Coaching Q&A

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Unknown
coaching is just is not just about this transactional back and forth between people. It's it's about the people. And it's it's deeply personal and important work.

00:00:10:07 - 00:00:29:00
Unknown
In some of your articles, like how you the article you wrote after your accident and the articles you wrote around the Covid pandemic time really help us remember, but we're doing this for people. So I just really appreciated that is is not a book you can just go to and say, okay, I'm just going to learn just about tools or just about this skill.

00:00:29:05 - 00:00:36:13
Unknown
It's also really teaching us about who we are as coaches and about the people that we are coaching in these relationships.

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00:00:52:00 - 00:01:19:15
Unknown
Hi everyone. It's ICG consultant Jessica Wise, host of the Coaching Questions on the Coaching Conversations podcast with Jimmy right here to talk about our virtual workshop titled System Support What Administrators Need to Know. We know that the impact coaches have is directly related to how effectively they are supported or not supported by their administrators. For that reason, it is crucial that administrators participate in professional development.

00:01:19:21 - 00:01:43:21
Unknown
That clarifies what coaches do and how they can be supported. Our virtual workshop system support will provide administrators with everything they need to know about instructional coaching. Join us to learn about the partnership principles that guide coaches interactions with teachers. The six specific actions administrators can take to support coaches effectively. The five Simple Truths of Helping and more.

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Unknown
Join us or learn more by visiting Instructional Coaching icon.

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Unknown
This show is for everyone that calls the Instructional Coaching Group home for all your instructional coaching content. These episodes are designed for everyone who desires to think and learn.

00:01:57:14 - 00:02:20:23
Unknown
Alongside Jim. As you continue to make an impact with all the great work you do. I'm Jessica Wise, a consultant with the Instructional Coaching Group, and today's episode is a special announcement about a new book being released this year. Yeah, it's titled the I See Toolkit, a compilation of literature, resources and activities that can be used to continue growing as instructional coaches.

00:02:21:01 - 00:02:39:09
Unknown
So to tell you all about it, Jim and I will take turns asking each other questions so you can get a sneak peek into the book that we are offering this year. And once our Q&A has come to a close, we'll have an epilog or a final note at the end of the show with two questions to wrap up our discussion before we sign off.

00:02:39:11 - 00:03:05:07
Unknown
So, on with the show. Hey there Jim. Jessica. What's new? I have an update for you. Okay, that's an ice bath. Yeah. How did you know? Yes, there's actually ice in the cold plunge now, and it's great, I love it. I felt personally challenged by our last conversation when you said it's a lukewarm plunge. So it is officially an ice bath now.

00:03:05:09 - 00:03:28:13
Unknown
Okay, good good, good. It's a little pricey, too. Well, I suppose you can create your own ice cubes at home, but, Yes, but it's a it's a challenge. So how long do you go? Ten minutes. 15 would be. Really. Okay, so in our next step is stay tuned for the 15 minute update. Yes, I'm enjoying it. I went on a longer run today and it just it's very relaxing after a long run.

00:03:28:13 - 00:03:47:01
Unknown
I'm really enjoying it, especially when it's hot and you get in there with bath. And I think it really does help a lot. I mean, you know, Olympic athletes have those big tubs, they get into their ice baths. So it's if they're doing it, we should do it. That's right. I'm just watching all the runners I follow on Instagram.

00:03:47:02 - 00:04:12:21
Unknown
I'm just trying to emulate that, emulate them and all the healing powers they have in their control. So yes, inspired by them. So have you ever run a marathon? Are you a marathoner? I signed a half marathon. I said I would do it, I did it and I'll never do it again. Okay. All right. Whereas you run marathons three and I've probably done 30 half marathons, but I don't think in any in like ten years.

00:04:12:23 - 00:04:31:08
Unknown
But okay. You said there was a period there where I was training for a marathon, so I'd run half marathons as part of my training. That's how I would work. Very good. Long run, a legitimate half marathon. I did, one in Banff, which was in the Canadian Rockies, which is incredibly beautiful, and one and, it's called the Big Sur Half Marathon.

