Education Teaching Books

Laura Robb's book saved me as I went from teaching second grade to
sixth grade. Filled with strategy lessons to use before, during, and
after reading, journal writing, assessment suggestions, this book has
been my beacon, my resource. Equally important, my students are
developing the tools they need to improve their comprehension, and
their ability to think and connect with information. Robb's voice is
honest and represents the best in her years of teaching.

This books has a lot of good ideas and activities for teaching reading in middle school. It has practical advice and sound methods for supporting literacy in the classroom. This book should be in every teacher's reference library.

Linda Rief's Seeking Diversity and Nancie Atwell's In The Middle offered a great deal more that was helpful and insightful. This book had much less content - plenty of big print, lots of pictures and charts - and what was there was rather basic. Rief's book is better for concrete activities that kids will actually enjoy, and Atwell's book has a novel and solid philosophy that I think will offer more real guidance than any number of handouts on journal formats. I mainly used the book for some information on books that middle schoolers would like, but honestly other teachers and my own students had much more to tell me.

This is a great book. I teach middle school reading intervention. I have used many of the techniques with my kids. The five finger rule for picking out a book that is at their reading level is very helpful. I also like the questions about reading.

This is a good starter book for those diving into the world of teaching their first English class. The only downside to the book is it's small size format which makes reproducing some the pages look like you "shrunk" them down instead of them being full size. Easy reading on how to teach reading strategies. . . not how to teach students how to read.

We had purchased this book for our 11-year-old son, and quickly found it insufficient. So it went to our 9-year-old. We tried to use it for fourth grade homework this week, and it has so little information it's not even funny. It wasn't helpful at all.

It's a pretty book though. It would be a nice thing for a preschooler through maybe first grade, for an aspiring scholar who craved the excitement of maps and world words, but didn't really need any hard information out of it.

This is a fascinating and comprehensive look at the history of modern American education during its most formative time...roughly the first half of the 20th century.

What is most striking to me is that the debates I see in schools and classrooms today were fought on a national scale during this time. This is an important book for anyone who wants background on the relationship among philosophy, values, methods, content, educational practices, and institutions.

You can see the history of many of the fundamental elements of modern American concepts of schools (grades, subjects, testing). Looking at this history and seeing the causes, people, decisions, and debates--how our assumptions are a construct--can expand a reader's concept about what is currently possible. For example, viable models of education based on child development that are now echoed by contemporary calls for more learner-centered pedagogy were steamrolled with factory models based on calls for "efficiency." It's grist for expanding your thinking about what is possible today in education...at least is was for me.

It's a good read as well...you'll be writing in the margins and underlining passages, even if you don't have a paper due.

Keliebard's book introduces the readers to the long history of American education. Essentially, education was something the wealthy used to keep their places in life, but eventually as education became more widespread, it became problematic and the fight for the American Curriculum began to take shape.

With its many twist and turns, the reader is given a glimpse into why education is the way it is, and the many voices and philosophies that helped shape it into its current hegemonic institution. The movement that has left the widest and most permanent imprint on education is that of social efficiency, rooted in the concepts of the Industrial Revolution - get them in and get them out. Sadly, that is the way things truly are.

The battle goes on. Recommended for anyone questioning the underlying beliefs of our current educational system.

The Struggle for the American Curriculum is a historical exploration of the changes that occurred in American education. It deals with reforms and the philosophies with gave curriculum its shape. In this book, Herbert M. Kliebard seeks to present a fair and balanced recount of the people and events, who and which fashioned the course of education during first fifty or so years of the twentieth century. In many ways, it is Kliebard's "search for progressive education."

The Struggle for the American Curriculum is a historical overview of pretty much the first fifty years of curriculum formation and philosophy in the 1900s. There are two aspects worth highlighting about this book. One is its comprehensive historical account of the development of curriculum theory and the other is Kliebard's special attention to "progressive education."

The historical overview is very comprehensive as mentioned before. Every major "player" of curriculum and education theory is explored and discussed. For instance, John Dewey is significantly and appropriately studied. His curriculum and its impact is given its full due. Not only is Dewey examined, but also Eliot, the Committee of Ten, and so forth. This book also shows how different movements and reforms, such as social Meliorism and vocationalism, took shape, reached their peaks, and eventually took its place in the educational curricular mosaic.

Yet, most interesting is Kliebard's last chapter on "progressive education." This seems to be his own interpretation in the curriculum debate. The author cites Cremin in defining "progressive education." It is expanding schooling to health and occupational competence, the application of scientific research for teaching purposes, and customizing instruction for the different types of students. Yet, this is only a definition. Kliebard is interested in "cleaning up" what progressive education is. He is keenly aware of the struggle for each philosophy and theory to become the definition. It is the subject of his book and the struggle which continues today.

