Learning from our work: An administrator's inquiry into the sociocultural practices of instructional coaches

This study examined the situated practices of a group of instructional coaches in one school district, seeking to describe the possible outcomes of the coaches' interactions on opportunities for teaching and learning across the district. Six instructional coaches met monthly to view video of themselves and one another in typical coaching interactions with teachers, discuss sociocultural concepts and the application of those concepts to their experiences as coaches, and interpret their interactions using sociocultural concepts as analytical tools. Led by the administrator responsible for guiding the work of the coaches, these meetings provided an opportunity for shared reflection around the coaches' current practices and possible outcomes of their work on the school district as a whole. Thematic analysis of the coaches' reflective journals and conversations during these monthly meetings provided data on the coaches' and teachers' positioning practices, the dominant Discourses for professional learning and coaching across the district, and the way that power and agency were negotiated across coaches' interactions with teachers. As a practitioner inquiry study, these findings provided insight and direction for the future work of the coaches within one school district, as well as implications that may inform the work of coaches in other contexts. Continued work in the focal school district included establishing a shared understanding of coaching and the possible roles of coaches among all educators in the district; building the skills and knowledge of instructional coaches about sociocultural concepts, facilitation of professional learning in a variety of collaborative structures, and intentionally connecting reflection to action; and attending to the broader sociocultural context surrounding professional learning across the district, working to embed ongoing teacher learning as an integrated social practice.