March 5, 2023 • 15 mins
In this episode, Becca and Mia discuss the third level of resistance: when educators don't feel competent enough to implement the change. They discuss the varying reasons why the resistance happens on this level. In addition, they share strategies on how to build capacity in a building where teachers feel safe and confident to take risks and try new things (including new changes). Stay tuned until the very end for a very special offer (HINT: It involves a free bonus workshop)!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Becca Silver (00:00):
Hello coaches and leaders, I am so excited to have
(00:04):
our part three of the resistanceto change series. Just briefly,
if you have not been catchingthe previous two parts of the
series, Mia is a program managerwith a direction and coaches,
school leaders and instructionalcoaches. She is the founder of
(00:24):
coach fest, which is aconference and retreat for
instructional coaches andleaders an absolutely incredible
experience. So today, we aregoing to be talking about level
three of resistance, or previoussessions, we talked about level
one, which is we need to beaddressing why the change is
(00:46):
happening when we have educatorsresisting change. And level two
is the need to build trust, thatif someone is resisting change,
they might not trust the leader,or the change itself. And so we
need to be really building thatfoundation of trust with our
(01:08):
educators that we are asking tochange, right. And so today, the
third level is really aboutbuilding capacity. So we are
going to be talking about how tobuild the skill and knowledge
set of the educators at ourschool. Here's the thing, most
(01:28):
of the time in schools, when I'mgoing into coach, educators and
school leaders, I see theleadership of schools skipping
to the stage do not skip to thislevel. Okay. So Mia, I would
love to hear your thoughts onbuilding capacity, what are some
(01:49):
different ways that leaders andcoaches can build the capacity
of their teachers?
Unknown (01:56):
Well, first of all, I 100% agree with you that a lot
of people skip to this part andthe building the foundation of
really understanding the whywe'll make this part so much
easier and go so much faster. Sowe can't reiterate that enough.
Once you get to this part,though, I think one of the
(02:16):
fastest ways to build capacityand to get people implementing
at a high level of fidelity isthrough meaningful feedback. So
you want to prepare your stafffor this meaningful feedback,
you want to lay that foundationof again, why are we giving
feedback? How are we going togive feedback, what types of
(02:38):
feedback can you expect, if youcan make that crystal clear in
the beginning, and kind of setup the systems and processes for
effective feedback, then peoplewill be much more open to it. It
will, you know, take away someof the fear that intrinsically
comes with getting feedback. Andthen you can really get specific
(03:00):
on the change you'reimplementing, and how you can
take those baby steps to improveday by day, little by little,
because that's really how theincredible growth happens over
time.
Becca Silver (03:14):
You know, part of building capacity, right?
Learning new things, isn't justsimply in isolation. It's not
like I'm teaching you a newthing, and you're going to go
learn it. There's a lot ofmindsets that impact our ability
to learn new things. And youknow, I think about the kind of
anxiety someone might have, ifthey are asked to change. They
(03:36):
don't know how to implement thechange, and then they're being
held accountable to have thatchange happen. And so I think
about mindsets as a reallyimportant factor that impacts
potentially someone'swillingness and ability to learn
new information. It really does
Unknown (03:57):
and mindsets don't typically change overnight. So
it's like that slow drip ofmessaging of you know, why the
change is positive, and whywe're doing it and how everybody
can contribute to the change ina positive way and how it's
going to be good for staff andstudents. I think those things
are really important. And it itreally brings to mind a very
(04:19):
specific example in my own lifethat I can share with you when I
was completely resistant tochange. I was working at a
school and we were going througha moving to data informed
instruction. And this issomething I had very little
training in at the time. Ididn't know why we were doing
it. We had a lot of peoplecoming into our classrooms and
(04:42):
watching us and telling us on adaily basis what we were doing
wrong. And so the anxiety wasvery high and the buy in was
quite low. And now looking backon it I can tell you that over
time and through the process ofof doing it and doing it with a
(05:02):
team that I trusted, even thoughat the time the leadership was
not where the trust was, then Ican say, Yes, I can see how
beneficial that was, for me togrow as an educator, it was
definitely beneficial for mystudents, my instruction got so
much better. But the resistancelevel at the beginning of that
was very high.
