SSAT’s relationship with the Centre for the Use of Research and Evidence in Education (CUREE) is long-standing. As part of the relationship, CUREE has had significant input into SSAT TEEP training methodology. The following is an extract from CUREE’s Mentoring and Coaching CPD Capacity Building Project and was originally shared at the SSAT Lead Practitioner Conference 2016.
Mentors learn to:
- Relate sensitively to learners and work through agreed processes to build trust and confidence.
- Model expertise in practice or through conversation.
- Relate guidance to evidence from practice and research.
- Broker access to a range of opportunities to address the difference goals of the professional learner.
- Observe, analyse and reflect upon professional practice and make this explicit.
- Provide information and feedback that enables learning from mistakes and success.
- Build a learner’s control over their professional learning.
- Use open questions to raise awareness, explore beliefs, develop plans, understand consequences and explore and commit to solutions.
- Listen actively:
- Accommodating and valuing silence
- Concentrating on what’s actually being said
- Using affirming body language to signal attention
- Replaying what’s been said using some of the same words to reinforce, value and develop thinking.
- Relate practice to assessment and accreditation frameworks.
Specialist coaches learn to:
- Relate sensitively to learners and work through agreed processes to build trust and confidence.
- Model expertise in practice or through conversation.
- Facilitate access to research and evidence to support the development of pedagogic practice.
- Tailor activities in partnership with the professional learner.
- Observe, analyse and reflect upon the professional learner’s practice and make this explicit.
- Provide information that enables learning from mistakes and success.
- Facilitate growing independence in professional learning from the outset.
- Use open questions to raise awareness, explore beliefs, encourage professional learners to arrive at their own plans, understand consequences and develop solutions.
- Listen actively:
- Accommodating and valuing silence
- Concentrating on what’s actually being said
- Using affirming body language to signal attention
- Replaying what’s been said using some of the same words to reinforce, value and develop thinking.
- Establish buffer zones between coaching and other formal relationships.
Co-coaches learn to:
- Relate sensitively to learners and work through agreed processes to build trust and confidence.
- Draw on specialist resources to inform learning.
- Draw on evidence from research and practice to shape development.
- Understand the goals of the co-coach.
- Observe, analyse and reflect upon each other’s practice, make this explicit and interpret it collaboratively.
- Provide information that enables learning from mistakes and success.
- Learn reciprocally with commitment and integrity.
- Use open questions to raise awareness, reveal beliefs and enable professional learners to reflect upon them.
- Listen actively:
- Accommodating and valuing silence
- Concentrating on what’s actually being said
- Using affirming body language to signal attention
- Replaying what’s been said using some of the same words to check meaning and or/value thinking.
- Set aside existing relationships based on experience, hierarchy, power or friendship.
Download CUREE’s National framework for mentoring and coaching document in full.
Find out more about the SSAT Lead Practitioner Accreditation programme.
