Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom


bell hooks - 1994
    Teaching students to "transgress" against racial, sexual, and class boundaries in order to achieve the gift of freedom is, for hooks, the teacher's most important goal.Bell hooks speaks to the heart of education today: how can we rethink teaching practices in the age of multiculturalism? What do we do about teachers who do not want to teach, and students who do not want to learn? How should we deal with racism and sexism in the classroom?Full of passion and politics, Teaching to Transgress combines practical knowledge of the classroom with a deeply felt connection to the world of emotions and feelings. This is the rare book about teachers and students that dares to raise critical questions about eros and rage, grief and reconciliation, and the future of teaching itself."To educate as the practice of freedom," writes bell hooks, "is a way of teaching that any one can learn." Teaching to Transgress is the record of one gifted teacher's struggle to make classrooms work.–from the back of the book

Mindsets in the Classroom: Building a Culture of Success and Student Achievement in Schools


Mary Cay Ricci - 2013
    Inspired by the popular mindset idea that hard work and effort can lead to success, Mindsets in the Classroom provides educators with ideas for building a growth mindset school culture, wherein students are challenged to change their thinking about their abilities and potential. With the book's step-by-step guidance on adopting a differentiated, responsive instruction model, teachers can immediately use growth mindset culture in their classrooms. It also highlights the importance of critical thinking and teaching students to learn from failure. Includes a sample professional development plan and ideas for communicating the mindset concept to parents.

The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African American Children


Gloria Ladson-Billings - 1993
    Through the stories and experiences of eight successful teacher-transmitters, The Dreamkeepers keeps hope alive for educating young African Americans. --ReverAnd Jesse L. Jackson, president and founder, National Rainbow Coalition In this beautifully written book Ladson-Billings illustrates the inspiring influence of a select group of teachers who keep the dreams alive for African American students. ?Henry M. Levin, David Jacks professor of Higher Education, Stanford University Ladson-Billing's portraits, interwoven with personal reflections, challenge readers to envision intellectually rigorous and culturally relevant classrooms that have the power to improve the lives of not just African American students but all children.

Fostering Resilient Learners: Strategies for Creating a Trauma-Sensitive Classroom


Kristin Van Marter Souers - 2016
    The authors--a mental health therapist and a veteran principal--provide proven, reliable strategies to help youUnderstand what trauma is and how it hinders the learning, motivation, and success of all students in the classroom. Build strong relationships and create a safe space to enable students to learn at high levels. Adopt a strengths-based approach that leads you to recalibrate how you view destructive student behaviors and to perceive what students need to break negative cycles. Head off frustration and burnout with essential self-care techniques that will help you and your students flourish.Each chapter also includes questions and exercises to encourage reflection and extension of the ideas in this book. As an educator, you face the impact of trauma in the classroom every day. Let this book be your guide to seeking solutions rather than dwelling on problems, to building relationships that allow students to grow, thrive, and--most assuredly--learn at high levels.

The Dyslexic Advantage: Unlocking the Hidden Potential of the Dyslexic Brain


Brock L. Eide - 2011
     In this paradigm-shifting book, neurolearning experts Drs. Brock and Fernette Eide describe an exciting new brain science that reveals that dyslexic people have unique brain structure and organization. While the differences are responsible for certain challenges with literacy and reading, the dyslexic brain also gives a predisposition to important skills, and special talents. While dyslexics typically struggle to decode the written word, they often also excel in such areas of reasoning as mechanical (required for architects and surgeons), interconnected (artists and inventors); narrative (novelists and lawyers), and dynamic (scientists and business pioneers). The Dyslexic Advantage provides the first complete portrait of dyslexia.

What Really Matters in Response to Intervention: Research-Based Designs


Richard L. Allington - 2008
    To help teachers acquire a fuller understanding of the complexity of response to intervention designs, literacy researcher and best-selling author Dick Allington offers clear recommendations to guide classroom teachers in designing response to instruction (RtI) programs such that struggling readers will develop their reading proficiencies to match those of their achieving peers. Unlike any other book on the topic, Dick Allington provides a research-base that supports closing the reading achievement gap along with implications this has for designing RTI programs. In addition, Dick provides a comprehensive discussion of the factors that inhibit poor, disabled, and second-language learners from achieving and offers a number of research-based instructional strategies and routines for turning struggling readers into achieving readers. Teachers will be inspired and confident to design response to instruction programs! Take a look inside... Provides a complete review of what is critical to accelerating the development of struggling readers.Presents educators with a framework for how we might design response to intervention (RTI) programs such that struggling readers will develop their reading proficiencies to match those of their achieving peers.Features a complete analysis of response to intervention design (RTI) and offers a detailed framework for evaluating existing and future intervention efforts.Includes numerous websites that provide teacher-friendly information, strategies, and tools for accelerating reading development.

