Category: Book Reviews

A to Z Advocacy Advice for School Leaders

Take an alphabetical tour through advocating for your school in this new book from Robert Blackburn, Barbara Blackburn and Ronald Williamson. Former principal Mary Langer Thompson shares the highlights and suggests the book can be most helpful in ed leadership classes.

200+ Lives to Explore in Picture Books

Picture book biographies can help students understand others’ perspectives and problem solving strategies. Teacher Joanne Bell recommends Deskins and Dorr’s take on aligning these science, social studies, and arts biographies to national content standards.

Literacy Essentials for All of Our Learners

If you want your all of your students to love reading and writing and all to be excellent readers and writers, Regie Routman’s new book will inspire, teach, gently cajole, and help you move your literacy teaching forward in service of these goals, says Rita Platt.

Motivating All Kids to Engage in Math Class

Calling on her background as a researcher specializing in authentic math for all students, Ilana Seidel Horn provides detailed explanations of why detached students resist engagement and offers thoughtful responses that teachers in any subject can use, says reviewer Patti Mosko.

Use Think Alouds to Foster Strategic Readers

Teacher think alouds should not be spur of the moment but carefully planned events built around specific objectives and your thoughtful analysis of the text in question. Molly Ness’s 3-step process will fully prepare you to wow your students, says reviewer Linda Biondi.

A 12-Step Program to Rescue Public Education

John Merrow weaves a narrative that explores the history of America’s failed school reform efforts and offers a vision for ridding public education of our addiction to more of the same in favor of long-term, meaningful and sustainable change, writes teacher Rita Platt.

What Kids Can Tell Us About Engagement

Drawing on her national survey of 1500 students, Heather Wolpert-Gawron’s “Just Ask Us” brings their voices to the challenges of engagement. Adding teacher interviews and research, she offers a strategy-filled resource that belongs in every teacher’s hands, says David Bever.

Why We Need to Entice Hard-to-Reach Writers

In Enticing Hard-To-Reach Writers, Ruth Ayres offers wide ranging ideas and resources to help all students become writers because “when writers believe their words matter, nothing can stop them.” We begin, reviewer Mary Langer Thompson notes, by getting our hearts right.

Use Messaging to Build Positive School Culture

Messaging Matters provides practical notions and step-by-step models to strengthen communication and build a positive culture with your students, parents, and community. And you can implement them almost immediately, writes school counselor Wendy Adams.

Simple Self-Care Strategies for Teachers

Mindfulness, teacher self-care, and increased job satisfaction for teachers are currently hot topics. Teacher librarian Rita Platt finds Lisa J. Lucas’ helpful book, Practicing Presence, a welcome addition to the conversation about Social Emotional Learning for educators.