Posts by Gretchen Schultek Bridgers
183: Remain Passionate When Your Toes are to the Fire
Educators experience stress just like all other professions. Sometimes those seasons of stress feel never ending and can even convince you that your life in education will never be any different than the ugly struggle it is right now. The truth is, seasons of stress when your toes are to the fire are moments for…
Listen to EpisodeHow to Lead an Efficient & Engaging Professional Development Session
Teacher leaders are often creating professional development [PD] sessions for the staff that they lead. These PD sessions historically have been meetings that are lengthy, rarely applicable, and have a “sit and get” mentality. This is an ineffective way to equip teachers with instructional best practices and knowledge of current pedagogy. Teachers need opportunities to…
Read Full Post182: Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing
It is easy this day in age to get distracted. Teachers can easily fall down a rabbit hole full of shiny, sparkly classroom implementations that don’t always lead to student learning or teacher effectiveness. Tune in to hear what the “main thing” is when it comes to teaching and tips to hone your craft in…
Listen to EpisodeHow to Provide Models of Expert Teaching Through Coaching
Expert teaching should be accessible to students on a daily basis, but it should also be available for teachers. They need to see great teaching in action and hone their craft. It is one thing to learn instructional pedagogy and another to see it implemented live in front of students. Live teaching demonstrations allow teachers…
Read Full Post181: The Reward of Developing People
Being a teacher is more than just teaching content lessons. It is the life-giving work of an educator to develop the people in front of them every day. One way to do that is to provide appropriate challenge and support so that overtime students begin to rely on themselves to overcome hardships. Tune in to…
Listen to EpisodeConduct a Classroom Observation with Clarity & Precision
There is an art to conducting a classroom observation that fairly depicts a teacher’s performance in the classroom. Nothing is more frustrating for a teacher than having an outsider watch you teach for a small snippet of time, come to a conclusion about your instructional proficiency and then put that rating score in your permanent…
Read Full Post180: Classroom Resources with Leanne Stone
Leanne Stone is a former third grade teacher in Charlotte, NC who taught through Teach for America. Like most new teachers, Leanne found herself overwhelmed by the responsibilities and costs of creating new classroom materials and began to explore online materials to help her prepare for class. Leanne now coaches hundreds of teachers and school administrators through Teachers Pay Teachers, an…
Listen to EpisodeHow to Prepare as an Instructional Coach
If instructional coaches want to be successful in impacting teacher proficiency and student achievement in the classroom, they have to prepare. Just like teachers write lesson plans by studying and researching content, instructional coaches study too. They take notice of the habits of those they mentor. They research teaching best practices to model and develop…
Read Full Post179: Leadership like Rock, Paper… Pencil
As teacher leaders, we have many pencils in our lives that need our attention to be sharpened so that their talents come to fruition. But if we do not provide the paper so that these pencils can develop and create their masterpieces, then it’s all for not. Tune in to hear an inspiring analogy from…
Listen to EpisodeCoaching Cycle- What is it and How Do I Conduct One?
A coaching cycle puts a framework in place to ensure teachers are improving in the classroom so that students can too. If you are new to the role of an instructional coach or want more clarity on what you could be doing to better help teachers, this blog post will outline how to successfully set up…
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