This publication will offer a panoramic view of the Socratic Method and expound upon the theoretical and practical aspects and implications of this teaching approach. Traditionally understood as an ancient teaching method arguably conceived and practiced by the philosopher Socrates, scholars in education have boldly explored the definitions, philosophical underpinnings, assumptions, and uses of Socratic dialogue in various learning situations and educational settings. Along with remaining true to Socrates' apparent learning processes and outcomes for his interlocutors - the experiences of aporia (perplexity) in the learning process, the use of one's cognitive resources, and contending with concepts such as virtue and justice, the publication will also investigate the Socratic method's impact on leadership, critical thinking skills, e-learning, adult education, and social emotional learning. By exposing educators to the current and emerging literature on the Socratic Method, there can be a renewed sense of how this instructional strategy can improve students' and teachers' abilities to think and discuss issues and subject-matter carefully and deeply, resulting in student achievement, quality instruction, and human flourishing. This book will be appropriate for teachers (high school and college-level), curriculum directors, instructional designers, and other school leaders. The publication will also equip trainers with information on how to incorporate Socratic discussion in adult training and professional development workshops.

Education is a field in which reflective practice is not only imperative for teacher and student success, but also for maintaining the desire to remain in the profession. During times of uncertainty, particularly as we faced the dual pandemics of social injustice and COVID-19 over the past year, we have felt demoralized and powerless. We know that we are not alone, as research indicates burnout, particularly among educators, is well-documented and increasing as a result of the continued heavy workload and added individual and societal stressors of the past year. During this turmoil, we have found solace, comfort, and connection in reflecting on our educational paths and sharing our stories with each other, friends, and colleagues. These reflective experiences, both individual and shared, have been powerful, rekindling our passion and desire to teach and thinking about ways we can support our students in and beyond the current climate of social unrest and a global pandemic. We believe that reading reflections of others' experiences will remind readers that they are not alone in their work, provide opportunities for them to find connections with fellow educators, and encourage them to engage in reflective practices of their own. The book is a timely collection of stories from various groups of people, such as those who identify as mothers, fathers, people of color, LGBTQIA scholars, first-generation college students, retired educators, those new to academia, and those with established academic careers, in an attempt to create a book where scholars can see themselves reflected in the stories of others, re-igniting the passion that led them to academia. This book is ideal for higher education faculty, those seeking to enter academia, educators who have left the classroom for administrative roles such as principals, assistant principals, instructional coaches, and district leaders, those considering a career in academia, and those in graduate degree programs.

In this digital age, faculty, teachers, and teacher educators are increasingly expected to adopt and adapt pedagogical perspectives to support student learning in instructional environments featuring online or blended learning. One highly adopted element of online and blended learning involves the use of online learning discussions. Discussion-based learning offers a rich pedagogical context for creating learning opportunities as well as a great deal of flexibility for a wide variety of learning and learner contexts. As post-secondary and, increasingly, K-12 institutions cope with the rapid growth of online learning, and an increase in the cultural diversity of learners, it is critical to understand, at a detailed level, the relationship between online interaction and learning and how educationally-effective interactions might be nurtured, in an inclusive way, by instructors. The Handbook of Research on Online Discussion-Based Teaching Methods is a cutting-edge research publication that seeks to identify promising designs, pedagogical and assessment strategies, conceptual models, and theoretical frameworks that support discussion-based learning in online and blended learning environments. This book provides a better understanding of the effects and both commonalities and differences of new tools that support interaction, such as video, audio, and real-time interaction in discussion-based learning. Featuring a wide range of topics such as gamification, intercultural learning, and digital agency, this book is ideal for teachers, educational software developers, instructional designers, IT consultants, academicians, curriculum designers, researchers, and students.

