Caroline's revelation will change the way you think. This book is the owner's manual for how our brains work."--Matthew and Laurie Crouch, Trinity Broadcasting Network"Caroline Leaf has given us a real jewel, translating modern brain science into language accessible to everyone."--David I. Levy, MD, neurosurgeon, author of Gray Matter"[Caroline] explains how our choices work scientifically, but in a practical way that makes something that is really hard to do much easier and more tangible."--Christine Caine, founder of the A21 Campaign; director of Equip and Empower Ministries; author of Undaunted"We encourage you to act on the wisdom found in Switch On Your Brain and begin the incredible journey of thinking God's way."--Robert and Debbie Morris, pastors of Gateway Church; authors of The Blessed Life, The Blessed Marriage, and The Blessed Woman"Dr. Leaf's teaching is not only life changing but life saving as it makes the renewing of the mind so real. I am so very grateful for the wisdom contained within these pages."--Darlene Zschech, singer-songwriter; author of The Art of Mentoring"Each of us is full of untapped potential when it comes to our ability to think and process our way through life. I pray that Caroline's years of research and passion in this realm of unfolding science will be a blessing to you."--Bobbie Houston, senior pastor, Hillsong Church

    Detentions. Suspensions. Expulsions. These are the established tools of school discipline for kids who don't abide by school rules, have a hard time getting along with other kids, don't seem to respect authority, don't seem interested in learning, and are disrupting the learning of their classmates. But there's a big problem with these strategies: They are ineffective for most of the students to whom they are applied.It's time for a change in course.Here, Dr. Ross W. Greene presents an enlightened, clear-cut, and practical alternative. Relying on research from the neurosciences, Dr. Greene offers a new conceptual framework for understanding the difficulties of kids with behavioral challenges and explains why traditional discipline isn't effective at addressing these difficulties. Emphasizing the revolutionarily simple and positive notion that kids do well if they can, he persuasively argues that kids with behavioral challenges are not attention-seeking, manipulative, limit-testing, coercive, or unmotivated, but that they lack the skills to behave adaptively. And when adults recognize the true factors underlying difficult behavior and teach kids the skills in increments they can handle, the results are astounding: The kids overcome their obstacles; the frustration of teachers, parents, and classmates diminishes; and the well-being and learning of all students are enhanced.In Lost at School, Dr. Greene describes how his road-tested, evidence-based approach — called Collaborative Problem Solving — can help challenging kids at school.His lively, compelling narrative includes:• tools to identify the triggers and lagging skills underlying challenging behavior.• explicit guidance on how to radically improve interactions with challenging kids — along with many examples showing how it's done.• dialogues, Q & A's, and the story, which runs through the book, of one child and his teachers, parents, and school.• practical guidance for successful planning and collaboration among teachers, parents, administrations, and kids.Backed by years of experience and research, and written with a powerful sense of hope and achievable change, Lost at School gives teachers and parents the realistic strategies and information to impact the classroom experience of every challenging kid.

    Daniel Goleman's brilliant report from the frontiers of psychology and neuroscience offers startling new insight into our "two minds"—the rational and the emotional—and how they together shape our destiny.Through vivid examples, Goleman delineates the five crucial skills of emotional intelligence, and shows how they determine our success in relationships, work, and even our physical well-being. What emerges is an entirely new way to talk about being smart. The best news is that "emotional literacy" is not fixed early in life. Every parent, every teacher, every business leader, and everyone interested in a more civil society, has a stake in this compelling vision of human possibility.From the Trade Paperback edition.

    Arnold, CHOICE"The book provides readers with a clear, sympathetic and unbiased understanding of the four conflicting visions of curriculum that will enable them to more productively interact with educators who might hold different beliefs. The book stimulates readers to better understand their own beliefs and also to provide them with an understanding of alternate ways of thinking about the fundamental goals of education" --SIRREADALOT.ORG"A much needed, insightful view of alternative curriculum orientations. This is an exceptionally written book that will be useful to teachers, curriculum workers, and school administrators."--Marc Mahlios, University of Kansas"Curriculum Theory: Conflicting Visions and Enduring Concerns is a thought provoking text that invites self-analysis."--Lars J. Helgeson, University of North DakotaCurriculum Theory: Conflicting Visions and Enduring Concerns presents a clear, unbiased, and rigorous description of the major curriculum philosophies that have influenced educators and schooling over the last century. Author Michael Stephen Schiro analyzes four educational visions--Scholar Academic, Social Efficiency, Learner Centered, and Social Reconstruction--to enable readers to reflect on their own educational beliefs and allow them to more productively interact with educators who might hold different beliefs.Key FeaturesProvides a historical perspective on the origins of curriculum ideologies: The book places our current educational debates and issues in a historical context of enduring concerns.Offers a model of how educational movements can be critically analyzed: Using a post-structuralist perspective, this model enables readers to more effectively contribute to the public debate about educational issues.Pays careful attention to the way language is used by educators to give meaning to frequently unspoken assumptions: The text's examination helps readers better understand curricular disagreements that occur in schools.Highlights the complexities of curriculum work in a social context: With an understanding of the ideological pressures exerted on them by society and colleagues, readers can put these pressures in perspective and maintain their own values, beliefs, and practices.Intended AudienceThis book is designed as a supplemental text for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses such as Curriculum Theory, Introduction to Curriculum and Instruction, Curriculum Philosophy, and Curriculum Theory and Practice in the department of education.Talk to the author! schiro@bc.eduTo visit the author's web site, please visit: http: //www2.bc.edu/ schiro/sage.html.

