Empowering teachers in my coaching role!

Meet teachers where they are! For one of my colleagues, just getting him comfortable with airplaying his iPad and using the timer app was a HUGE step for him. For another one, we co-taught a lesson together. It doesn’t have to be a giant step, but focus on small steps at a time. And celebrate each step! Then take another, and celebrate again. And before you know it, you will have made massive strides.

Good luck! I would love if you posted an update on how it goes this year!

What an exciting place to be! Empowering teachers is the best part of the coaching role. I agree with Eileen that meeting them where they are is a great place to start. Another strategy I have found helpful is sometimes, they don't know what to ask or how to get started themselves. At the beginning of the year, I send out a graphic introducing myself and how I can support them. Then each week I send my schedule with an appointment calendar where they can book individualized time with me. In addition, that weekly schedule email has a short highlight of a teacher who I had worked with the previous week and a short tech tip. I've attached an example. I find that right after I send that newsletter out, I will have an increase in teachers reaching out and wanting to plan or brainstorm something for their classroom.      

I was a library media specialist who was also the school technology integration specialist for nearly 20 years before I moved into my current technology position, so I can relate to your situation. I don't have all the answers, but I'll share a few ideas that have worked for me.

Sometimes I was able to motivate reluctant teachers by identifying a lesson or unit they always taught anyway and then offering a suggestion on an easy way to incorporate existing technology. This helps it seem less like "one more thing to do" and more like a way to improve the lesson in some way -- even if that way is simply giving students more options for completing an assignment or final product. You could mention that you learned about Clips in the Apple Learning Coach program, and you think it would be a good fit for this unit. Then offer to help them learn how to use it and be available for assistance, co-teaching, or modeling until they feel comfortable. Hopefully, they feel successful enough to try it with other projects and learn additional tools.

For the folks who are used to having you teach the iPad lessons independently, you might need to talk in PLC about what you've learned about teacher empowerment through this program and that it's a goal of yours to help teachers feel empowered and independent in their technology use. You are certainly still there to help, but it's important for you to coach not only the students but also the teachers. If you can teach them to feel more comfortable with the technology, you can have more impact on the students and the schools in the long run because the technology use continues even when you aren't available. You cannot be there every day, but you can help teachers eventually feel confident enough to continue the skills on their own. Then your efforts are farther-reaching.

For some teachers, you might motivate them through the perspective of Universal Design for Learning. The technology tools already at their disposal can help meet students' needs in terms of representation (audio and visual content, accessibility, etc.), engagement, expression, and student choice--all of which help learners become more successful because learning is more meaningful. Sometimes, the teachers I've worked with have embraced the technology coaching only after they've seen that it helps solve a problem or meet a need they've already identified but didn't know how to address otherwise.

It is challenging to reach all teacher learners, but give it your best effort with the goal of improving learning outcomes for everyone. With that in mind, you can feel good about the work and can't go wrong. Be sure to celebrate small successes because they do continue to grow when you're not there.