Reflectivity is the catalyst for dialogue that makes good teaching contagious. Teachers take what they learn from their peers and put it into practice. Teachers are who teachers best learn from.

Danieli Parker | Hallsville Independent School District, TX

USE CASE

To provide a district-wide professional development resource

Danieli Parker

Director of Innovation and Instructional Technology

School/District:

Hallsville Independent School District, TX

A powerful tool for our district

Danieli Parker is the Director of Innovation and Instructional Technology for her school district in East Texas. Her role allows her to utilize technology to support teachers in becoming the most powerful educators they can be in the classroom. With experience as a former elementary teacher, assistant principal, and principal, Danieli understands the demands of the classroom through many lenses. These prior roles largely influence which technologies her district decides to invest in. 

In her mission to provide district-wide support, Danieli found the perfect ally in Reflectivity. No other solution could match its versatility and impact on optimizing peer learning and collaboration.

“Makes good teaching contagious”

In 2015, Hallsville ISD was recognized as a model PLC. Even with this recognition, they were still struggling to coordinate live observations.

“We truly believe in learning from each other and using the strengths of each teacher to build peer learning. But, the biggest challenge in scheduling live observations was making them relevant and meaningful to each teacher. We needed a 4th-grade teacher to observe another 4th-grade teacher, even if they were in different schools, instead of having a 4th-grade teacher observe a 2nd-grade teacher because of availability.”

 Everything changed in 2018 when they were introduced to Reflectivity + Robot. Instead of needing to coordinate live schedules for observations, or travel to different schools to learn from each other, these Swivl solutions enabled each teacher to record high-quality video and audio to be watched asynchronously.

“We would record short lesson segments and then watch the videos together during PLC meetings. The recordings were a catalyst to drive conversations. Teachers would pick up on things happening in the video that I didn’t even notice! This allowed us to have deeper discussions about instructional practices.”

Danieli firmly believes that peer-learning lessons are the gems that stick. “Reflectivity is the catalyst for dialogue that makes good teaching contagious. Teachers learn best from other teachers. They take what they learn from their peers and put it into practice.” The videos she has her teachers record are leveraged to empower her teachers which sustains their professional development throughout the entire year.

Built-in adaptability

Reflectivity’s versatile features offered the teachers at Hallsville multiple ways to collaborate. In addition to the deeper instructional practice discussions, and watching relevant recordings asynchronously, teachers have the option to share written reflections. They can join communities around specific skills, and share links to resources, to build a collaborative mindset, outside of watching lesson recordings.

“Reflectivity has been a game-changer for our new teachers. The educators coming out of teacher prep programs are lacking in their conversation skills,” she said. “They’re more comfortable messaging back-and-forth, which they can do in Reflectivity. They don’t experience any barriers to asking for help or finding resources. Reflectivity provides a comfortable space for both newer and veteran teachers to  converse about instruction.”

Creating your Reflectivity plan

Want to see what Reflectivity can do for your institution’s Instructional Coaching? Schedule a consultation with the Swivl team to learn more.

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I found the color coding on each student extremely helpful. Assessing their tone meant I could immediately see the type of day each student was having.

Kim Sharp | Kleb Intermediate School, Klein ISD

USE CASE

Build reflective skills and improve writing outcomes

Kim Sharp

Instructional Specialist in Digital Learning

School/District:

Kleb Intermediate School, Klein ISD

Grade: middle school

As an innovative Instructional Specialist in Digital Learning for Kleb Intermediate School, Kim Sharp wanted to find new ways to gain insights into her students’ learning and growth. She decided to explore tech solutions that qualified for Title 1 funding. Her research led to Swivl’s new interactive reflection station, Mirror.

After receiving Mirror, Kim put the device to the test. Kim had her humanities co-teaching partner, Christy Stewart, create custom reflections in Mirror for each of her students to reflect on their writing processes. Their goal was to determine whether offering an option for students to record verbal reflections would help the students improve their written outcomes.

When setting up custom reflections for students to complete with Mirror, teachers have the choice to type out the “goal” of a reflection or to record themselves as they say the goal out loud. Kim and Christy decided to record the goal so the students would hear their teacher’s voice.

Students were initially hesitant about recording verbal reflections with Mirror, but after demoing how to use it, and hearing their teachers’ voices stating the goal, they quickly warmed up. The students even named their Mirror, Siggy after Sigmund Freud.