00:04:31:08 - 00:04:58:00
Unknown
So Monterey walnut along the Pacific Coast. Beautiful. Yeah, I have done a handful of five KS, but I think my favorite race, my husband and I did a Spartan Sprint or one of our anniversaries, and that was probably my favorite. What's a Spartan Sprint? So it's an obstacle course mixed with A5K, so you run a little bit, do some obstacles, and if you fail you have to do burpees, 30 burpees per obstacle that you failed.

00:04:58:00 - 00:05:17:20
Unknown
So it was tough. He he mastered all of them. I failed a few times but it was a great experience. Was there electric shock and nope, we didn't sign up for that part. Yeah opted for the fire jump right for the five. Okay, I want video evidence I want to see with. I have a picture. That'll do I will do.

00:05:17:20 - 00:05:38:10
Unknown
Okay. Well, Tim, I thought we could start today with a little fun fact. I have a fun fact for you. In 2022, you released The Definitive Guide to Instructional Coaching, and I was busy keeping tabs on all things instructional coaching group. I saw the release of the book immediately bought it. I ran to my colleagues. They bought it.

00:05:38:16 - 00:06:01:08
Unknown
We all read it, loved it, and I'm so proud that it's now officially a staple in the coaching program I used to be a part of here in Georgia, and so now this year there's two books being released, Data Rules, which I can't wait to add to my shelf, and a new one that we're here to talk about today, which is the IC toolkit and the Definitive Guide, is almost reached 100,000 printings.

00:06:01:08 - 00:06:22:16
Unknown
That's a lot of congratulations. Now, 30,000 of that were because it's a member book for CD. So it was sent out. But so more than 50 maybe 60. I don't know exactly how many, but we're getting close to a hundred thousand. That'll be a nice, nice moment of, impact. You know, it's great, exciting. Yeah, it's. Well, I was definitely one of those people I ran.

00:06:22:16 - 00:06:56:05
Unknown
I tell Amazon it said, send me that book overnight. Well, Jim, I know listeners are excited to hear about the IAC toolkit, so let's start with its origin story. Where did this idea for the toolkit come from? Yeah, I think it's really kind of three things. I was thinking about this. One of them is, I just had a lot of articles that I'd written over, you know, maybe 15 years, certainly the last ten years columns and, and articles for Ed leadership and for the learning professional before that journal staff development, other publications like principal leadership.

00:06:56:10 - 00:07:12:20
Unknown
I really wanted to get them. I just wanted to see them put all together in one place and so this is this is gathering together a lot of these articles that people might have seen some of them, but not all of them. And and then we've organized them so that people can use them to explore different aspects of what coaching looks like.

00:07:12:20 - 00:07:32:01
Unknown
So that would be one thing. I just wanted to bring all those articles plus activity. So there's a lot of activities we've been using or we've developed, put them all together in one place. But the second thing is, you know, we have a new course that we're developing on instructional coaching skills about giving coaches a chance to practice their skills and improve.

00:07:32:07 - 00:07:56:03
Unknown
And I wanted to have a textbook for this. So this, this, this book will represent our kind of course book, because it'll give people a chance to explore different kinds of skills. And that's the third thing. And maybe the main reason I wanted to create the book is I feel like everybody recognizes the coaching is a profession that involves practices and skills, and you have to develop your skills.

00:07:56:03 - 00:08:17:13
Unknown
But nobody had a, toolkit to help them put that all together. Like, if I really want to work on the way I ask questions, what's a checklist I could use, and what's a protocol I could have for working with my colleagues, or practicing describing strategies or practicing my listening skills, or any number of different things. And so, you know, you got a school year and coaches are getting together.

00:08:17:16 - 00:08:36:04
Unknown
I wanted to give them some high impact, powerful tools that I could use to really improve their skills. You know, you think of, anybody who's proficient at what they do, you know, like a, basketball player who shoots free throws or a gymnast. There's massive amounts of practice that goes into getting really good at what you do.

