School leaders and teachers have been increasingly turning to coaching for professional development. But is it right for everyone? Should every school pivot to a coaching model? And is it really a best bet for teachers\u2019 professional development?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In theory, coaching encourages teachers to improve their practice, much in the way that a teacher would hope pupils improve their learning. At the same time, it is a model built on a sense of agency for the teacher, which we know is conducive to engagement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The important question is whether the research evidence bears out these benefits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As educationalists with a research background, our first instinct is to define the terms of our inquiry, and here is where we find the first stumbling block.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is in fact surprisingly little consensus on what coaching actually is. This is even more true when employing the phrase \u2018instructional coaching\u2019 made popular by the author Dr Jim Knight. (Had he spoken British rather than North American English, he might have chosen slightly less murky terminology, like teacher mentoring.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What we\u2019re left with is a range of different models that all purport to offer \u2018coaching\u2019 \u2013 a classic case of educational jingle-jangle<\/a>, a term used to describe situations where either the same name means different things, or the same construct has different names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, the existing research does offer some good news. One meta-analysis looked at professional development programmes where coaches observed teachers and provided feedback (a rather broad definition). These researchers found<\/a> that coaching programmes had an overall positive effect on pupil achievement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, as with any good research, the study\u2019s conclusions came with caveats.<\/p>\n\n\n\nEagerness of teachers<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n