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Humanising Language Teaching
Year 4; Issue 5; September 02
Better Teaching through self-coaching
by by Paul Bress, UK
Introduction
It can be quite tempting to coast in teaching. When you have more than the requisite number of training qualifications, and you have an impressive list of letters after your name, why not take it easy for a bit….and rest on your laurels? However, the fact that you've taken the trouble to read this journal suggests that you don't identify with the teacher described above. You are probably a self-motivated teacher/trainer, and you are constantly trying to improve your craft.
But even for self-motivated teachers, it's difficult to find a mechanism for change that can be used for self-improvement by any teacher anywhere. There are plenty of books and journals to read, conferences to attend, refresher courses to follow. But no self-perpetuating programme for change. And this is where life coaching comes in.
What is life coaching?
Life coaching is an action-oriented form of counselling, in which the client is encouraged by the coach to take control of, and responsibility for, his/her life. It can take the form of face-to-face interaction, phone calls, or e mails.
Here are some of the guiding principles:
- Prioritising Clients divide their lives up into different areas, and decide what ones need working on. Typical areas are: physical health, spiritual health, relationship, friendships, work/study, financial situation, leisure - but clients can choose others.
- Doing Once the least fulfilled area has been chosen, it's time for action. Clients now carry out actions one by one - until they become habit-forming.
- The 'halo' effect Success in one action not only has a positive effect in the area the client's working on as but also on other areas of the client's life in general. Note: Clients don't try to produce a halo effect; the halo effect should automatically occur as a result of carrying out carefully targeted actions.
- Dividing up If there are problems, clients divide up a difficult actions into smaller ones. For example, if a client has problems saving money, s/he may work on separate sub-skills one by one, namely: thinking before spending; only buying what s/he needs; starting up a standing order into a savings account; budgeting; restricting him/herself to an annual limit for birthday presents (etc., etc.).
- Recycling When all actions have became internalized, clients start the process all over again - but from a stronger position. This process can continue indefinitely.
How can life coaching be applied to teaching?
Let's assume you're a teacher/trainer who is looking for a mecahnism for self-development within your professional life. Please answer the questions on your own sheet of paper.
1. Decide the most important areas of teaching/training Here are some suggestions, but they are just for guidance. Copy the ones that you think are crucial. Then add more.
- Clarity of communication
- Setting objectives
- Actualizing objectives
- Variety of activities
- Mixed ability teaching
- Reviewing
- Marking
2. Decide which ones you want to work on.
Put a mark by any of the chosen areas above where you think there's room for improvement in your own teaching/training.
3. Prioritise
Rewrite the list of areas you feel you need to work on. Write the biggest problem area at the top, and then the second biggest, etc. etc.
4. Write 'sure-fail' and 'sure-success' lists
Here's the odd bit! It's much more liberating and productive pinpointing how to screw something up than it is to pinpoint how to succeed in it. Try this out for yourself….for example, I bet you could give me 10 ways to ensure an unhappy life - but maybe not 10 to ensure a happy one.
So what you have to do now is look at you number one priority area. Now imagine you wanted to guarantee failure in this area. What would you do? Write your list under the heading 'Sure-fail'. When you've done that, write the opposite of the actions you've just written under the heading 'Sure-success'.
5. Do it
Carry out each of the actions just listed. Do each in turn until each feels a part of you. Never move on to the next one until you really feel ready. Continue this process until all actions for all priority areas have been completed and really feel part of you.
6. Start the process again
This may seem like an odd thing to do. But remember that a lot of time will probably have elapsed by now, and you'll be in a different 'place'. You will probably see teaching in a different light and have different priorities now.
What if things go wrong?
If you're finding it very difficult to accomplish an action, try breaking it down into smaller actions. Again, you can use the 'sure-fail/sure-success' list technique. In other words, if you find it difficult to slow your speech down for elementary students, your 'sure-fail' list may look like this:
a) Imagine you're talking to native speakers.
b) Never use simplified language.
c) Include a lot of 'asides'.
d) Be ironic.
e) Never give students a chance to speak.
You can imagine for yourself the 'sure-success' list. Then your next step would be to work on the key problem one and work down the list again. This may sound very laborious to you, but this dividing up process can be very comforting for teachers with certain 'blocks' in their teaching.
How it's worked for me (so far)
When I applied the self-coaching mechanism to my own teaching, I pin-pointed mixed ability teaching as the area that I needed to work on.
This was my 'sure-fail' list':
My 'sure-success' list was:
Out of these, the most important action that I was not succeeding in was the last one, namely determining individual student objectives before each lesson and then establishing if they'd been met afterwards. So what I did was this: prior to teaching a lesson on writing discourse, I wrote a list of the names of the students in my class, and, next to each, I wrote individual objectives:
e.g. Sophia should be able to
a) understand when it is appropriate to use 'However' in writing (and when not)
b) understand the correct punctuation to use with 'However'
c) understand the grammar environment of 'However'
d) use 'However' appropriately, and with the correct punctuation and grammar.
The effect of setting these individual objectives was to make my teaching much more sensitive and fine-tuned. I felt that, instead of talking to a group of people en masse, I was addressing a group of individuals. Consequently, a much better atmosphere developed in the classroom.
And this is an example of the "halo effect". While I was working on just one aspect of mixed ability teaching, I not only got better at that area as a whole, but also at other aspects of teaching (in this case 'clarity of communication' and 'setting objectives'). So…although you yourself might be working on one apparently discrete action, don't forget it might have far-reaching implications for your teaching as a whole.
Conclusion
The key advantages of this self-coaching system are that a) it empowers you to take responsibility for your own teaching, and b) it offers a continuous improvement mechanism. I hope you use it, whoever and wherever you are!
If you would like to report your results using this self-coaching system, please e mail me on paulbress@tinyonline.co.uk. You can also visit my website on www.bemycoach.co.uk
Paul Bress
Note: A 'non-teaching' version is due out in Training Journal later this year. The same self-coaching model (devised by Paul Bress) is used.
THE BRESS SELF-COACHING MODEL
START HERE
Evaluate teaching
Decide which components to work on
Decide on the first component
Write 'sure-fail' and 'sure-success' lists
Mark the actions you don't do
Decide on a key action
Do it
Can't do it?
Can do it?
Do the next action, etc., etc.
Can do it?
Finished all the actions of all components?
