What Is Collective Efficacy for PLC Teams? with Dr. Shannon LaFargue, ep. 265

What Is Collective Efficacy for PLC Teams? with Dr. Shannon LaFargue, ep. 265, Instructional Coaching with Ms. B Podcast

Chrissy Beltran [00:00:01]:

Hey, coach, and welcome to instructional coaching with miss b. Today, we’re chatting with doctor Shannon Lafargue about what collective efficacy looks like for PLC teams. Doctor Shannon Lafargue is a former student superintendent of a 60 school district in Louisiana and is currently the director of coaching and research at Bullseye Education where he works to build coaching systems that grow teachers and strengthen collective efficacy in schools. Doctor Lafargue also serves as an adjunct professor in the doctoral educational leadership program at Lamar University, preparing the next generation of educational leaders. We’re gonna welcome doctor Lafargue in just a second before I wanna ask you something. How many times have you sat in a PLC meeting with teachers where the conversation is so off topic that the whole meeting is basically a waste of time? Or even worse, teachers don’t talk at all. One person dominates the conversation and nobody else gets to share a single thought. I’ve got a free download you’re gonna love. The PLC discussion dice are easy to use with teachers, and they help you focus on the topic at hand and encourage participation from each teacher. You can actually grab it in the show notes for the episode at buzzingwithmissb.com/episode260five. Without further ado, let’s welcome doctor Lafargue. Welcome, doctor Lafargue, and thank you so much for being here today.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:01:18]:

Oh, thank you so much for having me.

Chrissy Beltran [00:01:21]:

Well, I would love to jump into this topic because I know this is an area that you really speak about. We’re really focusing on collective efficacy, especially for working with teams of teachers. So what does that look like? What is collective efficacy, specifically if we’re thinking about, like, PLC teams or teams working in, you know, planning, data, things like that?

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:01:41]:

Yeah. I I think it’s very important to, have a foundational understanding of how collective efficacy can build. You know, when I look back at the research and and my journey, from an educational career and especially looking at the empirical re research that’s built upon theory. I would have to go back to Edward Lorenz, who was a meteorologist at m I e t MIT. And what he discovered, in his mathematical calculations, and he kinda, accidentally came across the discovery, was that small changes in initial conditions, can create very different outcomes in these deterministic systems. Alright? So I know you’re a systems person, Chrissy. I had an opportunity to look at a lot of your podcasts and and, really great work, especially focused on what we’re talking about today. But, you know, understanding those human systems is what is going to lead us to developing CTE within, an environment ecosystem and educators, are are nurturing student achievement. And, you know, what he discovered is that is what eventually became what we know as the butterfly effect. Right? And I’m not talking about the movie, which is based upon the theory, but it goes pretty off base. But, essentially, you know, a small iteration or disturbance in a flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil Mhmm. Could cause a tornado or have an influence on a tornado in Texas, maybe even El Paso. Although there are many there. So when you when you step back and you look at holistically, wow, think about that. Then the focus really can come back to those initial iterations or those interventions on the initial conditions. So when you think about, the cousin of chaos theory, which I really dove hard into was complexity theory. This is the tremendous focus on nonlinear systems. And when you think of education and, and you do enough podcast on education, have conversations, it is not a linear environment. Even though it’s been created as a linear environment, it is so nonlinear. The the complexity of, outcomes, is is, you know, enormous. So, having that that really philosophical, theoretical understanding really assisted me when I ran across John Hattie’s research and a lot of other authors when talking about collective efficacy. Because when I became chief academic officer in our district in 2018, I already had a pretty good background or understanding fundamentally in that research that collective teacher efficacy was the number one had the number one effect size on student achievement at 1.57. And that was his 2012 work on 1,600 meta analysis. That’s that’s pretty impressive

Chrissy Beltran [00:04:44]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:04:44]:

To have that type of effect size. So, you know, our challenge was to address with our principals and with our instructional team. Okay, guys. Here’s here’s the research. Here’s that number. What is collective teacher efficacy? The the the definition is somewhat quite shallow in John Hattie’s work. It’s great work. But when you really look at the pragmatic application of how to develop it within a system, it becomes, you know, more nuanced. So that’s that began our pursuit collectively with our educational leaders and our principals and especially the district leadership. And quite simply, it becomes this. Alright? It’s the belief that a teacher has in their ability to move students. Now, collective though, that’s just the that’s just the the self belief that you have and there’s a difference. When you get to the collective part, that’s when I use the term, I come from a coaching background, you know, that the sum is greater, uh-uh the the parts are greater than the sum, right? So, it’s the cumulative effect of these iterations and interventions. It’s the shared belief that leads to a collaborative confidence in your pedagogical skill sets, in your ability to have great substantive dialogue that leads to an environment or ecosystem to where we have a confident belief collectively that we can move students. We can we can influence and impact the metrics that can, you know, give students the the the best possible education in our school building. And from the district level, of course, the responsibility that I had as CAO and then eventually as a superintendent was I was the lead instructional leader. So by us not pursuing CTE and truly diving into what what does it mean, what helps shape it? Because we linearly develop from the top down. Okay, y’all need to start having PLCs. You need to start having more collaboration in your school. You need to start having more grouping with students. You know, we’ve all been through the these mandates if you will. Yeah. But then collectively having a foundational understanding theoretically, philosophically, and hopefully, I’ll get into the metaphor of the, evolution of the the DNA growth. Healy sees that, that I use, then that is gonna be that impetus for moving or transcending beyond just average to exemplary. Mhmm. And that was the challenge that we had in in our district, and that’s the challenge that I see across the country. My current role as director of coaching research with, Bullseye Education, have an opportunity to talk to superintendents and principals across the country essentially about how to develop collective teacher efficacy. And then here’s the key, how do we amplify collective teacher efficacy by using and leveraging technology? And that’s kinda where our world really came together in 2018. And once we were able to merge that, we really facilitated a culture of coaching within the district, a culture of dialogue, a culture of shared beliefs, and that was just a a a great moment, for me as an instructional leader to see that continue to shape and evolve.

Chrissy Beltran [00:08:36]:

Yeah. That’s that’s so interesting. I, you know, I love the way that you share about how school is not linear, but we pretend it is. We you know, the phrase cookie cutter is used a lot, when we talk about schools. And I think that that is something that people who are outside of schools do not and cannot even imagine what it looks like. They do not understand. They cannot even fathom the complexity and the number of factors that are varied from person to person and school to school.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:09:01]:

Oh, absolutely. And and in some cases, you know, society with if they truly knew how nonlinear schooling was, it could be scary. But that shows you the, you know, the professionalism that teachers have, the professionalism that leaders have. It’s so much more grounded and deep rooted as far as understanding these this nonlinear world. But but there is a ceiling I I have found because of so much that goes on in a school. You know, like, you know, I like to term it a school year is a lifetime. And and it it is so true. So many things happen during the day in a school that it’s easy to lose focus of the focus. Mhmm. And again, if the number one driver of student outcomes is collective teacher efficacy, That should be, the priority in a school day. But you know as well as I do, it’s very hard to, you know, consistently maintain that priority.

Chrissy Beltran [00:10:03]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:10:04]:

But that’s the challenge. And then that becomes the responsibility of the leadership to ensure that the teachers have that freedom to feel like this is a non punitive environment in which we can have great dialogue and discussions, and I won’t be judged. Of course, human nature with accountability measures and test scores and school performance scores, it it seems like that’s all we’re being, you know, judged on is these metrics and these numbers. And and and that’s great at the end of the day. But there’s a whole another world that we try to cultivate. And again, it speaks to collective teacher ethics because it’s the in its essence, it is having that ecosystem to where I feel you stress not distress. You know, there’s nothing wrong with productive struggle. That’s okay because we want that in our kids. That’s when you truly grow. That’s where you truly learn learn. So, having that eustress environment is so much different in in the teaching world than the distress environment.

Chrissy Beltran [00:11:14]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:11:14]:

That’s when the teachers move out of the profession from year one to five. Right. As the data says. Mhmm. Because everything is linear, everything becomes so overwhelming, and then there’s not a collective environment to support or nurture that teacher. So that’s why CTE is so important because we are if if the, you know, the the teacher is gonna truly drive whether or not those students in that classroom are gonna learn. Yeah. There there’s no question about that. We know that. And then it collectively, we we see that if there’s shared, confidence in their pedagogical skill sets because the the students don’t just stay in their classroom all day for the most part. Right? There there’s counselors that are involved. There’s librarians that are involved. The assistant principal, the instructional coaches, the consultants, the community at large, people that, you know, assist in ensuring that we have safety and security. All of these people, it’s not just teachers who are contributing to the collective efficacy of that student’s performance. So the the metaphor that, I really grounded a lot of this, you know, theory behind philosophy and and to make it simplistic, obviously, because you have to have, you know, something to be able to refer back to to help drive that understanding. Was if you’re talking about growth, there’s nothing better for me to have, you know, symbolism of growth than DNA. Because that is that is ultimately, you know, our our evolution through DNA and the growth of humanity, the growth of, biological growth of, you know, humans and, and, and animals, and on and on, and on, right? Well, if you can transfer that to systems, because you’re going to see that it’s fundamentally the same. And if you think of emergence which is the learning. Think of the DNA helices with the two strands and the spiraling strands.

