they thought might be convenient about their
neighborhood, and they came up with a list of examples including grocery stores, coffee shops,
gas stations, and restaurants. Happy with their ideas, Grace said, “This is the basic setup for it.
See what we did—a brainstorm about community, then ‘How can I describe my community.’
Then we picked out the three best ones.”
After observing quietly for almost an hour, Amanda, from the back of the room, asked:
“Should they have the reasons in the introduction?” Grace replied, “Later. Right now, it’s barebones to get the structure in place. From my intro, the reader knows I will be talking about fun,
safety, and convenience.”
Grace finished the lesson by talking about the conclusion to the letter and how it would
contain the same points outlined in the introduction. Her final comment was, “We’ll go over it
again next time and work on the middle part, then work on different ways of beginning and
ending a paper.” She and Amanda walked around the room for about ten more minutes, until
class was over, helping students write their ideas from the prompt and reminding them to copy
the introduction that Grace had written with their input.
Record-keeping argument
The plan for the remainder of Grace’s workday was to reflect on the demonstration lesson
and figure out what to work on next with Amanda’s class and how to teach it differently for the
other section of Amanda’s language arts and social studies class. But this plan did not happen.
Just as Grace unlocked her office door, the phone rang. It was Lydia, another seventh-grade
language arts teacher who did not work with a coach and did not (according to Grace) want to
change the way she taught literacy, preferring to focus on Greek and Latin root words as she had
for many years. Her call was not about vocabulary, though, but rather about the Gates
MacGinitie pre- and post-testing required of all students as part of the grant-funded coaching
program. Many teachers, including Lydia, seemed to be under the impression that Grace was the
person in charge of this assessment, while Grace saw her role to be that of a resource person and
considered test administration to be a compliance issue with principal oversight. Lydia had just
viewed the spring Gates score reporting form that Grace had sent earlier via email, and she was
confused by the number of columns to fill in, with one each for vocabulary, comprehension, and
total battery. She insisted there had never been a separate column for total scores, and would
therefore not fill it in once her students had been given the assessment. Grace became visibly
frustrated, telling her that the form had always been this way and that she had conducted a staff
development meeting addressing this issue just a few weeks before.
Lydia hung up the phone, but a few minutes later arrived in person, sticking her head in
the doorway to reiterate her point and insist again that she would not fill in all three columns of
the scoring form. She disappeared as quickly as she had arrived, but Grace fumed, telling me that
she had not only conducted trainings but had also sent the entire staff an email message outlining
the steps in converting raw scores to standard scores and how to record these on the form that
was, she pointed out, a requirement for teachers to complete. Some staff members did not seem
to have a clear understanding of the kind of work Grace was expected to do, especially at the
whole-school level. Some seemed to treat her like an administrator, or at least like the principal’s
assistant in charge of testing. These perceptions of Grace’s roles and responsibilities appeared to
fuel a negative feeling toward Grace and her coaching job.
Moments later, Judith (the principal) arrived. Grace quickly filled her in on the encounter
with Lydia, and Judith shared her own opinion to the conversation, pointing out that Lydia loved
to complain and that as current department head she should know better. Judith left, not saying
why she stopped by in the first place, and for a moment it seemed the scoring-form argument was
over, until Grace checked her email. Lydia had taken her complaint online, asking other teachers
via email whether they shared her concern over the scoring form, and so by the time Grace signed
in, there were several messages from seventh and eighth grade teachers siding with Lydia.
Grace grabbed a binder of test-score data from the beginning of the school year, opening
to the section containing fall scores from the Gates MacGinitie. To her dismay, she found that a
number of teachers had in fact not filled in all three columns, adding substance to Lydia’s claim.
Looking a bit defeated, Grace pointed out to me that while she, as literacy coach, was to provide
support to teachers giving the test, Judith and Stephen were supposed to ensure that teachers
completed testing on time and turned in the proper scoring forms, correctly filled in. In
September this apparently had not happened. Grace decided this issue was now out of her hands.
Science rubric work
She spent the last part of her day looking online and through resource books for
information on writing rubrics to use in science classes. Ed, a science teacher, had recently
asked Grace to help him develop a rubric to use to score his students’ writing, so that he could
account for ideas and organization as well as grammar and proofreading. He had brought Grace a
draft of what he wanted, but she noted, “He came up with something that didn’t address any of
the grammatical stuff. It didn’t express any expectations around that, so he had the idea piece
and he said, ‘I expect you to write in complete sentences,’ but I said, ‘What do you expect in
terms of the state of the paper? What do you want them to do?’”
Grace looked online for Six-Trait writing rubrics that might specifically address science
content. She continued this search for about an hour, finding nothing that specifically met her
needs, and then called it a day and went home.
Day Two
Grace’s second composite day, outlined in Table 7, includes two interesting tasks relating
to classroom-instructional roles: substitute teaching and working with a student. While these
tasks may not, on the surface, be clearly connected to teachers’ daily planning and instruction, in
Grace’s case they could be categorized as classroom instructional tasks. On this day she
happened to substitute for a teacher she worked with regularly as coach; her appearance as standin substitute teacher gave her an unplanned opportunity to see what was going in this teacher’s
classroom and to give him some feedback another day. The purpose of the tutoring episode was
to provide the school intervention team, including the student’s language arts teacher, with
diagnostic information to guide instruction. Because of these potential connections to daily
classroom practice, these roles and related tasks were included in the classroom instructional
category. What follows is a description of how these episodes occurred for Grace in her second
composite day.
Table 7 Grace Composite Day Two
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
Meeting preparation
7:30
60
School
Substitute for Joshua
8:30
90
Instructional
Student tutoring
10:00
90
Instructional
Working lunch
11:30
60
School
Department meeting
12:30
120
School
Testing organization
2:30
60
School
Meeting preparation
Early in the morning, I found Grace in a conference room, setting up for a professional
development meeting organized by the school district office and scheduled by Judith. Grace
informed me that this was the last visit of the year, where a district-office consultant would be
conducting meetings with teachers, focusing on the use of strategies and graphic organizers in
writing instruction. Grace’s connection to this professional development project was unclear.
She said her goal was to work with participating teachers on implementing the writing strategies
before the scheduled meetings, so that they would be able to discuss their experiences with the
district consultant. But during my week-long visits over the course of five months I had not seen
her address this issue with teachers. One of Grace’s four targeted teachers for coaching, Peter, a
seventh-grade language arts and social studies teacher, was a participant in this series of
meetings—but he had, according to Grace, avoided working with her this year, and from what she
had been able to gather, was reluctant to use the writing strategies with his students. How Grace
obtained this information was not clear, but she admitted she had not been able to set up coaching
appointments with him this year. Although he seemed receptive to the idea, he always had a
reason to cancel or reschedule times and dates he had set up with her.
Peter and several other teachers arrived at the conference room a few minutes after school
began, but the meeting did not get off to a quick start. Joshua had not yet arrived. He was still in
his room, waiting for someone to cover his first-period language arts and social studies class.
Grace called the office, and was told there would be no more substitutes today. Wanting Joshua
to participate in the meeting, Grace volunteered to cover his class for at least the next hour. This
was something she had ended up doing for a number of different teachers since the beginning of
the school year.
On the way to Joshua’s classroom, Grace ran into two teachers who asked her questions.
The first wanted to know where to get Scantron sheets for administering the Gates reading test.
Even in a rush, Grace was called on as a testing and test preparation resource person. The
second, a science teacher who wanted to use a K-W-L chart in class discussions, asked Grace,
“What does the K stand for?” She did not appear surprised by this question, which, given the
general popularity of K-W-L charts among teachers, was remarkable. She told him the K stands
for what students already know about a topic. He thanked her, and Grace continued on her way
to Joshua’s classroom.
Substitute for Joshua
Entering the room, Grace found Joshua using the overhead projector to review
vocabulary words, apparently chosen from a novel the class was reading, in preparation for an
upcoming quiz. He stopped what he was doing, talked with Grace for a couple of minutes, and
then left for the professional development meeting. Grace handed out a list of ten vocabulary
words, which students were asked to define using the dictionary. Students worked in small
groups, talking about the words and copying definitions from the dictionary on lines next to each
word. Grace circulated around the room, helping students look up words. But after a few
minutes she returned to the front of the room and interrupted the class to consider multiple
meanings of the word acute:
Grace:
“I know in math it means an angle less than 90 degrees, but what does it mean in
a more general context?”
Students:
“Sharp or severe.”
Grace:
“What can you think of that’s sharp or severe?”
Student:
“A pencil.”
Student:
“A knife.”
“A pain that’s sharp like a toothache.”
Grace:
Sensing a gap in students’ conceptual understanding of the words on their list, Grace tried
talking through the words in an attempt to provide context so that students wouldn’t simply copy
from the dictionary the first definition they found. Their worksheet did not show word usage, so
students were simply copying the first definition for each word. Grace tried to compensate by
asking the students if they could find the words in the chapter of the novel the class was reading,
but they could not, as all of the books were locked in a cabinet and the students had not yet read
the chapter containing this week’s vocabulary words. Grace had reported working previously
with the staff on vocabulary instruction, holding several professional development meetings
focusing on ways to teach new words using context to help students develop a deep
understanding of meaning and usage. Although Joshua had been present at these meetings, his
lesson did not contain any element of context. Whatever the reason, there seemed to be little
connection between the strategies Grace had said she taught and the activities Joshua was
assigning his students. They had a list of words in isolation, a dictionary, and a pencil with which
to copy information from the book to the paper.
While Grace was talking, it became apparent that the students were used to copying
definitions from the dictionary but not to listening to the prolonged teacher explanations that
Grace provided. They gradually paid less attention to Grace and talked more loudly among
themselves. Grace changed tactics, focusing on the word melodramatic and asking students what
that word meant. Their response was right out of the dictionary: “Like or suitable, sensational.”
Trying to seize a teachable moment, Grace said, “Let me act out melodramatic.” She
jumped and then began screaming about an ant she was pretending to see on the floor. This got
the students’ attention.
Grace:
“So what was it like for me to be melodramatic?”
Student:
“You were acting like a drama queen.”
Grace:
“Exactly.”
This interlude seemed to increase student interest, but at least half of the students kept
talking in their small groups, and a few boys had begun milling around the room visiting with
various groups, causing laughter and giggles along the way. Despite the mounting disorder,
Grace continued her effort to bring meaning and context to this vocabulary exercise, asking the
class, “Dismay. What does dismay mean?”
No one answered the question. Students continued to talk with each other. Grace pushed
her point, resulting in this conversation:
“I’d sure hate to have to leave the teacher a note about how you wouldn’t stop
Grace:
talking.”
Student 1:
“Why don’t we do something else?”
Grace:
“We’re focusing on the words to be sure we know what they mean.”
Student 2:
“Let’s let her do her thing. We’re learning something.”
Grace:
“OK. The last word is incredulous, not ready to believe something. Give me a
sentence.”
Student 3:
“My aunt having a baby.”
Grace:
“A sentence.”
Nobody seemed to want to ask about the baby comment, and at this moment Grace
appeared to give up. She had tried bringing some meaning to this vocabulary exercise, but now
that the list of ten words had been discussed, she moved on. She directed students to get out
markers and geography resources as she handed out a worksheet featuring a map of the world.
Students colored their maps until Joshua returned from his meeting. Grace left, not having time
to talk with him about the vocabulary lesson.
Student tutoring
A few minutes after returning to her office, Stephen, the vice principal, arrived with
Andre, an African-American seventh-grade boy whose failing grade in language arts and poor
attendance at Adams’ after-school tutorial program were issues of concern to both his parent and
teachers. Stephen had asked Grace if she would be willing to administer the Qualitative Reading
Inventory (QRI) to Andre, to see if reading difficulties were at least partly responsible for his
struggle. The school did not have a reading specialist. Grace agreed to work with Andre. She
told me that she saw this work as a service to students in need, but that she didn’t want to be in
this reading-specialist role too often. She noted, “People really don’t understand what a coach
does. When that becomes too narrow for them it becomes an issue of necessity.”
Grace seemed afraid of becoming the school’s unofficial reading specialist.
Nevertheless, she acknowledged that working with students to assess reading skills helped her
gain credibility as a resource person, and that it also assisted her efforts to coach teachers as they
used assessment data to plan instructional interventions.
She welcomed Andre into her office, and once Stephen left, they sat down and got to
work. The administration of the QRI took Grace over an hour, and she did not finish. This was a
very long time compared to general QRI administration guidelines. One reason for the slow pace
of the assessment seemed to be Grace’s relative unfamiliarity with the QRI. For example, she did
not remove the text before asking Andre for a retelling of one of the texts—so he peeked while
recounting the story. She also did not seem sure how to record Andre’s comments as he retold
the story. Another reason was Andre’s surprisingly slow reading rate, which was also apparent
when answering the comprehension questions Grace asked him.
Once they had worked their way through a couple of passages, Grace put aside the testing
materials and continued their interview by asking Andre some questions about school and reading
interests. Andre seemed relaxed, but he spoke as slowly as when he had been reading QRI
passages aloud. He told Grace that he wanted to pass his classes, but that he didn’t bother doing
the homework, and didn’t feel like staying after school to do his assignments in the after-school
program. Grace noted this information, moving on to a more personal question: “What do you
think was your most painful school experience, your most painful memory?” Andre answered
that his mother had decided to hold him back a year when he was in the first grade, and that this
still made him very angry. He knew it was his mother’s decision--that she thought he wasn’t
ready for second grade because he wasn’t reading well enough. Grace didn’t seem to know what
to say. They talked for a while longer, and once the student-interest questionnaire had been
completed, she walked him back to class.
Back in her office, Grace considered Andre’s situation as she ate her lunch and sifted
through her email inbox, which had filled up with dozens of messages from Adams staff members
arguing back and forth over the appropriateness of leaving secret-pal gifts in teachers’ boxes. She
wasn’t sure how much of Andre’s struggle with reading had to do with skills and strategies and
how much was related to motivation. She also wondered how to summarize what she had learned
from the assessment and interview, and what to do with the summary. Should she share it with
the school psychologist, the language arts teacher, Lydia, or the principal? Grace did not have a
working relationship with Lydia, and did not have access to her classroom. At the whole-school
level, Lydia and others were encouraged to incorporate new teaching strategies into their daily
instruction, but attendance at professional development meetings was voluntary, and compliance
with components of the school improvement plans was very loosely enforced.
Working lunch
While Grace was eating her lunch and considering these points, Judith stopped by to see
what was going on. Grace debriefed her on Andre’s findings. Judith was not surprised to hear
that he was having trouble with his language arts teacher. Judith acknowledged that Lydia did
not teach with very much skill, and that her negative attitude toward boys, especially AfricanAmerican boys, was well known. For the kinds of silent and individual seat-work activities on
Greek and Latin roots that Lydia had her students do in class, Judith was sure Lydia preferred
quiet Asian girls to loud Black boys, and her history of referring the latter to the office for
discipline problems reflected this preference. Judith left as abruptly as she had arrived, Grace
finished eating her lunch and clearing out her email inbox, and all the while the topic they had
just been discussing hung in the air, unresolved.
Department meeting
After lunch, Grace went to a conference room to take part in the eighth-grade language
arts department meeting. For the past several years, teachers at Adams had worked in department
teams to develop curriculum maps outlining the topics they would cover over time in each of their
courses. While these department meetings were not the responsibility of the literacy coach, Grace
informed me that she had facilitated past meetings to encourage collegial conversations among
department team members and to encourage collaboration across departments. The task for
today’s meeting was to review and revise the curriculum map for the language arts and social
studies block class. In attendance were three teachers: Teresa, Barbara, and Sandy. Jill and
Maria arrived later. As we entered the room, the three teachers were discussing social studies
units and how to possibly rearrange them to make the whole progression run more smoothly.
Teresa suggested teaching Northwest studies before world geography and moving the eighth
grade project to begin earlier so that the exhibit could be scheduled before spring break. Grace
jumped right into the conversation:
Grace:
“Would there be a way to bring more student voice into the process? To make it
more successful for them?”
Teresa:
“Some had a personal piece. Others were able to choose topics they enjoyed. So
some progress was made. We want to look at themes and impact on individuals
and where they live to build on the idea of citizenship. Pretty soon they’ll be
driving and voting!”
Barbara:
“Students care but they don’t know enough. They worry about justice but don’t
know what to do about it.”
Grace:
“So what do we do to get kids to where they see the importance of these issues?”
Sandy:
“We can model that and show more depth to reveal other sides of a topic.”
Barbara:
“Not the stream but the problem behind the stream.”
“Solutions typically create other issues and there is always more than one side to
Grace:
any problem.”
The group talked in this manner for some time. There was no facilitator, and Grace did
not take on this role. The conversation drifted about, landing some time later on the topic of
school-wide consistency on issues of assessment, expectations, and curriculum.
Barbara:
“There needs to be consistency school-wide on minor things like spelling and
punctuation. Not only English teachers need to pay attention to this stuff.”
Teresa:
“We commonly value conventions.”
Grace:
“Students should at least know when they can’t write so they can get the
necessary support.”
“There’s a lack of curriculum in language arts, where other content areas have
Sandy:
kits, lessons, and resources.”
Grace did not mention anything she might have done as literacy coach to address this
curriculum issue. Instead, she responded to Sandy’s point by telling a rather lengthy story of how
a language arts curriculum had been chosen at the district level but had never been purchased due
to budget cuts. Everyone listened politely, but once she was finished with her story, the
conversation continued where it had left off.
Barbara:
“I feel like we talk a lot about theory but not about tools teaches use to utilize
them in class. We need products. We don’t have pre-made units so I have to try
to create lessons every night after I wash the dishes.”
Teresa:
“Maybe a starting point is pay per diem over the summer to come up with a plan,
then over the year work in occasional meetings on standards and how to address
them.”
Sandy:
“But new teachers need immediate help and materials.”
Grace responded to the teachers’ plea for curriculum help by telling them a little bit about
a new eighth-grade reading class planned for the following school year and the set of reading
materials designed to help struggling adolescent readers by working on comprehension strategies
in nonfiction text via small-group instruction. Grace passed out a few samples from the publisher
for the teachers to peruse. While looking through the materials, the eighth grade teachers really
seemed to seize upon the idea of small-group instruction:
Teresa:
“Another teacher does lots of small group work and it works for him.”
Grace:
“This is a way to provide materials so teachers can focus on instruction.”
Sandy:
“Can’t we get SRA? This Fast Tracks curriculum doesn’t look very teacherfriendly.”
“Diane said kids at her school really enjoy the materials. We will sort kids into
Grace:
the eighth grade class for the reading.”
Sandy:
“Are we using Gates or state reading test scores to do the sorting?”
Teresa:
“The Gates. I would like to start sorting now to see how the lists look.”
Barbara:
“Couldn’t we put all the kids together by reading ability? So each class can be
just one group reading the same thing?
The teachers had just been complaining about a lack of curriculum, but when Grace
showed them these reading materials, they balked. The issue of small group instruction seemed
to dampen any enthusiasm they may have had about these sets of glossy little books. Sandy’s
comment about SRA, a skill-based set of short texts with comprehension questions, suggested she
wanted something students could work on independently without having to work whole-class or
in small groups. Barbara’s suggestion, to put students in language arts classes by ability, was in
direct opposition to the school improvement plan’s written goal of differentiated instruction in
small groups. If Judith and Grace had assumed teachers were on board with this goal, their
assumption may have been incorrect.
The rest of the department meeting focused on the idea of ability grouping vs. small
group instruction. Small group or differentiated instruction did not seem to be viewed favorably,
especially by Barbara or Sandy. Yet if Grace picked up on what seemed to be a layer of
negativity underneath the surface of conversation, she gave no sign and offered no comment to
address it. Instead, throughout the meeting she offered advice and recounted anecdotes, without
making any noticeable attempt to steer conversation in one direction or another. Overall, the
meeting seemed like a struggle for Grace: She was a participant, but not a peer (since she wasn’t
a classroom teacher), yet at the same time she was clearly not the facilitator. Perhaps as a result
of this role ambiguity, or because she seemed to struggle to use her literacy knowledge to address
the issues and problems of these teachers’ practice, although her comments and questions were
heard, she seemed at the edge of irrelevance. The meeting concluded without major decisions
having been made.
Testing organization
Back in her office after the department meeting, which had ended after almost two hours
of discussion, Grace spent the rest of her day organizing materials for the spring administration of
the Gates MacGinitie test. This work involved counting Scantron sheets into stacks of 132,
counting test booklets, typing administration directions for teachers and fill-in instructions for
students, stuffing all of these materials in to folders, and depositing the stuffed folders in to
teachers’ boxes.
Having already completed this whole process in the fall, it was supposed to be finished
quickly. Grace, though, ran into some time-consuming problems. First, she had allowed teachers
to keep test booklets and administration guides after the fall test. Five months had passed, and
only one of dozens of teachers could locate these materials in her classroom. Everyone else
needed new ones. Second, Grace could not find her list of teachers who needed to administer the
test (this included special educators and others, not just language arts teachers). This list also
contained information on how many students each teacher needed to test. Without the list, Grace
was not sure which teachers needed materials or how many test booklets and Scantron sheets
each teacher needed. She called the office, but the secretary there did not have this information,
either. Grace spent an hour calling teachers to find which materials (and how many) they needed.
She made photocopies of test booklets. She counted out stacks of Scantron sheets. She had me
count out stacks of 132 as well. When she was mostly finished with these tasks, Grace called it a
day and went home, planning to start her day tomorrow by delivering envelopes of materials to
teachers’ boxes.
Coaching Issues and Perspectives
Grace had been assigned to work with four teachers this year, two on a voluntary basis
and two at Judith’s recommendation. Of these four, Grace only consistently worked with
Amanda (recommended) and Joshua (voluntary). At the same time, she found herself working on
a variety of other tasks, some by her own choosing and some chosen by administrators. From her
experiences emerged two major issues: perceptions and challenges relating to her coaching work,
and connections between coaching and changes in teacher learning and practice. Grace talked at
