1. How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School
   A landmark book published by the National Academy of Sciences summarizes research from the cognitive and social sciences on how learning takes place. It answered such questions as: When do infants begin to learn? How do experts learn and how is this different from non-experts? What can teachers and schools do–with curricula, classroom settings, and teaching methods–to help children learn most effectively? How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School examines research findings and their implications for what we teach, how we teach it, and how we assess what our children learn. The book is available to read online or downloaded as a PDF file. http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=9853

2. How Students Learn: History, Science and Mathematics in the Classroom
   This book, which can be read online or downloaded as a PDF file, explores how the principles of learning discussed in How People Learn; Brain, Mind, Experience and School apply in teaching history, science, and mathematics at three levels: elementary, middle, and high school. It is especially useful in showing how content can be integrated with the processes and methods used in various disciplines. Leading educators explain in detail how they developed successful curricula and teaching approaches, presenting strategies that serve as models for curriculum development and classroom instruction. http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=10126

3. The Visible Thinking Project
   This website describes a project developed by researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education to help classroom teachers create cultures of deep thinking and rich conversations about learning. Because they do not depend on specific content, the classroom routines that form the core of this project are compatible with various standards and curriculums currently being used in school districts around the country. http://www.visiblethinkingpz.org/VisibleThinking_html_files/01_VisibleThinkingInAction/01a_VTInAction.html

4. High Tech High K-12
   San Diego’s High Tech High K-12 network, with its mission “to provide all students with an extraordinary project-based education and to graduate students who will succeed in post-secondary education and be thoughtful, engaged citizens,” shares detailed information about its policies and practices that serve as models for developing hands-on, real world curriculum and learning environments: http://www.hightechhigh.org
   
   Founders Rob Riordan and Larry Rosenstock present their argument for an integrated, forward-looking curriculum in an essay entitled, “Changing the Subject”: http://www.hightechhigh.org/unboxed/issue11/editors_welcome.php
   
   The network uses four design principles in creating hands-on, real world learning experiences: personalization, adult world connection, common intellectual mission, and teacher as designer, which are described in more detail at this link: http://www.hightechhigh.org/about/design-principles.phpThe network has its own graduate school that publishes a peer-reviewed, practitioner-centered journal, Unboxed: A Journal of Adult Learning, in which teachers and other education experts discuss their experiences and challenges in creating authentic learning environments: http://www.hightechhigh.org/unboxed/back_issues.php

5. Ohio Resource Center.
   The ORC provides links to peer-reviewed instructional resources that have been identified by a panel of Ohio educators as exemplifying best or promising practice. Available resources include content and professional resources as well as assessment and general education resources that will support the work of pre-K to 12 classroom teachers and higher education faculty members. The resources are correlated with Ohio’s academic content standards and with applicable national content standards.The following disciplines are included: mathematics, English language arts, science, and social studies. http://www.ohiorc.org

6. “Student-Centered Schools: Closing the Opportunity Gap” (Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education.)
   A research report on the effects of “student-centered schools” describes instructional practices that increase opportunities for students to access and succeed in school curriculum. https://edpolicy.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/scope-pub-student-centered-research-brief.pdf

7. “Blended Learning Revisited”
   The former chief scientist for Xerox John Seely Brown, in a lecture videotaped at MIT, describes his research on how groups of people use technology in the workplace and explains how these findings can be applied to educational settings to support more integrated, sustained learning. http://video.mit.edu/watch/blended-learning-revisited-9557/

8. “The Building Blocks of a Good Pre-K”
   A New York Times article describes the critical role of play-based curriculum in developing the learning capacities of young children.
   http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/22/opinion/the-building-blocks-of-a-good-pre-k.html?smid=nytcore-iphone-share&smprod=nytcore-iphone&_r=0

9. “Orchestrating Productive Mathematical Discussions: Five Practices for Helping Teacher Move Beyond Show and Tell”
   Mary Kay Stein, University of Pittsburgh; Randi A. Engle, University of California, Berkeley; Margaret S. Smith, University of Pittsburgh; Elizabeth K. Hughes, University of Northern Iowa
   Researchers describe the latest thinking in how to help students at all levels develop conceptual thinking in mathematics. http://vocserve.berkeley.edu/faculty/RAEngle/SteinEngleSmithHughes(inpress).pdf

10. “Classroom Talk: Learning, Thinking and Classroom Communities” 
    Peter Johnton, University at Albany—SUNY
    Researcher Peter Johnston outlines classroom language structures and patterns of classroom language interactions that support higher order thinking in students. http://twu.firstclassconferences.com/Johnston_Classroom Talk.pdf

Back