Education

Far too often, our students attain only a superficial level of knowledge that fails to prepare them for deeper challenges in school and beyond. In Teaching for Deeper Learning, renowned educators and best-selling authors Jay McTighe and Harvey F. Silver propose a solution: teaching students to make meaning for themselves. Contending that the ability to ""earn"" understanding will equip students to thrive in school, at work, and in life, the authors highlight seven higher-order thinking skills that facilitate students' acquisition of information for greater retention, retrieval, and transfer. These skills, which cut across content areas and grade levels and are deeply embedded in current academic standards, separate high achievers from their low-performing peers. Drawing on their deep well of research and experience, the authors: Explore what kind of content is worth having students make meaning about. Provide practical tools and strategies to help teachers target each of the seven thinking skills in the classroom. Explain how teachers can incorporate the thinking skills and tools into lesson and unit design. Show how teachers can build students' capacity to use the strategies independently. If our goal is to prepare students to meet the rigorous demands of school, college, and career, then we must foster their ability to respond to such challenges. This comprehensive, practical guide will enable teachers to engage students in the kind of learning that yields enduring understanding and valuable skills that they can use throughout their lives.

The transition from being a student teacher to taking on the full responsibility as a teacher is experienced as challenging for many novice teachers. In this book, ten newly qualified teachers from five countries, Australia, England, Finland, Israel and Norway, tell their stories as they came through in individual interviews. The narratives, written by the authors, were all approved by the teachers as 'their' stories. What can we learn from listening to the narratives? What can we bring to decision-makers about how to support new teachers? Do new teachers face similar challenges around the world, or do experiences depend on their respective contexts? There are more similarities than differences. Relevant research literature is used in discussing the cases. Much of the literature on novice teachers focuses on difficulties, and the stories presented in this book confirm that the first year is tough. However, the resilience, motivation and enthusiasm reflected in the stories provide reasons for optimism as regards teachers' satisfaction with their career choice. A major reason for deciding to stay in the profession is in the relations they created with the students. Satisfaction or stress related to the curriculum or achievements in their respective teaching subjects was not mentioned. The lessons learned from the ten novice teachers are useful when discussing the teaching profession and, not least, the induction phase of a teaching career.

Research shows that discipline problems are prevalent in public schools and continue to be one of the greatest challenges in education. In Building Bridges, author Dr. Don Parker shows educators how to address this issue head-on. He shares an array of evidence-based strategies to build teacher-student relationships and create a welcoming learning environment that fosters student engagement, motivation, and achievement. Support students at risk by creating a positive school culture and building trust: Consider the student behaviors, characteristics, and experiences that are typically barriers to success in school. Learn how and why punitive punishments and zero-tolerance policies have failed to curb poor behavior in schools or provide adequate interventions for struggling students. Understand the importance of teacher-student relationships in teaching students at risk and the ways in which trust and positive relationships improve student behavior. Develop your ability to build positive teacher-student relationships through educational techniques, classroom management strategies, and teaching methods. Study the research that supports the many academic and social benefits of positive teacher-student relationships when teaching students at risk. Examine the ways in which school culture and climate affect the behavior of students and classroom engagement. Contents: Foreword Introduction Chapter 1: Develop the Mindset Chapter 2: Show That You Care Chapter 3: Establish a Culture for Learning Chapter 4: Don't Take Bad Behavior Personally Chapter 5: Create an Effective Classroom Management Plan Chapter 6: Connect Through Content Chapter 7: Use the Back Door Chapter 8: Take an Ecological Approach Chapter 9: Develop Empathy Chapter 10: Teach Life Skills and Give Students Hope Chapter 11: Build Students' Self-Esteem Chapter 12: Get to the Root of the Problem Chapter 13: Communicate With Your Heart Chapter 14: Open Up Chapter 15: Seal the Bond and Provide Effective Feedback Epilogue References and Resources Index

A progressive, research-based approach for making learning visible Based on the Reggio Emilia approach to learning, Visible Learners highlights learning through interpreting objects and artifacts, group learning, and documentation to make students' learning evident to teachers. Visible classrooms are committed to five key principles: that learning is purposeful, social, emotional, empowering, and representational. The book includes visual essays, key practices, classroom and examples. Show how to make learning happen in relation to others, spark emotional connections, give students power over their learning, and express ideas in multiple ways Illustrate Reggio-inspired principles and approaches via quotes, photos, student and teacher reflections, and examples of student work Offer a new way to enhance learning using progressive, research-based practices for increasing collaboration and critical thinking in and outside the classroom Visible Learners asks that teachers look beyond surface-level to understand who students are, what they come to know, and how they come to know it.

Teaching Tough Topics shows teachers how to lead students to become caring citizens as they read and respond to quality children's literature. It focuses on topics that can be challenging or sensitive, yet are significant in order to build understanding of social justice, diversity, and equity. Racism, Homophobia, Bullying, Religious Intolerance, Poverty, and Physical and Mental Challenges are just some of the themes explored. The book is rooted in the belief that by using picture books, novels, poetry, and nonfiction, teachers can enrich learning with compassion and empathy as students make connections to texts, to others, and to the world.

Theory and Practice of Multicultural Education: A Focus on the K-12 Educational Setting provides an in-depth discussion of the principles and practice of multicultural education in the K-12 classrooms. Building on a theory of multicultural education as a learner-centered pedagogy, the book begins with a discussion of the learner and the educational process, addresses the issues of culture, worldview, and their implications for the educational process. The historical foundations of multicultural education, as well as the practical steps to doing multicultural education in a K-12 classroom were discussed extensively with practical tips for teachers on how to do multicultural education in the K-12 setting.