length about these issues, which also surfaced when I interviewed Judith, the principal, and
teachers Amanda and Joshua.
Grace acknowledged feeling tension surrounding her work as a school-level literacy
coach. With many staff members and one coach, many teachers did not work directly with
Grace, and she felt this contributed to what she considered to be a negative perception of her
school roles, duties, and accomplishments. Grace recalled that the previous year one staff
member, a counselor, had declared in a meeting that Grace’s position was a waste of money since
she did not have a teaching load. This upset Grace, who felt she spent a great deal of time doing
work with Judith, work that other staff members did not get to see.
Grace spent a majority of her time working on tasks and projects not directly related to
coaching or supporting teachers on classroom-related issues. She considered her school-related
work, from facilitating department meetings to assisting Judith with the development of the
school’s annual transformation plan, to be useful, but acknowledged that teachers did not always
share this opinion. They saw a staff member without teaching duties. Grace tried not to take this
personally, claiming it was not an issue of competence but rather of worries over school financing
and a lack of understanding of the different roles and tasks that filled most of her day. She found
support for this viewpoint from Judith and Stephen, who she felt supported her completely in her
efforts to work more at a whole-school level than in individual classrooms. Grace insisted this
was the right approach, stating, “I can’t see how the coaching job can be separated from the
school plan or school transformation plan. This role is changing into a school resource person
and that’s something I think the building-based coaches are feeling.”
She also suggested that observing in classrooms was often a waste of her time: “I stop by
unannounced sometimes—but only with the four teachers I work with. With the others, it’s not
productive to just stop by.”
Grace was trying to say that she would, on occasion, stop by and observe Amanda or
Joshua, but that doing so with other teachers would not lead to anything meaningful. She did not
want to just observe, and did not think spending time in classrooms was valuable without having
first worked with the teacher—and expanding the number of teachers she worked with was not
part of Grace’s coaching plan.
Judith directly supported Grace’s focus on whole-school coaching work. She considered
her an essential part of the process of building capacity among the staff—the capacity to provide
explicit instruction of reading comprehension strategies in a consistent manner across subject
areas. She saw Grace contributing to the school’s professional development process by working
with her on the school improvement plan, which set goals for the following year and set
parameters for professional development initiatives offered at the school. She also encouraged
Grace to impact the school system by conducting professional development sessions for the entire
staff, attending and sometimes facilitating department meetings, and working with small groups
of teachers on targeted skills and strategies. It was not clear how many of these meetings Grace
was expected to schedule, or how well-attended they needed to be to be considered a success, but
it was clear that Judith supported Grace in her attempt to address literacy learning and
professional development at a whole school level, and not just with her four targeted teachers. To
Judith, Grace was an ally and confidant, a helper, someone to help with administrative duties and
to talk to about school problems.
At the individual-teacher level, Judith acknowledged that feelings of animosity toward
Grace had surfaced the previous year, when she had been directed to focus her coaching efforts
exclusively on the sixth-grade team. Judith commented that some teachers outside of this team
had felt left out, that someone else had gotten all the help and that they ended up with nothing,
struggling in their own classrooms without assistance. Judith felt she understood their point of
view, and, as a result, she and Grace had decided to split this year between whole-school efforts
and working individually with the four targeted teachers. She observed, “It’s obviously too big of
a job for one person with 43 staff members, so I think that somehow putting parameters around it
is necessary. It’s good for [the coach] to target a couple of people they are going to go deeper
with for the year, and to really move.”
While Grace’s job working with four specific teachers sounded clear in theory, in
practice it proved difficult. I asked Judith about the complicating factor of having two teachers
assigned to Grace while the other two worked with her voluntarily. She said her guess was that
the people who volunteered were doing better than the ones who were recommended, but that a
balance between the two was probably needed to keep the coach feeling positive. Judith did not
talk about the inherent difference between voluntary collaboration and mandatory participation,
or how the coaching process might be affected by this difference. When I asked Judith about the
school’s coaching recommendation process, she admitted it had been very unclear:
I’m pretty sure the ones who were recommended didn’t know they were recommended.
And maybe they should, I don’t know. Maybe it should be a conversation with the
principal, “I’m really not happy what I am seeing. I am going to expect you to work with
the coach.” We have done that, but I don’t think we have evidence of whether that’s a
good approach.
Grace found that the idea of working with just four targeted teachers was, on the surface,
a good one. As she noted, this arrangement allowed her to be more flexible when planning and
consulting with them than would be possible if she were trying to implement a school-wide
reading program. But having two volunteers and two possibly-resistant teachers on her short list
was problematic. It changed the context of the process from voluntary to mandatory. Grace
commented,
Coaching works better when people want it and when it focuses on an area of need. If I
feed them what they want, I can move them in another direction, too. This is a source of
conflict with administrators who want me to go in and tell teachers what to do. This is
evaluative and doesn’t work well.
In addition to the voluntary vs. assigned struggle was the fact that Grace only regularly
worked with two of her four teachers. At the beginning of the school year, she had tried setting
up a weekly schedule designating one day to each of her four teachers and Friday for reading,
planning, and other tasks. But two teachers refused to work with her. Although she tried to stay
committed to working with the other two teachers on their designated days, by spring her
schedule had become a somewhat chaotic day-to-day affair. If she talked with or observed the
teaching of Amanda and Joshua once each week, she considered those weeks to be wellorganized and relatively successful. This did not always happen. Grace considered the
complexities of individual relationships to be a major factor contributing to her struggle to coach
teachers on a regular basis, arguing:
There’s a whole psychology to how you approach different people I have to take into
account. People’s insecurities, what they are fragile about, and try to figure out the best
way of moving them from one place to another without creating some type of issue
between us.
Joshua had volunteered to work with Grace, and he considered their work together to
have been valuable. He identified two coaching tasks he saw as having been especially helpful:
planning and co-teaching. When talking about planning units and lessons with Grace, he had
words of praise for her: “Grace is a great resource to have. She is really knowledgeable about
everything that is going on. When I’m sitting down and planning with her I can tell I am doing
my planning with someone who really knows her way around instruction.”
He said he tried to meet with Grace once a week to plan and to talk about curriculum
issues and instructional strategies. As a result of this collaboration, Joshua felt current on best
teaching practices, and felt especially positive about a social studies unit on immigration that
Grace had helped him plan and implement. It seemed this unit had given them something
concrete to focus on, instead of talking about problems with his teaching or ways to implement
reading strategies without regard to subject matter.
Grace acknowledged she had found it necessary to talk with Joshua at length in order to
gain access to his class. She emphasized she thought it was a valuable thing to do, and that she
would not be there to evaluate him. That said, she did not hesitate to tell him that class
management and ways of communicating with students were part of the big picture of teaching
and therefore of coaching. She told him that management issues could not be separated out from
instructional skills and literacy strategies, because, “if your classroom is not managed, you can’t
teach.”
Having his emerging unit on immigration as the main focus of their work helped Joshua
adjust to the coaching process with Grace, so that he ultimately felt positive about the experience.
Describing his co-teaching experiences with her, he said,
It was very comfortable. She came in and we talked about the lesson before-hand, the
lesson we both kind of planned together, who would do what part. The parts that I didn’t
feel real strong about, those were the ones where she stepped in and modeled how to do
those parts. It went really well.
After co-teaching, the two met and decided what to teach next and how. They focused on
the goals of the immigration unit and the needs of the students, and the result seemed to be a
positive coaching experience for both.
Amanda’s coaching experience with Grace seemed more problematic. She had been
assigned to work with Grace, and her feelings about working with Grace were mixed. From
Grace’s point of view, the coaching process was right on track. She noted that Amanda had set
some instructional goals at the beginning of the year, including teaching writing, developing
writing units, and implementing some instructional techniques and approaches. Grace said she
had worked with Amanda throughout the year on addressing these goals, had met with her
frequently and observed her on a regular basis. She said she thought Amanda appreciated their
work together and looked forward to moving ahead with these goals the following year.
Amanda did not share this point of view. In an interview with me, her frustrations came
out in a rush:
It’s tough because I don’t really know what the purpose is, or the expectations or
requirements for the coach. It’s kind of like we just meet every week, and we do, but it
just seems like a lot of talk. Coaching to me is not talk. I don’t want to talk about how
you are in the classroom or how I am in the classroom. I want to be able to…it needs to
be concrete for me. I want to say, “Alright, this is what I do. When I started out teaching
writing, I had X Y Z trouble, just like you, and this is the breakdown. This is what it
looks like.” I don’t know if this is how coaching relationships work, but I would hope to
see…a binder. When you’re struggling in your first two years, I don’t know how to
explain it, but it’s just like their job is to work with people who are new to the profession,
so talking about it, what do I know? I’ve only been here two years trying to figure it out.
Yes, the coach is more advanced, but just telling me about it doesn’t help.
In their planning meetings, Amanda felt Grace was just talking, a sort of telling role
rather than a coaching role. To her this was not helpful. The coaching and co-teaching activities
they shared, on the other hand, were seen as much more productive. Amanda talked about the
work she had been doing relating to writing with Grace’s assistance. Although things had gotten
off to a slow start, with planning (talking) meetings taking up at least the first six months of the
school year, once they began co-teaching sections of her language arts class on how to pre-write,
form introductory paragraphs, and provide supporting details, she felt her teaching of writing
strategies had really improved. Amanda admitted that the work she had done with Grace this
year felt more like preparatory work for the following year, when she would really start teaching
writing strategies in September. After this year’s experience with Grace, Amanda already knew
what she would say to her next year: “We can write this stuff down, we can say great things, but
it’s pointless until I see them.”
The second major issue that kept surfacing was teacher learning, and whether and how
this was occurring in relation to Grace’s coaching efforts. She was aware of the perception
teachers had that being coached meant being assisted when in trouble. About Joshua and this
issue, she noted,
I think this brings up one of the challenges of doing what I do. I have to be really careful
to make sure that I don’t make anyone feel they aren’t competent at what they do. Even
though it wasn’t meant in that way, I think his affective filter processed it to mean, “She
doesn’t think I know what I am doing.”
Despite her gentle efforts and emphasis on planning curriculum and improving
instruction, evidence of Joshua’s learning from the coaching process was mixed. The vocabulary
lesson he left for Grace when she stood in for him showed a relative lack of knowledge of
vocabulary instruction on his part. Months before, Grace had taught a workshop or two on
teaching vocabulary words in context; Joshua did not include any ideas or strategies from these in
his lesson. The exercise was virtually devoid of context. Yet, something happened between the
time this lesson occurred and when I interviewed Joshua because he talked a bit about
vocabulary. It seems Grace talked with him about this issue in one of their planning sessions.
Joshua reflected:
There was one vocabulary activity that [we were trained] on last year, I forget the name
of the strategy but it’s kind of a word-association strategy where you give them, actually I
did it today, I gave them one of our vocabulary words, it was mesh, I pulled it out from
the textbook. You give them a word like mosquito and see if they can match up the word
mesh with it. I gave them a list of ten vocabulary words that I wanted them to focus on
and then I told them that there might be one word or more than one word they might
relate to the word I gave them, like mosquito. Some of them related the word probe to
doctor and the word heritage because if you are a doctor’s son or daughter you might
become a doctor as well. It was a really good activity. I had forgotten about that and
then Grace mentioned it. I was kind of running out of vocabulary activities at the time.
Grace talked about how she liked to seize teachable moments when coaching, and this
seems to be an example of this process in action. She talked with him about vocabulary
instruction, reminding him of a strategy he had learned the year before, and encouraged him to
put it to use. He did, with reasonable success, and felt positive about the experience. The
question this raises is whether Joshua would be able to show evidence of learning from the
coaching process by independently and consistently implementing new strategies, or if he would
in fact need someone to meet with him weekly and constantly remind him to use things he has
learned. Had Grace not been the proxy substitute teacher in his class that one day, she would not
have known he needed the additional vocabulary assistance. Would there be occasions where he
could put strategies he had learned from Grace to use independently, or would he rely on her
observations and reminders? This was not clear.
Amanda felt she had learned enough about the writing process to put it to use the
following year—great progress, considering that she considered herself to have been lacking
knowledge of teaching writing, something she had not learned how to do in her teacher education
program three years before. But overall she felt that her coaching experience with Grace had left
her with at least as much frustration as new learning. When I asked her what she had hoped the
coaching process would be like, she brought in a sports analogy, comparing coaching to teaching
tennis:
A coach is support. They have got a racket, too, like in tennis. They’re showing you the
moves, the form, and then you attempt it, and they try and fix it. Everyone has a hand in
it, you don’t just tell a player what to do, you don’t just sit there and say, “You need to
change your grip,” or “You’re hitting the ball a little short.” What does that look like?
What’s my grip? Does that make sense? If it’s wrong, then fix it. Does that make sense?
What it’s supposed to look like, not just, “You need to change your grip.”
Amanda was not sure she had learned how to change her grip in literacy. Although
Grace had, belatedly, co-taught some lessons to show Amanda how to utilize several writing
process strategies, coaching was a source of frustration to Amanda, who was not sure how much
she was learning from the process.
Split between whole-school tasks and mentoring work with teachers, Grace seemed to
struggle with her multiple coaching roles. From her own perspective, she saw her work as
valuable, but at the same time acknowledged a perception held by some that her position was a
waste of resources. In relation to teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes, Grace seemed to
make contact with teachers more in the out-of-classroom place than in the in-classroom place.
Although she attempted to work with her four identified teachers on classroom-related issues of
literacy instruction, most of her work ended up focused on more administrative concerns such as
standardized test administration and scoring. Ultimately, Grace defined her role as a questioner,
someone whose work was to help people think about future values of their instructional choices,
about best practices in literacy instruction. Yet, when this approach did not seem to be working
successfully, Grace found herself asking questions about the qualities it would take to make a
good teacher:
Can you teach an adult to be intrinsically motivated? Some people are simply miscast for
the job. The job requires you to do more than you get paid for. The blue-collar mentality
doesn’t work. Administration has a role, too, in steering and enforcing this role.
Teachers are supposed to be prepared and professional.
Grace said she was willing to coach teachers, to help them learn and implement new
instructional strategies. But she did not consider everyone worthy of being helped, and she
seemed to have an idea of where to draw the line. Grace also seemed to have some limitations of
her own.
Chapter 6
Composite Narrative: Michelle
Michelle did not have her own office. Being responsible for all seven middle schools in
the district, she spent a great deal of time in different places and in her car traveling from one
school to another. She did have a space in the district office, one that was shared by other
coaches, about 15 in all, at elementary and secondary levels. I first met Michelle in this shared
space, a long room divided into work cubes and a large meeting area with a conference table.
Two or three other coaches were working in different parts of the room, but it was apparent that
none of the coaches spent much time there.
Previously, the Wallace School District had provided one literacy and technology coach
for every two elementary schools, with the expectation that the coaches would split their time
between their two assigned schools and the district office, working on both school- and districtlevel literacy and technology issues. This year, the district expanded its coaching program to
include a middle and high school coach for each of several subject areas, including math, science,
and language arts. This was Michelle’s first year in this new position.
Michelle had been a middle school language arts teacher in the Wallace School District
for seven years before becoming the district’s language arts and technology coach. During those
years as a teacher, she volunteered for a number of leadership positions, including a middle
school curriculum committee and a vertical team of teachers from grades 4-12 who had been
given the task of articulating the district language arts curriculum across grade levels. Michelle
had also been a mentor to new teachers in her building. She pointed out that she had always had
some kind of leadership position that made connections between the work at her school and
issues at the district level. She had been the chair of the language arts department for five years,
and this job in particular had required her to make connections between her school and the district
office. Michelle saw this work as her best preparation for being a district-wide coach, noting, “A
lot of what I do has to do with just talking to people downtown at the district level, the assistant
superintendent and curriculum developers, to let them know what’s going on and what I’m
hearing in the trenches, that kind of thing.”
Michelle’s position was a combination of district- and school-level work. Her schoollevel work focused on helping teachers implement language arts curriculum materials that had
been adopted district-wide after a year of pilot testing. The curriculum materials were recentlypublished teacher guides and student workbooks for grades six, seven, and eight. The pilot
testing had been done in grade six and, based on feedback from teachers and district curriculum
developers, was expanded this year to include grades seven and eight in middle schools across the
district. The curriculum materials had been designed with college placement exams in mind, and
Michelle considered it to be much more rigorous than the variety of collected language arts
materials it replaced. Michelle saw herself as a resource for teachers, helping them to smoothly
implement this new curriculum, including its integrated technology components focusing on
planning and on computer-based diagnostic assessments for students. Every middle school
language arts teacher in the district was working through this new set of teacher guides, and
Michelle considered herself available to help in any way needed.
Michelle tried to establish herself as a curriculum resource during the first two days of
the school year by visiting each middle school language arts teacher in the district, just to say
hello and to introduce herself in her new role. She pointed out that she already knew most of
these teachers from her previous work on curriculum committees and from teaching in the district
for years. She also conducted a brief workshop in each school, outlining how to administer
technology-based diagnostic assessments and use the results to inform instruction of the newly
adopted curriculum.
These early efforts boosted her visibility and helped her establish a working relationship
with teachers and principals. Her current approach was to spend at least half of each day in one
of her seven schools, and the rest of her time in the district office. Michelle’s plan was to arrive
at a school early in the morning, situate herself in the library, and announce her presence via
email using her district-supplied laptop with wireless. Sometimes she set up appointments by
request, but many times she just showed up at a school and let teachers contact her with
questions. Until they appeared, she did other work:
I do other projects while waiting between appointments or seeing if teachers stop by. I
organize materials or fill out grant forms. I’ve found it’s not realistic to be in classrooms
all the time. If I ask permission to come see what kids are doing or to see a teacher teach
a lesson, it’s more successful than just showing up. So now teachers contact me and ask
me to come and work in their rooms. They still see me as a district person.
Michelle was determined to focus her efforts on supporting teachers, and she considered
her time in schools to be a good way to provide this support. She did not stop in classrooms and
observe unannounced but rather made herself available for teachers to request whatever support
they thought they might need. Michelle saw herself as a curriculum resource person at the school
level. She did not see her work as evaluative, and did not position herself as a mentor or even
observer unless this was requested by a teacher. She balanced this curriculum resource work with
district-level duties, participating in meetings and providing assistance to language arts
curriculum developers. Michelle never seemed to sit still for long.
Day One
Composite day one for Michelle started early, at a regularly-scheduled language arts
department meeting. She had been asked to attend by the teacher facilitating the meeting. As
outlined in Table 8, Michelle had a day of traveling between various district sites. Travel times
between locations have been accounted for in the schedule, with time spent driving from one
place to another averaging 30 minutes. In this composite schedule, Michelle is shown to have
worked in two schools and the district office. This was typical for Michelle as reflected in the
complete data set of observations and interviews. What follows is a narrative describing this first
composite day for Michelle as she worked across the Wallace School District.
Table 8 Michelle Composite Day One
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
7:00
30
School
8:00
60
Instructional
District office work
9:30
30
School
Summer reading coach
meeting
10:00
40
School
District office work
11:00
180
School
Planning with Lynn at
Lincoln
2:30
60
Instructional
Department meeting at
Lincoln
Planning with Andrea at
Fillmore
Department meeting at Lincoln
Michelle began her day at a 7 AM meeting of language arts teachers at Lincoln Middle
School. This meeting was a regularly-scheduled event, and on this occasion Michelle was invited
to discuss a couple of items on their agenda. Eleven teachers were in attendance. Michelle talked
first, outlining plans for the middle-school teachers’ summer institute and describing the current
high school curriculum adoption in progress. The teachers listened, but did not say much, at least
not until they got to the next item on the agenda: the summer reading program for students.
Michelle mentioned that she was meeting later in the day with the elementary literacy coaches to
talk about the program, and that this would affect sixth-grade teachers as all incoming students
would be arriving next September having read the same book over the summer. A pilot version
of this program had been implemented the year before, but this year was being expanded districtwide.
Michelle facilitated the discussion, positioning herself as a liaison between teachers and
district-level curriculum personnel.
Michelle:
“What might we change on the summer reading list—looking for improvement—
looking for active engagement among students. How can we streamline the
packet around this purpose?
“It is beneficial for everyone to have the same packet, but some of the special
Lynn:
education kids got the regular packet by mistake (last year).”
Michelle:
“We need to make sure the materials are properly distributed.”
Lynn:
“Could there be a way to preview the book with sixth graders? To get them
jazzed?”
“We could use the summer packet for the spring reading book, so they know how
Lynn:
to do it.”
Michelle:
“The school district website is another resource. It has a template students can
download.”
Wesley:
“Parents would like to help by having instructions available in Spanish.”
Lynn:
“How different is the ninth grade packet?”
Michelle:
“The vocabulary part at the end is different, but that’s about it. I love the idea of
using the packet on a spring book to use as a template and give kids some
practice. Let me clarify what I’m taking back from this meeting: instructions in
Spanish for parents, sample packet online.”
Michelle asserted herself as the facilitator of this part of the department meeting and
