HOW TO HOST A COACHING OR MENTORING WORKSHOP

SIMPLE Directions for Beginning Hosts

I. How to Organize and Promote Your Own TPRS® Coaching Workshop

STEP 1:Secure a location such as a school classroom, a church meeting room or your living room.

STEP 2: Fill out the contact form with the date, location and contact information and we will post it here. Coaching and mentoring get-togethers are organized by TPRS® teachers. Other TPRS® teachers from the vicinity are welcome to attend. Previous attendance at TPRS® workshops is recommended.

STEP 3: Send the information to the moretprs listserv (subscription info at the bottom of the page), your local TPRS® listserv if there is one, and to your state foreign language association listserv.

STEP 4: Set up a structure for your schedule. A recommended schedule for a Saturday coaching workshop is included below.

STEP 5: Post posters around the room and download and copy a TPR Stories Peer-coaching Feedback Form.  (This form is not intended to be use for evaluative purposes. It should be used by an observer familiar with TPRS® . The observer will need a watch or stopwatch. The teacher being observed should use the form to perform an informal self-evaluation of the content of the class). (These are not necessary, but help maintain a structure if you don't have a better idea for how to run it.)

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II. Suggested Schedule

9-9:30am introductions, make a list of goals, review the rules

9:30am Decide on ONE coach who will facilitate the get-together. (Or if it is a large group, split the group and have more than one coach, but only one per group at a time.) Practice the following skills in order. When each person has practiced one skill, move on to the next skill.

a) circling (in order)

b) circling (out of order)

c) parking on all of the question words

d) Parking on one question word

Last half hour to an hour OR over lunch: Open discussion, questions, general support

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III. Rules for a Successful Coaching Workshop

The biggest enemy of a successful coaching session is open-ended discussion. There is great value in discussion, so be sure to set aside structured time for unstructured discussion, but an entire day of valuable discussion will not leave any time for coaching. As the facilitator, remember that lecturing and discussion will not yield long term results in the classroom whereas "practice by doing" and "teaching others what you have learned" leads to nearly a 90% retention rate of the information. Asa the facilitator, it's your job to gently keep the group on task so that they have a high quality experience that will impact their classrooms. Through trial and error we have learned that if everyone agrees to follow the following rules, all of the participants will feel safe and the coaching workshop will be PROFOUNDLY more effective.

RULES:
1. There is only one coach.
2. Do not correct the language accuracy of another teacher.
3. No discussion.
4. BE students… not teachers. [BE the pacesetter (barometer) student if you don't know the language.]
5. NO out-of-bounds…. The word being taught and cognates only. (Not in the classroom, just in the coaching workshop.)
6. Hard-stop vs. slow stop

Explanations:
1. There is only one coach. Don't help the teacher while she's teaching. Instead, play the role of the student. It's too intimidating to the teacher to have several people coaching her simultaneously.
2. Our language abilities vary but in this group creating an environment of extreme safety and trust is the most important component of a successful coaching workshop.
3. Designate discussion periods once everyone has had a turn, but comments during the coaching session will dissolve into discussion groups very quickly.
4. The teacher will begin by identifying the pacesetter (barometer) student in the group for the language he teaches and then will check in with the pacesetter (barometer).
5. With so many languages in such a short period of time we are not trying to learn the languages, we are trying to practice the method. Stray words in many languages divert our attention from practicing. In your classroom, however, staying in-bounds includes all of the words it can be presumed they already know from previous instruction, expanding our base.
6. This is only necessary when multiple groups are run simultaneously. Since after several turns they will not stay in synch, any instructions you might give may cause an interruption. Distinguish between - "everybody pause so I can explain one thing and then you can start again" interruptions and "you have one more minute to wrap up this turn before we go on to the next activity or take a break" kind of interruptions.

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IV. Roles or jobs for each participant during coaching sessions
Pacesetter (barometer)
Rep tally-er
Teacher
Coach

Explanation:
The pacesetter (barometer) gives the teacher a sign every time he or she doesn't understand a word or the teacher is speaking too quickly. It is the pacesetters job to keep the teacher speaking slowly by giving slow down signs and stop signs the way a student would. A beginning pace should be "The boy (count 1...2...) wants (count 1...2...) to eat (count 1... 2...) a hamburger."

The "rep tallier" counts the number of times the "teacher" repeats the target structure.

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V. Exercises

A. CIRCLING IN ORDER (combine subject and object to have practice asking 9 continuous question / statements resulting in 13 reps. Each teacher takes one turn and then passes to the next teacher. At the end of each turn the rep tallier reports on the number of reps and the pacesetter reports if the pace was too fast and if words were incomprehensible.)

Make a statement (in the target language)
Bob wants to buy a hamburger.

1. CIRCLE THE SUBJECT

2. CIRCLE THE OBJECT

(Hint: Don't change the practice structure until everyone has exhausted all of the exercises UNLESS all of the teachers in the group teach the same language and the group wants some variety.)

When each participant has taken a turn, start over with circling out of order.

B. CIRCLING (out of order)

Teacher changes the order of the kind of question while circling, but does not add question words yet.

When each participant has taken a turn, start over with parking on all of the question words.

C. PARKING ON ALL OF THE QUESTION WORDS

Parking Poster

WHO?
WHAT?
WHERE?
WHEN?
WHICH?
HOW?
HOW MUCH?
HOW MANY?
WHY?

Exercise:

Who wants to buy a hamburger?

What does Bob want to buy?

Where does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

When does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

Which hamburger does Bob want to buy?

How does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

How much does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

How many hamburgers does Bob want to buy?

Why does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

When each participant has taken a turn, start over with parking on one question word.

D.PARKING ON ONE QUESTION WORD

Why does Bob want to buy a hamburger?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Coach the "teacher" to continue asking the students "But... WHY?" until the answers they give begin to create interesting information that could POTENTIALLY turn into a storyline. Once the storyline is evident, the "teacher's" turn is over.

When each participant has taken a turn, start over with a new structure and combine all 4 techniques. Be cautious not to make two statements in a row. Focus on a constant stream of questions and a high number of reps.

E. Combine A-D. Teacher continues using the target structure.

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VI. Discussion

Leave time at the end for questions, discussing issues, discussing the coaching format and making suggestions for subsequent meetings.