Straight Talk for Today's Teacher: How to Teach So Students Learn

For your students to be their best, you need to be at your best. Adrienne Mack-Kirschner, a National Board Certified teacher, has created a no-nonsense guide to good teaching that shows you how curriculum, organization, and mindfulness can combine to help make your classroom a place where kids go to learn and achieve, not just collect a grade.

In plain English, Mack-Kirschner gives you nuts-and-bolts advice on foundational but often difficult-to-understand teaching strategies like:

• the teaching-assessment loop
• brain-based teaching
• classroom organization
• motivating students
• student portfolios
• student-led conferences.

Mack-Kirschner further demonstrates how these concepts and a focus on learning come together to form a classroom management environment so seamless you and your students won't even know it's there. Plus, she includes numerous reproducibles-checklists, forms, evaluations, and self-evaluations-that help you clearly establish goals and expectations, and help your students meet them.

"The single most important ingredient in student success," writes Adrienne Mack-Kirschner, "is the quality of the teacher." If you're a novice just starting out, Straight Talk for Today's Teacher gives you exactly what you need to become a mindful, responsive, effective teacher. Even if you're a veteran teacher, Straight Talk will show you how refocusing your practice can lead to an energetic new teacher-student dynamic that actively engages your class. Either way, Adrienne Mack-Kirschner will help you become the best teacher you can be.

Adrienne Mack-Kirschner is an education consultant with vast experience as a classroom teacher, mentor, literacy coach, and NB candidate support provider. She is also an education researcher at UCLA, and an avid writer and lecturer. Her articles have been published in the Los Angeles Times, Teacher, Home and School Connection, and Family Health. Visit her website, www.accomplishedteaching.com, for more information on National Board Certification and consulting services.