In October we featured what we hope will be an annual event — our first Fall Book Review Festival. Our post included 15 reviews of professional books — each review written by a middle grades educator.

Well, the reviews just keep pouring in!

So we’ve decided to bring out a sequel: a dozen more brand-new reviews, covering teaching tips and strategies, digital tools and tech integration, the Common Core, bullying and behavior, brain-wise pedagogy, English language learners, creative thinking, motivation and more. Browse our brief summaries here and follow the links to read the complete posts.

And don’t forget: You can always read our latest reviews, browse the growing collection, and learn about writing reviews yourself by visiting our Book Reviews area of the website.

Teaching Students to Read Like Detectives

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Subtitled “Comprehending, Analyzing, and Discussing Text,” this book by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey and Diane Lapp achieves its not-so-modest goal of “teaching students to return to the text in their discussions,” says reviewer Joan Cansdale. “Wherever you are on your journey with your students to improve text-based critical thinking and discussion, you will find a wealth of ideas and resources here to speed you on your way.”

How to Bullyproof Your Classroom

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This comprehensive and practical resource is an excellent guide for educators as they try to balance the academic rigor of the classroom with student social and emotional development, says reviewer Linda Biondi. Best of all, 35-year teaching veteran Catha Crowe “is well-aware of a teacher’s burdens, and she’s provided us with lesson plans that include objectives, materials needed, vocabulary, step-by-step directions and follow-up activities.”

Reaching English Language Learners in Every Classroom

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Reviewer Mary Churchill works with pre-service teachers and picked up this book looking for ways to help her new educators better serve their future English Language Learners. She was rewarded with a book that is not only “reader-friendly and especially helpful for busy teachers” but “practical and informative” with ideas and strategies that are powerful for ELL students and many other learners as well. Her only disappointment: a lack of tips for technology integration.

Interactive Strategies That Engage Young Adolescents

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Author Jill Spenser extends an invitation you will be glad you RSVP’ed, says veteran middle grades educator Sandy Wisneski. Her AMLE book is full of adaptable ideas for high student engagement that will inspire creativity and problem solving in your classroom. “You’ll find that your guests may not want to leave,” Wisneski says, “and that’s a sure sign of the best kind of celebration of learning.” Wisneski includes several favorite activities from Spencer’s book in her review.

Strengthening and Enriching Your Professional Learning Community

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So many PD sessions waste teachers’ time. Geoffrey and Renate Caine have an answer, says reviewer Becky Osterfeld: Process Learning Circles. Not to worry: you won’t be holding hands and singing (unless you want to). But the Caines can help teachers “put the means for relevant, practical, thoughtful professional development back in your hands.” The process can be powerful, Osterfeld believes, with voluntary participation, a significant time commitment, and a knowledgeable process leader. “This is definitely a process that I can see using at my middle school.”

Inspiring Middle School Minds: Gifted, Creative & Challenging

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Reviewer Diane Horban says neurologist turned teacher Judy Willis succeeds in intertwining brain research with practical lesson ideas that can ignite the thinking power of 10 to 14-year olds. Although the book was written with teachers of the gifted in mind, Horban notes that “it inspired me to think differently about the way I teach lessons to my middle grades students…It’s a book about brain development in ALL students at middle school.”

Fall Down 7 Times Get Up 8: Teaching Kids to Succeed

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In our second review of Debbie Silver’s book on student motivation, teacher and MiddleWeb contributor Julie Dermody is equally lavish in her praise: “Fall Down 7 times, Get up 8 is the solution for time- and money-strapped teachers who want to be informed about current research on motivation as well as be reminded of the continued significance of past research.” What’s more, “It’s also the solution for teachers who want to understand words such as flow, self-regulation, deliberate practice, self-determination and mindset as they pertain to students.”

Making Students and Parents Your Partners in Learning

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Reviewer Nicole Warchol admits that parent outreach isn’t her strong suit. “When I saw Katy Ridnouer’s book, I took it as a sign from the universe that this could be the year I became more pro-active around parent engagement.” While a few of Ridnouer’s suggestions made Warchol uncomfortable (texting parents, visiting homes), she found many excellent ideas that she believes can help her become better at partnering with parents to advance student learning.

Transformational Teaching in the Information Age

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One of the biggest teacher challenges today, writes reviewer Jenni Miller, is to find ways to engage students “who seem to be more interested in being plugged in than in learning in traditional classroom settings.” Miller, a 20-year veteran herself, found this book to be “incredibly encouraging and helpful.” Among her takeaways: “Our students are growing up in a world wildly different than the world of our own youth.” And, most important, “the time we live in – the age of information overload – is not the enemy of good teaching.”

Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works

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Sixth grade teacher and technology coach Kevin Hodgson praises the authors of Using Technology for their emphasis on first creating an effective instructional framework. “My only real complaint is that there are too many tools here,” he says. But teachers “who dig in will find plenty of examples and strategies that can provide a nice road forward into using technology to plan instruction, and also, to engage students in learning.”

