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Puzzling Moments, Teachable Moments

Practicing Teacher Research in Urban Classrooms

Cynthia Ballenger

Publication Date: September 17, 2009

Pages: 160

Series: Practitioner Inquiry Series

Available Formats
PAPERBACK
ISBN: 9780807749937
$28.95
Puzzling Moments, Teachable Moments 9780807749937
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  • Description
  • Author
  • Reviews

Description+

In her new book, bestselling author Cynthia Ballenger explores the intellectual strengths of students whom teachers find “puzzling”—poor, urban, immigrant, or bilingual children who do not traditionally excel in school. Ballenger challenges the assumption that these children—whose families in many cases have less formal education, read fewer storybooks, and talk less with their children about school-like topics—have fewer intellectual or academically relevant experiences. This practical book offers a detailed roadmap for traversing the daily work of teaching today’s diverse population, and helping educators refine their work as it unfolds in the classroom. Ballenger guides the reader as she analyzes what the children said, what this indicates about their thinking, and how her dialogues with them informed her teaching.

Book Features:

  • Detailed portraits of the daily routines of teaching and learning.
  • Rich depictions of bilingual children doing serious work with science and literature.
  • Directions for how to listen to children’s ideas and how to analyze classroom discussions.
  • Guidance for following the practices of good teacher research.

Author+

Cynthia Ballenger is a reading specialist, science teacher, and one of the founding members of the Brookline Teacher Researcher Seminar. Her books include Teaching Other People's Children: Literacy and Learning in a Bilingual Classroom and the edited volume Regarding Children’s Words: Teacher Research on Language and Literacy.

Reviews+

“Ballenger remains a teacher with the focus of a researcher and a researcher with the soul of a teacher.”
—Bob Fecho, University of Georgia

“Any teacher—or teacher educator—who finds herself wondering how teacher research could improve her teaching needs to read Puzzling Moments, Teachable Moments.”
—Helen Featherstone, Michigan State University, Emerita

“Ballenger’s fascinating exploration of ‘teaching as research’ offers lucid, rich, and compelling images of what it means for educators to learn from children how best to teach them.”
—Susan L. Lytle, Associate Professor of Education, University of Pennsylvania, and coauthor of Inquiry as Stance: Practitioner Research for the Next Generation

$28.95

Professors: Request an Exam Copy

Print copies available for US orders only. For orders outside the US, see our international distributors.

Books In This Series
Democratic Habits in the Art Classroom
Democratic Habits in the Art Classroom
Promising Pedagogies for Teacher Inquiry and Practice
Promising Pedagogies for Teacher Inquiry and Practice
Autobiography on the Spectrum
Autobiography on the Spectrum
Repositioning Educational Leadership
Repositioning Educational Leadership
Professional Development in Relational Learning Communities
Professional Development in Relational Learning Communities
Impactful Practitioner Inquiry
Impactful Practitioner Inquiry
Teaching in Themes
Teaching in Themes
Family Dialogue Journals
Family Dialogue Journals
Making Space for Active Learning
Making Space for Active Learning
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