How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk.

Faber, Adele. Mazlish, Elaine. (1980). How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk. New York, NY: Harper Collins.

Summary / Analysis:

A series of stories that illustrate basic principles of interacting with children.  Much of the book is suggestions of specific language to consider using.  There are activities to do, including writing your own (imagined)words down, and also cartoons that show scenarios that have gone well and that have not gone well. The authors suggest reading the book carefully and putting it down between chapters, in order to begin practicing the language and responses.  It is mostly themed around the idea of using empathetic words and attitude to handle situations. The suggestions and advice are very practical, and would be greatly useful for teachers to use in every day interactions with their students. The authors have also written a book entitled How to Talk so Kids Can Learn, At Home and At School.

Relevant Quotes / Concepts:

“But more important than any words we use is our attitude. If your attitude is not one of compassion, then whatever we say will be experienced by the child as phony ot manipulative.  It is when our words are infused with out real feelings of empathy that they speak directly to a child’s heart” (18).

“Often what makes us repeat ourselves is a child who acts as if he hasn’t heard us.  When you re tempted to remind the child about something for the second or third time, stop yourself.  Instead, find out from him if you’ve been heard” (78).

“Parents told us that once their children became more accustomed to problem-solving, they were more able to work our their differences with their sisters and borthers.  This was a big bonus for the parents.  Instead of having to step in, take sides, play judge, and come up with a solution, they restated the problem and put it right back where it belonged – in the lap of the children.  The statement that seemed to activate the children to take responsibility to resolve their own conflicts was, ‘Kids, this is a tough problem: but I have the confidence that you two can put your heads together and come up with a solution that you can both agree to’.“  (132).

 “To Free Children from Playing Roles (that adults have assigned them unwittingly)

1. Look for opportunities to show the child a new picture of himself or herself.

2. Put children in situations there they can see themselves differently.

3. Let children overhear you say something positive about them.

4. Model the behavior you’d like to see.

5. Be a storehouse for your child’s special moments.

6.  When your child acts according to the old label, state your feelings and/or your expectations” (205). 
Annotations by A. Worrall

Raising Resilient Children.

Brooks, Robert. Goldstein, Sam. (2001).  Raising Resilient Children: fostering strength, hope, and optimism in your child.  New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Summary / Analysis:

This summary pertains to the chapter entitled The Alliance between Parents and Schools.  This chapter is organized into principles that guide the Parent-Teacher relationship. Among them; 1) Parents and Teachers are Partners, 2) Maintain Regular Contact Throughout the School year 3) Practice Empathy, Empathy, Empathy, and 4) Parent-Teacher Collaboration Should be Guided by the Goal of Developing a Resilient Mindset in our Children.  There are several more, and each is thoroughly addressed in turn. Parameters to consider as well as responsibilities and roles for Parent and Teachers in every example are outlined carefully, along with a rationale for each.

The chapter explains each principal in depth, simply and constructively.  Anecdotes are used effectively to illustrate each principle.  While dense at times, the book as a whole would be an excellent text to discuss at a parent/school book club, and this particular chapter could be used to launch the first Parent-Teacher interaction at a new school.

Relevant Quotes / Concepts:

“It is imperative that these significant adults in a child’s life collaborate in the quest to develop a resilient mindset in children. All of the guideposts described for parents raising resilient youngsters are applicable for educators in the school environment” (261).

“…we know of educators who have given children false praise or minimized or denied the problems that children were encountering.  In some instances they rushed in so that a child would not experience making a mistake (rather than helping youngsters discover that they could learn from mistakes).  In one school, children were given buttons to wear that said ‘I’m capable and lovable’ as remedies to low self -esteem.  Children are much more sophisticated than many adults realize in recognizing these various forms of false positive feedback.  If anything, they learn to resent these less-than-honest attempts to make them feel more competent” (267).

“A key component of a resilient mindset is a sense of ownership and responsibility for what transpires in one’s life” (270).

“Much research supports the premise that when students feel that there is at least one person at school who know them, believes in them and is an advocate for them, they are more likely to succeed in the school environment and less likely to become alienated or to drop out” (283).