Improving students’ reflective skills

The more Kim and Christy used Mirror with their students the more they realized that their students don’t know how to reflect on their own. This made them realize that Mirror needed a dedicated place in their classroom. This newly minted reflection station helps students easily build their reflective skills.

After a student records a reflection with Mirror, Mirror’s AI generates immediate feedback based on the student’s response. Each piece of feedback includes something a student did well, and offers an unbiased insight into how students can improve.

Data grounded in education research and theory

As part of the feedback Mirror offers, teachers can access a dashboard containing individualized reflection cards for each student reflection. To generate the data on each card Mirror’s AI measures the student’s reflection against education research and theories from Piaget, Kegan, Erikson, Vygotsky, CASEL, and more.

Minutes after a student completes a reflection, teachers are able to dive into the data. Mirror presents an overall reflection score comprising sentiment, tone, and mindset scoring. It clearly lays out how a student understood the objective of the reflection, to name a few of the data points.

“I found the teacher dashboard extremely helpful! The color coding on each student’s reflection that assessed their tone meant I could easily see the students that were having a really good day. On the students where the analysis was red, I immediately knew where I needed to focus more one-on-one time.”

Helping students demonstrate how they are thinking

Mirror is helping Christy and Kim better understand the thinking patterns of each of their students. Mirror isn’t a linear assessment. Mirror is enabling Kim and Christy to see a better representation of their students’ thinking processes – in their words, “We’re able to see the students who always think outside of the box, and the students who need more support to think outside of the box.” For Kleb Intermediate School they have found a solution that provides better opportunities for students to process concepts and themes while expressing the depth of their thinking.

Read more about how Klein ISD educators are using Mirror

• Klein ISD –  Monica Shallenberger, the Director of Professional Learning for the Klein Independent School District, uses Mirror to support her teachers amidst stringent state budgets. 
• Hildebrandt Intermediate School – Sarah Marin uses Mirror in her 7th-grade English classroom for project-based learning assessments.

Interested in seeing how Mirror can support your students and teachers? Sign up to participate in a 30-day, free demo of Mirror.

The post Research-based feedback for students and insights for teachers, within minutes appeared first on Swivl.

Reflection is the essential act for teacher growth, and instructional coaches are essential partners in helping teachers reflect. 

With this in mind, we asked four instructional coaches from the Swivl community about the role of reflection in teacher-coach relationships. Their comments have been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

Why is written reflection important for teachers?

Erica Beals, Instructional Coach at Waukee Schools in Iowa: Written reflection provides a layer of processing. When I meet with a teacher, sometimes the meeting is filled with emotion based on how the days has been. But when they have time to process, it eliminates some of the emotion because they’ve had that release already.

Then my questions will come in: I noticed on your reflection you said there was time wasted. What changes could we make, or what shifts would you like to see to eliminate that wasted time? So I never take an approach of telling teachers it should look like this. My questions are always going to be reflective in nature to allow them that realization of what’s taking away their energy or what their students might need. 

I want to take my teachers from where they are to where they want to be with their goals. That requires them to take steps forward without any of my intentions or beliefs pushing through.

How do instructional coaches help teachers set goals for reflection?

Erica: We usually start with a wide net and focus on our universal instruction, our tier one instruction.

We ask, what are we doing to meet all of our students? Within that, we look at academic work or behavior. I have checklists we might work through, asking, for example, How often are you sharing agendas with your students?

As an instructional coaching team in our district, we’ve created a number of tools that help us narrow in on a teacher’s goals. They include questions such as, How often do you provide a multitude of opportunities for students to reflect on their learning? How do you anticipate behavioral challenges? How do you create an emotionally safe space?

By having my teachers utilize these tools, and reviewing their responses together, we’re able to hone in on a goal together. Then, as we’re watching our videos, we’re reflecting through that lens. 

How do you help teachers build a reflective mindset?

Debbie Slocum, Instructional Coach at Byron-Bergen Schools in New York: Newer teachers are overwhelmed.  Every day they’re putting out fires, and they’re making 8,000 decisions. 

I will ask them, On your ride home, what is it that comes to mind? What do you feel in your gut? What is it that’s making you a little bit anxious? I try to help them pinpoint that with questions. 

Then, I say, don’t overwhelm yourself with the globalness of a classroom. Just focus on the thing that bothers you. It could be one kiddo that never raises his hand. Or someone who never finishes their work. Then we start to reflect on that.

From there we focus on, What can you do that works for you, but especially works for that child? 

Reflection has to be continuous. It has to be a priority because everything’s changing. Our expectations for the kids keep changing. Technologies keep changing, and culture is changing. There’s a need for continuous reflection to keep up with the changes. 

