Coaching

Coaching is a structured form of professional learning that can support teachers to improve their practice through cycles of observation, feedback, modelling, and reflection.  

Unlike supervision or appraisal, coaching is primarily developmental rather than evaluative, focusing on refining specific teaching goals within clear frameworks.  

Effective coaching depends on the quality of the relationship: it relies on trust and collaboration, with teachers more likely to engage when the process is non-judgemental and supportive.  

Instructional coaching, meanwhile, is a specific model where the focus is on precise elements of classroom practice. It involves detailed feedback and repeated rehearsal to help teachers refine techniques. Unlike evaluative approaches, the feedback remains formative, aimed at improvement rather than accountability.   

Impact on teachers

Coaching is often associated with stronger teaching practice, greater confidence, and more secure professional judgement. Evidence suggests its impact is greatest when it combines clear goals, deliberate practice, and supportive relationships. From this body of research, several key findings emerge:  

• Improved strategy use: Teachers who participate in coaching are more likely to embed effective practices such as modelling, scaffolding, and addressing misconceptions. Coaching can also increase teachers’ instructional practice. These gains are linked to opportunities within coaching for observation, feedback, and repeated rehearsal, which can support teachers in transferring strategies into their day-to-day practice. 

• Greater self-efficacy and reflection: Coaching can strengthen teachers’ sense of professional confidence and their ability to reflect critically on practice. Teacher self-efficacy and specialised content knowledge can also be significantly enhanced in teaching for students with moderate learning difficulties. These effects are particularly evident when coaching is relational, sustained over time, and focused on specific goals that matter to the teacher. 

• Support for early career teachers: Coaching may be especially beneficial in the early stages of a teaching career. Evidence indicates that structured approaches to coaching can help beginning teachers develop key professional skills and start to build a sense of teacher identity. These outcomes appear particularly important as teachers navigate the transition into the profession, though the extent of impact is likely to vary depending on the design and context of the coaching provided. 

• Behaviour management: Data-driven coaching and systematic performance feedback can improve teachers’ and TAs’ ability to implement evidence-based behaviour management strategies with high fidelity and can reduce student off task behaviours and physical aggression, resulting in higher academic engagement. 

• Conditions for success: Coaching is most likely to bring about positive changes when it is well structured, adapted to teachers’ individual needs, and provided by coaches who are both trusted and working within a consistent framework. 

Impact on pupils

The evidence on pupil outcomes from coaching is promising but often limited. Research reports stronger gains when coaching is sustained, aligned with curriculum goals, and consistently applied across classrooms.  It highlights several key findings:  

• Pupil outcomes: Coaching interventions show small but significant positive effects on student academic outcomes, with strongest gains seen in early childhood education for language and literacy. Targeted coaching in particular domains (literacy, behaviour management, maths and science) is found to be more effective, including for students with moderate learning difficulties. 

• Adaptive teaching: Students with specific learning difficulties can achieve appropriate and dramatic growth where coaching focuses on planning for adaptive teaching.  

• Students with disabilities: Where coaching focuses on specific aspects of provision for disabled students, it can lead to improved learning outcomes.  

• Instructional quality: Larger student gains are reported to require substantial improvements in teaching quality. 

• Sustained engagement: A level of commitment to the process, combined with ongoing practice seem critical for translating teacher improvement into pupil outcomes.  

• Consistent models: Programmes that include observation, modelling, feedback, and goal setting are associated with more reliable improvements in pupil outcomes.  

• Contextual limitations: Evidence shows weaker impact when coaching is short-term, disconnected from curriculum priorities, or when pupil outcomes are not adequately evaluated.  

• Slow progress: Improvements in both behaviour and progress can be slow to manifest, which can lead to initial frustration in both teachers and students.  

Coaching seems to be one of the most consistently effective forms of professional learning for improving teaching practice. Reviews show that it can strengthen teaching quality, build confidence, and support more reflective practice, particularly when feedback cycles are regular and underpinned by clear models. 

There is also evidence of impact on pupils, although this tends to be more modest and indirect. Reported gains are most often linked to the improvements in teaching that coaching supports, rather than to coaching alone. Effects are clearest in areas such as early literacy and language development, though findings vary across subjects and contexts. 

The conditions in which coaching is introduced appear to make a difference. It seems to be most effective when delivered over time, embedded in school priorities, and built on trust between coach and teacher. By contrast, programmes that are short-term, generic, or poorly integrated, or those where pupil outcomes are narrowly measured, tend to show weaker impact. 