Unconditional Parenting

.Cohen, Alfie. (2005).  Unconditional Parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishments to Love and Reason. New York, NY: Atria

Summary / Analysis:

Alfie Cohen continues his work dissecting adult roles in discipline and consequences.

Chapter titles include Withholding Love, Too Much Control, What Holds Us Back and Choices for Children .  there is an appendix on different parenting styles and the relevance of culture, class race.

Much of what Cohen instructs is easy to agree with, and difficult to actually do. The belief system behind Cohen’s arguments applies equally to teachers as it does to parents. The fact remains that children deserve to be heard and really listened to.  Teachers have a particularly important role in this work, most especially because they are working with other people’s children. It requires a tremendous amount of effort to respond to children in the moment using strategies most of us were not brought up with.  Unconditional Parenting reminds adults that our relationships with children can be more positive, and less reactionary, if we pay particular attention to our own responses and the child’s situation.

Relevant Quotes / Concepts: (Pages listed are from the e-reader version)

“Ensuring that children internalize our values isn’t the same thing as helping them to develop their own” (33).

“The subject of this book is not merely discipline but more broadly, the ways we act with our children, as well as how we think about them and feel about them” (40)

…many popular discipline strategies  cause children to feel they’re accepted only when they act the way we demand” (47).

“One reason that a heavy-handed do-what-I-say approach tends not to work very well is that in the final analysis, we really can’t control our kids – at least, not in the ways that matter” (177).

“Deci and Ryan believe that children are born not only with certain basic needs, including a need to have some say over their own lives, but also with the ability to make decisions in a way that meets their needs; they’re equipped with a ‘gyroscope of natural self-regulation.’  When we control kids excessively-for example, by offering them rewards and praise for doing what we want-they start to become dependent on external sources of control.  The gyroscope begins to wobble and they lose their ability to regulate themselves” (194).

“…many of the schools that are truly committed to high-quality learning – and to ensuring that students don’t lose their love of learning-make a point of avoiding letter and number grades altogether.  They find more informative and less destructive methods, such as written summaries or personal conversations, for letting parents know how well their children are doing and where they might need help.  And, no, these students don’t have any trouble getting into college as a result of the absence of grades’ (270).

“In addition to listening, we need to be candid about our feelings and, ultimately, to look for solutions together: ‘Let’s talk about what is fair to you but also what might address my concerns.  Let’s come up with some ideas and try them out” (557).

“Kids really respond when they are treated with respect, involved in problem-solving, and assumed to be well-intentioned” (559).
Annotations by A. Worrall

Radical Reflections.

Fox, Mem. (1993). Radical Reflections: passionate opinions on teaching, learning and living.  New York, NY: Harcourt

Summary / Analysis:

This summary pertains to a chapter entitled “Notes from the Battlefield. Toward a theory of why people write”.  Fox describes various writing situations, primarily though anecdote, explaining the forces that cause people to enjoy writing, or more often, dislike it.   The anecdotes are real, and are interconnected in such a way that the reader is drawn further into exploration of the theme. They involve writers of all ages, and the reasons people react to writing in different ways. Her analysis is deeply embedded in the “why” of writing, instead of the “how”. 

Mem Fox is an extraordinary writer, and a teacher, and a teacher of writers. The stories told throughout the book are repeatedly illustrative of her own passions, and serve to inflame the passions of whoever is reading the book.  At once idealistic and down to earth, Fox consistently points out the failures of our own teaching systems and exhorts us to teach in a way that excites everyone in the room (not just the students).  Her work will change your teaching no matter what age you are, or what age your students are.

  

Relevant Quotes / Concepts:

“I developed as a writer by developing my writing, which sounds tautologous, but it isn’t.  If the children in our classes don’t care about their readers, how can they develop as writers?  They can’t because they won’t care about what they are writing, and they won’t want to revise” (5).

“I hadn’t realized how often I wrote for fun until Malcolm read the first draft of this chapter and said, ‘I’m amazed that you haven’t explained how writing is central to your life. It fascinates you. It rewards you.  It fatigues you.  Nowhere have you actually said you can’t live without writing.’  Can’t live without writing? Had I heard correctly? I loathe writing!  It’s so easy to do badly and so difficult to do well that I quail before each new writing task.  I particularly detest the battle to produce a picture-book story in less than 750 words.  Of course I can live without writing – or can I?”(16).

