Schools and Instruction Books

In the area of nontraditional high schooling and related issues, Thomas Nixon has no peer.

When I was a kid growing up in Jackson, Mississippi, I had a pretty serious immune deficiency. Leave the house and I'd get sick. The doctors called it chronic fatigue syndrome, but there was no real idea of the cause or epidemiology. All I knew was that I was an 8-year-old with sore, swollen lymph nodes, bad arthritis, and a suspiciously low white blood cell count.

I was lucky; I had a mother who could afford to take time off and teach me at home. Went on to graduate from college; now I'm working on my doctorate. What would have happened if I didn't have that luxury? I have no idea.

But there are plenty of kids who don't. Sick kids, who can't make it to class every day; gifted kids, who are bored with the curriculum; kids with special needs, whose local schools might not provide for those needs in a useful way; troubled kids, who can't handle the social pressures; kids whose family relocate often, and find their educational experiences constantly interrupted. The list goes on and on--and that doesn't even include adults.

For people who fall between the cracks, or just find it cozier there, online high schools can be a blessing. This book will tell you everything you need to know to get online and start earning your diploma.

You see, all three of my daughters are high school dropouts. One was not very happy in a small-town high school that had no labs, no foreign languages, no challenges. She was 'rescued' when a good university recruited her in 11th grade, and off she went. One got through a month of 9th grade in a huge and scary urban high school, and just walked out. And the third never even went to high school; she discovered the GED equivalency exam, passed it at 15, and went on to college. All three ended up with Bachelor's degrees (Phi Beta Kappa), but it was a rocky and twisty road. If only there had been a book about alternative approaches to gaining a high school education and diploma.

Thankfully (for the rest of you), now there is. Tom Nixon's guide book is just the thing my daughters could have used. And now, in the age of the Internet, it is what so many other people need, to help them sort out the bad and fake schools (and there are plenty of them) from the good and excellent ones. Nixon explains how to choose a good school, and then devotes one page to each of 100+ good schools. Even though they're all good, there are significant differences in their curriculum, their cost, their academic model, their religious affiliatin (if any), and so on. This is like hiring a seasoned and excellent counselor for under twenty bucks. Highly recommended.

(Disclaimer: I have written books about earning degrees by distance learning, but I didn't address the high school world in any detail. I invited Tom Nixon to write the short 'high schools' chapter for recent editions of Bears' Guide. One should always go to the best experts, and for online high schools, that's Tom.)

I think that every teacher would be wise to read this book. It does an excellent job of demonstrating the constructionist principle, and its suggestions for using technology to help students think for themselves and develop new ways of thinking, is very good.

I've read many books on technology and education, and I have taught educators about technology. This has so far been the most intriguing book on the subject, and a book that got me to "think outside the box" (in a good way), more than any other book on the subject, other than the Problem Solving with Technology book in the same series.

I'm an instructional designer and I've chosen to use this book as both for a text in classes I instruct and as a handbook for working with faculty members at my university. The book focuses on ways to help students think better using technology tools, many of which are commonly available (such as spreadsheets). Many such books focus on ways to use technology first, with practical applications for teaching and learning second. Not so in this case. If you have to buy just one book on instructional technology, this is the one.

Every science teacher should read this book! The thought, research, and insight the developers put into the new designs for learning science are wonderful. They listened to students, observed how students made sense of the world around them, and adjusted the technology and learning strategies to connect science to everyday happenings in the lives of students. This book also tells the story of how partnerships between higher education, K-12, and field science organizations can bring relevance and meaning to the teaching and learning of science in our schools. Terrific Book!

From my role as a science teacher, it is encouraging to have a book which is informed by years of classroom research. My experience with the Computer as Learning Partnership project has greatly changed my understanding of how kids learn and what it takes to change the way they perceive the world around them. This book provides a pedagogical framework that has worked very successfully over several years and narrows the gap between academic research and classroom practice. I hope that my responses to the "Ask Mr. K." questions will be useful to teachers in reflecting on their own practices.

I have a daughter in 5th grade and she is a huge fan of this book series. The step-by-step apprach has her creating masterpieces every time! The drawings are a lot of fun, so she doesn't get bored with drawing mundane objects over an over. The drawing style is also cool and doesn't feel outdated like so many drawing books for kids do. I recommend these books very highly.

My grand-daughter is only 4 years old yet from the time she's been 2 she has loved to draw. She has tried to copy just what she sees and gets frustrated when she can't. So thought I should nurish her intrest in it. And I started learning with her for fun. First I brought books for me thinking I could teach her once I learned to better draw. Ha! I can't tell you how much money I wasted and felt like a failure.Trying to learn more realism in what I was drawing. They go from this to a finished product in 10 seconds and your scratching your head going what did I miss? So, I bought several of these books for her thinking at least they had cute critters in them she'd at least have fun with them. She follows with no instruction from me at all, just from looking at the pictures of what he's doing and can't read a word of it. Her pictures don't look exactly like his but she now draws a better circle than I do and she's have a great time with it. Has not once gotten frustrated because she can't draw just what she sees, as far as she's concerned she has, she drew the first circle that's an accomplishment to her. And from his strange creatures, doesn't matter to her if she's drawing a person with 20 arms and 4 legs she's drawn something and it's beautiful to her which is what's important. So weather your 4 or 43 it's well worth every penny. :-)Christopher Hart another great teacher check out his books as well. He'll teach you to draw 20 different sets of eyes, and several poses so you don't have to draw just what he's teaching you, you can mix it all up and still come out with a great drawing. Very easy to understand and follow.

