Seasons of Coaching Blog Series: Winter Strategy

A coaching strategy ensures teacher leaders have a focus for how to support teachers. This strategy is a thorough plan that is aligned to state/district goals, school curriculum, and teacher needs and wants. Having a seasonal coaching strategy ensures you are responsive to the growing needs and wants of teachers. It also continues to build…

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Instructional Best Practices for Teachers

Teachers should receive ongoing professional development (PD) for current instructional best practices. This ensures they continue to grow as professionals, performing at higher rates in the classroom, which also has a positive effect on student achievement. What to Focus On There are many instructional strategies teachers should employ when instructing students. However, two that have…

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182: 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…

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181: 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…

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Fire Your Mentor, Hire Your Idol

One of my biggest struggles in my early years of teaching was the lack of help and direction from experts in the field (veteran teachers, administrators, etc.). I attended all necessary training for new teachers, followed all protocol, and even asked questions whenever I could to whomever would listen. But, I still had major growing…

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The Inside Scoop on “Looping” with your Students

Administrators are always trying to find innovative ways to increase teacher efficacy and student achievement in the classroom [see my last post on the departmentalizing model of instruction.] Looping tends to be another popular strategy to also address those two important levers. What is ‘Looping?’ There comes a time in a teacher’s career where they…

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Online Modules

As an educator, I have been providing professional development to teachers for over a decade. I finally found a way to empower even more teachers without the obstacle of travel. The online modules below are hosted on Teachable, an online course platform. Click the images below to gain access to these instructional sessions. Getting the…

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About Gretchen

Hi, I’m Gretchen! Educator • Author • Instructional Coach • Professional Learning Consultant For more than two decades, I have worked alongside educators at every stage of their careers—from classroom teachers and teacher leaders to instructional coaches and school-based leaders. My work began in the elementary classroom, where I taught grades 2, 3, and 5…

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Work with Me

You don’t need more ideas. You need the right support to turn those ideas into action. Let’s Turn Learning Into Lasting Impact I partner with educators, leaders, schools, and organizations that are ready to move beyond one-time inspiration and create meaningful change in practice. Whether you need professional learning for a team, individualized coaching, strategic…

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