One thing I don’t mention often on this blog is that as well as my ICT work, I also do work in coaching and counselling. This has included working with school staff coping with their workload or wishing to learn more and progress their career. Generally, though, I try to keep the two roles separate.

Recently, however, I have been thinking more along the lines of merging the two roles, particularly the coaching and the ICT training. This is not just a ploy to try to get more work (though that would be nice) but has arisen as a result of looking at the type of training teachers/schools may need.

Training usually involves someone, usually an ‘expert’, leading a session and imparting skills and experiences to the attendees. This seems to be the traditional model and it is fine, it has its place and it has a role to play. I see it principally being of use where a new piece of equipment or a new approach is being introduced to an audience who need to know its ‘workings’ before they can make use of it.

Coaching I regard as something different. It usually involves a someone, the coach, working with an audience on an individual basis. The sessions will start by the client/recipient (I hate the word coachee) identifying their own topic and or goals for the coaching sessions. This is done with the help/support of the coach. The next stage is for the client and the coach to work together toward the client achieving those goals.

The key difference between coaching and training is that in the former the client is in charge of their learning and is responsible for their progress. The coach is responsible for supporting the client in identifying what they wish to learn and how they get there.

In some ways, I see coaching as being supportive of performance management in schools as well as being a tool for CPD.

Coaching is not quite the same as mentoring, in which an experienced hand shows shows how things are done. In training and in mentoring, the recipient can be seen as receiving input from an ‘expert’, in coaching the recipient is in charge and the coach acts, at best, as an equal and more often as a support.

Another key difference is the time taken. Training is often a one-off event, consequently a lot of new information/skills may be imparted at this event, which then have to be assimilated and implemented in practice. There is usually little recourse to the trainer if subsequent questions/issues/problems arise after the event and little opportunity to share experiences arising from practice.

Coaching is more of a long-term development between the client and the coach. It can therefore be more flexible and more productive, being able to take account of changing circumstances and recognising/rewarding successes along the way. It is also perhaps better able to take account of individual learning styles/preferences and progress rate than would a one-off training session.

I’d love to see coaching more widely adopted in schools/Local Authorities as a model for CPD. I believe teachers would benefit from it more than from traditional training approaches. This could be particularly true in ICT training, where nowadays we are less concerned about how devices/software work but more concerned about how they can be implemented in learning and teaching. I also feel coaching could be more effective with reluctant users/adopters of technology ( I hate the word techno-phobic) because the coaching could be better tailored to their level of understanding and needs; or at least better than a one of training session where they might just sit at the back and collect their certificate, having felt ‘lost’,'out of place’, or that the training went ‘over their heads’.

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Tags: counselling, model for CPD, Teacher education

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010 at 13:33 and is filed under Training INSET and CPD. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.