First Published in 2006. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book displays 37 “Friday Focus” memos, each of which provides insight into a specific aspect of teaching and learning for all to reflect on throughout the year. Friday Focus memos address the principal’s responsibility to shape the school culture, provide intellectual stimulation, and communicate effectively. The memos are organized around the school year and provide educators with a wide variety of insights into how to improve our schools. They are typically between 500–1,000 words in length and can be sent out via e-mail to each staff member – not only to the teachers but also secretaries, custodians, and cafeteria workers. A vehicle for school improvement, the Friday Focus memos provide a step-by-step plan for staff members and principals to work together as change agents for school improvement.

Use Friday Focus memos to motivate and engage your staff every week, and help create a school culture focused on the growth of students and teachers. Easy to understand and implement, Friday Focus memos offer an effective and efficient way to improve student learning, staff development, and school culture from within. Written by educational consultant and former principal of two award-winning schools, Jeffrey Zoul, these memos focus on topics such as active learning, high expectations, gratitude, test preparation, and more. Zoul provides 37 teaching and learning memos, one for each week of the school year, for principals and other administrators to reproduce and circulate among their staff. Zoul prefaces each memo with stories from his experiences as a teacher, coach, and assistant principal in the K-12 levels. You can also write your own memos, with guidance on possible topics and teacher takeaways.

This second edition of a teacher favorite features a fresh, easy-to-use layout including color coding by grade level, more support for student engagement in academics, greater emphasis on the effective use of teacher language, and a dedicated chapter on the all-important first day of school.

This book provides the busiest leaders with an accessible set of tools that can immediately be deployed to positively impact their school. Authors Ronald Williamson and Barbara R. Blackburn explore the COMPASS model—Culture; Ownership and Shared Vision; Managing Data; Professional Development; Advocacy; Shared Accountability; and Structures to Sustain Success—as an overall framework for school improvement. Chapters include in-depth discussions of easy-to-implement, useful strategies for improvement and address the most common concerns facing today’s school leaders. Supplemented with templates, charts, and other adaptable tools for ongoing, practical use, 7 Strategies for Improving Your School is your key guide to school improvement.

This book takes a practical look at how standards in education can be raised. It cuts through jargon and shows how ideas and intentions can be translated into effective action that will help a school.

Work with students at all levels to help them read novels Whole Novels is a practical, field-tested guide to implementing a student-centered literature program that promotes critical thinking and literary understanding through the study of novels with middle school students. Rather than using novels simply to teach basic literacy skills and comprehension strategies, Whole Novels approaches literature as art. The book is fully aligned with the Common Core ELA Standards and offers tips for implementing whole novels in various contexts, including suggestions for teachers interested in trying out small steps in their classrooms first. Includes a powerful method for teaching literature, writing, and critical thinking to middle school students Shows how to use the Whole Novels approach in conjunction with other programs Includes video clips of the author using the techniques in her own classroom This resource will help teachers work with students of varying abilities in reading whole novels.

From the author and illustrator of Our Class is a Family, this touching picture book expresses a teacher's sentiments and well wishes on the last day of school. Serving as a follow up to the letter in A Letter From Your Teacher: On the First Day of School, it's a read aloud for teachers to bid a special farewell to their students at the end of the school year. Through a letter written from the teacher's point of view, the class is invited to reflect back on memories made, connections formed, and challenges met. The letter expresses how proud their teacher is of them, and how much they will be missed. Students will also leave on that last day knowing that their teacher is cheering them on for all of the exciting things to come in the future. There is a blank space on the last page for teachers to sign their own name, so that students know that the letter in the book is coming straight from them. With its sincere message and inclusive illustrations, A Letter From Your Teacher: On the Last Day of School is a valuable addition to any elementary school teacher's classroom library.

Children in today's world are inundated with information about who to be, what to do and how to live. But what if there was a way to teach children how to manage priorities, focus on goals and be a positive influence on the world around them? The Leader in Meis that programme. It's based on a hugely successful initiative carried out at the A.B. Combs Elementary School in North Carolina. To hear the parents of A. B Combs talk about the school is to be amazed. In 1999, the school debuted a programme that taught The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Peopleto a pilot group of students. The parents reported an incredible change in their children, who blossomed under the programme. By the end of the following year the average end-of-grade scores had leapt from 84 to 94. This book will launch the message onto a much larger platform. Stephen R. Covey takes the 7 Habits, that have already changed the lives of millions of people, and shows how children can use them as they develop. Those habits -- be proactive, begin with the end in mind, put first things first, think win-win, seek to understand and then to be understood, synergize, and sharpen the saw -- are critical skills to learn at a young age and bring incredible results, proving that it's never too early to teach someone how to live well.

Teaching 400-600 students every week presents the ultimate classroom management challenge, one that if you're unprepared for can bury you in a mountain of stress and misbehavior. Classroom Management for Art, Music, and PE Teachers is a proven solution that will transform even the most difficult group of students into the peaceful, well-behaved class you really want. It provides the tools, tips, and strategies you need to simply and effectively manage any classroom, no matter how unruly or out of control, so you can focus on teaching, inspiring, and making an impact that lasts a lifetime.