Becca Silver (05:23):
Yeah. And, you know, I think about the need for
you to understand why that washappening. And even though it
sounds like they were givingregular feedback, it was
ineffective, because you didn'tactually know why this was
happening. You weren't bought in
Unknown (05:38):
right, resistance isn't a bad thing. And we label it as
something bad, but it's reallyjust fear. It's fear disguised
as, you know, anger and defianceand the behaviors that we see
come out in people. But we if wecan get to the bottom of where
the fear is coming from, andaddress that. And while we're
(05:59):
teaching these skills, so justimagine if what I went through
with data informed instruction,if we had had a coach, who along
the way, on a daily or weeklybasis was saying, okay, here,
let's look at this one thingthat you did, here's what you
did, well, here's one littletweak you can do to make it
better. And then, you know, youwould see that progress over
(06:22):
time, but you felt supportedthrough the whole process.
Imagine how different that wouldhave been?
Becca Silver (06:26):
Yes, exactly. I have a friend that calls it tiny
tweaks. And some educatorsreally need much more of that
tiny step by tiny step. And alot of it is really managing
their anxiety, it's not theircapacity to learn something new.
It's actually the underlyingthoughts about learning
something new, is it worth therisk? Is it not worth the risk?
(06:46):
Right? And so part of buildingcapacity and the willingness for
a teacher to learn something newis they have to be willing to
see the risk as somethingbeneficial for them, they are
asking themselves, is it worththe risk to try this new thing?
Will I be successful with it?
Unknown (07:06):
Yeah. So it goes back to the why it's exactly what we
talked about in the firstepisode of this series, and
Becca Silver (07:11):
it takes a leaders ability to listen, it takes a
leaders ability to listen toreally sort out at what level
educators are at right, not justskip to this building capacity
level. But are they needing toknow the why again? And, you
know, if not, if they're reallybought into the why, what skills
(07:32):
do they need? And what's thenext thing I want to say? And
how do they need to be taught?
So I want to shift into creatinga culture of learning. There's
lots of ways to teach teachersnew things, right? What are your
thoughts around how coaches andleaders can build a culture of
(07:52):
learning in their schools?
Unknown (07:56):
I think one of the really most powerful ways to
build a culture of learning isto show examples. So expose
people to other examples oflearning cultures and people in
in the field of education ornot, right, who have gone
(08:16):
through this process of learningand growing. And just constant
examples of how it's not a onetime thing is something that we
continuously do. And we say allthe time we give it lip service,
right? Like, we're lifelonglearners, we have a growth
mindset. But when you really,really stop and analyze, am I
living what I'm saying?
Sometimes we're not quite there,there's, there's a little bit of
(08:39):
a mismatch there. I want
Becca Silver (08:42):
to say something about modeling. I think modeling
can be really effective for someteachers. And with the whole
educator approach we talk about,there are different levels of
willingness. And there are somelevels of willingness, we call
them eager, and actually willingto change. And those two groups
(09:02):
of educators really benefit frommodeling, you show them how to
do it, they're like, Thank youfor the clarity. I'm gonna go
and do it. Right. Yeah, modelingis not appropriate for educators
that have seen what the changeis going to look like and are
still not implementing. So it'snot an issue of I don't know
(09:22):
what the change looks like. It'sanother issue right? And so
that's actually something that Ishare a lot with my coaches
which is don't model for your Icall them the stopped educators
don't don't model for peoplethat have seen it and gone
through lots of trainings andare still not doing it. They
don't need modeling, stopmodeling for some of your
teachers. So I wanted to sharethat and it's it can be shocking
(09:46):
for some leaders and coaches tohear because that's kind of a
that can be a go to.
Unknown (09:51):
So then do they ask you like, well, if I'm not modeling,
then what do I do? Yes, yes,
Becca Silver (09:56):
they do. Yeah. So there's so many other options.
There's co planning Holdteaching is a partnership
oriented approach that I highlyrecommend taking with educators
that are more hesitant tochange. And educators that just
aren't changing at all.
