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Collegial Coaching

Collegial Coaching Reflection

Ashley Nandlal

College of Education and Behavior Science, Houston Christian University

LTDE 5330 - Professional Development for Technology Integration

Dr. Katie K. Alaniz

April 22, 2024

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Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explain the importance of technology integration into the

classroom and the benefits of coaching staff members that are employed in the elementary

standpoint. This coaching study took place at Hyde Elementary in two fifth grade classroom with

one veteran teacher and a teacher that had been teaching five years and was getting ready to

leave the field of education. After conducting interviews with the teachers and determine their

strengths and weakness in the classroom regarding technology integration we developed plans to

enhance their classroom performance and use of technology.

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The use of technology in the classroom is essential to the betterment and the achievement

of student’s education. As teaching practices evolve teachers must also learn the new practices an

understand how to adapt to using technology in the classroom to help keep students engaged and

active in the classroom. Not only are we now looking at how can we use technology as a learning

engagement tool, but we are now also tasked with the question of how we can use gamification

in this process as well (Arnold, 2014).

Even in the early ages of education such as elementary it is important that students begin

exploring the array of application available to them on their computers and in order to do so their

teachers need vast training on them. The most common application space that children will

encounter is the Microsoft Office Suite and it ever expanding array of applications that can be

useful for any child no matter the grade level. As technology rapidly changes students need to be

introduced to the world of Microsoft so that they will be better equipped for every changing

world of education (Widagdo et al., 2023).

The use of collegial coaching has proving to be very beneficial in the elementary

classroom especially when the coaching is centered around goal setting and integrating of

technology to enhance learning standards and goals. The success of the coaching though depends

on the individual that is being coached and the mindset that they have as they entire the coaching

setting. Teachers that are more accepting of the coaching that they are being giving and

understand that it isn’t to criticize them but to benefit both them and their students usually fair

better than teachers that come into the coaching realm with their walls up (Lam et al., 2008). In

this study the participants had goals in mind that they wanted to achieve, and they were willing

to give and receive feedback from/to their coach. A relationship has to be formed and established

in order for collegial coaching (or peer coaching) to be successful, each party has to be
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comfortable in communicating with each other and voicing changes that they feel need to be

made (Koch, 2014).

Teaching is a profession that requires you to be a lifelong learner and you are constantly

attending professional developments but when you use collegial coaching you have a chance to

have learning experiences that are tailored specifically for you and to you and your classroom

needs. You are constantly growing as an educator and your needs are constantly changing and by

participating in collegial coaching you can ensure that those needs are being met (Axelsen,

2022). Growth is not something that is fixed and linear and over time it can change and progress

and with the help of a coach you can tell what needs you need to be specifically addressing.

Teachers and staff at the elementary level are greatly benefiting from coaching due to it

personalization and individualization over traditional professional development.

Methods

The coaching study took place at Hyde Elementary located in League City a private

school that services its community by providing schooling for grades pre-k through fifth. The

researcher served as a collegial coach to two participants in the Hyde Elementary 5 th grade staff.

Throughout the semester the coach met with the participants for sessions that ranged

from thirty minutes to an hour twice a week. During these sessions they discussed goal settings,

plans of actions, and went over feedback. The coach and the participants also worked together

outside of regularly scheduled meeting times to come up with additional practices that can best

benefit both the participants and the students in the long run.

Participants

Participant 1 is working at Hyde Elementary as a 5th grade Math teacher and has been

there for twenty-three years. Throughout her time there she has worked in third, fourth, and fifth
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grade and only taught math and science. She has talked about her use of technology constantly

evolving as she has been teaching since the types of technology have changed over the decades

but recently especially after the age of going online after COVID and the new age of students

she’s finding it difficult to connect with students and keeping them engaged.

For Participant 1 their learning activities focused on getting students more engaged in the

learning process and creating more interactive reviews, so Gimkit was introduced to the class.

