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Understanding and Engaging Adolescents

By: Jeffrey Miller, Peter Desberg

Inspire adolescents’ participation and boost their academic, research, metacognitive, and social skills through proven motivators, brain-compatible activities, study skills strategies, and the effective use of technology.

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Product Details

Grade Level: 6-12
ISBN: 9781412970013
Published By: Corwin
Year: 2009
Page Count: 168
Publication date: November 23, 2012

Price: $39.95

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Description

"This book should be on every middle and high school educator's desk and be required reading each summer. The authors discuss challenges that face our students and give teachers, counselors, administrators, and parents real tools and knowledge that should be implemented in every classroom."
—Reginald Sirls, Director of Secondary Education
Inglewood Unified School District, CA

"This book is funny, entertaining, well written and well documented, and informative."
—Jolene Dockstader, Seventh-Grade Language Arts Teacher
Jerome Middle School, ID

A proven-to-work tool kit for motivating adolescent learners!

Motivating adolescents can be challenging task for any middle and high school teacher. With artful humor, this engaging and reader-friendly guidebook provides educators with an in-depth look at the ways that adolescents learn and offers activities that educators can use to inspire greater student interest and participation.

Drawing on their backgrounds in social and behavioral psychology, the authors encourage you to create a vision statement for what you want to accomplish and provide the right tools to help you succeed. The book shows how to modify your instructional program by using:

Three components of motivation
Specific classroom management strategies
Proven, brain-compatible activities for individuals and groups that boost students' academic, research, metacognitive, and social skills
Steps to bolster learners' study skills
Technology to effectively bridge the gap between how students learn and how instructors present information

Insightful and appealing, this practical resource is the key to effectively meeting the learning needs of your students and helping ensure that every learner experiences success.

Author(s)

Jeffrey Miller

Jeffrey Miller spent eight years teaching middle school in urban Los Angeles and four years designing student success programs at Santa Monica College. Currently, he teaches courses in educational psychology and classroom management at California State University, Dominguez Hills. Miller is the managing director of the Miller Consulting Group and provides consultation and professional development to schools within Los Angeles and across the country, where he delivers keynote addresses and facilitates schools through organizational change. He completed his PhD in 2001 with a focus on motivation and learning in adolescent classrooms.

Peter Desberg

Peter Desberg is a professor of graduate education and coordinator of the Technology Based Education MA Program at California State University, Dominguez Hills. He is also a licensed clinical psychologist. Desberg is the author of 20 books and is a frequent presenter and keynote speaker at national conventions. He was the host of "Introduction to Computers" on the Los Angeles Unified School District’s cable channel for ten years and has appeared on many television shows and been written up in many newspapers and magazines, including Psychology Today, The Wall Street Journal, Cosmopolitan and Reader’s Digest.

Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

Part I. The Theory

1. In the Beginning

2. "This Is Stupid" or Why Adolescents Quit Trying

3.The Classroom Management Toolkit

4. What We Know About Learning

5. What We Know About Motivation

Part II. The Activities

6. Maintaining Your Activity Level

7. Teaching Them to Study

8. Understanding Themselves Better

9. Culture-Based Activities

10. The Technology Mismatch

References

Reviews

“The book is engaging, appealing, humorous, and relevant to my situation. Nice job!”

David Callaway, Eighth-Grade Language Arts Teacher
Rocky Heights Middle School, Highlands Ranch, CO

“This book addresses key issues and presents ideas on how to solve those issues.”

Kathryn McCormick, Seventh-Grade Teacher
Gahanna Middle School East, OH

“This book is funny, entertaining, well written and well documented, and informative.”

Jolene Dockstader, Seventh-Grade Language Arts Teacher
Jerome Middle School, ID

“This book should be on every middle and high school educators desk and be required reading each summer. Miller and Desberg clearly discuss many of the challenges that face our students and give teachers, counselors, administrators, and parents real tools and knowledge that should be implemented in every classroom.”

Reginald Sirls, Director of Secondary Education
Inglewood Unified School District, CA

“As a president of a nonprofit organization that stresses financial literacy, I was impressed with the information in this book. I read it as a service and knowledge provider to secondary students, but found multiple applications to motivating and understanding my own employees.”

Gary W. Hickman, President
Junior Achievement of Southern California, Inc.

“As a principal, I am always concerned that my teachers are looking at and discussing the central issues of learning and motivation. Not only does this book give them what they need, it gives them several practical exercises to engage our learners. Good work.”

Donna Jacobson, Principal
Richard Merkin Middle School, LA Alliance Schools, Los Angeles, CA

"Miller and Desberg have produced a resource that educators will turn to again and again as they encounter the day-to-day challenges of motivating and teaching adolescent learners. It is one of those rare books that effectively integrates theory, research, and practice. Utilizing these methods will go a long way in helping educators gain or regain the skills they need to make teaching the gratifying experience it should be.”

Judson H. Taylor, President Emeritus
State University of New York, Cortland

Other Titles in: Teaching Methods & Learning Styles | Brain-Friendly Teaching & Learning | High School Teaching Methods

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