Be prepared to respond to a wide range of potentially tough questions and sensitive concerns posed by young children. To work with young children is to constantly expect the unexpected. Tough questions are part of early childhood educators’ regular interactions with children and families. Based on children’s actual questions, Big Conversations with Little Children is readily accessible with guidelines for having difficult conversations with children, individually or as a classroom or group, and with families. The book provides guidance on how to approach specific topics related to: family, such as unemployment, divorce, and incarceration illness and death, such as loss of an unborn child, major illness in a child, and death of a pet social issues, such as racism, family structures, and gender fluidity upheaval and violence, such as natural disaster, terror events, and school shootings Fully based in developmentally appropriate practice, Big Conversations with Little Children helps educators support young children in a way that preserves their dignity and innocence when they encounter world and social events in addition to honoring the family’s preferred approach. An expert in the field of early childhood education, author Dr. Lauren Starnes empowers educators and families to answer sensitive or tough questions children pose, respond to their worries and concerns, and be prepared for an ongoing dialogue. Digital content includes family take-home information sheets for each topic.

A practical guide to teaching the way a child’s brain learns best In this update of a bestselling classic, you will learn how to develop children’s capacity and will to read. Each sequential chapter is practical, eye-opening, and exactly what you need to engage young learners, plan lessons, partner with parents, and align your PreK-3 classrooms to the science of learning and the science of reading. Gain the latest insights on: Brain development from birth to age eight, plus the skills to nourish it, age by age and grade by grade What the latest neuroscientific research now says about oral language acquisition The evidence base for practices such as read alouds, inventive spelling, and sustained silent reading Why vocabulary building must happen concurrently with phonological processing, decoding, fluency, spelling, and writing How to artfully combine explicit teaching of skills with playful, multi-sensory routines every day All aspects of memory are needed to develop successful readers. When we engage children’s brains and build our teaching practices around what we know about how the human brain makes meaning, literacy learning makes more sense for children... and for us.

This is the must-have book for parents of young people who want to keep their children safe, whole and happy. Teens and tweens are struggling with social media, relationships, and so much of what modern life is throwing at them. It's impossible for parents to be experts on all the new challenges their children are facing.That's why it's essential to turn to a real expert. Collett Smart is a psychologist, teacher, lecturer, writer - and a mum of three. She knows that it is crucial for parents to discuss uncomfortable, yet fundamentally important topics with their children - and this book tells parents why and how. If you're a parent who feels like you just don't know how to talk to your children about some of these difficult topics, this book has all the tools you need. There is invaluable advice on: * Body safety, body image and objectification * Break-ups, hook-ups and unconditional love * Sex education and pornography * Misogyny and harassment * Manners, empathy and respect Whether you want to prepare your child for the years ahead or you have an issue that needs to be addressed right now, this is the must-have book to help keep your children safe, whole and happy in these challenging times.

A very accessible, step-by-step guide that provides simple yet meaningful ways to discuss this crucial subject. Makes talking about sex easy and opens lines of important communications between parents and children. Bravo!" —Rabbi Steven Carr Reuben, Ph.D. author of Children of Character: Leading Your Children to Ethical Choices in Everyday Life. "Comprehensive, dignified, conscientious, and nurturing...Very worthwhile for teens and their parents." — Irving N. Klitsner, M.D., F.A.A.P., Founder and former Director, Teen and Young Adult Health Care Center, Kaiser-Permanente of Southern California and Professor of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, USC and UCLA. You know that it's important to talk with your kids about sex. But if you're like most parents, you get tongue-tied just thinking about having "the big talk." Even if you know exactly what you'd like to say, you may have no idea when or where to begin, or how to get your message across. This book can help. The Big Talk shows you how to have warm, nurturing conversations about puberty, dating, relationships, and sex. Drawing upon hard-won personal experiences and the experiences of teens and parents whose stories appear throughout this book, Laurie Langford makes communication easy. She shows you how to talk about values and self-respect, setting high standards and sticking to them, and having fun with members of the opposite sex without being pressured into sex too soon. She also supplies sample dialogues, games, role-playing exercises, and other useful tools for breaking the ice and keeping the lines of communications open.

Together with Leah Crawford, Angela Jenkins and Julie Sargent, Bob Cox has compiled this rich resource, complete with vivid illustrations by Victoria Cox, to help teachers enhance their learners' engagement with challenging texts and develop their writing skills as budding wordsmiths.Working in association with the Opening Doors network of schools, the authors address the vital concept of pitching high but including all pupils and how this approach can be delivered in practice. Opening Doors to Ambitious Primary Englishexplains and models top quality ways of thinking, planning and teaching. Theresources, case studies andauthors' innovative ideas on theorywill help you to make primary English vibrant, creative and challenging in your school. It alsoprovides frameworks and principlesfor any school wishing to be more ambitious in developing pupils' speaking, listening, reading, writing and thinking witha greater sense of curiosity and more originality. Opening Doors to Ambitious Primary Englishcontains chapter by chapter explanations of how English in primary schools can be developed in ambitious ways. Supported by research references, examples of pupils' work and illuminating case studies, the book provides teachers with a toolkit of strategies which schools can adapt and apply to their own contexts. The book is supported by the Opening Doors series of books which contain units of work based around selected texts. The authors hope this book will act as a starting block from which to develop an Opening Doors approach to English, and havesuggested key concepts around which the curriculum can be built, with the units providing examples to work from. Suitable for teachers and curriculum leads in primary settings.

