A mother and daughter spend a sunny day at the beach together where they swim, dance, build sandcastles, and, most importantly, communicate. But their communication is not spoken; rather, it is created by loving hands that use American Sign Language. Readers will learn how to sign 15 words using American Sign Language with the help of sidebars that are both instructive and playful. And the beautifully illustrated beach scenes will appeal both to the deaf community and to hearing parents and children, who will enjoy this gentle introduction to some basic words in ASL. Hands & Hearts is a picture book unlike any other, revealing the special bond between mother and child. Praise for Hands & Hearts "A memorable excursion." --Kirkus Reviews "The book is recommended for libraries with an interest in ASL, and those in need of beach-themed picture books for the mommy-and-me crowd." --School Library Journal

Drawing from diaries, autobiographies, and personal correspondence, the auther reveals the complex reality and history behind stereotypes of courtship, adolescence, sexuality, and marriage in America from 1770 to 1920.

The layman’s guide to the ins and outs of craniosacral therapy—what it is, how it works, and what you can do to deepen, or begin, your own CST treatment plan Craniosacral therapy (CST) is a powerful hands-on treatment that supports the body’s own wisdom and innate ability to heal. Tens of thousands of practitioners around the world can attest to the effectiveness of this rapidly growing therapy. In From My Hands and Heart, Kate Mackinnon interweaves her personal journey of using CST with case studies and detailed, easy-to-understand explanations of the theory behind it. Whether you’ve never heard of CST before, thought it didn’t apply to you, or are currently undergoing treatments, this book has something for you. Mackinnon guides you through creating a team of practitioners focused on your well-being, and explains how to help yourself at home between sessions. You’ll learn simple, safe techniques that almost anyone can perform and receive. Most important, you’ll gain a deeper understanding of the amazing powers of the human body and how, with individualized support through CST, it can find its own way to balance and health. Heart Disease

Hands and Hearts includes easy-to-follow instruction for activities, based on the liturgical year, designed to help your church family experience faith-based learning together. A source of fun and biblical learning, this interactive book is a great way to draw together a congregation of all ages for spiritual growth and learning.

Hearts and Hands deals with many of the difficult issues addressed in Luis Rodríguez’s memoir of gang life, Always Running, but with a focus on healing through community building. Empowered by his experiences as a peacemaker with gangs in Los Angeles and Chicago, Rodríguez offers a unique book of change. He makes concrete suggestions, shows how we can create nonviolent opportunities for youth today, and redirects kids into productive and satisfying lives. And he warns that we sacrifice community values for material gain when we incarcerate or marginalize people already on the edge of society. His interest in dissolving gang influence on black and latino kids is personal as well as societal; his son, to whom he dedicates Hearts and Hands, is currently serving a prison sentence for gang-related activity. With anecdotes, interviews, and time-tested guidelines, Hearts and Hands makes a powerful argument for building and supporting community life.

Schools, today, are in the midst of the most major, costly educational reform movement in their history as they grapple with the federal mandates to leave no children behind, says author Susan B. Neuman, former Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education under President George W. Bush. Although some efforts for investing resources will be substantially more productive than others, there is little evidence that, despite many heroic attempts to beat the odds, any of these efforts will close more than a fraction of the differences in achievement for poor minority children and their middleclass peers. As Neuman explains in this insightful, revealing book, schools will fail, not due to the soft bigotry of low expectations, but because there are multitudes of children growing up in circumstances that make them highly vulnerable. Children who come to school from dramatically unequal circumstances leave school with similarly unequal skills and abilities. In these pages, however, Neuman shows how the odds can be changed, how we can break the cycle of poverty and disadvantage for children at risk After laying the critical groundwork for the need for change—excessive waste with little effect—this book provides a vivid portrait of changing the odds for high-poverty children. Describing how previous reforms have missed the mark, it offers a framework based on seven essential principles for implementing more effective programs and policies. Building on successes while being fiscally responsible is a message that has been shown to have wide bipartisan appeal, embraced by both liberals and conservatives. Following Neuman's essential principles, chapters describe programs for changing the odds for children, when the cognitive gaps are beginning to form, in these earliest years of their lives. In a highly readable style, Neuman highlights programs that are making a difference in children's lives across the country, weaving together narratives that tell a compelling story of hope and promise for our most disadvantaged children.