made it clear through her comments that she would relay teachers’ concerns back to the district
level. Her goal was to support teachers and to make the summer reading program run as
smoothly as possible, bridging the gap between fifth grade (elementary school) and sixth grade
(middle school).
By the time the meeting ended a few minutes later, Turner, the assistant principal, had
arrived to talk briefly about upcoming assessments, including school administration of the
Diagnostic Reading Assessment (DRA) and the state reading test. There was some concern
among teachers over the amount of time needed to administer the DRA, which included an
individual student interview component. Michelle offered to help administer and score the
assessment, and her offer seemed to be well received. As the teachers dispersed, Lynn
approached Michelle and asked for help planning an upcoming language arts unit. Michelle
agreed to come back later in the day to help Lynn with her planning.
Planning with Andrea at Fillmore
Michelle left Lincoln Middle School and drove across town to Fillmore, where she was
scheduled to meet with Andrea to plan unit four of the new language arts curriculum materials.
Walking into the building, Michelle explained how this meeting had been scheduled:
Last week I was just in the building, because I don’t have an office I’m in a building and
I was walking down the hall and I just wanted to pop in and say, “Hi there, it’s your first
week, how are your kids” and that kind of thing and she said, “Oh Michelle I’m so glad
you’re here.” We started talking and so I suggested that we meet this week because she
wasn’t sure about unit four, had just opened the book.
Andrea was a long-term substitute for a teacher out on maternity leave. She was
currently teaching eighth-grade language arts and social studies, and although she said she had
been reasonably successful over the last few months, she wanted some assistance planning the
next unit, hoping that Michelle could help her focus on the most important concepts she should
teach to her students.
Michelle signed in at the office, walked down the hall to Andrea’s room, said hello and
gave Andrea a hug, and got right to work. They leafed through the unit four teacher’s manual:
Michelle:
“OK, the goal here is to look at unit four. The expectation for the district is just
to teach the first part and focus on essentials relating to the district assessment.”
Andrea:
“Yes, I only got through the first part of lesson one today.”
Michelle:
“There’s just too much. Kids get really engaged and it’s rich. Unit five is
important…I’m thinking three weeks on unit four and the rest on unit five. I
looked through unit four and added a section on persuasive writing so switch to
that at that point. I bet some of my kids would have trouble coming up with
topics, so maybe come up with a list of topics to help motivate students.
Students with common topics could even work together.”
Andrea:
“How specific do I need to be with the students?”
Michelle:
“I have eighth grade example papers. I would teach them how to write a thesis
together. I would have them do some sort of draft and revision. I would take
them through modeling—show an example on the overhead and underline the
topic sentences. For MLA and works cited, I would do that together and
incorporate peer editing into the project.”
Michelle was drawing upon her teaching experience and knowledge of the curriculum
materials to form recommendations for what she thought Andrea should do with her class. She
knew from past experience that although writing was a component of the unit plans, the ways in
which writing was taught was left largely to the classroom teacher. With this in mind, she was
not surprised that much of the talk focused on the writing activities and assignments outlined in
the upcoming units.
Andrea:
“Do they do the letter as homework? Do they rip the page out of their
workbooks?”
Michelle:
“That’s up to the teacher. They can write the prompt on blank paper, rip the page
out of the workbook, or take the whole book home and bring it back.”
Andrea:
“When would you suggest we do the writing?”
Michelle:
“This week through a set of unit four activities, the next set the following week,
the embedded assessment, writing a persuasive essay, the third week. Consider
not doing the virtual debate.”
Andrea:
“Is that OK?”
Michelle:
“Maybe voice opinion and have a discussion but not develop a whole formal
class debate. There are three levels of questions: factual, interpretive, and global.
These are crucial and they will be using these lots in high school. The
vocabulary component could be homework.”
Michelle and Andrea continued this conversation for another forty minutes, walking
through the rest of the unit and deciding what to teach and what to leave out for the sake of time.
Michelle knew the unit plans and seemed able to provide clear and direct answers to Andrea’s
questions. This interaction is an example of Michelle’s focus on being a curriculum resource.
Her advice was very specific. She was suggesting (and telling) ways Andrea might implement
the unit, spanning a range from the minute (when to tear out pages) to the broad (a three-week
outline). Unit implementation was her mission, and she shared any advice she could to make it
work for Andrea. Instructional approaches, however, were not prominent in the conversation.
Mostly they stayed focused on the curriculum materials themselves rather than on how to teach
them.
One interesting moment in their discussion was when Andrea asked if certain activities
could be cut; Michelle hesitated before answering, not wanting to agree too quickly. After the
meeting, on the way back to her car, Michelle mentioned she was troubled by Andrea’s
overriding concern with time, hoping that she would instead consider unit concepts and students’
needs with equal weight. Michelle commented, “I am worried about the time issue and making
decisions based only on that. She got a sense of looking at the purpose and focusing on that. I
need to look at that unit more thoroughly and see if she wants me to model a lesson for her.”
Michelle decided to follow up with Andrea after a few weeks, to see how she was doing
and whether she would like to have Michelle model a lesson for her. Her interaction with Andrea
focused on unit-planning issues as their conversation dealt with what to teach from the teacher’s
guide book and what to leave out. While this talk seemed productive, they did not talk about
either the concepts behind the unit activities or the kinds of instructional skills and strategies that
might be most effective when teaching the unit. In other words, Michelle found it easy to pull out
the teacher guide and go through it with Andrea. The unit was a relevant topic of focus for both
coach and teacher. But the coaching session did not transcend the materials. Instruction was not
discussed. Michelle’s main concern was over time. She said she thought time was too large of a
deciding factor for Andrea, in deciding what to teach and what to skip. She made a note to check
back in with Andrea in the near future.
District office work and summer reading coach meeting
After meeting with Andrea, Michelle drove to the district office and worked on email in
the coach workroom for about half an hour until it was time to facilitate the elementary literacy
coach meeting on planning the summer reading activity for students moving from fifth to sixth
grade. Seven elementary literacy coaches attended the meeting. Michelle had scheduled this
meeting and would facilitate it, since the summer reading activity affected her as well as the
elementary coaches: fifth grade teachers would need to practice the reading program elements
with their students before the end of the school year, and sixth grade teachers would be
responsible for collecting and scoring the summer reading packets in September. Michelle was
assigned by her supervisor to serve as the bridge between the two levels.
As was the case when planning with Andrea, Michelle tried to provide clear answers to
questions that arose during the meeting, and as before, the focus was on curriculum materials and
procedures rather than instruction. One topic of concern was the timing of introducing the
activity to fifth grade students before the end of the school year:
Abigail:
“What is the timeframe for this? What about testing pressure?”
Michelle:
“Let’s get the materials in kids’ hands in June, and four hours working on this in
June is better than nothing.”
Abigail:
“Should we do the book talks or give information to the fifth-grade teachers?”
Michelle:
“I think that depends on how well you know your teachers.”
Julia:
“We should be consistent.”
Michelle:
“I would love to come to classrooms with you.”
Vivian:
“Is there a format we should follow for presenting the book and program?”
Michelle:
“I just talked for a few minutes about the book.”
Julia:
“Sixth-grade teachers last year spent twenty minutes talking about the book,
packet, and rubric. Otherwise it’s overwhelming.”
Michelle:
“So you guys could go over the book and packet and pass out materials including
information about the public library, the website, and resources in Spanish. And
you could show the sixth grade sample packet for a different text.”
Michelle once again took on the role of liaison, as she had done at the early-morning
language arts meeting, offering to communicate the elementary literacy coaches’ concerns to
Megan, the school district’s middle and high school language arts curriculum director. This
meeting with the group of elementary coaches illustrated the liaison role Michelle seemed to
frequently assume, but within a more complicated structure. She was trying to coordinate efforts
between coaches working at sixteen elementary schools, all fifth-grade teachers in the district,
seven middle schools, and the school district language arts curriculum department. She seemed
determined to iron out details, despite a number of issues that kept surfacing, from special
education accommodations to public library support to English language learner concerns.
Through all of this, Michelle kept the meeting moving forward, staying in the liaison role by
summarizing tasks and promising to relay information to the appropriate parties and to get back
to all seven coaches in a timely manner. She concluded the meeting by summarizing what had
been covered, what she needed to do before their next meeting, and what she wanted the
elementary coaches to do in the meantime.
District office work
Michelle walked back to her shared office space and met with Jonathan, the district
technology coach for the district. All of the coaches in the district were expected to assist
teachers with technology, so part of Jonathan’s job duties was to provide technology support for
the coaches to help them support teachers in a more competent and knowledgeable way.
Michelle had requested a work session with Jonathan so that he could help her design and
construct two online surveys, one for language arts teachers and another for middle school
students in language arts classes. The superintendent wanted to know what students thought of
the new curriculum and how teachers might improve it, so he had asked Michelle to construct an
online metric for measuring opinions on the matter.
While they were settling into work with a software program used to design online
surveys, Michelle and Jonathan talked about new curricula in general and the substantial
influence they seemed to have over teacher learning and practice. Jonathan shared that he had
previously worked as a science curriculum developer, a job that turned out to have many
similarities to a coaching position. Reflecting back this work, he commented, “From my
experience in that job it became clear that it’s very difficult to improve teaching without a
curriculum.”
This comment fit with the work Michelle had been doing today: planning units and
activities with teachers and organizing the summer reading activity for students. The focus was
clearly on implementing units and lessons, and it seemed that instruction itself was assumed to
follow, instead of being addressed directly through coaching.
Jonathan and Michelle worked their way through the survey-building program, deciding
on a variety of response items, including multiple-choice, rating scale, and short answer. She
made the teacher survey much more open-ended, to better capture their thoughts and comments
about what they would like to change with the curriculum. She anticipated this information
would be used in summer months to actually make changes to the curriculum. Michelle
considered this to be a valuable way to honor the knowledge and expertise of teachers while at
the same time increasing the sense of ownership teachers might have in relation to a district-wide
mandated curriculum. The student survey was more narrowly focused, using more rating scales
than open-ended items. This survey seemed more of a litmus test to see whether students were
having positive or negative experiences in language arts classes.
Michelle stayed in the shared office space for three hours. During this time she finished
the two online surveys, sent them to the superintendent and to two of her schools for pilot testing,
received a materials request from a teacher via email and located the materials online, and ate a
granola bar in lieu of a lunch break. At about two o’clock she packed up her things and headed
back to Lincoln Middle School to conduct a curriculum planning session with Lynn.
Planning with Lynn at Lincoln
Lynn was the only eighth-grade language arts and social studies teacher at Lincoln, and
being new to the district, she felt she needed some assistance keeping on track with the
curriculum and with district expectations. The purpose of her meeting with Michelle was to plan
units and lessons for the rest of the school year. Lynn looked a bit winded after her day of
teaching, but seemed to perk up a bit once she and Michelle opened their guide books and started
identifying highlights of the unit. Once again, Michelle slipped into the role of curriculum
resource person, providing clear answers to Lynn’s questions about implementing various lessons
and activities. In this case they began by counting backward, week by week, from the end of the
school year, in an attempt to figure out how much time Lynn actually had to complete at least the
major parts of two more units of the curriculum.
Michelle:
“Look at the embedded assessment and go back from that to decide what to
teach. Let’s plan this out up to the first embedded assessment, then see how Tom
Sawyer fits in.”
Lynn:
“The kids have been looking forward to this unit on comedy for a long time.
Motivation won’t be a problem!”
Michelle:
“Start with kids by sharing the embedded assessment text and consider what
they’ll be asked to do.”
“We will be making a wall of comedy with comics, dry humor, internet funnies,
Lynn:
and so on.”
Michelle:
“Many of these steps can be done as homework. Some of these items, like
caricature, are in the literature series anthology. Introduce in class and send it
home as homework.”
Lynn and Michelle continued to talk through the curriculum unit on humor, deciding
which activities to focus on in class, which to send home as homework, and which to cut out.
They also considered ways to bridge the new unit with a study of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,
a novel that had traditionally been taught in eighth-grade language arts. Michelle, having taught
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer the previous year, seemed as familiar with issues surrounding the
novel as she was with the new curriculum materials; their conversation shifted to exploring ways
to integrate the novel with the humor unit. The two mapped out a reading schedule based on the
novel’s twelve parts without even looking at the text. At the end of their planning task, Michelle
reminded Lynn that this was the first year teaching the new curriculum and the Twain novel. Her
recommendation was to keep a clear purpose and to take good notes on what worked well and
what did not. Before she left, she checked in with Lynn, asking her if she felt OK with today’s
progress, acknowledging that she did lots of the talking in their planning session. Lynn
responded,
I really appreciate the help. The district meetings are overwhelming. People just report
out what they are doing. You have been very helpful. I’ve felt very good about teaching
this year. For once I don’t feel like I’m in survival mode. I’d taught in Texas but it’s my
first year here, but I’m getting lots of support.
Lynn’s positive comment suggested that, at least in her case, Michelle seemed to be
serving as a bridge between district demands and classroom realities. Lynn was not an
inexperienced teacher, but she was new to the district and felt that she might have been
overwhelmed were it not for Michelle’s assistance with implementing the new curriculum
materials in a district new to her. In the course of an hour, Michelle had helped Lynn sketch out
weekly plans for the rest of the school year, including integrating the humor unit with the novel
study of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Lynn now had a workable action plan and felt
positively about the experience. Their conversation, though, stayed focused on curriculum units
and coverage and did not address how Lynn would go about teaching the lessons. Instruction did
not enter the conversation.
Michelle checked her email via laptop and wireless from Lynn’s room, but decided to
head home from there rather than return to the district office this late in the afternoon. Having
begun her day early, she considered this a fair compromise.
Day Two
Michelle’s second composite day, outlined in Table 9, resembles the daily schedule
Michelle was actively trying to establish for herself. Her goal was to spend several hours at one
school being generally available and working with teachers who requested her assistance, and
then to spend the rest of the day engaged in scheduled tasks. This second composite day reflects
her scheduling goal, which she was fairly successful achieving over the course of my
observations.
Table 9 Michelle Composite Day Two
Task
Time
Minutes
Type
Work in Wilson library and
with teachers
Meeting with teachers at
Truman
Fillmore department
meeting
8:00
70
140
School
Instructional
12:00
60
School
1:30
40
Instructional
Summer book checkout
2:30
90
School
Work in Wilson library and with teachers
On this day I found Michelle, at eight o’clock, working on her laptop in the library of
Wilson Middle School. At the moment Michelle was participating in an email message
exchange, trying to track down class sets of a novel for two teachers at Wilson who had asked for
her help in locating them. Copies in the textbook warehouse were missing, so Michelle was
working to track them down via email. Her plan for the day was to camp out at this school until
noon and, then, to go to other meetings that had been scheduled in advance. Michelle decided
just that morning to spend time at Wilson, having kept her schedule flexible and open so that she
could simply decide where to go to be available for a few hours. She had just sent out a message
to the teachers, announcing her presence in the library and offering her services to any teacher
wanting to work with her this morning. She had also dropped by the office to say hello to
Andrew, the principal, who had talked with her about a substitute teacher who would be coming
in August to fill in for a teacher planning to be on leave next year. Andrew asked Michelle to
work with this new teacher in September.
Alicia, a sixth-grade language arts and social studies teacher, stopped by to say hello.
She and Michelle had known each other for several years, and their interaction suggested they
were friends as well as colleagues. Alicia set up an appointment with her to go over diagnostic
assessment data from her class. These data were generated by an assessment that was part of the
new curriculum, and Alicia was not completely sure how to interpret them. Michelle seemed
enthusiastic to discuss this topic with her, saying, “If anything, this will confirm what you already
know about your students…I can see support classes using these data to guide their instruction.”
Michelle did not say how teachers would do this. Her comment suggested an awareness
of the link between curriculum, assessment, and instruction, but she did not elaborate, and soon
Alicia had to return to her classroom.
At the beginning of the next period, Michelle walked around the school campus,
checking in with a number of teachers who had planning periods during that time. She started
with Melanie, one of two teachers who had requested Michelle’s help in locating multiple copies
of a novel to use in class. Michelle talked with her for a few minutes, asking her how things were
going with the new curriculum materials. Melanie recalled how she and a coworker had taught
recent units and, then, compared student performance on diagnostic assessments. She pointed out
that the writing assessment was vague. Michelle agreed, offering to send her a supplemental
resource on essay structures to help clarify what would be expected of students for the writing
task. She also suggested Melanie help her class generate a shared list of essay topics, so that
student selection of topics would not be totally random. Melanie said she felt that none of the
students had enough support and details in their writing. Michelle agreed, acknowledging her
concern and suggesting that Melanie might bring this up at the summer curriculum institute.
After a few minutes Michelle moved on to another classroom, not wanting to take up all of
Melanie’s planning time.
The next stop was Wendy’s room. Before entering, Michelle commented to me that
Wendy was a perfectionist, wanted clear plans for her teaching, and struggled with having to
teach both language arts and social studies to the same group of students in a single block of time.
Wendy was also a first-year teacher. She appeared happy to see Michelle and immediately
located her calendar and scheduled an appointment with Michelle to help her administer an
assessment to her class. Michelle said she would be glad to help and would pull some resources
for Wendy in preparation. They talked for about ten minutes about the new curriculum materials
and the integrated assessment and technology components. Wendy indicated she was pleased,
overall, with the curriculum, but was increasingly unhappy with the language arts and social
studies block. She said, “It’s a struggle to teach language arts and social studies together in one
block. I wanted to split them and focus on language arts, but nobody else wanted to.”
Michelle replied, “I’ll continue pushing it when I get the chance.” After we left Wendy’s
room, Michelle told me about this tension between integrated and separate language arts and
social studies classes. Years before, when middle schools replaced junior highs and when gradelevel standards were neither rigid nor greatly emphasized, the language arts/social studies block
seemed like a good way to integrate subjects and to keep students together in a cohesive group for
an extended class period. Now, with precise grade-level standards and a set district curriculum in
language arts, many teachers were advocating for separate periods for the two subjects. Wendy
wanted to focus on language arts and to teach it well. According to Michelle, this was an
increasingly popular opinion. Some schools had separated the two, but not everyone at Wilson
Middle School thought it was a good idea, especially not at the sixth-grade level. Michelle
established her role in this debate by acknowledging Wendy’s opinion and saying she would push
for the separation of language arts and social studies when she got the chance. This stance agreed
with Michelle’s efforts to be a district liaison and, in this case, the flow was in the opposite
direction from other examples: She was agreeing to push a teacher’s agenda at the district level
rather than pushing the district agenda at the teacher’s level. As district liaison, she was
transferring information in both directions between teachers and district-office officials.
Michelle returned to the library, not wanting to monopolize teachers’ planning time with
her impromptu visits. She got back on email to continue the hunt for the missing sets of novels,
finding that one of the ESL teachers had wanted the same book and was planning to order
additional copies soon. Michelle relayed this information to the teachers at Wilson, commenting
to herself, “I’m so ‘in the know’!” With 39 of the desired 80 novels located, she turned her
attention to other work until noon. She spent most of this time reviewing and revising an
informational text drafted by district-level language arts curriculum developers. This was
information that was to be shared with teachers as part of an upcoming district-wide professional
development effort that included the summer institute for teachers. Being familiar with the new
curriculum materials and with teachers’ current experiences using them in classrooms, she had
volunteered to review the text to make sure it matched teachers’ knowledge and experiences.
Again, this work seemed to be part of Michelle’s effort to work as liaison, bridging the gap
between district office personnel and classroom teachers.
Meeting with teachers at Truman
Michelle’s first scheduled meeting of the day was at Truman Middle School, with a
group of language arts and social studies teachers who were concerned about the implementation
of the district curriculum at the school level. These teachers had worked with Michelle several
times over the course of the school year, and she had recently toured the school with a group of
teachers from out of state who were interested in seeing how the new curriculum was being
implemented in relatively diverse middle school classrooms. She was pleased that the teachers at
Truman had taken the initiative to request a meeting with her, and although she was not sure
about the nature of their concerns, she hoped that she could help find resolution to the situation.
Rita, Sandra, and Nicole had gathered in Rita’s classroom for the meeting. All were
language arts teachers working with sixth or seventh graders, and all said they were doing their
best to implement the new curriculum materials. But they did not feel this was the case with
every teacher in their school, and they wondered what steps the district was taking to ensure
implementation compliance across classrooms and schools. Michelle sat down, said she was glad
the teachers had reached out to her, and began facilitating a conversation about the issue by
asking a few questions about how these three teachers had reached their current levels of
frustration.
Nicole immediately raised the issue of the combined language arts and social studies
block, pointing out that it would be nice to be able to focus on one or the other. She also
mentioned how difficult it had been at Truman to staff language arts classes adequately, given
this subject-matter combination: “We had a hard time with staffing this year. Everybody was a
social studies teacher, and there wasn’t anybody with a language arts background. I am so sick of
seeing people hand out a novel and twenty vocabulary words a week and calling that teaching.”
Michelle again acknowledged this issue, saying that she would bring it up at the district
level as being increasingly incompatible with the new language arts curriculum, recommending a
split between the two subject areas.
Even within language arts, these three teachers were upset with the way things were
going. Rita, who made clear that she was a supporter of the new curriculum materials, pointed
out how the integrated and articulated nature of the lessons made it difficult for teachers to be
flexible with curriculum unit implementation. Her feeling was that kids were losing out when
teachers picked and chose from the curriculum according to their own interests without
necessarily considering what might be best for the students. She was angry that she was working
