The effects of university faculty coaching on teachers’ confidence with classroom management

Improving instructional effectiveness is often a challenging task for teachers working in a struggling school. In many cases, impacting the success of effectiveness in the classrooms is the struggle or inability of teachers to effectively manage their classrooms (Marzano, Marzano, and Pickering, 2003). Instructional coaching can be an effective method to help teachers especially when provided by someone other than an evaluator. The research questions that guided this study were: 1. How receptive are elementary school teachers to accurately self-identify classroom management practices in which improvement is needed? 2. To what extent are elementary school teachers willing to accept non-evaluative coaching as a method to improve classroom management practices. 3. To what extent do teachers feel university professor coaching increased their skills in classroom management? Ten teachers volunteered to be a part of the coaching sessions with the researchers ranging from K-5th grade. Data collection included teacher surveys, observation notes, feedback notes, and researchers’ debriefing notes. The data were analyzed by both researchers using axial coding for the qualitative data and pre/post survey ratings to measure perceived increase in skills development. Results from the self-rated surveys indicated that for some teachers instructional coaching was effective to develop classroom management skills while for some it was not as effective and for one not effective. The researchers’ qualitative notes showed that teachers self-perception ratings were not always aligned with researchers’ observations and conversations with teachers. Recommendations for practice related to instructional coaching are provided