#12 - Motivating & Inspring Teachers by Todd Whitaker

One more EdAd class down, and one more book read. Dr. Stanfield requires us to choose a book for each of his classes and report on it. After three classes with 20 or so people in each class, we've heard reports about almost 60 books since January. It's a great way to find out about books that I want to add to my professional library.



I chose this one because I wanted something positive and something that would help with teacher morale. I have worked in schools that had morale problems which has made me very aware of the importance of a positive staff morale. Whitaker gives many easy to implement ideas for improving morale in any school. His tips include everything from time-management tips to ways to communicate better with the staff to strategies for praising and confronting staff in a positive way. It was a great book that I'll be sure to keep close at hand on my professional shelf.

I have two full weeks of travel ahead of me. I'm going to Austin this week with representatives from each campus for a Maximizing Student Success workshop which will emphasize Robert Marzano's Six-Step Process for Teaching Academic Vocabulary. This will be great, practical training that we can use throughout our district to help students become successful learners. As soon as I return from Austin, I'm going to Washington, DC for the American Library Association Annual Conference. I've never attended ALA, so I'm quite excited about it. One of the events we will attend is the Newbery/Caldecott/Wilder Banquet to honor this year's recipients. I'll return from ALA and have only a few days to wash and repack before I go back to DC for the Model Schools Conference. Model Schools is one of the very best conferences for school improvement in the nation. I'm going a day early with some friends so that we can get in some site-seeing. It's going to be a busy couple of weeks. I have several books in my pile that I'll take on these trips. Look for an update in early July!