00:08:36:08 - 00:09:00:04
Unknown
And, and usually that practice is guided by someone in who has tools to help you improve whatever. Stopwatch. or whatever might be. And so I want coaches to have a toolkit where they can go to that, and they can continuously improve because because the way they listen, the way they ask questions, where they explain things, the way they enroll people in coaching, all those things that you learn as part of the coaching process, got to practice.

00:09:00:08 - 00:09:11:17
Unknown
and, and that's what I'm excited about, to get better at what you do, you need some tools to help you do it. And coaches, coaches too. We can always get better at what we do, and this gives them the tools to do it.

00:09:11:17 - 00:09:42:16
Unknown
Hello, listeners. It's ICG consultant Jessica Wise. And I want to invite you to join Jim Knight and the instructional coaching group team at this year's Teaching Learning Coaching conference in New Orleans. If you are looking to learn, practice, reflect and grow your craft, the TLC conference is the place to be. Whether you join us in-person or online, you'll experience meaningful keynotes, powerful breakouts, and time to network and invest in human connection with like minded educators.

00:09:42:18 - 00:09:59:13
Unknown
Join us October 27th through the 29th as we gather to empower passionate educators to keep kids first busy. Instructional Coaching Hawken Forward slash TLC Dash to 0 to 4. I hope to see you there.

00:09:59:13 - 00:10:04:19
Unknown
And that's really exciting. Jim, I just I think back to when you first shared about this project with me.

00:10:04:19 - 00:10:15:09
Unknown
We are on the phone. You share this with me. I said, oh my gosh, this is so exciting. And they said, do you want to be a part of it? So I was just really grateful that you invited me to be a part of this. So I just want to say thank you. Oh, you're hardly a part of it.

00:10:15:09 - 00:10:31:18
Unknown
You're like, put the whole thing together. So. So, I just, like, threw everything at you. And then you put it. How did how did the whole the whole thing come together? Because you're the one who created the book. Well, I will say through lots of blood, sweat and tears and I'm joking. I want to give a shout out first to our coauthors.

00:10:31:18 - 00:10:58:19
Unknown
Of course, you and I worked together on this, and most of the book is from what you've written, Jim. But Michelle Harris, our director of consulting, was also one of our coauthors, as well as another IG consultant, Amy Mouzon. So I just want to give them a big shout out. I enjoyed working with my colleagues. We spent a lot of time on the phone and Marco Polo and via email and late at night, early in the morning, so we just we put our heart and soul into this book, and we're really excited to share this with everyone.

00:10:58:21 - 00:11:21:07
Unknown
But, you know, we began first with all those articles which we organized to align with your seven success factors. That was a big selling point for us is many, many people love learning about these seven success factors. So to take all the great work you've written, the articles in the columns and organize them into that, into those success factors made so much sense to us.

00:11:21:09 - 00:11:43:14
Unknown
And that's really where we started, as we would read through those articles and say, if we were to put this in a chapter for a success factor, where might it go? And then we added videos, your principles of coaching videos, partnership principle videos, checklists created by you and our IG team. We had case studies, scenarios we use in our workshops and professional learning and so many more things.

00:11:43:14 - 00:12:09:05
Unknown
So we began compiling all these resources, and what we ended up seeing is that we had offerings for experiences, ways that people who love to learn with IG and who love to learn from you. Jim could experience this learning with activities. So that's really what we did to put this book together is we organized all of the great things, put activities to go with those in alignment with you.

00:12:09:08 - 00:12:30:00
Unknown
Seven success factors so that people who come to us and say, hey, how can I keep learning about instructional coaching? Or how can I keep learning? With the instructional coaching group, we could say, here you go. This it's all in one place. And that's how we really put it together. 400 pages plus 400, of aces stories, activities, articles.

00:12:30:02 - 00:12:55:03
Unknown
explain the learning pathway idea in the book. I think that's really a cool feature you came up with. Yes. So once we had all of the resources put together, we took a step back and said, so what do we do with all of these things? And that's when that experience is really the idea of experiences drove us to think, if a person comes to this book, we want them to have choice in how they learn, but we also want them to have ways in which to learn.

