Books

Shifting from me to we provides common-sense guidance for creating and implementing a strong collaborative school culture. Author Michael Roberts shares evidence-backed tools and concepts for overcoming common roadblocks to PLC implementation.

For nearly four decades, Russ Quaglia has been laying the groundwork to inform, reform and transform schools through student voice. That deep commitment is reflected in this inspirational book. Quaglia and his coauthors at the Quaglia Institute for School Voice & Aspirations deftly synthesise the thoughts and feelings of hundreds of thousands of stakeholders and offer a vision for schools where everyone’s voice matters. They posit that students, teachers, administrators and parents must work and learn together in ways that promote deep understanding and creativity. Making this collaborative effort successful, however, requires widespread recognition that all stakeholders have something to teach and they all have a role to play in moving the entire school forward.

In this second edition, Parrett and Budge show you how your school can achieve similar results. Expanding on their original framework’s still-critical concepts of actions and school culture, they incorporate new insights for addressing equity, trauma and social-emotional learning. These fresh perspectives combine with lessons learned from twelve additional high-poverty, high-performing schools to form the updated and enhanced Framework for Collective Action. Emphasising students’ social, emotional and academic learning as the hub for all action in high-performing, high-poverty schools, the authors describe how educators can work within the expanded framework to address the needs of all students, but particularly those who live in poverty.

In Collaboration for career and technical education: Teamwork beyond the core content areas in a PLC at Work®, authors Wendy Custable and Paul C Farmer provide guidance for readers who wish to integrate their career and technical education (CTE) programs into the professional learning community (PLC) process. The PLC process is proven to help CTE teachers, who are often singletons, develop rigorous academic standards and best practices to effectively prepare students for their lives after graduation. The authors share vital information and strategies that CTE teachers will need to define their purpose and customise and improve their collaborative efforts in a PLC.

This must-have resource provides gifted education teachers, specialists and coordinators with methods and strategies for successful coplanning, coteaching, coaching and collaboration with a variety of school professionals. At the classroom level, collaboration enables effective management of differentiation and increases educators’ understanding of gifted students’ needs. The book includes considerations for working with special populations, including twice-exceptional students, underachievers and culturally, linguistically and economically diverse learners, as well as meeting students’ social-emotional needs, collaborating with families and communities and advocating for gifted education.

Autonomous learner model resource book includes activities and strategies to support the development of autonomous learners. More than forty activities are included, all geared to the emotional, social, cognitive and physical development of students. Teachers may use these activities and strategies with the entire class, small groups or with individuals who are ready to be independent, self-directed, lifelong learners. These learners have the passions, abilities, skills and attitudes to go beyond the regular curriculum and take control of their own educational pathways. Field-tested strategies and activities in the book include Find some who, Teacher and learner questionnaires, Lifelong notebook, Time capsule and Night of the notables.

Probability for Kids features real-world probability scenarios for students in Years 4-6. Students will encounter problems in which they read about students their age selling magazines for a school fund raiser, concerned about their homeroom assignments, and trying to decode the combination to a safe that their grandfather abandoned, among others, all of which maximise learning so students gain a deep understanding of concepts in probability.

Differentiated lessons for every learner supports middle school teachers in teaching all students, including those with high ability. The extension lessons in this book provide for active learning tailored to address multiple learning levels. Using this semi-structured process ensures differentiated learning experiences that align to the standards while also respecting that students have different interests, have different methods of learning and are learning at different challenge levels. The time is now upon us to emphasise interdisciplinary learning experiences that provide real-world connections and engage students in relevant and meaningful learning. We have long known that while critical for gifted and talented students, these higher-level thinking strategies benefit all students.

Ready-to-use differentiation strategies introduces various low-preparation, low-stress differentiation activities and strategies that can be implemented immediately in any content area in Grades 6-8. Each differentiation strategy encourages higher level thinking and intellectual risk taking while accommodating different learning styles.

Creativity can be taught and nurtured, and we can build classrooms in which creativity thrives. This innovative collection of essays explores approaches to teaching creativity from the perspectives of experienced educators and artists. The twenty-three authors in this book share teaching stories and helpful strategies that can be used to encourage students to become more creative within specific domains. The authors include master teachers, curriculum theorists, holistic educators and award-winning practitioners. In this readable and lively book, they share their personal stories and practical advice for infusing creativity into the lives of students.

The research leaves little doubt: instructional models work. Join Elizabeth Ross Hubbell and Bryan Goodwin as they explore the variety of instructional models available to today’s educators and explain how they can unite the faculty and students in identifying - and achieving - classroom goals.

You’ve probably heard that teaching is a journey. So . . . where are you on yours?

That all depends on which challenges you’re currently facing. Trying to solve them all at once would lead to disorientation and burnout, so where to start? For guidance, join five of America’s leading thinkers, consultants and writers on teaching and learning as they demonstrate the power of self-reflection to achieve ever-deeper insights into your own strengths – and ever-better results from your students.