Chapter 11: Peer Coaching as a Strategy to Build Instructional Capacity in low Performing Schools

The standards-based reform movement, which focuses on aligning high academic content standards with curriculum and assessment to impact student learning, depends in large part on interactions between state-, district-, and school-level policy. States across the nation have developed extensive academic content standards that include content indicators, benchmarks, and curriculum pacing guides to improve student academic achievement on standardized tests. School administrators and teachers have received copies of the state academic content standards, but many educators do not have the time to thoroughly align their curriculum and instruction to the standards in order to impact student performance. As states develop systemwide standards and accountability mechanisms to improve student achievement, they must be cognizant that district and school policies, as well as teacher behavior mediate state-led interventions. For example, a primary assumption of standards-based reform is that teachers will make changes to traditional instructional practices. Specifically, standards-based reform requires teachers concentrate on higherorder content and thinking skills aligned to structured standards and assessment systems (Cohen & Hill, 2000; Smith & Desimone, 2003). The critical issue is that “although teachers generally support high standards for teaching and learning, many are not prepared to implement teaching practices based on the integration of high academic standards” (Smith & Desimone, 2003, p. 119). While states and districts may recognize the importance of teachers in standards-based reform efforts, the link highlights a tension between the short term need for academic improvement and the long term process of changing teacher practices.