Coaching with Mindsets in Mind - Part 3

Coaching Lessons Learned . . . on Court

I have been a Tech Coach in title since 2009, but I have been in an integration/mentor/tech PD role in one way or another, for over 20 years.  In my current role as a full time coach I have been studying and reflecting upon cognitive coaching practices, models for tech integration, how to foster innovation and how to affect positive change in a school's culture.  Carol Dweck's research into Mindsets has really hooked me, and has led me to think about my own real life experiences working with and changing students mindset.  A few details in Dweck's book particularly intrigued me, particularly about screening for mindset and being able to put someone into a Growth or Fixed Mindset . . . which got me thinking about if I had personal examples from my own experience.

So let me tell you about some concrete examples and the lessons learned which can be directly applied in the classroom, but which came from a different coaching role . . . as head coach of the Western Academy of Beijing Varsity Badminton Team.

Example #1 

In my first year at WAB, I started a badminton club which met at 7:00 in the morning once a week as that was the only gym time we could get.  We were not a priority at all - some mornings we would arrive and could not use the gym, other mornings we would show up and play without a court or even a net.  At the time, badminton was considered a purely recreational sport within the school, even though it is the national sport of our host country.  But that didn't deter the students who came out to play, who ranged from grades 6-9 - they all just wanted to play and learn.  When the first high school ACAMIS badminton tournament came up in the spring, the club quickly changed into a school team . . . they all wanted to compete . . . even against much older and experienced students!  WAB only went up to G10 that year and my players ranged from G5-9, but we were going to compete against high school teams with players in G9-12 from across China.

So we got organized and started practicing specifically for the different tournament events.  But the rules got changed less than two weeks before the tournament, and we suddenly had to field a mixed doubles pairing.  We hadn't been playing any mixed doubles, so I had to get this figured out quickly.  I took my strongest boys singles player Dom, and then selected a grade 6 girl Hannah, who had a "no fear" attitude and an eagerness to learn, to form our mixed doubles pairing.  I think we only got in three practices with them playing together, learning how to move as a team with the female player controlling the net.  When we went to the tournament, none of the other mixed teams were playing proper mixed doubles style and they could not handle Hannah controlling the net on every point.  Dom was already a very fluid and skilled player, but Hannah had to learn everything about playing mixed style and how to play the net, in a very short period of time.  They dominated the mixed doubles event, were beautiful to watch, went undefeated and were the talk of the tournament.  Nobody could believe that they were in G6 & 9, and had only been playing together for two weeks.

Lesson Learned - Someone with a growth mindset can be moved to do incredible things in a short period of time with hard work, perseverance and a fearless attitude - all signs of a Growth Mindset. And Dweck is right - you can screen people for their mindset to select those who are Growth minded, if you know what to look for.

Hannah is in the back left, and Dom is front and center holding their Mixed Doubles Championship trophy - Go Tigers!

Example #2 

Fast forward a few years to the HS badminton team tryouts.  In walks Mike, a new grade 9 student who has come from a private school in Canada that I know. Mike has a swagger to him, and proceeds to warm up by hitting birds as hard as he could, to show off his prowess and superior skill.  He had been the best badminton player for years at his previous school - nobody could touch him on court because he had too much power.  But I could see a flaw - for all of his power and smooth strokes, he had poor footwork which hampered his game.  I asked him to hit overhead clears from baseline to baseline which he tried to do, but did not have the power.  He had never had to make such a shot before, as nobody else could hit it that deep on him.  But he wasn't in Kansas (or Vancouver) anymore, he was in China!

My approach was simple - I had to first establish a coaching relationship with him in order to break through his shell of bravado.  To jumpstart this process, I appealed to his obvious love of power.  I enticed him with a simple offer/challenge - that I could get him the last 2 meters of distance on his clears in under 5 minutes.  After a moments consideration, he took me up on the challenge.  With some simple coaching on his body positioning and footwork, he started generating more power from his legs and hips.  Pop, pop, pop - he was now hitting the full length of the court.  In about 2 minutes flat, Mike had changed to become a very coachable player and an important part of the team.

