If you care about school leadership or culture and don鈥檛 know Michael Sonbert, you really should. He鈥檚 been a teacher and a novelist, cut his teeth as a coach working in the nation鈥檚 largest turnaround school network, and then founded Skyrocket Education in 2016 and Rebel Culture in 2022. Today, he works on leadership development with schools, Google, Northwell Health Systems, and many more. I find him a terrific source of straight talk on school leadership. That鈥檚 why, when he sent me a recent note on instructional coaching, I asked if he鈥檇 mind expanding it for you all. He agreed. Here鈥檚 what he had to say.
鈥搁颈肠办
Jim Knight, founding senior partner at the Instructional Coaching Group, author of multiple books on instructional coaching, and architect of a widely adopted approach to instructional coaching, recently penned the , 鈥淪hould Coaches Give Feedback? It鈥檚 Complicated,鈥� for ASCD, the education publisher, technical-assistance provider, and all-around K鈥�12 juggernaut.
The essay, by a hugely influential coach for a hugely influential outlet, argues that 鈥渢op down鈥� coaching (as he refers to it) for teachers from coaches is often ineffective. Knight says, 鈥淭he coach shouldn鈥檛 tell the teacher what data means, but ask questions and listen, trying to think with the teacher.鈥� He continues, 鈥淭op-down feedback, I began to realize, was very helpful when there was a clear right and wrong way to do a task, such as when my dad taught me exactly how to skate backwards . . . [but not] when I tried it to discuss the complex environment of teachers鈥� classrooms.鈥�
I respect Jim Knight鈥檚 substantial contributions to education, but here he鈥檚 wildly off. Knight鈥檚 assertion supposes a false binary, whereby coaching is either 鈥渢op-down鈥� or more of an exploratory conversation between teacher and coach.
You see, there鈥檚 a third option that Knight is missing.
Schools need to have an agreed-upon vision for instructional excellence. Once that vision is clear (by the way, teachers can absolutely contribute to that vision), coaches don鈥檛 need to play guessing games with teachers but can instead compare what鈥檚 happening in the teacher鈥檚 classroom against the exemplar and then tell (yes, tell) the teacher, with compassion and kindness, precisely what needs to get better and what the teacher should do to get there.
The coach should then model the skill the teacher needs to improve upon and have them practice that skill multiple times, giving feedback throughout, until they begin to build automaticity.
Knight鈥檚 approach assumes that getting a teacher to a place of being highly effective is like trying to answer a confusing, ambiguous riddle. But it鈥檚 not. I鈥檝e worked in hundreds of schools in the past 15 years. The trends in classrooms across the U.S. are staggeringly similar, and what to do about them is surprisingly straightforward.
Now, that doesn鈥檛 mean execution is easy. Getting into great physical shape is straightforward: eat well, exercise, and burn more calories than you consume. But executing on it, for most people, is pretty difficult. Similarly, getting a school or individual educator to a place of being highly effective is straightforward: You start with systems, move to culture, and then go all in on instruction. But, as any educator can attest, executing this can often be challenging and fraught with obstacles.
What鈥檚 the point of using all the rubrics and frameworks that schools 鈥渦se鈥� if, when we enter a teacher鈥檚 classroom, we act as if we have no idea what success looks like? What鈥檚 the point of all the trainings and conversations about instruction if, when we observe teachers, we behave like great teaching is an unsolvable mystery?
A basketball coach, even at the professional level, wouldn鈥檛 ever ask the team to look at the score at halftime and have them analyze why they鈥檙e losing by 20 points. Instead, the coach would have meticulous notes on the places where the team can do better and then share those things with the team. Because the path to success is so clear, the coach can give feedback on how effectively the team is rebounding, playing defense, moving the ball, and鈥攐f course鈥攕hooting.
It鈥檚 the same thing in schools. More nuanced, yes, and with far more variables. Still, despite so many school leaders and teachers thinking their challenges are unique to them, they鈥檙e not.
The meetings that Knight describes, instead of radically building teacher skill, are just conversations. I know this because I鈥檝e observed dozens of them. In these meetings, the teacher and the coach talk. And while some learning may occur鈥攁nd they may even agree on some next steps鈥攚ithout actual skill-based coaching, very little changes. Which is why so many school leaders across the country are having the same conversations with teachers in May that they were having in September.
If we adopt Knight鈥檚 approach, we are wasting valuable time: the coach鈥檚 time, the teacher鈥檚 time, but most importantly, the students鈥� time. Maybe Knight is trying to solve a different problem than my team and I are trying to solve. But in the schools where we coach, things are extremely urgent. Students don鈥檛 have weeks or months for adults to figure things out. They need excellent teaching right away. In some cases, their lives literally depend on it. And in a profession dominated by terms like 鈥渆quity鈥� and 鈥渇airness,鈥� isn鈥檛 it more equitable and far more fair to make change for students as quickly as possible?
There may be places for an approach like Knight鈥檚. But they鈥檙e few and far between. When teachers are expert planners and have incredible classroom culture, collaboration about deep student engagement makes sense. When teachers can鈥檛 get students to sit down, are teaching without measurable objectives, and not assessing student outcomes, the approach just doesn鈥檛 make sense.
Knight鈥檚 approach, and others like it, at best assume that teachers have the ability and bandwidth to analyze their own classrooms and decide upon the next steps that would change student outcomes. I haven鈥檛 seen evidence that this is the case for the overwhelming majority of teachers. The approach, at worst, assumes that teachers are fragile, overly sensitive, and unable to receive straight feedback. Again, not random feedback grounded in what the coach thinks or is feeling in the moment but precise feedback aligned to the school鈥檚 instructional vision.
Moreover, these approaches also let coaches off the hook for being experts who can analyze classrooms, collect the most pertinent data, and model agreed-upon best practices for teachers and coach them to improve. Why do schools have coaches if they don鈥檛 coach but instead pass the buck to overworked, undersupported teachers to essentially coach themselves?
The rationale I鈥檝e received from people who use Knight鈥檚 model and others like it is that they鈥檙e great for building relationships with teachers. I haven鈥檛 seen evidence that this is the case. So many of the teachers I鈥檝e spoken to, on the subject of this kind of coaching, express frustration about long, meandering meetings and feeling like they鈥檙e trying to guess the answers to the coach鈥檚 questions when the coach could simply tell them instead.
Imagine you were lucky enough to receive tennis lessons from Serena Williams. It would be exhausting to spend a good chunk of time playing Q&A about proper form, foot positioning, and ball placement. But it would be invigorating to be taught by an expert. It鈥檇 be thrilling to know that in a very short time, you鈥檇 be better because of her coaching.
This is where great relationships come from. When a coach鈥檚 feedback is spot-on and a teacher knows that implementing that feedback will improve their teaching, students (and their teachers) will be better off. Strong relationships and trust come from providing value for someone (quickly), not spending a teacher鈥檚 entire prep pretending that questions about good teaching are unanswerable.
To the question about whether or not coaches should give feedback, it鈥檚 not complicated like Knight asserts. They should. To do anything less is borderline negligent.