00:12:55:05 - 00:13:20:06
Unknown
And so we partnered activities with you are articles, with videos with checklists, with scenarios, case studies, etc. and created paths in which to learn called learning paths. So each learning path in all seven chapters of the book comes with a guiding question. So a purpose for your learning resource choices that are right there in the book for you, and then guiding questions to reflect as you go through that learning experience.

00:13:20:06 - 00:13:41:08
Unknown
So we wanted everything to be in one place. And that's really what that learning path offers things to learn with how to learn, and then how to wrap up your learning and reflect to move that forward. So what I what stood out for you as you put the book together? You've written a lot of stuff, Jim. That's one of them.

00:13:41:10 - 00:13:57:12
Unknown
And you had to go through it all and we're going to. Yeah, I read every single word of everything you've written officially. And so that's one thing that just a fun fact is you've written a lot of stuff. Of course you know that. But I think the other thing is this sheer volume of opportunity is that this book has to offer.

00:13:57:14 - 00:14:15:21
Unknown
We, Michelle, Amy, and I held on to our audience as we wrote this book, as we put it together. Rather, you wrote most of the things in here. So we thought of the individual coach in a local school who wants to keep learning but isn't sure how. So we held that person in our minds and we created the learning paths for them.

00:14:15:23 - 00:14:34:21
Unknown
And then we held on to groups of coaches, like people we've had in our institute, and people learning partners who have helped give feedback on this book throughout coaches who gather, we wanted to offer them an opportunity to learn together. So the book represented, as we are putting it together, a way for those people to have resources to learn.

00:14:34:23 - 00:14:54:03
Unknown
And then finally, another thing that stood out to me is people who facilitate to instructional coaches who support the growth of coaches, whether those are coach champions, administrators, they now have a place to go. So if they think I really want to use some of Jim's research, I'm not quite sure how to facilitate that learning. It's all right here for you.

00:14:54:03 - 00:15:12:04
Unknown
So what stood out to me is no matter where you are an individual coach, all the way to a large group of coaches or a facilitator of coaches at the beginning of your journey, middle or end of your journey, there's ways for you to learn with us. Very cool. All right, Jim, so it brings me all of that.

00:15:12:04 - 00:15:32:11
Unknown
What stood out to me too, a question I have for you, which is that a major highlight of this book, is that people have access to. Remember I said you wrote lots of stuff to all that stuff. You've written all the articles, the columns, the great things that you've written about instructional coaching. Which of those articles are you most excited to share with the people who get the IC toolkit?

00:15:32:13 - 00:15:59:03
Unknown
You know, I don't know if there's any one article or two articles that stand out, but I think there's kind of themes that are important and I'm looking at the articles. And so, under each of the themes, they'll be different, different things that I've written about. So under the theme of, partnership, the partnership approach, this would be I mean, we have the success factors, but I think within the success stories, there's some big themes and I've written about what's the research say about autonomy.

00:15:59:03 - 00:16:16:09
Unknown
Why is that important for teachers? So a coach could go or a group of coaches could get together and talk about, well, how do we how do we embody autonomy in our way of coaching? And there's a another, part about the impact cycle. There's articles about the impact cycle. There's also checklists and tools to help people get better at the impact cycle.

00:16:16:09 - 00:16:41:23
Unknown
There's quite a few things around skills. and so just how you ask good questions, little maybe 700 words about some aspect of listening or looking at different kinds of things. And then there are quite a few around, let's just call it a living a, a full life. You know, a lot of the articles are for coaches, for educators, but they also transcend coaching.

00:16:41:23 - 00:17:07:07
Unknown
They're really about a meaningful life. So why wouldn't you want to gossip about other people or, say, make judgmental comments about other people? Or how how can you make learning a part of your life? And why is it so hard to make learning a part of your life? And so whether it's an article about Coach Splaining and why you want to get away from Coach Splaining, or it's about how to really demonstrate empathy to the people you're talking with and working with.

00:17:07:07 - 00:17:28:17
Unknown
Or it's about, moral purpose behind coaching, I think. I think it touches on some key themes. And so when I, when I'm excited about is that those articles, none of them are more than about 2000 words, maybe 3000 words at the most, but a lot of them are less than 1000 words. Those are quick things people can read and then discuss, and discussion should help them become more effective.

