NIUSI-Leadscape Guide for Coaching Dialogues

Professional Learning for School Leaders:

The Principals Role in School Transformation Cynthia MruczekRich BarbacaneApril 19, 2011

Rich and Cynthia

Introduce ourselves, our experience, and talk about our roles.1What is NIUSI-LeadScape?CYNTHIAThis is an OSEP-funded, five year grant for providing a variety of supports to principals who are increasing inclusive practices in their schools to increase educational access and achievement for all students.

2Ongoing Professional DevelopmentOur Partners:

CYNTHIANIUSI LeadScape works directly with a cadre of 30 Principals from Orlando, Tempe, Madison, Maricopa, Greensboro, and on the White River Apache Nation.

3OutcomesParticipants will be able toExplain the importance of the Systemic Change Framework to principals Communicate the benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsUnderstand the value of consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovation

CYNTHIA4The Systemic Change Framework

The Equity Alliance at ASUs Framework for Approaching and Assessing Systemic ChangeCYNTHIA Rationale for using Systemic Change Framework -change in a complex social and political system like education must be made at multiple levels, from national organizations and government to individual schools, in order to create the intended results. Innovations and distortions of practice and policy travel across levels.

Brief discussion of the framework Ferguson, Kozleski, & Smith (2003); Kozleski & Smith, 2009; Kozleski & Gibson, in press, 2011):

At the center of the framework is student learning. Moving out from the center, levels of the schooling system are represented from Student Effort through the Federal level. Within each of the levels are six principles of change including; Teaching Design and practice, Leadership for Equity, Group practice and professional learning, Family connections and partnerships, design and use of time and space, and Inquiry on Equity in schooling.

Educational systems are complex human activity arenas in which multiple units of analysis congeal activities around specific outcomes or objects. For instance, classrooms have as their outcome the production of some kinds of knowledge embodied within the students. The arena has spaces both mental (figured) and real in which activity is produced and material and intellectual property is exchanged. The classroom arena is embedded within an encompassing arena of the school, which has other rhythms and sets of transactions that produce outcomes; for example, for students who progress through levels of proficiency, as well as transactions and outcomes for teachers, administrators, and families. The diversity of outcomes of schools are embedded within a local educational unit, and that unit within the state, which is in turn heavily influenced by the federal government (Kozleski & Smith, 2009). Our perspective considers the interlocking nature of small systems that have not only internal agency but are also buffeted by complex social, regulatory, and political influences that are in turn manifestations of the ways in which power and privilege are constructed and accumulated to benefit some.

If any one person works in any one layer, you may see incremental changes that have some positive impacts on the central focus of student learning or whatever outcome is intended. The problem is that the chances of change being sustainable are drastically reduced because the change is tied to an individual rather than a systemic change. By addressing multiple levels of the system, the likelihood of initiating sustainable change is greater.

Sustainability and Scaling.5The Systemic Change FrameworkA. RADAR: This framework is just on the screen.B. RHETORIC: There has been talk about this framework, but little action.C. EMERGING: Our organization is aware of this element and has taken some action to implement it.D. ACCOMPLISHED: This framework is part of our practice.RADARRHETORICEMERGINGACCOMPLISHEDWhere is your organization on the radar screen? Mark the radar level on each screen according to the extent to which you believe your organization is accomplishing that element.CYNTHIA6

The Systemic Change FrameworkSchool levelCYNTHIA Schools are complex organizations. Find the school circle on this diagram. Notice how schools are nested inside the political, curricular, social, and economic constraints of school districts, state education agencies, and federal policies and initiatives.Schools are influenced by the other factors, external in the figure. And, in turn, schools influence the work of practitioners. Practitioners also influence the schools organization as well as the lives and life chances of their students.

Most of the conventional wisdom in school leadership research places great emphasis on the role of the principal. In our experience, reform and renewal built on individual leadership is difficult to sustain or to scale up because of the mobility of people in such roles. The challenges of changing leadership are even more critical in urban settings where all school personnel seem to move to new schools and districts at a higher rate than is typical in suburban or rural districts. At the same time, involving principals in change initiatives is integral to creating systemic change.