Coaching is a high-potential approach. Its value lies in designs that are both sustained and well structured, balancing the relational trust that enables teachers to engage fully with the clear frameworks that keep improvement focused. 

Coaching is reported to be most effective when supported by clear routines, skilled facilitation, and a culture of trust. Success depends not only on the model itself but also on the behaviours and relationships that shape how it is delivered.  

Behaviours

The quality of coaching depends heavily on how coaches and teachers interact. The following behaviours help build trust, engagement, and meaningful professional learning: 

• Build trust: Teachers are more open to reflection and feedback when they feel safe to share challenges and test new strategies. Allowing teachers choice and autonomy can increase trust, motivation and engagement.  

• Use purposeful dialogue: Active listening and thoughtful questioning can help teachers think deeply and develop professional judgement.  

• Provide timely feedback: Specific feedback, delivered soon after observation, can support practical improvements more effectively than vague comments.  

• Encourage deliberate practice: Repeated opportunities to practise, refine, and revisit strategies can help new approaches embed over time.  

• Anchor in evidence: Drawing on data or pupil work can ground coaching goals in classroom impact and make progress visible.  

Contextual factors 

Research suggests that coaching is most effective when the wider school environment supports it. Several conditions influence whether it is sustained and embedded over time: 

• Protect time: Regular space during the school day for observation and feedback is essential. When coaching is squeezed around other tasks, its impact tends to drop.  

• Align with priorities: Coaching appears more powerful when clearly connected to curriculum aims or improvement plans. If it feels disconnected, staff may not value it.  

• Select credible coaches: Teachers engage more when coaches are respected, skilled, and understand the local context. Both relational trust and expertise matter.  

• Account for staff and context: Factors such as teachers’ prior experience, workload, or working in high-poverty schools can affect engagement and outcomes.  

• Acknowledge wider influences: Organisational culture, visible support from leaders, resourcing, and national policy contexts can all shape whether coaching is sustained and equitable.  

Structured but flexible

Evidence indicates that coaching is more effective when it follows a clear structure while allowing flexibility to meet different needs. The strongest designs balance consistency with adaptability. Key strategies include: 

• Use repeatable cycles: Approaches such as plan–observe–feedback–refine can help teachers build momentum and make incremental improvements.  

• Apply shared tools: Templates, rubrics, or feedback guides can support consistent quality and keep the focus on priority areas.  

• Allow contextual tailoring: Flexibility to adapt across phases, subjects, or teacher needs can help maintain relevance without losing structure.  

• Embed in routines: Coaching appears more powerful when integrated into planning time or team meetings, rather than treated as an add-on.  

• Offer delivery options: Face-to-face, digital, and blended coaching can all be effective, provided core principles of feedback and sustained practice remain in place.  

Even with strong evidence, coaching can fall short if common risks are not addressed. These challenges often reflect deeper structural or strategic issues: 

• Teacher discomfort: Teachers may experience feelings of risk or discomfort when coaching requires them to ‘unlearn’ established methodologies. They can also experience high initial levels of stress and cognitive load when attempting to integrate complex practices into their daily routines.  

• Unclear purpose: Without a clear rationale or link to teaching improvement, coaching can lose focus and deliver minimal impact.  

• Competing initiatives: If not aligned with broader professional learning strategy, coaching risks being sidelined as “just another programme.”  

• Capacity gaps: Over-reliance on external coaches or lack of structured support for internal ones, can undermine sustainability and quality.  

• Unequal access: Coaching is sometimes limited to new teachers or specific projects, leaving experienced staff excluded and reducing whole-school impact.  

• Scaling difficulties: Expanding coaching across multiple settings can dilute quality and weaken the key ingredients of practice, feedback, and individualisation.  

Several additional factors can influence how coaching is perceived and sustained: 

• Design choices: Whether coaching is voluntary, time-bound, or linked to review processes affects engagement. Clear goals and structures can help maintain focus.  

• Digital delivery: Online or video-based coaching can improve access, but its effectiveness depends on trust, dialogue, and consistent routines.  

• Separation from appraisal: Linking coaching too closely to performance management risks undermining openness and becoming more about compliance. Emphasising its developmental purpose can help protect trust.  

• Scaling and sustainability: Small-scale pilots and gradual rollout allow refinement and capacity building before wider adoption.  

• Coach perspectives: Supporting coaches’ workload, role clarity, and development can strengthen overall implementation.