00:17:28:19 - 00:17:49:07
Unknown
Is there anything that stood out for you as you looked at all those articles? Any one that kind of hits you? I think probably not one article, just like you said, I have articles like Dialog and Trust on my brain because we've talked about dialog and trust recently. They're just such quick, easy reads, and they give you some so much information that you can apply right away.

00:17:49:07 - 00:18:10:17
Unknown
But I'll say this, Jim, as I read your articles, every single one, every word is that you have great information about instructional coaching, but there's also just very humanizing articles that remind us that coaching is just is not just about this transactional back and forth between people. It's it's about the people. And it's it's deeply personal and important work.

00:18:10:22 - 00:18:29:15
Unknown
In some of your articles, like how you the article you wrote after your accident and the articles you wrote around the Covid pandemic time really help us remember, but we're doing this for people. So I just really appreciated that is is not a book you can just go to and say, okay, I'm just going to learn just about tools or just about this skill.

00:18:29:20 - 00:18:49:08
Unknown
It's also really teaching us about who we are as coaches and about the people that we are coaching in these relationships. There's probably a little autobiography in there, where I it's, you know, someone said, you write the book you need, you know, you need to read. And that's probably the case with some of those articles where I use the article as a vehicle for working things out.

00:18:49:08 - 00:19:07:00
Unknown
And then hopefully it touches on something helpful or universal that people can learn, can learn from. What are you is most excited about the IC toolkit? No one in the world knows that book better than you. So what do you seeing it out in the world? I think I'm most excited about that. I have this vision of what the book looks like.

00:19:07:00 - 00:19:23:13
Unknown
I can't wait to have it in my own arms, but I think I'm excited for other people to have it. You know, Jim, I was thinking about that just recently. I was having a conversation with folks at our workshop in our institutes, and they always call themselves learners. I think in the world of education, we would all identify as learners.

00:19:23:19 - 00:19:49:14
Unknown
Maybe it's this way for all professions, maybe it isn't. But for all the people who say, I just want to keep learning, I'm really excited for them to have this book because people constantly ask Jim, they'll say, hey, do you know Jim's article or the one about, you know, the one about autonomy? Actually, now I can say, yes, I know exactly which one you're talking about, but they want those articles and then they'll say, hey, do you have any ways that I can talk to people about enrolling teachers?

00:19:49:14 - 00:20:15:14
Unknown
Are there ways we can practice creating effective peers goals? And now the answer is yes. It's all in this book. So I'm just really excited for all the people who ask those questions to have not only the answers, but the tools to be successful themselves while staying connected to us and the support we can offer. And I'm also this is just a that's a minor detail, but the book is very friendly to to our learners out there.

00:20:15:16 - 00:20:30:13
Unknown
So I have my stack of books that I read right here beside me. I write in the margins, I use sticky notes, and then I go to my journal and I'll write things there, and then maybe I'll plug some things into a presentation. And I'm working on the I see toolkit is built for you to do all that right there in the book.

00:20:30:14 - 00:20:53:18
Unknown
There's space in the margins to write. It's spiral bound. You can lay it flat. We have a reflection questions and line spaces where you can write all your ideas. We really, truly thought of our people, the end user, as we've made this book. So I'm just really excited for people to put it into action and me to, I have to admit, I'm excited about just seeing, all the articles in one place.

00:20:53:20 - 00:21:17:22
Unknown
Yes, it's kind of like I wrote them and then they're gone. You know, it's maybe from five years ago and, or longer and and, and you write it, but having it all in a book is going to be quite wonderful to see all that. But it's not just the articles. There's all kinds of cases and activities and, all kinds of checklists and tools coaches can use.

00:21:17:22 - 00:21:38:22
Unknown
But but I am especially grateful for the chance to put all these articles in one place. And and they kind of won't get lost. They're all captured in this book. So that's exciting to me. It's selfish, but that's the thing that I'm excited about. Oh, it's like a it's a moment in time for you. You get to hold this book and say, look at the many, many years I've invested in writing about instructional coaching.