In today's educational world, supporting graduate students from all backgrounds and ensuring they receive the best education possible is vital. Due to this, academic mentors and graduate student mentoring programs must provide equitable support within learning environments as a construct of social justice for supporting the success of advanced, underrepresented student learners. Best Practices and Programmatic Approaches for Mentoring Educational Leaders discusses empowered perspectives about conceptual and best practice approaches regarding mentoring and supporting doctoral students' success and considers the area of diversity and inclusion in higher education related to best practices in programming. Covering topics such as educational leadership, higher education, mentoring networks, and communities, this reference work is ideal for industry professionals, administrators, policymakers, researchers, academicians, scholars, practitioners, instructors, and students.

This guidebook is designed to be the elementary school teacher's friend in addressing a wide variety of questions regarding the use of educational and instructional technologies. It can serve as a companion and guide through the myriad challenges and opportunities related to the effective use of technology in one's classroom and school. A sample of U.S. elementary school teachers provided us with detailed answers about their experiences with using technology in their teaching. Specifically, they shared their challenges, barriers, ideas, and suggestions for working successfully with administrators, technology specialists, students, fellow teachers, and parents when teaching with technology. We have organized the teachers' experiences and recommendations according to each stakeholder group. Rather than recommending or reviewing specific educational technology companies, applications, or tools, we provide a large number of strategies that are "built to last" and should be applicable regardless of the specific tool under consideration. We assume that it doesn't ultimately matter what the tool or technology is that you're using-it's how and why you're using it for teaching and learning that will determine whether it is successful or not. The "how" and "why" aspects encompass the built-to-last strategies included in this guidebook.

The volume is divided into an introduction, Part II, which explores important concepts and ideas in regards to mentoring and then Part III which are essays from individuals whom Fran Kochan mentored throughout her life. In closing, Fran Kochan lives and breathes her words. Even today, she continues to work with scholars, practitioners and others she meets. She offers a guiding hand, she uplifts and she supports all that she meets. Please enjoy this volume of highlights of research from top mentoring experts who are peers of Dr. Kochan, as well as the tributes from a sampling of individuals she has mentored to successful careers. You will be inspired to learn how Dr. Fran Kochan masters both the art and science of mentoring. We honor her in this book as scholar, mentor, and friend.

Various pedagogies, including the use of digital learning in education, have been used and researched for the past 40 years, but schools have little to show for these initiatives. This contrasts starkly with technology-supported initiatives in other fields such as business, health care, and the military. Traditional pedagogies and general digital technology applications have yet impact education in significant ways that transforms learning. This handbook posits that a primary reason for this minimal impact on learning is that digital technologies have attempted to make traditional instructional processes more efficient rather than using a more appropriate paradigm for learning. As there have been transformative applications in other fields, the book will identify suggested transformative applications that empower learners. As technology is used as a partner in other fields, transformative applications become partners with students (not teachers) to empower their learning process in and out of school. This handbook identifies and justifies the paradigm of transformative learning and pedagogies in education, provides exemplars of existing transformative applications that, if used as partners to empower student learning, have the potential to dramatically engage students in a kind of learning that better fits 21st century learners, and provides pedagogical models to help teachers empower students to learn.

Teacher-pupil planning means teachers and students working in a partnership to articulate a problem/concern, develop objectives, locate materials/resources, and evaluate progress. The intent of this volume of Middle Level Education and the Self-Enhancing School titled, "School is Life, Not a Preparation for Life"-John Dewey: Democratic Practices in Middle Grades Education, is to take the thoughts about the middle grades school curriculum presented in volume one (Middle Grades Curriculum: Voices and Visions of the Self-Enhancing School) and demonstrate the efforts taking place in teacher education programs and middle grades classrooms today. Volume two is organized into two parts, efforts within teacher education programs and efforts of practitioners in the middle grades classrooms. We asked authors in both contexts to address the following questions: 1. Antecedents: What knowledge, skills and dispositions must be in place in all stakeholders to have teacherpupil planning serve a central role in the middle grades teacher education program or middle grades classroom? 2. Implementation: What does the teacher-pupil planning process look like within your teacher education program or middle grades classroom? 3. Outcomes: What benefits (knowledge, skills, and dispositions) are derived from the implementation of teacher-pupil planning in your teacher education program or your middle grades classroom?

