Letters to Young Men in the Classroom: From a Teacher's Perspective


Book Description

This book is meant to encourage young men in school to keep going. I wrote this book in hopes that some young man who feels like giving up on school and education picks it up and decides to give it one more try. It is our duty to make sure our boys are equipped with the necessary tools to survive in this world. We need to create an environment where excellence is the total expectation for all children who cross our paths.




Letters to a Young Teacher


Book Description

The author shares a series of personal reflections, anecdotes, wisdom, and guidance in his letters to Francesca, a first-year teacher in a Boston elementary school, as he attempts to help her deal with the challenges she encounters.




Letters to a Teacher


Book Description

Inspirational reflections on the art of teaching from the acclaimed essayist and teacher who inspired Dead Poets Society. Sam Pickering has been teaching for more than forty years. As a young English teacher at Montgomery Bell Academy in Tennessee, his musings on literature and his maverick pedagogy touched a student named Tommy Schulman, who later wrote the screenplay for Dead Poets Society. Pickering went on to teach at Dartmouth and the University of Connecticut, where he has been for twenty-five years. His acclaimed essays have established him as a nimble thinker with a unique way of enlightening us through the quotidian. Letters to a Teacher is a welcome reminder that teaching is a joy and an art. In ten letters addressed to teachers of all types, Pickering shares compelling, funny, always illuminating anecdotes from a lifetime in the classrooms of schools and universities. His observations touch on topics such as competition, curiosity, enthusiasm, and truth, and are leavened throughout with stories—whether from the family breakfast table, his revelatory nature walks, or his time teaching in Australia and Syria. More than a how-to guide, Letters to a Teacher is an invitation into the hearts and minds of an extraordinary educator and his students, and an irresistible call to reflection for the teacher who knows he or she must be compassionate, optimistic, respectful, firm, and above all, dynamic. “Perhaps the most poetic–even elegiac writing about education published in the past year.” —Library Journal




Look Both Ways


Book Description

"A collection of ten short stories that all take place in the same day about kids walking home from school"--




Letters to a Teacher


Book Description

Ten essays on literature, competition, curiosity, enthusiasm, and truth from the teacher who inspired "The Dead Poet's Society" reveal the joys of teaching and the power of innovation over stale formalism.




The Knowledge Gap


Book Description

The untold story of the root cause of America's education crisis--and the seemingly endless cycle of multigenerational poverty. It was only after years within the education reform movement that Natalie Wexler stumbled across a hidden explanation for our country's frustrating lack of progress when it comes to providing every child with a quality education. The problem wasn't one of the usual scapegoats: lazy teachers, shoddy facilities, lack of accountability. It was something no one was talking about: the elementary school curriculum's intense focus on decontextualized reading comprehension "skills" at the expense of actual knowledge. In the tradition of Dale Russakoff's The Prize and Dana Goldstein's The Teacher Wars, Wexler brings together history, research, and compelling characters to pull back the curtain on this fundamental flaw in our education system--one that fellow reformers, journalists, and policymakers have long overlooked, and of which the general public, including many parents, remains unaware. But The Knowledge Gap isn't just a story of what schools have gotten so wrong--it also follows innovative educators who are in the process of shedding their deeply ingrained habits, and describes the rewards that have come along: students who are not only excited to learn but are also acquiring the knowledge and vocabulary that will enable them to succeed. If we truly want to fix our education system and unlock the potential of our neediest children, we have no choice but to pay attention.




The Boy Who Made Everyone Laugh


Book Description

When life is funny, make some jokes about it. Billy Plimpton has a big dream: to become a famous comedian when he grows up. He already knows a lot of jokes, but thinks he has one big problem standing in his way: his stutter. At first, Billy thinks the best way to deal with this is to . . . never say a word. That way, the kids in his new school won’t hear him stammer. But soon he finds out this is NOT the best way to deal with things. (For one thing, it’s very hard to tell a joke without getting a word out.) As Billy makes his way toward the spotlight, a lot of funny things (and some less funny things) happen to him. In the end, the whole school will know -- If you think you can hold Billy Plimpton back, be warned: The joke will soon be on you!




The Last Lecture


Book Description

The author, a computer science professor diagnosed with terminal cancer, explores his life, the lessons that he has learned, how he has worked to achieve his childhood dreams, and the effect of his diagnosis on him and his family.




Teachers As Cultural Workers


Book Description

Upon its original publication in Portuguese Teachers as Cultural Workers became an instant success. Translated and published in English and now reissued in paperback with new essays from leading education scholars




School, Family, and Community Partnerships


Book Description

Strengthen programs of family and community engagement to promote equity and increase student success! When schools, families, and communities collaborate and share responsibility for students′ education, more students succeed in school. Based on 30 years of research and fieldwork, the fourth edition of the bestseller School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for Action, presents tools and guidelines to help develop more effective and more equitable programs of family and community engagement. Written by a team of well-known experts, it provides a theory and framework of six types of involvement for action; up-to-date research on school, family, and community collaboration; and new materials for professional development and on-going technical assistance. Readers also will find: Examples of best practices on the six types of involvement from preschools, and elementary, middle, and high schools Checklists, templates, and evaluations to plan goal-linked partnership programs and assess progress CD-ROM with slides and notes for two presentations: A new awareness session to orient colleagues on the major components of a research-based partnership program, and a full One-Day Team Training Workshop to prepare school teams to develop their partnership programs. As a foundational text, this handbook demonstrates a proven approach to implement and sustain inclusive, goal-linked programs of partnership. It shows how a good partnership program is an essential component of good school organization and school improvement for student success. This book will help every district and all schools strengthen and continually improve their programs of family and community engagement.