What's the secret to making schoolwide SEL work? Growing numbers of people recognize that social-emotional learning (SEL) is central to a well-rounded education and to success in life outside and beyond the school building. What's missing is the know-how and framework for weaving SEL into the fabric of the school. In this highly practical and eminently readable book, Thomas R. Hoerr shows teachers, administrators, and other school staff how to integrate the Formative Five success skills (empathy, integrity, self-control, embracing diversity, and grit) with school culture essentials by answering these questions: 1. How can you ensure that your school or district is helping students develop their SEL skills across disciplines? Address your values, vision, mission. 2. What effective programs and activities support student development of SEL skills at the classroom, school, and district levels? Consider your practices. 3. How can you leverage personal relationships within the school and in the community to cultivate students' appreciation of how the differences among us make us stronger? Involve your people. 4. How can you weave an SEL narrative into your school's culture? Live your narrative. 5. What can you do to establish and nurture a welcoming school environment as you strive to enhance students' SEL skills? Embrace your place. Replete with real-life examples from the author's years as a school leader, relevant findings from the research, and helpful strategies for use at all levels and with all K-12 populations, Taking Social-Emotional Learning Schoolwide is the ultimate blueprint for making sure students and staff are equipped to thrive.

An effective kindergarten workbook that provides daily social and emotional learning (SEL) activities to help students explore emotions, actions, relationships, and decision making. The daily activities connect to the CASEL competencies, mindfulness, and key affective education initiatives. This SEL workbook makes at-home learning, whole class instruction, or small group support, quick and easy. Help students build self-awareness, analyze relationships, discover diverse perspectives, and apply what they have learned with engaging lessons. The use of fiction and nonfiction text allows for self-reflection and growth. Parents appreciate the teacher-approved activity books that keep their child engaged and learning. Great for homeschooling, to reinforce learning at school, and build connections between home and school. Teachers rely on the daily practice workbooks to save them valuable time. The ready to implement activities are perfect to introduce SEL topics for discussion.

The definitive guide to creating and using experiential exercises in the classroom. For anyone interested in continuously improving their teaching practice, this book provides an overview of the theory and empirical evidence for active learning and the use of experiential exercises. Using a prescriptive model and checklist for creating, adapting or adopting experiential exercises in the classroom, the authors demonstrate evidence-based best practices for each step in the development and use of experiential exercises, including tips, worksheets and checklists to facilitate use of these practices. In addition, the book provides rich examples which illustrate how educators have used this model and practices in their own classrooms, and resources to help find experiential exercises, learn more about effectively using them, and connect with organizations, journals, and people dedicated to the use of experiential exercises in the classroom. Higher education educators seeking to improve their teaching practice, to increase effectiveness and to learn how to develop and use experiential exercises as well as doctoral students learning how to develop and use experiential exercises will find direction and inspiration in Experiential Exercises in the Classroom.

Whether you're already in command of a classroom, or are just starting out as a student teacher, these top tips will help you cope with pupils, parents and the everlasting pile of marking. Alternately practical, wise and funny, Top Tips for Teachers will guide you through those career defining moments: parents evenings, negotiating the staffroom and help you preserve your dignity when all you want to do is hurl chalk at the board. Teaching can be a rewarding vocation allowing you to get to know your pupils and guide them into their future. This book will keep you organised, calm and motivated until the summer holidays. It contains witty illustrations by Bob Dewar, one of the UK's top satirical artists.

Students need to connect to the real world, be engaged, and learn deeply. But how are teachers supposed to ensure that students meet these objectives in the current school system? In The Relevant Classroom, Eric Hardie presents six strategies derived from his two decades of experience as an elementary and secondary teacher and principal to show teachers ways to foster real-world connections, genuine engagement, and deeper learning: 1. Make meaning central to student work. 2. Contextualize the curriculum. 3. Create space to learn. 4. Connect student work to the community. 5. Follow the (student) leaders. 6. Reenvision feedback and evaluation. This practical volume includes advice on how to get started, vivid examples, reflection questions, and tips on how to overcome common obstacles. The Relevant Classroom is about recognizing that teachers who tap into students' capacities for creativity, collaboration, and innovation can create learning experiences that are truly meaningful for students.

In today's schools, students and teachers feel unprecedented-even alarming-levels of stress. How can we create calmer classrooms in which students concentrate better and feel more positive about themselves and others? Author Thomas Armstrong offers a compelling answer in the form of mindfulness, a secular practice he defines as the intentional focus of one's attention on the present moment in a nonjudgmental way. In Mindfulness in the Classroom, Armstrong: Explains how mindfulness affects the structure and function of the brain. Provides an overview of mindfulness as both a personal practice and a classroom methodology that aligns with such educational models as Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), Positive Behavioral Intervention and Supports (PBIS), and Universal Design for Learning (UDL). Shares and explains the extensive research that shows the positive effects of mindfulness practices in the classroom. Describes how to adapt mindfulness for different grade levels, integrate it into regular school subjects, and implement it schoolwide. Offers guidelines for teaching mindfulness responsibly, without religious overtones. Dozens of observations from teachers, students, researchers, and practitioners provide striking evidence of the power of mindfulness and offer hope to anyone who wants to make classrooms more productive places of learning.

