Schools and Instruction Books

This book gives you valuable information on how to create a low cost curriculum. It has been a wonderful tool through the past 3 years. I keep going back to this book for information! A must have for any beginning home schooling mom!

This book gives a detailed description of what you should be teaching your children at the different ages, stages, and grades. The state requirements are not very well explained by the state, but this book tells you what your child should be learning enabling you to fulfill the state requirements and giving your child a very well rounded sound education.

This was a good intro book or if you are required to submit something, but a lot of it seems to be common sense. For exmaple, she talks about figuring our your educational goals and subjects you want to teach your child. If you are required to submit something formally, the questionaires can help to make sure you don't forget something that may be required. I was looking for a book that would explain a specific lesson plan for teaching a specific topic. Some people gave it 5 stars, because they liked the breakdown of education topics, but this can be found on-line at World Book Encylopedia's web site or in the books series "What your XX grader needs to know". It is alot more detailed and includes actual lessons. I would give it 5 stars for what it contains, but it was not what I was looking for.

This is the book I've been looking for! It's incredably detailed, takes you through all the steps of creating a curriculum that reflects you and your values (not necessarily religious), and gives you a list of what subjects your students should know by when. If you ever find yourself in legal trouble, if you followed the easy advice of the author, you should have No trouble standing up in court and proving that you are an able teacher with a child who is learning and is probably above standard.

The book may seem basic, but have you really ever put serious thought into what you want your child to get out of education? Do you want them to be ready for life, ready for college, ready for love? This book makes you think everything through, write it down, make it concrete, not just a vague thought in your mind only. So far this has been the most helpful book I've come across in my research of homeschooling. I will definately write my own curriculum when the time comes, and I won't be overwhelmed by it, thanks to this book.

This was the very first book we read when we first decided to home school. This book helped give us the confidence to go on and do the research we needed to do for how we wanted to school our child. I strongly recommend it for anyone starting out.

I've been searching and exploring many different ways to teach children mathematic thru art process, as well as sharing my ideas in my e-books ([...]), I thought I already knew all about teaching art. This book really fun and all the topics are covered with indicating the difficulty level suitable for which age groups, that help me to find the suitable topic easily to my children. Parents who is looking for how to teach your kids mathematic concept at the begining, this is a best book to have. Some ideas in side can be as reference, and you can modify different ways of doing it!

Math is in art, and art in math. It doesn't have to be a mystery anymore!! :o) These math-art projects are unique and new, and also can be enjoyed as art ideas without relating them to math concepts. As a former teacher, I found math could be daunting for many adults. With this book, it doesn't have to be anything more than an exploration of wonderful art projects. The concepts are for young children, but the art is for anyone of any age. I especially love the projects in this book for truly imaginative creativity. Some great group projects too. These are some of my very favorite art ideas to do with kids because they are so unusual. The math concepts are just part of the recipe!

I was a little disappointed in this book. Family Math and Peggy Kaye's Games for Math cover similar territory in a much better way. The activities in those books are more fun and the authors do a better job of explaining what skills kids will learn from doing the activities. There are a half dozen or so projects I will try, but most of them don't seem worth the effort.

While looking for a book to teach math concepts to my VERY kinesthetic 5 year old, I came across Matharts and it is a wonderful find. The concepts are solid, the activities are fun, the materials are easy to find and the mess factor is fairly low. I do think that the age range (3-6) may be a little low - the older childre I've worked with enjoy and learn from the activities as well. A terrific homeschool, preschool, or school resource.

My kids were delighted to find out that math is beautiful! The projects in this book are all art ideas that incorporate a strong math concept. I especially like how innovative and new the ideas are...very open and free process projects. I can see that these projects could be used with all ages, but the math concepts are really for younger kids. Excellent book, and what a unique approach to art! You can count on art (get it, COUNT on art?).

This book is FULL of amazing ideas for integrating technology into the classroom. There is a section at the end of each chapter that invites you to look at the book online where you can find resources for your area of teaching. I had to buy this book for a class I was taking and it is a book I will be keeping. Great stuff for the beginner and expert tech integrator.