Overall, Kliebard's book is a very tedious work that is very hard to get into. The way he portrays the evolution of curricular thought is very detailed and hard to follow for a beginning student of curriculum design. Kliebard does not make good use of primary sources. One may wish that he provided more samples of the original work of figures such as Dewey. There are no tables, charts, or diagrams to help comprehend the various views and movements. In this way, the book is somewhat hard to follow. This is the overall weakness.

Yet, Kliebard does a fine job in presenting all the views, movements, and people who impacted curriculum design. His attention to detail is admirable and helps a beginner become acquainted with the humanists, child-study people, the social efficiency educators, and social meliorists. Indeed, this book is very helpful in this fashion.

Once can also appreciate Kliebard's fair treatment of all the views and influential figures of curriculum. In fact, it is not apparent which side he takes. He raises the strengths and weaknesses of each viewpoint in an equal manner. Therefore, he depicts the "struggle" for the American curriculum in a very succinct fashion. Kliebard does an admirable job in representing the facts in a straightforward and seemingly unbiased manner.

Kliebard's "Struggle", now in its third edition, is considered by most to be one of THE most important books about the history of American education. Starting in the early 1890's with the Committee of Ten, Kliebard gives the reader a coherent version of a rather complex story, the story of how four factions have competed to build American schools in their own image. Interestingly, Kliebard shows how each faction was able to have profound influnece on public education and how we think about education in general.

Those who believe that schools should be a place where young people are intellectually engaged in worthwhile learning for the ultimate purpose of developing active democratic citizens may walk away from the book a little depressed since Kliebard does seem to indicate that the factions who believe schools are meant to 1) prepare young people for jobs 2)secure American hegemony in the global marketplace, or 3)indoctrinate students to be obediant patriots who conform blindly to whatever adults tell them are the ones who in the end have had the most influence on what our children are actually doing (or not doing) in public schools. Kliebard's quote of Joel Spring in the Afterword rings true for democratic educators who have dedicated their lives to improving education for the common good. Spring contends that the "social efficiency" faction has left such a deep impression on American education that any efforts at reform are hopeless because there are certain organizational features of our schools which we take for granted as normative inhibit freedom and individuality and demand social adaptation.

At any rate, this book is great for anyone who wants to learn more about the deep history of why our schools look the way they do and who is patient enough to read through an intelligent and scholarly work.

This book by Kliebard is a classic in the world of college textbooks about American educational history and curriculum. However, if I might be so bold to say so, it is not a classic due to its own strength but rather to the paucity of books that cover this topic.

I have no problem with Kliebard's choice of years to write about (1893-1958) since they are the years when debate over what should be the proper curriculum in America's schools was at its most fierce, beginning with the Committee of Ten report in the 1890s, he documents several movements and ends with the federal government assuming more control over education right after the Sputnik incident caused the American government to doubt the quality of teaching science and math students were receiving.

Kliebard is a professor of education. This shows when he tells this story to his readers. Although he knows his material backwards and forwards, he clearly is an apologist for John Dewey and he has little tolerance for any other education movement. He openly mocks many of them as tools for social control by the ruling class. Other times he pulls out sexist and racist quotes that are intended to excite the reader into disliking educational movements. While it is a dependable (but cheap) tactic to score a few points in a debate, it is a very poor way to write history. It also distorts the true study of some of these movements.

Any history student can tell you that America in the late 1800s and early 1900s was a racist and sexist place. It serves no purpose to drag those facts into the discussions of the policy debates of the time. Rather, it clouds the issue behind the offending words and phrases. This book was the source of much discussion in my graduate level class I am taking and many of the students would become upset with the words and phrases of certain educational movements and then utterly dismiss their main ideas. Thus, the true study of the philosophies of curriculum becomes obscured in the name of partisanship.

The only exception to these tactics is John Dewey. Kliebard admits in one of his prefaces (he has included each preface from each of his 3 editions of his book in this edition) that he is a big fan of Dewey. Unfortunately, Kliebard does not make it entirely clear why. He talks about Dewey's University School and some of the innovations in rather vague terms. Many other times in the book he points out that Dewey is incorrectly interpeted by other movements who claim Dewey as one of their own, but he does little to explain why this well-written, widely-published educational philosopher could not clearly lay out a plan that would not be misinterpreted by so many. Mr. Kliebard, if Dewey was so great why couldn't he more clearly express himself, especially when it came to curriculum for the secondary level?

So, this book gets a grade of C. He loses points for being biased in his reporting of history. He gets extra credit for being one of the few to document this facet of American history in a fairly reader-friendly format.

I have had great success with the activities in this book. The students enjoy the activities. It has helped my students spell better and it is great for my ESL students. Students of all ability levels benefit from these activities.

I purchased this after a literacy workshop in our district. After reading the introduction and the first month of lessons, I'm hooked! It's the first "spelling" approach I've seen in my 10 years teaching that makes sense and shows how to teach students to look at words in a whole different light than traditional, ineffective workbook programs. It provides words and structured instructional lessons for TEACHING word work rather than assigning words to memorize for a week, then forget.

