The past two years have been packed with events. I have attended several conferences and presented at most of them.
After this tour de force has finished, I felt drained. Do you think that my first thought was to go on holiday and take a rest? No way!
I felt drained because I thought I had given everything that I knew, all my knowledge and my experiences to those I had met. I shared everything I had experienced during my classes with teens and teachers in the previous years. It was time to recharge my batteries by filling my heart, brain and soul with methodologies and content that I would continue to share with my colleagues and students.
At that stage, I decided to go further afield even though I studied from home: USA and Brazil.
I attended the Team Coaching Program with the Brown University of Professional Studies – ACT Leadership in the US. A great course with a fantastic cohort of coaches who all shared the passion for coaching and the same idea that coaching can really change your life.
Team coaching is a systematic approach which supports the team while maximizing each student’s potential. During the course, I learnt the most up-to-date coaching techniques when working with teams, the coach’s styles and skills. In other words, my mind was filled with ideas that could be brought in the educational system to open up opportunities for teachers to do their work To their best ability and to support students to engage with soft skills that are necessary in today’s world.
I qualified as team coach last November. Since then I have been implementing a new model of team coaching to be used when working on class projects: an intriguing mixture of team coaching (revised for the educational sector) and project based learning. The techniques will be presented in April at the IATEFL Conference in Harrogate.
Another area that I decided to develop was assessment. Assessment is part and parcel of coaching; a fundamental aspect of my profession. To be able to compare and contrast the techniques used in coaching from those used in teaching, I attended “Assessment as learning for young learners and teenagers” organized by IATEFL and Troika Brazil.; three day course on assessment for young learners and teenagers.
Have I noticed any differences? Yes. Coaching offers you (and the teacher-coach) a different approach, a different point of view. No, assessment is a sensitive issue both in coaching and teaching: you need to turn assessment into an opportunity for change (in coaching) and for learning (in teaching).
Now, with a newly acquire understanding of team coaching processes and techniques and an increased awareness of assessment, I am ready to plan my next presentations. I have so much to share and I can’t wait to meet you all at the next events that I will attend in 2023
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