What role does autonomy play in encouraging teachers to reflect?

Mandi Olson, Instructional Coach at Alpine School District in Utah: For any coaching process to work, teachers have to be involved in choosing what they want to work on. 

At first, teachers may choose something they already feel confident about. If it’s the first time they’re working with me, they deserve the right to develop a spirit of vulnerability and trust with me. If they want to show me that they’re good at something, that’s okay. That’s a start, and it’s a way in for me.

How do instructional coaches use reflection to balance teacher needs and district goals?

Mandi:  At our school, we want teachers to be diagnosing, intervening and evaluating their impact every day. Especially for new teachers, that’s a lot. 

After we have classroom management and procedures under control at the beginning of the year, we ask, What’s your learning intention? What’s your success criteria? How are you going to know that kids meet it every day? How are you stating that to kids? Can I walk in the room and ask a student what they’re learning, why they’re learning it, and what success looks like? That’s our goal.

We try to direct teachers that way because those are general enough statements that you can direct any lesson there. If there’s something else teachers want to focus on, we can work on that, too. But if we don’t have a clear learning target and clear success criteria every day, then that’s a good place to start with a new teacher.

How does reflection lead to teacher growth?

Brenda Tomanek, Instructional Coach at El Campo ISD in Texas: Reflection leads to us becoming self-aware.  

This is a trait that isn’t the easiest for many of us to acquire because it requires us to be vulnerable, humble, and self-critical at times.  As an instructional coach, it is my job to make sure the teacher doesn’t become too self-critical. I encourage them to use their reflection and self-awareness to improve their skill set. 

I have to let them not look at missteps in the classroom as failures but as stepping stones toward improvement.

Coaches have been trained to ask reflective questions. More than likely, the teacher will come up with what he or she needs to change through reflective questioning. They may not always know how to change it, but they can see what needs to change.

I’m reminded of the quote from Henry Ford, “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got.” Reflection is the key piece that has to be there for a teacher to grow.

The post Four instructional coaches explain why reflection is essential for teacher growth appeared first on Swivl.

When administrators in Dodge City, KS, reviewed their student data in 2019, it was clear that literacy, specifically for their English Language Learners (ELLs), needed to be a top priority.

With 80% of the district’s 7,000 students identifying as Hispanic/Latino, this was already an area of focus. After receiving funding from a state grant, though, the district was ready to take a new approach.

Instead of focusing on top-down PD, Dodge City leaders invested in teacher coaching and self-reflection as a path to student literacy growth. 

To better support ELLs, Dodge City needed to remake their tools and systems for coaching

According to Kelley Clark, Literacy Project Manager and Professional Development Coordinator, this was a research-informed decision.

“We had seen a body of evidence saying that PD sessions alone won’t give us the return we wanted,” Kelley said. “We needed to support what we were doing with instructional coaching.”

In the past, Dodge City had had versions of instructional coaching, and even used classroom video in support of it. But they had identified several challenges to address.

“Coaching looked different across buildings and between individuals. Coaches often did ‘other duties as assigned’ instead of true coaching,” Kelley said.

Their old method of capturing classroom video was also a challenge to address.

“Lots of teachers found coaches visiting classrooms and using iPads to record them intimidating. The teachers had questions: What’s going on with the video? Whose video is it?” Kelley said.

With a clear goal and challenges to address, Dodge City was ready to get to work.

Leaders replaced classroom visits with Swivl Robots to create a more teacher-centered coaching program

Dodge City systematized and focused their coaching efforts by adopting Jim Knight’s Impact Cycle. While coaches used to visit classrooms to record lessons with an iPad, teachers now recorded their own lessons with Swivl Robots. 

Kelley was unsure how teachers would feel about recording themselves with Swivl Robots.

“The teachers actually preferred using the Robots to record themselves over having their coach record them with an iPad,” Kelley said.

At the same time, administrators and coaches audited coaches’ time. This clarified the job’s responsibilities and opened new ways for coaches to offer teacher support.

“Coaches began to leverage video captured by Swivl Robots at multiple points of the coaching cycle,” Kelley said. 

This included:

• Capturing video before coaching to capture the current reality
• Coaches sharing model lessons for teachers to refer to during the coaching cycle
• Recording lessons during the cycle for reflection and richer coaching conversations

Additionally, Dodge City started using Swivl Robots to empower curriculum implementations. When ELA and Math teachers wanted to see a new curriculum taught in a lesson, coaches recorded and shared model lessons. These acted as concrete examples of instructional expectations teachers could revisit and share with others.

