The highly anticipated sequel to the bestselling Fires in the Bathroom—filled with practical, honest advice from middle school students to their teachers Following on the heels of the bestselling Fires in the Bathroom, which brought the insights of high school students to teachers and parents, Kathleen Cushman now turns her attention to the crucial and challenging middle grades, joining forces with adolescent psychologist Laura Rogers. As teachers, counselors, and parents cope with the roller coaster of early adolescence, too few stop to ask students what they think about these critical years. Here, middle school students in grades 5 through 8 across the country and from diverse ethnic backgrounds offer insights on what it takes to make classrooms more effective and how to forge stronger relationships between young adolescents and adults. Students tackle such critical topics as social, emotional, and academic pressures; classroom behavior; organization; and preparing for high school. Cushman and Rogers help readers hear and understand the vital messages about adolescent learning that come though in what these students say. This invaluable resource provides a unique window into how middle school students think, feel, and learn, bringing their needs to the forefront of the conversation about education.

Since its initial publication in hardcover in 2003, Fires in the Bathroom has been through multiple printings and received the attention of teachers across the country. Now in paperback, Kathleen Cushman's groundbreaking book offers original insights into teaching teenagers in today's hard-pressed urban high schools from the point of view of the students themselves. It speaks to both new and established teachers, giving them firsthand information about who their students are and what they need to succeed. Students from across the country contributed perceptive and pragmatic answers to questions of how teachers can transcend the barriers of adolescent identity and culture to reach the diverse student body in today's urban schools. With the fresh and often surprising perspectives of youth, they tackle tough issues such as increasing engagement and motivation, teaching difficult academic material, reaching English-language learners, and creating a classroom culture where respect and success go hand in hand.

Teens talk to adults about how they develop motivation and mastery Through the voices of students themselves, Fires in the Mind brings a game-changing question to teachers of adolescents: What does it take to get really good at something? Starting with what they already know and do well, teenagers from widely diverse backgrounds join a cutting-edge dialogue with adults about the development of mastery in and out of school. Their insights frame motivation, practice, and academic challenge in a new light that galvanizes more powerful learning for all. To put these students' ideas into practice, the book also includes practical tips for educators. Breaks new ground by bringing youth voices to a timely topic-motivation and mastery Includes worksheets, tips, and discussion guides that help put the book's ideas into practice Author has 18 previous books on adolescent learning and has written for the New York Times Magazine, Educational Leadership, and American Educator From the acclaimed author of Fires in the Bathroom, this is the next-step book that pushes the conversation to next level, as teenagers tackle the pressing challenges of motivation and mastery.

A sequel to the classic Fires in the Bathroom that illuminates what adolescents most need from teachers in today's upsetting times The context in which adolescents are learning has shifted radically since students first offered blunt advice to high school teachers in the groundbreaking Fires in the Bathroom, a perennial bestseller. Now their world is changing at warp speed, and classrooms too are seething with anxiety. This sequel raises the voices of diverse youth around the nation as they live through the mind-bending quandaries of this era and ask their teachers to notice. In Fires in Our Lives, Kathleen Cushman and her co-authors Kristien Zenkov and Meagan Call-Cummings (both leaders in bringing student voices to teacher education) present new first-person testimony on how today's youth experience the risks and challenges of high school. The students who speak here need their teachers more than ever as they navigate cultural, social, and political borders in their communities. Reinforced by classroom examples and supplemented with helpful takeaways, Fires in Our Lives offers a compelling dialogue about students' emotions, ideas, and developing agency. In a world that sorely needs the thoughtful participation of its rising generation, this new staple belongs on every high school teacher's bookshelf.

Suddenly they go from striving for A’s to barely passing, from fretting about cooties to obsessing for hours about crushes. Former chatterboxes answer in monosyllables; freethinkers mimic everything from clothes to opinions. Their bodies and psyches morph through the most radical changes since infancy. They are kids in the middle-school years, the age every adult remembers well enough to dread. Here at last is an up-to-date anthropology of this critically formative period. Prize-winning education reporter Linda Perlstein spent a year immersed in the lunchroom, classrooms, hearts, and minds of a group of suburban Maryland middle schoolers and emerged with this pathbreaking account. Perlstein reveals what’s really going on under kids’ don’t-touch-me facade while they grapple with schoolwork, puberty, romance, and identity. A must-read for parents and educators, Not Much Just Chillin’ offers a trail map to the baffling no-man’s-land between child and teen.

The #1 New York Times bestseller! “Witty, wise, and tender. It's a marvel.” —Paula Hawkins, author of The Girl on the Train and A Slow Fire Burning “To say I love this book is an understatement. It’s a deep psychological mystery about the power of motherhood, the intensity of teenage love, and the danger of perfection. It moved me to tears.” —Reese Witherspoon From the bestselling author of Everything I Never Told You and Our Missing Hearts comes a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives. In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned—from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren—an enigmatic artist and single mother—who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town—and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia’s past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs. Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood—and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster. Named a Best Book of the Year by: People, The Washington Post, Bustle, Esquire, Southern Living, The Daily Beast, GQ, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Audible, Goodreads, Library Reads, Book of the Month, Paste, Kirkus Reviews, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and many more... Perfect for book clubs! Visit celesteng.com for discussion guides and more.

This is an up-to-the-moment, engaging, multicultural introduction to education and teaching and the challenges and opportunities they present. Together, the four authors bring a rich blend of theory and practical application to this groundbreaking text. Jeannie Oakes is a leading education researcher and former director of the UCLA teacher education program. Martin Lipton is an education writer and consultant and has taught in public schools for 31 years. Lauren Anderson and Jamy Stillman are former public school teachers, now working as teacher educators. This unique, comprehensive foundational text considers the values and politics that pervade the U.S. education system, explains the roots of conventional thinking about schooling and teaching, asks critical questions about how issues of power and privilege have shaped and continue to shape educational opportunity, and presents powerful examples of real teachers working for equity and justice. Taking the position that a hopeful, democratic future depends on ensuring that all students learn, the text pays particular attention to inequalities associated with race, social class, language, gender, and other social categories and explores teachers role in addressing them. The text provides a research-based and practical treatment of essential topics, and it situates those topics in relation to democratic values; issues of diversity; and cognitive, sociocultural, and constructivist perspectives on learning. The text shows how knowledge of education foundations and history can help teachers understand the organization of today s schools, the content of contemporary curriculum, and the methods of modern teaching. It likewise shows how teachers can use such knowledge when thinking about and responding to headline issues like charter schools, vouchers, standards, testing, and bilingual education, to name just a few. Central to this text is a belief that schools can and must be places of extraordinary educational quality and institutions in the service of social justice. Thus, the authors address head-on tensions between principles of democratic schooling and competition for always-scarce high-quality opportunities. Woven through the text are the voices of a diverse group of teachers, who share their analyses and personal anecdotes concerning what teaching to change the world means and involves. Click Here for Book Website Pedagogical Features: Digging Deeper sections referenced at the end of each chapter and featured online include supplementary readings and resources from scholars and practitioners who are addressing issues raised in the text. Instructor s Manual offers insights about how to teach course content in ways that are consistent with cognitive and sociocultural learning theories, culturally diverse pedagogy, and authentic assessment.New to this Edition: "