In a “normal year” co-teaching follows a process of coaching a teacher and determining their goals, planning a lesson, implementing the lesson, and reflecting upon the lesson. This year is unlike others but I really value the process and implementing of a co-teach lesson to help teachers reach their goals so I did not want to alter the steps too much. This particular time I have co-taught with Ms. Perez before, and actually taught alongside her before I moved into my role of instructional specialist. Our relationship has been previously built so we have had goal conversations in the past and co-taught lessons prior as well.
Step 1: The Pre Planning Discussion
This discussion helps determine what the goal of the co-teach lesson will be, how our co-teaching roles will work in the planning and lesson and what we will do after the lesson. This year her goal was to increase student engagement and voice in virtual learning when all students were at home and meeting synchronously through zoom. During this discussion we decided a time frame for when the co-teach lesson would happen as well as our next planning meetings leading up to the lesson. Since meeting through a virtual platform can take longer, we knew we needed to plan multiple meetings before the actual lesson.
Step 2: Planning the Lesson
Since we had already determined the goal of the lesson was to increase student engagement and voice we decided to plan a jigsaw lesson virtually since we have implemented them in an in person setting prior and have had great success with student learning. Jigsaw is a high yield strategy with an effect size of 1.2(3 years growth) and gives students a focus of discussion and a need to listen to each other and learn from one another. We ended up having two planning meetings and creating some of the work outside of meeting time so we could discuss again together the next time. Since we were meeting via zoom we decided what work would be done outside of the zoom meeting.
We created a jigsaw groups template as well as the learning target and the problems students would be working together on. The focus was on slope in Algebra 1 so together we decided to have students explain how to calculate slope from various representations.
Our plan was to have the first numbered group solve for slope with their given representation. Students were to be put into breakout rooms, determine group roles, and work together to calculate the slope. The goal was for this group to take no more than 10 minutes. Our second color group would then contain one person from a table, a graph, and an ordered pair to explain how they solved for slope. Then this color group would work on some synthesizing questions by comparing how they found slope from the various forms and generalizing a statement about slope. Our hope was these final questions would not allow put emphasis on learning from one another but also using their knowledge toward a common goal.
During these planning meetings we also discussed the roles each of us would play in the lesson, who would take the lead when, and how we wanted to question the students. Since the students were not used to me in their class, and virtual learning is a whole new ballgame with teaching, we decided she would take the lead on directions, explaining the lesson, and facilitating any questions. I would then assist in breakout rooms, facilitate the exit assignment, and provide support to the teacher and students.
Step 3: Coteaching
During the planning meetings, we previously discussed the roles each of us would play in the lesson. We began the lesson as we intended to, with Ms Perez taking the lead of the opening activity, a would you rather. While most of the lesson did go as planned, we did not get to have the second group respond to the synthesizing questions. We found the first breakout room groups took longer than anticipated. We both bounced between break out rooms and assisted students in directions or any math struggles. One great feature about zoom breakout rooms is we could both return to the main room and have a quick coaching conversation about how the lesson was going and then jump back into the rooms with students.
One in the moment adjustment was the grouping of students. We had preplanned the template and the groups, but not all students showed up to the live zoom. Thankfully, Sara had made me a cohost of the meeting so behind the scenes I could be building and rearranging the breakout rooms as needed. Now that zoom allows participants to choose their breakout rooms, you could always project the groups and have students choose their corresponding room.
Step 4: Reflecting on the Lesson
We met a few days after the lesson to reflect upon our thoughts about the lesson and if we made progress toward the goal that was established in the pre-planning meeting. In our conversation, Sara mentioned how she through the lesson went really well and there was evidence of student learning. The students completed their work on a Jamboard so we pulled the Jamboard back up to take a look at the work completed to help focus our thinking and reflecting. Sara mentioned altering the last few questions to condense to one question so the students may have time to generalize their learning about slope. We discussed the goal of student engagement and felt most students were actively engaged and contributing to the lesson or asking questions. We agreed to meet again and plan another lesson together later in the school year. All students will not be virtual then so there will be other factors to consider for the next lesson.
I have found this four-step process helps to improve the effectiveness of co-teaching and modeling with a teacher while keeping the focus on the teacher established goal. Coming from a classroom teacher role, as a coach I can get excited to teach math again and could easily overstep my role established for co-teaching. These conversations really help to build the agreements between the teacher and the coach and guide reflection conversations after the lesson.
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