This page will include some comments about books in the field of education. I am always interested in new insights. I like to read. I have found the my work as a practitioner (classroom teacher) is enhanced by reflection. Some of that comes from reflecting on what goes on in my class. Some comes from reading the ideas of others, and reacting to them. Since I am also now a doctoral student in Educational Administration and Policy, it becomes even more incumbent upon me personally to be cognizant of the literature about my field, including books written for the general public: after all, educational policy is often made by elected public officials who themselves are part of the general public. I believe all of us as practitioners would be well served to do at least some reading about our field. The following are books I have read within the past 4 years that I found well worth the expenditure of time (and in my case money, as I like to mark up books that I read).
Bruner, Jerome The Culture of Education at the graduate School of Education at Harvard, Bruner, one of America's most important and influential thinkers about education, now is a Research Professor of Psychology and Senior Research Fellow in Law at New York University. In this book he goes beyond the normal framework of schooling to look at the role of education in society. Among his chapters are those entitle Culture Mind and Education; Folk Pedagogy; The Complexity of Educational Aims... I found this book very thought-provoking. Let me share just one brief quote, from p.83 (in the chapter The Complexity of Educational Aims): "Are we willing enough, united enough, courageous enough to face up to the revolution we are living through? We probably have little better sense of where the culture is heading than did the French in 1789. And the changes may be even greater than in those days."
Bluestein, Jane, compiler Mentors, Masters and Mrs. MacGregor We teachers need to remember the impact we can have on those who pass through our classrooms. This is a collection of brief stories about teachers who made differences in their students lives. The reminiscences are from the well-known and the unknown, and are interspersed with comments from current school students about teachers. Read coach Joe Paterno on his Latin teacher, Education Secretary Richard Riley on his third grade teacher, and so on.
Sizer, Theodore Horace's School Ted Size is also one of the most important thinkers and writers about education. He has been headmaster of Phillips Academy, Andover; Dean of the Graduate School of Education at Harvard; and taught in the School of Education at Brown. He is the founder and chair of the Coalition of Essential Schools, one of the more important efforts at school reform currently underway. This book, first published in 1992, examines in detail some of the issues about school reform, school structure, national standards,etc, that have so dominated the press and politics, especially since the publication of A Nation at Risk. Sizer argues for respecting the integrity of individual school communities, and CES is an attempt to share what works. The Coalition was founded in 1984, and is dedicated to 9 common principles of effective education,which can be found in an appendix at the end of the book, which itself is a description of a fictional high school undergoing the changes necessary to be successful, and following the pattern of the CES.
Kohn, Alfie What to Look For In A Classroom Kohn has now written 6 books on education. Himself a former classroom teacher, he writes and lectures on the subject constantly and nationally. This books is a collection of pieces that have appeared in Phi Delta Kappan, Education Week, Educational Leadership, The Boston Globe, and elsewhere. Kohn tends to challenge the conventional thinking on education. For example, he has a chapter where he challenges the Character Education movement entitled How Not to Teach Values, where he raises the legitimate question of whose values are being taught, and whether or not some of the proponents of the movement are not in fact pushing a different agenda. He is a critic of extrinsic motivation, and has done an exhaustive review on the literature about ADHD and the use of Ritalin in the classroom. If you tend to accept the conventional thinking, be prepared to be challenged as you read this book. But Kohn doesn't just argue, he refers to the research, and is prepared to criticize studies that are flawed even if they are in support of positions with which he agrees.
Mathews, Jay Class Struggle: What's Wrong (and Right) with America's Best Public High Schools Mathews is the thought-provoking education writer for the Washington Post, where he also has a monthly column (also called Class Struggle) which appears in the Sunday Post Magazine.In 1989 he published a book called Escalante: The Best teacher in America which made many people aware of Jaime Escalante, the Garfield HS (Los Angeles) Calculus teacher made famous in the movie Stand and Deliver. This book was a detailed look at some of the best schools in America, with his analysis of why they fail to push their less academically gifted student. The major part of the book was a three year study of one such high school Mamaroneck High in Mamaroneck, New York (self-disclosure: I am a 1963 graduate of that institution). Mathews is not afraid to challenge assumptions. One way he defines elite high schools is by the number of Advanced Placement Examinations taken per capita within the school divided by the number of graduating seniors. He puts those with a ratio of greater than 1.0 (that is, more than one exam per student) in his category of elite schools. The list that he gives at the end of the book does not include schools such as Thomas Jefferson High School in Virginia and Bronx High School of Science in New York that are only select schools, that is, only the most gifted students can attend. The school must at least partially have geographic boundaries and include regular (comprehensive) students. Thus the school at which I now teach, Eleanor Roosevelt in Greenbelt Maryland, qualifies: a little less than 1/3 of our students get in by competitive examination to our Science and Technology Magnet program, and a good number of others come into our other Talented and Gifted programs, or for our wide selection of foreign languages (including Japanese and Italian) or extensive music program (nationally recognized). Mathews argues that students should be challenged to do more. He criticizes schools that either discourage students from trying to take AP courses, or if allowing them to enroll, discourage them from taking the tests (because lower level students might drag down the schools performance average on the examinations). He notes that many of the problems encountered in the non-elite schools can also be seen in the so-called elite. For example, a disproportionate percentage of failures in elite schools come from the poorer neighborhoods within such schools. Form my own experience at Mamaroneck and my observations at Roosevelt, there is much truth in what Mathews says.
Since writing the book, Mathews has expanded his definition of elite schools to take into account International Baccalaureate Examinations as well as AP exams. Thus, the highest rated school in the DC metropolitan area would be George Mason in Falls Church VA, which has an extensive IB program, but where no students take AP tests. A couple of comments might spring to your mind, as they did to mine. Many students take AP courses because they weigh more heavily in computing GPAs: thus by taking several AP courses, one has the possibility of of a GPA in excess of 4.0. This of course unfairly punishes in terms of class standing any student not allowed to take AP courses. Further, the scale he uses of more than 1 exam per graduating senior can be misleading: a school with 100 graduating seniors, where 20 students take 4 AP exams, 10 take 2, and 10 (all juniors) take 1, has a total of 110 exams, or a ratio of 1.1, even though only about 1/3 of the students are participating in the process. Mathews recognizes this, which is part of his argument for making the more rigorous courses open to more students, while allowing them to take the AP exam, even if they might not succeed (getting at least a 3 out of a possible score of 5). It would mean a school's average score on APs might decrease, but Mathews argues the benefits to be gained by the students are more important.
I found this book thought provoking, and now it's time for another self-disclosure. I first read this book in January of 1998. After reading another piece by Mathews, I used my status as a graduate of Mamaroneck as an occasion to communicate via e-mail.. Since then, he and I have carried on a sporadic e-mail correspondence on a variety of educational subjects. I have found him to be open to different ideas, but perfectly willing and able to defend his own. I think he sees his role as provoking further thought and discussion about the ways education functions in this country. I still find the book worthwhile, which is why it is on this list.