Nonfiction Books

This book has been helpful in getting writing going. Not intimidating and for all ages to use.

I know this book was written for teachers, but as a newspaper columnist, I am often asked to conduct writing workshops for adults and teens who want to become writers. Not only do DiPrince and Thurston give hundreds of prompts for on-the-spot writing exercises, many of which help the writer practice and identify good writing techniques, but they also give 50 examples of how to get started writing in "the real world," which is what most adults in these workshops want. For years I'd done my own research and shared my own experiences concerning good places to start out writing, but this list tops anything I ever did on my own. Also, as a substitute teacher, I sometimes find I have dead time to fill and these prompts are fabulous both as fillers and as full lessons for those times teachers leave no plans. There's something in here to cover all bases and as the title implies, this book provides exercise all areas of the brain.

Teaching students to write used to be so boring. I can remember my teachers in school saying, "Be creative!" but I was never really taught how to do that. I am now a teacher and am faced with the challenge of teaching students to be creative. Yoga for the Brain is a great addition to my writing program in that it gives the student something to base their creativity. For example one entry is "What has been a hard lesson for you to learn?" What a great idea to think about! This is not your typical sentence starter book.

Yoga for the Brain is a wonderful tool for teachers of writing. I use this book daily, along with Unjournaling, as journal prompts for my 6th grade students. They laugh, talk, and really get the imagination going! My kids no longer whine when it is journal time...they actually remind ME to do it! Great book to buy!

This book has some excellent designs. It would not be good for most children as the designs are too complicated. It is also provides some great ideas for Papel Picado. It does not limit designs to Day of the Dead.

"Get out your crayons and your pencils" This is mommy's coloring book-something every mom should have. The intricate line drawings offer hours of coloring that produce very framable finished works. This is great for plane trips, hospital visits, or just plain procrastination. Next time your boss calls say your are coloring and mean it. I recommend fine tip markers or quality colored pencils.

This is a fun way to be introduced to mexican folk art culture.
I also use it for ideas when I paint decorations on furniture,wooden boxes,etc.And since the pages are'nt colored,I am not restricted or influenced,I can choose my own interpretation.

I am an embroidery arts digitizer. This coloring book is a great source for my designs.
Love all Dover Books and Love the Amazon Prime Membership
Sierra

Cover was great but the inside was sketchy, at best. However, it will provide the guidelines I need for a project I'm working on. That's all I was really looking for.

This book is classic Dr. Seuss...fun, silly, and children don't realize they're learning something. Great book for teaching about maps. I bought this for my 6 year old prior to going on vacation. We had been looking at maps and talking about what states we'd be driving through on our trip. He enjoyed listening to the book and because of the way the information is presented (fun and silly rhymes), he has retained what he learned. He has even referred back to specific bits of information we read from the book (i.e. Never Eat Shredded Wheat to remember North, East, South and West.)

The back of the book contains a glossary of terms mentioned in the book. Highly recommended as an additional tool for teaching about maps.

The Cat in the Hat's Learning Library books are all great tools to get beginning readers to read and explore different topics at the same time.

There's a Map on my Lap is my favorite in this series. It explains in typical Cat in the Hat rhyme and stance all the different uses for maps.
It explains the difference between a globe and a map, what latitudes and longitudes and other features of maps are. You learn to read a map by using the windrose or a grid.
The book goes well beyond town or country maps. It features weather maps, topographical maps and even marine charts.

What truly separates this book from the crowd: it is shockfull of hands-on things to do. It begins with peeling an orange while leaving the skin in one piece to demonstrate what a world map should really look like - brilliant idea! Then it goes on to make a map of your room, town, imaginary countries. Or how to measure the length of a curved road on a map using a straight ruler and string.

At the end of the book you find a glossary that explains the "big" words like topographical map and others again. Also a list of more books about maps and globes for children.
If you like doing hands on things with your preschool through 2nd graders this book is for you! Hours of fun and education all rolled into one big happy Cat in the Hat poem.

This is a fun book for introducing young children to maps. I will use it in my early childhood classroom but I wish I'd had it when my own chldren were young. They would have loved it!

Children enjoyed this book. Used in map unit for PS and elem. settings.

I always get quick response from Amazon after placing my order, especially if I purchased item(s) directly from Amazon, including this book. I'm happy with Amazon's service.

I like to warn others that this study guide is wrongly advertised.

When I ordered this Item.I received a similar one, but with a different author.
I wrote to you, and you nicely apologized, and offered me a refund.
However,I asked, but was never told if the right guide is available (with the rigth author). The problem with this item, is that, it is advertised with an author that matches my geometry book, but the actual item delivered comes with a different author, meaning that did not match the problems (answers) for my geometry book.

I hope you someone corrects this probem soon.

Very helpful addition to the book - I do wish it was printed larger though in full size pages as opposed to 2 pages to 1. Just means I have to copy each page as a PDF and then blow it up to 200% - Still worth it as if follows the classwork and gives examples for the kids to do.