Who's Doing the Work?: How to Say Less So Readers Can Do More


Jan Burkins - 2016
    Jan Burkins and Kim Yaris rethink traditional teaching practices in  Who's Doing the Work: How to Say Less So Readers Can Do More . They review some common instructional mainstays such as read-aloud, guided reading, shared reading, and independent reading and provide small, yet powerful, adjustments to help hold students accountable for their learning.Next generation reading instruction is much more responsive to student needs and aims to remove some of the scaffolding that can hinder reader development. Instead of relying on teacher prompts,  Who's Doing the Work  asks teachers to have students take ownership of their reading by managing their challenges independently and working through any plateaus they encounter. Whether you are an elementary teacher, literacy coach, reading specialist, or parent,  Who's Doing the Work  provides numerous examples on how to readjust the reading process and teach students to gain proficiency and joy in their work.

How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens


Benedict Carey - 2014
    We’re told that learning is all self-discipline, that we must confine ourselves to designated study areas, turn off the music, and maintain a strict ritual if we want to ace that test, memorize that presentation, or nail that piano recital.   But what if almost everything we were told about learning is wrong? And what if there was a way to achieve more with less effort?   In How We Learn, award-winning science reporter Benedict Carey sifts through decades of education research and landmark studies to uncover the truth about how our brains absorb and retain information. What he discovers is that, from the moment we are born, we are all learning quickly, efficiently, and automatically; but in our zeal to systematize the process we have ignored valuable, naturally enjoyable learning tools like forgetting, sleeping, and daydreaming. Is a dedicated desk in a quiet room really the best way to study? Can altering your routine improve your recall? Are there times when distraction is good? Is repetition necessary? Carey’s search for answers to these questions yields a wealth of strategies that make learning more a part of our everyday lives—and less of a chore.   By road testing many of the counterintuitive techniques described in this book, Carey shows how we can flex the neural muscles that make deep learning possible. Along the way he reveals why teachers should give final exams on the first day of class, why it’s wise to interleave subjects and concepts when learning any new skill, and when it’s smarter to stay up late prepping for that presentation than to rise early for one last cram session. And if this requires some suspension of disbelief, that’s because the research defies what we’ve been told, throughout our lives, about how best to learn.   The brain is not like a muscle, at least not in any straightforward sense. It is something else altogether, sensitive to mood, to timing, to circadian rhythms, as well as to location and environment. It doesn’t take orders well, to put it mildly. If the brain is a learning machine, then it is an eccentric one. In How We Learn, Benedict Carey shows us how to exploit its quirks to our advantage.  Praise for How We Learn“This book is a revelation. I feel as if I’ve owned a brain for fifty-four years and only now discovered the operating manual.”—Mary Roach, bestselling author of Stiff and Gulp“A welcome rejoinder to the faddish notion that learning is all about the hours put in.” —The New York Times Book Review   “A valuable, entertaining tool for educators, students and parents.” —Shelf Awareness   “How We Learn is more than a new approach to learning; it is a guide to making the most out of life. Who wouldn’t be interested in that?” —Scientific American   “I know of no other source that pulls together so much of what we know about the science of memory and couples it with practical, practicable advice.”—Daniel T. Willingham, professor of psychology at the University of Virginia

Number Talks, Grades K-5: Helping Children Build Mental Math and Computation Strategies


Sherry Parrish - 2010
    The author explains what a classroom number talk is; how to follow students’ thinking and pose the right questions to build understanding; how to prepare for and design purposeful number talks; and how to develop grade-level specific thinking strategies for the operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Number Talks includes connections to NCTM’s Principles and Standards for School Mathematics as well as reference tables to help you quickly and easily locate strategies, number talks, and video clips. Includes a Facilitator’s Guide and DVD.

The One World Schoolhouse: Education Reimagined


Salman Khan - 2012
    Today millions of students, parents, and teachers use the Khan Academy's free videos and software, which have expanded to encompass nearly every conceivable subject; and Academy techniques are being employed with exciting results in a growing number of classrooms around the globe.Like many innovators, Khan rethinks existing assumptions and imagines what education could be if freed from them. And his core idea-liberating teachers from lecturing and state-mandated calendars and opening up class time for truly human interaction-has become his life's passion. Schools seek his advice about connecting to students in a digital age, and people of all ages and backgrounds flock to the site to utilize this fresh approach to learning.In THE ONE WORLD SCHOOLHOUSE, Khan presents his radical vision for the future of education, as well as his own remarkable story, for the first time. In these pages, you will discover, among other things:* How both students and teachers are being bound by a broken top-down model invented in Prussia two centuries ago* Why technology will make classrooms more human and teachers more important* How and why we can afford to pay educators the same as other professionals* How we can bring creativity and true human interactivity back to learning* Why we should be very optimistic about the future of learning.Parents and politicians routinely bemoan the state of our education system. Statistics suggest we've fallen behind the rest of the world in literacy, math, and sciences. With a shrewd reading of history, Khan explains how this crisis presented itself, and why a return to "mastery learning," abandoned in the twentieth century and ingeniously revived by tools like the Khan Academy, could offer the best opportunity to level the playing field, and to give all of our children a world-class education now.More than just a solution, THE ONE WORLD SCHOOLHOUSE serves as a call for free, universal, global education, and an explanation of how Khan's simple yet revolutionary thinking can help achieve this inspiring goal.

