There is love on these pages, love for nature, the cosmos, the body's deep knowing and students. Learning in Nature focuses on the lives of 6 drama students who gathered weekly at a community arts center during their childhood and adolescence. Before each play rehearsal the students explored contemplative practices such as meditation, yoga, breathing and visualization. After these warm-up sessions the rehearsals were dynamic and highly creative. So, what might happen if these students went out into nature and experimented with the same practices? What would happen, over a year long period, if they stopped the noise of life and just listened, deeply, just looked and inhaled, phenomenologically? Returning the experience of learning to nature, the book tells the story of this group, it tells of their lives and their growing understanding of consciousness, and does so through the complex and rich perspectives of holistic teaching and learning.

The social and emotional welfare of students in both K-12 and higher education settings has become increasingly important during the third decade of the 21st century, as students face a variety of social-emotional learning (SEL) challenges related to a multitude of internal and external factors. As concepts around traditional literacy education evolve and become more culturally and linguistically relevant, the connections between SEL and academic literacy opportunities warrant considerable exploration. The Handbook of Research on Supporting Social and Emotional Development Through Literacy Education develops a conceptual framework around pedagogical connections to social and emotional teaching and learning within K-12 literacy practices. This text provides a variety of research and practice protocols supporting student success through the integration of SEL and literacy across grade levels. Covering topics such as culturally relevant literacy, digital literacy, and content-area literacy, this handbook is essential for curriculum directors, education faculty, instructional facilitators, literacy professionals, practicing teachers, pre-service teachers, professional development coordinators, school counselors, teacher preparation programs, academicians, researchers, and students.

Helping teachers understand and apply theory and research is one of the most challenging tasks of teacher preparation and professional development. As they learn about motivation and engagement, teachers need conceptually rich, yet easy-to-use, frameworks. At the same time, teachers must understand that student engagement is not separate from development, instructional decision-making, classroom management, student relationships, and assessment. This volume on teaching teachers about motivation addresses these challenges. The authors share multiple approaches and frameworks to cut through the growing complexity and variety of motivational theories, and tie theory and research to real-world experiences that teachers are likely to encounter in their courses and classroom experiences. Additionally, each chapter is summarized with key "take away" practices. A shared perspective across all the chapters in this volume on teaching teachers about motivation is "walking the talk." In every chapter, readers will be provided with rich examples of how research on and principles of classroom motivation can be re-conceptualized through a variety of college teaching strategies. Teachers and future teachers learning about motivation need to experience explicit modeling, practice, and constructive feedback in their college courses and professional development in order to incorporate those into their own practice. In addition, a core assumption throughout this volume is the importance of understanding the situated nature of motivation, and avoiding a "one-size-fits" all approach in the classroom. Teachers need to fully interrogate their instructional practices not only in terms of motivational principles, but also for their cultural relevance, equity, and developmental appropriateness. Just like P-12 students, college students bring their histories as learners and beliefs about motivation to their formal study of motivation. That is why college instructors teaching motivation must begin by helping students evaluate their personal beliefs and experiences. Relatedly, college instructors need to know their students and model differentiating their interactions to support each of them. The authors in this volume have, collectively, decades of experience teaching at the college level and conducting research in motivation, and provide readers with a variety of strategies to help teachers and future teachers explore how motivation is supported and undermined. In each chapter in this volume, readers will learn how college instructors can demonstrate what effective, motivationally supportive classrooms look, sound, and feel like.

While the research on bullying and peer victimization has increased considerably over the past 20 years, a number of studies are emerging that document mixed results of bullying and prevention programs. During the last decades, several special issues devoted to research on bullying and victimization have been published in national and international scholarly journals. Based on the increase of published articles on bullying and victimization in journals, textbooks, government reports, and documents in professional organizations, it is timely for a special volume on research on bullying and victimization to appear in the series on Contemporary Perspectives in Early Childhood Education. The purpose of this volume is to share a collection of research strands on bullying and victimization of young children. It describes the historical roots and suggests anti?bullying programs and strategies to decrease bullying and victimization. The bullying and victimization volume can be a valuable tool to researchers who are conducting studies in that area. It focuses on important historical and contemporary issues on bullying and victimization in early childhood education (ages 0 to 8) to provide the information necessary to make judgments about these issues. It also motivates and guides researchers to explore gaps on research on bullying and victimization.

