Supporting Teachers’ Practice When They Don’t Have Access to An Instructional Coach
Instructional coaches are proven to have measurable impact on teaching practice and learning outcomes.
But, not all teachers or all schools have access to instructional coaches.
Those teachers very much still need and would benefit from coaching and feedback.
After all, every teacher deserves to pursue their vision of the teacher they want to be in their classroom, for their students.
“TeachFX is a tool that I wish I had as a teacher. That would have been so helpful for me to just take a step back and understand what actually happened in my classroom, and think concretely about ways that I could improve.”
How can TeachFX help in schools where teachers don’t have access to coaches?
1. TeachFX allows teachers to gather their own instructional feedback.
Rather than relying on classroom observations or walkthroughs, teachers can use the TeachFX app to gather feedback on their instructional practice.
And, no special equipment is needed.
Using any phone, tablet, or laptop, teachers record audio of their lesson. And the TeachFX app uses AI to generate valuable, actionable feedback that a teacher can reflect on in minutes.
2. The TeachFX app contains suggested reflection questions to help guide teachers in reflecting on their own.
With each insight, the TeachFX app provides suggested reflection questions to help guide teachers in considering what each insight reveals to them about what’s happening in their classroom, and what practices they’d like to pursue.
3. Teachers can reflect on TeachFX insights with their peers, with mentors, and through professional learning communities (PLCs).
At many of our partners, teachers use TeachFX with their peers. There are often natural contexts, where teachers can engage in conversations about their TeachFX data with each other.
We see this happen in the context of PLCs. Teachers might come together on a weekly basis, each bringing an example TeachFX report. There, they can exchange data, share different ways that even the same lesson that they taught across their different classrooms went, provide feedback to each other on what worked and what didn't work as they would’ve liked, and give each other ideas for how to improve that lesson.
Research supports that AI-powered, job-embedded instructional feedback reliably helps teachers change teaching practice
Heather C. Hill and Dora Demszky’s research has proven automated, job-embedded feedback improved frequency of taking up student ideas in multiple settings. And that students taught by these instructors had more favorable perceptions of their learning experience.
Hill and Demszky, in partnership with TeachFX, then sought to confirm the extent to which these findings are applicable in K-12 classrooms. They’ve recently completed a study of 100 mathematics teachers in Utah utilizing TeachFX.
Importantly, the teachers involved in the Utah study were not all working with coaches. While some teachers did have coaches, many were using TeachFX independently to help improve their teaching practice. And the researchers did find an effect on teaching practice.
And we do have some examples of studies where, even in context, where teachers are using and reviewing these data independently, we still see growth in their practice and changes in student talk over time.
TeachFX can help teachers improve their own teaching practice – even when instructional coaching is not present or accessible
Instructional coaches are vital. They help unlock each teacher’s potential to become a more effective and impactful educator for each student, year after year.
But for so many reasons, there are many schools in which instructional coaches simply are not present.
Even if there's not an instructional coach present, TeachFX can help teachers create for themselves meaningful opportunities to have data-informed reflections and conversations about their practice and to get advice from colleagues about how to grow and improve their practice over time.
And even when instructional coaches are accessible, they are often also managing multiple roles (including teaching in the classroom themselves) and working with as many as 16 or more teachers at a time.
Any teacher can give TeachFX a try for free, right now, by signing up and using the app on their phone, tablet, or laptop. With your free trial, you can record up to three lessons. And if you’d like to extend beyond that, just reach out to talk with the team.
There's so much potential for TeachFX to be highly impactful even when there aren't instructional coaches present to support teachers in working through this data.