     And yet it feels impossible to have that focus when you’re exhausted and overwhelmed. How can you make a difference when you’re distracted by never-ending paperwork, meetings, errands, and housework? How can you give the best of yourself when you’re bogged down with mundane tasks and unfulfilling obligations? You’ll never have enough time to do everything. But there is a way to free up time, attention, and energy for the things that really matter: the activities that truly impact student learning; the practices that make you a more effective educator; and the routines that make your home and personal life more fulfilling. Throughout this book, you’ll learn how to disrupt the status quo by challenging school and cultural norms. You’ll also discover how to create healthy boundaries, overcome feelings of self-doubt, release yourself from perfectionism, and decide what work/life balance looks like for you. "Fewer Things, Better" will help you challenge the correlation between hours worked and effectiveness. It’s not about how much you’re working; it’s what you’re using your hours to focus on. As you read, you’ll gain clarity on what’s most important in every aspect of your life and work so you can allocate time to your biggest priorities. You’ll deepen the courage it takes to live with intentionality, so you can do more of what you love and let go of habits and expectations which aren’t serving you well. It’s time to release yourself from the feeling of never having done enough. It’s time to stop giving in to the pressure to be constantly busy. It’s time to do fewer things, so what remains can be done even better.

    With wisdom gained through years of medical practice and research, Scattered Minds is a must-read for parents – and for anyone interested how experiences in infancy shape the biology and psychology of the human brain.Scattered Minds:- Demonstrates that ADD is not an inherited illness, but a reversible impairment and developmental delay- Explains that in ADD, circuits in the brain whose job is emotional self-regulation and attention control fail to develop in infancy – and why- Shows how ‘distractibility’ is the psychological product of life experience- Allows parents to understand what makes their ADD children tick, and adults with ADD to gain insights into their emotions and behaviours- Expresses optimism about neurological development even in adulthood- Presents a programme of how to promote this development in both children and adults

    N.D.D., or Nutrition Deficit Disorder, as coined by Dr. Bill Sears, is based on the idea that if "you put junk food into a child's brain, you get back junk behavior and learning." Dr. Sears will explore the latest scientific research on the effects of nutrition on the brain. He will present case studies of his own patients who were diagnosed as "N.D.D." and showed major improvement in learning and behavior with diet change. Instead of simply medicating his patients, Dr. Sears looked for a better solution -- in fact, with better nutrition, many of his patients were able to greatly reduce or even stop their medication. The book will also provide parents with a prescription, shopping and meal tips, and recipes to make implementing a healthier lifestyle that much easier. The N.D.D. Book will be a must-have for all parents who want to help their children become healthier, happier, and better prepared to learn.

    Rest assured that the book is not mere theory. Ericsson's research focuses on the real world, and he explains in detail, with examples, how all of us can apply the principles of great performance in our work or in any other part of our lives."-- Fortune Anders Ericsson has made a career studying chess champions, violin virtuosos, star athletes, and memory mavens. Peak distills three decades of myth-shattering research into a powerful learning strategy that is fundamentally different from the way people traditionally think about acquiring new abilities. Whether you want to stand out at work, improve your athletic or musical performance, or help your child achieve academic goals, Ericsson's revolutionary methods will show you how to improve at almost any skill that matters to you."The science of excellence can be divided into two eras: before Ericsson and after Ericsson. His groundbreaking work, captured in this brilliantly useful book, provides us with a blueprint for achieving the most important and life-changing work possible: to become a little bit better each day."--Dan Coyle, author of The Talent Code "Ericsson's research has revolutionized how we think about human achievement. If everyone would take the lessons of this book to heart, it could truly change the world."--Joshua Foer, author of Moonwalking with Einstein

     Twenty minutes a day is all you need, and within 100 teaching days your child will be reading on a solid second-grade reading level. It’s a sensible, easy-to-follow, and enjoyable way to help your child gain the essential skills of reading. Everything you need is here—no paste, no scissors, no flash cards, no complicated directions—just you and your child learning together. One hundred lessons, fully illustrated and color-coded for clarity, give your child the basic and more advanced skills needed to become a good reader.

    Too often, however, the mathematics instruction that we impose upon them in the classroom fails to connect with this informal knowledge. Children's Mathematics was written to help you understand children's intuitive mathematical thinking and use that knowledge to help children learn mathematics with understanding. Based on more than twenty years of research, this book portrays the development of children's understanding of basic number concepts. The authors offer a detailed explanation and numerous examples of the problem-solving and computational processes that virtually all children use as their numerical thinking develops. They also describe how classrooms can be organized to foster that development. Two accompanying CDs provide a remarkable inside look at students and teachers in real classrooms implementing the teaching and learning strategies described in the text. Together, the book and CDs provide you with the foundation necessary to engage children in discussions of how they think through problems-providing suggestions for what problems to give and insight into what responses to expect, and how children's thinking will evolve.

