I admit that this is an area of growth for me, and looking at it as "to be expected" is an aha moment. I tend to go into leader mode when a teacher gets offensive and thus feel the discussion must be recorded and evaluative. 

I do have a few defensive teachers and your suggestion of using "how" instead of "why" is a great starting point with them. The boss route has not had great outcomes in my experience with my defensive teachers and instead I usually use a coaching approach and really listen to them. The listening part can be difficult when I have people lined up outside my door and "emergencies" that crop up. 

I think coaching provides more of an opportunity for thinking. 

With one defensive teacher in particular, I needed to be the boss. I needed to give directives because the instructional practices were poor. That being said, we still have a good professional relationship because during the meeting, I had a conversation. I did not just talk at her. I allowed her to voice her rebuttals. I made sure to follow up and visit the classroom later in the year. You can best get your teachers thinking by giving them a safe space to share their thoughts and ideas. 

Defensive teachers...have the difficult conversations if that does not work PIP or a CAP. Best teachers...encourage to share their skills with others. 

The best way I have found to work with defensive teachers is to build trust by being a coach and colleague first. 

In terms of my more defensive teachers, I definitely spend more time in the boss role, but unfortunately I have to spend more time there because I am correcting issues or addressing problems with their practice. If I am really going to change them and help them improve I need to shift out of the boss role and spend more time as the coach or leader. It is everyone's best interest if they make the decision to improve as much as I want them to improve. 

I have had good and bad experiences with defensive teachers. Good experience would be one where the teacher is defensive initially, but I have the framework with me, and we're discussing how, again to your point, not why, but how the teacher met certain criteria within the framework in her lesson. And once we look at it from that angle, the teacher is less defensive and the teacher is looking at the framework, and we're both looking at the framework to guide our conversation. And a bad experience would be when the teacher isn't reflective at all and isn't willing to let the framework guide the conversation or is being dismissive of the framework. And in those instances, it's seldom that I can be a coach, I have to be more of a boss in those types of situation.

I have a couple of defensive teachers. I get why they are defensive. Most times I have to be in the boss role when talking with them. I have to tell them they should or should not be doing something. I think if I start the conversation with "Tell me about..." I may get them to talk about what is happening. Even in the boss role, I can try to get to the root of the problem by letting the teacher do the talking. 

The hardest part of being in administration is working with a variety of personalities within the staff. My approach with each and every member of our staff has always been open mind, open ears and positivity before providing any suggestion or changes that need to be made. I have had push back from some in the form of excuses, however, I believe adding a positive spin on the situation aides in the development of a solution. 

I believe defensive teachers have a mindset that they should not need to explain what, why, or how they are teaching because they have experience. At best, I believe building relationships with them prior to having conversations about how they fulfill their role as a teacher helps to bring their walls and defenses down. 

I try to be a coach but if I need to be a boss to assure student achievement and teacher accountability, I will. I think to create an environment that is not evaluatory and allow for opportunities for teachers to co-teach or observe each other is best. Sometimes stepping back and allowingteam members to work with difficult staff works. Other times, I need to be the boss! 

My most defensive teachers are usually the ones who have the most experience and who think they have perfected their practice as a result. With those teachers, I usually need to be the leader. I can provide those teachers with resources like research based articles and have deeper conversations with them because they are already so knowledgeable about their craft. 

I have one teacher that keeps coming to mind as we talk about the defensive teacher. I am wondering when I change my approach next year if it will help us have better conversations. I like using the "how" questions. With my best teachers I love the professional role of the lotus. Their judgement is what leads to their practice. This is where I would love to get all of my staff. 

For me, it's just all about building that rapport with the staff members, making sure that I'm listening to what they're requesting, making sure that I am there to support them as needed. It's important to also, as difficult as it may be at times, to ask them why they're doing what they're doing and the reasoning behind it, and to show some data to, you know, why this is important to the staff member, the way they have designed a test, or the way they are instructing the students store in the morning meeting, etc. It's also important just to kind of have those deeper conversations with them.

Developing relationships and rapport with teachers is fundamental where conversations regarding school improvement, teacher practice, administrative practice, and student learning are an expected part of every conversation. The notion that we are always striving to improve makes conversations such as these a collaborative interaction rather than a defensive conversation. 

When I think about my most defensive teacher, I find that I am usually approaching him from a coaching role. While I am still working at not offering suggestions and solutions, I find that we can have some of the best conversations around instruction once the walls come down. This teacher often starts the conversation with "these students" and proceeds to tell me how they are unprepared. The best way for me to turn this conversation is to inquire about ways that the teacher can bridge those gaps. 

I take a coach and leader role with teachers that are defensive. I want to make sure they feel supported and that we are not “out to get them “. I want to ensure I give the support I can give before more directive measures need to be taken.