Information in this book is helpful if you know nothing about computers.

It seems like the department of education decided that teachers need an information technologies class to earn a credential and then they scrambled around to find an author to write a supporting text. So much of the information is common knowledge - software, hardware, world wide web etc . . . Seems like a waste of time and money. If you are in a post-bacc program and you don't know what an operating system is or how to open an application, then you probably should get out while the getting is good. However, there are a few nuggets of information that are applicable. For example, in the software chapter, there is a step-by-step description of how to design a classroom website. It is very detailed and informative. I might photocopy that section before I sell the book back. Hope this info helps.

This book is great for teachers who need to learn to use computers in their classrooms and for students who are studying to be teachers. I used it for a college class and it was very helpful.

I like using this text because it is well laid-out. The diagrams are easy to read, follow, and learn from. The explanations are clear and focused. Each chapter has a summary and review. The on-line text complements and reinforces the text by supplementing with more information, by offering links to websites, and by including interactive summaries and quizzes for each chapter.

I have a friend in New Jersey whose daughter took lessons from Jimmy Brown for years and he is a great teacher and a great player, but that's not why I bought the book. I bought it because I have a daughter who is 5 and wants to rock out and there are not a lot of rock books that a 5 year old can enjoy learning from. I'm a skeptic and approached this book without bias, but have been pleasantly surprised at just how good this book/cd is. I suggest getting the edition with CD included. When my daughter started Suzuki Method classical guitar I also started guitar with her. Whether 5, 15 or 50, this book/cd is an excellent starter for learning the basics of rock guitar. I would love to see an edition with DVD as well. Hopefully there will be a part 2 which could include popular rock songs that utilize the techniques that are presented in the first book. That being said, it's a great introduction to rock playing. It includes basics of how to hold a pick, how to read TAB, how to tune, power chords, simple riffs, palm muting, accents, power chord extensions, 12 bar blues, lead playing and jamming. He introduces the student to all these techniques in simple easy to understand language with excellent exercises that are demonstrated on the accompanying cd. It's 36 pages of stuff you have to know. He takes you straight into playing rock guitar. Most kid methods have you playing "Yankie Doodle" or "Home On The Range" with either strumming or single note leads. Ain't no "Yankie Doodle" here. Just Rockin' in the style your kids hear on the radio.I'd love to see a part 2 but even without it, this is all necessary stuff and kids (big and small) can start rocking immediately.

I spent about $80 on instructional videos and books to learn how to play guitar, this book is the only one that would recommend to others. Every other "beginners" book had me trying three finger cords and progressions from the start.
Frustration! This book has you playing riffs from modern rock songs string by string, one or two finger chords - you will actually playing music that sound cool, not Kindergarten sing-a-long crap. EVERY instructional for beginners should start this way. Highly recommended.

I have a friend in New Jersey whose daughter took lessons from Jimmy Brown for years and he is a great teacher and a great player, but that's not why I bought the book. I bought it because I have a daughter who is 5 and wants to rock out and there are not a lot of rock books that a 5 year old can enjoy learning from. I'm a skeptic and approached this book without bias, but have been pleasantly surprised at just how good this book/cd is. I suggest getting the edition with CD included. When my daughter started Suzuki Method classical guitar I also started guitar with her. Whether 5, 15 or 50, this book/cd is an excellent starter for learning the basics of rock guitar. I would love to see an edition with DVD as well. Hopefully there will be a part 2 which could include popular rock songs that utilize the techniques that are presented in the first book. That being said, it's a great introduction to rock playing. It includes basics of how to hold a pick, how to read TAB, how to tune, power chords, simple riffs, palm muting, accents, power chord extensions, 12 bar blues, lead playing and jamming. He introduces the student to all these techniques in simple easy to understand language with excellent exercises that are demonstrated on the accompanying cd. It's 36 pages of stuff you have to know. He takes you straight into playing rock guitar. Most kid methods have you playing "Yankie Doodle" or "Home On The Range" with either strumming or single note leads. Ain't no "Yankie Doodle" here. Just Rockin' in the style your kids hear on the radio.I'd love to see a part 2 but even without it, this is all necessary stuff and kids (big and small) can start rocking immediately.