I am sorry,I am not writing review about the book. I would like to ask you to e-mail the contents of the book to me as soon as possible. Thank you

I am always fascinated by creativity. Whenever I come across a creativity book, irrespective of whether it is intended for the business or academic world, I will always scan it first and if it appears "intriguing" judging from the front/back covers, table of contents and index page, I will often peruse - and reflect on - it. I will often adapt the ideas to my consulting work. In this case, this book did not disappoint me.

In a nut shell, this is a book about practical strategies for teaching and learning creative thinking skills. Although it has been written primarily for teachers and students, I find that many of the information on theory, strategies and assessment covered by the book are applicable and useful for anyone who is interested in exploring creativity, even in non-academic areas.

The main bulk of the book pertains to approaches to teaching the basic curriculum - mathematics, science, social studies, language - that encourage creative problem solving, and information on how research on motivation and creativity applies to decisions about classroom management, organisation and assessment.

The book is divided into two parts: "Understanding Creative People & Processes" and "Creativity & Classroom Life.". The first part gives an excellent grounding in creativity fundamentals. The second part gives practical suggestions for creativity design, development & assessment in a classroom setting. For teachers, this part, especially the assessment tools, is a real gem.

Very fortunately, the author's fluid writing style, coupled with her interesting case studies and numerous applications, makes the book easy-to-follow.

The author has very masterfully organised practical activities, such as "Thinking about the Classroom" and "Journeying and Journalling" in every chapter. For readers, there are a lot of points to ponder, several questions to ask and many things to do. This is the part I enjoyed "playing" with them the most.

At the end of each chapter, and also in the bibliography, the author has listed many useful references for further exploration. For research purposes, this is a gold mine.

For parents, who are looking for simple ideas and practical strategies to develop creative activities for their children, I dare say this book is definitely a very helpful guide.

As a matter of fact, if you are just looking for creative opportunities in your own life, this book (particularly chapter 6) can be a valuable source of curious delight.

This is THE BEST book I have read on math instruction. It fits my philosophy of sequential learning. It breaks every math skill into hierarchial steps, offers instructional presentation strategies, and assessment strategies. Every teacher of math needs to look at this book.

Great book for developing direct instruction for math. Nice job with task analysis - breaking down concepts into steps. Helps inform my teaching.

When my daughter was about 10 I realized that my technique of answering questions she asked but not going into more detail than she asked about no longer worked. She suddenly knew just enough to be embarrassed to ask about anything! She really hated it if I brought The Subject (sex) up, so thinking that she just didn't want to associate The Subject with her mother (I can certainly understand that!) I got her a book that she could read privately. She refused to even look at it. So I read it to her as a bedtime story. We shut the door and read it over three or four nights. It's a pitch-perfect book. I'm so glad my daughter wouldn't listen to me -- hearing it from Dr. Ruth, with her open-minded, loving yet clinical, detached, scientific yet human perspective was truly informative, interesting, and empowering. That was three years ago and my daughter is very calm and realistic as she, and her whole 7th grade class, surf through puberty. I'm buying it again because I raved about it so much that I lent it out and haven't seen it for two years and now the little sister needs a turn.

I love Dr. Ruth. A rational approach to sexual development and an excellent investment.

Dr. Casey, a leading researcher and professor in teaching reading, presents a compelling argument for the implementation of technology in classrooms as early as pre-school. While this is not a revolutionary idea these days, the approach she advocates is. Many schools still use the computer as a glorified typewriter or calculator, or as an electonic "ditto sheet." Not so here. With the help of colleagues throughout the world, Dr. Casey has studied real-life situations in which children, who might otherwise fail and join the ever-growing ranks of the functionally illiterate, not only learn to read, but experience the joy of success. This is accomplished through the use of the "talking computer", a learning machine which gives immediate feedback to children in all learning modalities, visual, kinesthetic, aural, and oral. Many practical problems are addressed, such as funding, and the resistance to change in the "corporate culture" of many schools. A helpful appendix ennumerates online sources, software and other technology resources. Specific advice for teachers is given in the form of a checklist. My only disappointment with the book is a lack of illustrations; this is no doubt attributable to the publisher's budget restraints. I highly recommend this book as a starting point for school districts and staffs, as well as parent advocacy groups. Many state school boards would also be well-advised to heed Dr. Casey's words.

Dr. Casey presents compelling anecdotes of the real experiences of many children who have been transformed by the use of the "talking computer." That's what makes this book stand out from the pack of other comupter-in-the-classroom works. She espouses an even higher technology which replaces and surpasses the use of computers as alternate work papers. The word-sound connection, which has been proven to be of paramount importance in several recent studies, is experienced in realtime with visual, kinesthetic and aural feedback. Not content to stop with her own observation and experience, which is impressive, she collaborates with colleagues from several countries in Europe to prove the efficacy of her methods across cultural and language barriers. The outstanding results should raise some eyebrows, not only among classroom teachers, but in the hallowed halls of administration, and at the state government level. Many current problems such as bilingual education, increasing functional illiteracy and dropouts could be easily solved by the methods presented here. A useful appendix ennumerates websites, online sources, software and reviews. Highly recommended for those dedicated to the belief that Johnny CAN read, if given the right tools.

written to fascinate and proactively involve the museum-goer of all ages! This book is a must have for aanyone wishing to understand and appreciate the art of ancient Egypt. It is a fun trip even if confined to a cozy chair at home !!

This is a wonderful book and brings to life the world of Egyptian art in a way that is sure to fascinate children of all ages. Knapp and Lehmberg have created a book which will make museum going interesting for everyone in the family.

I love this book and CD. You can take it anywhere and learn. If you want to learn the Spanish basic's get this book.

This product is so helpful in so many aspects. I am able to use it in many areas of my life. The cool thing about Everyday Spanish is that it comes with a CD that you follow along with and it helps you with pronounciation. I work and live in an environment with spanish speakers and this program definitely comes in handy for me.