Lesson Learned - As Dweck says, you can shift someone from a Fixed to a Growth mindset just by talking to them, and framing things in ways which engages them in learning.  It's all about making connections, building a relationship, and then finding the right hook/challenge/opportunity to draw them in. The moment you have them, is the moment their mindset changed.

China Cup Junior Varsity Championship Team showing off their hardware - Mike is second from the right in the back row

Example #3

What do you get when you put two precocious, bright, MS BFFs on court together?  Either a total disaster or a team with great unrealized potential.  Liz and Monica always wanted to play doubles together since that first year with the club.  At first, they were not complimentary players and were not very good together - all talk and goofing around (after all, they were and still are BFFs).  But over the 5 years playing together they grew stronger as players and teammates, and became my #1 girls doubles pairing.  

One year, we hosted the ACAMIS tournament in Beijing, but finished second to Suzhou - we were close but outclassed in a few areas including girls doubles.  The following year, Liz and Mon lost to the same Suzhou team in the round robin, which bumped them to second place in the girls doubles event.  In the team championships, we were again playing against Suzhou, and girls doubles went so long that it ended up being the deciding match.  Going into that match, Liz and Mon had not ever beaten their rivals.  Rather than delivering a stirring, "let's get pumped up speech" (I'm not that kind of coach), we found a quiet place to talk about their game plan and strategy.  One thing that I love about badminton is that it is a cerebral sport, where you can outwit your opponent and think your way through a match.  

The championship deciding match drew a huge crowd as they were on court for so long. It was full of ups and downs, twists and turns, and changes in the lead.  Suzhou came out strong and won the first game of the best out of three match.  Liz and Mon scrapped and fought to win the second game to tie the match, but fell behind in the third and deciding game.  They dug deep, leaned on each other, clawed to get to a final game tiebreaker, and to eventually win our first of many ACAMIS team championships.  What was I the most proud of? That they thought their way through the match, adapting and changing their game plan as needed to win it in the end.  They talked and communicated on court throughout, and we adjusted to their opponents game during the coaching breaks.

Lesson Learned - Having a growth mindset means learning from your losses, moving forward, and trying again.  Celebrate your failures, don't mourn them.  Learn from them, rather than make excuses.  And having supportive peers around you can make all of the difference.  A growth minded team is much stronger than the sum of its parts, and will take you beyond your setbacks, losses and failures.

That's Liz and Mon on the front-left after our second consecutive ACAMIS Championship - Go Tigers!

It's all about the learning - on the court or in the classroom!  Mindset matters!

Coaching with Mindsets in Mind - Part 2

It's that time of the school year for reflection, which also means surveying the teachers that I work with in order to improve my practise and to better support the faculty in the future.  Over the past few years, I have found the faculty survey process to be enlightening, definitely useful and seriously stressful all at the same time.  As I work primarily with faculty, it is an inherently different process than surveying the students in your class.  I just sent out my tech coach survey and the responses are starting to trickle in - it's a very busy time of year for everyone so I do not expect to get a 100% response rate.  Last year, I received feedback from almost half of the faculty, which I reckon was pretty good.  I have read that with some big schools and universities, that they consider a 1/3 return rate as highly successful.  But I don't think that the previous response rate will be repeated this year, as we have a huge turnover of teachers in the high school - I wonder if the leavers will find the time to do my survey at all, over the myriad of other tasks that must be on their plate right now.

As the first responses come in, I can't help but have a look at the written comments and think about what I can learn from them.  One comment has stuck in my mind (for the last few days ;-) went something like this:

Could you audit a unit in everyone's class and give suggestions about how tech could improve the unit?

Coaching is active and self-reflective, should be initiated by the teacher and focus on the teacher's own pedagogy.

