How to prepare for a class observation?

       According to Coaching with a Focus (class material), the first part of the collaborative coaching cycle is the collaborative planning conference (pre-observation conference). It allows the mentor and mentee to discuss lesson plan goals and objectives and to determine the focus for a classroom observation. Understanding and analyzing the classroom context is essential to the mentoring cycle. What is the classroom context? It is established by the teacher and students through daily practice to create a positive and effective teaching and learning environment, for example, set up and follow the class rules, ask and respond to the questions, borrow and return the pencil. Examining the classroom context with the mentee helps the mentor understand the classroom culture during the observation. 

       During the collaborative planning conference, the mentor can guide the mentee to get to know deeper about students by examining students' assets. This process allows the mentee to discover students’ weaknesses, strengths, and more. The mentor can ask the mentee the following guided questions “Who are your students outside of the school walls? What do they love? Where did they come from? What do they fear? (Harper, 2020)”. The mentor should provide the standards to the mentee and jointly select the standards as the focus of the observation and coaching. Many schools in California apply the California Standards for the Teaching Profession (CSTP) for observation. In order to to help the mentee exceed this standard, the mentor can guide the mentee to truly know about her students’ background, interest, strength, and areas that need to improve by asking the above questions. Knowing students’ assets can make her teaching connect with students’ lives in a more meaningful and fun way. The coach can also share the growth mindset with the mentee what Labor (2020) states regarding the asset-based approach to teaching: that is grounded in what students can do rather than what they cannot do or areas of weakness. 

       It is crucial for the mentor and the mentee to analyze students' learning needs during the pre-observation conference. It can be conducted by using and analyzing the collected data to distinguish the different learning needs groups: advanced, average, and struggling students. The mentor can guide the mentee to plan the differentiated teaching to each group to meet their needs with equity. 

       Marzano (2012) states that setting goals or objectives is associated with gain in student achievement. Goal-setting strategies are most effective when used in specific times, for example, at the beginning of a unit. The discussion between the mentor and the mentee about the learning goals and objectives can help the mentor to have the focus of the observation and the mentee to have the clear purpose of teaching. 

       During the collaborative planning conference, the mentor and the mentee can also discuss how to collect students' work products, such as how many sample works are needed, should it be randomly selected, or select sample works from the advanced, average, and struggling group of students? In the following conference, the mentor can discuss with the mentor about the collected students’ works from the gifted student, English learner, and student with special needs. The mentor can support the mentee to analyze and dig more deeply into the evidence they have captured together (2014). The mentor and the mentee can analyze students’ strengths and areas that need to be improved, and discuss the ways of adapting teaching to meet students’ needs with equity.

Resources:

2014, A Reflective Guide to Mentoring and being a Teacher Mentor by EdPartnerships International, commissioned, the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development

Coaching with a focus, Concordia University class material

Labor (2020), 3 Steps to Developing an Asset-Based Approach to Teaching, Edutupia, https://www.edutopia.org/article/3-steps-developing-asset-based-approach-teaching

Nichelle Harper (2020), Empower Your Classroom: Let's Talk About Assets-Based Instruction, https://www.yeseep.org/blog/empower-your-classroom-lets-talk-about-assets-based-instruction

Robert J. Marzano, Julia A. Simms (2012), Coaching Classroom Instruction, Marzano Resources