Follow the journey of families while they complete the 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten challenge. Parents/caregivers pledge to read to their children about colors, shapes, animals, cars, nature and adventure with the goal that one day their children will be reading to them.

Reading aloud to children boosts their vocabulary, grades, social skills, and well-being. Now, families worldwide have joined the movement to read 1000 books in the years before school. This reading log, created by the former head of K-12 Education at Google and her husband--Washington DC's Teacher of the Year--comes with everything you need to make reading aloud an easy part of your daily routine: 100+ kid-friendly stickers for tracking progress Free app that saves a visual library of all the books you read together Guided activities like "Cooking with Storybooks" and "How to Host a Reading Party" Genre and Game suggestions from "Real-Life Heroes" to "Role-Playing with Characters" A full list of 1000 quality titles, sorted by age and interest Whether you read 200 or 2000 books, your child will treasure those minutes together. Cuddling close while reading aloud builds a powerful emotional bond, all while inspiring imagination and creative thinking. Plant a love of reading and watch it bloom! Reading is to the brain as exercise is to the body--and independent reading volume is the #1 predictor of reading achievement in elementary students. Badge Books motivate kids and families to read for fun, and reward their progress. An in-hand companion to the Beanstack mobile app used by 2 million readers, each title is a reading log and sticker book, plus themed challenges, activities, and recommended titles. Badge Books have helped more than 100,000 families build a lifetime love of reading. Each Badge Book connects kids to a set of realistic reading goals, then rewards their efforts with over 100 themed stickers and digital badges. The books work hand-in-hand with the free Beanstack Mobile App available on Android and iOS. Simply swipe your phone over any book cover to the book and get credit for every minute your child reads. How It Works: Fun activity pages get kids to dive deeper into favorite reads Easy guides on where to place badges and mark progress Spiral binding allows the book to lay flat As kids hit their reading goals, they get rewarded with stickers and activities in the Badge Book Use the app in conjunction with the books for easy tracking - switch between all your kids with a tap or log for multiple kids at once Cover art, titles, and authors load automatically when you scan books with the app New reading challenges and learning activities added to the app regularly With theme kids love--from science, space, music, mystery, heroes, and more--there's a Badge Book for every interest.

A step-by-step program that shows parents, simply and clearly, how to teach their child to read in just 20 minutes a day.

From one of the foremost authorities on education in the United States, former U.S. assistant secretary of education, “whistle-blower extraordinaire” (The Wall Street Journal), author of the best-selling The Death and Life of the Great American School System (“Important and riveting”—Library Journal), The Language Police (“Impassioned . . . Fiercely argued . . . Every bit as alarming as it is illuminating”—The New York Times), and other notable books on education history and policy—an incisive, comprehensive look at today’s American school system that argues against those who claim it is broken and beyond repair; an impassioned but reasoned call to stop the privatization movement that is draining students and funding from our public schools. ​In Reign of Error, Diane Ravitch argues that the crisis in American education is not a crisis of academic achievement but a concerted effort to destroy public schools in this country. She makes clear that, contrary to the claims being made, public school test scores and graduation rates are the highest they’ve ever been, and dropout rates are at their lowest point. ​She argues that federal programs such as George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind and Barack Obama’s Race to the Top set unreasonable targets for American students, punish schools, and result in teachers being fired if their students underperform, unfairly branding those educators as failures. She warns that major foundations, individual billionaires, and Wall Street hedge fund managers are encouraging the privatization of public education, some for idealistic reasons, others for profit. Many who work with equity funds are eyeing public education as an emerging market for investors. ​Reign of Error begins where The Death and Life of the Great American School System left off, providing a deeper argument against privatization and for public education, and in a chapter-by-chapter breakdown, putting forth a plan for what can be done to preserve and improve it. She makes clear what is right about U.S. education, how policy makers are failing to address the root causes of educational failure, and how we can fix it. ​For Ravitch, public school education is about knowledge, about learning, about developing character, and about creating citizens for our society. It’s about helping to inspire independent thinkers, not just honing job skills or preparing people for college. Public school education is essential to our democracy, and its aim, since the founding of this country, has been to educate citizens who will help carry democracy into the future.

A portrait of African-American activist Geoffrey Canada describes his radical approach to eliminating inner-city poverty, one that proposes to transform the lives of poor children by changing their schools, their families, and their neighborhoods at the same time.

Strengthen programs of family and community engagement to promote equity and increase student success! When schools, families, and communities collaborate and share responsibility for students′ education, more students succeed in school. Based on 30 years of research and fieldwork, the fourth edition of the bestseller School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for Action, presents tools and guidelines to help develop more effective and more equitable programs of family and community engagement. Written by a team of well-known experts, it provides a theory and framework of six types of involvement for action; up-to-date research on school, family, and community collaboration; and new materials for professional development and on-going technical assistance. Readers also will find: Examples of best practices on the six types of involvement from preschools, and elementary, middle, and high schools Checklists, templates, and evaluations to plan goal-linked partnership programs and assess progress CD-ROM with slides and notes for two presentations: A new awareness session to orient colleagues on the major components of a research-based partnership program, and a full One-Day Team Training Workshop to prepare school teams to develop their partnership programs. As a foundational text, this handbook demonstrates a proven approach to implement and sustain inclusive, goal-linked programs of partnership. It shows how a good partnership program is an essential component of good school organization and school improvement for student success. This book will help every district and all schools strengthen and continually improve their programs of family and community engagement.

Follow bestselling author, speaker, and pastor James MacDonald as he delivers the biblical hope of God’s promises in the midst of life’s storms. 2 Peter 1:3 refers to certain portions of God’s Word as exceedingly great and precious promises. Great promises are ones that don’t fall apart during difficult times; they reveal hope in the midst of the storm. Precious promises are ones that we find strong enough to hold us up and resilient enough to get us through. God’s promises become exceedingly great and precious to us when nothing else will do. By way of digging into the theology of God’s Promises, Pastor James uncovers 5 major categories of promise in the Bible and the 5 areas about which God repeatedly makes promises. From what to do with fear and doubt to God’s goodness, help, and victory—the Bible has much to say about God’s presence in our difficulty. Last year, Pastor James released When Life is Hard to point you toward hope in the midst of trials. Now, Always True will point you to God’s promises, which are always true.