School Coaching

(SINI/ DINI) | Instructional Coaching | Leadership Coaching | Inquiry Driven Science | Faculty

Effective school change encompasses the whole education system and involves all constituencies. ACSR provides a full range of coordinated services for teachers, administrators, students, and the community to work toward sustained, substantive, results-oriented change in schools. Our experience in schools as educators, researchers, and evaluators helps schools assess current and future programming and assists in all stages of systems change. The Antioch Center for School Renewal provides school coaching services as one means of pulling disparate program elements together. The coach acts as a conduit between groups and assists in moving the school towards a shared vision.

A school coach works with individual schools to help them and guide them through change. The coach's role is to facilitate the change process, provide resources, and guide schools while helping to build the capacity of school faculty to do this work on their own.

A coach plays many roles in the school, but his or her primary purpose is to be an agent of change. In this role, the coach mentors and supports educators to continually improve teaching, learning, and assessment. As facilitator, the coach asks challenging questions and offers strategies, but rarely offers prescriptive directions about how the school should undertake its change effort. A coach empowers teachers to be reflective practitioners and agents of change. Asking questions that prompt individuals to reflect, opening up channels of communication, giving feedback and written pieces to staff - these all help to create a culture of problem-solving and risk taking.

Support for Schools and Districts In Need of Improvement or Schools in Restructuring

School coaching can be particularly effective for Schools or Districts in Need of Improvement (SINI/ DINI) or schools who have begun the process of restructuring. Let us help you develop a cohesive course action based on not only your specific needs, but also our experience with broad-based school change.

To learn more about the ways that a school coach can support your efforts, contact us.

Instructional Coaching

ACSR offers a complete range of professional development services that provide on-going support for sustainable school improvement. Job Embedded Professional Learning opportunities focus on specific areas of school improvement efforts providing instruction, modeling, and feedback to teachers as they gain new skills. We offer engaging, learner centered, customized, on-site support on topics including:

Classroom Management & Instruction for Paraprofessionals
Building Lessons that Push the Envelope and Engage the Learner
Beyond Character Education: Supporting Students' Academic and Social Development
Creating and Assessing Extended Learning Opportunities Bringing the Real World into the Regular Classroom
Creating and Using Formative Assessments
Reflection as a Tool for Learning and Assessment
Using the Cycle of Inquiry to Improve Teaching and Learning
Teachers as Learning Facilitators

Leadership Coaching

Leadership Coaching is a collegial relationship between a current school leader and a personal coach with experience and knowledge regarding educational leadership. Coaching is the act of listening and reflecting back to the individual what is being said and helping the individual find her/his own solutions to the challenges leaders face. School leaders have many tasks and coaching can provide the leader with an unbiased view as well as questions that need to be answered in order to maintain a positive direction in the school.

As a first time principal I've appreciated the support from other administrators. However, what was missing was a more in depth relationship with an experienced administrator. Beginning administrators need a confidant, someone who they can talk with freely without being judged. Through coaching, I've come to appreciate the differences in our respective school cultures and learn that each site has its own issues. There are many common themes that can be identified and discussed with the help of a coach. Of benefit is having scheduled, uninterrupted time to meet with an experienced colleague to talk about the daily challenges of the principalship. It's not the answers the mentor provides, but the questions asked that help a beginning principal view a situation from many perspectives and assist in decision making and other leadership issues. —A.S., principal in Vermont

Inquiry Driven Science

The 2008 science NECAP results have awakened science educators from across the region to a real issue that needs our attention. The results strongly indicate that students do not have very well developed critical thinking and problem solving skills as part of their science learning.

We are proud to announce that the Inquiry Driven Science Institute is now available using our school coaching model. Through a year-long workshop and coaching support, we can help your teachers learn to build critical thinking, creative thinking, problem solving, and collaboration skills along side the acquisition of science content knowledge. Teachers will study and develop science curricula based on student centered, experiential, problem based learning. This curricula will utilize the most rigorous science domain frameworks across the disciplines (earth, life, and physical sciences). They will explore the integration of experiential, problem-based, collaborative, and standards-driven learning methodologies, focusing on the role of teacher in designing curriculum, guiding student understanding, and assessing performance. Teachers will also develop the capacities to build and advance their classrooms as dynamic, collaborative, science learning communities.

We can only support a limited number of schools in this effort. Contact our office for more information- ACSR@antiochne.edu or 283.2302.

Last Updated: 12/4/09