This book is huge. No basic magic trick is missed. The text is easy to understand and the illustrations are great. I also enjoyed the added little tips on presentation that hightens the tricks, adding comedy and entertainment. This is definately a must-have for all beginning magicians. At this price, this book is a great value, even for those of us just wanting a few little tricks to amaze our friends. I bought this book for a ten-year-old. He is just a little young to be able to idependantly use the entire book. However, I believe that within a few years, he will need no assistance at all reading and interpreting the book. There are so many tricks described in the book that I think he will be using it for a long time to come.

This is the instruction manual that I use to teach new magicians.
Lawrence O'Leary

I've always fascinated by magic. And for those guys who like to entertain the women, will find an absolute importance of magic in their routine. The tricks in this book are ranging in difficulty and definitely require times, energy and whole lot of practices to execute.

I was expecting there will be lots of impromptu magics, the kinds I like to entertain people. Quite dissapointed to find the section to be basic and not very impressive. However, if you are a professional magician without this book, you'll be like a man in LA without a car. Thus I can say that this book is critical and mainly focused for stage magicians.

This book is wonderful for anyone wanting to learn magic tricks. This book explains how each trick will appear to the audience and then gives very detailed instructions with drawings showing each step. I used the information in the book to teach rope tricks to a bunch of third grade cubscouts. The parents were so impressed with the tricks that they wanted to learn them too.

Many times applauded, this classic for teaching magic is practically unequaled. If you want to learn magic from scratch, this book is what you need.

If you want to read a book that combines brief overviews of the work of many well-regarded leaders in the field of education, this book is a good beginning. Those who work in public education and understand the need for re-structuring and re-culturing our schools will appreciate the authors' laser-like focus on student learning through the development of professional learning communities.

The authors of the various chapters of this book focus on the essential elements that most impact student achievement. Rick Stiggins discusses assessment for learning vs. assessment of learning. Douglas Reeves focuses on curriculum and the importance of power standards and differentiated assessment. Jonathon Saphier stresses the need for high expectations for all students and suggests what educators can do when students aren't learning. And there are more . . .

In these times of student and teacher accountability, all educators must use data to make decisions, including those regarding staff development. Professional Learning Communities provide educators with the structure for collaboration and learning. Teams of teachers and administrators work together in a PLC to create an environment that supports school improvement to result in greater student learning.

Developing a PLC in your school is certainly not the silver bullet. However, the book is a good one to read to gain an overview of what educators can do to positively affect student achievement. If you are already familiar with the work done by many of our educational leaders, you may need to go deeper. In that case, this book is probably not for you.

As the processes of school improvement shifts from regulatory compliance to authentic work in schools, it is essential to build a broad understanding of decades of thinking on school reform. This book offers a strong summary of the concepts most likely to bring real change in the only place that matters, the classroom. We have spent decades talking about change and the learning community concept has the potential to be the catalyst of change.

On Common Ground can build a broad foundation of knowledge however; other resources are needed to detail the specifics. The best highlights include:
1) Michael Fullan on building collective capacity.
2) Doug Reeves on anaylsis of student work and feedback.
3) Rick Stiggins on assessment for learning.
4) Jonathon Saphier on motivation.
5) Mike Schmoker on urgency.
6) Larence Lezotte on shared leadership.

If your goal is to building common understanding about contemporary thinking in the area of school improvement, On Common Ground provides a great starting point.

Rarely do I find a collection of essays by multiple authors to be a great book. Too often the prose is uneven and the authors, despite the assertions of the editors, come off as talking at cross purposes. This book is no exception.

It is not without value. The theme of this book is the importance of professional learning communities in education and I am a supporter of the concept. I didn't need the authors to convince me of this. Perhaps the most perceptive comment made in the book is that teachers already know how to teach well, they know the best practices, we just need to give them an opportunity to work together, develop mutual support and implement them. The problem is that, on a practical level, this is a hard thing to do in an evironment where scheduling conflicts and self-contained teaching is the norm. What would be nice is to have authors who say more than "this is difficult but you must do it" and instead give some practical suggestions on how to do it. There are some here but not enough.

Perhaps the editors would have been better off authoring the entire book themselves. Some of these essays only pay lip service to PLCs as they wander off into theories that are more personal. I respect Michael Fullan's work on sustainable systems but he didn't seem to really fit here, as did some of the other authors with their own axes to grind.

Still, if a reader goes into this book with eyes wide open, then there are things of value to be found. And, in the tough world of education, anything of value is worth considering.

I wanted to like this book. After agreeing to lead a book study for On Common Ground, I *needed* to like this book. I believe in Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) and think very highly of the work that the DuFours have done in that regard, but I just couldn't get into the book.