Participant 1 also wanted to familiarize their students with the Microsoft Office Suite as the got

ready to transition into middle school, so we worked with utilizing PowerPoint to create a project

to present to the class and using OneNote for digital note taking,

Participant 2 has been at Hyde Elementary for one year and is a 5th grade ELA teacher

and she is completing her fifth year of teaching (halfway through our coaching relationship she

shared that she wouldn’t be returning to the teaching profession in the fall). This participant’s

backgrounds vary a lot more than Participant 1 in part that before she got into teachings, he spent

her time overseas in the military before she decided teaching was for her and then she went the

route of alternative certification to become an educator. Her experience with classroom

technology is also a wider scope because prior to teaching 5th grade ELA she taught ninth grade

English and third grade self-contained (including during the COVID years).

With Participant 2 teaching ELA and a majority of wat they do in class being paper based

we took the initiative of utilizing the Microsoft Office Suite and learning how to use OneNote

and PowerPoint to completely digitize the student’s readers and writers’ journals as well as
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helping them digitize tehri end of year “Living Wax Museum” project. We also took a step in the

design category and accessed the Canva Design space for teachers so that Participant 2 could

create an “interactive Whiteboard” so that their students stayed abreast of each day’s current to-

do’s.

Summary Participant Information

Participant Years Teaching Position Pre-/Post- Projects

Coaching Undertaken with

Technology Coach

Rating

1 23 5th Grade Math 2 to 4 - Gimkit

- MS

OneNote

- MS

PowerPoint

2 5 5th Grade ELA 3 to 5 - MS

OneNote

- MS

PowerPoint

- Canva

Studio
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Results

After completing this study, I can say that collegial coaching is much more beneficial for

both the coach and the participant than attending a professional development since these

coaching sessions are specifically tailored to the individual. While traditional professional

developments can offer many benefits, I can see the coaching session offering more specific

technical applications to the individuals.

When we look at Participant 1’s and their original confidence levels before starting to

coach we can see that their confidence has greatly grew as they have gone through coaching and

learned how to utilize gamification in the classroom throughout the spring semester as well as

using Microsoft Office. Even though she had some knowledge and confidence working with

technology in the classroom the coaching sessions allowed for a boost in these skills. By taking

the few skills that they had mastered over the twenty plus years of teaching it easy to mold the

skills and added in new skills to help them progress into a stronger educator with a stronger use

of technology skills.

Participant 1 say the biggest learning curve with getting acquainted with Gimkit and

having students use it for a studying tool as well as a tool for informal assessment. Getting them

trained in using it was easy enough since accessing the tool and creating kits was something the

participant was familiar with due to other gamification platforms. They received the most

pushback in the classroom due to students being unfamiliar with the platform and when trying to

access the platform on the student’s end they had connectivity issues. “Even though it took a

while for all of us to get adjust to it soon enough it became something that we could greatly
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enjoy.”, Participant 1 shared after using Gimkit in the classroom for a week during their science

units.

Slowly we were aligning with their goals of increasing their confidence in the classroom

of using technology and integrating gamification that we were able to move on to their goal of

helping students use Microsoft office. Since we wanted this goal to be simplified, we only

focused on having students get comfortable with using PowerPoint and using OneNote as a

means to keep science anchor charts. We decided that by having students using PowerPoint we

could have them create four to five slide PowerPoint that detailed the upcoming Total Solar

Eclipse. The student’s job was to learn how to insert images, create new slides, change fonts, and

add backgrounds. Before the project was introduced to the students Participant 1 had been

trained a practiced doing the same task until they mastered it. As for creating a digital notebook

participant one posted science anchor charts and important images pertaining to their lessons on

Canvas and had their students practice Copy and Paste so that they could insert it into their

digital OneNote journal that they had created as a class.

Participant 2 started with a higher level of confidence in working with classroom

technology and they ended the coaching sessions feeling very stable and confident in what she

was doing in design and using Microsoft Office. Even with their prior experience of using

Microsoft Office Suite they didn’t have great knowledge in having their students utilize it to

enhance performance in the classroom, so they wanted to explore the different applications

available in the Suite such as OneNote and PowerPoint. By Participant 2 having prior knowledge

of Microsoft office, it was easy to get them to trained and acquainted with the different

applications that they would be using in the classroom.