This has really made me think and I have flip-flopped back and forth about whether this suggestion has merit, whether it is very practical or productive, and whether it would even work.  I have gone from "there isn't time to do that", to "how would I choose which unit to audit?", to "this approach could work for some, but not everyone."  To me, there are a number of facets to this suggestion which determine how successful such an approach would be, which include:

• Evaluation - as a tech coach, my role is strictly non-evaluative which means that I cannot/should not randomly audit a lesson or unit and then present my ideas about how it could be changed or improved; unsolicited feedback generally does not go over well with faculty and can sometimes have the opposite effect where the walls go up and doors close; this approach would only work if I was invited in to observe, initiated by the teacher
• Time and Practicality - as I work with about 35 faculty members who teach over 100 different courses across the high school, finding the time to audit whole units from everyone's courses seems to be totally impractical; again, having the teacher identify the unit or lesson in advance would be more practical
• Focus - taking the time to audit a unit of a course without having a specific focus for the observation would not be productive; in order for this approach to be successful, the focus of the observation needs to be identified in advance by the faculty member rather than the coach; furthermore, discussing the focus of the observation in advance would also be important as that could lead to identifying the best lesson or unit to be observed, rather than the other away around
• Mindset - in order for coaching to be effective, the teacher being coached must have a growth mindset and be willing/wanting to improve/update/change/transform their unit, lesson or project . . . if the teacher has a fixed mindset then any suggestions I have for them will likely be met with resistance and defensiveness; I have experienced this before when a teacher has asked for "general feedback and ideas" but is unwilling to even consider trying any of them due to "not having any time", or they "don't really know if it would work", or "maybe next year when they do this project again".

I recently read Carol Dweck's "Mindset - the New Psychology of Success" and have been reflecting on how people's mindset impacts on my work, and how I can apply her research to working with faculty.  Framing this faculty member's comment in Dweck's work makes me think that this suggestion has some positive elements which can be extracted and used next year.  Dweck says that you can screen for mindset, to look for those who are growth minded.  Applied here, I should not use a "one-size fits all" approach and try to audit a unit from everyone's classes - that just would not work.  Instead, I should make a bigger effort to actively ask faculty to invite me into a lesson or to audit a unit or to plan a project, in order to find the growth minded.  I do this already, but perhaps this person never took me up on the offer.  Perhaps being more forward with this and providing a little more encouragement would tip the scales for this person and for others as well.  By screening for mindset, I would also be able to identify the units/lessons/projects that the faculty member wants to work on and focus on the specific aspects that they want to improve upon.  

With respect to educational technology, do you have a Fixed or Growth Mindset?
Are you set in your pedagogy, constantly recycling lessons and units from one year to the next?

Dweck also talks about putting someone into a Growth Mindset, just by talking with them.  Growth minded teachers are reflective and are looking to improve their pedagogy/approach/delivery, rather than passively waiting for someone to tell them what and where to improve.  Waiting for someone to tell you what to do is a clear sign of a Fixed Mindset which made me think at first that this comment was coming from such a faculty member.  On further reflection and application of Dweck's ideas, I think this person could be in the middle of the continuum between Growth Minded and Fixed Minded, and just needs a little nudge to get to across the fence.  For the teacher who is open to me auditing a unit or lesson in their class, but does not have a focal point in mind already, perhaps they can be moved into a Growth Mindset simply through a professional planning conversation.

So my takeaways from this comment are to give some more nudges and opportunities to the faculty, which I can easily do when I touch-base with everyone on my regular Walkthroughs.  When I check-in with them I will now extend my initial ask "Is there a lesson/unit/project that you would like my help to plan" to include "or which you would like me to sit in on to give you feedforward and ideas?"  I think this added nudge will help to engage some of the faculty who don't want to take the time or risk to plan a lesson/unit/project with me, but are willing to invite me into a lesson(s) where they choose what they want me to focus on for collecting data and providing feedforward (note that I purposefully use feedforward here based on this article by Joe Hirsch for Edutopia which explains how feedforward is looking for positive change in the future).  It will also help me to screen for the Growth Minded teachers who just need a little encouragement to take the next step forward with tech coaching to improve their teaching practice.  Even small steps forward will eventually get you to where you are going in the end!

Coaching with Mindsets in Mind - Part 1

I have been reading Carol Dweck's "Mindset - the New Psychology of Success" and have been thinking about how it connects with my role as a tech coach.  In various coaching workshops, two "models" have come up which classify my clientele (i.e. the faculty that I work with) into different groups - the Train Model and the Garden Model (as I call it, for lack of a better name).  