Chrissy Beltran [00:13:26]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:13:27]:

And you think of the bonds that connect those strands. So if you have on one strand, emergence, which is learning, that could also be formative coaching. And the other strand is the coherence. And that is the the summative evaluation. That is where you have standards, you have evidence, you have alignment, all of those things are necessary. So, you can’t remove one strand from the helices and expect there to be continued growth. So, those those two strands do have to coexist in a symbiotic dance if you will of educational growth and of teacher growth. A lot of times, we put too much emphasis in the in the coherence strand or the, accountability strand, if you will. And then that diminishes or suppresses innovation, curiosity, and just the teachers’ will to, you know, live in that eustress environment. And on and on the other hand, if we put too much emphasis on the emergence, then we we don’t have the realistic outcomes because we can’t we can’t understand them. We can’t see them in a much bigger environment. And so we don’t develop the trends because the in the emergence world or the emergence strand, they’re just living in isolation.

Chrissy Beltran [00:14:51]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:14:51]:

And then connecting those two strands are the bonds of of trust, of dialogue, of reflection, of feedback. So let’s think about those coaching cycles. How important, Chrissy, is trust?

Chrissy Beltran [00:15:10]:

Mhmm. Yeah. It’s essential. It’s foundational.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:15:13]:

It it’s foundational. There there’s some research, recent research in which, an individual, exactly, write a dissertation, talks about the trust gap being so significant in in schooling and especially in the development of evaluation and observation systems. So that was the first thing that I challenged our administrators with is we are going to understand the two strands. And we are gonna ensure that. Because of the if those bonds are broken, then those strands move apart and we already know, then you’re not gonna have the type of outcomes that you so seek.

Chrissy Beltran [00:15:55]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:15:55]:

So having the trust, having the dialogue, having the feedback, and then also, this is another critical empirically based, attribute to CTE and that’s reflection. If you can’t cognitively reappraise Mhmm. Or self reflect, then that bond’s gonna be broken. And the trust that you have to self reflect is not gonna be there. And then the dialogue dialogue then is not going to exist. So the feedback, the self reflection, the trust in the system, and then ensuring that leaders and principals and and assistant principals understand that it’s about substantive feedback and communication that the teacher feels trustworthy in giving and then responding and knowing that it’s not punitive in nature.

Chrissy Beltran [00:16:53]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:16:53]:

It’s not gonna be punitive. Look. Through the widget effect, there’s enough research on on on and even in the sequel of the widget effect, teachers are not getting fired.

Chrissy Beltran [00:17:04]:

Yeah.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:17:04]:

95, 96% of teachers are are rated, you know, above average when you when you look at the data from the state scores and and, state mandated, accountability measures for teachers. So if we look at it that way, are we gonna teach to the are we gonna are we gonna try to grow the 4%? You know, in general, those are gonna be the ones that’ll work their ways out of the professions anyway, through through attrition. How about we focus on that 96% and we coach up what we got? Mhmm. And we do it to the best degree possible. But you have to understand systems and how us as professionals within the the educational ecosystem, we contribute to CTE by designing the systems and understanding the systems and not leaving teachers in isolation to where they feel unsupported.

Chrissy Beltran [00:18:03]:

Absolutely.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:18:03]:

So so that’s that’s the metaphor that I, you know, like to use. Mhmm. And, it it speaks to me, and, hopefully, it can speak to other people as well.

Chrissy Beltran [00:18:14]:

So now you just started kind of getting at how the responsibility that we have as school leaders to foster this culture of collective teacher efficacy. So what are some ways that we can go about doing this at our schools? Like, really practical things. You talked about systems. Like, what are some things that we can have in place to make sure that we we can make this happen?

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:18:32]:

Yeah. Number one is, I look at it as four levers.

Chrissy Beltran [00:18:37]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:18:38]:

One is is language. It’s growth language.