In this revised and updated 4th edition, Discipline with Dignity provides in-depth guidance for implementing a proven approach to classroom management that can help students make better choices and teachers be more effective. Emphasizing the importance of mutual respect and self-control, the authors offer specific strategies and techniques for building strong relationships with disruptive students and countering the toxic social circumstances that affect many of them, including dysfunctional families, gangs, and poverty. Educators at all levels can learn: The difference between formal and informal discipline systems and when to use each. The role of values, rules, and consequences. How to address the underlying causes of discipline problems that occur both in and out of school. What teachers can do to defuse or prevent classroom disruptions and disrespectful behavior without removing students from the classroom. Why traditional approaches such as threats, punishments, and rewards are ineffective-and what to do instead. How to use relevance, teacher enthusiasm, choice, and other elements of curriculum and instruction to motivate students. How to reduce both teacher and student stress that can trigger power struggles. With dozens of specific examples of student-teacher interactions, Discipline with Dignity illustrates what you can do-and not do-to make the classroom a place where students learn and teachers maintain control in a nonconfrontational way. The goal is success for all, in schools that thrive.

How can educators leverage neuroscience research about how the human brain learns? How can we use this information to improve curriculum, instruction, and assessment so our students achieve deep learning and understanding in all subject areas? Upgrade Your Teaching: Understanding by Design Meets Neuroscience answers these questions by merging insights from neuroscience with Understanding by Design (UbD), the framework used by thousands of educators to craft units of instruction and authentic assessments that emphasize understanding rather than recall. Readers will learn: How the brain processes incoming information and determines what is (or is not) retained as long-term memory. How brain science reveals factors that influence student motivation and willingness to put forth effort. How to fully engage all students through relevance and achievable challenge. How key components of UbD, including backward design, essential questions, and transfer tasks, are supported by research in neuroscience. Why specific kinds of teaching and assessment strategies are effective in helping students gain the knowledge, skills, and deep understanding they need to succeed in school and beyond. How to create a brain-friendly classroom climate that supports lasting learning. Authors Jay McTighe and Judy Willis translate research findings into practical information for everyday use in schools, at all grade levels and in all subject areas. With their guidance, educators at all levels can learn how to design and implement units that empower teachers and students alike to capitalize on the brain's tremendous capacity for learning.

How can you energize yourself to maintain or regain a positive outlook and love of teaching? What specific, immediate actions can you take to enhance your well-being and thrive both on and off the job? Award-winning teacher Chase Mielke draws from his own research, lesson plans, and experiences with burnout to help you change your outlook, strengthen your determination to be a terrific teacher, and reignite your core passion for teaching. Often lighthearted, yet thoroughly grounded in research on social-emotional learning and positive psychology, The Burnout Cure explains how shifts in awareness, attitudes, and actions can be transformational for you and for your students. The book describes specific steps related to mindfulness, empathy, gratitude, and altruism that you can use on your own and with students via classroom lessons and activities. Equipped with these tools, teachers can be their best, so they can give their best to the learners in their care.

We all want our students to feel safe, collaborate well with others, feel ownership for their learning, and be joyfully engaged in their work. Nevertheless, many teachers end up using language patterns that undermine these goals. Do any of these scenarios sound familiar? We want students to take responsibility for their learning, yet we use language that implies teacher ownership. We want to build positive relationships with students, yet we use sarcasm when we get frustrated. We want students to think learning is fun, yet we sometimes make comments that suggest the opposite. We want students to exhibit good behavior because it's the right thing to do, yet we rely on threats and bribes, which implies students don't naturally want to be good. What teachers say to students-when they praise or discipline, give directions or ask questions, and introduce concepts or share stories-affects student learning and behavior. A slight change in intonation can also dramatically change how language feels for students. In What We Say and How We Say It Matter, Mike Anderson digs into the nuances of language in the classroom. This book's many examples will help teachers examine their language habits and intentionally improve their classroom practice so their language matches and supports their goals.

