This book seeks to make fractions more accessible to both students and teachers by introducing an element of fun. The stories, poems, plays, and parodies contained in these pages are designed to entertain your students and at the same time to give them a solid grasp of important fractional concepts. The characters and situations in each activity will also help students apply the concepts they learn to real-life situations--a key element of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics' Curriculum Standards. - from the book.Grades 3-6.

This pathbreaking book for educators shows that focusing on relationships, resilience, and reflection can better prepare graduates for the future. Learning something new-particularly something that might change your mind-is much more difficult than most teachers think. Because people think with their emotions and are influenced by their communities and social groups, humans tend to ignore new information unless it fits their existing worldview. Thus facts alone, even if discussed in detail, typically fail to open minds and create change. In a world in need of graduates who can adapt to new information and situations, we need to renew our educational commitment to producing flexible and independent thinkers. In Teaching Change, Jose Antonio Bowen argues that education needs to be redesigned to take into account how human thinking, behaviors, bias, and change really work. Drawing on new research, Bowen explores how we can create better conditions for learning that focus less on teachers and content and more on students and process. He also examines student psychology, history, assumptions, anxiety, and bias and advocates for education to focus on a new 3Rs-relationships, resilience, and reflection. Finally, he suggests explicit learning designs to foster the ability to think for yourself. The case for a liberal (by which Bowen means liberating) education has never been stronger, but, he says, it needs to be redesigned to achieve the goal of creating lifelong learners and citizens capable of divergent and independent thinking. With an expansive and powerful argument, Teaching Change combines elegant and gripping explanations of recent and wide-ranging research from biology, economics, education, and neuroscience with hundreds of practical suggestions for individual teachers.

Mastering Primary Religious Education introduces the primary religious education curriculum and helps trainees and teachers learn how to plan and teach inspiring lessons that make religious education irresistible. Topics covered include: * Current developments in religious education * Religious education as an irresistible activity * Religious education as a practical activity * Skills to develop in religious education * Promoting curiosity * Assessing children in religious education * Practical issues This guide includes examples of children's work, case studies, readings to reflect upon and reflective questions that all help to show students and teachers what is considered to be best and most innovative practice, and how they can use that knowledge in their own teaching to the greatest effect. The book draws on the experience of two leading professionals in primary religious education, Maria James and Julian Stern, to provide the essential guide to teaching religious education for all trainee and qualified primary teachers.

Teachers are constantly faced with a plethora of challenges, but none has been more prevalent in the 21st century than educating a diverse collection of students. In the midst of the current challenges in teaching P-12 students, pre-service teachers may be under district contract but may not be prepared for teaching students with disabilities, the homeless, second language learners recently immigrated to the United States, or students who face emotional challenges or addiction. Overcoming Current Challenges in the P-12 Teaching Profession is an essential reference book that provides insight, strategies, and solutions to overcome current challenges experienced by P-12 teachers in general and special education. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as global education, professional development, and responsive teaching, this book is ideally designed for educators, administrators, school psychologists, counselors, academicians, researchers, and students seeking current research on culturally responsive teaching.

How the College Board's emphasis on standardized testing has led the AP program astray. Every year, millions of students take Advanced Placement (AP) exams hoping to score enough points to earn college credit and save on their tuition bill. But are they getting a real college education? The College Board says that AP classes and exams make the AP program more accessible and represent a step forward for educational justice. But the program's commitment to standardized testing no longer reflects its original promise of delivering meaningful college-level curriculum to high school students. In Shortchanged, education scholar Annie Abrams uncovers the political and pedagogical traditions that led to the program's development in the 1950s. In revealing the founders' intentions of aligning liberal arts education across high schools and colleges in ways they believed would protect democracy, Abrams questions the collateral damage caused by moving away from this vision. The AP program is the College Board's greatest source of revenue, yet its financial success belies the founding principles it has abandoned. Instead of arguing for a wholesale restoration of the program, Shortchanged considers the nation's contemporary needs. Abrams advocates for broader access to the liberal arts through robust public funding of secondary and higher education and a dismantling of the standardized testing regime. Shortchanged illuminates a better way to offer a quality liberal arts education to high school students while preparing them for college.

Learn how to increase students' skills as writers and storytellers with an innovative, inclusive, and empowering framework for teaching writing that centers student voice. Tell Your Story: Teaching Students to Become World-Changing Thinkers and Writers explores how to help students see themselves as writers and storytellers who are developing the skills and techniques to communicate in ways that resonate with various audiences. When students make that shift and see themselves as active and valued participants in their own communities, cultures, and literary journeys, they become powerful writers eager to explore and share ideas.With the strategies in this book, you can Create an environment of belonging that fosters creativity and confidence. Demonstrate the value of oral and visual storytelling. Teach story structure, both old and new and in a variety of genres. Offer a variety of role models and exemplars through mentor texts. Assess and confer with student writers to help them improve their skills. Value students' voices as future agents of change. When you help students unlock the stories they want to tell, you'll see writing anxieties and resistance fade as students come alive to the multitude of ways in which they can make their voices heard. Storytelling can be a wellness practice, a tool for empowerment, and a method for self-understanding and self-expression. For all students, storytelling is a path to lifelong learning and to realizing the full power of their voice and their potential to change the world.

Mastering Primary Physical Education introduces the primary physical education curriculum and helps trainees and teachers learn how to plan and teach inspiring lessons that make physical education irresistible. Topics covered include: * Current developments in physical education * Physical education as an irresistible activity * Physical education as a practical activity * Skills to develop in physical education * Promoting curiosity * Assessing children in physical education * Practical issues This guide includes examples of children's work, case studies, readings to reflect upon and reflective questions that all help to exemplify what is considered to be best and most innovative practice. The book draws on the experience of four leading professionals in primary physical education, Kristy Howells, Alison Carney, Neil Castle and Rich Little, to provide the essential guide to teaching physical education for all trainee primary teachers.

Comprehension Ninja Workbooks are ideal for supporting your child's learning at home. With bespoke non-fiction texts and hundreds of questions, they're packed full of comprehension practice with strong links to the National Curriculum. Created by teacher and bestselling author of Vocabulary Ninja, Comprehension Ninja and Write Like a Ninja Andrew Jennings (@VocabularyNinja), they're perfect for developing those all-important literacy skills at home and for boosting children's confidence in reading comprehension. Key features of Comprehension Ninja Workbook for Ages 6-7: - Covers popular National Curriculum topics currently taught at Key Stage 1, such as Rosa Parks and animal habitats - Features a variety of question types including true or false, fill the gap and multiple choice - Contains illustrations throughout and a fun ninja theme to engage children - Includes advice for parents and answers at the back of the book