Effects of Coaching on SAT I: Reasoning Test Scores

A College Board-sponsored survey of a nationally representative sample of 1995–96 SAT takers yielded a data base for more than 4, 000 examinees, about 500 of whom had attended formal coaching programs outside their schools. Several alternative analytical methods were used to estimate the effects of coaching on SAT I: Reasoning Test scores. The various analyses produced slightly different estimates. All of the estimates, however, suggested that the effects of coaching are far less than is claimed by major commercial test preparation companies. The revised SAT does not appear to be any more coachable than its predecessor.     

Coaching psychology: an approach to practice for educational psychologists

Coaching psychology is a distinct sub-discipline of academic and applied psychology that focuses on the enhancement of performance, development and well-being in the broader population. Applied in educational contexts, the practice of coaching psychology has the potential to have a positive impact by supporting children and adults to achieve enhanced standards of functioning and well-being. It therefore represents a way in which educational psychologists (EPs) might elect to diversify their practice. However, EPs are disproportionately under-represented in the development of this emerging field. This article charts the birth and evolution of contemporary coaching psychology, and presents a case study illustrating the application of this methodology in a school context. Suggestions are given regarding professional development activities that might be undertaken by EPs seeking to develop coaching psychology as a strand of their practice.     

Characteristics of SAT Quantitative Items Showing Improvement After Coaching Among Black Students From Low-Income Families: An Exploratory Study

The present exploratory investigation is an extension of a 1985 study that evaluated a Scholastic Aptitude Test preparation program involving black urban students. The present study was conducted to determine if there are identifiable characteristics of quantitative items associated with a susceptibility to coaching. Items showing p-value improvements of. 10 after coaching were compared with items not showing such improvements; comparisons were made in terms of the content, type. format, level of cognitive requirement, and position of the items. Items showing improvement were found across content areas, formats, and type. Findings are discussed in relation to the usefulness and improvement of well-designed supplemental instructional programs that have the potential to affect criterion performance in mathematics     

The Training of Coaching Skills: an implementation study

In this study, the implementation effects of a programme for the training of coaching skills with Dutch school counsellors are described. These school counsellors are expected to provide help and support to primary school teachers. Coaching is a form of in‐class support intended to provide teachers with feedback on their own functioning and thereby stimulate self‐reflection and self‐analysis in order to improve instructional effectiveness. To assist school counsellors in their attempts to coach teachers, a training programme was designed: ‘The school counsellor as coach.’ A quasi‐experimental, treatment‐control group investigation was then set up to test the effects of this programme. Based on the pre‐ and post‐training ratings of coaching conferences, a significant treatment effect was found for the coaching skills concerned with the development of autonomy (empowerment), feedback, and purposefulness. The pre‐ and post‐training ratings from coached teachers showed no significant treatment effects. This was because the teachers were not accustomed to in‐class assistance and thus rated the coaching skills of the school counsellors quite favourably even at pre‐test.     

Universities and the Public Purse: an Update

This paper examines the arguments put forward by the author in an article published in Minerva in 1967 about what he saw as the demonstration of the incompatibility between the state-funding of higher education and university autonomy, in their relation to developments since that time. It deali with the increased intmentionism of the DES and the Treasuy during the period between that date and the Education Reform Act of 1988 and the likely impact of the new finding system upon what survives of university autonmny. The paper argues that the increased pressure upon universities - unnecessary and damaging as it is - does not flow merely from the policies of individual governments or the ambitions of civil semants but reflects the indqference of the general public to university values. Given that other democracies have in various ways seen something of the same, the paper concludes that we may be witnessing the end of the university as an autotumous community of scholars.     

A Coaching Model for Student Affairs Assessment

Emily M. Slager and D'Arcy J. Oaks describe the coaching philosophy that helped the Student Life departments at The Ohio State University excel at the sometimes daunting process of outcomes‐based assessment.     