It helps teachers grow in confidence and creativity, and provides them with practical tools that will increase their own enjoyment of teaching and their pupils' enjoyment of learning. Celebrating Strengths does not 'teach' positive psychology as an additional subject, but weaves it into the existing curriculum and life of the school. It is based around Strengths Gym, a programme for helping adults and children identify and use their strengths inside and outside the classroom through a cycle of festivals and storytelling. The methods have been tried and tested during four years of work in primary schools in North Lincolnshire, UK.The principles that underpin it, however, are universal and will readily adapt to early years settings, as well as those involving older children and young adults, and will be of as much interest to parents and carers as they will be to teachers. Celebrating Strengths will help anyone to flourish and be at their best - adults and children alike.

Population diversity is becoming more prevalent globally with increasing immigration, emigration, and refugee placement. These circumstances increase the likelihood that a child will be raised speaking a different language in the home than the common language used in each country. This necessitates the development of comprehensive strategies that promote second language learning through the adoption of new technological advancements. New Technological Applications for Foreign and Second Language Learning and Teaching is a scholarly publication that explores how the latest technologies have the potential to engage foreign and second language learners both within and outside the language classroom and to facilitate language learning and teaching in the target language. Highlighting a range of topics such as learning analytics, digital games, and telecollaboration, this book is ideal for teachers, instructional designers, curriculum developers, IT consultants, educational software developers, language learning specialists, academicians, administrators, professionals, researchers, and students.

Many research studies show that the use of technology inside and outside classrooms makes teaching and learning more engaging and motivating. Technology can provide learners with endless opportunities, for instance, it can (a) improve the learners' learning experience; (b) simplify access to educational resources; (c) enhance the learners' autonomous learning; meet the learners' individual learning needs, and (d) prepare the learners for future career success when using it to foster the 21st-century skills. However, the range and number of technologies currently available can yield challenges for educators if they do not know how to effectively integrate them into their teaching pedagogy. Therefore, this book, Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) explores language with technology focusing on English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context and sharing with educators everywhere how the effective use of technology can bring a positive transformation to the class dynamics and the students' learning process. With that being said, to professionally assist learners master all of the four language skills; learners need to be able to communicate in the target language fluently. This, of course, involves developing the learners' language proficiency through interactions and providing them with authentic opportunities for learning that go beyond repetition and memorization of grammatical patterns in isolation. To assist language learners in mastering these sets of competencies, they need to be given the opportunities to understand and use the language appropriately and to communicate in authentic social environments using a variety of well-planned activities. The effective integration of technology in language teaching and learning could support achieving the above-mentioned competencies and more. Luckily, there are many useful and easy to use educational technology tools that are available for all language teachers, educators, and learners to use during class time and/or independently. These tools are increasing rabidly that teachers might feel intimated and choose to avoid learning about them and integrating them in their teaching pedagogy and instead they would feel comfortable keeping with the traditional methods of teaching. Therefore, in this book, CALL experts will provide language teachers with some useful and easy to use technology tools for teaching and learning; support the recommendation with practical ideas such as mini-lesson plans to leverage the use of that specific technology; and promote all or any of the learners' 21st-century skills, e.g., building strong interpersonal communication skills, working as effective team players, thinking and creating in an innovative way, thinking critically about what they are doing and learning and more. The book is intended for all language teachers and educators, language program directors and administrators, Computer Assisted Language (CALL) coaches, university professors, instructional technology coaches, language instructional technology specialists, and all graduate and undergraduate students who are interested in teaching language through technology. Each chapter should include practical tips and ideas to support best practices for each soft skill and language strand with the use of technology.