When you were watching the Olympics this month, did you get some practice making judgments? Even though I don’t know much about diving, I love watching the graceful moves the divers execute between board and water, and I get caught up in the experience. In my enthusiasm, I start shouting out scores as soon as the diver hits the water. I comment on how tight the tuck was or how smooth the entry was, making my evaluation before the judges post their scores. Sometimes I’m close to the actual scores, and sometimes we’re miles apart. It’s laughable that after a few minutes of watching I have become an arm-chair expert, when in reality I know almost nothing about what is going on!Sometimes the same thing happens when I visit a classroom. It is easy to jump to judgment after spending a few minutes in a classroom. Easy to notice what is not happening. Easy to feel myself expert when I know almost nothing about what I am really seeing. When I find myself jumping to judgments, I remind myself to observe first, listen next, and judge last. Observing means I am using my eyes and ears to notice and note what is happening. Listening means that, during debriefs, I start by asking rather than telling and by take an inquiring stance. After I have noticed and wondered, any evaluations I make, and any recommendations that grow out of those evaluations, will be more grounded.
Making judgments is easy when I have only surface-level knowledge. Understanding deepens when I know more about what is going on beneath the surface. When I am quicker to listen and slower to judge, my coaching is more likely to hit the mark.
This week, you might want to take a look at:
Planning for what really matters:
The importance of building agency at the beginning of the school year (video with Kim Yaris):
Gradual release of the classroom library at the beginning of the school year:
Lessons for using mentor texts to teach memoir:
An inspirational video about mentoring:
That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!
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