Kategoria BISAC: Education >> Professional Development

Principals in today's schools face the complex challenge of being both visionary educational leaders and effective managers. They struggle to meet the conflicting needs and expectations of the staff and students, the parents, trustees, and even those in the wider community. They constantly strive to create a quality school environment that encourages learning for all.

A teacher educator, researcher and consultant, Susan Church has a long-standing interest in the complexities and challenges of educational leadership. In The Principal Difference she explores the issues that...

The school library has changed dramatically. Today, it is a portal to a world of learning that includes traditional books, digital resources, and online environments. As the importance of information and communication technologies grows, teachers and teacher-librarians hold the key to creating powerful learning opportunities that help students function more effectively.

This comprehensive guide discusses the changing responsibilities of classroom teachers and teacher-librarians in helping students become better readers, writers, and researchers. It offers suggestions for re-inventing...

The Writing Circle explores classroom writing groups as a powerful structure for giving students the support and guidance they need. Based on a common structure found in the writing world outside of school, these groups provide an ideal way for students to learn from each other. Under the teacher's guidance, young writers can work together on all aspects of the writing process--sharing drafts of writing, responding to each other's works-in-progress, and building confidence in themselves as writers.

The writing process is dynamic; writers move from one stage to the other and...

This practical book offers effective and creative activities that help young students master the skills they need to grow as writers. Among the topics discussed, the book thoroughly explores the important beginning steps, such as:

• putting pencil to paper;
• identifying and printing letters of the alphabet;
• exploring sound-symbol matches.

Basic Tools for Beginning Writers recognizes that story and image are good ways to introduce students to concepts. The making of a simple word such as "go" is told as a story, the combining of onsets with...

This playful 32-page flip book explores all aspects of poetry -- from guidelines and an overview of poetic forms to the Top Ten lists of various poetry favorites. Handy reproducible masters are also provided which include a poetry timetable, ten questions to ask about any poem, an observation checklist for teachers, and a personal poetry inventory for students.

Created by two remarkable poets and educators, The Poetry Experience brings their infectious style to a topic that is often challenging for students and teachers alike. From questions and short activities to full...

This is a book about problem solving--an internal tool that shapes the cognitive development of young readers and writers. At the same time, it is a book about the role of the teacher and the curriculum in structuring problem-solving opportunities. It is a book that advocates for schools to create intellectual environments that make literate thinking a top priority for children. Finally, it is a book that presents teaching and learning as collaborative processes between many people with a common goal--literacy for children.
from the Introduction

How can teachers create a...

The goal of teaching writing is to create independent and self-motivated writers. When students write more often, they become better at writing. They acquire habits, skills, and strategies that enable them to learn more about the craft of writing. Yet they require the guidance and support of a more knowledgeable person who understands the writing process, the changes over time in writing development, and specific techniques and procedures for teaching writing.

In Scaffolding Young Writers: A Writers' Workshop Approach, Linda J. Dorn and Carla Soffos present a clear road map...

This book will help teachers solve the dilemma: What does the rest of my class do while I'm working with a small reading group? Debbie Diller offers practical suggestions for over a dozen literacy work stations that link to instruction and make preparation and management easy for teachers. Learn how to set up work stations, how to manage them, and how to keep them going throughout the year.

Each chapter includes:

• how to introduce each station;
• materials to include at each station;
• what to model;
• how to solve problems;
• how to...

Teaching comprehension with informational texts is a critical component of any reading program and one that many children struggle with as they progress through their schooling. Nonfiction can be overwhelming to young readers, presenting them with complex vocabulary and a new density of information that may combine text, diagrams, pictures, captions, and other devices. In this book, Tony Stead provides wonderful ways to enhance children's understanding and engagement when reading for information. Based on many years of working in K-7 classrooms, he outlines practical approaches to ensure...

The benefits and importance of Socratic seminars are widely recognized, but little has been written on how to make them happen successfully in the classroom. By offering real-world examples and straightforward answers to frequent questions, Matt Copeland has created a coaching guide for both the teacher new to Socratic seminars and the experienced teacher seeking to optimize the benefits of this powerful strategy. Socratic Circles also shows teachers who are familiar with literature circles the many ways in which these two practices complement and extend each...

In the early grades, talking and drawing can provide children with a natural pathway to writing, yet these components are often overlooked. In Talking, Drawing, Writing: Lessons for Our Youngest Writers Martha Horn and Mary Ellen Giacobbe invite readers to join them in classrooms where they listen, watch, and talk with children, then use what they learn to create lessons designed to meet children where they are and lead them into the world of writing. The authors make a case for a broader definition of writing, advocating for formal storytelling sessions, in which children tell...

Comic books and graphic novels, known collectively as "graphica," have long been popular with teenagers and adults. Recently graphica has grown in popularity with younger readers as well, motivating and engaging some of our most reluctant readers who often shun traditional texts. While some teachers have become curious about graphica's potential, many are confused by the overwhelming number of new titles and series, in both fiction and nonfiction, and are unsure of its suitability and function in their classrooms.

Drawing on his own success using graphica with elementary students,...

While the population of Hispanic/Latino and African American students in the United States continues to grow, the rate at which they attend college remains alarmingly small. These students, who are often defined as "educationally underrepresented," are a bellwether of a shortcoming in our nation's educational system that has serious implications for the future. In Greater Expectations, Robin Turner, a high school English teacher from Anaheim, California, offers pragmatic, proven methods for better preparing underrepresented students for higher education.

The study of educational leadership makes little sense unless it is in relation to who the leaders are, how they are leading, what is being led, and with what effect. Based on the premise that learning is at the heart of leadership and that leaders themselves should be learners, the Leadership for Learning series explores the connections between educational leadership, policy, curriculum, human resources and accountability. Each book in the series approaches its subject matter through a three-fold structure of process, themes and impact.

Series Editors - Clive Dimmock, Mark...

Based upon Gerald Haigh s acclaimed weekly column in the Times Educational Supplement, this book is a lively and refreshing look at what it takes to get on in teaching.

Touching on everything from the legacy of Ted Wragg to the film Brokeback Mountain the author s incise eye will give teachers wanting to get on in their career both inspiration and much to ponder upon.

This reworked and thematically grouped collection will give leaders and aspiring leaders in education vital insights and observations into a wide range of topics including:

• the...