This post on taking a critical coaching stance is, simply put, on point. While it might be a stretch to say the author created critical coaching, as a number of scholars have been drawing on similar frameworks for some time (including some from our UW family...), I truly appreciate the clarity with which the author asserts the need to ground literacy coaching work in asset-oriented perspectives that seek to address issues of equity. 

I've been reflecting on this topic a lot lately since we began searching for literature to guide our SIG on Coaching for Equity. It has also become apparent in our current coaching study that equity is taking a backseat within our participant coaching beliefs, as it has been subsumed within the broader belief of focusing on student evidence. But a focus on student evidence does not in itself drive deeper into structural questions about equity or how they play out within classroom instruction. Even a more strategic focus on the use of culturally responsive practices or analyzing the ways in which assessments construct language demands that may or may not be relevant to learning goals could be easy inroads to engage more constructive and equity-oriented dialogue in coaching conversations.

All of this speaks to the larger point made by ILA in distinguishing between coaching to conform, coaching into practice, and coaching for transformation. How we support coaches to engage in this work is essential to the potential impact of coaching efforts, especially if we hope to see instructional coaching live up to the high expectations that have been placed upon this form of PD.

It will surprise no educator (or logically thinking person) to consider that education ought not be aligned to models of factory or medicine. Teachers are neither transforming raw material into products or curing disease through a clearly designed method. The variables attached to every educational situation are instead moral-laden and begin with the importance of context.
Somehow while I feel like I always inherently knew this, it wasn’t until reading Good Education in an Age of Measurement by Gert Biesta that I realized what the very nature of educational research implies. He makes the point that even though research can tell us what works, it is not possible (in our field) to determine what will work every time. Results are not generalizable even from student to student in the same classroom–something that every teacher obviously learns through their own interactions. This understanding is fundamentally at odds with any blanket decision to apply a strategy or pedagogical approach that requires teachers to assume that if something worked once, it will work always (as opposed to the opposing view that just because something worked once does not mean it can ever be repeated because the variables of the context cannot be controlled for). These are people we are talking about after all–not organized systems that can be studied but unpredictable entities influenced by “fuzzy stuff” such as motivation, emotional state, prior knowledge and experience, attitude, and beliefs…
And thus, the very act of engaging in this research can create the illusion that what is “discovered” must be applied. At the heart of this application, however, lies one of the most important attributes of the teacher: professional judgment. As our states and districts continue to limit the degree to which teachers are able to draw upon professional judgment in navigating which research to test out when and how to adapt it for their unique situation, we are placing all of our faith on a causal understanding of what teaching is and how it should be studied–a frightening trend that I am just learning how to articulate.

I think that it is possible to construct spaces for participatory cultures to exist within a formal classroom and really to be a driving force for how learning is “done.” I also believe that these learning spaces are in line with the types of learning objectives and standards laid out by the Common Core, which leads me to my contested assertion that standards (possibly within their own vacuum) can actually co-exist with creative, collaborative, and exploratory learning. However, I see this contingent on two big IF’s–

IF… schools/districts/states allow for teacher agency and autonomy in designing learning experiences in their classrooms. When curriculum is instead sold as pre-packaged products devoid of context (and mostly meaning) there is little chance of constructing the room (both physically and in terms of scheduling) for these types of learning environments to flourish. Many of the characteristics that typically define “formal” learning must be reconfigured in this type of learning environment (physical space, teacher role, technology access, etc), yet I believe these are within easy reach for a willing teacher to embrace. However, a school setting that imposes the formality of norms (through curriculum, behavior management, censorship, etc) may be an insurmountable challenge.

