What Training Do Academic Coaches Need? Part Two

Are you curious whether you have what it takes to become an academic coach? Maybe you’re a school-based educator hoping to start a side business, or perhaps you want to get one of the new “academic coaching” positions that are popping up in schools and universities around the country?

In Part One of this series, we discussed the least you need to know to be a successful academic coach helping students thrive in school and in life:

1. Compassionate communication skills, and 

2. Some basic learning theory and a few strategies to put that theory into practice (both study strategies and time management/organization for students)

In the Anti-Boring Learning Lab, we truly believe that these two skills are the minimum necessary for new academic coaches to get started working with students. As a result, we’ve structured all our courses and community calls to help new academic coaches get up and running on those skills as fast as possible. 

However, most educators seeking out training as an academic (or ADHD, executive function, or student success coach) want to be more than just decent coaches. They want to deliver great services to students! And serve their students well. 

To that end, there are two more skillsets that help new coaches get up and running as fast as possible -- and set themselves up to offer amazing services to help de-stressify school for students. 

Before you pay tons of money for in-depth coach training, and after you’ve equipped yourself with the two toolkits listed above, here’s what you need to know next:

3. How to Lead a Session

Even if you’re a good communicator and have a few basic learning tools and organizational strategies, I’ve found that many new academic coaches feel uncertain unless they’ve gotten some basic training in how to lead a typical coaching session.

Most longer coach training programs will provide some instruction in how to lead a session. In the Anti-Boring Learning Lab, we have three unique approaches to helping you learn the best practices in running a session:

The Academic Coaching Decision Making Tree

In our Academic Coaching 101 micro-credential, we introduce you to a brand new tool designed to support educators in troubleshooting where to start with a struggling student. 

This tool is a one page chart I developed when I was consulting recently at a medical school. The original intent was to teach the instructors there “the least they needed to know” about how to also be good academic coaches to their students. I wanted an easy, one-page solution to helping classroom teachers figure out where students were struggling. When I introduced the faculty to this Decision Making Tree, many of them swooned (figuratively, of course). I quickly realized I had a gem of a tool on my hands. 

I’ve now had a chance to receive feedback from the latest coaches-in-training working through the Learning Lab Micro-Credentials. Here are a few comments from inside the course:

• “I. Love. This. This really helps me visualize and see a path to planning for new students. Thank you so much for creating this.” ~ Reading specialist turned academic coach
  

• “This chart is exactly what I need, thank you!” ~ Content tutor adding academic coaching to her skillset. 
  

• “OMG this chart and video are SO HELPFUL. Signed, anonymous coach who doesn't know where to start 🙂.” ~ Writing specialist adding academic/executive function coaching to her skillset

To learn how to use the Academic Coaching Decision Making Tree with your clients, simply register for the CORE Anti-Boring Toolkit here. It’s our most affordable level of membership inside the Learning Lab, and truly your fastest path to building your academic coaching skillset.

The Habit and Grades Tracker

Another Anti-Boring tool that is the bedrock of an organized and anti-boring coaching session is the Habits and Grades Tracker. 

I devised this tool back in 2013 as a way to do a number of things at once:

1. Track what happens during sessions, so the student, parent and I have a record of what we’ve done

2. Track the commitments students make to me, so I can help hold them accountable

3. Record the habits a student is working on developing, and visualize their progress

4. Help the student track their own grades, and see the connection between successful habit acquisition and accomplishing their grade goals

5. Collaborate with the student, so they are helping to co-create sessions, rather than just be the passive recipient of our work together

The Habit and Grades Tracker has also become the central way I organize my coaching sessions. We refer to it to check in at the top of our call, we work inside it later in the session as we learn and practice skills, and we record our commitments at the end of the session. 

I’ve now used this process with hundreds of students. Also, almost every educator who comes through my training program swears by it. You can tell a coach is Anti-Boring trained if they use some version of the Habit and Grades tracker. 

Don’t take my word for it, though. Here are some reflections from a coach who just finished working through the micro-credential:

“This has to be my favorite module yet! This tool is a great way to help students recognize how their behaviors and efforts affect their outcomes, grades, stress levels, etc. [...] When reflecting on whether grades or habits increased vs decreased, this fosters a great conversation to reflect on what went well, what we can celebrate, versus making a plan to learn/study/plan better!”

“[Also], using this tool has been so fun [...] I just used it with a client this week and she said she appreciates how it’s all easy to see and use! I learned that having the student type in the goal, rather than me doing it, gives them more authority and independence. THIS is a game-changer! “

Although the Habits and Grades Tracker is not technically “the least you need to know” to be an organized and efficient academic coach (or ADHD/EF/Student Success coach), it’s a close second. 