This is an excellent choice for teachers who wish to implement a phonics program that can really work for upper grades. The book is divided into months. Each month there are activities ready to be used. The activities are categorized into four specific goals. Once you learn how to teach the four goals for the first month, you will be prepared to teach the same lessons again the next month, of course, using different words.

The phonics activities help students notice spelling patterns in words through clever activities that the older kids will enjoy. For instance, there are phonics lessons based on brand names! I highly recommend this program because it will give upper grade students the chance to learn how to spell high frequency words, to identify spelling patterns in big and small words, to monitor their spelling, and to use root/prefix/suffix parts of words to define and spell words.

This book is suitable for 4-8 grades. It includes lessons that will last for nine months of the school year. Teachers on year round schooling will also be able to use this book. Each lesson should take between 15-30 minutes, depending on the teacher's scehdule. This is an excellent book for upper grade teachers!

This has been a great supplement for my high school English classes. The kids love it and they get a chance to work and look at words differently. They are using skills they don't use on a regular basis. It's quite a challenge for most!

This book is by far the most beneficial I have found for my upper elementary students struggling to improve their reading skills. It gives simple, step by step instructions for each of the activities and requires very little planning time for the teacher. EVERY child can succeed at improving reading skills, and the activities are appropriate for older students. They do not feel like they are doing 'baby' lessons- an issue I have dealt with when using other phonics books.

I'm not satisfied with the quality of papers. If it's just for practicing words or reading, it's ok. But this is kind of a game. It's not fun to play game with it!

Very useful for second language learners. My students want to play one of these games every day. The games take a little while to make, but once done (make sure you laminate them!!) they are a big hit.

I found this product useful. It says grades 1-3 but is geared toward below grade level readers. The games were very easy to assemble.

This book has some great games for reinforcing previously taught skills. My aide was able to easily assemble them and have plenty of materials to use with the kids. Now I know she always has something appropriate to engage the kids if they finish assignments early. I feel good knowing that the kids are doing something they see as a fun reward, but they are not spending their time idly.

It's not instant if it's not colorful, ready to laminate and easy to put together.

My son needed this book for school and we received in time for school. Great service!

This book is an amazing edition to any library and is great for studying how to live a healthier life. i used this book in my health class and when i finished the class i felt like i understood the class better then my friends who taken the class with another book. this seller is also very reliable, i have bought many things from Neobuller and have recived nothing but quality service and products.

Recently our school has been reviewing many text books for yournew health class. Our school is in an Urban district with many Englishas a Second Language students, so the problem that we found is that the challenge becomes the reading not the information. With the this text the reading level is low compared to the information presented. We were amazed at the supporting resources avalible. The book is very interactive with many options for labs and home activities. Our school has choosen this text to be implemented in our curriculum for the 2000-01 school year.

This book is only masquerading as a textbook -- it is a propaganda tool for those who want to stick their heads in the sand and not talk honestly about contraception. Check the index for yourself -- "birth control" and "contraception" are NOT EVEN LISTED. The section on AIDS does NOT MENTION condom use. It is appalling that in this day and age a textbook to be used in health class can leave out science, truth, and a well-rounded discussion of responsible use of contraceptives. This book deserves far less than 1 star.

I am a 7th grade student and we use this book for health class. Most of my friends and I think that the lessons don't make sense. We did the chapter on emotional health this week. I had to ask my mom who is a counselor to explain the lesson and even she had difficulty understanding what they were trying to say. This is a very confusing book. We were going to buy the book so we could work on the lessons at home but it costs too much.

This text is well thought out. It has poems and helpful charts and diagrams, but I don't think I learned very much new material that I hadn't already read in other books or class.

A very practical source for new Kindergarten teachers. Absolutely easy to use and tailor to your own classroom needs. I used many of these ideas the first week of school and will continue to tap this source throughout the school year.

the book is well written, the authors know what they are talking about and the content is worth reading.

Great ideas, especially for getting to know your students and getting them prepared for coming to class on the first day.

The only thing I don't like is the layout. The pages are those cheap, off-white type sheets, which makes it slightly tougher to read. The pictures would have also been more helpful if they were in color.

Overall, an okay read and worth the $12.00

I would also recommend: Early Learning Environments that work, and Designs for Living and Learning.

The book had many wonderful ideas for kindergarten.....not so many for preschool age. I wish I had bought a used copy $$$$$.

This book may have been written by a real teacher, but you will learn absolutely nothing new about working with kindergarten kids from her. The authors regurgitate well-learned ideas and praise themselves for the "novelty" of incorporation of these in practice. This book may be somewhat well suited for new-graduates, that yearn for examples of how things work. But even new graduates eventually develop an aversion to the patronizing self-praising style of these authors. Dont waist your money, buy something else!