Teaching Real World Writing Through Modeling and Mentor Texts

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by John Norton

Our Fall Book Review Festival features 15 brand-new reviews of professional books — each one written by and for middle grades educators.

Our collection of reviews covers a wide range of topics: teaching tips and strategies, visual & media literacy, intelligent test preparation, Common Core issues, academic icebreakers, RTI & special education, social studies, math teaching and achievement, teacher research, ESL/ELL strategies, and student motivation.

Look over all the offerings here and follow our links to the reviews that interest you most. You can always read our latest reviews, browse the growing collection, and learn about writing reviews yourself by visiting our Book Reviews area of the website. (Special thanks to Janice Norton for managing our book review program!)

Helping Students Motivate Themselves

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Larry Ferlazzo effectively ties student motivation to relationship-building, classroom culture and metacognition, says book reviewer and intermediate grades teacher Becky Bair. It’s the go-to book when we’re looking for good ways to respond to that sad, familiar comment: “These kids just don’t want to learn!”

How to Teach Thinking Skills Within the Common Core

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This book may be too structurally complex to be a valuable everyday resource to the classroom educator. But there’s still plenty to admire, says teacher-reviewer Kevin Hodgson,  including its stance that rote learning and memorization do “not produce the kind of thinking, problem-solving citizens that the world will need.”

Interactive Modeling: A Powerful Technique for Teaching Children

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This Responsive Classroom guide for PK-8 educators can improve teaching of essential academics, social skills, routines and behaviors, says reviewer Linda Biondi. The author’s practical advice “builds upon best practices that teachers may already apply in their classrooms, and introduces us to the highly useful Interactive Modeling concept.”

I See What You Mean: Visual Literacy K-8

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Visual literacy is a vital skill for iGeneration students, says our reviewer Patricia Thomas-Jeanig. In this second edition of a book first published in the 1990s, Steve Moline explores many kinds of visual texts and includes great teaching ideas, all in the context of today’s pervasive social media.

Kick-Start Your Class: Academic Icebreakers to Engage Students

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Imagine, 125 icebreakers and 40 closure activities all in one book! It’s a teacher’s dream come true, says our reviewer Anne Anderson. The rich collection of activities, she says, will help teachers in many grades and subjects engage students while meeting the high demands of Common Core State Standards.

The Line Between Us: Teaching about the Border and Mexican Immigration

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Bill Bigelow’s teacher-friendly book offers concrete strategies to help students understand immigration and globalization issues, says teacher educator Kelly Moser. Firsthand accounts and other resources provide students with a glimpse into how other peoples live, the challenges they face, and the reasons they come to the United States.

Living the Questions: A Guide for Teacher Researchers

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This teacher research guide can help educators analyze, reflect upon and improve their practice, says reviewer Amanda Wall. The authors “clearly value and respect the work of teachers and include short essays, tips, and examples submitted by teacher researchers themselves.”

Math in Plain English: Literacy Strategies for the Mathematics Classroom

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Finally, says reviewer Shelly Sims, there’s a book combining literacy strategies with what we know about math thinking and problem-solving. Author Amy Benjamin “challenges the teacher-reader to incorporate both receptive and productive math instruction.”

 Media Literacy in the K-12 Classroom

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Reviewer Jamey Cates says this ISTE guide by consultant Frank W. Baker is an excellent resource for cultivating media literacy skills in today’s iGeneration students, with well-thought-out and ready-to-serve lessons correlated to standards.

Minding the Achievement Gap One Classroom at a Time

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ESL teacher Julie Dermody found this book to be a great resource for implementing Classroom Instruction That Works strategies for second-language learners, although she says its vague title almost caused her to overlook it.

Small Steps, Big Changes: Eight Essential Practices for Transforming Schools Through Mathematics

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Reviewer and math teacher Michelle Schwartz admired the authors’ eight essential elements for schoolwide math success but wondered how they might be accomplished in schools without a math coach or “on-board” principal.

Teach Like a Champion Field Guide

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This field guide to 49 teaching techniques developed for the Uncommon Schools charter organization provides new ideas and useful information “to refresh my classroom teaching,” says reviewer Susan Shaver.

The Energetic Brain: Understanding and Managing ADHD

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Special education teacher Laura Von Staden, a mother of two children with ADHD, found this book authoritative and a good source of research-based information about ADHD but thought it lacked the detail teachers need about specific interventions.

What Every Middle School Teacher Needs to Know about Reading Tests

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Sick of test prep that required her students to read boring texts and fill out worksheets, our reviewer Rebecca Crockett was excited to discover a book offering practical advice about reading tests and engaging test-prep activities that integrate well into the content she teaches.

What Every School Leader Needs to Know about RTI

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This book for school leaders “provides the steps and framework necessary to seamlessly apply the RTI approach within our schools,” says Linda Biondi. “It’s an important book for all school-based and district-level administrators to read.”

Our book review collection will continue to grow. Watch for them here! If you’re a publisher interested in providing books for review, contact John Norton at MiddleWeb.