This volume focuses on multicultural curriculum transformation in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics or STEM subject areas broadly, while also focusing on sub-content areas (e.g., earth science, digital technologies) in greater detail. The discussion of each sub-content area outlines critical considerations for multicultural curriculum transformation for the sub-content areas by grade level (early childhood and elementary school education, middle and/or junior high school education, and high school education) and then by organizing tool parameters: standards (both in a generalized fashion, and specific to Common Core State Standards, among other standards), educational context, relationships with and among students and their families, civic engagement, considerations pertaining to educational "ability" broadly considered (for example, for gifted and talented education, bilingual gifted and talented education, "regular" education, bilingual "regular" education, special education, bilingual special education), as well as relative to specific content and corresponding pedagogical considerations, including evaluation of student learning and teaching effectiveness. In this way, the volume provides a conceptual framework and concrete examples for how to go about multiculturally-transforming curriculum in STEM curricula. The volume is designed to speak with PK-12 teachers as colleagues in the multicultural curriculum transformation work at focus in each subject area and at varied grade levels. Readers are exposed to "things to think about," but also given curricular examples to work with or from in going about the actual, concrete work of curriculum change. It bridges the gaps between preparing PK-12 teachers to be able to 1) independently multiculturally adapt existing curriculum, and, 2) create new multicultural curriculum differentiated for their content areas and grade levels, while also, 3) providing ample examples of what such adapted and new differentiated curricula looks like. In so doing, this volume also bridges the gaps between the theory and practice of multicultural curriculum transformation in higher and PK-12 educational contexts.

The book argues that academics, academic developers and academic leaders need to undertake curriculum work in their institutions that has the potential to disrupt common sense notions about curriculum and create spaces for engagement with scholarly concepts and theories, to re-imagine curricula for the changing times. Now, more than ever in the history of higher education, curriculum practices and processes need to be shared; the findings of research undertaken on curriculum need to be disseminated to inform curriculum work. We hope the book will enable readers to look beyond their contextual difficulties and constraints, to find spaces where they can dream, and begin to implement, innovative and creative solutions to what may seem like intractable challenges or difficulties.

What is understanding and how does it differ from knowledge? How can we determine the big ideas worth understanding? Why is understanding an important teaching goal, and how do we know when students have attained it? How can we create a rigorous and engaging curriculum that focuses on understanding and leads to improved student performance in today's high-stakes, standards-based environment? Authors Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe answer these and many other questions in this second edition of Understanding by Design. Drawing on feedback from thousands of educators around the world who have used the UbD framework since its introduction in 1998, the authors have greatly revised and expanded their original work to guide educators across the K-16 spectrum in the design of curriculum, assessment, and instruction. With an improved UbD Template at its core, the book explains the rationale of backward design and explores in greater depth the meaning of such key ideas as essential questions and transfer tasks. Readers will learn why the familiar coverage- and activity-based approaches to curriculum design fall short, and how a focus on the six facets of understanding can enrich student learning. With an expanded array of practical strategies, tools, and examples from all subject areas, the book demonstrates how the research-based principles of Understanding by Design apply to district frameworks as well as to individual units of curriculum. Combining provocative ideas, thoughtful analysis, and tested approaches, this new edition of Understanding by Design offers teacher-designers a clear path to the creation of curriculum that ensures better learning and a more stimulating experience for students and teachers alike.

Teachers struggle every day to bring quality instruction to their students. Beset by lists of content standards and accompanying ""high-stakes"" accountability tests, many educators sense that both teaching and learning have been redirected in ways that are potentially impoverishing for those who teach and those who learn. Educators need a model that acknowledges the centrality of standards but also ensures that students truly understand content and can apply it in meaningful ways. For many educators, Understanding by Design addresses that need. Simultaneously, teachers find it increasingly difficult to ignore the diversity of the learners who populate their classrooms. Few teachers find their work effective or satisfying when they simply ""serve up"" a curriculum-even an elegant one-to students with no regard for their varied learning needs. For many educators, Differentiated Instruction offers a framework for addressing learner variance as a critical component of instructional planning. In this book the two models converge, providing readers fresh perspectives on two of the greatest contemporary challenges for educators: crafting powerful curriculum in a standards-dominated era and ensuring academic success for the full spectrum of learners. Each model strengthens the other. Understanding by Design is predominantly a curriculum design model that focuses on what we teach. Differentiated Instruction focuses on whom we teach, where we teach, and how we teach. Carol Ann Tomlinson and Jay McTighe show you how to use the principles of backward design and differentiation together to craft lesson plans that will teach essential knowledge and skills for the full spectrum of learners. Connecting content and kids in meaningful ways is what teachers strive to do every day. In tandem, UbD and DI help educators meet that goal by providing structures, tools, and guidance for developing curriculum and instruction that bring to students the best of what we know about effective teaching and learning.

In this comprehensive resource for elementary school teachers, Kristina J. Doubet and Jessica A. Hockett explore how to use differentiated instruction to help students be more successful learners-regardless of background, native language, learning preference, or motivation. They explain how to: Create a healthy classroom community in which students' unique qualities and needs are as important as the ones they have in common. Translate curriculum into manageable and meaningful learning goals that are fit to be differentiated. Use pre-assessment and formative assessment to uncover students' learning needs, tailor tasks accordingly, and ensure that students are ""getting it."" Provide interactive learning experiences that encourage students to engage with both the content and one another. Present students with avenues to take in, process, and produce knowledge that appeal to their varied interests and learning preferences. Navigate potential roadblocks to differentiation. Each chapter provides a plethora of practical tools, templates, and strategies for a variety of subject areas developed by and for real teachers. Whether you're new to differentiated instruction or looking to expand your repertoire of DI strategies, Differentiation in the Elementary Grades will show you classroom-tested ways to better engage students and help them succeed every day. Includes URL and password for free downloadable forms.