Evaluating Work to Provide Evidence of Instructional Coaching Effectiveness with Dr. Jana Lee, ep. 258

Is what I’m doing really making a difference?
Do teachers seem to be buying in or just complying?
Are students actually benefiting from my coaching work?
If you’ve ever wondered whether your coaching efforts are truly making a difference, you don’t want to miss this episode! We’re talking all about evaluating work to provide evidence of instructional coaching effectiveness.
In this episode of Instructional Coaching with Ms. B, I sat down with Dr. Jana Lee, CEO and Executive Director of Jana Lee Consulting. We break down the often murky waters of evaluating instructional coaching effectiveness. She shares practical ways for coaches to assess their progress, build strong relationships, and overcome challenges that can interfere with effective coaching.
This podcast is part of our series about your mid-year coaching reset. Listen now for evidence-based strategies to track progress and ensure that your coaching leads to tangible results. You’ll get frameworks and ideas to help you evaluate your work and communicate your effectiveness to stakeholders.
Measuring the Impact of Instructional Coaching
While numbers and data points matter, they don’t tell the whole story. Dr. Lee explains that real effectiveness is built on relationships and trust. Developing partnerships and open collaboration are the foundation of successful instructional coaching. Without these, it’s nearly impossible for teachers to feel empowered and confident enough to take risks and try new things in their classrooms.
Barriers to Effective Coaching and How to Overcome Them
Instructional coaches find themselves in the middle of both teachers and school supervisors. It’s not always an easy place to be!
During the conversation, Dr. Lee and I discuss common obstacles to effective coaching and explore strategies to overcome them. Here are a few of the challenges instructional coaches face on campus:
- Leadership that is not supportive and does not give teachers the ability to take risks
- Instructional coaches feel isolated
- Inadequate understanding of the coaching role
- Lack of alignment between coaches and school leadership
- School culture is not strong
- Limited opportunities for ongoing cross-collaboration among coaches
- School leadership wants instant results
- Top-down approach instead of a collaborative one
These challenges are often intertwined, and overcoming them requires strong relationships, clear communication, and a shared vision for success across all levels of the school community.
Gathering Evidence and Measuring Effectiveness of Instructional Coaching
So how can you evaluate your work and determine its effectiveness? Dr. Lee suggests looking at data components through two lenses: qualitative and quantitative.
On the qualitative side, she encourages coaches to gather anecdotal evidence from classroom observations, paying attention to student, teacher, and coach moves. Coaches can then reflect on what is working and what is not.
Dr. Lee says we do need some numbers, too. For the quantitative side, she recommends developing shared indicators that provide coaches with a way to track what is happening or not happening when they visit classrooms. She also mentions the value of collecting artifacts to show student learning.
She highlights that combining all this information gives coaches a more holistic portfolio to share with administrators and stakeholders. It tells the real story of the coaching impact.
Rethinking Teacher Surveys: What Really Works?
During the conversation, we touch on the role of teacher surveys and whether teachers should rate their coach. Dr. Lee suggests moving away from subjective rating surveys because they put the work of one person in the hands of someone else and don’t always reflect the substance of professional growth.
Instead, she advocates for putting it back on the teachers to share more about themselves and the work they’re doing in the classroom. Dr. Lee recommends using a “3-2-1 model” where teachers identify:
3 components or strategies they’ve tried in the classroom
2 challenges they faced in implementing them
1 area they want to keep learning about
This open-ended format provides more insights into teacher development and the impact of coaching. It centers the feedback on the work and not personality or likability. After all, it’s about professional growth, not who is most popular.
Coaching Different Grade Levels and Content Areas
One question I hear often is whether a certain coaching strategy applies to different grade levels or content areas. Dr. Lee says her approach doesn’t change much across grades because the foundational coaching framework (relationship building, shared goal setting, co-developed action steps) remains the same. The content, exemplars, and modeling may differ, but high-impact coaching practices work at every grade.
Evaluating Work to Provide Evidence of Instructional Coaching Effectiveness
What an enjoyable conversation! I really appreciated how Dr. Lee advocated for taking a wide view of coaching work and letting evidence from various sources decide coaching effectiveness.
Test scores are only a piece of the puzzle. The bigger picture includes observations, artifacts, and ongoing conversations. When we evaluate coaching through a portfolio lens, we see not only where we are, but how far we’ve come and what we should focus on next.
If you’re ready to rethink how you evaluate coaching effectiveness, be sure to listen to the full episode. It’s packed with practical advice and ideas for evaluating your coaching work.
Topics and Questions Discussed in Episode 258 – Evaluating Work to Provide Evidence of Instructional Coaching Effectiveness with Dr. Jana Lee
- How coaches can evaluate the effectiveness of their work
- The importance of building relationships and trust
- Obstacles that interfere with effective coaching
- Collaborating with school leaders and avoiding isolation
- Why admin support is critical for success
- Limitations of relying solely on test data to measure coaching impact
- Evaluating your coaching using qualitative and quantitative evidence
- What to include in a coaching portfolio
- Using school-wide surveys to measure coaching effectiveness and why open-ended self-reflection prompts are better than simple ratings
- Navigating coaching across different grade levels and content areas
- How to reset your coaching mid-year
- Collaborating with other coaches to identify patterns and solve shared challenges
Grab the Action Plan Toolkit
Want some help with your mid-year reset?
Grab the Action Plan Toolkit! It’s filled with practical resources that build on what we talked about in this episode. You’ll get tools to help you conduct a needs assessment, set clear priorities, and create a focused plan so you’re not spinning your wheels or just crossing things off an endless to-do list. Instead, you’ll make real progress at your school!
Ready to listen?
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Learn more
- Episode 257 – Mid-Year Reset: Re-Introducing Yourself as a Coach with Chanavia Patterson
- Buzzing with Ms. B on Instagram
- Join My Facebook Group: Instructional Coaching with Ms. B
- Free Five-Day Challenge: Coaching Resistant Teachers
- Jana Lee Consulting
- Dr. Jana Lee on Instagram @jana.c.lee
- Dr. Jana Lee on X @Jana_C_Lee
- Dr. Jana Lee on LinkedIn @janaclee
Helpful Resources
- Instructional Coaching Action Plan Toolkit Binder: Forms, Planners, & Guide on TpT
- Instructional Coaching Action Plan Bundle
- Instructional Coaching Action Plan Bundle – PD, PLC + Coaching Cycle Forms on TpT
- Instructional Coach Binder Megapack – Editable Forms, Calendars, Planning Tools
- Instructional Coaching Binder Megapack – Editable Forms, Documents & Tools on TpT
- Buzzing with Ms. B TpT Store
- The Confident Literacy Coach
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Podcast produced by Fernie Ceniceros