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Why involve principals?Important entry point to school reformPositions of influence within the schoolPrincipals need to understand the Systemic Change Framework (they cannot do it on their own)The Systemic Change Framework

CYNTHIA Anything SPDG organizations are doing need to be articulated to DO people, as evidenced by the systemic change framework. A multi-directional relationship

Blumberg and Greenfield (1986) observed that the eight principals interviewed in their study used "different concepts to describe their view of themselves in their role, one that stemmed from his or her own personality, experience and training" (p. 7). The researchers go on to identify three factors that explained the on-the-job-success of these eight principals: (a) desiring and eager to make schools over in their image, (b) proactive and quick to assume the initiative, and (c) resourceful in being able to structure their roles and demands on their time in a manner that permitted them to pursue what might be termed their personal objectives as principals. Blumberg and Greenfield (1986) open their book with the conviction that it takes a unique person to help give a school, first an image of what it can be, and second, to provide the drive, support, and skills to make that image approximate reality (p. viii). We call this aspect of the principal, the personal identity for leadership the ability of the principal to remake the demands of the job into role responsibilities that serve to achieve ones own vision of leadership and organizational goals.

8The Systemic Change Framework

What are some thoughts you have about this framework?

How does it relate to your work?CYNTHIA-Allow for participants to share thoughts, concerns, and questions regarding the framework.

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The Systemic Change FrameworkCYNTHIA The Equity Alliance website has hundreds of free, downloadable resources on a variety of topics in our Learning Carousel. This data base can be searched by category, tag, or by clicking on an area of interest in our Systemic Change Framework, which identifies the elements needed to effect change in school systems.

http://ea.niusileadscape.org/lc10

The Systemic Change Frameworkhttp://www.equityallianceatasu.edu/lchttp://www.niusileadscape.org/lc/CYNTHIA Discussion of resources on the Learning Carousel possibly feature the Building Leadership Teams resources for principals.

11The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizations

When thinking about the Systemic Change Framework we just discussed, what are some benefits of partnerships between schools and State Associations or other agencies?RICH and CYNTHIA (I was thinking we might do well tag-teaming on this one)12The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsPeople, Policy, and Practices link the multiple levels of the Systemic Change Framework CYNTHIAPeople are key since educational systems are created to educate people, infants, children, adolescents, and adults. Educational systems employ people. Teachers and other school educators work together to create effective learning communities for the students they serve. School leaders and other administrators help to keep the system flowing so that students enter, progress, and graduate. Teachers and other personnel are recruited, hired, coached, evaluated and retired in a constantly flowing process.

Policies help to guide the people side of the work. They are created to maintain the learning process and reduce the amount of effort expended on activities other than learning, like getting supplies to the classroom, deciding which students are assigned to which teachers, and making sure that there are enough books, desks, classrooms and buildings to house all the students. Policies help parents and students know what to expect, what is expected from them and how the school calendar will flow from the time that school opens until the end of the school year.Creating policy that will transform schools into culturally responsive milieus requires understandings of institutional processes and factors that can enable or constrain the performance of culturally and linguistically diverse students in various school contexts. While different constituencies affect policy at different levels of the system national, state, district, school and classroom; policies continue to be set at each of these levels.

The critical features of effective and sustainable policies include the educative function of policy. That is, that policies constrain some kinds of activities and sanction others because of fundamental beliefs about the individual rights of human beings. Policies should be developed in such a way that they educate the people that will be affected by the policy. This includes student polices.

Second, effective policy informs. That is, it names the issue or problem that the policy is intended to effect. Consider IDEA (the Individuals with Education Act), when it was first passed, it provided evidence about the number of students with disabilities who were prevented from attending school (about 6 million students) as a foundation for the necessity of the law.

Policies need to be equitable. That is, they need to ensure that the impact of the policy will be equitable across groups of people so that no one group will benefit at the expense of another group.

Policies should emancipate. That is, that they should provide greater levels of autonomy and decision-making for the people impacted.

