What is the Dial Board?
Every teacher plays two roles simultaneously — referee and coach. The referee is clinical and cut-and-dry: they hold the standards, apply the rules, and deliver verdicts. The coach is personal and soft: they develop the student, build method, and meet the person where they are.
Different students, in different moments, need different proportions of each. This tool helps you diagnose your natural defaults — and build the perceptual flexibility to dial each function up or down deliberately.
Referee
- Holds standards impersonally
- Applies same criteria to all
- Delivers clear verdicts
- Context-blind by design
- Outcome-oriented
Coach
- Calibrated to this student
- Asks: where are you now?
- Builds method and capability
- Context-rich by necessity
- Process-oriented
How to use this tool
Self-Diagnosis tab: Work through the student scenarios. For each one, tag the signal the student is sending, then set your dials to reflect how you would respond. Before you reveal the ideal, commit to your settings — then compare. The gap is where growth lives.
Profile tab: After rating several scenarios, your aggregate profile builds automatically. The ideal markers (when shown) reveal your calibration tendency — whether you over-referee, under-coach, or default to one register regardless of student need.
Add Scenario tab: Bring your own real student moments. Setting the ideal dials yourself is its own learning exercise.
The key insight
The referee doesn't need to know you. The coach cannot function without knowing you. The same teacher must inhabit both roles — but the relationship each requires is almost opposite. Recognising which mode a student needs, and switching registers fluidly, is the advanced skill this tool trains.
Your experience with this tool matters. The questions below take about three minutes. Responses go directly to the tool’s author and will be used to improve future versions for classroom practice.