So you're getting married! The wedding is the most gloriously celebrated of life's rites of passage. Today couples of all faiths, colors, and cultures are choosing an interfaith ceremony for its spiritually inclusive and personal approach. It is a way of rejoicing in our differences and celebrating our commonality in an atmosphere of mutual love and respect. If yours is an interfaith, intercultural, or interracial union, then you have already embraced a love that knows no boundaries. What could be more beautiful? But now that it's time to make a public statement to the world, you may suddenly be filled with questions: How do we make sure that our ceremony is a reflection of our love and our relationship? How do we remain true to ourselves and still make our families happy? How can we create a wedding ceremony that merges our religious, spiritual, cultural, and personal beliefs? Can we do this without offending or alienating anyone? Who will officiate at our ceremony? When and where will the ceremony take place? Which rituals will we include? Joining Hands and Hearts will help you answer all of these questions and more, with a detailed questionnaire to help you learn more about yourselves and each other, practical guides to structuring an interfaith wedding ceremony, tender counsel on how to work with your families, and the most complete manual of religious, cultural, and universal rituals, prayers, vows, and blessings available. In warm, inclusive language, Reverend Susanna Macomb guides you through the most sensitive of issues with love and encouragement. She offers the stories and ceremonies of other couples to inspire you. You are not alone! Interfaith, intercultural, and interracial couples bring healing and hope for all of us. You are the future, and Joining Hands and Hearts can help you celebrate your union with all of the love, grace, and magic it deserves.

David Campbell's personal and professional life changed course in the wake of the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 26, 2004. A chance remark to a friend about the tragedy led his companion to reveal that he had dined, just a week prior to the tsunami, on a hotel patio where everyone had been killed. "In that moment," Campbell remembers, "a faraway event was brought much closer." That meeting launched Campbell into action. After researching travel and lodging, he packed everything he thought he would need in a major disaster zone and boarded a plane to Thailand. But his most important asset was his vast network of friends in the technology industry and his decades of experience in businesses management. His colleagues and friends wanted to help and he wanted to help them do it. Campbell didn't realize it at the time but he had stumbled on the key elements of what would become All Hands Volunteers, an entirely new kind of disaster relief organization: his own credibility, creative use of the Internet to make connections, and most importantly, the immeasurable power of "being there." ALL HANDS: THE EVOLUTION OF A VOLUNTEER-POWERED DISASTER RESPONSE ORGANIZATION shares the story of how, over the past ten years, Campbell and thousands of dedicated volunteers have personally and profoundly impacted the lives of people reeling in the wake of natural disaster.

A NATIONAL BESTSELLER "My Grandmother's Hands will change the direction of the movement for racial justice."— Robin DiAngelo, New York Times bestselling author of White Fragility In this groundbreaking book, therapist Resmaa Menakem examines the damage caused by racism in America from the perspective of trauma and body-centered psychology. The body is where our instincts reside and where we fight, flee, or freeze, and it endures the trauma inflicted by the ills that plague society. Menakem argues this destruction will continue until Americans learn to heal the generational anguish of white supremacy, which is deeply embedded in all our bodies. Our collective agony doesn't just affect African Americans. White Americans suffer their own secondary trauma as well. So do blue Americans—our police. My Grandmother's Hands is a call to action for all of us to recognize that racism is not only about the head, but about the body, and introduces an alternative view of what we can do to grow beyond our entrenched racialized divide. Paves the way for a new, body-centered understanding of white supremacy—how it is literally in our blood and our nervous system. Offers a step-by-step healing process based on the latest neuroscience and somatic healing methods, in addition to incisive social commentary. Resmaa Menakem, MSW, LICSW, is a therapist with decades of experience currently in private practice in Minneapolis, MN, specializing in trauma, body-centered psychotherapy, and violence prevention. He has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show and Dr. Phil as an expert on conflict and violence. Menakem has studied with bestselling authors Dr. David Schnarch (Passionate Marriage) and Dr. Bessel van der Kolk (The Body Keeps the Score). He also trained at Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing Trauma Institute.