“I’m anxious about the power, or lack of it, in school writing.  Power is about being able to craft a piece of writing so effectively that its purpose is achieved.  Craft means understanding the nature and importance of leads and endings; of showing, not telling; of sharpening and tightening; of structure and focus; of purpose and audience; and of the conventions.  Craft means being able to put those  understandings into practice.  Craft means struggling in that battlefield between brain and hand until the best possible draft is achieved…such power doesn’t come from nowhere.  It comes from practicing writing for real reasons. It comes from having read powerful writing.  It comes from having been taught, and I mean taught, the basic skills of spelling and punctuation in the context of real writing events.  Those who write well have more power and therefore more control over their lives (italics added).  It seems to me to be a supreme arrogance on our part as teachers not to see that the granting of this power to our children is politically and socially essential” (20).

“Children develop language through interaction, not action.  They learn to talk by talking to someone who responds.  They must therefore learn to write by writing to someone who responds.  It’s not a new theory, but it is one I keep forgetting even though it’s so clear and simple.  Please keep it somewhere safe” (22).

Annotations by A. Worrall

High Tech High Mentor Training

Btsa induction. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://sites.google.com/a/hightechhigh.org/induction


Summary:  The website is High Tech High's hub for their BTSA induction program.  As part of their program, I attending mentor training on November 11, 2010.  The agenda included a review of the intern and induction programs, a CSTP self assessment, and role-playing observations.  For the role play, groups of 3 reviewed HTH's observation tool and the debrief protocol.  Then a video clip from a classroom was shared and teams role played the new teacher, the mentor, and an observer who shared notes on what they saw that worked/didn't work about the conversation between the new teacher and the mentor.  This process was repeated a second time, changing roles.


Evaluation:  The tools and resources from the training directly support the work that must be done by both new teachers and mentors as part of the induction/intern program.  The training supported the goals of the program and helped mentors prepare for actual conversations with their mentees.


Reflection:  This training was extremely useful to me as I develop a mentor training at my school.  It showed me how crucial it is for teachers to have a chance to see how video observations can be used as a conversation tool and to actually role play what that conversation could be like.  Also, I felt like mentors gained confidence and had a chance to ask questions about using the forms and following the protocol.  Engaging new teachers in reflective and critical thinking and conversation is a fine art; having tools and time to practice using them in a safe environment was incredibly beneficial.

Website: California State Teacher Performance Assessment

California commission on teacher credentialing. (2011, April 19). Retrieved from http://www.ctc.ca.gov/educator-prep/TPA.html


Summary:  This is the Commission's website for accessing information about the Teacher Performance Assessment, which all Multiple and Single Subject teaching candidates must complete in order to earn their preliminary credential.  The site has flyers for administrators, parents, policy makers, school board members, and teacher candiates; information about the three models of the TPA that are currently available (California Teaching Performance Assessment [CalTPA], Fresno Assessment of Student Teachers [FACT], and Performance Assessment for California Teachers [PACT]); as well as information for those considering designing their own Teaching Performance Assessment.  for each of the models, the site has links and information for further details about the specifics of each program.


Evaluation:  The site is user-friendly and up to date.  Since it is a state run site, one presumes the information is correct and current.


Reflection:  This site is key to my work developing mentors for my school's intern credential program.  Anyone involved with credentialing or working with new teachers would do well to be familiar with these standards as they represent the State's expectations for teachers (both new and experienced).  It is especially relevant working with new teachers to help them develop these skills and working with experienced staff to continue to develop and build upon their skills.

Website: Looking at Student Work

Looking at student work. (2000). Retrieved from http://http://lasw.org/


Summary:  This website was created by a an "association of individuals and educational organizations that focus on looking at student work grew out of a meeting on "Examining Student Work and School Change" held in Chicago in October 1998, hosted by the Chicago Learning Collaborative and the Annenberg Institute for School Reform."  The purpose of the site is to introduce, model, and provide resources for educators who want to begin or improve their practice of looking at student work using protocols.  The site highlights ten protocols and gives detailed explanations for each as well as sample protocols complete with pictures of the students work and transcripts of the conversation.  The site gives straightforward explanations of why and how one should look at student work and answers faq's from peers in the "LASW" community.


