GLOBAL MIND ED CONFERENCE
Day 1: Breakout III –
K-12 Panel on Ways to Become the One Important Person/
COGNTIVE COACHING: A NEW IDENTITY*
By
Arthur L Costa, Professor Emeritus,
California State University, Sacramento
and
Co-Director Institute for Habits of Mind International
1. To coach you must establish and maintain a trusting relationship. This
means skillful listening with understanding and empathy, no value
judgments; no advice-giving unless asked for, not trying to "fix" the other
person and consistently modeling in your own behavior the values that you
profess. .
2. You have to take on a new identity as a coach: the identity as a
mediator of self-directed learning: Self directed means self managing, self
monitoring and self-modifying. Your job satisfaction comes from
putting yourself out of business and having the other person become selfcoaching
3. You must realize that all behavior is a result of the mental processes of
decision-making, perceptions, beliefs, and values. To change behavior
you must alter the person's mental maps, beliefs and values: Thus,
"Cognitive" coaching means coaching another person’s cognition.
4. Cognitive Coaches draw on a range of skills: Mediative questioning,
listening, clarifying, paraphrasing, using silence. They lay
aside advice giving, autobiographical listening, and solution listening,
*Costa, A. & Garmston, R. (2015) Cognitive Coaching: Developing SelfDirected Learners and Leaders. Lanham, MD. Rowman and
Littlefield