Exploring the enactment of a coaching stance: Findings from one coach–teacher dyad

Abstract

Coaching teachers is complex work as coaches must navigate multiple and competing roles of expert and colleague. Within mathematics education, there is a lack of research exploring how coaches enact their stance for coaching, balancing the roles of expert and colleague, in ways that best support teacher learning. Furthermore, little is known about the specific discursive practices coaches use when enacting different stances during mathematics interactions with teachers. Drawing on data collected from one coaching cycle for one coach–teacher dyad during mathematics instruction, including transcripts of two planning meetings, one modeled lesson, one reflection meeting, and five semi‐structured interviews, this study explores one instructional coach's discursive enactment of their coaching stance. Qualitative analyses indicate that the coach had the goal of enacting a responsive coaching stance, and in her practice the coach discursively enacted multiple coaching stances. Furthermore, findings indicate that the coach's disciplinary expertise seemed to influence the discursive enactment of her coaching stance. Implications for research and practice are discussed.