hard to follow the unit plans while other teachers, she felt, were selecting lessons for the sake of
convenience.
Michelle acknowledged Rita’s feelings. She conceded that part of the problem was a
district-level professional development issue, and that increasing teachers’ knowledge of the new
curriculum materials was a continuing goal, and that the upcoming summer institute was the next
opportunity she had to address it. She also made clear that part of the curriculum implementation
issue was an administrative matter: if the new units were a district requirement, then principals
would need to look for them when observing and evaluating teachers in classrooms.
The conversation continued for a while, but with planning periods running short,
Michelle took the initiative to summarize what had been said and what she intended to do with
this information:
I could come to a department meeting and talk about what I am seeing at other schools.
I’m hearing you’d like me to share some information with Edina (the assistant
superintendent, in charge of curriculum) about how the new curriculum is being used
here. That could be the focus of our June institute, along with embedded assessments and
specifics of writing instruction.
Michelle also offered to come back to Truman in June to help administer a reading
assessment. All three teachers readily accepted her offer, and they looked more calm and relaxed
than when Michelle had arrived.
Michelle had facilitated this discussion, which touched upon issues of concern at both the
building and district level. She helped them see the issue from several different perspectives and
offered to voice their concerns to audiences at the district level, people with whom Michelle had
frequent contact. The meeting made clear that these teachers had a strong desire to “do it right,”
to adhere to district policy and implement the new curriculum materials in a complete and
coherent manner, while keeping students’ needs in mind. Rita, Sandy, and Nicole said they were
willing to do the hard work, but they clearly resented their coworkers who they felt were not
putting in equal effort. The existence of this culture of hard work suggested peer pressure among
staff might have an influence on Michelle’s work as coach. These teachers did not consider the
new curriculum materials to be optional, and looked down upon teachers who did. They saw
Michelle as a resource for moving ahead and for implementing and enforcing district initiatives.
Michelle responded to their needs by reacting quickly to their meeting request and by facilitating
the discussion to help them see different facets of the problem.
But Michelle did seem a bit hesitant to take a strong stand on the issues the teachers
raised. She was there to listen and to facilitate, but did not offer to take immediate action as
coach to intervene. Michelle did not offer to go and talk with the teachers of concern to this
group, for example. From her comments it was clear that she considered school administrators as
playing a key role in solving any non-compliance issues in relation to the required use of the new
curriculum materials. An underlying pressure to conform was present in this meeting. Such
pressure is not necessarily positive, but in this case the group of teachers meeting with Michelle
saw the curriculum materials as a good thing for everyone to use, and were hoping everyone
would implement the materials properly so that all students in the school would benefit. Michelle
listened, facilitated the discussion, said she would relay the information to district officials, and
then she left.
Fillmore department meeting
Michelle drove across town to a language arts department meeting at Fillmore. This
second scheduled meeting of the day was very different from the first. It was the last in a series
of meetings held by Michelle and Tamara, the principal of Fillmore. The purpose was to discuss
writing instruction, look at student work, and design and put into action a plan for improving
writing instruction school-wide. Being the concluding meeting, a celebratory tone was in the air,
especially since Michelle was greeted with a gift and applause from Tamara and the ten teachers
attending the meeting.
Tamara facilitated the meeting, starting with having everyone reflect and write for a few
moments in response to two questions: What did I learn as a teacher? What did I learn about
student writing? Michelle took out pen and paper, writing her reflections along with everyone
else. This action aligned her more with the teachers than with the principal. After about five
minutes, Tamara facilitated a discussion to debrief their thoughts and experiences. Much of their
talk focused on teaching more writing this year as a result of the group’s focus on writing
instruction, and also on their increased use of writing rubrics and connecting them back to
instruction. Irene, a seventh grade language arts teacher, commented, “I’ve had students write
more this year. They’ve done it routinely. I’ve also scored them tough, on a 1-5 scale. And the
next time their writing is better.” Others agreed with this comment.
The other major topic that surfaced in this meeting was process writing and its place in
the new curriculum materials. Several teachers observed that writing activities were included
both in class and as homework, and that these activities were integral parts of the overall learning
experience, but that writing instruction itself was virtually missing from the teacher guidebooks.
Michelle, who had been listening to their comments, supplied an explanation, saying that the
materials had been designed to intentionally leave out the writing-instruction piece, so that it
could be supplied at the local level. She pointed out that she had used student work and sample
papers to help teach essay elements like introductions and conclusions. The teachers seemed to
take her explanation at face value, finishing the meeting by talking about how their work on
writing helped them be more intentional in teaching process writing and to provide students with
more authentic assignments. As Irene, a seventh-grade language arts teacher observed, her
students were appearing to understand more of the language arts and social studies content
through writing, now that they were engaged in more authentic writing tasks and not just filling in
blanks on worksheets.
As the meeting ended, several teachers came up to Michelle, thanking her for her
contribution to their group’s efforts and suggesting the district at large ought to do the kind of
work that this team had accomplished here at this school. Michelle thanked them for their kind
words, dropped her gift in her shoulder bag, and headed for her car to drive back to the school
district office for her last task of the day.
Summer book checkout
Michelle entered a large conference room at the district office and sighed. This room was
full of books to be distributed to every elementary school so that each fifth grader would have a
copy to read over the summer. She had planned the summer reading activity with the elementary
literacy coaches, and while they were willing to do their part in orchestrating the whole event,
Michelle realized that she would need to take a more active role than she had originally thought.
The glitch was the district’s library book checkout system. As a middle school person, Michelle
had access to the system via her district-supplied laptop computer. The elementary coaches did
not, and as it turned out, the district did not own enough license rights for the software to provide
it to them. What this meant was that Michelle, with a borrowed bar-code reader, would have to
check out summer-reading books to all of the fifth graders in the school district.
Today was the first of two days spent on this effort. Elementary coaches began to arrive
with lists of students in hand. Each of them had reading packets, folders, and boxes of books.
Their task was to stuff and label folders while Michelle scanned books using the check-out
software. With about 1,200 fifth graders in the district, there was a very large pile of books.
Michelle put a country-western CD in her laptop so that she and a couple of the coaches could
sing along as they worked, but she acknowledged that this repetitive task was not the best use of
her time. She was doing this work because of a software licensing glitch and because there really
wasn’t anyone else to do it. After scanning books for over an hour (it took three scans per book),
she stretched and exclaimed, to the coaches, “We will do this differently next year! You will all
have textbook tracker on your machines by then!” Eventually everyone called it a day and went
home, but Michelle would return in the morning to finish the task, no matter how long it took.
Coaching Issues and Perspectives
Michelle experienced and discussed several major issues over the course of my
observations. First was her emphasis on being a curriculum resource for teachers, helping track
down materials, plan units of study, and showing teachers how to administer and score
technology-based assessments. Second was Michelle’s work being a liaison between the district
agenda and teachers’ needs and concerns. Third was the issue of various tasks taking Michelle
away from time she might otherwise have spent in one of the seven schools she was expected to
visit. From acting as tour guide to personally checking out over one thousand books to fifth
graders, Michelle got the job done even when it was not clear how the task connected to her work
as coach. These three issues were discussed by Michelle as well as by Alicia and Wendy, two
teachers, and by Tamara and Andrew, two principals, whom I interviewed as part of the study.
Michelle saw language arts curriculum support as her primary responsibility as coach.
One major way she supported teachers was to visit each building on a regular basis and spend a
number of hours there, meeting with teachers during their planning periods and being available in
the school library just in case someone stopped by with a question. Michelle observed:
I feel like I have an obligation to support them with the language arts curriculum because
that’s what the district is asking them to do. I think just letting them know that I am here,
if they have a question or need a book, they might as well, teachers have to ask 15 times
before they get one thing, so they might as well ask me too: “Hey Michelle, do you know
where these five novels are?”
Michelle positioned herself as an available resource for teachers to use in implementing
the new curriculum materials. Sometimes this meant she did district-level work in the school
library while waiting for teachers to contact her. Other times she walked around the school,
dropping in to say hello during language arts teachers’ planning periods. When she did this,
curriculum materials rather than instruction was the focus of their conversation. Since every
teacher in the district was working to implement the new units, Michelle appeared able to walk
right into a classroom and ask the teacher how things were going and how she might be able to
help, either with the unit or with its integrated technology component. Curriculum was
Michelle’s key to every middle school language arts classroom in the district. She could simply
appear, say hello, and have teachers be glad to see her.
One specific service she offered was to meet with individual teachers to plan units and
lessons. Although she made an open offer for such meetings, it was up to the teacher to make the
request. Thus, as coach, she only met with teachers who chose to work with her. Two teachers at
Wilson Middle School, Alicia and Wendy, had taken Michelle up on the offer to plan with them,
meeting occasionally over the course of the school year. In talking with each of these teachers
about their experiences with their coach Michelle, it became apparent they saw her primarily as a
valuable curriculum resource. Alicia noted:
I probably email her once a week if not more, I would say more. And then she’s
probably in my room every two or three weeks. And she comes to this school pretty
often and says, “I’m available if you want to come to the library and talk.” So I’ll go
down and say hi and see what’s going on.
Alicia was a confident, experienced language arts teacher who had studied the new
curriculum materials as part of the district pilot testing the year before. She seemed to know as
much about it as Michelle, yet she welcomed the assistance when it was convenient and available.
In fact, Alicia mentioned she felt spoiled by the attention and the amount of time Michelle was
able to spend in her class, planning lessons, and even co-teaching once in a while.
Wendy had a slightly different take on the coaching process. She was a new teacher, and
she felt that she was floundering a bit just to follow the new curriculum and keep her classes
organized and on track from day to day. Wendy said she didn’t feel ready for the coaching
process, but that maybe over the next few years she would be able to more effectively draw upon
Michelle’s expertise:
For me, I haven’t utilized it as much as I could because I’m new. I say that, for me, it’s
just too difficult because all of my free time is learning the curriculum, and so what I
predict for me is that my second and third, third and fourth year of teaching really will be
utilizing, having that support there. I could go to someone who has been a master teacher
and who has been through the curriculum, who knows it really well, and say, if a lesson
didn’t go well, or year after year if this one lesson doesn’t go well, presenting this lesson
to Michelle and saying, “This is how I did it all these years, I’ve tweaked things here and
there. What can I be doing differently?” It would be nice to get that feedback from
somebody. Sometimes your colleagues are busy doing other things, so you can’t really
talk to them.
Wendy suggested she might benefit more from Michelle’s expertise if she had a more
experience and knew what to ask. Also, she felt that time was not on her side, as she needed
every moment for pragmatic planning concerns and could not spare a little bit of her planning
time to talk with Michelle, except for the occasional chat like what occurred today. At the same
time, Wendy acknowledged the desire to receive feedback, just not yet. Her comments suggested
she considered herself too new to make use of such information. In this way, Michelle seemed to
be a valuable yet slightly unusable resource for Wendy.
Michelle’s work with groups of teachers seemed to be appreciated by those who had
taken part in this form of professional development. Both Alicia and Wendy spoke favorably of
Michelle’s small-group professional development meetings she held at the school to lead teachers
through the process of administering and interpreting online diagnostic assessments. She met with
these groups early in the year, helped them establish an assessment schedule using the computer
lab, and then returned to assist the teachers in actually giving the assessment to students.
Tamara, the principal at Fillmore Middle School, also emphasized Michelle’s utility as a
curriculum resource. In particular, Tamara encouraged teachers on the fringe of language arts to
contact Michelle and take advantage of her curriculum expertise. Fillmore had somewhat large
English as a Second Language (ESL) and Special Education programs (compared to other schools
in the district), so Tamara was concerned that teachers in these two areas might not receive
enough support in language arts. Michelle acknowledged that several Special Education and ESL
teachers had been in regular contact with her, and that she was happy to assist them in the same
ways she helped mainstream language arts teachers. Although the district had support staff for
these programs, Michelle worried that they might not have had much knowledge of the new
curriculum materials, so she was committed to providing assistance when it was requested.
Beyond curriculum support, Michelle spent time and effort on the role of liaison between
teachers and district office personnel. She reflected on this role fairly often, acknowledging its
importance and inherent dangers:
I’m kind of the middle man, the communication person, sometimes things I hear that
things the district wants me to say to the teachers, I communicate that with teachers, and
they communicate, usually, their frustrations. When it’s good it’s fabulous. I try to
communicate that and often things get misinterpreted and the communication from
district to individual teachers still needs to happen. It’s not like coaches can always be
that go-between, so that’s been a challenge for me, when to say, “I’m going to take
myself out of this situation, and you need to talk to the principal or someone, I’m not the
right person to talk to about that.” Staying out, trying to appease both sides but never
have them talk.
This role was prominent for several reasons, the first of which was her assignment of
working with all seven middle schools in the district. As a former teacher and current district
representative, it seemed only natural for her to communicate the official line while also listening
to the voices of individual teachers in the field. The second reason for her liaison role was that
she was not only the district representative but a consultant for the new curriculum materials. Her
task was to help teachers implement units and lessons effectively, which was of utmost
importance to the district. But the superintendent also wanted to know what teachers and even
students thought of the new approach, so Michelle was encouraged to listen to teachers’ feedback
and relay this back to the district office.
One danger of this role was to avoid getting caught between district mandates and teacher
frustrations, and worse, to be labeled a district spy by teachers. Although Alicia, the teacher at
Wilson, had chosen to work frequently with Michelle, she was well aware of the spy potential,
saying about Michelle and other middle school coaches:
I think they’ve done a pretty good job trying to reassure us they’re not trying to be spies.
But yes, they do report back what they see, because people downtown will ask and they
can’t just say, “I don’t know what they’re doing,” but they share their successes and their
thoughts within the classroom. I think they try pretty hard to be open.
Tamara saw Michelle’s liaison role as a powerful asset to the district. She considered her
to be a respected resource who served as a conduit to connecting teachers from different schools,
making it possible to share ideas across sites and to work together, through Michelle, to
successfully implement the new curriculum materials. Tamara considered Michelle’s role as
conduit to be especially valuable in relation to her school’s work on improving writing instruction
and assessment. The writing rubrics and anchor papers developed and identified at Fillmore were
now being shared, by Michelle, with other teachers across the district. Tamara felt this sharing
was beneficial to Fillmore, establishing stronger connections with writing instruction efforts at
other schools. In this district it seemed that being on the same page with other schools was
important, and Tamara saw Michelle as a key factor in making this possible.
Michelle echoed Tamara’s thoughts, but more from a teacher’s than a principal’s
perspective. She noted that with approximately 180 students per day, teachers had little time to
look at the larger district-wide picture of middle school language arts education. By visiting all
seven schools and communicating what she had seen in different places, Michelle knew she was
helping teachers see the overall process and know they were not facing unique challenges in the
isolation of their individual classrooms.
Andrew, the principal at Wilson, took the liaison idea in a different direction, asking
Michelle to lead a school-wide effort at his school to promote the new language arts curriculum to
the parent community. The potential problem was that the new comprehensive curriculum
materials were designed to replace both the remedial and honor programs with one integrated
program for all learners, and this leveling might have angered parents, especially those of
students enrolled in the honors program. Michelle gathered information and put together a video
of the progression the school had gone through in changing its language arts program, looking at
the work the school wanted to establish so it was student-friendly from one grade to the next and
letting people know why it would be important to see continual growth in student achievement.
Michelle and a group of teachers held several community meetings for parents, using the video to
explain the school’s language arts plan. Andrew noted that the new language arts program had
been phased in without a single complaint from the community, even though the outgoing honors
program had been held in high regard. He credited Michelle for the smooth transition, and he
considered her a talented spokesperson for both Wilson Middle School and the district language
arts program.
The third major issue that surfaced during the observations, and through Michelle’s own
words, was the number of tasks she was asked to do that had very little to do with supporting
teachers or serving as liaison. Dedicated to her job and her district, Michelle performed these
tasks, but she clearly identified them as obstacles to her work. In relation to teachers’
professional knowledge landscapes, these tasks Michelle ended up completing seemed to have
little to do with teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes at all. The most extreme example of
this was the summer reading activity book checkout for graduating fifth grade students. Due to
software licensing agreements, the elementary coaches could not check out books to students.
Michelle realized that nobody else could complete this task. Since she valued the summer
reading activity, and since she wanted incoming sixth graders to be well prepared for their first
year of middle school, she did this work herself. Beyond the hour and a half described in the
narrative, Michelle spent another four hours the next day checking out books, one by one. This
was time she could have spent working with teachers, either at the abstract level of the out-ofclassroom place on teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes or at the more concrete level of
the in-classroom place of daily instruction. The lack of connection between these tasks and the
middle school language arts teachers seemed to frustrate Michelle.
She was also asked, on several occasions, to be a tour guide for visitors from other
districts. The language arts program was seen as new and innovative, so the Wallace School
District implementation was attracting considerable attention. Michelle found that requests to see
the new program in action were forwarded to her, with the expectation that she would arrange
school and classroom visits and work out logistical details for groups of teachers and
administrators coming to see what was going on. Michelle did this work, partly because she
knew there was nobody else to do it, but she expressed frustration over the time it took to be a
tour guide. She observed:
I spent time this week contacting possible middle schools to visit by first checking with
the principal then asking teachers. It was for the most part productive because I have
done this thing twice this year but, at the same time, it was a bit frustrating because I
would rather be working with teachers to impact student learning. I do feel, however,
that showcasing our schools and sharing our programs will touch student lives, even if
they are not inside our district.
Despite her desire to be a useful curriculum resource and liaison between district and
school personnel, Michelle ended up spending quite a bit of time doing other things. From book
check-out to tour guide, to having to drive from school to school, Michelle did not spend as much
time coaching as she had originally hoped. Working with teachers, helping them with their day to
day teaching, making things easier, relaying information between district and teachers—these
were the goals Michelle focused on as coach. Reflecting on her overall work as coach, she
summed up what she saw as the most important aspect of her work:
I think it’s definitely providing a link that wasn’t there in our district before, and just
from the reception that I get when I am in buildings is that people are very thankful just
to have someone to sit down with and talk things over. It can be as easy as, “I feel really
behind in our sequence,” and I say they aren’t and that they are in the exact same place as
other teachers. They are relieved.
Summary of the three composite narratives
Coaches in this study assumed a variety of roles as they worked with teachers and
otherwise engaged in the coaching process. Some of these roles focused on mentoring-oriented
tasks that connected to teachers’ daily work with students. Other roles assumed by the coaches
focused on whole-school literacy efforts, district-wide professional development, or other schoolrelated issues of concern to teachers or administrators. While each coach engaged in both of
these kinds of work, the amount of time spent in each varied from coach to coach, as did the
specific roles the coaches assumed.
Settings and contexts also varied from coach to coach. In particular, organizational
factors such as school schedules, the combination of language arts and social studies, and the time
Michelle spent traveling from school to school had an impact on the ways in which the coaches
were able to engage in the coaching process. School culture also impacted this process, as did the
characteristics and actions of the school principals. Further, the coaches themselves affected the
degree to which they engaged in the coaching process. Professional background and ways of
interacting with others seemed to influence the degree to which Diane, Grace, and Michelle were
able to interact with teachers at both an individual and whole-school level.
Each coach worked on classroom instructional and school-related tasks, but the impact of
the coaching process on teacher learning and classroom practice was unclear. Some teachers and
principals made positive comments about their work with the coaches, while others raised
questions or expressed frustration. Even when co-teaching and working actively with teachers on
curriculum, planning, and instruction, the effects of the coaching process on teacher learning and
classroom practice remained uncertain.
The purpose of the composite narratives was to construct a vivid picture of the
experiences of the three literacy coaches as they engaged in their daily work. How the cases of
Diane, Grace, and Michelle compare, and the trends that emerge from this cross case comparison,
is the subject of the next chapter.
Chapter 7
Cross-Case Analysis
The purpose of this chapter is to analyze trends across the three cases of coaching in this
study. By comparing the unique experiences of each coach, I consider the patterns that emerge
from the data and interpret these patterns in relation to the study’s research questions concerning
coaching roles, school contextual factors, and coaching connections to teacher learning and
classroom practice.
Middle School Coaching Roles
Roles coaches assumed fell into two categories, classroom instructional and schoolrelated. While each coach spent time working on role-related tasks in both of these categories,
the amount of time allocated to one or the other varied. Table 10 shows the percentage of total
observed time each coach spent working within these two categories.
Table 10 Classroom Instructional and School-Related Roles: Percentage of Total Observed Time
Instructional
School
Diane
43
57
Grace
37
63
Michelle
33
67
Classroom instructional roles were comprised of tasks involving actual classroom work
and support directly related to this work, such as planning with a teacher, co-teaching, observing
lessons, or providing support for current daily classroom work. As indicated in Table 10, all
three coaches spent some time on these tasks, with Diane spending the most time working on