Finally, policies should ensure access access to goods and services that are available to everyone, rather than a particular, advantaged group.

Practices are what people do. They include simple things like how students are greeted at the beginning of the year, to how reading is taught in the classroom, to how assessment occurs. While policies regulate the spheres in which people operate, much of daily practice is up to the people who do the work: students and school practitioners alike. Practices also include how teachers interact with one another, their supervisors, and the building leadership. The practices of administrators at central administration affect the lives of school personnel and the choices they make to involve themselves in decision-making. When we talk about making a system culturally responsive, we mean that people, policies, and practices need to be assessed in terms of the degree to which they permit or impede culturally responsive action.

13The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsVision + Skills + Incentives + Resources + Action Plan = CHANGE______ + Skills + Incentives + Resources + Action Plan = CONFUSIONVision + ______ + Incentives + Resources + Action Plan = ANXIETYVision + Skills + _________ + Resources + Action Plan = RESISTANCEVision + Skills + Incentives + __________ + Action Plan = FRUSTRATIONVision + Skills + Incentives + Resources + ___________ = TREADMILL

Essential Variables for Leading Inclusive SchoolsCYNTHIA14Processes for developing high quality, inclusive practices

The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsCYNTHIAThe components that are necessary to develop inclusive practices in your school include vision, frameworks, technical assistance, and mediating experiences. As the school leader, YOU create the vision for what your schools practices will be to include all students. You lead your staff to establish the frameworks for how you will work together (i.e., teaming, meeting structures, shared planning, and even the language that you use together). Every day you provide Technical Assistance to your teachers in helping them deal with problems that arise and transferring skills. You also mediate the experiences of your teachers by talking with them, coaching them.15The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsWhy partner? Networking, communication, resources, etc.Avoiding the perspective of Just one more thing to doWorking more efficientlyLeadScape and the Learning CarouselResources available (data maps, professional learning modules)Other partnerships?RICH and CYNTHIA16

The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsCYNTHIAhttp://www.niusileadscape.org/lc/Tag/coach

One resource you might find useful in partnering with principals at the school level is found on the learning carousel. It is a product called Culturally Responsive Coaching for Inclusive Schools.17The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsDeveloped by Art Costa and Bob Garmston, Cognitive CoachingSM is based on the following four major propositions:

Thought and perception produce all behavior.Teaching is constant decision-making.To learn something new requires engagement and alteration in thought.Humans continue to grow cognitively.Art Costa and Bob Garmston, the co-developers, define Cognitive CoachingSM as a set of strategies, a way of thinking and a way of working that invites self and others to shape and reshape their thinking and problem solving capacities.

It is not enough for a person to behave in a certain way; what's important is the thinking that goes on behind the behavior. A large part of the role of a cognitive coach is based on trust and rapport with the person being coached.

18The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizations

An iceberg can serve as a useful metaphor to understand the process of changing school cultures. As an iceberg floats in the water, the huge mass of it remains below the surface.

Only a small percentage of the whole iceberg is visible above the surface. In this way, the iceberg is like the school. The immediate issues are what we notice above the surface, while the individual assumptions and motivations remain unseen below the surface. No amount of chipping away at the issues on the surface will have a lasting impact unless you also address the individual beliefs, assumptions, and expectations below the surface that create and maintain those issues.

19How People LearnLearning scientists concur:Deeper conceptual understanding comes from active participation in ones own learning(Sawyer, 2005)The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsAlthough we often use showing to teach people skills, research shows that active engagement in making meaning is the best way to learn.20The benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsCoaching is used in many different ways to support the ongoing learning and improvement of educators

Cognitive coaching focuses on changing patterns of thought in order to open new paths for learning

Our model of coaching builds on what the research says about how people effectively learn

The broad idea behind coaching is to help educators develop new ways of looking at their work so that they can create new scripts for addressing challenges of practice21Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationHow experienced are you with culturally responsive pedagogy?Im very experienced with CRP and have a firm grasp of itIve heard of it, but have a small understanding of itIve never heard of it

RICH22Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationDiscussion of fidelity90% implementation by 90% of the individuals to have sustainable changeDiscuss notions of fidelity through a culturally responsive lens

RICHWhat are the key points you believe are important in fidelity related to RTI and PBIS? What are issues around fidelity that schools have encountered when implementing the two? (How will they share?)