Unknown (10:13):
We have to differentiate and meet them
where they are, well, we have todo the same thing, when the
educators are the students, sowe have to know where they are
in their mindset, know wherethey are in the resistance kind
of cycle, and then meet themwhere they are, and meet those
needs. And that's done throughwhat you were just describing
(10:34):
that coaching partnership. Yeah,
Becca Silver (10:37):
totally. You know, and one last thing I wanted to
talk about as an option to buildcapacity is something I spoke
about a few episodes ago, whichis peer coaching, really
developing a culture whereeducators throw open their
doors, and normalize giving eachother feedback. Now that takes
(10:58):
training, you can't just say,hey, teachers, right, we're
going to de privatizeclassrooms, you are now going to
give each other feedback. Goodluck with that, right, which
sometimes we see initiativeshappen, like you're going to do
this with no training, or youactually want to have your
teachers trained in this. Butthis is such a powerful way of
building capacity organically,because the way change happens,
(11:19):
actually, is there's a curve.
And you start with earlyadopters, you start with
innovators, and that goes intoearly adopters. And it is you
start with a small group ofpeople and it grows and grows.
And peer coaching is a reallyincredible way of doing that. So
check out the peer coachingepisode as well. So I'd like to
wrap up this conversation. Mia,is there anything else you want
(11:41):
to share with our coaches andleaders about building capacity,
I'll just build
Unknown (11:47):
a little bit on what you just said about peer
coaching to say that when youhave some people who maybe have
been teaching a while and theyseem resistant to that, start by
using them as the ones who aresharing their expertise and
coaching others becauseeventually what will happen is
the relationships will form andthey will start being exposed to
(12:12):
other teachers are doing evennew teachers who have new and
fresh ideas. And they're they'llbe like, Oh, well, that's
interesting. You know, tell memore about that. So again, like
you said, it happensorganically, but it's very
powerful. And
Becca Silver (12:25):
just remember coaches and leaders, if someone
is resisting learning a newskill, there's fear involved. So
really start looking at theirhumanity and instead of saying,
Ah, they're just resisting, theywon't learn the new thing,
right? Ask yourself, what arethey afraid of? And we will be
following up with our finallevel for over resistance next
(12:48):
week. See you soon
Hello coaches and leaders, I am so excited to have
(00:04):
our part three of the resistanceto change series. Just briefly,
if you have not been catchingthe previous two parts of the
series, Mia is a program managerwith a direction and coaches,
school leaders and instructionalcoaches. She is the founder of
(00:24):
coach fest, which is aconference and retreat for
instructional coaches andleaders an absolutely incredible
experience. So today, we aregoing to be talking about level
three of resistance, or previoussessions, we talked about level
one, which is we need to beaddressing why the change is
(00:46):
happening when we have educatorsresisting change. And level two
is the need to build trust, thatif someone is resisting change,
they might not trust the leader,or the change itself. And so we
need to be really building thatfoundation of trust with our
(01:08):
educators that we are asking tochange, right. And so today, the
third level is really aboutbuilding capacity. So we are
going to be talking about how tobuild the skill and knowledge
set of the educators at ourschool. Here's the thing, most
(01:28):
of the time in schools, when I'mgoing into coach, educators and
school leaders, I see theleadership of schools skipping
to the stage do not skip to thislevel. Okay. So Mia, I would
love to hear your thoughts onbuilding capacity, what are some
(01:49):
different ways that leaders andcoaches can build the capacity
of their teachers?
Unknown (01:56):
Well, first of all, I 100% agree with you that a lot
of people skip to this part andthe building the foundation of
really understanding the whywe'll make this part so much
easier and go so much faster. Sowe can't reiterate that enough.
Once you get to this part,though, I think one of the
(02:16):
fastest ways to build capacityand to get people implementing
at a high level of fidelity isthrough meaningful feedback. So
you want to prepare your stafffor this meaningful feedback,
you want to lay that foundationof again, why are we giving
feedback? How are we going togive feedback, what types of
(02:38):
feedback can you expect, if youcan make that crystal clear in
the beginning, and kind of setup the systems and processes for
effective feedback, then peoplewill be much more open to it. It
will, you know, take away someof the fear that intrinsically
comes with getting feedback. Andthen you can really get specific
(03:00):
on the change you'reimplementing, and how you can
take those baby steps to improveday by day, little by little,
because that's really how theincredible growth happens over
time.