teacher-instruction tasks. Between planning daily lessons, observing, providing feedback, and
co-teaching, Diane spent a fairly large amount of time on classroom instructional tasks. Still,
none of the coaches in this study spent even half of their time engaged with teachers on tasks
relating to daily classroom practice.
Table 10 also shows that all three coaches spent the majority of their time in schoolrelated roles, engaged in tasks such as professional development meetings, workshops,
administrative duties, and other work removed from day-to-day classroom happenings. Michelle
spent the most time on these tasks. Between designing surveys for the superintendent, checking
out books for the summer reading program, and attending district-level meetings, it was not
surprising to find that she spent two thirds of her time engaged in school-related tasks. Whether
at many schools or just one, though, all three coaches spent a majority of their time in schoolrelated roles. This indicates the coaches spent relatively limited amounts of time engaged with
teachers on issues of daily classroom practice.
These two categories, classroom instructional and school-related roles, are significant in
two ways. First, they run parallel to, but are not synonymous with, the two major responsibilities
of literacy coaching identified in the literature: to mentor teachers and to promote whole-school
professional development efforts. The coaches in this study spent time on both coaching
responsibilities, dividing their work unequally between teacher mentoring and literacy advocacy.
Second, they suggest a number of ways in which coaching may affect teacher learning and
classroom practice at different levels, from individual mentoring sessions to large-group
meetings. In the next two sections I consider classroom instructional and school-related roles in
relation to these issues.
Classroom instructional roles
Classroom instructional roles had the potential to impact teacher learning and practice at
the level of daily classroom instruction, suggesting a link to the mentoring responsibility of
coaching. Tasks relating to these roles involved the coach working directly with a teacher (or
rarely a small group of teachers), or in a few instances suggested the potential for the coach to
work directly with the teacher as a follow-up to the particular task.
I identified five distinct coaching roles in relation to coaches’ classroom instructional
tasks. Table 11 shows the percentage of total observed time each coach spent on tasks associated
with these roles. The profile of each coach’s time dedicated to classroom instructional tasks is
unique. Diane, for example, spent approximately half of her classroom instructional time either
observing or working with teachers while students were in the room. Grace spent much less time
on this sort of class-session work, and Michelle did not observe or co-teach once during the
weeks I observed her. She did, however, spend time in the role of district liaison, translating
district mandates and requests into language teachers could incorporate into their daily work with
students. Neither Grace nor Diane engaged in this role, perhaps because they were only
responsible for one school each and did not find themselves in a position to relay information
from the district to individual teachers. They were focused solely on the work of one school, and
with their positions being funded by a private foundation, the district had no control over the
kinds of work they did in their schools.
Table 11 Classroom Instructional Roles: Percentage of Total Observed Time
Teacher
Class-session
Student District Substitute
resource
resource
tutor
liaison
teacher
Percent of
total time
Diane
22%
21%
0%
0%
0%
43
Grace
10%
8%
12%
0%
7%
37
Michelle
24%
0%
0%
9%
0%
33
The role labeled teacher resource was comprised of five distinct codes: materials person,
curriculum, planning, direct, and indirect. The first, materials person, involved situations when
the coach, usually at the teacher’s request, looked up or located materials for the teacher to use in
class. When Michelle spent time during composite day two tracking down copies of a novel for
two teachers at Wilson Middle School, she was at that time acting as materials person. While
working as a materials person was helpful to teachers, its impact on the coaching process
appeared limited. The teachers at Wilson needed Michelle’s help in locating books, but they did
not ask her how to plan or teach lessons dealing with the book’s contents. Materials-person tasks
had distinct benefits and shortcomings. On the positive side, this aspect of the teacher resource
role put the coach in a positive light in the eyes of teachers, and also helped the coach gain access
to classrooms. It also appeared to foster the development of the teacher-coach relationship,
showing teachers in a concrete way that the coach could be helpful. On the negative side,
materials-person tasks seemed to be an easy way for coaches to busy themselves instead of
moving into other perhaps more difficult work, such as engaging in conversations about
instruction. While being a materials person supported teachers in an individualized way, and
appeared to have the potential to lead to meaningful coaching experiences, it ultimately came
across as a job more fitting to a clerk than a mentor, and seemed like a limited use of the coach’s
expertise.
Curriculum and planning, two other closely-related codes in the role of teacher resource,
took up a noticeable amount of classroom instructional time for all three coaches. These codes
were applied to instances when the coach talked with teachers, usually one-to-one, about
curriculum materials or unit or daily lesson planning. Michelle, for example, spent a noticeable
amount of time on curriculum materials, talking with teachers about units, lessons, activities, and
homework. Diane dedicated some large chunks of time to talking with teachers about daily and
weekly planning, highlighting concepts to teach and how those concepts would connect to
established state standards. While these roles had potential in relation to the mentoring
responsibility of coaching, to get teachers to consider issues of learning and practice, the clear
limitation of these curriculum-focused tasks was that they only covered what the teacher should
be teaching, not how it should be taught. Issues of instruction were not discussed. Rather,
conversations stayed focused on the curriculum materials and how to fit the lessons into a limited
timeframe. It might be argued that by discussing units and lessons, teachers take initial steps to
expanding their professional knowledge, but noticeably absent from these curriculum-focused
coaching tasks was talk of instruction, consideration of observation and feedback, or reflection on
teaching. Instead of delving deep into the teaching and learning process, the curriculum-focused
aspect of the teacher-resource role skated across the surface of teacher knowledge, targeting what
to teach rather than how to teach it.
Occasionally, coaches were observed engaging teachers in conversations about issues of
instruction. These interactions, still part of the teacher resource role, were coded as indirect or
direct. Indirect was when the coach steered the teacher toward an instructional insight in a
suggestive manner; direct was when the coach gave the teacher more straightforward instructional
advice. Diane tended to employ the indirect approach. She tried to encourage teachers to think
beyond the content of a lesson by asking questions about the means of instruction that might be
most appropriate for both students and course content. Grace favored the direct approach,
delivering statements recommending certain instructional approaches as a way to get teachers to
consider how to teach upcoming lessons. Both coaches in these moments of interaction appeared
to be functioning as mentors, guiding teachers toward new ideas and instructional approaches and
suggesting ways they might be implemented in the classroom. Given the mentoring
responsibility of coaches, these were instances that seemed to hit the mark: coach and teacher
engaged in discussions about issues of instruction and current classroom practice. Yet the
scarcity of such conversations, representing just a handful of all coded data segments in this
study, suggests that engaging teachers in instruction-focused discussions was a significant
challenge for the coaches. Although they met with teachers and talked with them, these
conversations seemed to move toward less threatening topics, such as curriculum materials or
student behaviors, missing the mentoring-for-instruction purpose embedded in the coaching
process.
The next classroom instructional role evidenced in Table 11 is class-session resource.
This included all instances when the coach was in classrooms while teachers and students were
going about their work, and such instances were coded as either observer or demonstration. The
difference between these two codes proved significant to understanding the way coaching played
out during class sessions. Much of Diane’s time, for example, was actually spent observing
rather than conducting demonstration lessons. When observing, Diane was relatively powerless.
She could watch, but she could not (or did not) interact with the teacher at some point, either
during or after class, to discuss issues of learning and practice. Time spent as observer, without
follow-through to other coaching tasks, was a missed opportunity to initiate conversations of
learning and practice.
Demonstration lessons seemed more productive. Several lessons taught by coaches were
well-received by teachers who indicated that such lessons helped them bridge the gap between
professional development in theory and application in practice. The downside of demonstration
lessons was that they did not always turn out to be rich opportunities for the coach to engage the
teacher in discussions about instruction. Without being integrated with a set of coaching sessions
involving planning, debriefing, or reflection, there was little to suggest that teachers felt prepared
or supported enough to try teaching a similar lesson independently. Conducting demonstration
lessons alone, without much support or follow-through, did not seem to lead to engagement in the
coaching process. In general, the time coaches spent in classrooms seemed necessary but not
sufficient for instructional coaching to occur. Coaching seemed to require not only time in
classrooms, but time in classrooms as part of a coordinated and scheduled effort to work with
teacher through observations, demonstration lessons, debriefing, reflection, and repeated visits as
part of an ongoing coaching process. Without such an ongoing process, there seemed to be only
isolated observations and occasional demonstration lessons.
The next role in Table 11, student tutor, refers to instances when the coach worked
directly with students in an official manner. Grace was the only coach who spent time working in
this way, administering reading assessments, at the request of the principal and/or teacher as if
she were a reading specialist rather than a coach. While the goal of this work was to assess these
students’ reading abilities and use the results to help their language arts teachers with daily
classroom instruction, in practice this second step did not happen. Grace did not transform these
reading assessment sessions into coaching opportunities, as she did not follow through with the
students’ teachers by discussing her findings with them. The teachers did not ask for the
assessment results either. It appeared that data Grace collected were not shared with teachers or
used to inform instruction. In this way, the student tutor role had potential to connect to daily
classroom practice, but this potential was not realized. Grace ended up spending more time in the
role of student tutor than she did as a teacher resource. From her experience, it appeared that time
the coach spent working with students, something traditionally associated with reading
specialists, took time away from the kinds of teacher-related work that were more central to the
responsibilities of instructional coaching.
District liaison was a classroom instructional coaching role that was unique to Michelle’s
situation of traveling to multiple schools to assist teachers with the implementation of curriculum
materials. Michelle often facilitated conversations with teachers to explain how school district
policies and purposes related to their daily classroom work. She saw this work as essential to her
job and complementary to her work implementing the new curriculum materials district-wide.
She considered herself a district representative, encouraging the use of the new curriculum
materials the district had purchased for teachers to use. She also considered herself an advocate
for teachers at the district level, having been a middle school language arts teacher before
accepting the coach position. Yet, through interviews and observations, it became clear that,
although the liaison role may have made teachers more comfortable with their work, coach time
spent in this role did not contribute to instructional conversations or mentoring focused on
changes in teacher learning or classroom practice. In this district liaison role, the coach seemed
to help everyone understand each other and get along well but did not seem to push forward any
conversations about instruction.
The final role listed in Table 11 is substitute teacher, a role that only Grace assumed. She
was asked fairly regularly to fill in for teachers, especially when it involved half-day releases for
professional development meetings or teachers who needed to go home mid-day due to illness.
This role was classified as classroom instructional because there was potential for her to see what
was going on in classes, possibly teach students a demonstration lesson, and talk with the teacher
afterward to reflect on instructional approaches and classroom events. Yet, it was clear from the
data that this role consumed enormous amounts of time and energy that otherwise might have
been spent working on issues of instruction in planned and meaningful ways. While the coach
might salvage the situation by scheduling a follow-up meeting with the absent teacher, the lack of
coaching potential of the substitute-teacher role was clear: being a last-minute substitute could
not be planned in advance, did not include preparation, and had no scheduled follow-up
discussion. It consumed most of a day and took precedent over any other appointments the coach
may have previously scheduled. Time spent as a substitute teacher could not be spent working
with teachers on issues of instruction.
While coaching roles considered classroom instructional were categorized as having a
potential impact on teachers’ daily classroom practice, sometimes this potential did not
materialize. In the case of the other category, school-related roles, links between tasks and some
aspect of the coaching process were harder to ascertain.
School-related roles
This category was broadly defined to include a wide range of coaching roles and related
tasks. Although all of these tasks were school-related on some level, their potential to relate to
issues of learning and practice was not clear. Some school-related tasks appeared to have this
potential, and some did not. Coaches were observed in five roles relating to these tasks,
continuing the pattern from the previous category of coaches assuming a variety of roles. Table
12 shows the percentage of school-related time spent in each of these roles. Breaking apart this
set of roles reveals different profiles for each of the three coaches and brings to question the
impact the coaches may have had on teacher learning and classroom practice.
Table 12 School-related Roles: Percentage of Total Observed Time
Professional Principal Lunchtime Tour
Office
developer
assistant
librarian
guide
worker
Percent of
total time
Diane
20%
11%
2%
0%
24%
57
Grace
16%
14%
0%
6%
27%
63
Michelle
34%
0%
0%
8%
25%
67
The first role, professional developer, was drawn from three data codes: coordinator,
facilitator, and technology assistant. All three of these codes were closely related in terms of the
literacy advocacy purpose of the professional development of teachers, and so were combined
under the umbrella term of professional developer. Tasks in this role included planning or
leading professional development meetings, facilitating department head or other regularlyscheduled school meetings, and in Michelle’s case, assisting with technology in small or largegroup settings. This role suggests at least some potential for the coach to work with teachers on a
literacy-advocacy rather than mentoring level. All three coaches, in some capacity, engaged
teachers in literacy-related discussions, either through technology tutorials, department meetings,
or coach-facilitated professional development sessions. Observations of these events, along with
data gleaned from interviews, suggest the professional developer role may have contributed to the
coaches’ whole-school professional development efforts as literacy program advocate. The
impact of such efforts, however, and connections between this role and those categorized as
classroom instructional, remain unclear.
The remaining four school-related roles did not seem to have much potential in relation to
either the literacy-advocacy or mentoring responsibility of coaching. Sometimes the coaches
found themselves assuming a principal-assistant role, either at the request of the principal or on
their own initiative if they thought there was no other way to fix a problem or get something
done. Michelle did not find herself in this position, but since she traveled to seven schools and
was not in any one place for long, opportunities for her to be exposed to the principal assistant
role were few. Grace and Diane, in contrast, frequently worked on administrative tasks.
Different factors contributed to time spent in this role. Grace was frequently asked to give her
opinion on a variety of administrative issues under consideration, while Diane found herself
picking up the leadership slack in order to push forward the school’s literacy agenda. While both
principals praised the coaches for their work and leadership, the coaches had differing opinions of
the principal assistant role. Diane expressed frustration over it, while Grace considered this work
part of her contribution to the school. Either way, the principal assistant role reduced the amount
of time the coaches had to work with teachers.
The lunchtime librarian role was classified as school-related because it was a stand-alone
experience for students and did not connect to work teachers were doing in class. Only Diane
assumed this role, working with students who chose to come to her space during their 40 minutes
of lunch and free time to visit and check out books. While this accounted for a small fraction of
her school-related role time, it did seem to have a significant impact on students. In the halls they
identified her as “The Book Lady” and on most days there was a group of students hanging out in
her office reading books. This role was something Diane decided to do on her own to make a
positive difference for students and for herself. While a coaching role focused on motivating
students may benefit the students (and school), in this case it did not connect to issues of teacher
learning or classroom practice. This appears to be an example of when a coach ended up
funneling her energies into a role that remained disconnected from ongoing work with teachers to
improve instruction.
One role Diane did not have to play, but that took the time of Grace and Michelle, was
that of tour guide. These two coaches found themselves scheduling school tours and hosting
groups of visitors, mostly teachers from other districts, showing them around and conducting
discussions afterward. This role took up large chunks, even entire days, of the coaches’ time.
Michelle, who was frequently asked to be a tour guide for the district, was frustrated by this task,
as it took a great deal of advanced planning to establish a tour schedule to see classrooms, in
various schools, at different levels where the new curriculum materials were in use (and where
teachers would be willing to have a group of visitors watching). While such tours might be a
good public relations tool for school districts, they had nothing to do with coaching teachers. In
doing the bidding of their superiors and assuming the role of tour guide, the coaches ended up
setting aside their own coaching work to perform duties unrelated to teacher learning or
classroom practice.
The rest of the coaches’ school-related time was spent in an office work role. Office
work in this case is a blanket term covering everything from sifting through school or district
email, making photocopies, and organizing books, binders, or office materials, to sorting through
stacks of student test booklets, revising texts written by curriculum developers, and other clerical
or organizational tasks not connected to supporting teachers’ daily classroom practice or to
whole-school literacy advocacy work. While this kind of work would seem to be an inevitable
part of working with principals and teachers in fairly large middle schools, it is nevertheless
surprising that coaches might spend more time in the role of office worker than professional
developer, or that a coach would spend nearly half of her school-related time working alone in
her office on clerical sorts of tasks. The discovery of this office-work role, along with those of
principal assistant, lunchtime librarian, and tour guide, suggest that coaches spend a significant
amount of time engaged in work not connected to the two responsibilities of coaches, literacy
program advocacy and teacher mentoring. This discovery led to the identification of a third
category, peripheral tasks, fed overwhelmingly by coaching roles that were school-related.
Peripheral tasks
Approximately 30% of observed coach time was spent on peripheral tasks that appeared
to have little if any potential to connect to teacher learning or classroom practice. Of the five
school-related roles discussed, only the first one, coordinator, seemed in some way connected to
the coaching process, or more specifically, to the coaching responsibility of literacy program
advocacy. Few other school-related tasks appeared to be connected to the coaching process at all,
either at a literacy advocacy or teacher mentoring level. One striking example of such a task was
when Michelle ended up checking out books for the district summer reading program, as outlined
in day two of her composite narrative. She spent hours doing this work. It was literacy-related.
But it had nothing to do with teachers’ knowledge of literacy instruction.
Some of the peripheral tasks performed by the coaches were assigned to them, while
others were chosen by the coaches themselves. Either way, it was clear that the coaches, with
their multiple classroom instructional and school-related roles, frequently ended up spending their
time working on peripheral clerical, bureaucratic, and administrative tasks disconnected from
issues of teacher knowledge and classroom practice. While sometimes it appeared as though the
coaches chose these tasks, mostly it seemed as though the disconnected tasks were piled upon
them. Time coaches spent on peripheral tasks represented time taken away from mentoring
teachers or from taking up issues of literacy advocacy.
In summary, coaches spent time assuming a variety of classroom instructional and
school-related roles. While some of these roles and related tasks seemed to hold potential to
connect to issues of teacher learning and classroom practice, a considerable amount of coach time
and effort missed the intended target, landing instead in a place of peripheral tasks, disconnected
from issues of teacher learning or classroom practice. Although the coaches worked full time,
they were not full-time instructional coaches.
School Contexts
The coaches in this study did not function in a vacuum. Their many classroom
instructional and school-related roles were influenced by a variety of school contexts. The
prominent contextual factors of school were: organizational factors, school and classroom
climate, principal and coach relationships, and coach-related factors. I will consider each of these
in the following sections.
Organizational factors
Coaches worked within a series of well-established and sometimes rather complicated
structures, and organizational factors relating to these structures impacted the coaching process.
Michelle’s position, for example, was organized around meeting the needs of language arts
teachers at all seven middle schools in the district. Being a somewhat large district
geographically, she ended up spending lots of time in her car. The constant traveling that was
part of her job made it difficult for her to engage in ongoing work with teachers in classroom
instructional roles such as classroom resource, where advance planning and follow-up would be
required for this time to be used effectively. Traveling from school to school seemed to have the
effect of reducing Michelle’s capacity to work as a mentor with teachers on an ongoing basis.
She had to be many places in any given week, and had to spend lots of time in her car getting
there.
Diane had organizational challenges of a different sort. In her case it was a scheduling
dilemma that kept her from coaching a larger number of teachers. The problem was that many
language arts teachers taught their classes during the same two periods near the end of the day,
making it difficult for Diane to observe and have debriefing sessions with any of these teachers.
One way she seemed to compensate for this was to visit various classrooms when she had time,
perhaps contributing to her frustrating experiences in the observer role.
Grace’s struggle was with individual teachers in relation to the school schedule. With
four targeted teachers for her coaching work, she had tried setting up a schedule to work with a
different teacher each day (except Friday). But field trips, shortened schedules, assemblies,
teacher-release times, and other scheduling factors seemed to reduce her calendar to chaos. With
scheduled planning meetings or demonstration lessons for the day canceled, she may have stayed
at her desk and done office work instead of venturing into classrooms without a schedule.
For all three coaches, organizational factors interfered with their work with teachers in
classrooms, and all three said at some point they wished their schedules were more stable and
could involve more time in classrooms. Middle school structures and scheduling presented
obstacles to coaches’ attempts to work with teachers in meaningful ways, moving them toward
peripheral tasks when it seemed that other sorts of tasks could not fit the schedule. Ongoing
mentoring work, for example, would need to include a series of planning meetings, observations,
and follow-up conversations. Without a clear and systematic schedule to accommodate these
kinds of meetings, the coaches struggled to assume coaching roles that had potential to connect to
issues of teacher learning or classroom practice.
School and classroom climate
School and classroom climate had an impact on the attempts the coaches made to engage
teachers in the coaching process, so that scheduling alone was not enough to ensure successful
work with teachers. A negative school climate made it difficult, at times, for the coach to gain
access to classrooms or to engage in conversations with teachers. In Grace’s case, the negative
climate was subtle, becoming evident only occasionally, but it hinted at what Grace perceived to
be widespread resentment toward her by teachers who considered her job an unnecessary luxury.
This negativity may also have discouraged her from observing in classrooms and engaging
teachers beyond the four she had been assigned. Grace said she did not see the point in visiting
classrooms unannounced, but perhaps she also did not want to venture into classrooms where she
may not have felt welcome. She worked with a sense of caution, almost checking her back as she