The problems are many. Section 1, by Richard DuFour, is nice enough. It gives a good overview of the PLC structure and how it should work, thought chapter 2 was printed earlier in the ASCD's "Educational Leadership" magazine and can thus be found for free. In section 2 we start going downhill in a hurry, particularly in chapter 4 by Rick Stiggins. By the time you get to section 4, where they talk about taking PLCs into a broader, district context, you're completely out of the realm of the schools and into the work of researchers and administrators.

That's the major problem I have with On Common Ground--impracticality. There are good ideas here, but they aren't useable. Many of the authors talk in grand, eloquent language about their topics, but you have to work incredibly hard (believe me, I did) to make the book practical.

If you're looking for a book on PLCs I recommend "Whatever It Takes" or "Professional Learning Communities at Work." They're far more useful.

In how many ways are we going to have to hear that the unexamined methods in which our schools have been organized, structured, staffed, and departmentalized work against our best efforts to create real, sustainable learning communities? The following items were a collection of thoughts on behalf of educators working at the Butte County Office of Education that gathered to discuss this book as part of their professional reading series.

This book offers one of the most comprehensive, candid, and clear calls for reforming the ways in which we approach and engage students each and every day in our schools. By combining the ideas and research from today's most prominent thinkers on the development of effective environments for learning, this book serves as a wonderful, concise compass leading those of us in education who pick it up and care to pay attention to its guidance.

Some guiding points of interest included:
Assessing for Learning vs. of Learning
Focus on the Positive Outcomes of Learning vs. the Punitive Consequences of Not Learning
Collaborative Agreement of Essential Learning vs. Individual, Departmentalized Development of Learner Expectations
Modeling Elements of the Learning Community vs. Merely Proselytizing those Elements

Follows the new IB Biology syllabus PERFECTLY, so if you study from here you're sure to get ALL the details you need to know for the exam. the information is written clearly and it's not only just plain text, it's got articles and also additional material and information that's interesting to read. there are also review questions at the end of each chapter (one negative point is that the answer section just covers these questions, not the ones that are found throughout the book like in every single page, but I guess the book would be ten times bigger if it answered all of them). highly recomend it :)

I was very disappointed upon receipt of this book. I needed a good source for my coursework and to study from, and this was not at all what I needed. It does not even cover all of the IB Syllabus assessment statements, I firmly recommend "Biology for the IB Diploma" instead.

This course companion has proved immensly helpful in my studies. For every topic I personally have encountered, it fully explain all statements from the syllabus - though my experience seems to differ greatly from that of the other reviewer. Additionally, the book provides the slight amount of depth needed to understant the topics as opposed to simply memorize terms.

Perhaps the most helpful feature, however, is the short quiz/review at the end of each section. The questions are IB-style and provide insight about whether you have fuilly comprehended the material.

Altogther, I would highly reccomend this book to any IB student, escpecially one who has struggled (as I have) in a class they have always done well in in the past. It is an excellent additional resource and quite worthy of its cost.

A+ !

Book was in good condition as discribed by the seller. My son loves the book

"ANARANJADO" is the word I learned for the COLOR orange. "NARANJA" means the fruit, not the color. Confusing, since in English the color and the fruit are the same word! Other than that, a very cute early Spanish book!

My 16 month old LOVES this book. She has been bringing it to me for months asking me to read it 'with' her. she points at all the different things on each page and I tell her what it is and what colour it is. ex "that's a green grasshopper" or "he's painting the fence purple". It's a very colourful book for us to share together. And as a bonus we get to learn spanish colours too!

Me encanta este libro. Mi hija de apenas 10 semanas se lo disfruta muchisimo. Las imagenes y las diferentes tonalidades de colores en cada pagina son perfectos para el aprendizaje por asociacion ya que te da la oportunidad de poderles inventar historias. Ademas es buenisimo para los pequeñitos pq pueden ejercitar los musculos de la vista, ademas que es una manera muy bonita de comenzar a introducirle los colores y de una vez ampliar su vocabulario de manera bilingüe.

Great book, my toddler loves it. And there are no mistakes.

For clarification: the color orange is "naranja" in Spanish from Spain. We call the fruit and the color the same in Spain (just as they do in English!). I know in Latin American countries they say "anaranjado". But that does not make "naranja" a mistake in the book. It is correct Spanish, found in the dictionary.It was just probably translated by a Spaniard.

I was shocked by the review by a teacher saying that she tells her students that the word "naranja" is wrong. I would never tell my toddler that "anaranjado" is incorrect, even though we don't say it that way! It's just a proof of the diversity of the Spanish language. Shame on this teacher who says she uses "naranja" as an example of bad translation - and complains of seeing the mistake frequently. No wonder, since it is not a mistake. She should instead explain how different Spanish-speaking countries use different words, and all are correct.

This series is great for homeschool. My kids love it. Lots of pictures for younger readers but written to keep older ones interested. At least thats how my kids rated it. We will be getting the whole series