Reading Essentials: The Specifics You Need to Teach Reading Well


Regie Routman - 2002
    This is where Regie Routman steps in: giving clarity, support, specific demonstrations, and confidence to teachers so they can teach reading in a manner that is consistent with research and learning theory and respectful of students' needs, interests, and abilities. In Reading Essentials, she realistically describes how to achieve these goals-and get high test scores too.Based on her continuing work teaching in schools, Routman proves that good teaching doesn't have to mean lots of hours spent planning. What's necessary is good thinking-thinking about what matters to kids, what kids need to know, how we can move them forward, and how to ensure that they comprehend and enjoy what they read-including struggling students. Readers will discover research-based strategies, immediately doable ideas, and detailed lessons-all based on an instructional framework that includes:demonstrations shared demonstrations guided practice independent practice. Thoughout the text, Routman emphasizes the use of professional common sense and demonstrates how to maximize your time, making the most of every teachable moment. Practical, philosophical, and political, Reading Essentials gets to the heart of what excellent reading instruction is all about-and puts the fun back into your teaching.

Igniting a Passion for Reading: Successful Strategies for Building Lifetime Readers


Steven L. Layne - 2009
    But how can you teach the "how" without the "why?" In his new book, Igniting a Passion for Reading, Steve Layne shows teachers how to develop readers who are not only motivated to read great books, but also love reading in its own right. Packed with practical ways to engage and inspire readers from kindergarten through high school, this book is a "must have" on every teacher's professional book shelf.Well known for his children's books, young adult novels, and keynote speeches across the nation and around the world, Steve, aka Dr. Read, offers teachers everywhere a plan for engaging even the most reluctant reader. From read-alouds to creating reading lounges to author visits and so much more, this book will help schools create a vibrant reading culture. The book also includes reminiscences from many of today's well-known children's and young adult authors—Mem Fox, Sharon Draper, Steven Kellogg, Candace Fleming, Eric Rohman, Neal Shusterman, and Joan Bauer—about the teacher who ignited their passion for reading.Written with humor, grace, and poignancy, Igniting a Passion for Reading will have a profound effect on the teaching of reading in our nation's schools.

Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning


James M. Lang - 2016
    But that's easier said than done. Many books about cognitive theory introduce radical but impractical theories, failing to make the connection to the classroom. In "Small Teaching, " James Lang presents a strategy for improving student learning with a series of modest but powerful changes that make a big difference-many of which can be put into practice in a single class period. These strategies are designed to bridge the chasm between primary research and the classroom environment in a way that can be implemented by any faculty in any discipline, and even integrated into pre-existing teaching techniques. Learn, for example: How does one become good at retrieving knowledge from memory? How does making predictions now help us learn in the future? How do instructors instill fixed or growth mindsets in their students?Each chapter introduces a basic concept in cognitive theory, explains when and how it should be employed, and provides firm examples of how the intervention has been or could be used in a variety of disciplines. Small teaching techniques include brief classroom or online learning activities, one-time interventions, and small modifications in course design or communication with students.

For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood... and the Rest of Y'all Too: Reality Pedagogy and Urban Education


Christopher Emdin - 2016
    He begins by taking to task the perception of urban youth of color as unteachable, and he challenges educators to embrace and respect each student’s culture and to reimagine the classroom as a site where roles are reversed and students become the experts in their own learning.Putting forth his theory of Reality Pedagogy, Emdin provides practical tools to unleash the brilliance and eagerness of youth and educators alike—both of whom have been typecast and stymied by outdated modes of thinking about urban education. With this fresh and engaging new pedagogical vision, Emdin demonstrates the importance of creating a family structure and building communities within the classroom, using culturally relevant strategies like hip-hop music and call-and-response, and connecting the experiences of urban youth to indigenous populations globally. Merging real stories with theory, research, and practice, Emdin demonstrates how by implementing the “Seven C’s” of reality pedagogy in their own classrooms, urban youth of color benefit from truly transformative education.Lively, accessible, and revelatory, For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood...and the Rest of Y’all Too is the much-needed antidote to traditional top-down pedagogy and promises to radically reframe the landscape of urban education for the better.

Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction for the Thinking Classroom


H. Lynn Erickson - 2006
    Synthesizing Lynn Erickson's past 15 years of field work with teachers, curriculum developers, teacher educators, and instructional leaders, this resource offers a complete guide for designing curriculum and instruction to foster the continuous growth and development of students' critical, abstract, and creative learning skills. Educators will learn how to:Bring coherence and clarity to high-quality curriculum design and instructional planning Teach the way that students' minds learn best Encourage students' creative and abstract thinking, regardless of level or subject area Gain the support of principals and district administrators