walked the halls, and did not often visit classrooms.
Diane worked in a decidedly more negative environment. Her day to day battles to gain
access to classrooms and get teachers thinking about literacy instruction sometimes left her so
discouraged she felt compelled to quit her job. Diane did visit classrooms on occasion, but
teachers were so noticeably stressed in terms of daily survival that there did not seem to be much
Diane could do except sit a few minutes, take notes, and then leave. In some of these cases the
classroom climate Diane observed was hostile. Students were angry and, on occasion, declared
their anger. It was hard to imagine how Diane might have gone about moving from an observer
role into a more active coaching role in these instances, especially without principal support. On
a whole-school level she did attempt to do some work to improve the school climate, such as
being a participating member of the instructional council, but this took a great deal of effort and
seemed to push Diane into the principal assistant role more often than might have been
anticipated.
Although Michelle did not encounter negative school climates during this study, she did
face the challenge of working with multiple school climates and of being perceived by teachers as
a sort of district spy. This context may have influenced her tendency to announce her presence
via email and then set up shop in the library, working while she waited for teachers to come see
her. This made participation optional and in control of the teachers. Michelle also only visited
teachers unannounced during their planning period, and did not do random observations of class
sessions. Her tendency to assume less-threatening teacher-resource roles may have been
influenced by the teacher perception of her being a district agent, and by her desire to appear
helpful and not as a sort of spy.
Based on these coaches’ experiences, it appeared that a negative school climate impeded
access to teachers in relation to the mentoring responsibility of coaching. Having retreated to
safety, sometimes with doors locked, teachers seemed reluctant to allow the very presence of a
coach into the physical or conceptual spaces in which they considered and practiced their daily
teaching work. In a negative school climate, doors both metaphorical and real were closed and
locked to keep outside influences, including coaches, out of kinds of situations where mentoringrelated coaching work might have occurred. Initiating the coaching process was a struggle within
this context.
Principal role
Principals exerted considerable influence over the working lives of coaches. Whether
coaches were aiming to affect literacy instruction through whole-school professional development
or mentoring work with teachers, the opinion and viewpoint of the principal had a powerful
impact on the coaching process. Grace’s principal Judith, for example, seemed to treat her as a
member of the administrative team, asking her for professional opinions on a variety of
administrative issues. Grace did not appear to mind this treatment, which may have contributed
to both the amount of time she spent in the principal assistant role and to the level of resentment
toward her held by teachers at her school.
Contrasting with this was Diane’s situation, where Linda left a leadership void with her
impending retirement. This contributed to Diane’s perception of not being supported in her
coaching work and of having to pick up the slack herself if she wanted something accomplished.
For both coaches, it became apparent that the influence of the principal over the coaching process
was both pervasive and significant. The principal appeared to have a great deal of power in
shaping the way the coach interacted with teachers and in dividing time between literacy
advocacy and teacher-mentoring efforts.
Having to work with seven principals, Michelle’s case was noticeably different from the
other two. Principals saw her as a resource to be utilized according to the perceived needs of the
school, so requests for assistance affected the ways in which Michelle worked in their buildings.
These diverse requests appeared to have a significant effect on the coaching roles Michelle
assumed when working in various schools. One principal, Andrew, saw her as a public relations
resource for fostering support for the new language arts curriculum materials among the parent
community. In response to this request, Michelle spent time in the professional development
role, familiarizing teachers with the curriculum materials so that they could more effectively
discuss them with parents. She also spent time doing office-worker tasks like scheduling
meetings via email and writing paragraphs for parent-information pamphlets.
Another principal, Tamara, saw Michelle as a conduit of knowledge among schools,
having Michelle conduct a series of language arts department meetings at her school and then
disseminate information from these meetings across the rest of the district. In this case Michelle
worked to facilitate a year-long series of department meetings focused on student assessment and
ways to teach writing. The sort of work Michelle did in each school depended, at least in part, on
the ideas, needs, and requests of each school principal, and the roles she assumed at the different
schools reflected these principal influences.
Overall, school principals had a unique ways of working with the coach, and this
principal-coach interaction had considerable influence over the ways in which the coaches
engaged in the coaching process at the whole-school and individual level. With support and a
clear sense of purpose from the principal, the coach seemed to experience a greater sense of focus
and momentum, even if the resulting work did not always seem to have a strong connection to
teacher learning and classroom practice. Without principal support, the coach struggled to gain
access to classrooms or to move forward with any sort of coaching agenda.
Coach-related factors
While external contexts had an effect on the coaching process, it became apparent that
the coaches themselves did as well. Each coach in this study brought unique skills, experiences,
and interests to her work. The background and knowledge of the coaches, as well as their
personal preferences and dispositions, influenced the ways in which they approached their
coaching roles and interacted with teachers. Michelle’s background as a middle school language
arts teacher, for example, helped her relate to the kinds of worries and challenges teachers might
have been experiencing. She identified with the teachers because she had been in their shoes for
seven years, and in this way came across as a peer. She felt comfortable talking with teachers on
a personal level, and appeared to be friends with many of them, chatting here and there about
babies, husbands, or country-western music. She also brought knowledge of the new curriculum
materials to coaching situations. It was clear that Michelle felt comfortable talking through a set
of unit plans from the teacher guidebook, and it was even clearer that she knew exactly how to
work the technology components of these materials and could demonstrate them with ease. This
sense of ease and comfort may have influenced her tendency to chat with teachers about
curriculum materials and assist them with related technology—she liked working on tasks in
these roles, so she did.
Diane brought a different set of skills, experiences, and personal interests to her work as
coach. She had a passion for adolescent literature and for teaching reading, and both of these
influenced how she engaged in the coaching process at her school. The lunchtime librarian role
was a striking example of her passion for literature and for her desire to connect with students in a
school where this was not the norm. Diane spent her own money on hundreds of books, read
them (at home), and worked to engage visiting students in discussion to help find a book
matching the student’s interests. This role seemed to be created by Diane’s interests.
Her knowledge of best practices in teaching reading contributed to her reciprocal
teaching work with Stephanie, but was also a source of frustration. She knew the kinds of
instructional approaches teachers should, in her opinion, be implementing, but they did not ask
for help, and few teachers utilized her expertise during the weeks I observed her at work.
Observing teachers using what she may have considered ineffective instructional approaches
appeared to be disheartening to Diane and, after some of these observations, she spent
considerable amounts of time in her office.
Grace brought her experiences as a curriculum developer in writing instruction to her
literacy coaching job, using this expertise to work with teachers on issues of writing instruction.
She seemed confident talking about writing instruction and different ways to get students engaged
in writing activities, and this preference seemed to come through on occasions when Grace
assumed the teacher resource role using a direct approach. This preference also came through in
her class-session resource role in providing demonstration lessons, which were all about writing.
Grace did not place much emphasis on reading instruction. In sum, it appeared that each coach
brought strikingly different knowledge and experiences to her coaching work, and these diverse
points of emphasis, along with personal preferences and dispositions, influenced the ways they
went about their daily coaching work.
The analysis of data relating to school contexts of coaching revealed a pattern of
contextual factors influencing the coaching process in significant ways. It seems that
organizational factors, school and classroom climate, principal and coach relationships, and
coach-related factors all affected the ways in which the coach went about her work on both
classroom instructional and school-related tasks. Further, these contextual factors influenced the
balance (or imbalance) of time and effort the coach spent on classroom instructional, schoolrelated, and peripheral tasks. With so many contextual factors shaping the coaching process, and
so many differences in background and experience among coaches, the coaching process played
out differently for each coach in this study. The next section considers possible connections
between the coaching process and changes in teacher learning and practice.
Connections to Learning and Practice
With a multitude of coaching roles and school contexts to take into account, connections
between the coaches’ work and teacher learning and practice were difficult to ascertain. First,
initiating the coaching process seemed to be a struggle. Conditions needed to be aligned a certain
way for the coach to have an opportunity to assume coaching roles relating to learning and
practice. Second, in some specific cases, connections between coaching and classroom
instruction could be made—but these cases were few. Ultimately, connections between coaching,
learning, and instruction were difficult to make, raising concerns regarding the effectiveness of
coaches and the coaching process.
Initiating the coaching process
Coaches needed to get the attention of groups of teachers, or to gain access to classrooms,
in order to engage in the coaching process to affect change in learning and practice. Initiating the
coaching process was frequently a struggle. This struggle was clear in Diane’s case. She
experienced locked doors and inward-focused teachers within a school climate of negativity and
distrust. Without administrative support, she had few ways to overcome the acrid aura and gain
access to classrooms, at least not as coach. She could observe, but that proved to be a powerless
role, and in the end she was only able to work systematically with just a few teachers. Grace did
not fare much better, as the undercurrent of resentment at her school interfered with her efforts to
engage teachers in the coaching process. Of the four she was assigned to work with, only two
would see her. For both of these coaches, there appeared to be significant obstacles to gaining
access to classrooms to initiate the coaching process. Further, beyond school contextual factors
and the limited-potential coaching roles Diane and Grace assumed, there appeared to be no initial
step, no key for initiating the coaching process, for either of these coaches to use to get things
moving in the right direction. When trying to interact with teachers, there was not always an
initial topic of discussion.
Michelle, in contrast to Diane and Grace, did not struggle to gain access to classrooms. It
appeared that she could walk into any language arts class in the district and strike up a
conversation with the teacher about curriculum materials. These curriculum materials functioned
as a key to language arts classrooms, and Michelle had success using that key. She could always
ask about the curriculum materials. But initiating the coaching process did not ensure
engagement in the coaching process. While Michelle got teachers talking about curriculum
materials, this talk did not lead to discussions of instruction. Influenced by a number of school
contexts, Michelle tended to assume roles that did not involve mentoring teachers on issues of
instruction. In this way the coaching process seemed to take a step in the right direction for
Michelle, but then stop.
From these coaching experiences, it seemed that without an initial step, or a key to
teachers’ classrooms, coaches struggled to gain entrance to classrooms and engage in any sort of
conversation with teachers about issues of instruction. Given that the whole-school advocacy and
teacher-mentoring responsibilities of coaching, it was disturbing to see the coach standing outside
of so many locked classroom doors, unable to gain access. Yet a key to classrooms does not
appear to be a guarantee of coaching-process engagement, as additional coaching steps may not
occur, depending on roles and contexts surrounding the coach, teacher, and classroom situation.
Limited instances of change
While instances when coaches gained access to classrooms and began the coaching
process were somewhat limited in number, instances of change in learning and practice connected
to this process were even rarer. Some examples of such connections did surface on occasion,
however. Diane’s reciprocal teaching work with Stephanie could be considered such a moment.
It had an impact on the way Stephanie thought about reading instruction and how she conducted
her first block language arts class. Through conversations they had to debrief lessons, Stephanie
said she had a growing awareness of different ways students might learn to become better readers,
and now understood that a variety of reading comprehension strategies might help students who
did not emphasize the verbal aspects of literacy as she herself did. With Diane’s help, she had
students work in small groups, and even asked students to read articles independently rather than
to follow along while she read aloud. Stephanie was moving toward a more powerful way of
teaching literacy, and this was made possible by the work she had done with Diane. Yet the
impact of this learning appeared limited, as no part of the progress Stephanie appeared to be
making with her first block language arts class transferred to her second block class. She
continued to teach the second block class in her traditional way: whole group instruction followed
by individually-completed worksheets. This lack of transfer surprised Diane who considered
Stephanie’s second-block group to be the most in need of the kind of instructional intervention
reciprocal teaching had to offer. But this did not happen.
Another example of teacher change occurred after Grace’s substitute-teaching experience
outlined in her composite narrative. A few days after trying to teach his lesson, Grace met with
Joshua and reminded him of different methods of vocabulary instruction that teachers had been
encouraged to try throughout the year in conjunction with professional development meetings
Grace had facilitated. Later, in an interview with me, Joshua indicated he had taken Grace’s
suggestion to heart and had worked on implementing more context-oriented vocabulary activities
with his students. He felt positive about this change, and said he had learned a lot from his
conversation with Grace. Her reminder seemed to have prompted him to bring forth something
he had learned but not utilized and to implement it in the classroom. Yet while positive, the fact
that Grace discovered Joshua’s vocabulary-instruction issue by chance and had to remind him of
things he was supposed to have learned (but forgot) does not indicate a strong connection
between her work and his classroom practice. It raises the question of how much Grace had
ultimately been able to impact the learning and practice of other teachers at her school through
whole-school professional development efforts. Had they changed their approach to teaching
vocabulary? This was an open question, and Grace did not seek the answer.
Finally, although teachers working with Michelle indicated satisfaction with the coaching
process, this work was limited mostly to resource-person and district liaison roles. Neither of the
teachers I interviewed had worked on implementing new instructional strategies with Michelle’s
assistance. One was an experienced teacher who did not see a need to work with Michelle in this
way, and the other considered herself too new to be able to effectively utilize her expertise. In
Michelle’s case, connections between curriculum materials, teacher learning, and classroom
practice were difficult to see, due perhaps in part to the roles and contexts comprising and
affecting her coaching work. With so much time and effort needing to be spent addressing
curriculum materials implementation across many middle schools, ongoing discussions of
instruction may have seemed beyond the scope of her job.
From these examples of possible connections between the coaching process and teacher
learning and classroom practice, it seems that the literacy coach needed a key, such as a common
curriculum or shared instructional language, to gain access to classrooms to work with teachers
on issues of learning and practice. Yet while essential for entry, this key did not ensure that
instructional coaching occurred. Efforts ended up focusing on curriculum materials
implementation, classroom management, or test preparation, and not on instructional strategies or
best practices. Changes in teacher learning and classroom practice appeared to occur when the
coach gained access to the classroom, the teacher was willing to engage in the coaching process,
and the effort was both collaborative and sustained over time. The cases of Diane, Grace, and
Michelle demonstrate that while some connections between coaching work and changes in
learning and practice could be identified, these were few in relation to the time the coaches spent
working in various roles affected by a number of school contexts. For the overall amount of time
these coaches spent working in classroom instructional and school-related roles, few clear
connections could be made between their work and changes in teacher learning or classroom
practice.
Summary
Coaches in this study worked in a variety of classroom instructional and school-related
roles, across a range of school contexts, to get teachers to engage in the coaching process and
improve instruction. Roles the coaches assumed were many, and this multiplicity of roles seemed
to lead to at least the partial fragmentation of the coaching process, where some of the work the
coaches busied themselves with appeared to be tasks that did not connect to issues of teacher
learning or classroom practice. Instead, this work seemed peripheral to the teacher mentoring and
literacy advocacy responsibilities of coaching.
Additionally, school contextual factors played a heavy hand in shaping the coaching
process. Organizational factors and a negative school climate had effects on coaching roles, in
some cases dramatically impacting coach efforts to work with teachers. The school principal
seemed to affect the coach’s efforts as well, influencing coaching roles by providing different
levels of support and distinct notions of the kinds of work the coach should perform in the school.
In addition to these factors, the coach herself affected the coaching process, as the kinds of
knowledge and skills, as well as dispositions and preferences, the coach brought to the job
factored into the ways in which she went about her work.
Considering the multiplicity of roles coaches assumed and the complexity of contexts that
affected their work, a key to classrooms appeared necessary to initiate the coaching process—but
access to classrooms did not ensure teacher engagement in coaching. Although there were
moments when connections between coaching, teacher learning, and classroom practice seem to
have been made, these moments were rare. More common were instances when the coaching
process broke down, when there was insufficient follow-through to get beyond piecemeal
conversations and into a steady pattern of ongoing interactions focused on instruction. Getting
into classrooms was a challenge, and once the coach was there, changes in teacher learning or
classroom practice did not appear to often take place.
The coaches in this study worked full-time at their jobs. While they spent some time
working with teachers on planning, co-teaching, and providing feedback, for example, or even on
conducting department or after-school meetings, they spent most of their time on different sorts
of tasks only tenuously connected, if at all, to the goal of improving literacy instruction.
Coaching occurred in bits and pieces; its full potential did not seem to be realized.
Chapter 8
Discussion
The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the findings of this study of middle school
literacy coaching, consider implications relating to these findings, and identify the limitations of
the study. This study explored the roles three literacy coaches assumed while working in middle
school contexts, the ways in which these contexts impacted the coaching process, and possible
connections between the coaching process and teacher learning and classroom practice. In the
next sections I explore three propositions that span the study’s research questions, drawing upon
the cross-case themes discussed in the previous chapter in relation to the literature on teacher
change, teacher knowledge, and middle school literacy. This discussion of propositions and
related implications is followed by study limitations and recommendations for further research.
Findings and Implications
Proposition one: Multiple coaching roles, influenced by a range of school contexts,
fragment the coaching process
Coaches in this study assumed a surprising number of roles as they worked across
contexts on a variety of tasks, seemingly breaking the coaching process apart into a series of
disjointed bits. Most of these roles appeared tied to the two major responsibilities of coaching
identified in the literature, teacher mentoring (Dole, 2004; Toll, 2005) and literacy program
advocacy (Sturtevant, 2003; Walpole & McKenna, 2004). This finding is in line with the
standards for middle and high school literacy coaches (IRA, 2006) that are evenly split between
these two coaching responsibilities. The clusters of roles relating to literacy advocacy and
teacher mentoring did not appear to play out well in practice, and some roles described in this
study did not appear connected to coaching at all. The multiplicity of these roles, influenced by
contexts such as school structure, scheduling, and principal support, as well as the presence of
some disconnected roles, contributed to the fragmentation the coaching process, raising the
question of how viable instructional coaching is as a two-part model of ongoing professional
development for teachers.
The responsibility of mentoring teachers (Dole, 2004; Toll, 2005) proved difficult for the
coaches in this study to fulfill. While previous research suggests power in mentoring-related
coaching roles (Hasbrouck & Christen, 1997; Ballard, 2001), such research has typically focused
on a pre-established set of roles and related tasks. In this study, mentoring-related classroom
instructional roles were numerous, with only a small number of these involving conversations
with teachers about issues of instruction. The roles of resource person and observer, for example,
proved to be missed coaching opportunities. The resource-person role had the potential to lead to
conversations of instruction sparked by the curriculum materials in question, and the observer
role seemed to open the door to practice-oriented discussions of instruction. But neither role, on
its own, seemed to contribute much to the coaching process. Separately, classroom instructional
roles represent the building blocks of the teacher-mentoring responsibility of coaching. Without
follow-through and a plan for using these roles in concert, however, they instead represent missed
opportunities to engage teachers on issues of instruction.
Literacy advocacy appeared to be an even more difficult responsibility to fulfill. Schoolrelated roles associated with this responsibility presented a bleak picture of missed opportunities
and lost time, suggesting a pronounced level of coaching-process fragmentation. On the surface,
these roles appeared to function as part of the literacy advocacy responsibility of coaching,
seemingly addressing the capacity-building habit of cultures of inquiry (Szabo, 1996), with the
coach as a collaborator and change agent for improvements in literacy instruction. A closer look
raises the question of relevance, however, as the coaches in this study spent a majority of their
time in school-related roles working on tasks having little apparent connection to the literacy
coaching process. Occurrences of coaching work emphasizing group collaboration, for example,
where the coach would function as a change agent for continuous learning among teachers
(Lieberman, 1996), were scarce. The roles of tour guide and office worker, in contrast to this
ideal, appeared disconnected from literacy advocacy work, yet consumed a noticeable amount of
coach time and effort. The tasks coaches worked on in these and other school-related roles were
peripheral to the responsibilities of coaching and disconnected from the coaching process. This
work on peripheral tasks made it more difficult for the coaches to focus on issues of literacy
advocacy or to engage teachers in discussions of instruction. Overall, the sheer number of roles
assumed by the coaches, and the sorts of tasks the coaches ended up performing within them,
contributed to the fragmentation of the coaching process.
Beyond the dual coaching responsibilities, however, it was apparent that school contexts
such as school structure, scheduling, and the role of the principal, influenced the coaching process
and factored into its fragmentation. The middle school structure appears to be considerably more
complex than that of the elementary school. The three coaches in this study struggled to work
with different academic departments, deal with combined blocks such as language arts and social
studies, and were even asked on occasion to stand in for an absent teacher. Trying to compensate
for the departmentalized and layered school structure seemed to leave coaches with disjointed
chunks of time in which to try to do their coaching work.
Scheduling also seemed to contribute to coaching-process fragmentation. Complex
scheduling of block periods, prep times, department meetings, principal meetings, and seeminglyrandom events such as teacher absences and school assemblies, made it difficult not only for the
coaches to schedule meetings with teachers, but at times left them without a clear idea of what
they would do from day to day.
A third contextual factor connected to the fragmentation of the coaching process was the
supporting role of the building principal. When the principal had a vision of the coach’s purpose
and the needs of his or her school in mind, the coach appeared to have a clear sense of direction