“We invested in teachers, focusing on collective efficacy,” Kelley said of the changes Dodge City made to support ELL achievement.

Teachers are empowered to reflect with classroom video, and ELLs show growth in crucial skills

“Change takes time. But we are seeing teacher practice shift,” Kelley said. 

This shift in practice has led to concrete results related to Dodge City’s goal to support ELLs. Recently, the Dodge City ESOL and Diversity Director shared assessment data showing growth in speaking, listening, and reading skills for ELL students.

“It’s steady, incremental growth, which is what we want to see,” Kelley said.

Kelley believes that giving teachers tools to engage in meaningful self-reflection and coaching is a key piece of that growth.

“When the Swivl Robot is in the classroom, it’s an objective observer,” Kelley said. “Teachers look at what they’re doing, and how their kids are responding. That’s more powerful than anyone coming in and saying ‘you should be doing this or that.’”

Kelley looks forward to expanded use of Teams by Swivl (now Reflectivity) for asynchronous discussion through time-stamped commenting, as a way to enrich face to face conversations with teachers.

During a recent coaching session, Kelley observed the power of giving teachers tools to reflect on classroom video.  While watching a video, the teacher saw how often she laughed with students and had fun moments with them during class. 

“She was laughing and having a good time, but she wasn’t conscious of it,” Kelley said. “It’s not always about identifying negative things. There are so many positives to discover.”

The post How Dodge City Schools Transformed Their Coaching Program to Support ELL Achievement appeared first on Swivl.

Guilford County needed a flexible, efficient way to support and assess a math curriculum implementation.

Kat Stevens is the PreK-12 Director of Math in Guilford County Schools, a district of over 70,000 students and 120 schools in North Carolina. The district’s 27 middle schools recently adopted a new math curriculum with a goal of providing an equitable math education for all students.

But a successful curriculum implementation would require ongoing teacher support and assessment. “Just handing out books is not enough,” Kat said. 

To support this, Guilford County needed an implementation plan that was time and resource-efficient, while encouraging teachers to self-reflect and collaborate with coaches.

Another challenge for Guilford County was their size. District leadership needed to assess and support hundreds of teachers with various needs and experience levels. Kat recalled needing to help a 30-year veteran teacher buy-in to the need for a district-wide curriculum, while helping a first-year teacher master the new curriculum content.

Ultimately, Kat’s vision was about equity. “Every kid deserves high-quality math instruction,” she said.

District leaders assess 27 middle schools and coaches support hundreds of teachers through Swivl Teams + Robots

With one math supervisor dedicated to supporting 27 middle schools, Kat and her district leadership team have leveraged several outside teacher coaching consultancies to provide job embedded coaching. This coaching supports the implementation of the new math curriculum across the district’s middle schools.  

Through recording, sharing and discussing instructional videos through Swivl Teams + Robots, Kat shared that her coaches approach their work with a mindset of, “What do we see? What do we hear? How do we support the glows and grows of math curriculum implementation?”

Video also helps Guilford develop a shared language and consistent set of expectations for the delivery of their curriculum. Instructional leaders visit classrooms to model lessons streamed live for coaches and others to watch and discuss. Through this process, they ensure district leaders, coaches, and teachers are aligned with what success looks like and how to talk about it.

Guilford County has learned that the benefits of self-reflection and coaching over classroom video go beyond reducing the need for travel. Even though coaches have returned to visiting classrooms, they record lessons so that teachers can self-reflect over the videos during PLCs and coaching sessions.

“It’s always important for teachers to self-reflect,” Kat said. “When you think about an effective coaching model, it’s not about a coach telling teachers what to do, but a coach supporting me in conversation and helping me see what I need to do.”   

As Guilford County navigates large-scale change, Swivl tools make alignment and growth easier at all levels

Guilford County’s use of Swivl tools has led to improvements at all levels of the district.

In the classroom, Kat believes Swivl Teams + Robots empowers teachers to not only improve through work with coaches, but to take ownership of their growth through self-reflection over video.

“Swivl Teams + Robots has improved our coaching conversations because teachers are not only able to have their coaches watch them, but they’re able to go back, watch the video and reflect on their own teaching,” Kat said.

Kat believes the Swivl Robot’s ability to track educators as they move around the room, as well the high-quality audio captured by Swivl’s audio markers make a significant difference in the coaching and self-reflection experience.

