Grade Level or Departmental Model Scenario

Linda and Manuel worked in a school that had received a lot of technology, but noticed few teachers using these tools on a regular basis. The school had earlier adopted a model where much of the school’s professional development was focused on teachers meeting regularly in grade-level teams to compare student work samples and plan a more integrated curriculum. This model was at the heart of the professional development strategy written into their school's improvement plan. As the school looked for a way to use this model to meet the needs of teachers who wanted to use technology, they read about several schools that used coaches or mentors to lead professional development for their teacher teams. The school believed that coaching would add value to their team-based professional development approach and asked Linda and Manuel to be their coaches.

The departmental teams already had common planning times, but other pieces needed to be added. The school decided to use the technology stipend provided by the district for two coaches. They also used the building budget to provide some release time for participating teachers. Finally, they used federal funds from Title IIa of the No Child Left Behind legislation to fund additional release time for their coaches to work with other teachers. Linda and Manuel found that teaching with technology brought instructional resources to their classrooms that would not have been possible just a few short years ago. Their students were eager to use technology for researching, writing, and publishing their work. Their colleagues agreed to use Linda and Manuel as coaches so they could integrate technology and enrich their classroom activities in a similar manner.

Coaching became an effective way for the teachers on Linda’s and Manuel’s teams to learn new technology skills and instructional strategies for integrating technology in their classrooms. Each coach had a common planning time with a team of teachers involved in the coaching project. Once a week they met to plan activities, share resources, compare student work samples, or learn a new technology skill. At one of their first meetings the teachers all agreed on a common focus: student writing. Next, they talked about how to organize their classrooms so that each team of students could gather around one computer. Then the coaches helped the teachers get started with small projects they could use with their students the next day. Eventually they started planning longer projects and ongoing activities related to their writing focus.

While these weekly planning meetings were important for laying out goals and charting progress, Manuel and Linda found that most of their coaching activities happened during informal meetings throughout the school day. Often they bumped into teachers in the halls or the teacher lounge and checked on their progress. During these informal meetings, collaborating teachers often discussed teaching strategies, received tips for valuable online resources, or found answers to immediate software questions that kept their lessons on track and their confidence high. Linda’s and Manuel’s coaching duties went far beyond planning and just-in-time support. Several times a year they scheduled substitutes for teams of teachers so they could observe students using technology in a coach’s classroom. At other times they team-taught a lesson with their colleagues. Coaching had increased the sense of collaboration among the teachers on these teams. The teachers knew there was someone to turn to if they had a question or wanted to share ideas about a new lesson or project. By working together, teachers had been more successful at using technology to enrich student learning.