Project Clear Blog Post: Beginning Training as Teacher Leaders

After many years of working as Reading Recovery teachers, this past year we shifted gears and began our Teacher Leader (TL) training. Prior to TL training, Jessie trained as a Reading Recovery teacher in 2014 and has worked as a Reading Recovery teacher and instructional coach in San Francisco Unified, San Mateo Foster City Schools, and at Phillips Brooks School in Menlo Park. Tim began his journey in Reading Recovery back in 1996 through CSU Fresno. At the time, he was sharing a first grade classroom with another teacher who was also training. This experience was truly life changing as an early literacy teacher. He continued for two more years as a Reading Recovery Teacher and Literacy coach. Clay’s theory was also the driving force behind an intervention program designed at Tim’s school site for 3-6 graders. While Tim did not continue as a Reading Recovery teacher for the next 25 years, the principles he learned in literacy guided him in his current roles as a Staff Development and Curriculum Specialist at Tulare County Office of Education. Becoming a Teacher Leader has become a “full circle” moment for Tim that started over 25 years ago. 

In the second half of our year we took on a more active role, planning and leading teacher training classes, facilitating conversation during Behind-The-Glass (BTG). While attending Ongoing Professional Development (OPD) and planning for BTG were familiar, planning training classes and shaping the conversation of teachers-in-training was new. We were a little hesitant at first, but through the coaching of our own BTG’s led by Deb and Adria throughout the year and informative articles describing and analyzing “Chains of Reasoning” in BTG conversations, we felt equipped to lead these professional learning conversations with teachers in training. We worked with trained TLs to identify the focus of each class, and to find readings from the Observation Survey of Early Literacy Achievement (OSELA) and Literacy Lessons Designed for Individuals (LLDI) that would support teacher growth. We also planned opportunities for collaborative conversations among the teachers, and worked to anchor their learning in Clay’s theory. While actively participating in conversations online can be a challenge for participants, framing the expectations and creating a safe space to share their observations helped increase the participation of the participants. 

In addition to leading online Behind-the-Glass sessions, we individually coached teachers-in-training, both virtually and in-person. Tim is looking forward to coaching teachers in person as a regional Teacher Leader in Tulare County. These experiences gave us the opportunity to build on teacher strengths while guiding them to reflect on their own practice through coaching conversations, a hallmark of professional learning with Reading Recovery and Literacy Lessons. While there will always be continued learning from leading Behind-the-Glass sessions and coaching conversations, we both feel more confident to support teachers in their learning and growth for future teachers in training. 

Next year, we look forward to leading new cohorts of new Reading Recovery teachers. Jessie will be supporting Ben Ley in West Contra Costa, which has two full cohorts of classroom teachers training in Literacy Lessons. The district is hoping to have a positive impact on Tier One instruction by developing the theoretical and practical expertise of classroom teachers. Tim is looking forward to leading a cohort of teachers in the Central Valley that are training to become Reading Recovery teachers. Throughout the entire Teacher-Leader training year, we valued learning from Deb and Adria’s instruction and feedback, leading other Teacher Leader classes, and coaching teachers. At the same time, we were also instructing our own students in Reading Recovery and Literacy Lessons. While it was demanding and rigorous, all of these experiences have prepared us to be Teacher-Leaders. After an absence of a Teacher Leader in the Central Valley for over 20 years, Tim is excited that Reading Recovery will be reestablished. He is looking forward to not only teaching the Reading Recovery course, but also coaching teachers in person throughout Tulare County. The hope is to improve literacy outcomes, especially for the many multilingual learners in the area. We are excited to take all we learned in TL training and apply it to the learning of these new teachers!