Coaching Sales Performance: A Case Study

Century 21 International, like so many sales organizations, suffered lower productivity and higher attrition from new sales associates than they judged to be acceptable. The answer, Century 21 executives believed, was to develop a twenty-one module, multimedia training program. An external consultant urged them to study the situation prior to committing to any one solution. The results were clear. While new sales people certainly needed to have their field skills “buffed” after going through pre-licensing training and entering the office, that was not their most critical need. Far more important was an in-office support system, someone to tell them how to think through inevitable rejections, how to approach recurring challenges, how to maintain confidence even when sales do not occur, how to prospect portions of the community and how to integrate into the real estate community. The data revealed the need for a solution system comprised of training, incentives, performance support materials, the introduction of a new position, a coach, into each office, and a selection method for that coach. This article describes the front end study, the program, and some of its results in real estate offices across the United States.     

Coaching for the PISA test

Coaching is known to improve student performance on tests with high personal relevance (“high-stakes tests”). We investigate whether the same holds for a test that has no personal relevance for the students taking it (“low-stakes test”). More specifically, we explore whether student performance on the reading and mathematics assessments of the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) can be fostered by coaching (and administering a pretest). Coaching and pretest effects were studied for each content domain separately in a pre-/posttest quasi-experimental design. To examine differential effects of academic tracks, samples were drawn from German Hauptschule and Gymnasium schools. Results show that only the combined effects of pretesting and coaching have substantial positive effects on student performance. Implications for the interpretation of large-scale assessment programs are discussed.     

Coaching Students in Research Skills: A difficult task for teachers

The new Dutch curriculum for the upper levels of secondary education requires students to use research skills. Students have to conduct a number of small research projects, culminating in the writing of a research paper as a formal part of the new examinations. Although the literature offers abundant advice on how to write a good research paper, comparatively little research seems to have been done on this subject as it relates to the classroom. This article describes some results of a study which examines the problems encountered by students when carrying out research projects and which looks into the difficulties teachers face when coaching students in research skills. These obstacles are particularly apparent in the initial stages of the research process. Problem finding is revealed to be an underdeveloped skill in education. Although teachers score much better than students on a test of research skills, finding an effective way to channel these superior skills into coaching methods that benefit students remains problematic. It is evident that procedural knowledge cannot be seen separately from declarative knowledge. Working together in interdisciplinary teams might help teachers overcome some of these problems.     

Substituting SAT II: Subject Tests for SAT I: Reasoning Tests: Impact on Admitted Class Composition and Quality

Using data from a sample of 10 colleges at which most students had taken both SAT I: Reasoning tests and SAT II: Subject tests, we simulated the effects of making selection decisions using SAT II scores in place of SAT I scores. Specifically, we treated the students in each college as forming the applicant pool for a more select college, and then selected the top two thirds (and top one third) of the students using high school grade point average combined with either SAT I scores or the average of SAT II scores. Success rates, in terms of first-year grade point averages, were virtually identical for students selected by the different models. The percentage of African American, Asian American, and White students selected varied only slightly across models. Appreciably more Mexican American and Other Latino students were selected with the model that used SAT II scores in place of SAT I scores because these students submitted subject test scores for the Spanish test on which they had high scores.     

企业教练理论与外语教学“教练”理念研究

将企业界的“企业教练”理论引介到外语教学就形成了外语教学的“教练”理念,该理念突出了对学生主体和学习实践的关注,把传统的“教师→外语→学生”型教学观念提升到“教师→学生→外语”型的以人为本、重在实践的教学理念,从而升华了师生关系、优化了课堂教学、提升了教学效果、强化了课外训练、提高了学习效率,是一种符合当代教育价值观念与发展趋势的新型教学理念。     

A Framework for Defining Contextual Features of Training and Coaching Practices

Training and coaching are cited frequently to achieve different goals, by different people, across different fields. Who provides training and coaching and where and how they are provided may influence the effectiveness of the training and coaching efforts, making the clear identification of these contextual features of paramount importance to successful implementation and dissemination of training and coaching programs. First, we propose a framework for elucidating these contextual features, and then we apply this framework to a circumscribed review of the literature on parent training and coaching in early intervention services to assess its utility. We discuss the extent to which contextual features have been described in this body of research, offer additional considerations for applying the framework based on this review, and propose possible implications of our findings for implementation, dissemination, and future research efforts.     

