Coaching that develops mental models for adaptive practice
7 min read
SARAH COTTINGHATT, RESEARCH LEAD, STEPLAB, UK; PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT CONSULTANT, AUTHOR AND COACH
ADAM KOHLBECK FCCT, DEPUTY HEADTEACHER; CO-FOUNDER, EDUPULSE, UK
CHRIS PASSEY FCCT, DEPUTY HEADTEACHER; CO-FOUNDER, EDUPULSE, UK
Instructional coaching, a form of professional development, may be a strong bet for schools (Sims, 2019). While there is debate about the definition, for the purposes of this article, we broadly define it thus:
Instructional coaching involves one teacher working with another teacher, to help them take small, personalised steps to improve their practice.
Mccrea, 2024
In part, the benefits may derive from the fact that instructional coaching is a natural fit for many mechanisms that appear to drive change in teacher practice, such as goal-setting, modelling, rehearsal and action planning (Sims et al., 2021). These mechanisms, most of which are drawn from the behavioural sciences (Michie et al., 2013), address a core aim of professional development: teac
Join us or sign in now to view the rest of this page
You're viewing this site as a guest, which only allows you to view a limited amount of content.
To view this page and get access to all our resources, join the Chartered College of Teaching (it's free for trainee teachers and half price for ECTs) or log in if you're already a member.
- Banks B, Sims S, Curran J et al. (2024) Decomposition and recomposition: Effects on novice teachers’ enactment and transfer of behaviour management practices. Ambition Institute. Available at: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/ambition-institute/documents/Decomp-Recomp_2024_Full_paper_digital.pdf (accessed 27 March 2025).
- Correnti R, Matsumura LC, Walsh M et al. (2021) Effects of online content‐focused coaching on discussion quality and reading achievement: Building theory for how coaching develops teachers’ adaptive expertise. Reading Research Quarterly 56(3): 519–558.
- Cottinghatt S (2024) Closing the knowing–deciding–doing gap. In: Cognitive Coaching. Available at: https://cognitivecoaching.substack.com/p/closing-the-knowing-deciding-doing (accessed 8 December 2024).
- Davis B and Sumara D (2007) Complexity science and education: Reconceptualizing the teacher’s role in learning. Interchange 38: 53–67.
- Eraut M (2000) Non‐formal learning and tacit knowledge in professional work. British Journal of Educational Psychology 70(1): 113–136.
- Hu Y (2024) Reconceptualizing teacher adaptability: The teacher adaptive-cognition theory. Doctoral dissertation, Michigan State University, USA.
- Jones NA, Ross H, Lynam T et al. (2011) Mental models: An interdisciplinary synthesis of theory and methods. Ecology and Society 16(1): 46.
- Kavanagh SS, Metz M, Hauser M et al. (2020) Practicing responsiveness: Using approximations of teaching to develop teachers’ responsiveness to students’ ideas. Journal of Teacher Education 71(1): 94–107.
- Klein GA (2017) Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions. Massachusetts: MIT Press.
- Lagnado DA (2021) Explaining the Evidence: How the Mind Investigates the World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Mccrea P (2024) A beginners guide to instructional coaching. Steplab. Available at: https://steplab.co/resources/beginners-guide-to-instructional-coaching/66d9d0ea0982810001156c8f (accessed 9 December 2024).
- Michie S, Richardson M, Johnston M et al. (2013) The behavior change technique taxonomy (v1) of 93 hierarchically clustered techniques: Building an international consensus for the reporting of behavior change interventions. Annals of Behavioral Medicine 46(1): 81–95.
- Pfeffer J and Sutton RI (2000) The Knowing–Doing Gap: How Smart Companies Turn Knowledge Into Action. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
- Sieck WR, Klein G, Peluso DA et al. (2007) FOCUS: A model of sensemaking. US Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences. Available at: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA469770.pdf (accessed 27 March 2025).
- Sims S (2019) Four reasons instructional coaching is currently the best-evidenced form of CPD. In: Sam Sims Quantitative Education Research. Available at: https://samsims.education/2019/02/19/247 (accessed 28 November 2024).
- Sims S, Fletcher-Wood H, O’Mara-Eves A et al. (2021) Identifying the characteristics of effective teacher professional development: A critical review. School Effectiveness and School Improvement 32(1): 47–63.
- Walsh ME, Witherspoon EB, Schunn CD et al. (2023) Mental simulations to facilitate teacher learning of ambitious mathematics instruction in coaching interactions. International Journal of STEM Education 10(1): 9.
I really enjoyed reading this piece and it reminds me more broadly of the need for nuance in interpreting educational research and the importance of boundary conditions. Being an evidence-informed practitioner requires that perspective, and this important piece gives us ways of inculcating evidence-informed practice via the means of instructional coaching.