Issues: Who should be on the problem solving team? Helping principals finding materials (find an example)? Tiers are not fixed. Not a use for delay of identification. Transitioning students with special needs to the workplace. 23At all tiers, teachersuse culturally responsive teachingimplement linguistically appropriate instructionensure explicit instruction to acquire academic language Embed culturally responsive behavior strategies

24Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationRICHProgress monitoring compares ELL student to other true-peer ELLs since their rate of progress cannot be compared to that of the English-only group Culturally responsive instruction is fundamental at this tier and not an add-onExplicit and linguistically appropriate instruction is also fundamental (attention given to language forms and functions)Strategies appropriate for instructing ELLs such as Total Physical Response, visuals, real objects, modeling, repetitive language and gestures must be usedInstruction includes language activities and explicit instruction in phonological awareness, the alphabetic code, vocabulary development and comprehension strategies

February 201124Believe in student ability and desire to learnHold high expectations for student learningExplicitly teach skills Challenge and support students Respect student languageRelate to student social context25Culturally responsive teachers Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationRICHSelf-explanatory

Good time to have participants share examples of what this looks like in the classroom

For presenter guide may want to include a classroom example for each statement

February 201125Linguistically appropriate instructionTotal Physical ResponseUse of visuals Use of real objectsModeling reading, writing, conversationRepetitive languageUse of gestures26Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationRICHSelf-explanatory

Good time to have participants share examples of what this looks like in the classroom

For presenter guide may want to include a classroom example for each statement

February 201126Effective practices for ELLsAttend to language developmentBuild on background experiencesFocus on building understandingProvide multiple opportunities for practice and applicationUse repetition and redundant informationAssess frequentlyReteach as necessary

27Source: Center for Research on the Educational Achievement and Teaching of English Language LearnersCulturally responsive approaches for the support and development of personnelRICHSlide is self-explanatory

Interestingly, same strategies as for all struggling learnersFor ELLs language development plays a more prominent roleFebruary 20112728Vision for Schools of TomorrowShared ownership, accountability, and leadershipFlexible delivery of support servicesAll struggling students receive supportsEligibility considered after intervention and ongoing progress monitoring within MTSS

Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationFebruary 201128RICHAuthentic assessments and progress monitoring throughout the curriculum; less focus on standardized assessments to determine eligibility for special education

Shared ownership all faculty in a building see it as a shared responsibility to see that all students learn and are meeting their highest potential, including the full range of cognitive abilities Flexible delivery educators work together to support all students and their learning; early intervening is critical; quality supported/scaffolded instruction; it is ensuring that instructional and behavioral learning strategies are employed so that all children succeed; interventions are not a hoop to jump through on the way to testing for special education eligibility; interventions are implemented wherever and whenever student needs indicateAll struggling students Students perform at grade level within the general education curriculum; needs of students struggling with a particular skill or concept are addressed through differentiation of the core instructional program; when more supports are needed, the student is then referred to the MTSS Problem Solving Team to determine the next set of interventions to meet student needs; applies to both academics and behaviorsEligibility considered the degree to which a student responds to an intervention indicates when the intervention needs to be faded, continued, or changed; several different intervention strategies may be implemented before the one that best meets a students individual needs is found; emphasis in law and regulations with the exclusion factor of lack of instruction for determination of SLD

Consistency and alignment of core concepts across systems for sustainability and scaling innovationWrapping up the conversation

How do you, as state leaders, help principals change their perspective from Assessment OF learning to Assessment FOR learning?

29RICH and CYNTHIA29Wrapping it upParticipants will be able toExplain the importance of the Systemic Change Framework to principals Communicate the benefits of partnering with State Associations and other organizationsExamine culturally responsive approaches for the support and development of personnel

Comments, Questions, or Concerns30RICH AND CYNTHIA30Thank You!!31