The kids found the book to be interesting, and as far as it goes, useful as well. The exercises and commentary are all written to the children's abilities. My problem with this bookis that it is just too short and too simple.

Just as the kids are starting to feel like they aren't wasting their time; just as they are seeing some progress; and just as they are eager to turn the page and learn the next bit, the book ends, with the final page telling them that they are now on their own, and that the best way to learn guitar is to listen to their favorite music and try to follow along.

Well, if the authors had said that on the first page we could have saved a little money and simply bypassed this book altogether. I think it is a great disservice to kids eager to learn, to tell them [after they have spent their money and time buying and following a guitar book] that they shouldn't really be using books to learn guitar.

This book is not about different Hudson School painters painting the same view but in their own styles. As in history and in my life, I go out painting with other painters and we paint the same view. Each painting is unique but you can see that they were painted it in the area on the same day. This book has nothing to do with that idea. A nice book, as reviewed by others, but not what I expected.

Different Views In Hudson River School Painting by Judith Hansen O'Toole (Director and CEO of the Westmoreland Museum of American Art, Greensburg, Pennsylvania) is an expansive and beautifully presented anthology of the art and the artists who pioneered the first native style of American landscape painting. Providing readers with an illustrative compendium of examples supported by an informative and "reader friendly" text, Different Views In Hudson River School Painting delves deep into the study of many various artists in terms of their diverse styles and productivity. A perfect edition to personal, academic, and community library Art History collections, Different Views In Hudson River School Painting is very highly recommended and informative reading.

It is both beautiful and facinating, since it compares the styles specific to most of the artists of this era. It brings together the paintings that are meant to be reviewed together and makes them that much more amazing. It is a great book for lovers of the Hudson River School.

Sometimes when looking at these landscape paintings you feel you are looking out a window or are in the landscape itself. It's beautiful to see the natural, the wilderness, especially for me (like many others) who are surrounded by machines all day long. O'Toole does fine job explaining each painting and its symbols. For example, deers are symbolic of wilderness while cows are symbolic of man's encroachment into the wild. Another example, a scene of a boat with hay being guided by a tugboat toward dark clouds (the top picture on the cover) appears to be "a metaphor for man himself being guided through the challenges of nature's perils and his persistence in working to tame them..."

I would recommend it.

I was waiting for this book to be published, because I was told from multiple sources that it was going to be a good source for ecological design and building schools, but i was extremely disappointed in this book. It is in no way comprehensive and I am not sure why you would publish a book like this that was not comprehensive.

There is some decent information in here, but nothing that you can't get from spending a little bit of time doing some searches on the internet.

It is a shame, because this type of book is needed and a great idea.

I was very pleased to finally find a well written and thoroughly comprehensive study of the options out there for someone looking for an education based on ecological design. This is a very important and developing area of study and needs specific attention. When I was in school for design you only had "word of mouth" on what was out there for a design education based on the environment. The author has obviously recognized the need for such a resource for people interested in design, as well as people interested in teaching and implementing sustainable design programs. Great book. I may buy another to send to some old professors. Very recomended.

The rise of environmental design or "green" architecture is by far the most important movement in architecture and the building industry for the last two decades. And for years young people have faced the daunting task of finding the best education to meet their needs. My architectural office is constantly receiving questions from students asking where they should study. At last we have a clear and effective guide to the broad range of opportunities to learn about sustainable design.

The guide takes on the very broad and sometimes confusing diversity of ecological design fields, from "natural building" schools to institutions that offer study in more technological solutions. This book covers an incredible range of schools, including traditional 4 year college as well as part-time schools, post-professional education, and organizations that provide hands-on instruction.

The book is very well organized, and I found the ratings charts of the schools to be especially clear and useful. I only wish there were more of the concise 1 page profiles that paint a very clear portrait of what the schools are like. While students still have to do more personal research as to which school will ultimately suit them best, they now have an excellent base to get them started.