Becca Silver (03:14):
You know, part of building capacity, right?
Learning new things, isn't justsimply in isolation. It's not
like I'm teaching you a newthing, and you're going to go
learn it. There's a lot ofmindsets that impact our ability
to learn new things. And youknow, I think about the kind of
anxiety someone might have, ifthey are asked to change. They
(03:36):
don't know how to implement thechange, and then they're being
held accountable to have thatchange happen. And so I think
about mindsets as a reallyimportant factor that impacts
potentially someone'swillingness and ability to learn
new information. It really does
Unknown (03:57):
and mindsets don't typically change overnight. So
it's like that slow drip ofmessaging of you know, why the
change is positive, and whywe're doing it and how everybody
can contribute to the change ina positive way and how it's
going to be good for staff andstudents. I think those things
are really important. And it itreally brings to mind a very
(04:19):
specific example in my own lifethat I can share with you when I
was completely resistant tochange. I was working at a
school and we were going througha moving to data informed
instruction. And this issomething I had very little
training in at the time. Ididn't know why we were doing
it. We had a lot of peoplecoming into our classrooms and
(04:42):
watching us and telling us on adaily basis what we were doing
wrong. And so the anxiety wasvery high and the buy in was
quite low. And now looking backon it I can tell you that over
time and through the process ofof doing it and doing it with a
(05:02):
team that I trusted, even thoughat the time the leadership was
not where the trust was, then Ican say, Yes, I can see how
beneficial that was, for me togrow as an educator, it was
definitely beneficial for mystudents, my instruction got so
much better. But the resistancelevel at the beginning of that
was very high.
Becca Silver (05:23):
Yeah. And, you know, I think about the need for
you to understand why that washappening. And even though it
sounds like they were givingregular feedback, it was
ineffective, because you didn'tactually know why this was
happening. You weren't bought in
Unknown (05:38):
right, resistance isn't a bad thing. And we label it as
something bad, but it's reallyjust fear. It's fear disguised
as, you know, anger and defianceand the behaviors that we see
come out in people. But we if wecan get to the bottom of where
the fear is coming from, andaddress that. And while we're
(05:59):
teaching these skills, so justimagine if what I went through
with data informed instruction,if we had had a coach, who along
the way, on a daily or weeklybasis was saying, okay, here,
let's look at this one thingthat you did, here's what you
did, well, here's one littletweak you can do to make it
better. And then, you know, youwould see that progress over
(06:22):
time, but you felt supportedthrough the whole process.
Imagine how different that wouldhave been?
Becca Silver (06:26):
Yes, exactly. I have a friend that calls it tiny
tweaks. And some educatorsreally need much more of that
tiny step by tiny step. And alot of it is really managing
their anxiety, it's not theircapacity to learn something new.
It's actually the underlyingthoughts about learning
something new, is it worth therisk? Is it not worth the risk?
(06:46):
Right? And so part of buildingcapacity and the willingness for
a teacher to learn something newis they have to be willing to
see the risk as somethingbeneficial for them, they are
asking themselves, is it worththe risk to try this new thing?
Will I be successful with it?
Unknown (07:06):
Yeah. So it goes back to the why it's exactly what we
talked about in the firstepisode of this series, and
Becca Silver (07:11):
it takes a leaders ability to listen, it takes a
leaders ability to listen toreally sort out at what level
educators are at right, not justskip to this building capacity
level. But are they needing toknow the why again? And, you
know, if not, if they're reallybought into the why, what skills
(07:32):
do they need? And what's thenext thing I want to say? And
how do they need to be taught?
So I want to shift into creatinga culture of learning. There's
lots of ways to teach teachersnew things, right? What are your
thoughts around how coaches andleaders can build a culture of
(07:52):
learning in their schools?
