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The School Leader's Guide to Learner-Centered Education

From Complexity to Simplicity

By: Barbara L. McCombs, Lynda Miller

A new leadership paradigm for increasing collaboration and boosting achievement!

This innovative resource introduces a transformative leadership model for creating and sustaining a learner-centered school environment. Using core principles of educational psychology, the authors demonstrate how educators can support student growth, development, and achievement by focusing on key factors such as cognition, metacognition, motivation, affect, and individual differences. Numerous reflective exercises, assessment tools, and real-life success stories help readers:

Provide moral leadership for creating school change
Incorporate learning standards without sacrificing student engagement
Prepare students for the challenges of global citizenship
Promote success for diverse populations and marginalized groups

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Product Details

Grade Level: K-12
ISBN: 9781412960175
Published By: Corwin
Year: 2008
Page Count: 288
Publication date: August 01, 2008

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Description

"The time is right and the need is profound for learner-centered practices in schools. McCombs and Miller describe the tools available and how a school can use them to make substantial changes that increase student performance."
—Jean W. Pierce, Professor of Educational Psychology
Northern Illinois University

A new leadership paradigm for increasing collaboration and boosting achievement!

In today's educational environment, school leaders must find new ways to create a positive school climate for staff and students while helping them meet rigorous testing and accountability requirements.

The School Leader's Guide to Learner-Centered Education introduces a transformative leadership model for creating and sustaining a learner-centered school environment. Using core principles of educational psychology, the authors examine how educators can support student growth, development, and achievement by focusing on key factors such as cognition, metacognition, motivation, affect, and individual differences. Numerous reflective exercises, assessment tools, and real-life success stories help readers:

Provide moral leadership for creating school change
Incorporate learning standards without sacrificing student engagement
Form learner-centered support groups that utilize networking and technology
Prepare students for the challenges of global citizenship
Promote success for diverse populations and marginalized groups

Designed to meet the needs of a rapidly evolving world, this new leadership paradigm provides school principals, superintendents, and district leaders with the means to engage all members of the educational community in a lifelong process of growth, improvement, and empowerment.

Key features

Designed for school principals, superintendents, and district leaders and administrators
Offers practical tips and skills for transforming current school level practices and developing new leadership styles
Includes interactive exercises, self-assessments, and reflection tools

Author(s)

Barbara L. McCombs

Barbara L. McCombs directs the Human Motivation, Learning, and Development Center at the University of Denver. The center focuses on the professional development of educators, personal and organizational change, systemic educational reform, and school violence prevention.

McCombs’ current research is directed at new leadership models for redesigning outdated views of schooling and learning. This research has led to her international and national recognition in areas that include transformational teacher development approaches, motivating hard-to-reach students, and the use of technology as a primary tool for empowering youth and facilitating relevant learning.

The author has begun a series of books published by Corwin Press. Learner-Centered Classroom Practices and Assessments: Maximizing Student Motivation, Learning, and Achievement (2006) was co-authored with Lynda Miller and written for teachers. Her second book in the series, written for school administrators and other school leaders, was also co-authored with Lynda Miller and is titled A School Leader’s Guide to Creating Learner-Centered Education: From Complexity to Simplicity (2008).

McCombs is the primary author of Learner-Centered Psychological Principles (LCPs): Guidelines for School Redesign and Reform. She has developed research-validated learner-centered models of teaching and learning based on the LCPs.

Through collaborations with colleagues at the University of Bristol in England, she developed an online version of her Assessment of Learner-Centered Practices (ALCP) teacher and student surveys. These surveys have been validated with over 35,000 students and their teachers in Grades K-3, 4-8, 9-12, and college level. The ALCP surveys are being used in numerous national and international K-12 schools as well as colleges.

Lynda Miller

Lynda Miller began her professional career as a junior high school English teacher in Westminster, Colorado. Her interest in language and cognitive development led her to graduate studies, which culminated in a PhD in language development and disorders and learning disabilities. She has held teaching positions at the University of Colorado, the University of Montana, and the University of Texas at Austin, where she pursued her research on cognition, learning styles, and intelligence. Her research and teaching focused on identifying and describing students’ learning strengths and abilities, and on translating that information into instructional strategies designed to support students’ developing skills as motivated, self-responsible learners. Miller is the author of numerous publications on a variety of topics, the majority of which focus on the learner and learning as the essential features of successful instruction.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

1. Why This Is a Time for Change

Why Read This Book?

Schools as Living Systems

What Does "Learner-Centered" Mean?

How This Book Is Organized

How Do You Like to Learn?

2. What We Know About Learning and Leading

What Kind of Learner and Leader Are You?

What Does Existing Evidence Say About Leadership?

The "Big Picture" View: An Ecology of Learning Model

What It Means to Be Learner-Centered

A Learner-Centered Educational Model

What Are the New Notions of Schooling as Part of Living Systems?

Self-Reflections

What's Next

3. What the Learner-Centered Model Means for Practice

What It Means to Be a Learner-Centered Leader

What the Research Shows About the Effectiveness of Learner-Centered Models

How the Learner-Centered Principles Translate Into Practice at the School Level

Implications for Leadership and Building Communities of Learners

Self-Reflections

What's Next

4. The Tools Needed for the Journey

Tools for the Journey Within

Tools for a School-Level Assessment System and Leadership Process

Implications of Implementing Learner-Centered Leadership Tools

Tools for Answering the Truly Important Questions

Self-Assessment and Reflection Tools to Chart the Journey

Self-Reflections

What's Next

5. What Learner-Centered Assessment Tools Can Accomplish

What Is Expected of Our Educational System?

How School Leaders Can Provide What Is Wanted

The Big Issues Facing Today's School Leaders

The Leader's New Role in Staff Development

Background and Supporting Research for the Assessment of Learner-Centered Practices Surveys

Experiencing the School-Level Assessment of Learner-Centered Practices Survey for Yourself

Self-Reflections

What's Next

6. How We Can Move Toward New Student and System Outcomes

Understanding What Is and What Could Be

Aligning the New Vision With Existing Realities

Dealing With Current System Inequities in New Systems Designs

The Learning Partnerships and Networks That We Need

The Learning Partnerships You Will Need

Self-Reflections

What's Next

7. How We Develop Leadership Qualities From Within

New Ideas From Brain Research

Preparing for the Future

Other Characteristics of the Needed Framework

Further Leadership Challenges in Creating Learner-Centered Models

What It Means to Develop Capacity From Within

A Summary: Moving From Complexity to Simplicity

Summary

Conclusion

Self-Reflections

Introduction to Summary Chapter

Introduction to Additional Resources

8. Summary of Major Points in Each Chapter

Chapter 1: Why This Is a Time For Change

Chapter 2: What We Know About Learning and Leading

Chapter 3: What the Learner-Centered Model Means for Practice

Chapter 4: The Tools Needed for the Journey

Chapter 5: What the Learner-Centered Assessment Tools Can Accomplish

Chapter 6: How We Can Move Toward New Student and System Outcomes

Chapter 7: How We Can Develop Leadership Qualities From Within

Appendix

Resources

Glossary of Learner-Centered Terms

References

Index

Reviews

"This book is for any school that promotes book studies for professional development or that is looking for ways to reach the student in a personal manner."

Jean L. Krsak, Faculty, CalStateTEACH
California State University, Fullerton

“The time is right and the need is profound for learner-centered practices in schools. McCombs and Miller describe the tools available and how a school can use them to make substantial changes that increase student performance.”

Jean W. Pierce, Professor of Educational Psychology
Northern Illinois University

Other Titles in: Leadership | School Change, Reform, & Restructuring | School Counseling

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