IF… learning experiences are intentionally designed. I really love the integration of Understanding by Design (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005), because I think backwards design is even more important when constructing digital learning experiences, even moreso in participatory cultures. I think it can be easy to get caught up in the technology itself, without carefully attending to the process of learning (the scaffolding of skills it might require and how to rethink what these skills look like in a digital context–even again after students bring their own understanding to the community, expanding on the original goals, complexities, or potential outcomes the teacher may not have invisioned). I see the culture itself as not only allowing for but embracing “play” and flux–a clear vision is important, but unlike traditional settings/assignments, I think there is a greater need for the vision itself to be negotiated and refined through the community. Allowing for flux also takes into account many of the logistical concerns of implementing these experiences in real classrooms (access, tools, timelines, etc).
Reviewing the list of experiences Jenkins describes of “What Could Be Done” across the different core skills, it is clear that none were accomplished by serendipitous accident. Many will require not only a teacher’s knowledge of content but also a reconceptualization of what teaching means in a participatory culture. Furthermore, teachers will likely need to collaborate with resident tech experts or instructional technology coaches to support their learning of the tools themselves. After all, it might be hard to envision how to design experiences around “judgment” if the teacher can just barely use the technology at a functional level. Which only further supports the need for developing these core skills in the teachers themselves. Sure we can say that the learning and teaching is distributed–which it is– but most teachers will only feel comfortable moving into this space with at least some degree of competence themselves. We might support them to see their role as facilitator or co-learner as opposed to expert, but going forward with no knowledge might make intentional design not just a harder sell but practically impossible.
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But what does this mean in an era where “Failure is Not an Option?”
I was also thinking about failure in terms of teaching being perceived as “failing” if certain assessment goals are not met on standardized tests. In questioning my first response, I came to a larger question: Can people enact (not just embrace) progressive reforms while operating within a regressive state? The essence of participatory culture asks teachers to rethink their traditional teaching roles and relationships to students, understanding of content delivery and construction of meaning, and learn to play and take risks with new forms of digital tools– risks that might be readily accepted as new challenges and paths to learning but only under circumstances that allow for and support risk-taking. A national climate that instead imposes daunting standards and standardized testing as the measure of teaching ability and professional competency, as well as determining pay and even employment is NOT a climate in which teachers would be as likely to willingly embrace a whole new approach to teaching and learning–rather a more likely outcome might be to sacrifice progress to at least maintain credibility. Can you have authentic progress if your goal is to measure each mis-step as a failure and means for exposure? I’m wondering if this is more problematic than I may have originally thought…

“What we are witnessing today is something new, and something much more dangerous than a worship of science or the ‘cult of efficiency.” Its uniqueness lies in its pervasiveness, its threat to the very foundations of public education, its wide embrace by the educational establishment, its direct assault on the intellectual, aesthetic, and ethical life of teachers, and its radical misunderstanding of teaching” (Taubman, 2009, p. 5).

I cannot get this image out of my head since reading the introduction to the book Teaching by Numbers by Peter Taubman. It’s a familiar image, probably wedged somewhere in your memory between nostalgia and fad. It also probably represents the last time I attempted to “paint” or be artistic in any traditional sense. The title references the infamous Paint by Number sets that allowed any John, Jane, or Sarah to become an instant artist by following prescribed directives as to what color to paint each sectioned and numbered area on the page, that eventually evolved into a coherent image when–voila–the painting was complete! To even suggest that the art of art could be broken down and essentialized into coloring corresponding segments is simplistic at best. To take the essence and soul out of an aesthetic understanding may have reduced the creation of art to a list of steps, but then again, it was basically an activity for children to complete–not a devaluing of  the profession and nature of “art” itself.

In a similar fashion, the art of teaching is being reduced by and large into a disturbingly familiar pattern of “teaching by numbers,” as his metaphor goes. In many ways, the privatization and corporate take-over of public education is applying the same methodology to dull the creativity and genuine passion that has led so many professionals into the field of education. Pre-packaged curriculum with pacing guides, prepared materials, and the imposition of externalized values of worth and corresponding measures, have attempted to essentialize and reduce the nature of teaching to its most simplistic form. And yet, what I fear most, is not just the existence of this trend but what feels like an ever-increasing tide of public agreement with this sentiment. In contrast to the former example, where painting by numbers did not intend to replace the imaginings of what constitutes “art,” I fear in many ways that the opposite reality exists in the realm of education.

By reducing the myriad of decisions related to content, instructional strategies, classroom management, communication, organization, and most importantly relationship building down to a list of bullets or steps to follow with little input or reference to the actual “goings-on” in the classroom, how can these pre-packaged systems really deliver any legitimate education? How can we reduce the complexity of context and culture to boxes and numbers and honestly tell ourselves (and our communies) that our intent lies in improving the quality of educational experiences?
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One more lie, I just don’t buy. And yet, I realize that I too am part of the problem–very much so in many regards–but those shortcomings are for another time, another blog.