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When I began working with teachers as a first-year coach, I felt like I had no idea what I was doing. To build my coaching skills, I emulated the coaches around me, but those opportunities were limited. Unsure of myself, I posed big-picture reflection questions to teachers and was too intimidated to share my true feedback. Not surprisingly, the teachers made very little progress. Feeling like an imposter, and desperate to find my voice and my ability to help teachers develop their skills, I spoke to my supervisor. She told me that other coaches were feeling the same way. At first, it was reassuring to know that I was not suffering alone. But it was disappointing to think about the lack of impact our coaching

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References

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

Lazarte-Alcala, N.R. (2021). Oklahoma educator supply and demand report. Oklahoma Department of Education.

Lein, J. (2017). Building teacher competence through modeling and practice in an instructional coaching session[Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. University of Oklahoma.


Jo Lein

Jo Lein is a leadership development coach at Tulsa Public Schools and an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University. She founded the Teaching and Leading Initiative of Oklahoma and the EduCoach by Dr. Jo Lein Substack.


Categories: Advocacy/policy, Change management, Coaching, Collaboration, Continuous improvement, Data, Implementation, Leadership, Learning communities

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