Evaluation:  The site is thorough, drawing on the experiences of the authors as well as upon research and other resources to explain and demonstrate the ten protocols.  The site is well maintained and provides many references and opinions, making it multi-dimensional rather than just one person's opinion or experience.  The authors are also connected to the Annenberg Institute for School Reform and Harvard's Project Zero, both respected insitutions in the field of education.


Reflection:  This website is a gold mine for those new to protocols or looking for new protocols to try.  It is focused just on looking at student work and is therefore both thorough and simple to access because everything about the site is designed to help educators learn about LASW protocols.  The transcripts and model conversations were particularly helpful as they helped me "visualize" how the conversation would go (rather than just reading a list of steps).  I was inspired by this site to do two protocols with my staff and to incorporate LASW as a weekly part of our school's intern mentoring program.

The Power of Protocols

P.J. McDonald, N. Mohr, A. Dichter, & E.C. McDonald. (2003). The power of protocols: an educator's guide to better practice. New York, NY: Teachers College Pr.


Summary:  This book is a collection of 24 tried-and-true protocols that are appropriate for a variety of educational contexts: using outside resources, working on problems of practice, and exploring student work.  The authors carefully explain the purpose of protocols, which are structures for guiding a discussion or conversation that increase equity and focus in a group.  Each protocol is outlined with recommended contexts and step-by-step breakdown of the components and time frame. 


Evaluation:  The authors pull from a variety of resources and credit each protocol to its originator.  There is a significant list of print and online resources and references at the end of the book as well.  The authors come from a variety of backgrounds but pull on their collective knowledge of and experiences with protocols to create a well-rounded and useful guidebook.  


Reflection:  This is an immediately accessible book: one could access different sections based on need or use the whole book to study protocols.  Prior to reading this book, I had never heard of protocols.  The authors do an excellent job explaining the purpose of protocols and when each might be useful: in the classroom, with small or large groups, with different levels of trust/familiarity amongst participants.  The sections about developing norms and establishing trust in a group have been crucial to how I have been approaching staff development at my school.  The other section is the protocols used to look at student work--I needed ways to evaluate student and teacher work in authentic, engaged, but honest ways and these protocols give the structures to make such evaluations successful!

Mentoring Matters

Lipton, L., Wellman, B., & Humbard, C. (2003).Mentoring matters: a practical guide to learning-focused relationships, 2nd edition. Sherman, CT: Mira Via.


Summary:  This book is almost a workbook of usable resources, references, and best practices for mentoring relationships with new teachers.  The focus of the book is on breaking down the components of a successful mentoring relationship in order for the "user" to assemble or improve their mentor skills.  The authors discuss the following topics in succinct, resource-packed sections:

1. The Mentor's Role
2. Learning-focused Interactions: A Continuum
3. Maximizing Time and Attention
4. Learning-Focused Verbal Tools
5. Facilitating Professional Vision: from Novice to Expert Teaching
6. Strategies for Success
7. Appendix
8. Structured Forms, Tools and Blacklines
9. References and Resources

Evaluation:  This workbook is packed with usable tools: calendars, forms, sample journals, key ideas, rubrics and more.  The authors regularly reference outside sources and include extensive print and online resources.  Each chapter explains a component of mentoring and gets to the heart of what makes this component successful.

Reflection:  This book was critical to my development of a mentoring program for my school.  I used or modified many of the forms and templates to suit our needs and followed the suggested ideas for reflection journals, mentoring skills, and forms of/skills of communication.  This is an outstanding, to the point resource for anyone looking to improve their own or others' mentoring abilities.

Building an Intentional School Culture

F., C, & Fulton, D. (2007). Building an intentional school culture: excellence in academics and character. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Pr.