I have been interested in Ecological Building (primarily Cob Building)for at least 14 years and have logged many hours online in search of schools and courses. Thankfully someone gave me a copy of this book and I now have a compendium of schools at my fingertips. The 'Program Tables,'comparisons of schools' curriculum. learning environment etc. were particularly useful and the school 'Profiles' were very inspiring (eg. EcoVillage at the Farm) for a novice builder like myself.

Being Canadian, I appreciated that research on Building schools was carried out for my country and included both schools that I recognize and ones that were new to me.

Any student of Ecological Design and Building will find this book an invaluable resource. Buy it!

I like how the book has dozens of ideas. If you expect lots of detailed directions, don't. But that's ok with me. I know how to use software applications already, but feel like I'm trying to reinvent the wheel when integrating the computer into the classroom material. This book gave me many ideas.

I use Windows machines at my school and the projects work great.

I teach computers in a lab setting to elementary students, and I found this book only mildly helpful. It gives general advice, but any detailed project descriptions used MAC applications such as Kidpix and Hyperstudio, and would be much more difficult in Windows.

I greatly enjoyed Saltveit's work on teaching computers to K-5. Her book is a most valuable source of help and ideas to me and to the teachers at my school (Marymount, Paris).

This book would be helpful to any teacher wanting to incorportate technology in the classroom. With over 50 projects this book can help learning across the curriculum easily. Saltveit's style makes it easy to read and enjoyable. She gives suggestions and even mentions what might go wrong and what to anticipate before you start your lesson.

This is a useful book for music educator who works with big classes. However if you are looking for ready-to-use lesson plans this book is not for you. The core idea is how to teach rather than what to teach. The author shares her ideas on classroom management,and presents various teaching strategies on how to introduce the material. I used some of the ideas from this book in the classroom. They worked like magic!
No one knew I was not the magician. Thank you, Ms. Lavender.

I'm an elementary school music teacher for an Asian country, and I must say that this book has been a very useful resource and I do not regret buying it.

The cons of this book is that stuff like classroom management techniques are highly cultural sensitive - so it is definitely more suitable for the context of American classrooms.

However, many of the teaching techniques mentioned will definitely inspire you to make your lessons more interesting for children. They also seem to correspond quite closely with the 'learning through doing' techniques for teaching music to children that I was highly ingrained with during my pre-service training.

In short, this book is a sensible read and resource for elementary school music teachers who wish to inject a more creative approach towards teaching in their classrooms. It far beats some of those books which boast of a 101 music games etc etc which leave you with a feeling that you are running a circus rather than a music class.

This book is jammed with great ideas for music classes or for any elementary school class where the teacher wants to inject a little fun. If you can get past the author's "controlling nature" -- she basically tries to tell you what clothes to wear and how to say "good morning, class" -- it will be well worth your while. I teach music in Los Angeles and use this book constantly.

I agree with earlier reviewers, this book is a great resource for the music teacher but is not for you if you are looking for ready-made lesson plans. It's formatted in a very user friendly way and I especially love the warm-ups.

I don't know who that book is written for. I bought the book, since it appeared on the suggested reading list for the California Teaching exam. It's so technical that, unless you already know the stuff, it's useless. The classroom exercises use teaching concepts that should have been left on the cutting room floor fifty years ago. Parents, watch out.

I was plesantly surprised at how easy this book is to use for both musicians and new musicians. Watch out for used books not all of them have the cd that I needed for my class. For the musicians- sometimes I forget that newbies don't know about the Staff or note names this really starts form the begining. It demonstrates good places to start teaching from.

