DEVELOPMENT COACHING TO EMPOWER TEACHERS PROVIDING EXPERIENTIAL LEANING TO ENHANCE CRITICAL THINKING FOR STUDENTS

Abstract

              The objectives of this research article were to 1) develop coaching to enhance school-teacher’s competency for providing experiential learning process to promote critical thinking for school students, 2) evaluate the effectiveness of coaching to enhance school-teacher’s competency for providing experiential learning process to promote critical thinking for school students. Action research was used as the research methodology. Purposive sampling was used to select the participants from Bantungkroa school, an extended opportunity school that needs to develop learning management through a coaching strategy. The target groups consisted of 1) internal coaching teams were three school administrators, five volunteer school teachers acting as coaches, 2) external coaching teams were three supervisors, one primary health care staff, two teachers from Walailak University, 3) fifteen school teachers responsible for learning management in the experiential learning process, and 4) forty-five school-students representatives, a total of seventy-four people. Action research divided into three phases with four steps of activities was used: 1) Initial phase: planning stage, 2) Working phase: action stage, and 3) Terminate phase: observation stage and reflection stage. The data were collected by using focus-group discussion, interviews, and observation. Content analysis was used in data analysis. The results revealed that effective coaching consists of four steps:                        1) understanding, planning, and defining roles and duties in the coaching process between the coaches and the coaches of administrators, teachers, and related parties; 2) developing the competency of the coaches, implementation of coaching operations in positive ways, continuous monitoring of coaches from both internal and external coaches; 3) observation of the coaching process; and 4) reflections during and after the end of the operation. The results revealed that school teachers developed learning management competencies in the experiential learning process and also were able to see the positive changes in the analytical thinking competencies that occur with school students effectively.