2019 Coaching Conference Concurrent Session Descriptions

Math Coaches: Leadership Issues and Challenges You Confront
Participants will be engaged in considering elements of leadership impacting their daily responsibilities as a mathematics coach/specialist. These include issues related to involving adult learners, coaching, navigating relationships, and developing communities of practice. 
Jon Wray
Howard County Public Schools
Concurrent Session 1:  Room DC307
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC307

Starting Your Math Coach Journey
Are you a new or aspiring coach?  This session is designed for you!  Learn about strategies to have a successful start to a math coaching career.  This session will also highlight resources to help you on your math coach journey.
Jenny Novak
Howard County Public Schools
MCTM Board Member
Concurrent Session 1: Room DC301


The Coaching Equation: Five Steps to Formulate Effective Math Coaching
Looking for the formula to build effective coaching relationships? Join us as we share our 5-step approach to individualize support for teachers in all grade levels. Participants will explore our systematic coaching method developed to move all teachers forward toward effective instruction.
Lynley Smith & Staci Torok
Baltimore County Public Schools
Concurrent Session 1: Room DC305


Keep Calm & Coach
Coaches have the tall task of leading with vision, helping to maintain a positive team culture, ensuring alignment of written, taught, and assessed curriculum, and so much more. This work can be rewarding and yet it can easily overwhelm even the most organized and diligent person. During this session, we will engage in some exercises and discuss strategies to help coaches establish healthy habits that promote overall well-being and stability for themselves and thus the teachers whom they lead.
Damitra Newsome & Robin White
Howard County Public Schools
MCTM Board Member & MCTM President-Elect
Concurrent Session 1: DC222


Balancing Acts: Leveraging Coaching Styles in the Math Classrooms
Problem structures for addition and subtraction can be difficult for teachers to teach and for elementary students to learn.  What can you do as a coach to help your teachers with this? Join us for this interactive session and gain some new insights!
Nikki Snier, Emily Dwivedi, & Joe Teng
Baltimore County Public Schools
Concurrent Session 1:  Room DC306


Look Who's Talking Now: A Coach's Guide to Increasing Student Discourse
Explore practices that will give teachers and teacher teams the confidence and skills to allow their students to lead classroom discussion. Examine the structural changes, professional learning, and individual feedback that one feeder system used to shift their classroom culture from teacher to student-centered.
Megan Gittermann
Howard County Public Schools
Concurrent Session 1:  Room DC233

Using Classroom Data to Support Coaching Conversations
Participants will engage in a process used to support the growth of collaborative teacher teams in developing high quality common assessment items and changing teachers’ ideas on assessment practices. Including the use of an assessment evaluation tool, used to evaluate the quality of the assessment, as well as, evaluating the potential of the assessment in supporting the development of mathematical content and mathematical practices.
Melissa Waggoner & AnnMarie Varlotta
Howard County Public Schools                 
Concurrent Session 1:  Room DC308

Coaching Lab: Practice for Difficult Conversations
Want to enhance your coaching skills, particularly when you have a difficult conversation ahead of you?  This interactive session is designed for coaches to engage in role plays to practice in-the-moment coaching moves in order to prepare for difficult conversations.
Jenny Novak
Howard County Public Schools
MCTM Board Member
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC301

Increasing Vertical Awareness
Feeling stuck in the middle? Increase vertical awareness with teachers and help teams leverage elementary number strategies to enhance reasoning in middle school classrooms.  Explore Number Talks, Math Talks, facilitating cross level classroom visits, and ways to collaborate with elementary teams to support vertical articulation.
Christy Dellota & Lindsay Kelley
Howard County Public Schools             
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC305


Empowering Teachers with Classroom Instructional Routines
In this session coaches/leaders will learn how to motivate and inform educators of the benefits of instructional routines within the classroom. Guidance on how to reach the most reluctant teacher(s) through discussions on the importance of observing student's mathematical thinking, rewards for students, and equity based teaching practices.
Andrea Lang & Meredith Adams
Howard County Public Schools 
MCTM Board Members (Adams)              
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC306


Moving Beyond Push-Back: Shifting Team Culture Through Positive Deviance
Have you experienced reflexive push-back when attempting to implement positive, behavioral change within your teacher teams? Come explore how to shift the culture of rejection! Engage in strategies that activate your teams’ strengths within to create the individual cognitive dissonance necessary for sustainable change.
Robin White
Howard County Public Schools                
MCTM President-Elect
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC222


Dependent & Independent Learners: Implications for Math Teachers
Based on the book Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain, we will focus on independent vs. dependent learners and brain-based research to help teachers support students.
Jennifer Mullinix
Howard County Public Schools                 
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC233

Creating a Peer Coaching Collaborative in Your School
Participants will unpack the purposes of classroom observations, discuss various models of peer coaching, share best practices, and create an action plan to start a coaching collaborative at their school for the 2019-2020 school year.
Brett Parker & Laura Potter
Baltimore County Public Schools                 
Concurrent Session 2:  Room DC308