Surprisingly, neither the online booksellers nor the publisher, Prentice Hall, refers to the audiocassette of all 60 musical selections in the model lessons for teaching music, which accompanies the Fourth Edition of this book. This is actually one of the main benefits to having it in a classroom or home setting. College instructors use this as a textbook to teach musician and non-musician teachers how to teach the art to elementary school students. Even parents who home school their pre-school and elementary school age children should find this a very accessible resource for teaching all basic musical elements: expressive qualities, melody, rhythm, form and harmony. I wish that I had found out about this resource guide and lesson plan library before returning to teach elementary school music full time after 30 years of pursuing a varied carrier in law, business and "higher" academics. The standardized essay exams for certification in music education should be a snap now. All the right conventional pedagogically sound verbiage is there to satisfy the most melancholy of lesson plan freaks. The cassette tape makes this book more helpful than Music Fundamentals, Methods, and Materials for the Elementary Classroom Teacher by Michon Rozmajzl and Rene Boyer-White(2nd Ed., Longman, 1996). For a complete (and much more expensive) library of childhood music experiences in the schools go to the K through 8 textbooks and teacher aids (ample CD recordings, overhead charts, wall charts, musical play scripts, and several video cassettes) in the Share the Music series published by McGraw-Hill (2nd Ed. 1998).

smithgrp@quixnet.net

This book and accompanying cassette are invaluable! I teach grades K-8 general music and this book has been very useful for lesson plans. There are step by step lesson plans and the cassette provides the music and excerpts needed to present an effective lesson to the children. I've found that these lessons tie in easily with the benchmarks and goals for all of my children. If you do not own this book- buy it. I'm now waiting for an addition to come out that includes my 6-8 grades.

I read "Poisoned Apple" carefully because education is my full time study. This largely anecdotal book is a description of modern reform ideas in the setting of reform efforts by Betty Wallace in North Carolina. Reformers and reform ideas are overly praised in my judgment while the very real problems of reform are too often blamed on short sighted opponents. True believers in recent versions of education reform will find here confirmation of their views. More dispassionate readers will want to read more widely

The insidious pervasiveness of Bell Curve practices is truly the central cause of ongoing decline of public schooling in America--forcing bell curve comparisons among same-age children through grade placement and standardized testing rather than simply measuring each child's growth along a continuum of progress regardless of age. It is no wonder that thousands of parents are turning to homeschooling and private education of their children, and we can expect this trend to continue.

Wallace and Graves clearly hit the nail on the head, but it is already too late to combat such heavily entrenched bell curve practices. The demise of American schools is too far gone. The lucrative testing and textbook industries will continue to protect their profit margins, and politicians will continue to point to standardized testing as the way to compare schools and states. And, in the best interest of their children, caring parents will continue to seek better ways to educate their children rather than subject them to the tyranny of same-age bell curve comparisons in public schools. Sadly and irretrievably, this horse left the barn a long time ago.

As a university professor, I have been teaching leadership and learning for the past eight years. Throughout that time, Wallace's book has been required reading in our programs at every level of graduate study. It represents a microcosm of the broader community within which schools must exist. In a well-written case study, Wallace has presented a number of the problems faced by public schools and potential solutions that were explored under her leadership in Vance Co, North Carolina. Both success and failure are presented for everyone to read. She has exposed her actions, for better and for worse, for her readers to evaluate. This is a comprehensive description of what happens in a challenging community when school reform is attempted. This book should be required reading for every school administrator, school-board member, and professor of education, not to mention anyone else interested in improving the quality of schools. The book simply must be reprinted or published in a revised form with a follow-up report of what has happened in Vance Co., NC, in subsequent years.

In Japan there is a relatively simple educational philosophy; through hard work all students can succeed in challenging subject matter
Ms. Wallace and Mr. graves present a compelling point that many American schools have established an assessment system that compares students to the average in district or in state test-taker based on the results of a bell shaped curve
The authors compare this to the teaching of high standards and benchmarks or the now politically incorrect term, outcomes, (OBE)
In order to successfully reach such goals children must progress at a pace independent of age, (grade).

Although the school district that I am affiliated with, (school trustee), is relatively successful in comparison to the North Carolina district that Superintendent Wallace attempts to reform, there are far to many students who are both held back as they await their class to advance or find themselves in high school despite suspect grades
Too often trustees don't know the questions to ask in order to solve problems
"Poisoned Apple" is written by "friends" of education and despite the title, the book leaves me with a feeling of hope
I found it in my county public library, (Kalispell, Montana), and I am extremely disheartened to discover that it is out of print, (I will call the publisher).