Coaching Conferences

 I have been teaching the Lucy Calkin's workshop model for three years now.  The first year I taught this model it was overwhelming, exhausting, confusing, hard, and frustrating. That first year was like trying to learn how to swim. I had days where I felt confident about my teaching and days I went home crying. There are so many aspects to the workshop model. I finally decided, after months of stress and tears that I needed to focus on one part at a time. My first year I focused on laying the foundation and procedures for reader's and writer's workshop. Then my second year I focused on making sure my teaching point was clear and appropriate in addition to the active engagement part of the model. I worked hard to make sure my students were actively engaging not only with me but with their partner on the carpet as well. 

Now that I am in the third year of teaching this model I have decided I need to work on my coaching during the individual conferences. I have not yet mastered the other goals I worked on during year one and two. However, I do feel more confident about those parts of the workshop model. 

Individual conferences with students make me nervous!! When I approach the student, I always remember to give them a compliment but then after that it's like I forget what to say. Usually I catch myself asking way to many questions and talking to fast! Usually, I am thinking I need to conference with at least four students every day. That doesn't seem like a lot but I don't have a lot time and usually there is always a disruption of some sort. 

The blog post that I read is from a blog called Two Writing Teachers. This blog has some incredible posts from teachers who have been trained from Lucy Calkins. The post is titled Coaching Conferences. In this post it lists five things to keep in mind for an effective independent conference; use very lean prompts, give wait time, coach into independence, making your teaching transferable, and be responsive. Those five tips were very helpful, especially lean prompts and wait time! I need to remember that less is more when dealing with prompting. Also, coaching into independence was a great reminder. I know sometimes I just do things for my students without thinking. However, they will grasp the idea better if they do it on their own. This post really helped me! I am looking forward to using these tips tomorrow!

       

Here is the link:
Coaching Conferences