Linda and Richard Eyre stress that it's never too soon-or too late-to start discussing sex and values with your children, and they've got proven strategies to make it easier. For parents who want to go beyond the birds and the bees talk, How to Talk to Your Child About Sex provides thoughtful, clear, specific guidance on when and, most important, how to help children begin to learn and understand sex, love, and commitment from the most positive viewpoint possible. Preliminary "as needed" talks with three-to eight-year-olds The age eight Big Talk Follow-up talks with eight-to thirteen-year-olds Behavior discussions and guidelines with eleven-to sixteen-year-olds Discussions of perspective and personal standards with fifteen-to nineteen-year-olds

A People’s Curriculum for the Earth is a collection of articles, role plays, simulations, stories, poems, and graphics to help breathe life into teaching about the environmental crisis. The book features some of the best articles from Rethinking Schools magazine alongside classroom-friendly readings on climate change, energy, water, food, and pollution—as well as on people who are working to make things better. A People’s Curriculum for the Earth has the breadth and depth ofRethinking Globalization: Teaching for Justice in an Unjust World, one of the most popular books we’ve published. At a time when it’s becoming increasingly obvious that life on Earth is at risk, here is a resource that helps students see what’s wrong and imagine solutions. Praise for A People's Curriculum for the Earth "To really confront the climate crisis, we need to think differently, build differently, and teach differently. A People’s Curriculum for the Earth is an educator’s toolkit for our times." — Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate "This volume is a marvelous example of justice in ALL facets of our lives—civil, social, educational, economic, and yes, environmental. Bravo to the Rethinking Schools team for pulling this collection together and making us think more holistically about what we mean when we talk about justice." — Gloria Ladson-Billings, Kellner Family Chair in Urban Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison "Bigelow and Swinehart have created a critical resource for today’s young people about humanity’s responsibility for the Earth. This book can engender the shift in perspective so needed at this point on the clock of the universe." — Gregory Smith, Professor of Education, Lewis & Clark College, co-author with David Sobel of Place- and Community-based Education in Schools

What should conversations about race look and sound like in the elementary classroom? How do we respond authentically and truthfully to children's questions about the world? And how can we build classroom communities that encourage these meaningful conversations about race? Matthew Kay and Jennifer Orr take on these questions and more in We're Gonna Keep On Talking: How to Lead Meaningful Race Conversations in the Elementary Classroom. A companion work to Kay's Not Light, But Fire, this book focuses on the unique and powerful role discussions about race can play in the elementary classroom. Drawing its title inspiration from the lyrics of the freedom song "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around," sung by hundreds of children marching against segregation in what came to be known as the Children's Crusade of 1963, We're Gonna Keep On Talking is written for teachers who are willing to match children's courage and brilliance, and who believe that "a foundation in meaningful race discourse will help [children] to seek justice for themselves and their neighbors, to be kinder, [and] more thoughtful." Writing with the humility and honest storytelling of two career classroom teachers, Matthew Kay and Jennifer Orr share: Strategies for building safe and supportive classroom and school spaces for productive discourse Dozens of practical teacher moves for facilitating race conversations Classroom stories that allow readers to envision ways into the work through picture books, art, graphs, historical photographs, and current events Tips for aligning the work of race conversations to your grade-level standards Whether you are unsure of where to begin or looking to deepen your practice, We're Gonna Keep On Talking will be your guide to the important work of race conversations in the elementary classroom.

Saying ‘NO!’ like you mean it! While Jesse is walking home from school with his good friend Selena, she says that something bad happened last week but she was told that she had to keep it a secret. Now she doesn’t know what to do. She’s afraid that maybe it was her fault and that nobody will believe her anyway. After Jesse says “that sounds like a No Feeling Secret, the kind you don’t have to keep,” Selena decides to confide in him that she was kissed on her lips after soccer practice by an adult friend of her family. “It felt yucky!” Jesse invites Selena to his back yard to get advice from Lady B at her Safety School. After listening, Lady B tells Selena that “It’s not your fault, and you’re allowed to say ‘NO!’ to a No Feeling Body Secret. We can practice until you get good at it, just like practicing soccer.” Along with their background friends, Jesse and Selena learn to scream it like they mean it! In the final part of this series about how to deal with unwanted touch, children learn assertiveness skills when faced with an uncomfortable situation, and to identify and seek help from trusted adults. Because children sometimes don’t want to upset their parents, Lady B encourages Selena to talk to her school counsellor who will know what to do and even help her talk to her parents. It takes a team to learn you don’t have to play ball with people who give you a No Feeling, and that having a safety coach on your side can make all the difference. www.allowedtosayno.com