Recommended Reading

EDUCATION CANADA • December 2015 | Canadian Education Association

The focus of this article, is “Leadership from the Middle” (LftM), first identified by Hargreaves and Braun4 in their evaluation of the implementation of a special education initiative in Ontario.

The middle consists of school districts or clusters of schools. The article shows how districts, individually and collectively can be a force for local and state change. Thus, it gives the middle a major role in shaping implementation,

… Read more Leadership from the Middle: A System Strategy

Break free to make real change for yourself and others.

Have you ever felt like your progress was being blocked, not just by your own circumstances, but by the presence and actions of others? Do you constantly tell yourself that you would be more successful at teaching, leading or contributing to an organization if only others did not stand in your way? Bestselling author Michael Fullan’s new book, Freedom to Change: Four Strategies to Put Your Inner Drive into Overdrive explores the two kinds of freedom in our daily lives: freedom from obstacles versus freedom to take initiative and act.

… Read more Freedom to Change: Four Strategies to Put Your Inner Drive into Over Drive

A recent paper by Michael Fullan, Santiago Rincón-Gallardo, and Andy Hargreaves has been published by the Education Policy Analysis Archives as one of their ‘Special Series’.

This paper seeks to clarify and spells out the responsibilities of policy makers to create the conditions for an effective accountability system that produces substantial improvements in student learning, strengthens the teaching profession, and provides transparency of results to the public. The authors point out that U.S. policy makers will need to make a major shift from a heavy reliance on external accountability and superficial structural solutions (e.g.,

… Read more Professional Capital as Accountability

Worlds of Education is celebrating the completion of the first phase of Education International‘s Quality for Education campaign with several insightful articles by globally renowned policymakers, educators, authors and researchers.

Included in the publication is Fullan new article, Next Steps in Teacher Policy: Clarifying dangerous half truths. Here Fullan presents six ideas that in combination lead to greater performance of the teaching profession as a whole and thus, greater education achievement of students.

… Read more 2015 will be a Crucial Year for Teacher Policy

The Grawemeyer Awards are five annual prizes given in the fields of music, political science, psychology, education and religion. They were founded by H. Charles Grawemeyer to help make the world a better place.

Grawemeyer distinguished the awards by honoring ideas rather than life-long or publicized personal achievement. He also insisted that the selection process for each of the five awards–though dominated by professionals-include one step involving a lay committee knowledgeable in each field. As Grawemeyer saw it, great ideas should be understandable to someone with general knowledge and not be the private treasure of academics.

… Read more Hargreaves & Fullan win the Grawemeyer Education Award

Michael Fullan and Alan Boyle

Big cities have struggled to improve public school systems. This book shows why—and offers a framework for achieving future success. Fullan and Boyle, internationally renowned thinkers on school change, demonstrate that while the educational challenges of big cities may be overwhelming, they are not insurmountable. They draw on ten years’ of research to identify six essential “push” and “pull” actions that enable big school systems to improve student achievement.

Big-City School Reforms offers invaluable advice to those leading the next phase of school reform in cities around the world.

… Read more Big-City School Reforms: Lessons from New York, Toronto, and London

For those who have a copy of The Principal: Three Keys to Maximizing Impact, we would like to offer you a copy of the Facilitator’s Guide produced by Joanne Quinn and Eleanor Adam. There is no fee for this package of material that includes the Facilitator’s Guide, Powerpoint presentations for each of the chapters, and PDFs for Action Items and Discussion Topics for each chapter.

This professional development training kit can be downloaded from www.wiley.com/go/theprincipal

To download Facilitator’s Guide click here.  

… Read more Facilitator’s Guide to The Principal: Three Keys to Maximizing Impact

Scholastic’s Spring 2014 digital magazine has a plethora of articles and information on education, learning, social media, digital technology, classroom management, books, software, and more.

Scholastic Spring 2014 Nxtbook

… Read more Scholastic Administrator – Spring 2014 Nxtbook

LEARNing Landscapes <www.learninglandscapes.ca> has just published their twelfth issue entitled, “Teaching and Learning in the Digital World: Possibilities and Challenges.” There are several good articles in the publication from a diverse group of educators. The issue also includes my commentary on The New Pedagogy.

… Read more The New Pedagogy: Students and Teachers as Learning Partners