Remixing the Curriculum offers educators a way to rethink traditional curricular approaches through a “curricular remix,” a concept in which a curriculum becomes different from its original form, retaining its basic foundational elements, but experiencing a metamorphosis to create a new version. Remixing the Curriculum suggests that the way to develop curriculum to maximize student access and engagement is to employ essential elements of traditional pedagogy, but infuse it with technology to create new features through the X Framework (XFW). XFW capitalizes on four essential features of educators’ practice and learning: Technology Fitness, in which a teacher self-evaluates their comfort level using technology; Proactive Teaching, which front-loads the planning and preparation for instruction to prior to implementation; Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a set of principles which guide the conditions for learning, including flexible learning environments to accommodate individual learning differences; and Assistive Technology, technology to improve the capabilities of students with disabilities. At the intersection of these four quadrants is X, which serves as a fulcrum for access to the curriculum.

Many educators already know that hip-hop can be a powerful tool for engaging students. But can hip-hop save our schools—and our society? Hip-Hop Genius 2.0 introduces an iteration of hip-hop education that goes far beyond studying rap music as classroom content. Through stories about the professional rapper who founded the first hip-hop high school and the aspiring artists currently enrolled there, Sam Seidel lays out a vision for how hip-hop’s genius—the resourceful creativity and swagger that took it from a local phenomenon to a global force—can lead to a fundamental remix of the way we think of teaching, school design, and leadership. This 10-year anniversary edition welcomes two new contributing authors, Tony Simmons and Michael Lipset, who bring direct experience running the High School for Recording Arts. The new edition includes new forewords from some of the most prominent names in education and hip-hop, reflections on ten more years of running a hip-hop high school, updates to every chapter from the first edition, details of how the school navigated the unprecedented complexities brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and uprising in response to the murder of George Floyd, and an inspiring new concluding chapter that is a call to action for the field.

EDUCATION / Teaching Methods & Materials / Language Arts

Engaging Students with Music Education is a groundbreaking book about using DJ decks and urban music in mainstream schools to re-engage disaffected learners and develop a curriculum which better reflects overall contemporary tastes. Many young learners are ‘at risk’ of exclusion; this book argues that for such individuals, the implications of such a shift in the music curriculum could be especially positive. Drawing extensively on the author’s own wealth of teaching experience, and bridging the gap between practice and theory, this book demonstrates through case studies that DJ decks can prove extremely valuable in mainstream classroom situations across the secondary school age ranges. Addressing challenging and crucial topics, combining rigorous theoretical analysis with practical suggestions, the book addresses questions such as: Are DJ decks actually a musical instrument, and are they suitable for classroom teaching? Will Ofsted's school inspectors approve of music teaching involving DJ decks and urban music? If we bring urban music into the classroom, will this further marginalise classical music? Are DJing and MCing skills recognised within examination specifications, at least in the UK? Current teachers will find the practical advice on how to incorporate DJ decks and urban music into their classroom especially helpful, whilst educational researchers will be captivated by the critical discussion of the child-centred tradition and a theoretical approach which stretches from ‘continental’ philosophy to practice-based reflection. With an insistence that the starting point for music education should always be the interests and experiences of the learners, this book is essential reading for those music teachers and researchers interested in the benefits of non-standard music-making in the classroom.

This book promotes the development of nontraditional literacies in adult education, especially as these critical literacies relate to global citizenship, equity, and social justice. As this edited collection argues, a rapidly changing global environment and proliferation of new media technologies have greatly expanded the kinds of literacies that one requires in order to be an engaged global citizen. It is imperative for adult educators and learners to understand systems, organizations, and relationships that influence our lives as citizens of the world. By compiling a comprehensive list of foundational, sociocultural, technological and informational, psychosocial and environmental, and social justice literacies, this volume offers readers theoretical foundations, practical strategies, and additional resources.

Design Education: Creating Thinkers to Improve the World is a curricular resource that offers theoretical concepts and practical advice for teaching lessons in design to PreK-12 grade students. The book is for art educators at the preK-12 level in schools, museums, and enrichment programs, and university professors in teacher preparation programs. Design education is about problem-solving, learning through objects of our daily lives, and the role design plays in social responsibility and the creative economy. Designers utilize research methods, technology, sketching, and the construction of prototypes. The basis of these techniques, systems, and tools may be taught to Prek-12 students. Students need lifelong skills that build their creativity and problem-solving capabilities to better understand the world and themselves and use visual communication to advance their abilities to express ideas. Design is a study about life and can touch on all school subjects, making it a valuable interdisciplinary study. Students are able to directly apply thinking strategies and learning about facts, figures, and concepts at the same time they are crafting meaningful ideas about the importance, influence, and social implications of everyday items and the potential to improve the world.