Summary:  This book is the result of the authors' "work in improving school culture for more than sixty schools across the county."  The book is broken down into five sections, each with anecdotes/sample schools as well as usable resources:  

1. Building an Intentional School Culture: Excellence in Academics and Character: explains the importance of school culture, defines the basics of what school culture is, describes a sample school, and provides a sample School Culture Survey.
2. The School Touchstone: a touchstone is the heart/soul of a school--the point that all decisions center around.  This chapter gives samples for distilling a school's touchstone, how the touchstone can be utilized to define and build the culture of a school, and resources to promote and evaluate a touchstone.
3. The Four Mind-Set Model: the four mind-set model can be applied to teachers, students, parents and leadership; it is comprised of the mind-sets of integration, interdependence, independence, and dependence.  These four mind-sets help us understand how individuals and groups perceive their involvement in defining, building, defying, or resisting a school's culture.  After defining and discussing each mind-set, the authors provide several resources such as rubrics and models that can be used to evaluate the mind-sets of different members of a school community.
4. Introduction to the Eight Gateways:  the eight gateways are the ways that school culture is impacted: through Leadership; Teaching, Learning, and Assessment; Relationships; Problem Solving; Expectations, Trust, and Accountability; Voice; Physical Environment; Markers, Rituals, and Transitions.  Each of these is defined and described so the impact of each can be understood and modified to improve school culture.  Resources such a surveys and reflection tools are included.
5. Applying the Four Tools: the final chapter looks at ways to apply the Touchstone, the Four Mind-Sets, the Eight Gateways, and the practices of other industries/cultures to affect the culture of a school.  This chapter includes a two-year breakdown of goals for a school culture overhaul as well as answers to frequently asked questions.

Evaluation:  This book is full of resources to immediately apply the ideas presented.  It also references a significant list of resources and draws on years of actual experience working with schools of all sorts.  Therefore, the material was down to earth and usually both defined and described using a sample school scenario to show the work "in the real world."  Although the authors are biased towards their system, they justify how the system was developed and why they have seen it work successfully.  The book feels like a tool rather than just a source of theory.


Reflection:  This book clarified for me some of the complexities faced when trying to impact school culture which is such an amorphous and living phenomenon.  I am working to develop a mentor training and support program and this book helped me think about ways I need to address  leadership, voice, and "Expectations, Trust, and Accountability" in particular.  The mentoring program will affect the staff and thus affect the students so I want to be careful about how I approach it.  I also found the four mind-sets useful in considering how to work with specific staff members and how the mentoring program may impact the overall culture of our school.  I used the provided sample surveys to build a school culture survey and will probably use some of the other tools with my staff as well.  This book is a great resource of resources!

The Hardest Questions Aren't On the Test

Nathan, L., (2009). The Hardest Questions Aren't on the Test. Boston: Beacon Press. 


Summary: 


Nathan founded the Boston Arts Academy, a charter high school serving a high needs student body, in 1998.  Her book gives honest insight into the workings of a school, boiling it down to the culture and vision of a school--what gives it its heart and soul.  The book is broken into three sections: Structuring a School, Supporting Teachers, Addressing Inequality.  Each section includes anecdotes, first-person thought processes, and connections to common challenges and success beyond the BAA campus.  Nathan is forthwright in sharing how her campus, and she as a school leader, grappled with questions such as: What does this school really stand for?  What happens when schools develop shared values? What makes great teachers possible, and how much can school leaders really ask of them?  What are the risks and rewards of transforming a faculty into a professional learning community?  How do we talk about race?  How can we learn to see the invisible barriers students face and helf student break them down?




Evaluation:  Nathan is writing from her life experiences as an educator and as founder and leader of Boston Arts Academy; therefore her book is both very biased and very open about her experiences.  She doesn't highlight only the best and most successful moments, but includes the many roadblocks and bumps that she and her staff, students, and community have struggled with along the way.  Many of her stories are uncomfortable as they describe inequities, both apparent and hidden, that BAA has grappled with.  What is most admirable about her descriptions is her willingness, as an author and a school leader, to address these sensitive and complex concerns with genuine concern and honesty.


Reflection:  This book influenced my thinking about school culture tremendously because it is not a template of "how to do it" but an actual model of "how we are trying to do it."  As such, it gave me a taste of the pitfalls and potentials in structuring a school community.  Nathan defines strategies and ideas that BAA uses (for example, RICO represents the core values of BAA's "unifying framework" that is the foundation of all student and staff work) but she also describes how these strategies and ideas are put to work, how they are discussed, how they generate new questions and opportunities.  Nathan's honesty and optimism serve as a model for me as an aspiring school leader.  The level of student and staff engagement push my thinking about what a mentoring program should/could look like at my school.