Lead Lit Topic: Getting Organized
Getting Organized
Results
Coaching Minute: Lunch Tip
Trying to build relationships with teachers? Heather Rader suggests informal lunches in this quick video tip. Whether you are a building-based or district-based coach, try to schedule a common...
Coaching Conversations: Collaborating and Celebrating Small Victories
Natasha Axelson shares some of the surprises and challenges of coaching, as well as the importance of celebrating small victories with Brenda Power in this audio interview. A full transcript...
Forming a Partnership with a New Coach
My first years of coaching came at a time when our district began a five-year literacy initiative which brought the workshop model into every classroom for reading and writing. In...
Creating a Healthy Classroom Culture the First Week of School
Teachers are lucky: we get two New Year’s Days when we get to celebrate and make resolutions for a fresh start. The most important one, of course, is the unofficial...
Leading a Multi-Day Curriculum Meeting
Twenty-four people. Six and a half hours a day. Four days. Two curricula to write. One coordinator to facilitate it all: me. All school year, I heard other coordinators...
Finding Purpose in Coaching with Organized Notes
The first two years of my coaching career were fun, and a lot of time was spent on building relationships, but I am not sure we accomplished as much as...
Literacy Learning and Parent Teacher Organizations
Soon after I began my work as an elementary principal, I had a conversation with a group of parents that seemed baffling at the time. It was during our monthly...
Coaching Conversations: Building a Foundation of Trust
In this audio interview, Brenda Power chats with Gwen Blumberg about her lessons from her first years of coaching: trust takes time, and baby steps toward change need to be...
Coaching Minute: A Conduit for Resources
Heather Rader explains why professional reading needs to be a priority for literacy coaches in this quick video. A transcript is available below the player. As you...
ABCs of Coaching
Summer gives me time to think about the upcoming coaching season. In particular, I’m thinking about the new coaches—Vikki, Samantha, and Meghan—whom I’ll be mentoring in the fall as well...
Digital Clutter and Being Present with Teachers
With all the technology and interruptions in our lives today, it’s easy to be distracted during a conversation. I pride myself on multitasking and being efficient in my work, but...
Getting Instructional Practices Up and Running
How long does it take to get an instructional practice up and running? A week? A month? A semester? A year? Is there any such thing as too much support?...
Coaching Owls, Larks, and Hummingbirds
What do birds have to do with coaching? More than I initially suspected. I first read about sleep patterns of larks, owls, and hummingbirds in John Medina’s book Brain Rules:...
Teacher Evaluation: A New Role for Coaches
To make dreams apparent to others and to align people with them requires not just more explanations or clarification, but the creation of meaning. Warren Bennis Like many districts...
Guess Who’s Coming? Planning an Author Visit
I was following a trail of students to the cafeteria. A smile formed when I noticed heads turning to glance at a countdown calendar. Excitement had been building day by...
Picture It: Celebrate!
There are many times throughout the year when it is important to take a moment to celebrate all the wonderful things happening in our school community. As a principal, I...
Rubrics and Muggles: Common Frameworks and Instructional Coaching
My son is obsessed with Harry Potter. It started with an introduction by his older cousins to the first movie and has snowballed from there. He has taken to putting...
Developing a Collaborative Vision for Leading Literacy Coaches
Let us make a special effort to stop communicating with each other, so we can have some conversation. Mark Twain It’s August, and Amanda and I are perched in...
Climbing Gordon’s Ladder with New Teachers
Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better. Maya Angelou As a teacher leader for the Teacher Mentor Program, I worked...
Operation Classroom Library
One, two, three, four crates of books were stacked against the wall, standing taller than any kindergarten student in the class. The stack was teetering, in danger of abruptly crashing...
Planning for a Year of Study Groups
Sustainable improvement can never be done to or even for teachers. It can only ever be achieved by and with them. Andy Hargreaves and Michael Fullan As a literacy...