Chrissy Beltran [00:18:41]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:18:42]:

Really sitting down and again, I use the word collectively a lot for obvious reasons, but collectively sitting down and looking at gotcha language

Chrissy Beltran [00:18:53]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:18:54]:

Versus growth language. And and if you if you, you know, line item, those, you know, those those two areas of gotcha language and growth language, you’re gonna you’re gonna see that that just simple change in nuance changes the interpretation of how it’s received, how it’s given. Yeah. And then think about the initial conditions I talked about earlier. Tiny initial interventions to initial conditions can really cause great outcomes or catastrophic outcomes. So if I can phrase it right when I’m talking to you about, your growth or about your feedback in the classroom, talking about a specific domain, and I do it in the right way, I’m actually building upon that cumulative effect to where we are growing. And that DNA is now spiraling because we have trust, we have reflection, we have dialogue. Right? We have those things. We have the appropriate feedback, and then we’re ensuring that we’re given the formative coaching with that significant strand. And then, of course, we have the hint and the other strand of, hey, this this is important. This is really important. There is always that accountability that you feel, but it’s the way you look at it and interpret accountability that assist in the growth. And then you have the visibility without punishment. And when I walk into your classroom, we we need to ensure that the teacher, does not get on their heels but stays on their toes. As a former coach, I stressed to my players, if we’re playing on our heels and we’re not playing on our toes, then we’re not fully engaged. Mhmm. And then you lose authenticity, then you then you have paralysis by analysis.

Chrissy Beltran [00:20:48]:

That’s right.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:20:49]:

So that moves more to the distress environment and away from the eustress environment. That’s where that trust comes in. The trust gap has to be eliminated. Team based reflection. So we talk about PLCs And then, of course, instructional leadership teams started to form and develop. Well, what’s the intentionality of the PLC? What’s the intentionality of the ILTs? Is it strictly to look at data? There’s nothing wrong with being a data driven district. Mhmm. There’s nothing wrong with being a data driven school. But the data has to tell a story.

Chrissy Beltran [00:21:24]:

Yes.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:21:25]:

The data has to tell a story, and that story must be verbalized in growth language, and then it must be visible in a trustworthy environment.

Chrissy Beltran [00:21:36]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:21:37]:

And then the interpretation of the leaders must be appropriate. Mhmm. So those those four levers, I like to look at as if we can pull those levers daily and consistently, and that’s the thing, consistently consistency leads to the synergistic effect of really enveloping the school in CTE or the context of a PLC in CTE. And that should be the pursuit. I think of CTE as as a pinata. And we ought to be beaten the living mess out of that pinata so we can get the candy whenever we can really, have the fruits of our labor and the fruits of our focus. So I think if if that conversation can be had with with leadership, with professional development. So not just focusing on numbers.

Chrissy Beltran [00:22:37]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:22:37]:

Not just folk focusing on standards, indicators, having the courage. That’s the appropriate, you know, word that we tapped. Having the courage to say, hey, this isn’t working but that’s not a deficiency. It’s just a signal. That’s all it is. So, discerning that it’s not a deficiency because then you get into that gotcha language. Hey, this this numbers doesn’t, these numbers don’t look good but that’s just a signal that our systems when we envelope them with the levers and with the understanding that trust, dialogue, self reflection, and the pop cycle and having that continually repeat leads to that that DNA metaphor, if you will, of constant growth. And then at the axis of the metaphor, at the axis of the helices is student achievement. And when you can when you can understand that at the center, at the axis of student achievement and everything going on during the day is revolving around that student because we’re supposed to be sooner student centered, anyway. Mhmm. You know, everything we do every single day should be student centered. But we can’t forget about there has to be teacher centered, leader centered. All of those things must exist in order for ultimately and this is the next piece that is, that I’m moving towards is student self efficacy. Mhmm. When the student then has the same feeling, the same DNA, if you will, of it’s okay for me to trust my teacher.

Chrissy Beltran [00:24:37]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:24:37]:

It’s okay for me to self reflect and have productive struggle. It’s okay for me to have dialogue with my teacher based upon the feedback. Then the student starts to have the ownership necessary for true learning to take place. Mhmm. So at all levels, efficacy is really the same thing. Everyone has their own DNA molecule, and you’re all different, yet we’re all the same. So that’s just a a holistic, you know, perspective or interpretation that I have. I don’t know if it resonates with you or not, but, it it’s it’s something that I’m really grounded in.

Chrissy Beltran [00:25:20]:

Yeah. No. I think it’s so valuable to consider that at all levels. If if leaders don’t believe if leaders don’t believe that we can make a different difference so that we can create support systems for teachers to help them grow in a positive way that will affect students, you know, then, I mean, really, what are we doing? You know?

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:25:38]:

Yes. What what are we doing? Time to lead in the fight.