Featuring voices from academics, practitioners, school system leaders, school administrators, and graduate students from across Canada and abroad, this unique edited collection offers conceptual discussions and empirical examples of leadership for flourishing in a variety of educational contexts. This volume affirms that by fostering positive leadership, striving for well-being, and encouraging flourishing for all, significant benefits and new potentials will be felt throughout the learning communities. Grounded in theoretical approaches of positive leadership, positive psychology, and positive organizational scholarship, the accounts from K-12, post-secondary, and professional contexts explore the impacts and influences of leadership at all levels of education. Editors and chapter authors describe their research findings and first-hand experiences of supporting educators and school leaders in learning how to grow their agentic role for fostering well-being among all members of the community. The book is divided into three sections: stories of school-level flourishing, stories of personal professional flourishing, and stories of the impacts and influences of positive leadership in various educational contexts.Engaging and practical, this book encourages readers to reflect on the topics through discussion questions and to apply the learning to their own educational and organizational settings. This positively oriented volume will be invaluable for students of educational leadership, education administration, and organizational studies in education, in North America and beyond.

In this updated edition, Cathy Vatterott examines the role homework has played in the culture of schooling over the years; how such factors as family life, the media, and ""homework gap"" issues based on shifting demographics have affected the homework controversy; and what recent research as well as common sense tell us about the effects of homework on student learning. She also explores how the current homework debate has been reshaped by forces including the Common Core, a pervasive media and technology presence, the mass hysteria of ""achievement culture,"" and the increasing shift to standards-based and formative assessment. The best way to address the homework controversy is not to eliminate homework. Instead, the author urges educators to replace the old paradigm (characterized by long-standing cultural beliefs, moralistic views, and behaviorist philosophy) with a new paradigm based on the following elements: Designing high-quality homework tasks. Differentiating homework tasks. Deemphasizing grading of homework. Improving homework completion. Implementing homework support programs. Numerous examples from teachers and schools illustrate the new paradigm in action, and readers will find useful new tools to start them on their own journey. The end product is homework that works-for all students, at all levels.

Some great teachers are born, but most are self-made. And the way to make yourself a great teacher is to learn to think and act like one. In this updated second edition of the best-selling Never Work Harder Than Your Students, Robyn R. Jackson reaffirms that every teacher can become a master teacher. The secret is not a specific strategy or technique, nor it is endless hours of prep time. It's developing a master teacher mindset-rigorously applying seven principles to your teaching until they become your automatic response: Start where you students are. Know where your students are going. Expect to get your students there. Support your students along the way. Use feedback to help you and your students get better. Focus on quality rather than quantity. Never work harder than your students. In her conversational and candid style, Jackson explains the mastery principles and how to start using them to guide planning, instruction, assessment, and classroom management. She answers questions, shares stories from her own practice and work with other teachers, and provides all-new, empowering advice on navigating external evaluation. There's even a self-assessment to help you identify your current levels of mastery and take control of your own practice. Teaching is hard work, and great teaching means doing the right kind of hard work: the kind that pays off. Join tens of thousands of teachers around the world who have embarked on their journeys toward mastery. Discover for yourself the difference that Jackson's principles will make in your classroom and for your students.

Teacher leadership holds great promise for improving the quality of teaching and ensuring student success. But for co-performance of leadership among teacher leaders and principals to be effective, they must learn to lead in sync. Leading In Sync: Teacher Leaders and Principals Working Together for Student Learning provides principals, assistant principals, coaches, department leaders, grade-level and content team leaders, mentors, professional development leaders, and in fact all teachers with the strategies and tools needed to: Examine their own thinking about what constitutes high-quality teaching so they can work toward a shared vision. Identify teachers' many strengths as potential assets for achieving the shared vision. Recognize ways in which most teachers are already leading. Support leadership collaboration through efficient, effective communication. Develop trust required to learn to lead together. Jill Harrison Berg offers thought-provoking context and reflection questions that enable educators to examine their unique settings; real-world examples of teachers and principals co-performing leadership to improve student success; and dozens of strategies, tools, and templates to facilitate leading in sync. This book includes a link to free downloadable tools.

In this 2nd edition of Focus: Elevating the Essentials to Radically Improve Student Learning, Mike Schmoker extends and updates the case that our schools could be on the cusp of swift, unparalleled improvements. But we are stymied by a systemwide failure to simplify and prioritize; we have yet to focus our limited time and energy on the most essential, widely acknowledged, evidence-based practices that could have more impact than all other initiatives combined. They are: simple, coherent curricula; straightforward, traditional literacy practices; and lessons built around just a few hugely effective elements of good teaching. As Schmoker demonstrates, the case for these practices-and the need for them-has grown prodigiously. In every chapter, you'll find late-breaking discoveries and practical advice on how to simplify the implementation of new state standards in the subject areas; on the hidden pitfalls of our most popular, but unproven instructional fads and programs; and on simple, versatile strategies for building curriculum, planning lessons, and integrating literacy into every discipline. All of these strategies and findings are supported with exciting new evidence from actual schools. Their success confirms, as Michael Fullan writes, that a focus on the best ""high-leverage practices"" won't only improve student performance; they will produce ""stunningly powerful consequences"" in our schools.