“There’s such a difference between putting up a laptop and recording versus having that Swivl full view and seeing everything that’s going on,” Kat said. She also noted Guilford County teachers and coaches love to use audio markers to bookmark important moments during lessons.

While classroom visits can be stressful for teachers and students, videos captured by Swivl Robots and shared through Swivl Teams allow administrators to get a more accurate picture of their implementation with less stress on teachers and students. 

Ultimately, it’s about putting tools and systems in place to ensure a great math education

At the building and district level, capturing, sharing and discussing classroom videos ensures everyone in Guilford is “aligned with what high-quality instruction looks like,” as Kat put it.

Kat believes the biggest impact Swivl Teams + Robots have had on her leadership team has been helping the district be more aligned while saving time by capturing, sharing and discussing classroom video.

“We can have conversations no matter where we are,” Kat said. “I can go into a classroom anytime, anywhere, even if I’m not in the building. So it supports our conversation as leaders.”

Through frequent self-reflection, coaching, and administrator alignment, all supported with classroom video, Guilford County has put the tools and systems in place to ensure every student gets the high-quality math instruction they deserve.

Ready to ensure all your teachers have the support they need

to deliver high-quality instruction?

The post How Guilford County Supports Math Curriculum Implementation at 27 Middle Schools with Classroom Video appeared first on Swivl.

Relationships among educators and with students are foundational to the positive culture you create in your school community. As we shared in our recent blog, Why Video Coaching is Important This Fall, “teachers who have a strong, trusting relationship with their coach or mentor can use that relationship as a model of what to build with each student they teach.”  When educators participate in video-based coaching it is imperative that the tools they use facilitate respect, trust, and instructive communication to help sustain strong relationships.

We already know video is the ideal medium for observations because the most actionable feedback is gained from gathering and examining evidence of a teacher’s practice in a real classroom setting. Unlike in-person observations, videos portray authentic classroom environments where both teacher and students can act naturally, unencumbered by a visitor. When videos depict authentic classroom experiences, feedback becomes more specific and leads to greater growth outcomes too. Feedback tools like our Time-Stamped Annotation also make it easy for educators to set goals, track their progress, and communicate about what was observed in class. 

This is why Swivl is making feedback a priority with our Teams product release today, with Sessions.

Sessions make for better feedback

Feedback without clarity results in confusion. Classroom observations should have clear intentions. In our newest feature, Sessions, we’ve made it so you set your Intention upfront. As with many meaningful activities associated with delivering feedback, the first step is to define your “look-fors” not only for yourself but for your feedback partners. Important questions to ask yourself when setting an Intention for your video:

• What do you hope to accomplish in this video? 
• Does the evidence you will record allow you an opportunity to achieve your Intention? If not, before you proceed it might be helpful to go back and record another short segment of the instruction that allows you to explore the context of your Intention. 
• Where do you want your viewers to focus so they know how to reflect, question, and comment throughout your video?

Example: “In this math lesson, I would like to analyze which students struggle when I ask them to describe the method they chose to arrive at their answer.”

To continue your Session make sure to provide feedback, in the form of Time-Stamped Annotation on the video. This is the real “meat” so be clear with your response. The more time you take to reflect on what evidence you choose to address, the more evidence there will be for others  to respond to and reflect on. This is also a great time to highlight your “glows” and identify your “grows” with Web Bookmarking. Start comments with Prompts for guidance, and utilize Rubrics that tie into your organization’s coaching or self-reflection frameworks. When combined, these tools pave the way for structured, meaningful feedback on every observable teaching practice exhibited throughout the video.

When you are finished with Time-Stamped Annotations, it is time to consider the entire observation, summarize your experience, and define next steps.

Specifically: 

• Did you meet the Intention you set? 
• If not, what will you do differently next time? 
• What are your next steps from here?
• How will you use what you learned in this video to impact other areas of your instruction going forward? 

Example: “I learned that a majority of students in my green group struggled with describing the methodology they chose to develop the answer to the problems. In my next video, I’ll work on some new strategies to help them break down those building blocks of problem-solving and utilize scaffolded questioning to help them answer my targeted question around methodology.”

We have left ample room for you to develop a meaningful Summary response so take your time when using this space to conclude your actions in this Session.

Watch this 30-second video on Sessions to see just how easy it really is.

We hope that these improvements will bring greater purpose for your experience inside Teams so you can focus on the heart of the observation process: Clear and prescriptive feedback based on video evidence.

The post We’ve Made Actionable Feedback Central to the Teams Platform appeared first on Swivl.