    What will she do? And what are the implications for her behavior later in life?The world's leading expert on self-control, Walter Mischel has proven that the ability to delay gratification is critical for a successful life, predicting higher SAT scores, better social and cognitive functioning, a healthier lifestyle and a greater sense of self-worth. But is willpower prewired, or can it be taught?In The Marshmallow Test, Mischel explains how self-control can be mastered and applied to challenges in everyday life—from weight control to quitting smoking, overcoming heartbreak, making major decisions, and planning for retirement. With profound implications for the choices we make in parenting, education, public policy and self-care, The Marshmallow Test will change the way you think about who we are and what we can be.

    It views the human animal as a unique being, endowed with an instinctual capacity. It asks and answers an intriguing question: why are animals in the wild, though threatened routinely, rarely traumatized? By understanding the dynamics that make wild animals virtually immune to traumatic symptoms, the mystery of human trauma is revealed.Waking the Tiger normalizes the symptoms of trauma and the steps needed to heal them. People are often traumatized by seemingly ordinary experiences. The reader is taken on a guided tour of the subtle, yet powerful impulses that govern our responses to overwhelming life events. To do this, it employs a series of exercises that help us focus on bodily sensations. Through heightened awareness of these sensations trauma can be healed.

    Little has changed, however, since then: over half of our children still read at a basic level and few become highly proficient. Many American children and adults are not functionally literate, with serious consequences. Poor readers are more likely to drop out of the educational system and as adults are unable to fully participate in the workforce, adequately manage their own health care, or advance their children's education. In Language at the Speed of Sight, internationally renowned cognitive scientist Mark Seidenberg reveals the underexplored science of reading, which spans cognitive science, neurobiology, and linguistics. As Seidenberg shows, the disconnect between science and education is a major factor in America's chronic underachievement. How we teach reading places many children at risk of failure, discriminates against poorer kids, and discourages even those who could have become more successful readers. Children aren't taught basic print skills because educators cling to the disproved theory that good readers guess the words in texts, a strategy that encourages skimming instead of close reading. Interventions for children with reading disabilities are delayed because parents are mistakenly told their kids will catch up if they work harder. Learning to read is more difficult for children who speak a minority dialect in the home, but that is not reflected in classroom practices. By building on science's insights, we can improve how our children read, and take real steps toward solving the inequality that illiteracy breeds. Both an expert look at our relationship with the written word and a rousing call to action, Language at the Speed of Sight is essential for parents, educators, policy makers, and all others who want to understand why so many fail to read, and how to change that.

    Good teaching, we believe, should be creatively tailored to the different learning styles of students and should use strategies that make learning easier. Make It Stick turns fashionable ideas like these on their head. Drawing on recent discoveries in cognitive psychology and other disciplines, the authors offer concrete techniques for becoming more productive learners.Memory plays a central role in our ability to carry out complex cognitive tasks, such as applying knowledge to problems never before encountered and drawing inferences from facts already known. New insights into how memory is encoded, consolidated, and later retrieved have led to a better understanding of how we learn. Grappling with the impediments that make learning challenging leads both to more complex mastery and better retention of what was learned.Many common study habits and practice routines turn out to be counterproductive. Underlining and highlighting, rereading, cramming, and single-minded repetition of new skills create the illusion of mastery, but gains fade quickly. More complex and durable learning come from self-testing, introducing certain difficulties in practice, waiting to re-study new material until a little forgetting has set in, and interleaving the practice of one skill or topic with another. Speaking most urgently to students, teachers, trainers, and athletes, Make It Stick will appeal to all those interested in the challenge of lifelong learning and self-improvement.

    The children who heard more words were better prepared when they entered school. These same kids, when followed into third grade, had bigger vocabularies, were stronger readers, and got higher test scores. This disparity in learning is referred to as the achievement gap.Professor Dana Suskind, MD, learned of this thirty million word gap in the course of her work as a cochlear implant surgeon at University of Chicago Medical School and began a new research program along with her sister-in-law, Beth Suskind, to find the best ways to bridge that gap. The Thirty Million Word Initiative has developed programs for parents to show the kind of parent-child communication that enables optimal neural development and has tested the programs in and around Chicago across demographic groups. They boil down to getting parents to follow the three Ts: Tune in to what your child is doing; Talk more to your child using lots of descriptive words; and Take turns with your child as you engage in conversation. Parents are shown how to make the words they serve up more enriching. For example, instead of telling a child, “Put your shoes on,” one might say instead, “It is time to go out. What do we have to do?” The lab's new five-year longitudinal research program has just received funding so they can further corroborate their results. The neuroscience of brain plasticity is some of the most valuable and revolutionary medical science being done today. It enables us to think and do better. It is making a difference in the lives of both the old and young.  If you care for children, this landmark book is essential reading.