In the Train Model, you can envision the faculty as being in one of three cars of the ed tech train, which is constantly in motion moving down the tracks.  There could be spur-lines that branch off of the main tracks, but everyone is generally moving in the same direction.  The first car contains the early adopters, the techies, and the gurus who are constantly exploring new ed tech tools and how they can be employed in their classrooms.  The last/third car has the tech sceptics, the tech-phobics and those teachers who use the minimal amount of technology or no technology at all when it comes to conducting their lessons.  In the middle car are most of your faculty, who use some technology in their classrooms and generally stick to what they know and have used before.  In this model, the early adopters are leading the way, and the sceptics are trying to slow the whole train down.  As a tech coach, we talk about focusing on the middle car to try and expose them to new ed tech tools, and to move them up into the lead car.  By moving the middle group ahead, others in the middle group and hopefully some of the sceptics in the caboose will be drawn along with them.

In the Garden Model, you can envision two groups - the plants and the rocks.  I know this may sound derogatory but I don't think it was ever meant to be.  As a tech coach, I have been told that "you have to feed the hungry" which means nurturing and fertilising the plants in the group so that they thrive and grow.  At the same time, I have also had conversations about "always remembering to water the rocks", meaning that I have to work with everyone on staff (which is very true) no matter where they are on the ed tech spectrum, or where they are in the garden.  With this model, it focuses more on working with everyone, rather than spending most of your time working with the group in the middle (plants that need a little more nurturing and care ;-).

So which model is better?  Which model better describes what we as coaches should be doing?  Dweck's "Mindset" has given me a new perspective on these two models and how they can be blended together.  When you apply mindsets to the Train Model, the first car is clearly the Growth Minded - always taking risks, trying new things out, constantly learning and reflecting.  The last car is the Fixed Minded - wanting to keep things static and comfortable, not believing that they can learn new things, and simply feeling overwhelmed by all things technology (they feel that it is beyond their ability to learn these new tools).  So what about the middle car?  People here are in the middle of the mindsets spectrum, somewhere near the border between Growth and Fixed.  Dweck talks about screening for mindset and working with those people to move them forward - this would mean looking for the people nearer to the front of the second car.  Dweck also talks about putting people into a Growth Mindset simply by talking to them or putting them in a specific situation - this means finding the people in the middle of the second car and nudging them forward by connecting with them, exposing them to new tools, and putting ed tech into contexts that they can relate to (such as demonstrating a tool in a class which they can observe and see for themselves).  Working with those people in the middle car does make sense, as you are trying to pull the trailing car along with the rest of the train.

Dweck's Mindsets can also be applied to the Garden Model in the same way.  Plants = Growth and Rocks = Fixed (sorry, no pun intended ;-).  The parallels are obvious here, I think.  "Feeding the hungry" refers to working with the Growth Minded, which Dweck explains can achieve great results in a very short amount of time, reflect and move off in new directions, and create new innovations.  "Watering the rocks" refers to creating opportunities and experiences which serve to shift people's mindset to Growth, even temporarily, so that they can learn and move forward . . . one small step at a time.  When you apply mindsets to the Garden Model, coaches need to be working with everyone across the spectrum and differentiating how we work with people according to their mindset rather than their tech abilities and skill set.  If you think ablaut it, this really makes sense as you can be far along the ed tech spectrum, but still have a Fixed Mindset - this is the teacher who is very comfortable with the ed tech that they employ in their class and good at it, but unwilling to consider new tools as they don't have the time.  

So which model is best?  Personally, the Mindsets Model really appeals to me and makes sense.  The more that I think about it, the more instances come to mind which fit Dweck's model or are explained by Dweck's thinking.  Moving forward myself, I will continue to write a few more posts about Mindsets and how it connects with my role as a tech coach and with my work in educational technology.  If you haven't read "Mindset" yet, you really should - even if you are not a coach yourself . . . it has totally changed my thinking.