Facilitating Instructional Rounds for New Staff

The most effective, engaging, trust-building, culture-shifting, low-cost, high-reward practice that you can fold into your new staff mentor program or professional development plan? Instructional rounds.

Staff will feel less isolated. The observed teachers will feel seen and valued for their practice. Trust will be built between the observed and the observer, as well as between the new staff member and the facilitator.

As an instructional coach, I’ve scheduled and facilitated instructional rounds for many years. Here are some of the practices I’ve developed.

Have a Set Protocol

Before heading to classrooms, take a minute to review the protocol. The form we use includes two main fields for the observer:

• Observations (What are the students doing and saying? What is the teacher doing and saying?)
• Analysis (What patterns do I see? What is causing the learning?)

The form also includes prompts for follow-up conversations:

• Describe (What was noticed)
• Analyze (How it impacted student learning)
• Discuss (What moves did you see? What moves might you try? What was most useful overall about this process?)

Choose a Focus

Before rounds begin, instruct educators to choose a focus. You might direct them toward a previous professional development experience, a schoolwide goal, or perhaps one component of the evaluation criteria. New staff members commonly choose a focus that includes engagement strategies, communicating about purpose and content, or questioning and discussion techniques. To ensure that the rounds are focused on student learning and personalized for the observers, pause to connect to previous conversations about practice, inquire about the “why” behind their focus choice, and predict what might be observed.

In our district, we use a list of “look-fors” (cocreated with instructional expert Charlotte Danielson) that participants can choose from—possible observations about how students are participating organized into categories.

Prepare for the visits

The logistics behind organizing instructional rounds can feel overwhelming. By trial and error, I have found what works in my district. An hour to an hour and a half is ideal. Suggesting specific dates and times works best to actually get the rounds on calendars. Working closely with the administrators who schedule subs is key, as is taking time to explain to the sub coordinator both the “why” and positive outcomes gained by making the effort. I have even had administrators sub for teachers to make instructional rounds happen, which shows staff how much value there is in observing and learning from each other.

Prior to the instructional rounds, have teachers share which classrooms they are most interested in visiting. If possible, plan to observe two to four classrooms and encourage rounding with another new staff member.

A few days prior to the visits, email teachers to make sure they are ready—mention that you’ll assume it’s a “go” unless you hear otherwise. Doing so ensures that teachers are comfortable with visitors and that assessments are avoided. Warn teachers that you might be in and out of the classrooms, as it can be advantageous to shift classrooms if a lull in activity is occurring, such as during independent work.

As a facilitator, remember to model what it might look like to circulate, ask students questions, and deeply observe students at work. Quiet side conversations can help new staff notice connections to their focus that they might have missed and encourage them to look through a lens they might not have otherwise.

Follow up with the observer

Carve out 15 to 20 minutes to debrief with the observer, allowing for a few extra minutes for the teachers to transition back to their own students at the end of the conversation. Find a quiet space and ask observers to share what moves they noticed the teachers make and how those moves impacted student learning (a part that is often forgotten). As a facilitator, take notes in bullet point form, and don’t be afraid to share your own observations in the list. As you take notes, continue to prompt thinking about students. Ask what moves the observer might use for their own students.

Teachers don’t often critique moves, but it’s crucial to ensure that that doesn’t happen. We want the culture of a building to feel safe, and the purpose of instructional rounds is to highlight effective moves—not to point out how things could be changed.

Follow up with observed teachers

After the follow-up conversation with the observer, clean up your notes and send them to the observer. Ask the observer to email a thank-you note to any teacher observed and to include the notes about how their moves are impacting student learning. A list of the ways they’re positively impacting students is one of the best things that can show up in a teacher’s inbox. Teaching can feel isolating, but these kinds of messages create connection and trust between new staff members and established teachers, and they help the established teacher feel seen and valued for their practice.

Instructional rounds can create the connections that encourage further conversations about practice. As an instructional coach, I am constantly in teachers’ classrooms, and I am inspired by the variety of ways we can help kids grow by meeting them where they are. It’s time we open the doors and make the effort to let our teachers see each other at work, reduce isolation, increase value, and spread the magic that’s already happening in our buildings. Engaging in instructional rounds is one of the strongest and most cost-effective collective actions we can take to improve instruction.