Three educational leaders working with the Israeli Ministry of Education are visiting the Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning (CASTL) this week to learn more about the MyTeachingPartner™ coaching model for secondary teachers.
Dr. Shahaf Gal, an education researcher and consultant, is the principal investigator on the project. Tamar Golan, who works in the Ministry of Education’s Division for Experiments and Innovations is the project manager. Odelia Vardi, who is director of pedagogy at the Branco Weiss Institute and is pursuing a doctorate in video-based pedagogical coaching for teachers, is the pedagogy leader for the MyTeachingPartner project.
The trio arrived in Charlottesville over the weekend. They are working with a CASTL team comprised of Sharon Deal, Judith Wasserman, and Marla Read Capper on enhancing their skills as professional development coaches and preparing them to lead the MyTeachingPartner program in Israel.
The program is a joint venture of the Division for Experiments and Innovations and the Yad Hanadiv Foundation. 
The visitors all work with an Israeli teacher professional development program called MIRROR, which was established to test and create models of teachers’ communities of professional knowledge by using reflective practice that relies on video recording of teaching, according to Gal. “As the name suggests, we intend the video to serve as a mirror for the teachers,” Gal said.
Program leaders have found the MyTeachingPartner coaching model and the CLASS-S (Classroom Assessment Scoring System-Secondary™ version) on which the model is based, to fit well with their program goals. “They provide teachers with highly effective instruments, with which [teachers] can gain access to accurate description and analysis of their teaching processes and be able to share it with others,” Gal said.
Five middle schools across Israel participate in this program. In each school a coordinator was chosen who will learn to be a teacher coach and will provide personal teacher coaching within his or her school. In addition, Gal said, the schools will each generate models of professional learning communities based on the CLASS-S tool, which will be disseminated throughout the Israeli educational system.
This collaboration with CASTL developed through initial connections with several Israeli education and developmental psychology researchers at professional conferences and with the Yad Hanadiv Foundation, said Robert C. Pianta, dean of the Curry School and director of CASTL. He has visited Israel on several occasions and consulted on education reform initiatives there. Education leaders who were familiar with Pianta’s work in the area of teacher effectiveness, developed an interest in assessing how MyTeachingPartner and CLASS-S would help advance instruction in the Israeli context. The project began last summer, when Deal and Capper traveled to Israel to lead initial training sessions on the CLASS-S observation techniques and MyTeachingPartner coaching.
Anyone interested in learning more about the educational reform work in Israel related to MyTeachingPartner is invited to attend a presentation by Gal, Golan, and Vardi on Friday, January 20, from 1-2 p.m. in the conference room at 2200 Old Ivy Road. For more information, contact Christopher Hafen at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
by Lynn Bell