Register for the Full Anti-Boring Toolkit to gain immediate access to the Habit and Grades Tracker Micro-Credential. Find out more about it here. 

Recordings of Coaching Sessions

Last (but not least), one of the best ways to learn how to run a coaching session is to watch one in action. Every month inside the Learning Lab we post one full-length coaching session between me (Gretchen) and a student. 

Some months you’ll get to see a 60-minute session; others you’ll see a 30-minute session. These are completely unedited recordings, so you get a realistic sense of the flow of a full session. 

I don’t know any other training programs that provide this raw glimpse into what student coaching sessions look like. Recently an Anti-Boring coach-in-training posted a goal of watching four student videos this quarter.

I commented back, “I love that you have this as a goal, and I’m interested in hearing what you’re getting out of them?”

She responded enthusiastically, “I love these videos. I find them super helpful. [During my coaching sessions with students] I keep thinking ‘am I doing this right? Am I doing enough?’ … and the videos help to know that I’m all ok.”

I love that she feels so reassured watching the recordings of me coaching! So many of the educators who come to the Anti-Boring Learning Lab are already expert coaches in their own right -- perhaps this is because they’ve been trained elsewhere, or because they arrive naturally inclined to be an excellent coach thanks to their previous life experiences. Regardless, I notice that most of these educators also struggle with some version of imposter syndrome. How wonderful that just watching sessions of another coach coaching can help them see their own inherent competence more easily. 

To access the recordings of the student sessions, simply register for the FULL Toolkit. This is your all-access-pass to all the training resources inside the Anti-Boring Learning Lab. 

4. An Introduction to Executive Function

Alrighty. We’re nearing the end of our tour of what kind of training a person needs to become a quality academic coach. 

So far we have outlined three skill sets that are helpful for professionals transitioning to coaching:

1. Compassionate and student-centered communication skills

2. Basic learning theory and a few effective study strategies

3. How to lead a session

There is one more skill set that is increasingly important for educators to equip themselves with these days -- an introduction to executive function. This is not just true for academic coaches; it’s also true for tutors, teachers, school administrators, parents. Basically, anyone who works with students should better understand executive function theory. 

If you don’t know yet, “executive function” refers to a set of cognitive processes housed in the prefrontal cortex that help humans get stuff done. All of us have challenges with executive functions -- even us grown-ups! -- but students especially have challenges because their prefrontal cortex hasn’t fully developed yet (age 25-30 is when this part of the brain is finally mature).

Although a new coach can get started coaching without an in-depth understanding of executive function, you will best serve your students by equipping yourself with (1) a basic understanding of these cognitive processes and (2) strategies to help students navigate “getting stuff done” challenges. 

For this reason, the Anti-Boring Learning Lab has launched a new micro-credential called Executive Function 101. A partnership with Crista Hopp of Connected Pathways, this micro-credential introduces you to “the least you need to know” about executive function theory. It includes four hours of videos about:

• Metacognition

• Cognitive flexibility

• Working Memory

• Time management

• Planning

• Organization

• Perfectionism

• Motivation, Procrastination, and Task Initiation

• Self Regulation

• Processing speed

Each video introduces basic brain research on the topic in question and ends with the specific Anti-Boring Tools that help support a student with challenges in these particular executive functions. 

Whether you are a coach in private practice OR a school-based educator, this micro-credential will be a game changer in regards to helping you better support your students with challenges in getting stuff done. 

Executive Function 101 is part of our TRULY HIGHLY ADVANCED Toolkit, which you have access to after you’ve finished working through the FULL Toolkit. 

In Sum… 

So what kinds of training do new academic coaches need? At minimum, I recommend training in these four skill sets:

1. Compassionate communication with students

2. Basic brain theory and study strategies

3. How to lead a session

4. Executive function 101

Why is this “controversial,” as I mentioned in the title of this post? It’s controversial because many of the expensive and in-depth training programs would want you to believe that you need a ton of training to deliver effective services to students. 

I believe, on the other hand, that educators interested in becoming academic coaches should start coaching new clients as soon as possible -- before they’ve completed an in-depth training!! 

It is certainly possible to take hundreds of hours of training in all four of these areas, which you might want to eventually do. However, if the goal is to simply get started as an academic coach, I recommend that you focus on “the least you need to know” in each of these categories. 

The Anti-Boring Learning Lab is (not surprisingly) geared towards getting you up and running as an academic coach as soon as possible! We have designed it to be a “one-stop training shop” to get your basic coaching skills up and running, and start serving scattered students immediately. 

If this approach appeals to you, please click here to put yourself on the waiting list. We open the doors to the lab several times a year, and the folks on the waiting list are the first to find out when the doors open again.