Lesson Planning

104 Activities That Build: Self-Esteem, Teamwork, Communication, Anger Management, Self-Discovery, Coping Skills

Classroom Instruction That Works: Research-Based Strategies for Increasing Student Achievement

What works in education? How do we know? How can teachers find out? How can educational research find its way into the classroom? How can we apply it to help our individual students? Questions like these arise in most schools, and busy educators often don't have time to find the answers. Robert J. Marzano, Debra J. Pickering, and Jane E. Pollock have examined decades of research findings to distill the results into nine broad teaching strategies that have positive effects on student learning:

* Identifying similarities and differences.
* Summarizing and note taking.
* Reinforcing effort and providing recognition.
* Homework and practice.
* Nonlinguistic representations.
* Cooperative learning.
* Setting objectives and providing feedback.
* Generating and testing hypotheses.
* Questions, cues, and advance organizers.

This list is not new. But what is surprising is finding out what a big difference it makes, for example, when students learn how to take good notes, work in groups, and use graphic organizers. The authors provide statistical effect sizes and show how these translate into percentile gains for students, for each strategy. And each chapter presents extended classroom examples of teachers and students in action; models of successful instruction; and many "frames," rubrics, organizers, and charts to help teachers plan and implement the strategies.

Teaching With Love and Logic: Taking Control of the Classroom

Available for the first time in paperback.

Teachers often find themselves facing a variety of classroom situations never covered in initial training. This valuable resource helps teachers increase skills, enhance professional development and maximize classroom learning time.

Discover why Love and Logic works in the school environment and understand the psychological reasons for its effectiveness.

Jim Fay and David Funk's truly positive approach and time-tested ideas and strategies will empower teachers to effectively manage classroom dynamics while bringing the joy back to teaching.

The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation: An Easy-to-Use Guide with Clear Rules, Real-World Examples, and Reproducible Quizzes

The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation is filled with easy-to-understand rules,real-world examples, dozens of reproducible exercises, and pre- and post-tests.

This handy workbook is ideal for teachers, students in middle school through college, ESL students, homeschoolers, and professionals. Valuable for anyone who takes tests or writes reports, letters, Web pages, e-mails, or blogs, The Blue Book offers instant answers to everyday English usage questions.

Spaces & Places: Designing Classrooms for Literacy

Integrating Differentiated Instruction & Understanding by Design (Connecting Content and Kids)

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.

Razzle Dazzle Writing: Achieving Success Through 50 Target Skills

Get ready to transform "ho-hum" intermediate-grade writers into mature writers who love to write -- and perform well on assessments.

Razzle Dazzle Writing shows you how to teach narrative and informational writing through mastery of 50 key, target writing skills.

Your students succeed because Razzle Dazzle Writing:
- organizes writing craft teaching into standards-based single-lesson chunks for easy modeling practice, and mastery.
- addresses different learning styles, preferences, and interests with a variety of student-friendly formats to teach writing strategies.
- makes learning easy and fun wtih student-oriented writing craft lessons, checklists, models, student exercises, and graphic organizers.

Move your students to the next level with Razzle Dazzle Writing!

Elementary and Middle School Mathematics: Teaching Developmentally

John A. Van de Walle has written a book that helps readers make sense of mathematics and become confident in their ability to teach mathematics to children K to 8. Elementatry and Middle School Mathematics consists of 16 chapters reflecting the view that all mathematics can be taught through a problem-solving approach that motivates children and builds their confidence as they learn. This book thoroughly discusses the new standards and clearly develops four key aspects of teaching mathematics: the nature of mathematics as a science of pattern and order; an understanding of how children learn mathematics; a problem solving view of teaching mathematics; and specific methods for integrating assessment with instruction. Simple yet effective classroom activities are woven throughout the chapters as well as suggestions for technology and literature. For teachers, future teachers, and educators. nt Code -- F

Teach Like Your Hair's on Fire: The Methods and Madness Inside Room 56

The New York Times bestseller that is revolutionizing the way Americans educate their kids—“Rafe Esquith is a genius and a saint” (The New York Times)

Perhaps the most famous fifth-grade teacher in America, Rafe Esquith has won numerous awards and even honorary citizenship in the British Empire for his outstandingly successful methods. In his Los Angeles public school classroom, he helps impoverished immigrant children understand Shakespeare, play Vivaldi, and become happy, self-confident people. This bestseller gives any teacher or parent all the techniques, exercises, and innovations that have made its author an educational icon, from personal codes of behavior to tips on tackling literature and algebra. The result is a powerful book for anyone concerned about the future of our children.

The First Days of School: How to Be an Effective Teacher

Used by new and veteran teachers, college instructors, and administrators, this is a beautifully designed book on classroom management, student achievement, and teacher effectiveness. Color graphics.