Swimming in the Deep End


Book Description

"Acquire the knowledge and resources necessary to achieve true success as a leader and enact strategic change and school improvement. In Swimming in the Deep End, author Jennifer Abrams dives deep into the four foundational skills required of effective leadership and change management: (1) thinking before speaking, (2) preempting resistance, (3) responding to resistance, and (4) managing oneself through change and resistance. Throughout the book readers receive ample guidance for building these vital skills and leading school initiatives and implementation plans that face 21st century challenges head-on." --




Professional Learning Communities at Work


Book Description

Provides specific information on how to transform schools into results-oriented professional learning communities, describing the best practices that have been used by schools nationwide.




Developing Assessment-Capable Visible Learners, Grades K-12


Book Description

“When students know how to learn, they are able to become their own teachers.” —Nancy Frey, Douglas Fisher, and John Hattie Imagine students who describe their learning in these terms: “I know where I’m going, I have the tools I need for the journey, and I monitor my own progress.” Now imagine the extraordinary difference this type of ownership makes in their progress over the course of a school year. This illuminating book shows how to make this scenario an everyday reality. With its foundation in principles introduced in the authors’ bestselling Visible Learning for Literacy, this resource delves more deeply into the critical component of self-assessment, revealing the most effective types of assessment and how each can motivate students to higher levels of achievement.




The NEW School Rules


Book Description

Actions to increase effectiveness of schools in a rapidly changing world Schools, in order to be nimble and stay relevant and impactful, need to abandon the rigid structures designed for less dynamic times. The NEW School Rules expands cutting-edge organizational design and modern management techniques into an operating system for empowering schools with the same agility and responsiveness so vital in the business world. 6 simple rules create a unified vision of responsiveness among educators Real life case studies illustrate responsive techniques implemented in a variety of educational demographics 15 experiments guide school and district leaders toward increased responsiveness in their faculty and staff




The Leader in Me


Book Description

Children in today's world are inundated with information about who to be, what to do and how to live. But what if there was a way to teach children how to manage priorities, focus on goals and be a positive influence on the world around them? The Leader in Meis that programme. It's based on a hugely successful initiative carried out at the A.B. Combs Elementary School in North Carolina. To hear the parents of A. B Combs talk about the school is to be amazed. In 1999, the school debuted a programme that taught The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Peopleto a pilot group of students. The parents reported an incredible change in their children, who blossomed under the programme. By the end of the following year the average end-of-grade scores had leapt from 84 to 94. This book will launch the message onto a much larger platform. Stephen R. Covey takes the 7 Habits, that have already changed the lives of millions of people, and shows how children can use them as they develop. Those habits -- be proactive, begin with the end in mind, put first things first, think win-win, seek to understand and then to be understood, synergize, and sharpen the saw -- are critical skills to learn at a young age and bring incredible results, proving that it's never too early to teach someone how to live well.




Strategic Doing


Book Description

Ten skills for agile leadership Complex challenges are all around us—they impact our companies, our communities, and our planet. This complexity and the emergence of networks is changing the practice of strategic management. Today’s leaders need to understand how to design and guide complex collaborations to accelerate innovation and change—collaborations that cross boundaries both inside and outside organizations. Strategic Doing introduces you to the new disciplines of agile strategy and collaborative leadership. You’ll learn how to design and guide complex collaborations by following a discipline of simple rules that you won’t find anywhere else. • Unleash the power of true collaboration • Learn and master the 10 skills of agile leadership • Apply individual skills to targeted situations • Introduces a new discipline of leadership strategy Filled with compelling case studies, Strategic Doing outlines a new discipline of leadership strategy specifically designed for open, loosely-connected networks.




Creative Curriculum


Book Description

The Creative Curriculum comes alive! This videotape-winner of the 1989 Silver Apple Award at the National Educational Film and Video Festival-demonstrates how teachers set the stage for learning by creating a dynamic well-organized environment. It shows children involved in seven of the interest areas in the The Creative Curriculum and explains how they learn in each area. Everyone conducts in-service training workshops for staff and parents or who teaches early childhood education courses will find the video an indispensable tool for explainin appropriate practice.




The NEW Team Habits


Book Description

Leading teams in a rapidly changing world To achieve their ambitious goals, it is essential that education leaders build effective teams. Many leaders want to shift the way their teams collaborate, make decisions, and learn together, but struggle to make lasting change. Written for leaders who want to improve their teams, this guide is a follow-up to the best-seller, The NEW School Rules, a framework for transitioning to a more responsive, innovative organization. The NEW Team Habits goes further, providing battle-tested practices the authors have used with hundreds of leadership teams to build better team habits. Readers will find • a five step learning cycle for building team habits • videos, readings, and other resources to build knowledge • engaging team activities to drive learning With tools leaders and teams can use right away, this guide provides the inspiration, steps, tools, and activities you need to improving your team habits for learning, meetings, and projects.




The Strategic School


Book Description

Strategically reorganize school resources to support instructional and performance priorities! How can schools best use the resources they already have? Exploring the link between purposeful resource allocation and academic achievement, this book shows principals and administrators how to effectively use all available resources: people, time, and money. Drawing on their extensive research with urban schools and districts, the authors offer case studies, planning guides, checklists, worksheets, and strategies aligned with ISLLC standards to help leaders: Assess current resource use in new ways Organize resources more creatively and flexibly Craft a master schedule that works Connect resource allocation to student and school performance




Literacy Triangle


Book Description

Accelerate learning with high-impact strategies. Beginning and veteran teachers alike will find insights and practices they can use immediately. The authors dovetail their proven instructional process of chunk, chew, check, change with before-, during-, and after-reading strategies in this must-have guide for powerful literacy instruction. No matter what content area you teach, this book will help you develop the strategic reader in every student. K–8 teachers who are interested in high-impact teaching strategies will: Learn how to incorporate the literacy triangle's three points—reading, discussing, and writing—into instruction for any subject Cut through the conflict caused by the reading wars and gain clarity on the science behind effective, well-rounded literacy instruction Help students enjoy reading, gain comprehension, and build reading stamina Get differentiation ideas for scaffolding and enriching each strategy using best practices in literacy instruction Discover how to engage students in opportunities for making meaning, choosing texts, and leading discussions Understand how setting a student's purpose for reading can encourage focus, engagement, deeper conversations, and a motivation to keep reading with literacy strategies Contents: Introduction Part 1: Planning for Quality Literacy Instruction Chapter 1: Teaching Literacy Effectively Chapter 2: Choosing the "Right" Text Chapter 3: Using the Literacy Triangle to Drastically Improve Literacy Part 2: Implementing Quality Literacy Instruction Chapter 4: Preparing for Success--Before Reading Chapter 5: Staying Focused on the Goal--During Reading Chapter 6: Consolidating With Discussion and Writing--After Reading Chapter 7: Bringing It All Together Conclusion References and Resources Index