May Motivation: Ending the School Year as an Instructional Coach
May Motivation: Ending the School Year as an Instructional Coach
We all know this year is the toughest any educator has had to endure, so keeping up spirits may be especially difficult as the last weeks of school approach. Here are some of the ways your coaching efforts can help as the school year comes to a close.
Stay the Course
As we race closer to the finish line of a marathon year, consider how to keep your team on track by setting the pace in the final lap. You can do this by wrapping up your current coaching cycles: collect summative data from student performance, celebrate positive outcomes (bright spots), and capture the takeaways to implement or change for the next school year. Make time to debrief with the teachers you worked with as well as other instructional leaders at your site to determine what will be needed for the staff, including yourself, next year and beyond.
Evaluate Your Impact
In order to reflect on your impact as a coach and prepare for the next school year, take this time to survey the staff about their experiences with coaching. This can be facilitated with paper-based reflection tools or through digital form collection like this one from the Google for Education Certified Coach Program. You may also want to consider surveying your administration team and student groups to determine how your efforts contributed to successes or shortcomings.
Another means to evaluate your impact is to reflect on your cycle notes, calendars, agendas, observation forms, communications, project guides, or any other methods for tracking your time spent as a coach. Determine where and how you spent your time and energy most often as an instructional coach. This will help you see where coaching had the greatest impact and where to make adjustments in the future. It may also direct where professional development is needed, either for yourself or the educational staff you support.
Get Organized
Begin organizing materials that will be needed for next year. This can be cataloging materials needed for purchase, collecting or distributing resources, or re-evaluating materials based on their effectiveness and use.
If you know the room you are working out of next year, consider preparing that space as well. Decide how best to organize the room for storage, seating, or just your own sanity. Organizing your space should also happen digitally. Share pertinent files with the appropriate teams, systemize your digital folders, monitor the share settings in group files to prevent unnecessary changes over the break, and clear what you can from your inbox or task lists.
By prioritizing must-do and will-do tasks from one year to the next, determining how your interactions with teachers led to an impact on student learning, and organizing your physical and digital space you will be able to wrap up this school year and be prepared for the next year with a well-earned summer break, the finish line!