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Getting started with Canva Design Studios had helped Participant 2 get their feet wet and

get a better understanding of what online design is and how to create digital classroom boards

that were interactive. “I was able to plan out my entire day for each of my classes and it was no

longer boring, but it was attractive and appealing to my students. It felt like I made a PowerPoint

but more advanced and it made my students more excited to come in and work every day.”

Participant 2 shared after completing training on how to utilize the design studio. As for getting

acquainted with their second goal of going digital in the classroom they decided to switch their

readers and writers journals into an online database so we had to have them get adjusted with

using OneNote and the multiple features that it had to offer. Even though they had used

Microsoft Office before we had a great learning curve in getting adjusted to OneNote before we

were able to pilot it to the students. Since this took longer to get adjust with, we decided to work

on PowerPoint so that the students could begin on working on their “Living Wax Museum”

project. Since students had already been previously introduced in their math class, they had some

familiarity with the application, so the learning was mostly on Participant 2’s side.

It was very evident that after a few weeks both participants became very masterful in the

use of Microsoft Office and on days that I was not meeting with them they began to work with

each other and add to their skills. I will say that I benefited though by always being close to them

by being on the same campus as them but by being tied up with my own class we tried to stick to

our original arrangement times so at times it felt that it wasn’t that beneficial since we were

stretched on time.

Coach’s Personal Reflections

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This coaching session wasn’t just a period of a learning and growth for the participants,

but it was also a period of growth for me as a coach as well. Throughout the process of helping

the participants grow and incorporate technology into their lessons I also had to familiarize

myself with new pieces of technology that they could use. For example, with participant one and

introducing gamification into their lessons into the classroom I did not want to go the regular

route with the regular use of Kakhoot! so I decided to research, and I found a new online

learning gaming site name Gimkit. Before I could pilot it to Participant 1, I had test it out first

and ensure it was something that could effectively be used in the class rather it be used as an

interactive game or used as an assessment piece.

The coaching experience also helped me with growing my communication skills in the

workforce so that I know how to effectively communicate with my peers or with those that I may

be in charge of or leading. By giving the participants frequent feedback and also having them

relay feedback on my coaching style I was able to see areas on which I could improve on as time

continues.

Final Reflections

This study proves that coaching can be very effe3ctive especially in the elementary

setting for those who need more knowledge on integrating technical aspects into their daily

teaching, In the end we want to make the participants in this study teaching lives easier and make

learning for other students more enjoyable.

This coaching process also keeps the participants in the role of being a lifelong learner.

Although while being a teacher, they can continue to learn best teaching practices by attending

traditional professional developments, they can have a more meaning learning experience and
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enhance their learning by building their confidence by one on one training with a coach. Even

though this method is more time consuming it allows for it to be more customizable to the

individual and they can get directed feedback that allows for them work on their goals and ensure

they are reached in the specified time period.

It is very important to remember that none of this would be possible if neither party is

receptive of constructive criticism or willing to have open conversations to receive feedback

from each other during the process. In the end the coaching sessions aren’t just coaching but they

are earing and teaching experiences and every individual involved is a student of some sort. By

implementing this in a school setting individuals may be more receptive of receiving feedback

and teaching since it won’t be seen as confrontational but as helpful since in the end this is all in

the sake of learning and self-improvement.

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References

Arnold, B. J. (2014). Gamification in education. Proceedings of the American society of

Business k and Behavioral Sciences, 21(1), 32-39.

Axelsen, E. M. (2022). The Quest for Growth: The Role and Impact Collegial Coaching Plays in

a the Professional Growth and Decision Making of School Leaders (Doctoral

n dissertation, University of St. Francis).

Koch, M. A. (2014). The relationship between peer coaching, collaboration and collegiality,

m teacher effectiveness and leadership (Doctoral dissertation, Walden University).

LAM, S. F., & LAU, W. S. (2008). Teachers' Acceptance of Peer Coaching: Impact of

y Collegiality and Goal Orientation. Journal of School Connections, 1(1).

Widagdo, M., Purwono, P., Afrilies, M. H., & Jayusman, H. (2023). Socialization of Basic

w Software and Microsoft Word Application Training for Elementary Students. Journal

q Pengabdian dan Pemberdayaan Masyarakat Indonesia, 3(2), 59-66.