Coaching the Mentor: Facilitating Reflection and Change

The purpose of this study is to explore the process of coaching a mentor of experienced teachers. In particular, we sought to determine if coaching would help a mentor to compare her espoused beliefs about mentoring to her mentoring behaviors and possibly resolve any dissonance. The mentor and coach (the co‐researchers) participated in a platform conference, three coaching conferences, and a debriefing conference. In the platform conference, the mentor espoused the use of nondirective mentoring behaviors. The mentor and coach used the coaching conferences to review audio recordings of the mentor working with mentees during conferences intended to improve the mentees’ teaching, and to engage in reflective dialogue concerning the mentor’s interpersonal behaviors. The mentor experienced cognitive dissonance on several occasions during the coaching conferences when she discovered her use of directive behaviors in some interactions with mentees. Eventually, the mentor resolved this dissonance, primarily by changing her beliefs about mentoring and shifting from a nondirective to an eclectic platform. We conclude that the coaching of mentoring explored in this study has considerable potential for future research on the coaching process.     

Taking the Next Step: Ways Forward for Coaching Science

Coaching is no longer a subset of physical education or sport psychology but is rather an established vocation for research. In reaching such a position, we argue that a broad range of epistemologies have been used to investigate coaching such as sociology and cognitive psychology. However there is danger that, in the search for new ground, research becomes increasingly esoteric, having less and less impact on the domain that it is researching—namely coaching. As a step against this trend, we argue for and attempt to establish the commonalities across these research approaches suggesting that coaching is social, political, and pedagogical in nature. We accept that coaching is inherently complex but argue that coaches can be educated to cope with complexity through a professional judgment and nested decision making process. To facilitate this process, we offer a model for coaching that is inclusive of the commonalities across coaching research, summarizes our major theoretical points yet practical enough for application by coach educators and coaches.     

Peer Coaching: Professional Development for Experienced Faculty

The professoriate, as a whole, is growing older and more experienced; yet institutions often overlook the professional development needs of mid-career and senior faculty. This article, based on a review of the literature and the development of a peer coaching project, examines peer coaching as a professional development opportunity for experienced faculty that meets many of their immediate needs and offers a variety of longer-term benefits to their institution. Six recommendations for creating a peer coaching program emerge from the literature and the authors’ experience.

The Transferability of Sport Coaching Research: A Critical Commentary

ABSTRACT

The utility and applicability of research in sport coaching is widely reported to be problematic. This article offers a critical commentary on the factors impacting the potential transferability of research findings into coaches’ practice and into coach education, arguing that a more nuanced appreciation of these factors is necessary. The issue is conceptualized as one of knowledge transfer, and the article examines the roles of the researcher and the practitioner in facilitating research-informed practice. Single-focus disciplinary research, an absence of application research and the paucity of studies on coaching interventions are identified as limiting factors. A more realistic appreciation of the particularity of role, domain, and context is required, along with a recognition of their influence on coaches’ perceptions of the relevance of research findings. It is suggested that the inertia of academic publishing practice may continue to constrain more pragmatic and interdisciplinary research in this field.     

Success for All: A Summary of Research

The purpose of this article is to describe the current state of research on Success for All, a program built on the idea that every child can and must succeed in the early grades, no matter what it takes. The idea behind Success for All is to use everything we know about effective instruction for students at risk to direct all aspects of school and classroom organization toward the goal of preventing academic deficits from appearing in the first place, recognizing and intensively intervening with any deficits that do appear, and providing students with a rich and full curriculum to enable them to build on a firm foundation in basic skills. The Success for All program is based on a commitment to do whatever it takes to see that every child becomes, a skilled, strategic, and enthusiastic reader as he or she progresses through the elementary grades.