High Reliability Schools

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High Reliability Schools

• 1997

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Feedback
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Responding to Teachers as Individuals...

• Mentors can help teachers to learn and to develop
  independently and thus encourage teachers to do
  the same for their students

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Mentors as Counselors...

• Mentors who adopt a counseling orientation
  usually do not subscribe to a laissez-faire
  attitude of teacher growth nevertheless, they
  accede to individual differences in their
  acceptance of the teaching environment
• This is an environment in which the goals and
  objectives for teaching are established and
  controlled primarily by the teacher

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• Person-centered humanistic mentors draw upon
  individual differences, such as perceptions of
  teacher warmth and openness, to minimize teacher
  frustration or failure and to look for abilities
  and aptitudes that determine successful teaching
• Such mentors view growth and development mainly
  as the responsibility of the teacher

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• Person-centered approaches concentrate mainly on
  the personal needs of the teacher, not the
  teachers technical skills of delivering
  instruction

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• Because mentors who function as counselors
  typically use nondirective approaches, they may
  frustrate teachers seeking more direct advice and
  guidance

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Teacher Efficacy

• Teacher efficacy is believed to be one of the
  most significant social-pyschological factors
  influencing teachers work
• Teacher efficacy is defined in many ways
• It has been equated with empowerment and connoted
  with knowledge about practice

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• Teacher efficacy has been synonymous with
  teachers sense of responsibility for past
  student learning
• It has been view both as a broad construct and as
  a narrow concept that distinguishes among
  individual, organizational, and professional
  dimensions

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• An element common to many definitions of teacher
  efficacy is personal teacher efficacy-- the
  beliefs that individual teachers hold about their
  own capacities or abilities to act in ways that
  bring about student learning and development

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Bandura contends that self-efficacy develops
from...

• 1- actual performance attainments
• 2- vicarious experiences-- seeing or visualizing
  other similar people perform tasks both
  successfully and unsuccessfully
• 3- verbal persuasion-- attempts of others to lead
  individuals to believe that they indeed possess
  the capablities to perform particular tasks
• 4- physiological indices-- trembling, sweating,
  etc.

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Functions of self-efficacy

• Self-efficacy influences individuals decisions
  regarding choice of activities, tasks, and social
  situations.
• Self-efficacy is related to how much effort
  individuals will extend and how long they will
  persist in the face of obstacles or aversive
  experiences
• Self-efficacy influences how individuals think
  about and react emotionally to others and to
  their environments

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Research Speaks on Training...

• A number of training components have been
  identified as contributing to the impact of a
  training sequence

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Presentation of theory

• Studying theory can provide the rationale,
  conceptual base, and verbal description of an
  approach to teaching or instructional technique
• Level of impact presentation of theory can
  raise awareness and increase conceptual control
  of an area however, alone, it is not powerful
  enough to achieve much beyond the awareness level

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Modeling or demonstration

• Modeling involves enactment of a teaching skill
  either through live demonstration, or through
  television, film, or other media
• Level of impact modeling appears to have a
  considerable effect on awareness and some effect
  on knowledge. Demonstration also increases the
  mastery of theory

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Practice under simulated conditions

• Practice involves trying out a new skill or
  strategy simulated conditions are achieved by
  practicing either with peers or with small groups
  of children under circumstances which do not
  require management of an entire class
• Level of impact when awareness and knowledge
  have been achieved, practice is a very efficient
  way of acquiring skills and strategies

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Structured feedback

• Structured feedback involves learning a system
  for observing teaching behavior and providing an
  opportunity to reflect on those observations
• Level of impact taken alone, feedback can
  result in considerable awareness of ones
  teaching behavior and knowledge about
  alternatives it has reasonable power for
  acquisition of skills and their transfer to the
  classroom situation

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Coaching for application

• If constant feedback is provided with classroom
  practice, a good many, but not all, will transfer
  their skills into the teaching situation
• For many others, however, direct coaching on how
  to apply the new skills and models appears to be
  necessary
• Coaching involves helping teachers analyze the
  content to be taught and the approach to be
  taken, and making very specific plans to help the
  student adapt to the new teaching approach

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• The most effective training activities will be
  those that combine theory, modeling, practice,
  feedback, and coaching for application

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Coaching
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• The culture of most school faculties has been
  highly individualistic, with nearly all
  interaction over day-to-day operations
• Without collective action, schools have
  difficulty addressing problems that cannot be
  solved by individual action
• Various models for team teaching have included
  forms of a collegial, inquiry-oriented notion.

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• The extensive use of study teams and councils to
  facilitate learning is recommended
• Each teacher and administrator has membership in
  a team whose members support one another in study
• Each person can have membership in a coaching
  team of two or three
• Each team is linked to one or two others, forming
  a study group of no more than six members

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• The principal and the leaders of the study group
  in a school form the staff development/school
  improvement council of that school
• A representative from each school within a
  district cluster serves on the District Cluster
  Network Committee, which coordinates staff
  development efforts between schools and the
  district and works directly with the director of
  staff development

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• The coaching teams and study groups are the
  building blocks of the system
• Team members support one another as they study
  academic content and teaching skills and
  strategies

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Transfer...

• Transfer refers to the effect of learning one
  kind of material or skill, or the ability to
  learn something new
• Teaching, by its nature, requires continuous
  adaptation it demands new learning in order to
  solve the problems of each moment and situation

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• Horizontal transfer refers to the conditions in
  which a skill can be shifted directly from the
  training situation in order to solve problems
• Vertical transfer refers to conditions in which
  the new skill cannot be used to solve problems
  unless it is adapted to fit the conditions of the
  workplace

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• Setting up arrangements for the trainees to
  develop a self-help community to provide coaching
  is regarded as essential if transfer is to be
  achieved
• Ideally, coaching teams are developed during
  training

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Coaching involves three major functions

• 1- provision of companionship
• 2- analysis of application
• 3- adaptation to the students

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Provision of Companionship

• The first function of coaching is to provide
  interchange with another adult human being over a
  difficult process
• The coaching relationship results in the
  possibility of mutual reflection, the checking of
  perceptions, the sharing of frustrations and
  successes, and the informal thinking through of
  mutual problems

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• The companionship not only makes the training
  process technically easier, it enhances the
  quality of the experience
• It is a lot more pleasurable to share a new thing
  than to do it in isolation

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Analysis of Application

• Among the most important things one learns during
  the transfer period are when to use a new model
  appropriately and what will be achieved by doing
  so
• During training, the coaching teams need to spend
  a considerable amount of time examining
  curriculum materials and plans and practicing the
  application of the model they will be using later

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Adaptation to the Students

• Successful teaching requires successful student
  response
• One of the major functions of the coach is to
  help players to read the responses of the
  students to that the right decisions are made
  about what skill training is needed and how to
  adapt the model

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• Successful use of a new method requires practice
• One of the principle jobs of the coaching team is
  to help members feel good about themselves during
  the early trials