and was less likely to encounter resistance or indifference among teachers. When the principal
provided less support and direction, the coach seemed to struggle to initiate the coaching process
or to schedule even the most informal of observations. Support, especially from the building
principal, appears to be a necessary component of a purposeful and sustained coaching process.
This proposition has two implications for theory. First, there appears to be a need to
clearly establish, and focus, expectations for the responsibilities and roles the literacy coach will
be asked to assume, with careful consideration of how much time and energy should be spent on
teacher mentoring and literacy advocacy. Although the ideal of simultaneously affecting
teachers’ professional development as literacy advocate and teacher mentor may sound promising
as outlined in the literature (Blachowicz, Obrochta, & Fogelberg, 2005), and in the coaching
standards for middle and high school literacy coaches (IRA, 2005), in practice this dual purpose
of coaching seems to create confusion, interfering with the kinds of ongoing and focused work
with teachers that is considered powerful professional development (Darling-Hammond &
McLaughlin, 1996). Administrators and coaches need to clearly identify a specific set of roles
that are to be included in the coach’s repertoire—ideally a small set of roles—and to make sure
that other roles do not get added to the coaches’ list of expectations as the school year progresses.
These roles should be carefully balanced to address both responsibilities of coaching, making sure
that adequate time and effort is given to classroom instructional roles.
Second, even when focused on classroom instructional roles, time coaches spend on tasks
related to these roles does not appear to equate to time spent as mentors engaged with teachers in
the coaching process. Observation, for example, may sometimes occur in isolation, with little
follow-up or discussion once the observation is over. This suggests the coaching process is
susceptible to fragmentation even when the coach is focused on classroom instruction. Between
observing, teaching demonstration lessons, and co-teaching, the coach may end up short of
achieving a balance between roles and tasks, hampering the coaching process even within this
specific classroom context. Clear expectations would need to be set for classroom instructional
tasks, identifying parameters for the coach in relation to mentoring teachers so that both coach
and teacher would be better able to engage in meaningful coaching work. This work would need
to be part of an orchestrated coaching effort involving carefully-chosen roles focused on specific
goals, such as teacher learning of content-area literacy instruction or the implementation of key
comprehension strategies or other best practices in reading.
Assuming a multliplicity of roles appears to fragment the coaching process. By
narrowing the focus on a small set of roles carefully decided by principal and coach, and by
paying careful attention to the balance between teacher mentoring and literacy advocacy, this
breakdown of coaching may be minimized. Without these safeguards, the coaching process
appears to break into disjointed parts, diminishing its potential effect on teacher learning and
classroom practice.
Proposition two: The coaching process only partially aligns with teachers’ professional
knowledge landscapes
The metaphor of the teacher’s professional knowledge landscape offers an interpretive
lens for understanding the kinds of knowledge teachers possess and the ways in which new
knowledge filters through the out-of-classroom place into the in-classroom place on the
landscape. The transition between these two places is difficult for teachers who must interpret
abstract information from the out-of-classroom place and implement this information in the inclassroom place without support (Clandinin & Connelly, 1995). Instructional coaching holds
promise as a way to assist teachers with this transition, bridging the conceptual divide between
these two places on the landscape. Yet the coaching process appears to be only partially aligned
with teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes, as shown in Figure 1.
Three factors appear to influence this misalignment. First, it is clear that classroom
instructional and school-related tasks relate to teachers’ in-classroom and out-of-classroom
places, but these terms are not synonymous, and tension exists between these sets of terms.
Second, coaches appear to engage in a number of tasks that, although may be considered part of
the coaching process, extend to a peripheral place beyond any connection to teacher knowledge.
Third, both this tension and the existence of peripheral tasks appear to be influenced by a number
of school contexts, which affect the coaching process as it relates to teacher knowledge.
Figure 1 The Coaching Process and The Professional Knowledge Landscape
Classroom instructional roles and related tasks did not always align with the in-classroom
place on the teacher’s professional knowledge landscape. For the coaches in this study, this
misalignment seemed to contribute to the struggles the coaches experienced in initiating the
coaching process or continuing to engage teachers in instruction-related discussions. Observing a
teacher, for example, would be considered a classroom instructional task. But it only aligns with
the in-classroom place if the teacher and coach have the opportunity to meet and discuss the
observation, connecting to instruction. Otherwise, the observation is a stand-alone task that does
not affect teacher knowledge.
Similarly, school-related tasks do not always appear to align with the out-of-classroom
place on the knowledge landscape. While the coaches in this study worked on a variety of
school-related tasks, from developing an online survey for students to photocopying test
preparation booklets, these tasks did not often relate to issues of teacher knowledge. Tension
between these sets of concepts appears to negatively impact the coaching process and to reduce
the potential of coaching to function as a bridge between abstract knowledge teachers receive in
the out-of-classroom place and the ways in which they might implement that knowledge in the inclassroom place. Coaches appear to end up saddled with tasks irrelevant to teachers, while
teachers seem to continue struggling to make sense of new knowledge and to adapt it to daily
classroom instruction without the coach’s assistance. Without this bridge, instructional coaching
appears much less promising and seems to have more in common with traditional forms of
professional development that do not attempt to address teachers’ in-classroom place on the
landscape, which is where abstract knowledge is transformed into practice.
Beyond this tension between the coaching process and places on the professional
knowledge landscape, there appears to be a large segment of the coaching process that extends
beyond any point of connection to teacher knowledge. This segment is filled with peripheral
tasks. In this study, peripheral tasks took up approximately 30% of observed coach time. These
tasks, spanning the range of coaching roles but occurring most often in relation to school-related
tasks, kept the coaches busy but appeared to have no connections to teachers’ professional
knowledge landscapes. This concept of disconnect is shown in Figure 1.
With regard to the process of teacher learning, Darling-Hammond and McLaughlin
observe, “Like students, teachers learn by doing, reading, and reflecting; collaborating with other
teachers; looking closely at students and their work; and sharing what they see. This kind of
learning enables teachers to make the leap from theory to accomplished practice” (1996, p. 204).
Coaches engaged in peripheral tasks seemed to be in no position to help teachers make this leap
from theory to practice.
Both the tension between points on the landscapes and the prevalence of peripheral tasks
appeared to be affected by a number of school contexts, including scheduling, a negative school
climate, and the coach’s own forms of knowledge. Middle school scheduling, in all of its
complexity, seemed to create a number of challenges for coaches as they tried to access
classrooms and work with teachers. Middle school coaches clearly struggle with class times, prep
periods, and department-level scheduling as they try to gain access to classrooms and work with
teachers.
A negative school climate appeared to be a formidable obstacle to both initiating and
sustaining the coaching process, and in some cases teachers retreated into their classrooms and
locked their doors. The working context of a negative climate prevented collaboration and kept
coaches from working with teachers in classrooms. When teachers did emerge and interact with
one another, the community of practice (Wenger, 1998) in which they were involved was one of
potential mistrust, suspicion, and fear. The traits of such a community seem at odds with
coaching, which is generally seen as a collaborative endeavor (Joyce & Showers, 2002). Without
a community of practice conducive to working together, it seems difficult for the coaching
process to take hold or remain focused. Consistent with the situated-learning perspective
(Putnam & Borko, 2000), it appears that a positive school climate is a necessary condition for the
alignment of the coaching process and teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes. Overall,
coaches in this study did not appear able to more than cursorily address issues of collaboration
through school-related roles relating to literacy advocacy. The multiplicity of roles they
experienced, and the school contexts that affected these roles, appeared to increase the amount of
effort they spent on peripheral tasks and to decrease their opportunities for engaging in schoolrelated roles that may have connected to teachers’ out-of-classroom space on the professional
knowledge landscape.
Literacy coaches themselves appeared to have an impact on the coaching process and its
alignment with teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes. Although contextual factors such
as school structure and climate influenced the coaching process, the coaches in this study were
not pawns being pushed from space to space in the middle school. What coaches brought with
them to the position, from content knowledge to teaching experiences to personal interests, had a
considerable impact on the ways they initiated and participated in the coaching process. It would
seem that each coach draws upon her or his own content, pedagogical content, practical, and
personal practical knowledge when working with teachers, drawing upon strengths and
compensating for knowledge gaps, making the coaching process unique for each individual
coach.
This proposition relating to the alignment of the coaching process with teachers’
professional knowledge landscapes has several implications. First, if the coaching process is to
be defined in terms of teacher knowledge, the kinds of roles coaches are assigned should relate to
the out-of-classroom and in-classroom places on the landscape, with a particular emphasis on
helping teachers incorporate knowledge from one space into the other. To effectively change the
way they teach literacy, teachers go through a process of acquiring knowledge about new ways of
teaching and then transforming this knowledge into a usable form for classroom implementation
(Clandinin & Connelly, 1995; Shulman, 1986). The potential of instructional coaching may be
more effectively realized if coaching roles were more closely focused on bridging the inherent
tension between out-of-classroom and in-classroom places on teachers’ professional knowledge
landscapes.
Second, with a clear focus on increasing teacher knowledge, peripheral tasks should be
minimized in order to get the greatest benefit from the coach’s time and effort. By more
completely aligning the coaching process with teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes,
peripheral tasks would be minimized. Even the most hard-working coach cannot be considered
effective if one third of her or his time is spent on tasks not contributing to the improvement of
classroom instruction.
Third, the complexity and significant impact of school contexts on the coaching process
should be taken into account when designing or implementing middle school coaching programs.
With large numbers of staff, scheduling by department, and a maze of language arts and
preparation periods, the middle school presents a unique set of obstacles for coaches hoping to
engage teachers in the coaching process.
Fourth, school climate needs to be considered when designing and implementing a
coaching program. Teachers who feel negative or threatened may shut their doors on change,
making the coaching process difficult to initiate and sustain. A negative school climate seems to
push teachers into survival mode, where they seek the shelter of the in-classroom place on the
landscape and become reluctant to open this space to change. The alignment between the
coaching process and teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes would, ideally, be more
complete in order to maximize the potential impact of the literacy coach on instruction within the
safe place of the classroom.
Finally, for this alignment to be sustained, the coaching process would need to receive
ongoing support to achieve lasting levels of change in learning and practice. Coach and teachers
alike would need assistance to persevere within a potentially lengthy change process. This
implication emphasizes programmatic longevity, something not always seen in professional
development approaches. To affect lasting changes in teacher learning, the coaching process
would need to be ongoing, sustained, collaborative, and embedded in context (Cochran-Smith &
Lytle, 2001; Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1996). With these factors in place, the coaching
process would perhaps be in better alignment with teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes.
Proposition three: The coaching process is situated on a developmental trajectory of
change
The first two propositions illustrate the complex nature of instructional coaching and
suggest ways to increase the potential effectiveness of this professional development approach.
While the coaches in this study did struggle with coaching, their experiences provide insight into
the coaching process and its potential. This third proposition draws upon the experiences of the
coaches in this study to propose a model of coaching visualized as integrated with a
developmental trajectory of change. As shown in Figure 2, this trajectory highlights coaching
roles as they relate to three components of change: initial steps leading to change, necessary
supports to encourage change, and ongoing efforts to keep the process moving forward.
The normative-reeducative approach to change (Chin & Benne, 1969), as interpreted by
Richardson and Placier, “suggests that individuals act on the basis of sociocultural norms to
which they are committed. A necessary condition for change is that individuals alter their
normative orientations and develop new ones” (2001, p. 917). In terms of teacher change, this
suggests that the first component of the change trajectory would need to focus on changing
teacher orientations and beliefs and initiating teacher discourse communities for discussing these
changes. Change-related discourse communities, groups of teachers sharing a set of common
experiences (Putnam & Borko, 1997), would provide supplemental assistance to teachers beyond
what the coach would be able to provide. Both teacher mentoring and literacy advocacy roles of
instructional coaching could be used to support this component of the change trajectory.
Figure 2 Instructional Coaching and a Trajectory of Teacher Change
In a focused teacher mentoring role, the coach would provide demonstration lessons,
observations, and follow-up discussions as a way to encourage teachers to change their beliefs
and instructional orientations. Dialogue opportunities in discourse communities would help
support this part of the change process, and would begin to address some of the challenging
contexts, such as school culture, that influence both the coaching process and change in general.
In a focused literacy advocacy role, with principal support, the coach would work to facilitate
dialogue within various communities of practice, from team-planning meetings to department
meetings to after-school workshops, helping transform these groups into functioning discourse
communities that would help support teachers across the change trajectory.
Without these initial components in the change trajectory, the coaching process would
seem to struggle, as appeared to be the case with the coaches in this study. But once these
components were in place, with principal support and attention given to school contexts, the
potential of coaching to influence change would perhaps be increased.
The middle component of the change trajectory would focus on opportunities for teachers
to experiment with new knowledge and instructional practices, as well as to continue developing
and participating in change-oriented discourse communities. Coaching work integrated with this
component of the change trajectory would focus on providing support for teacher learning,
exploration, and experimentation. Coach efforts would be closely aligned with teacher attempts
to try new ideas in the classroom. In a teacher mentor role, the coach would endeavor to help
bridge the gap between ideas learned on the out-of-classroom place on the professional
knowledge landscape and the implementation process in the in-classroom place. Through a
carefully-conceived process of planning, observing, debriefing, and reflecting, coach and teacher
would work together to bring new ideas to practice.
In a literacy advocacy role, the coach would focus on working with teacher discourse
communities, striking a careful balance between facilitator and teacher resource to help teachers
reflect on issues of learning and practice while considering additional ways to implement changes
in the classroom. These supporting roles would draw upon the coaching skills and content
knowledge of the coach, providing teachers with support to continue changing their beliefs and
experimenting with the implementation of new instructional strategies.
The potential of the coaching process as part of this component of the change trajectory is
clear, considering that classroom implementation is the stopping point of change for many wellintended professional development attempts. As Richardson and Placier observe, “Inevitably,
whether a change is mandated or voluntarily endorsed, teachers have a considerable amount of
discretion as to whether they implement the change in their classrooms. This discretion has
contributed to proposed changes not being implemented in many staff development programs”
(2001, p. 909).
Rather than leave change to the discretion of the teacher, coaching would bring the coach
into the classroom to work with the teacher on implementing change, as well as to help facilitate
ongoing teacher discourse communities focused on issues of learning and practice. These efforts
would need to be supported by the building principal, who would, for instance, need to consider
aligning whole-school literacy goals and teacher observations with the work of the coach in both
literacy advocacy and mentoring roles. Middle school structures, schedules, and other contexts
would also need to be addressed in relation to the change efforts taking place in this component
of the change trajectory. Without these supports, the coaching process may run the risk of
fragmenting into sets of disjointed tasks, as appeared to be the case with the coaches in this study.
The third component of the trajectory would focus on providing ongoing supports for
teachers engaged in the change process, which would need to be ongoing, sustained, and
intensive in order to create lasting change and to build capacity among teachers (DarlingHammond & McLaughlin, 1996). Coaching work relating to this component would need to
include, beyond what has already been outlined, the development of discourse communities into
collaborative coaching teams and support for the continuing professional growth of the coaches
themselves.
Considering the length of time likely to be necessary for change, the demands of
advocacy and mentoring roles for the coach, and the large number of teachers working in any
given middle school, empowering teachers to coach each other through established discourse
communities would be a desirable step in the process of sustaining the change process over time.
By assuming a literacy advocacy role of facilitator, the coach would work to guide teachers
through a process of forming peer coaching groups, where the coaching process as experienced
with the literacy coach would be taken up by small groups of teachers. Collaborative peer
coaching groups would have the potential to add another dimension to the change process at the
school (Joyce, Calhoun, & Hopkins, 1999).
Finally, coaches themselves would need to continue expanding their own knowledge in
order to continue supporting teachers. The coach would need to be provided with opportunities to
assume the role of learner, growing in knowledge and engaging in the change process, perhaps
with other coaches, as part of an ongoing and sustained commitment to literacy learning (Walpole
& McKenna, 2004).
This third proposition, outlining a trajectory of change and making connections between
coaching and three components on the trajectory, is a suggestion. In making this suggestion, I
considered not only literature on change, teacher change, and coaching, but also the work of the
three coaches in this study—their struggles, hopes, and moments of success. Their experiences
suggest coaching is a complex process that is at once full of potential and fraught with hidden
obstacles. By aligning the coaching process with a trajectory of change, the hope is to offer a
model of how instructional coaching could perhaps function more effectively to promote teacher
change.
Summary
Three propositions span the research questions that guided this study. These questions
were:
1.
What roles do middle school literacy coaches play in different school settings?
2.
In what ways do contextual factors, and the coaches themselves, affect these roles?
3.
What connections can be made between coaching and teacher learning and classroom
practice?
The first proposition claims that a multiplicity of roles seemed to fragment the coaching
process, while the second proposition acknowledges an apparent misalignment between the
coaching process and teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes. The third proposition takes
an interpretive step toward understanding the difficulties and complexities of coaching in relation
to a trajectory of teacher change. These three propositions suggest that coaching, while it may
struggle to reach its potential in practice, possesses a great deal of potential in theory from the
perspective of long-term teacher change.
Limitations
There were several limitations to this study. First, the study was comprised of only three
cases of coaching within two school districts. This sample, while specifically chosen as part of
case study methodology, may have only included coaches who emphasized certain aspects of the
instructional coaching process. Further, the three coaches who participated in the study were
volunteers, giving prior consent before being observed, interviewed, and shadowed for weeks.
The original study design was to include four coach participants, but one declined to participate.
The three who did participate may have felt more comfortable with their work as coaches, or at
least more confident as educators with years of experience.
Second, I knew two of the three coaches from previous work I had done as a research
assistant. As such I was a familiar face at Jefferson and Adams middle schools, perhaps leading
to a more quickly-developed sense of ease and trust than might have otherwise been the case.
Although I had not met Michelle, the third coach, before recruiting her for this study, I had
worked in the Wallace School District some years before, and thus was a familiar name among
principals, although I had not worked at the middle school level. This connection helped me
obtain permission to conduct research in the district across such a large number of schools, access
that might not have otherwise been granted.
Third, I was the only observer in this study. I designed field observations to follow a
staggered schedule in order to minimize changes in my own perspective over time and to
maintain consistency across cases of coaching. Semi-structured intake and follow-up interviews
helped minimize confounding separate cases, and my background in the area of literacy research
and instruction helped me understand the literacy practices and issues the coaches were observing
and experiencing. On the other hand, having never been either a literacy coach or a middle
school teacher, I was less susceptible to projecting my own experiences and beliefs upon the
situations I was observing.
Finally, there is the probability that my presence as researcher influenced the data
collection process and, possibly, the results of the study. Each coach participant expressed at
least some feelings of isolation, and my presence provided them with opportunities to reflect on
their work that they otherwise would not have had. Also, protocol required me to briefly explain
my presence to every individual I encountered (with the exception of students) and to obtain
verbal assent before observing. While no classroom teacher expressed dissent, the protocol itself
prevented me, at least at first, from blending into the background during coach observations. On
the other hand, knowing the reason for my presence may have more quickly put teachers at ease
than needing to wonder for an entire class period who this person was taking notes in the back of
the classroom.
Conclusion
Dole and Donaldson (2006) noted overhearing a newly-hired reading coach ask a
colleague, “I just want someone to tell me, what am I supposed to do all day?” pointing out that
research has not yet provided a clear answer to this question. The purpose of this study was to
shed light on the roles, contexts, and connections to teaching experienced by three different
middle school literacy coaches. The findings of this study suggest that while coaching may have
potential as a means of professional development, a number of questions arise in relation to the
implementation and ongoing work of the coaching process in middle school contexts and to the
alignment between this process and teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes.
Coaches in this study spent more time in school-related than classroom instructional
roles, and overall experienced such a variety of roles that the coaching process became
fragmented, so that actual time working with teachers on issues of instruction was limited.
Further, coaching and teacher knowledge were only partly aligned, revealing a number of
coaching tasks that were peripheral to the central responsibilities of coaching. This misalignment
was influenced by a number of contextual factors, so that even when the coaching process seemed
to be progressing, the impact of coach efforts was diffused or minimized by factors such as
scheduling and logistics, the role of the principal, a negative school climate, and the coach’s own
knowledge and experience. Because of the misalignment between the coaching process and
teachers’ professional knowledge landscapes, connections between coaching and changes to
teacher knowledge and instruction were few. This study suggests the potential of instructional
coaching in middle school literacy, but also raises issues to be considered regarding the
implementation and effect of this professional development approach.
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Appendix A
Coach Intake Interview Protocol
Intake:

Tell me about your literacy background.

Tell me about your previous experiences in coaching and/or professional development

In what kinds of ways do you think you will work with teachers this year on literacy
instruction? How were these decided? Are there other things that you think you will do
at your school(s)? What are they?

Tell me about how you spend your days. How do you decide how to spend your time?
Do you have a daily or weekly schedule?

What kinds of challenges might face you this year?

How do you feel about your role as coach so far this year?
Appendix B
Coach Follow-up Interview Protocol
Exit:

Tell me about what you’ve been doing here at (Name) School. How have you made
decisions about what to do?

Tell me about the ways you have been working with teachers.

Tell me about how you have been spending your time. Do you have a daily or weekly
schedule?

Tell me about some successes and challenges you’ve experienced.

If you could make some changes to the job of coaching, or to the coaching process, what
would they be?
Appendix C
Coach Observation Interview Protocol
Before Observation:

What are your plans for the day? How and why did you decide to do this (ask about
each “plan”)? How often do you do these kinds of things?

Who will you be working with today? In what ways will you be working with (her, him,
them)?

How does today’s work fit into the larger picture of what you’ve been doing here at
(Name) School?
After Observation:

I’m interested in your thinking about your work today. How do you think it went?

Where will you go from here? What will you do next?

What are your expectations for the teacher(s) you worked with today? (Ask if the coach
worked with a teacher when being observed)
Appendix D
Classroom Teacher Interview Protocol

How did this plan you had with the coach come about? What did you want to happen?

How did it work out?

What’s next for you?

Where do you think you and the coach will go from here? What will you do next?

What do you think about the idea of coaching in general?

What suggestions would you have for making coaching meet your needs?
Appendix E
Principal Interview Protocol

What professional development plans do you have for the year?

Tell me about your approach to literacy this year, here at (Name) School.

Tell me about the literacy coach at your school and about your hopes and expectations for
her/him.

What kinds of challenges do you think might be facing the coach this year?
Appendix F
Codes with Descriptions
Category
Coach
Background
Coach
Background
Coach
Background
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Classroom
Practice
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Code
Coaching
Literacy
Teaching
Coach
Observation
Coach
Perspective
Principal
perspective
Primary
Investigator
Perspective
Student
Observation
Student
Perspective
Teacher
Observation
Teacher
Perspective
Colleague
Curriculum
Demonstration
District liaison
Facilitator
Observer
Perceptions of
Planning
Principal
assistant
Coordinator
Student tutor
Description
Previous experience with coaching, mentoring,
professional development
Previous experience and/or background in literacy,
reading curriculum, as reading specialist, etc
Previous experience teaching in classrooms
Instance of observing coach participation in classroom
practice
Coach's stated perspective/opinion of classroom practice
Principal's stated perspective/opinion of classroom
practice
PI’s perspective/opinion as recorded in reflective memos
on observations
Instance of observing student participation in classroom
practice
Student's stated perspective/opinion of classroom
practice
Instance of observing teacher participation in classroom
practice
Teacher's stated perspective/opinion of classroom
practice
Coach interacting as colleague, either with other coaches
or in some cases as a teacher with other teachers
Coach providing curriculum-specific tutoring or
implementation assistance to teacher(s)
Coach demonstrating instructional methods or
techniques by working directly with a group of students
Coach acting as go-between on teacher vs. district office
curriculum and teaching issues
Coach working to facilitate a meeting of teachers,
coaches, or other staff
Coach watching, usually silently, sometimes taking
notes, mostly in classrooms
From various sources, reflections or comments on
coaches and the coaching process
Coach working with teacher to plan curriculum as a
precursor to working on curriculum and/or instruction
Coach working on specific administrative tasks for
principal OR talking with principal as colleague
Coach conducting meeting or workshop focusing on
issues of teacher learning and/or classroom practice
Coach working with individual students, administering
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Materials person
Lunchtime
Librarian
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Coaching
Role
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Social
Context
Teacher
Learning
Teacher
Learning
Teacher
Learning
Substitute teacher
Teacher
Learning
Principal
Investigator
Perspective
Indirect
Technology
assistant
Direct
Tour guide
Helper
Classroom
Culture
Department
Culture
Department
Event
Department
Program
District
Culture
Dist event
District
Program
Grant
Program
School
Culture
School
Event
School
Program
Coach
Observation
Coach
Perspective
Principal
Perspective
assessments, tasks usually done by a reading specialist
Coach gathering materials or resources, usually at
teacher's request, often somewhat menial
Coach supplying books to students from the collection
housed in her office (sometimes-edgy and controversial
books)
Coach filling in for teacher as actual substitute, for a
period or longer
Coach working with teacher on classroom practice or
teacher learning, but in a subtle, almost indirect way
Coach providing technology-specific assistance to
teachers
Coach giving advice to teacher in direct and assertive
manner
Coach acting as guide for visiting groups of educators
from other sites
Coach working with individual students in class, usually
when otherwise observing
Classroom-related factors possibly affecting roles of the
coach
Department-related factors possibly affecting roles of the
coach; sometimes parallel to school culture
Scheduled department event attended by, or connected
to, the coach
Established department program or structure possibly
affecting coach, teacher learning, classroom practice
District-related factors possibly affecting roles of the
coach; sometimes closely connected to school culture
Scheduled district event attended by, or connected to, the
coach
Established district program or structure possibly
affecting coach, teacher learning, classroom practice
Funder-related program affecting coach's work and roles
School-related factors possibly affecting roles of the
coach
Scheduled school event attended by, or connected to, the
coach
Established school program or structure possibly
affecting coach, teacher learning, classroom practice
Something the coach observed relating to teacher
learning; usually communicated to PI by coach
Something relating to teacher learning reflected upon by
coach, usually communicated to PI
Something relating to teacher learning reflected upon by
principal, mostly having to do with coaching, usually
communicated to PI
Something relating to teacher learning reflected upon by
PI through observation and reflective memos
Teacher
Learning
Teacher
Learning
Teacher
Observation
Teacher
Perspective
Something the teacher observed relating to teacher
learning; usually communicated to PI by teacher
Something relating to teacher learning reflected upon by
teacher, usually communicated to PI