Maximize School Success with the Teaching & Learning Cycle: A Guide for Educational Leaders

Introduction: Facing Mid-Year Challenges

As October ends and the first quarterly check-in approaches, many school leaders find themselves in a familiar situation. You’ve set priorities and goals for the year to promote an empowering learning environment, but upon review, progress seems to lag behind expectations. You have a wealth of data at your disposal, yet determining which metrics to track progress can be overwhelming. Teachers might feel disconnected from the schoolwide and districtwide goals, further complicating efforts to achieve them.

If this scenario sounds familiar, it might be time to implement a structure for continuous and intentional improvement to impact student outcomes. At ANet, we utilize the Teaching & Learning Cycle — a strategic framework that ensures intentional time for teachers and leaders to:

• Collaboratively plan
• Analyze student data and work
• Adapt instruction
• Reflect on changes

ANet Coaches work closely with partners to integrate actionable insights into planning and teaching, promoting a cycle of continuous improvement.

The Four Phases of the Teaching & Learning Cycle

The Teaching & Learning Cycle consists of four key phases:

• Plan
• Teach
• Analyze
• Adapt

Leaders typically engage in this cycle 3–4 times per school year. Below is an in-depth look at each phase and how to implement them effectively in your instructional practice. Click to jump to a specific section or continue reading.

1. Plan: Laying the Foundation

The PLAN phase involves collaborative experiences where teachers deepen their understanding of the strategies and content necessary to address instructional focus areas. This preparation is crucial for successful teaching.

During the PLAN phase, teachers:

• Interpret curriculum, data, student experiences, and educational standards.
• Apply new strategies and content learnings to upcoming units, modules, or lessons.

During the PLAN phase, leaders:

• Provide expert insights and professional development opportunities (e.g., collaborative planning and group PD sessions) to help teachers align with goals, pedagogy, and content. This support should occur weekly and be integrated into unit or lesson-level planning.

Planning is an ongoing process throughout the cycle, complemented by opportunities for teachers to practice and refine the strategies and content they’ve developed.

2. Teach: Bringing Plans to Life

In the TEACH phase, teachers put their plans into action, applying new strategies and practices to their instruction.

During the TEACH phase, teachers:

• Deliver instruction based on their learnings and planning from professional development and collaborative sessions.

During the TEACH phase, leaders:

• Observe and reflect on instructional changes aligned with the cycle’s goals.
• Provide targeted feedback to support teachers in achieving instructional and professional development goals. This may also include facilitating peer observations.

This phase also involves collecting data on the effectiveness of new practices, their impact on student experiences, and student learning outcomes. Assessment of student mastery typically occurs between the TEACH and ANALYZE phases.

3. Analyze: Evaluating Impact

The ANALYZE phase is where teachers and leaders collaborate to assess the effectiveness of instructional changes and their impact on student learning.

During the ANALYZE phase, teachers:

• Examine data to identify strengths and areas for improvement in teaching and learning. Collaborative analysis of common assessment data is ideal.

During the ANALYZE phase, leaders:

• Define the purpose of data analysis and celebrate progress and successes observed in student work and data.
• Guide teachers in making connections between data insights and progress toward goals.

Following this analysis, sharing data and feedback with students and families can help everyone understand student progress and work together on learning goals. Many educational leaders struggle with this step for various reasons, such as not understanding or establishing methods for collecting student work and real-time data, leaders and teachers analyzing data in isolation from other colleagues and other data sources, allowing this step to occur sporadically without following up with an action plan, or not taking the time to provide feedback to successfully move to the ADAPT phase of the cycle. This step is crucial to continuous improvement, and one that may require teachers and leaders to reflect on the readiness of their teams to analyze data before engaging in analysis.

4. Adapt: Refining Instruction

In the ADAPT phase, insights gained from analysis are used to refine instruction, ensuring it meets the evolving needs of students.

During the ADAPT phase, teachers:

• Address unfinished teaching and learning based on identified student strengths and challenges, using insights from previous lessons.

During the ADAPT phase, leaders:

• Prepare for reflection meetings and adjust support strategies for teachers in the upcoming cycle’s planning phase.

Following teachers’ adapting their instruction, leaders and teachers should engage in a reflection meeting to name improvements, share what worked in supporting unfinished learning, and collect the best practices that worked across classrooms. Reflection meetings offer teachers the chance to discuss what worked, share successful strategies, and gather best practices for future use.

After completing the ADAPT phase, the cycle begins anew with planning, promoting continuous improvement.

Conclusion: Building a Culture of Continuous Improvement

Implementing the Teaching & Learning Cycle 3–4 times annually empowers school leaders to:

• Support collaborative teacher learning and action toward shared goals.
• Monitor progress toward goals effectively.
• Foster a culture of data-driven practices.

When teachers and leaders work together with intention and persistence toward common goals, students benefit. By adopting the Teaching & Learning Cycle, schools can create an empowering learning environment where teachers are informed and included, students are encouraged and equipped, and leaders foster collaboration and community within their buildings.

If you’d like to learn more about how our coaches can help you implement the Teaching & Learning Cycle, explore our K-12 Coaching webpage.