Unknown (07:56):
I think one of the really most powerful ways to
build a culture of learning isto show examples. So expose
people to other examples oflearning cultures and people in
in the field of education ornot, right, who have gone
(08:16):
through this process of learningand growing. And just constant
examples of how it's not a onetime thing is something that we
continuously do. And we say allthe time we give it lip service,
right? Like, we're lifelonglearners, we have a growth
mindset. But when you really,really stop and analyze, am I
living what I'm saying?
Sometimes we're not quite there,there's, there's a little bit of
(08:39):
a mismatch there. I want
Becca Silver (08:42):
to say something about modeling. I think modeling
can be really effective for someteachers. And with the whole
educator approach we talk about,there are different levels of
willingness. And there are somelevels of willingness, we call
them eager, and actually willingto change. And those two groups
(09:02):
of educators really benefit frommodeling, you show them how to
do it, they're like, Thank youfor the clarity. I'm gonna go
and do it. Right. Yeah, modelingis not appropriate for educators
that have seen what the changeis going to look like and are
still not implementing. So it'snot an issue of I don't know
(09:22):
what the change looks like. It'sanother issue right? And so
that's actually something that Ishare a lot with my coaches
which is don't model for your Icall them the stopped educators
don't don't model for peoplethat have seen it and gone
through lots of trainings andare still not doing it. They
don't need modeling, stopmodeling for some of your
teachers. So I wanted to sharethat and it's it can be shocking
(09:46):
for some leaders and coaches tohear because that's kind of a
that can be a go to.
Unknown (09:51):
So then do they ask you like, well, if I'm not modeling,
then what do I do? Yes, yes,
Becca Silver (09:56):
they do. Yeah. So there's so many other options.
There's co planning Holdteaching is a partnership
oriented approach that I highlyrecommend taking with educators
that are more hesitant tochange. And educators that just
aren't changing at all.
Unknown (10:13):
We have to differentiate and meet them
where they are, well, we have todo the same thing, when the
educators are the students, sowe have to know where they are
in their mindset, know wherethey are in the resistance kind
of cycle, and then meet themwhere they are, and meet those
needs. And that's done throughwhat you were just describing
(10:34):
that coaching partnership. Yeah,
Becca Silver (10:37):
totally. You know, and one last thing I wanted to
talk about as an option to buildcapacity is something I spoke
about a few episodes ago, whichis peer coaching, really
developing a culture whereeducators throw open their
doors, and normalize giving eachother feedback. Now that takes
(10:58):
training, you can't just say,hey, teachers, right, we're
going to de privatizeclassrooms, you are now going to
give each other feedback. Goodluck with that, right, which
sometimes we see initiativeshappen, like you're going to do
this with no training, or youactually want to have your
teachers trained in this. Butthis is such a powerful way of
building capacity organically,because the way change happens,
(11:19):
actually, is there's a curve.
And you start with earlyadopters, you start with
innovators, and that goes intoearly adopters. And it is you
start with a small group ofpeople and it grows and grows.
And peer coaching is a reallyincredible way of doing that. So
check out the peer coachingepisode as well. So I'd like to
wrap up this conversation. Mia,is there anything else you want
(11:41):
to share with our coaches andleaders about building capacity,
I'll just build
Unknown (11:47):
a little bit on what you just said about peer
coaching to say that when youhave some people who maybe have
been teaching a while and theyseem resistant to that, start by
using them as the ones who aresharing their expertise and
coaching others becauseeventually what will happen is
the relationships will form andthey will start being exposed to
(12:12):
other teachers are doing evennew teachers who have new and
fresh ideas. And they're they'llbe like, Oh, well, that's
interesting. You know, tell memore about that. So again, like
you said, it happensorganically, but it's very
powerful. And
Becca Silver (12:25):
just remember coaches and leaders, if someone
is resisting learning a newskill, there's fear involved. So
really start looking at theirhumanity and instead of saying,
Ah, they're just resisting, theywon't learn the new thing,
right? Ask yourself, what arethey afraid of? And we will be
following up with our finallevel for over resistance next
(12:48):
week. See you soon
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