Chrissy Beltran [00:25:41]:

Yeah. And I do have one more question for you. I would love just your very best tip. What is the best like, your first thought about how coaches, especially coaches who are not necessarily, principals, you know, they’re in a very unique position. How can they handle the situation, with those teachers who are more outliers and they’re pushing back against team or PLC structures? Because over time, we know people generally acclimate to these systems, but it can take some time. Right? So what do coaches do that just the reverse thing that they could try?

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:26:12]:

Understanding that it’s it’s a signal. If Mhmm. You know, everyone wants immediate buy in, and that’s just not the way it works because you have to go through the iterations of trust.

Chrissy Beltran [00:26:22]:

Yes.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:26:22]:

You have to have the iterations of dialogue and reflection. And then that environment to where and and again, you know, it’s not about being cheerleaders all the way around. That’s not what we’re saying. Because once you lose authenticity Mhmm. If I’m an instructional coach, you want to be authentic. Mhmm. You’re not assigning the ratings. You are providing a trust hopefully, trustworthy feedback in which you allow the teacher to reflect, and then we go through that cycle over and over and over again. And then the teacher realizes, hey. This coach is really just trying to help me and

Chrissy Beltran [00:26:57]:

support. Yeah.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:26:58]:

So it it becomes, you know, I I say growth not got you, but it’s not I got you, but I got you. I’m here to support you and hold you up because I was a teacher before I became an instructional coach. That’s right. I understand. I get it. So hopefully, there’s some validation in that and some credibility. But that that instructional coach also needs needs to reflect upon the fact that they are participatory in the formative coaching environment and they are also participatory in the summative strand that we talked about where coherence evolves. So, they can’t think of themselves only being an emergence sphere or that emergence strand. They are also participatory even though they’re not assigning a rating necessarily. They’re having conversations with the ILT teams and developing and extracting trends. They’re having conversations with the principals in those ILT teams.

Chrissy Beltran [00:28:00]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:28:00]:

So they are help helping provide the iterations of interventions to an initial condition, which will hopefully determine a positive outcome. So that’s the power of an instructional coach. It’s the power of a literacy coach. Even though they don’t go in the room as an assistant principal and a principal and assign rating that you do with the summit of evaluation. What they do is more powerful and impactful than just that, you know, one formal observation in the fall and one in the spring.

Chrissy Beltran [00:28:36]:

Right.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:28:36]:

So much more valuable. Mhmm.

Chrissy Beltran [00:28:38]:

Alright. I love that. I think that’s such the I part of it is just patience and coming back to the plate every day. I think that’s so important. Thank you so much for everything that you shared with us today. How can people keep learning from you if they’re interested?

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:28:52]:

Well, hopefully, soon, I’m a, be able to publish, a book based upon a lot of the things you just heard today. Awesome. A playbook a playbook will accompany that.

Chrissy Beltran [00:29:02]:

Mhmm.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:29:02]:

It will have a much more deeper dive into the type of growth language, which I think is lacking. It will talk about the trust gap and then really dive into the theory and the metaphor of how growth is truly an evolution, based upon biological science. Yeah. Awesome. I also work with Bullseye Education. I’m the director of coaching and research, and I’m able to talk to districts across the country and provide insight of how to develop CTE and specifically for who I work with with Bullseye. The platform helps facilitate the communication, the cognitive reappraisal, and the reflection, and then extracting the trends or the signals in which we can pivot and then provide more support because it’s easier to and more efficient to collect, aggregate the data and then disaggregate it in a timely in a real time manner and not waiting till the end of the year until we look at that one summative evaluation of of the teacher. So those are hopefully some of the ways and and then conferences. I have an opportunity to speak at at conferences and share this insight. So, hopefully, you know, being on this powerful podcast, Chrissy is gonna assist me and do that. So I really appreciate you allowing me to be here and and have this discussion. I love it.

Chrissy Beltran [00:30:30]:

I appreciate it. I’m so glad you were able to join us. And whenever your book does come out, you let me know, and we will add it to the show notes so people can grab it there.

Dr. Shannon LaFargue [00:30:37]:

Oh, love it. Thank you. Alright.

Chrissy Beltran [00:30:42]:

Is your brain a little bit more full than it was before? I know doctor Lafargue really shares so much information, and I think digging into that in the context of a book would be great because it is there’s so much going on here that you can take and really apply to the way that you think about your work at schools and your work with teachers and kids. I love that work. So next week, we are continuing to dig into this idea of coaching teams because, you know, this is something that we all have to figure out, and it can be a challenge. So what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna look at mindset shifts. We’re gonna think about how sometimes our PLC teams get stuck in a certain way of thinking, and that can hold them back. So we’re gonna talk about ways to support our teachers and seeing things through a different lens next week. And until then, happy coaching!