Games, Simulations and Playful Learning in Business Education takes a fresh, insightful look at original and innovative ways of incorporating games, simulations and play to enhance the quality of higher education learning and assessment across business and law disciplines. Chapters cover wide-ranging business areas such as marketing, accounting and strategy and include practical advice, tips and thoughts on how to strengthen existing learning techniques to include a fun element. Contributors examine the core achievements that can be gained from playing games and simulations and how these can be adapted to learning within the business environment using a variety of techniques such as remote online learning, creating a digital game application and taking part in simulations that teach life skills for employability. The book also highlights the value and importance of skill learning through games alongside traditional methods to provide a more pleasurable learning experience. Examining all aspects of teaching and education, this book will be an invaluable resource for academics in business and law schools based in the UK and internationally.

Drawing upon decades of research and myriad authentic classroom experiences, Kathleen M. Budge and William H. Parrett dispel harmful myths, explain the facts, and urge educators to act against the debilitating effects of poverty on their students. They share the powerful voices of teachers-many of whom grew up in poverty-to amplify the five classroom practices that permeate the culture of successful high-poverty schools: (1) caring relationships and advocacy, (2) high expectations and support, (3) commitment to equity, (4) professional accountability for learning, and (5) the courage and will to act. Readers will explore classroom-tested strategies and practices, plus online templates and exercises that can be used for personal reflection or ongoing collaboration with colleagues. Disrupting Poverty provides teachers, administrators, coaches, and others with the background information and the practical tools needed to help students break free from the cycle of poverty.

While building a soapbox racing car, a pair of friends provide an easy-to-understand lesson in how simple machines are all around us, making our work more efficient. Michael and Luci show readers that a broom is a lever, nails are wedges, and a screwdriver is both a lever and a wheel and axle. The two also prove that curious children can be just like scientists, making observations and using how and what questions to explore physical science principles they encounter all the time. Michael s Racing Machine is part of the I Wonder Why book series, written to ignite the curiosity of children in grades K 6 while encouraging them to become avid readers. These books explore the marvels of light, color, machines, sound, and other phenomena related to physical science. Included in each volume is a Parent/Teacher Handbook with coordinating activities. The I Wonder Why series is written by an award-winning science educator and published by NSTA Kids, a division of NSTA Press.

In the decades since it was first introduced, Howard Gardner's multiple intelligences (MI) theory has transformed how people think about learning the world over. Educators using the theory have achieved remarkable success in helping all students, including those who learn in nontraditional ways, to navigate school (and life outside it) with confidence and success. Within the context of classroom instruction, no author besides Gardner has done more to popularize MI theory than Thomas Armstrong, whose best seller Multiple Intelligences in the Classroom has become a bona fide education classic in its own right. This expanded fourth edition provides educators at all levels with everything they need to apply MI theory to curriculum development, lesson planning, assessment, special education, cognitive skills, career development, educational policy, and more. In addition to the many strategies, templates, and examples that have made Armstrong's book so enduringly popular, this edition is updated to examine how emerging neurodiversity research, trends toward greater instructional personalization, and rapidly evolving virtual learning tools have affected the use of MI theory to enhance student achievement. It also includes brand-new lesson plans aligned to nationwide standards and a revised list of resources for further study.

How can we ensure that all students, regardless of cultural background or socioeconomic status, are granted equitable opportunities to succeed in the classroom and beyond? In Keeping It Real and Relevant: Building Authentic Relationships in Your Diverse Classroom, author and veteran educator Ignacio Lopez offers hard-won lessons that educators at all levels can apply to teaching, assessing, counseling, and designing interventions for learners from all walks of life. These insights are all rooted in the same core principle: building deep and meaningful relationships with students is the key driver of their success. In addition to examining the pivotal role of relationship-building among teachers and students in preparing the latter to perform at the highest level, this book offers: Real-life examples of challenging classroom situations, each with a detailed breakdown of how they were peacefully and non-punitively resolved. Strategies for designing learning environments suited to the individual needs of students and reflective of their cultural backgrounds. Ideas for scaffolding students as they experience and internalize epiphanies about what works and what doesn't, both academically and behaviorally. Activities and reflection questions for use in professional development. Many teachers find balancing the needs of increasingly diverse classrooms made up of learners from increasingly diverse backgrounds to be a difficult and often thankless task-and one that takes precious time away from instructional planning. Here, Lopez outlines simple but ingenious steps for addressing these needs holistically, in a way that takes no extra time yet amply enhances the learning experience for students. Clear, practical, and much-needed, Keeping It Real and Relevant is the ultimate blueprint for creating a harmonious and successful classroom for kids of all colors, creeds, and cultures.