Coach Interview (Instrument 4)

OMB No.: XXXX-XXXX

Expiration Date: XX/XX/XXXX

SCOPE Coach Interview Protocol

Introduction

An important part of the Study of Coaching Practices in Early Care and Education Settings (SCOPE) study is learning about how coaching is working for early care and education programs across the country. For this study, it’s important that we learn about your experience as a coach working with teachers/providers. As you might remember from the recent survey you completed, the goal of this interview for the SCOPE project is to better understand how your experience working as a coach has changed or stayed the same since COVID-19 began in early 2020.

Participation in this interview is voluntary; refusing to participate or answer a question will not negatively affect you in any way. An agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, a collection of information unless it displays a currently valid OMB control number. The OMB number for this information collection is XXXX-XXXX and the expiration date is XX/XX/XXXX.

Your responses will remain private. We will not share any information that identifies you or your organization with anyone outside the study team, except as required by law. The information in this study will be used only for research purposes and in ways that will not reveal who you are. You will not be identified in any publication from this study. Data from this study will be transmitted to the Child & Family Data Archive or a similar data archive at the end of the study so it can be used by other researchers. No personal information that could identify you or the programs you serve will remain in the interview notes that are shared with the data archive.

I would like to record our discussion so I can listen to it later when I write up my notes. No one besides our research team will listen to the recording. If you want to say anything that you don’t want recorded, please let me know and I will be glad to pause the recorder. We will delete all recordings at the end of the study. Do you have any objections to being part of this interview or to my recording our discussion?

We will have about 45 minutes for our conversation today. Do you have any questions for us before we begin? Great! Let’s get started.

Note to the interviewer: If the survey indicates interviewee is currently coaching, use the “Currently Coaching Interview Module. If they are not currently coaching, skip to the “Not Currently Coaching Interview Module”.

Currently Coaching Interview Module

1. For the SCOPE project, we first learned about your role as a coach when you completed a survey in 2019. You recently completed another survey to help us understand your experiences now. In the survey you mentioned some of the ways your work has changed or stayed the same since COVID-19 began in early 2020. [insert information from Qx and Qx]. Are there other things that have changed since you completed the survey?

2. [If at least some remote coaching was reported in survey] In the survey, you told us that you have done some remote coaching since COVID-19 began in early 2020. As a reminder, when we talk about coaching, we are referring to work that happens on a regular basis with teachers or FCC providers to provide feedback and guidance to help them improve their practices.

   1. What is your opinion of remote coaching?

   2. How prepared were you to work remotely with providers? Please explain.

   3. What do you feel like you are doing well in remote coaching?

   4. Is anything easier than you expected?

   5. Is anything more challenging than you expected?

   6. Are there any coaching activities that you did in-person that don’t translate well to a remote format?

   7. What would help you do better at providing remote coaching?

Skip to Q4

3. [If remote coaching was not reported in survey] We know that some coaches worked with teachers and FCC providers using remote coaching since COVID-19 began in early 2020. From the survey, you reported that wasn’t the case for you and that you have continued in-person coaching.

   1. What aspects of in-person coaching have you been able to keep doing?

   2. Has there been anything you have had to stop doing in-person?

   3. Was remote coaching something you ever considered doing?

      1. [If yes] What were you hoping to accomplish with remote coaching? What made you ultimately decide not to use a remote coaching approach?

      2. [If no] Why didn’t you consider doing remote coaching?

4. Have you received any kind of support, resources or training for any new or different aspects of your work since COVID-19 began in early 2020?

   1. Prompt, if needed: Examples of support include coaching, extra or different supervision, peer mentoring, IT support, etc.

   2. How helpful is it and why?

      1. Prompt, if needed: Increasing your knowledge? Making time more efficient? Reducing stress?

   3. What types of support, resources or training would be useful?

5. Thinking about your communication with programs and staff since COVID-19 began in early 2020, what has worked well?

   1. Are there differences in what works well when communicating with directors, teachers, or family child care providers? If so, please explain.

6. Thinking about your communication with programs since COVID-19 began in early 2020, what has been challenging?

   1. Are the challenges the same or different for directors, teachers or family child care providers? If so, please explain.

   2. What, if any, topics have been challenging to discuss and why?

7. Have you seen any promising innovations in coaching since COVID-19 began in early 2020?

   1. What, if any, best practices or tips have you learned about coaching since COVID-19 began in early 2020 that you would want others to know about?

   2. Do you have any ideas about new coaching activities you would like to try?

8. Thinking about all of the challenges and opportunities facing providers right now, where do you think coaching--or working with teachers or FCC providers on a regular basis to provide feedback and guidance to help them improve their practices--falls on the list of priorities for the people you are supporting now?

   1. How much can they focus on coaching right now?

   2. How much can they focus on professional development right now?

9. Is there anything else that we haven’t talked about that you think is important for us to know about the impacts of COVID-19 on coaching?

Not Currently Coaching Interview Module

1. For the SCOPE project, we first learned about your role as a coach when you completed a survey in 2019. You recently completed another survey to help us understand your experiences now. In the survey you mentioned some of the ways your work has changed or stayed the same since COVID-19 began in early 2020. [insert information from Qx and Qx]. Are there other things that have changed since you completed the survey?

2. In the survey, you let us know that you are not currently coaching, but you are providing other types of professional development supports to teachers or FCC providers (Screener Qx). Have you received any kind of support, resources or training for any new or different aspects of your work since COVID-19 began in early 2020?

   1. Prompt, if needed: Examples of support include coaching, extra or different supervision, peer mentoring, IT support, etc.

   2. How helpful is it and why?

      1. Prompt, if needed: Increasing your knowledge? Making time more efficient? Reducing stress?

   3. What types of support, resources or training would be useful?

2. Thinking about your communication with programs and staff since COVID-19 began in early 2020, what has worked well?

   1. Are there differences in what works well when communicating with directors, teachers, or family child care providers? If so, please explain.

2. Thinking about your communication with programs since COVID-19 began in early 2020, what has been challenging?

   1. Are the challenges the same or different for directors, teachers or family child care providers? If so, please explain.

   2. What, if any, topics have been challenging to discuss and why?

2. Have you seen any promising innovations in professional development since COVID-19 began in early 2020?

   1. What, if any, best practices or tips have you learned about professional development since COVID-19 began in early 2020 that you would want others to know about?

   2. Do you have any ideas about new PD activities you would like to try?

2. Thinking about all of the challenges and opportunities facing providers right now, where do you think coaching--or working with teachers or FCC providers on a regular basis to provide feedback and guidance to help them improve their practices--falls on the list of priorities for the people you are supporting now?

   1. How much can they focus on coaching right now?

   2. How much can they focus on professional development right now?

2. Thinking about your future in coaching, do you expect to go back to coaching?

   1. If yes, when do you think you will coach again?

   2. If no, why not?

2. Is there anything else that we haven’t talked about that you think is important for us to know about the impacts of COVID-19 on coaching?

Updated November 2020 4