Social Sciences Education

In Reconnect: Building School Culture for Meaning, Purpose, and Belonging, a team of distinguished educators from Teach Like a Champion and Uncommon Schools deliver practical guidance and concrete advice for teachers, administrators, and community members who seek to dramatically improve the lives of children and young people by fostering a sense of belonging in schools. In the book, you'll find hands-on solutions to build or rebuild students' sense of shared work and community in an era of increasing isolation and disconnections.

In 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, Yuval Noah Harari raises challenging questions about concepts that have become so enshrined in the global society and the author shows how these concepts have failed us, particularly now that we need them the most. Disclaimer: This is NOT the original book. If you’re looking for the original book, it is available from Amazon and Audible.

Adam Braun began working summers at hedge funds when he was just 16 years old, sprinting down the path to a successful Wall Street career. But while traveling as a college student, he met a young boy begging on the streets of India. When Braun asked the boy what he wanted most in the world, he simply answered, "A pencil." This small request became the inspiration for Pencils of Promise, the organization Braun would leave a prestigious job at Bain & Company to start with just $25 at the age of 24.

The positive discipline method has proved to be an invaluable resource for teachers who want to foster creative problem-solving within their students, giving them the behavioral skills they need to understand and process what they learn. Each tool is tailored specifically for the modern teacher, with examples and solutions to each and every roadblock that stands in the way of cooperative and student-centered learning.

Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide.

In this moving account, Peter Korn explores the nature and rewards of creative practice. We follow his search for meaning as an Ivy-educated child of the middle class who finds employment as a novice carpenter on Nantucket, transitions to self-employment as a designer and maker of fine furniture, takes a turn at teaching and administration at Colorado's Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and then founds a school in Maine: the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, an internationally respected nonprofit institution.

Only he who understands life will be able to take his lessons from life itself. He will draw up no capricious schemes, for he knows that no other fundamental laws of life will prevail in the future than such as prevail in the present. Theosophy will therefore of necessity have respect for the existing state of things. Even, should it still find in what is existent, very much that might be improved, yet it will not fail to perceive in the present the germs of the future. But it knows, too, that for all things nascent there is a growth and a development.

The Unteachables examines the overrepresentation of Black students in special education over the course of the twentieth century. As African American children integrated predominantly white schools, many were disproportionately labeled educable mentally retarded (EMR), learning disabled (LD), and emotionally behavioral disordered (EBD). Keith A. Mayes charts the evolution of disability categories and how these labels kept Black learners segregated in American classrooms.

Do you worry that you've lost patience for anything longer than a tweet? If so, you're not alone. Digital-age pundits warn that as our appetite for books dwindles, so too do the virtues in which printed, bound objects once trained us: the willpower to focus on a sustained argument, the curiosity to look beyond the day's news, the willingness to be alone. The shelves of the world's great libraries, though, tell a more complicated story. Examining the wear and tear on the books that they contain, English professor Leah Price finds scant evidence that a golden age of reading ever existed.

In 1974, a federal judge ruled that Boston’s public schools were unconstitutionally segregated. The solution? A controversial experiment in desegregation known as “busing,” which would take children from majority-white schools and bus them to predominantly Black schools, and vice versa. In this dramatic audiobook full of surprising twists and fascinating characters, journalist Leon Neyfakh unpacks the history of busing in Boston and brings to life the human stories behind the headlines by talking to the people who saw what happened with their own eyes.

This detailed and persuasive study by the author of The Patton Papers was described by Patton's daughter Ruth as "an extraordinary book". It is widely considered the best biography ever written of the General, an American hero as compelling as he was complex.

Hunger of Memory is the story of Mexican-American Richard Rodriguez, who begins his schooling in Sacramento, California, knowing just 50 words of English, and concludes his university studies in the stately quiet of the reading room of the British Museum. Here is the poignant journey of a "minority student" who pays the cost of his social assimilation and academic success with a painful alienation - from his past, his parents, his culture - and so describes the high price of "making it" in middle-class America.

Published in 1762, it had a profound impact on the approach to the education and upbringing of a child, through infancy, childhood, adolescence and into adulthood. This was partly fuelled by the format – for Rousseau presents before us the boy Emile, taking him through the various stages of life, and as Emile becomes a young man, introducing a female counterpart, Sophie. This device personalises what would otherwise be a more formal philosophical presentation.

How does one keep from going through their comfortable, prosperous adult life unconsciously? How do we get ourselves out of the foreground of our thoughts and achieve compassion? This audiobook version of a David Foster Wallace commencement speech, read by his sister, Amy Wallace-Havens, captures his electric intellect as well as his grace in attention to others. After his death, it became a treasured piece of writing reprinted in The Wall Street Journal and the London Times, commented on endlessly in blogs, and emailed from friend to friend.

One L, Scott Turow's journal of his first year at law school and a best seller when it was first published in 1977, has gone on to become a virtual bible for prospective law students. Not only does it introduce with remarkable clarity the ideas and issues that are the stuff of legal education; it also brings alive the anxiety and competitiveness, with others and, even more, with oneself, that set the tone in this crucible of character building.

This thought-provoking work traces the origins of voucher-based education reform to mid-twentieth-century fears over school desegregation. It shows how, in the intervening decades, a cabal of billionaire conservatives supporting a host of special political interests-including economic libertarianism, religious choice, and parental rights-have converged around the issue of education freedom in an ongoing culture war. Through deliberate policymaking, legislation, and litigation, Cowen reveals, an insular advocacy network has enacted a flawed system for education finance driven largely by dogma.

In this inspirational guide, FranklinCovey Education’s global thought leaders Dr. David K. Hatch and Muriel Summers reveal seven leadership skill sets that enable teachers to profoundly impact students’ positive well-being and academic success. Drawing upon extensive research and their decades of experience in helping to transform more than 8,000 schools across the globe, the authors provide practical best practices for connecting with students and empowering them to achieve their full potential.

Founded in 1970, NPR is America’s most powerful broadcast news network. Despite being overshadowed by the larger and more glamorous PBS, public radio has long been home to shows such as All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and This American Life that captivate millions of listeners in homes, cars, and workplaces across the nation. NPR and its hosts are a cultural force and a trusted voice, and they have created a mode of journalism and storytelling that helps Americans understand the world in which we live.

Screenwise offers a realistic and optimistic perspective on how to thoughtfully guide kids in the digital age. Many parents feel that their kids are addicted, detached, or distracted because of their digital devices. Using the foundation of their own values and experiences, parents and educators can learn about the digital world to help set kids up for success in a world fueled by technology.

When Temple Grandin was born, her parents knew that she was different. It wasn’t until years later that she was diagnosed with autism, a brain disorder that makes communication difficult. Today, Dr. Temple Grandin is a scientist and professor of animal science at Colorado State University. Her career has revolutionized the livestock industry - each year, half the cattle in the United States are handled in cruelty-free facilities she designed. She is also a passionate advocate for autism, using her experience to prove that people with this disorder can have “normal” lives.