00:21:38:22 - 00:21:58:00
Unknown
And that's a really neat idea. We should we should frame it and hang it on your wall in a shadowbox. Okay. All your on your wall you want. Who did all the work? Oh okay. Two shadow boxes come in our way. All right. Well Jim, to close out our show today, we have two final questions. And the first one I want to give a shout out, actually.

00:21:58:00 - 00:22:17:21
Unknown
And maybe you could help me with that. So we had a team who put this book together. But there are many people who helped us along the way, including the places where your articles were originally published. So who would you like to give shout outs to today? Well, I'm really grateful to Anthony, who, is really a great friend of mine at AKD.

00:22:17:23 - 00:22:49:17
Unknown
He and I worked together for a long time, and in many ways, and I really feel, privileged to get to work with him and Suzanne at Learning Forward. I know that both Anthony and Suzanne were very generous with their willingness to help us. put these books, articles together because I think, it's generous on their part, to allow us to use this, because I can see how they might want to not have that knowledge reproduced, because I might they might want to keep it just in their articles, not out there.

00:22:49:17 - 00:23:06:14
Unknown
And so I'm grateful to both Suzanne and Anthony in it. And then, Megan at Corwin has been great to work with. So it's been wonderful to work with them. But but you know all about Megan. You and her are like best buds now. So how have you been working with her? Megan and Lucas at Corwin are my new best friends.

00:23:06:14 - 00:23:27:12
Unknown
We are officially bonded for life through this experience. I'm really grateful for them. A great collaboration between Instructional Coaching Group and Corwin, of course. Big shout outs to our coauthors, Michelle and Amy. But we've also had a variety of learning partners who have been essential in giving us feedback through this process. And we've given them a shout out in our acknowledgments in the book.

00:23:27:12 - 00:23:43:19
Unknown
But I also just want to say here that we've had many people coach champions, instructional coaches, part time consultants with ICG. Look at this book and give it their thoughts. So thank you to all of you who read many versions of many drafts. So we're really grateful for you. It is the fastest book I've ever seen put together.

00:23:43:19 - 00:23:59:18
Unknown
It's like astonishing. Like I think three months ago it was an idea. Now it's going to be a book. So it's it's together and going to print. So it's pretty amazing. Not going to print but going into production. Yes. And by the time this podcast comes out, they can actually order the books. They can order it as soon as this goes out.

00:23:59:20 - 00:24:21:10
Unknown
Great. And when is the book coming out? So when it is available for preorder, if you are listening to this podcast, but if you really want the full experience of getting the book and holding in your arms, you can come to TLC because the Icy Toolkit will officially drop at the TLC event this year in New Orleans in October, so please come out.

00:24:21:12 - 00:24:42:19
Unknown
I can't wait to give the book a big hug. I feel like I'm going to just gather them all in my arms and pull in. It's it's been such a wild ride. But yeah, it's come to TLC to get your book. Or you can order on our instructional Coaching group website. Any final notes about the book? Before we wrap up today, Jim, it's been fun to put it together, I think.

00:24:42:20 - 00:24:58:15
Unknown
I hope that people find it really. It's intended to be really, really helpful. almost like an anthology, you know, and, it'll be great to see it. And I don't think there's another book quite like it. So it's going to it's going to meet a need for those people who are trying to how can I get better?

00:24:58:16 - 00:25:19:09
Unknown
I can I lead my team to get better. How can I personally get better? So I'm very excited to see it. And, it's first of many for you, Jessica. We're just scratching the surface here. I'm already got plans, so we'll see what's next. I can't wait, maybe more than five weeks for the next two, six weeks minimum.

00:25:19:11 - 00:25:37:02
Unknown
Well, thank you all for listening today, everyone. If you found today's episode helpful, it would help us if you liked or followed the podcast. You can also leave us a rating or a comment so we can continue to create meaningful content just for you. Thank you. And until next time, go forth and lead great coaching conversations. Thank you so much for our conversation today.

00:25:37:02 - 00:25:44:15
Unknown
Jim. Thank you ma'am. Thank you for everything you've done in the book. It's astonishing and I I can't wait to see it. Yeah. Thank you.