Thinking Strategies for Student Achievement


Book Description

This revised edition offers 30 specific strategies, readily integrated into daily lesson plans, to help K-12 students extend their thinking capabilities and raise their achievement levels.




Thinking-Based Learning


Book Description

Originally published in hardcover: Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon Publishers, c2008.




Thinking Strategies for Student Achievement


Book Description

"This resource provides a repertoire of high-effect comprehension strategies. It is important for classroom teachers and school leaders to be able to justify why they are using specific strategies and what the benefits are of a specific strategy. Nessel and Graham provide this justification." -W. Dorsey Hammond, Professor of Education Salisbury University Use these strategies to develop your students′ thinking skills and increase their learning in all subject areas. How can teachers improve students′ higher level and creative thinking? The revised edition of this handbook provides strategies and sample lesson plans to help students learn to think more effectively and to raise their achievement levels. Drawing upon past and recent research, the authors discuss the importance of actively engaging all students-including those with a history of low achievement-in higher levels of thinking. Thirty specific strategies, including K-W-L, Read and Think Math, and Reciprocal Teaching, can be readily integrated into daily lesson plans. This step-by-step guide shows teachers how to: Help students develop, refine, and extend their thinking capacities Challenge students to creatively approach complex and unfamiliar material Encourage students to bring their own perspective to class assignments Provide students at all learning levels with appropriate support With its user-friendly, practical approach, this important resource should be in the hands of every educator!




Building Executive Function


Book Description

Educators clamor to provide top-notch lessons and resources for students, but if students lack executive function, even the best materials won't produce the desired results. If students haven’t developed the brain-based skills to focus, catch and correct errors, identify cause-and-effect relationships, and more, they can't make sense of lessons. Executive function is the missing link to student achievement. But how can you develop this in the classroom? In this new book, bestselling author Nancy Sulla has the answers. She explains how building executive function requires a combination of activities, structures, and teacher facilitation strategies aimed at six increasingly complex life skills that should be the goal of any school: conscious control, engagement, collaboration, empowerment, efficacy, and leadership. She also offers a variety of examples, activities, and structures fit for every grade level and subject area. With the book’s practical strategies and tools, you will be inspired, armed, and ready to establish a clear framework for building executive function in all your students.




Thinking Through Quality Questioning


Book Description

Asking the right questions is the answer This groundbreaking book provides teachers with an accessible, research-based blueprint for developing student metacognitive skills and ensuring that students take responsibility for their own learning. The authors use the findings of cognitive scientists to highlight quality questioning behaviors and explain how to apply them for improved student outcomes. Key features include: Short vignettes of quality questioning in action Evidence that ties question strategy to student achievement An overview of collaborative, written, electronic, and group response strategies Examples of how quality questioning connects to formative assessment Special note regarding the eBook version: Some figures have been redacted in compliance with digital rights permissions.




Mistakes That Worked


Book Description

The greatest discoveries are made outside the classroom! Learn all about mistakes that changed the world with this collection of the strange stories behind everyday inventions! It's no accident that you'll love this book! SANDWICHES came about when an English earl was too busy gambling to eat his meal and needed to keep one hand free. POTATO CHIPS were first cooked by a chef who was furious when a customer complained that his fried potatoes weren’t thin enough. Coca-Cola, Silly Putty, and X rays have fascinating stories behind them too! Their unusual tales, and many more, along with hilarious cartoons and weird, amazing facts, make up this fun-filled book about everyday items that had surprisingly haphazard beginnings. And don't miss Eat Your Words about the fascinating language of food! “A splendid book that is as informative as it is entertaining . . . a gem.” —Booklist, Starred Review




Visible Learning


Book Description

This unique and ground-breaking book is the result of 15 years research and synthesises over 800 meta-analyses on the influences on achievement in school-aged students. It builds a story about the power of teachers, feedback, and a model of learning and understanding. The research involves many millions of students and represents the largest ever evidence based research into what actually works in schools to improve learning. Areas covered include the influence of the student, home, school, curricula, teacher, and teaching strategies. A model of teaching and learning is developed based on the notion of visible teaching and visible learning. A major message is that what works best for students is similar to what works best for teachers – an attention to setting challenging learning intentions, being clear about what success means, and an attention to learning strategies for developing conceptual understanding about what teachers and students know and understand. Although the current evidence based fad has turned into a debate about test scores, this book is about using evidence to build and defend a model of teaching and learning. A major contribution is a fascinating benchmark/dashboard for comparing many innovations in teaching and schools.




Visual Thinking Strategies


Book Description

2014 Outstanding Academic Title, Choice "What’s going on in this picture?" With this one question and a carefully chosen work of art, teachers can start their students down a path toward deeper learning and other skills now encouraged by the Common Core State Standards. The Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) teaching method has been successfully implemented in schools, districts, and cultural institutions nationwide, including bilingual schools in California, West Orange Public Schools in New Jersey, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. It provides for open-ended yet highly structured discussions of visual art, and significantly increases students’ critical thinking, language, and literacy skills along the way. Philip Yenawine, former education director of New York’s Museum of Modern Art and cocreator of the VTS curriculum, writes engagingly about his years of experience with elementary school students in the classroom. He reveals how VTS was developed and demonstrates how teachers are using art—as well as poems, primary documents, and other visual artifacts—to increase a variety of skills, including writing, listening, and speaking, across a range of subjects. The book shows how VTS can be easily and effectively integrated into elementary classroom lessons in just ten hours of a school year to create learner-centered environments where students at all levels are involved in rich, absorbing discussions.




Thinking Strategies for Student Achievement


Book Description

Formerly a SkyLight publication. This one-of-a-kind handbook will help teachers expand their approaches and strategies to teaching and dramatically alter students' achievement. In Thinking Strategies for Student Achievement, educational experts Denise Nessel and Joyce Graham Baltas present several strategies for improving thinking and literacy skills, including "Readers' Theater," "Freewriting" and "Key Word." The authors give expert advice on: Why the strategies should be used When to use them How to implement them The authors also include methods to revise strategies to best fit teachers' individual needs.




Using the Workshop Approach in the High School English Classroom


Book Description

Do you find that preparing for standardized tests interferes with teaching advanced thinking, reading, and writing skills in a meaningful way? Do you want to balance test preparation with more creative activities? Success in school and beyond depends on one’s ability to read fluently, write coherently, and think critically. This handbook uses the workshop model for exponentially increasing adolescents’ abilities in these three key areas. This practical guide addresses the daily running and practice of a workshop-based classroom, using research and the author’s own experiences to illustrate how to establish a workshop that: Fosters lasting learning while reinforcing the skills needed for standardized tests Teaches audience and purpose as a vehicle to style and structure Provides a supportive and lively environment in which students are comfortable enough to take risks and share original ideas Try Urbanski’s approach to teaching literacy analysis and mentoring student writers, and discover just how rewarding the workshop experience can be!




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