This book is a practical resource designed to raise leadership educators understanding of culturally relevant leadership pedagogy for the purpose of creating inclusive learning spaces that are socially just for students. For leadership educators seeking personal and professional development to assist in building and enhancing their levels of cultural competence in leadership education, this book is a guide. The audience for the book ranges from new and entry-level leadership educator roles to senior scholars in leadership education. Operationalizing Culturally Relevant Leadership Learning, provides leadership educators with a substantive and comprehensive approach to the topic, offering personal narratives from leadership educators who have operationalized the model in their own personal and professional contexts. We believe that reframing leadership education with the culturally relevant leadership learning model, leadership educators will be able to integrate new insights into their own pedagogy and practice and move towards action. This book illustrates how leadership educators can shift the way they experience and facilitate leadership learning. By framing the operationalization of culturally relevant leadership learning, this book discusses the why, who, what, where, when, and how of developing culturally relevant and socially just leadership education. Readers of this text are encouraged to actively engage in the content through the questions each chapter pose and consider for themselves how culturally relevant leadership learning can be implemented in their own context.

Creating a meaningful and interactive learning environment is a complex task for any educator. However, once this is accomplished, students have the chance to receive enhanced opportunities for knowledge development and retention. Challenges Associated with Cross-Cultural and At-Risk Student Engagement provides a comprehensive examination on emerging strategies for optimizing instructional environments in modern school systems and emphasizes the role that intercultural education plays in this endeavor. Highlighting research perspectives across numerous topics, such as curriculum design, student-teacher interaction, and critical pedagogies, this book is an ideal reference source for professionals, academics, educators, school administrators, and practitioners interested in academic success in high stakes assessment environments.

This book discusses activity-based collaborative active learning (CAL) approaches in connection with the learning and teaching of STEM and non-STEM disciplines. It also covers feedback and assessment activities as learning activities supported by learning technologies and applied in appropriate learning spaces. The contributing authors discuss in detail the implementation and facilitation of activity-based CAL strategies, the problems encountered and corresponding mitigation measures. In addition, all activities are developed in a blended mode, making them suitable for readers at any level of education who are interested in trying out CAL. Covering both STEM and non-STEM disciplines, this book offers comprehensive guidelines for lecturers who are interested in active learning.

Leading faculty members in educational psychology, who are expert classroom teachers, describe inherent difficulties encountered when teaching different subject matter in educational psychology to diverse populations of students, including undergraduate teacher candidates, psychology and child development majors, and graduate students in education and psychology. Educational psychology addresses subject matter as diverse as child and adolescent development, motivation, learning theories, student assessment, teacher expertise, and research methods and statistics. Drawing from their years of classroom experience, as well as their expertise in designing and conducting educational research, the contributing authors report their successful instructional efforts and innovations designed to increase student learning and knowledge of the discipline.

Using psychological theory as a basis, Socializing Children through Language examines naturally occurring conversations between mothers and children in the context of achievement, self-regulation, food consumption, and television watching to illustrate how families of different socioeconomic means interact and discuss a variety of topics in the home. Specifically, the chapters in this book draw on enhanced audio recordings of over 40 families across a range of education and income levels to investigate how mothers' language relates to child behaviors over time. The unique pairing of this digital observer data with empirical data on achievement tests, regulation tasks, and parenting information on the home environment collected one year later presents an altogether revolutionary way to understand and think about how family socialization works across socioeconomic levels.

Recent research findings have challenged the idea that creativity is domain-general. Domain Specificity of Creativity brings together the research information on domain specificity in creativity -- both the research that supports it and answers to research arguments that might seem to challenge it. The implications for domain specificity affect how we move forward with theories of creativity, testing for creativity, and teaching for creativity. The book outlines what these changes are and how creativity research and applications of that research will change in light of these new findings.

Development of Mathematical Cognition: Neural Substrates and Genetic Influences reviews advances in extant imaging modalities and the application of brain stimulation techniques for improving mathematical learning. It goes on to explore the role genetics and environmental influences have in the development of math abilities and disabilities. Focusing on the neural substrates and genetic factors associated with both the typical and atypical development of mathematical thinking and learning, this second volume in the Mathematical Cognition and Learning series integrates the latest in innovative measures and methodological advances from the top researchers in the field.

Educators are continuously seeking ways to engage their students in active learning processes and are faced with challenges that include engaging students in learning activities, promoting meaningful learning experiences, and providing effective experiences for every student. Studies that investigate instructors' experiences are limited since more focus is given to students. Future research calls for teachers' innovative contributions in introducing new strategies and teaching approaches to further involve students, increase student attendance in online sessions, and employ a variety of technological tools. Fostering Meaningful Learning Experiences Through Student Engagement is an essential reference source for the latest scholarly information on curriculum development, instructional design, and pedagogical methods for fostering student engagement learning initiatives. The book examines engagement and meaningful learning techniques in both face-to-face and online instruction. Covering topics that include active learning, language learning, teacher experiences, and teacher-student relationships, this book is ideally designed for teachers, instructional designers, curriculum developers, academicians, researchers, professionals, and students that believe that stronger or improved student engagement should be their instructional objectives and wish to engage students in learning activities that promote meaningful learning experiences.